Yet There Is Method In It

A very short review of Human Is? by Philip K Dick

I am not normally one for short stories but I mainly enjoyed this collection. The anthology contains the inspiration for the movies Paycheck and Total Recall - strangely I have seen neither. I had expected a fairly straight forward collection of sci-fi technology related themes but I guess I should have known better from the Dick novel/films Blade Runner, Minority Report and A Scanner Darkly! The theme is not so much technology but on reality and human cognition. The majority of stories have humans trying to understand reality, often via some abstracted representation - and usually doing a poor job of it. Post modernists might say that there is no objective reality to be mistaken about but I am not going to address this today!

My favorite stories were: Adjustment Team - where a man discovers his awareness of reality turns out to be rather like Plato’s cave dwellers - a bit incomplete. It reminds me of the anime short “Beyond” from The Animatrix. I don’t want to say too much about either.

The Mold of Yancy - asks if a totalitarian regime could be created not from oppression but from persuasion…

Oh, To Be a Blobel! - I thought this was darkly hilarious. I won’t even attempt to describe the plot although wikipedia has a good attempt.

And one story I did not find as appealing: The Pre-Persons - rather than the usual Dickian questioning of reality this had a strong underlying message. The story was a parody of the pro-choice movement. The story imagines a world where abortion was legal up to twelve years after birth. The reason given is children have no soul and are unthinking automatons until this age. The situation is compounded by street patrols of dog catchers who also collect stray and unwanted children. Obviously Dick does not really believe in this but it is an attempt to point to the absurdity of calling something alive at the moment of birth and not before.

He has a point that it is in some ways totally arbitrary. Of course that is not hard to rebut from existentialism! What right have people not to be murdered? Is that not also arbitrary? And any point chosen to limit abortion/contraception is in some sense arbitrary… The point I am trying to make is we must decide upon arbitrary rules to live - or the alternative is nihilism.

Anti Citizen One

I was inclined to write this after reading an interesting article by Stuart Jefferies in the Guardian concerning the great social divide between religion and secularism that is becoming increasingly intolerant.

“We must accept the other fellow’s religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart.” H.L.Mencken

This perceptive comment by an American Journalist many years ago would seem to provide a compelling argument for respecting other peoples beliefs and disbeliefs and most importantly not allowing disagreements about it (which psychologically rest on matters of taste) to spoil friendships. And yet in the latter 20th and early 21st century it would appear that the ‘argument’ between these two deeply entrenched sides has led to the souring of the relationship and a greater dependence upon the law courts and parliament to seperate and adjudicate.

“You have a triangle with fundamentalist secularists in one corner, fundamentalist faith people in another, and then the intelligent, thinking liberals of Anglicanism, Roman Catholicism, baptism, methodism, other faiths - and, indeed, thinking atheists - in the other corner. ” Colin Slee - Dean of Southwark

The battle then, for thats what it is, is no longer about people of faith and people of no faith simply agreeing to disagree and living their lives in accordance with their tastes and with respect to the laws of their society, it has become (between the fundamentalists) a war, a desire to eliminate or subjugate the other. But why should this be so? Why should this situation that has previously been timid have become such a violently contentious issue?

According to Tariq Ramadan a Muslim scholar and senior research fellow at St Antony’s College, Oxford, it is due to a fear of the “other”. Secularists and people of faith particularly post 9/11 and post cold war have grown to distrust and fear the other, and percieve a ‘threat’ where perhaps none exists. This seems to me, along with an intellectually stale uncritical and literal acceptance of the ‘key discourses’ (both religious and secular) to have the ring of truth to it. The “other” so central to postmodern ethics and politics, the object with which we are compelled to identifiy in postmodernism, is now described by otherwise intellectually rigorous scholars with abusive terms and mocking scorn. It seems the “other” has never been so far away as it is now, when people of faith condemn to the hellfires those who are heathen and heretic and when atheists such as Dawkins describe faith as a poison, dangerous to self and society, that euphemistically calls “gerinoil” (an acronym for religion).

But abuse is nothing as compared to the sort of language that borders on incitement to hatred or dogmatic ideology. What is going on, truly, in the minds of the author or the reader when someone reads Christopher Hitchens for example conclude the opening chapter of his book God is not Great with words such as these?

“As I write these words and as you read them, people of faith are in their different ways planning your and my destruction, and the destruction of all the hard-won human attainments that I have touched upon. Religion poisons everything.”

Is this not the language of the crusade? Is this not the language of the rabble rouser and the mob? What is being inferred here? That our way of life is in danger thanks to religion and religious people, they will destroy us… unless. ‘Unless’ what? In response to Hitchens the obvious question is, ’so what are we to do about it?’ - I don’t think I need to elaborate, hateful polemic and hateful propaganda transform into hateful actions sooner or later. Although Hitchens would despise my comparison I must say it nonetheless; in the late 1920’s many Jews would have been revolted at the fiercely anti-semitic polemic evident in Hitler’s raving manifesto Mein Kampf, but too few would have interpreted in it a warning of soon-to-come pogroms, ghettoization and genocide. Precisely the same criticism can be levelled at people of faith too when their dogmatic and unshakeable belief in the righteousness of their God and their scripture leads them to make such violent statements of intent about throwing homosexuals off of tall buildings, or condemning people for making lifestyle choices such as Gay marriage or abortion. Though some may find such choices not to their taste is this justification for condemning them, describing them as abomination, the worst of the worst, and reason to blow them up?

It is remarkeable to note but both sides feel threatened, and when ones way of life is threatene, then much as one would if your life itself was under threat, moves are taken to build the barricades and defend oneself. But unfortunately the deeper one digs the bunker the further one removes onself from the “other” and the less likely one is to even try to attempt understanding, respect, tolerance and reconciliation.

Perhaps most remarkeable of all is that this battleground is being drawn up by intellectuals who should know better. Whose intelligence is such that they should have learnt the lessons of history regards intolerance and absolutist dogmatism. So what are we to do?

Some say education is the key. But how? At Exeter university the Christian Union was banned from its facilities because membership of the Union required a person to sign up to a testimony of beliefs, which naturally as it is a worldview is liable to offend somebody somewhere. Because of its anti-homosexual opinions it was banned. Rightly so perhaps, for surely homophobia has no place in society - but an educational institution banning a society - has all tolerance and freedom of expression - including the freedom to express unpalatable opinions - been eradicated?

Then of course there are faith schools. I shall say little on these as our blog has covered this topic and the pro’s and con’s more than enough already. But is abolition of a system that at present provides choice the answer of tolerance? John Sentamu Archbishop of York sees more sinister forces at play. The abolition of faith schools on the grounds that they are indoctrinaire is just a cover for aggressive secularist policies. What next? The British Humanist Association thinks that religion has too much of a foothold in politics. Certainly with anglican bishops in the house of lords and public rituals broadcast on tv and religious oaths in use across the lands courts, they may have a point. But, is this evidence of an underground movement to subvert the state and the freedom of its citizens by a religious minority (majority if faith identification rather than practise is the criteria) or is it just emblematic of an anachronistic system that hasnt quite realised that the days of ‘Christian Britain’ and the British Empire have long ceased to be true or relevant?

Of course the media and popular culture has got into the act too. The danish cartoons of the prophet Mohammed sparked protests and counter protests, Jerry Springer the Opera has angered evangelicals who want a return to the old strict blasphemy laws. Even childrens authors are having a go, Phillip Pullman argues that atheism should be taught in schools.

“What I fear and deplore in the ‘faith school’ camp is their desire to close argument down and put some things beyond question or debate. It’s vital to get clear in young minds what is a faith position and what is not, so that, for instance, they won’t be taken in by religious people claiming that science is a faith position no different in kind from Christianity. Science is not a matter of faith, and too many people are being allowed to get away with claiming that it is.”

If he is talking about the teaching of a seven day creation as literal truth, or of intelligent design being taught as a challenge to evolutionary science, then yes perhaps there is a problem that needs to be addressed. But is this true of faith schools in general, or is he guilty of the very thing he deplores closing arguments down. Isn’t that what teaching atheism in schools is aimed at doing? Isn’t that what his childrens books hope to achieve? Isn’t that what Dawkins explicitly stated as his intention when he wrote the God Delusion?

I believe it is. From my perspective as a postmodernist, Modernity is now in crisis. The fundamentalist corner of religious and secular thinkers are plunging us into a new dark age. As rigorously dogmatic as each other all emphasis on practise and inner peace is ignored in favour of beliefs.

“It is not just in the rigidity of their unbelief that atheists mimic dogmatic believers. It is in their fixation on belief itself… When they dissect arguments for the existence of God, atheists parody the rationalistic theologies of western Christianity.” John Gray professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics.

Science may not be a faith, in the literal meaning of the word, but it is a worldview and its methods nothing more than a toolkit to present and verify it, and is therefore totally neutral regards religious claims (when both language games stay in their respective corners I admit!).

“No scientific method says that there is no doubt. If you don’t accept there’s doubt in all things, you’re being intellectually dishonest. ” Rabbi Nueberger

Would it that the fundamentalists of both sides could see and share this postmodern view. It is bad enough when a society tears itself apart over whether its employers may allow its workers to wear a religious symbol while at work, and to debate the values of faith and secularism. But when ‘believers’ and I deliberately use that word of both sides use the language of hate, scorn and derision then I fear we are building ourselves a huge bonfire that is going to do irreperable damage.

What have we come to when an otherwise respectable intellectual and scientist such as Richard Dawkins can comment publicly - as though it was worth us bothering to listern - his opinions on the worker who wanted to wear her small crucifix to work.

“I saw a picture of this woman. She had one of the most stupid faces I’ve ever seen.” R.Dawkins

Surely we have learnt the lessons of Soviet Russia who tried and failed to eradicate religion forceably. Are not people free to choose, should we not as Mencken asks tolerate with a sense of irony the peculair oddities in the beliefs of ‘others’. If we dont then the divide will only get deeper and the comments of Richard Chatres Bishop of London, will I fear, for both secularists and religious minded people come to be true.

“If you exile religious communities to the margins, then they will start to speak the words of fire among consenting adults, and the threat to public order and the public arena, I think, will grow and grow.”

Tolerance and respect for diversity will cost us substantially less than intolerance, division and hatred for others beliefs.

A Libertarian and Relativist quote taken from the Christian Anarchist Leo Tolstoy. Somewhat compatible with discourse theory.

 ”That this social order with its pauperism, famines, prisons, gallows, armies, and wars is necessary to society; that still greater disaster would ensue if this organisation were destroyed; all this is said only by those who profit by this organisation, while those who suffer from it - and they are ten times as numerous - think and say quite the contrary.” Leo Tolstoy - The Kingdom of God is Within You.

The terms social order and organisation can be replacd with any form of discourse of power. Although the numbers that can be said to suffer from it will vary proportionate to the power of the discursive practise.

This brief outline of Foucault’s theory of discourse is intended to bridge other ideas that I have posted on; such as language games (Wittgenstein and Feyerabend), and recently libertarian socialism. Rather than detail the connections between the three, i’ll leave it to the reader to deduce (or to comment and enquire on). Besides I think the connection is fairly obvious.

The theory of discourse is a postmodern ethical argument concerning discourse and power. Here the term discourse means an historically evolved set of interlocking and mutually supporting statements. It is the ‘language games’ of particular intellectual disciplines, which could also be described as ‘discursive practice’. They usually accept some dominant theory/philosophy to guide them, i.e. science and rationalism. But importantly these discursive practices also include contentious political activity. In other words the discourses define and describe their antagonists, evident in concepts such as ‘irrational’, ‘criminal’, ‘insane’, ‘terrorist’. At the same time the discourse, as well as labelling those who are the archetypal anathema to its orthodoxy, also expresses the political authority of its protagonists.

Prisoner: As God is my judge, my Lord, I am not guilty.

Judge: He is not. I am. You are. Six months.

The language games that each disipline adopts enacts the authority of those empowered to use it within a particular group. Thus when I see a surgeon, his authority is enhanced by his use and application of medical knowledge and terminology. He is empowered to operate on me by my compliance, which accepts his authority in surgical discourse. The opposite would be the case if when I see the surgeon his diagnosis and prognosis was performed in accordance with the interpetation of astrological data. He may be very knowledgeable about my horoscope, but he lacks the sort of authority I would expect from a surgeon, and thus no way would I consider empowering him to anaeasthetize me and open me up! The same is true across the disciplines, thus scientists and theologians often engage in conflict because neither accepts the authority of the other to speak about the others discipline.

But discourse theory is concerned with more than just providing a critique of appropriately acquired and applied knowledge. It is concerned with the political use of authority and empowerment to subordinate, exclude and marginalize those who are defined as being outside, antagonistic, antithetical to the discipline.

We are familiar with the term ‘knowledge is power’ in Foucaults theory this can be rephrased ‘discourse is power’. Law, Penology, Medicine* are powerful discources that in some cases are rathe robviously designed to exclude and control people, such as those diagnosed as criminally insane or ill. - * Such an investigation is relevant also to Institutional Religion, Political Systems, Education, Philosophy etc.

The general juridical form that guaranteed a system of rights that were egalitarian in principle was unsupported by these fine, everyday, physical mechanisms, by all those systems of micro-power that are essentially non-egalistarian and asymmetrical that we call the ‘disciplines’ such as exams, hospitals, prisons, the regulation of workshops, schools, the army. -Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punishment: The Birth of the Prison

Consequently for postmodernists there is an imperative to identify with the victim and to analyse power from the bottom up. Foucault attempts to show that the will to exercise power beats humanitarian egalitarianism every time, and this implies the guilt even of the Enlightenment reliance upon universal principle and reason. With echoes of Feyerabend, Reason and Rationality are identified as being incipiently totalitarian, because the appeal to an always correct Reason is itself a system of control and will always exclude what it makes marginal, defining it as non-rational, irrational and the like.

Rationalism and its supporters define what constitutes Reason, but furthermore are its sole arbitors, thereby excluding and marginalising its critics, its opponents and whosoever else it decides. The tag ‘irrational’ implies a lack of authority, non-validity of argument, deprived and perhaps even depraved. Those thus labelled are therefore either to be pitied, ridiculed (commeansurable identification of religious believers with those who believe in Fairies at the bottom of the garden, for instance), ignored, excluded from meaningful dialogue (see the arguments had between El Sordo and AC1 on whether non-rational arguments including notions of sentiment and feeling can be valid or included), marginalised from the economy of discourse (which university would fund an atheist theologian, or a pseudoscientist in physics?).

The normalizing discourses, that various disciplines define and enact, go beyond merely intellectual segregation, but also in numerous situations impinge upon the liberty of individuals and even groups. Thus the medicaly ‘reasonable’ psychiatrist is empowered and endowed with the authority to define the ‘unreasonable’, pass judgement upon them and to lock them in an asylum. Such prejudicial discourses can be found everywhere, sexists, racists, imperialists all use similar techniques. They make their normalizing discourse prevail, they create their own deviants and exclude them accordingly. (The Patriarchal influence of most early religious philosophy significantly contributed to the oppression of women and their role in society over thousands of years.)

The most important point that postmodernists make about the role of discourse is that it is not confined to the obvious formal contexts, such as the law courts. It inescapeably permeates the whole of society from top to bottom, from judges pronouncements, to scientific journals, to TV advertisements, to pop songs, to newspapers. The more dominant a discourse is within society, the more natural it seems and ironically the more it justifies itself by appeals to nature. Everybody, the postmodernists claim, absorp these subordinating norms, because they are often an intimate part of our language, of which we adhere to unwittingly as though they were facts rather than psychologically and politically motivated features of our talk about it.

The task for postmodernists (and indeed everyone) is to provide an ethical solution to the chauvenistic influence of discourse. This is a failing of Foucault, he identifies a problem, promotes ’struggle’ and rebellion as solutions, but does not detail beyond what Lyotard suggest: small-scale local reforms*. In other words small groups of the excluded (i.e. Homosexuals) could unite and fight against exclusion, but how do we eradicate exclusion from society wholesale (and is it even possible).

* The Zapatista rebellion in South Mexico, and the Abahlali baseMjondolo of South Africa are excellent example of small-scale postmodern rebellion and may well induce egalitarian change in their societies, but what relevance does it have for us? Note with the Abahlali part of their discourse excludes the political intervention of wellmeaning outsiders.

Another task for postmodernists is to evaluate the role of individual agency and responsibility within discourse. Is it enough to attirbute blame to the discourse of power that flows through individuals, or does the individual themself hold some accountability. (This has some relevance to our recent Institutional Religion discussion).

The critique of discourses of power has one final important role to play in modern philosophy. The role and identity of the self. Certain theories have developed that propose that concepts of the ’self’ are inseperable from the various discourses of power that flow through us. Thus for a very simple example a male (generally) is inherently a patriarchal sexist, he has to play the role that is defined as being male. Unfortunately there is too much material to explore this further, thus postmodern theories on self and identity must be reserved for a different post. I will conclude with a quote and the plot for a postmodern novel.

A human being is “not a unity, but a process, [is] perpetually in construction, perpetually contradictory, perpetually open to change.” Catherine Belse, Critical Practice

In John Barth’s Lost in the Funhouse the narrator Ambrose, describes the difficulty of writing a story called ‘Lost in the Funhouse’ about a character called Ambrose who is Lost in the funhouse. He is visiting his family which includes visiting a funhouse. But he is described by an author who is perpectually aware of the fact that he is telling a story and that he is using literary conventions to do so. Ambrose systematically loses his autonomy and is identifiable as the function of the authors story, the creature of the person who is writing him.

The ultimate conclusion, and possible topic for another post, is that human identity, the ’self’ is a fiction.

In furthering my studies of the Zapatista movement of South Mexico I came across this group. Abahlali baseMjondolo is a South African Libertarian Socialist movement. The name is isiZulu for ‘the shack dwellers.‘

Rather than go into extensive detail into the aims of the movement (which I will leave to the individual to research via the links provided) I will just give a very basic outline of the principles of Libertarian Socialism and the Abahlali baseMjnodolo .

Libertarian Socialism rejects the roles of the state or the political party in the promotion of liberty and social justice. Both party and state are top-down political movements, therefore removed from the realities of the struggles it purports to represent. Liberterian Socialists instead look towards trade unions, workers councils, citizens assemblies and non-bureaucratic decentralized means of action.

An example of LibSoc is the Zapatista movement of South Mexico which places the revolution in the hands of the people. There is no party, there is no single political theory, there is merely community action and communal consensus. All members of the community have a voice, all participate within the rule of the community, and a system of ‘ministerial’ rotation. In other words the machinery of power is rotated amongst the whole community over a period of time.

Zapatista and Abahlali baseMjondolo are examples of postmodern revolution. Practical realities replace theory. It is not anti-theory, but theory arises secondary to practical experience. Thus as an example in the Durban shack townships the role of religion is very important to the people. Instead of imposing a secular view from above (as in classical Marxist theory) Abahlali respects and promotes the equality of personal belief. Other examples from Chiapas (South Mexico) is that different communities have different economic templates, some maintain money, others have transferred to a gift economy.

Abahlali has three key areas in its philosophy.

• Politics of the Poor. This means politics conducted by and for the poor. Instead of by wellmeaning outsiders. The political process is liberated to include in its functions the people it aims to help. In practise this means that the political process takes place where the poor people live, at whatever time is convenient for the people of that area, it is conducted in their language, and respects their indigenous cultural identities.
• Living Politics. This has two meanings. 1) that its politics is shaped by experience not theory. Political education creates its own elites that impose ideas upon others. 2) Living politics is democratic and communal.
• Peoples Politics. The whole community participate, decisions are based upon the consensus of the whole. The system does not allow for representational politics, or the establishment of a professional political class. Personal power and financial reward are rejected.

In the OUPbook Postmodernism: a very short introduction, Christopher Butler analyses different themes in postmodernism, particularly its approaches to philosophy, politics and art. In one chapter he considers the postmodern (now reffered to as pomo) approach to science. Generally pomo is characterized as avant garde, anti-realist, irrealist, anti-rational, sceptical and perhaps in some quarters even as anti-science.

The pomo tool of deconstruction when applied to science critically evaluates the role of political and sociocultural influences upon scientific research, funding for the sciences and its technological innovations. A particular focus of concern is concentrated upon weapons development, pollution and industrial exploitation of the worker. A postmodernist critique of science will in general be critical of the notion that the ‘march of science’ equates with progress.

However in Butler’s overview he is generally critical of the pomo approach to science. In fact he appears to support science unconditionally, thus relegating the scope of postmodernism to cultural theory, politics and liberative ethics. This unquestioning adherence to science (for which he doesnt provide a justifying explanation) seems to promote the primacy of deductive reasoning and empirical method over and above all other ways of thinking. Ironically Butler’s pro-science stance would appear to demonstrate what pomo calls the modernist tendency to prejudice. I found this chapter a little hard to swallow as it seems to make an innaccurate generalisation about pomo approaches to science. As is implied in the pomo ’school of thought’ there is of course no one single approach favoured, thus the anti-science tag would sit uncomfortable with philosophers of science such as Feyerabend and Kuhn, who explicitly accept science as a valid method, but reject its claims to primacy. Such relativistic approaches have sought to legitimise non-scientific and non-rational endeavour (i.e. Religion).

In his chapter, Butler quotes two leading physicists Sokal and Bricmont who responded to the pomo critique. Firstly defending the misuse of some of their work and secondly attacking the pseudo-scientific inclinations of certain philosophers such as Jean Baudrillard. Baudrillard had a tendency in his work to use scientific, or scientific sounding terminology in his writings. Two famous examples were ‘hyperspace‘ and ‘the Euclidian space of war‘. Sokal and Bricmont criticise Baudrillard on two grounds. Firstly it would appear that he is using the terminology in order to give it an air of scientific authority. Secondly, and more misleadingly they accused him of mistaking certain scientific ideas, distorting science, misrepresenting it, and therefore talking unscientific nonsense. This attack was in effect an attack upon the legitimacy of the postmodern critique of science. Butler unquestioningly accepts this attack, I however do not. Baudrillard certainly does use scientific terminology and broaches certain scientific issues. So in response to the critics we must analyse what is happening. There are 3 possibilities.

1) Baudrillard is correct in his use of the terminology, and Sokal and Bricmont are wrong.

2) Baudriallard has redefined the scientific terminology to mean something else. Therefore they only bare a family resemblance to the original meanings of the words, in which case Sokal and Bricmont are at the least mistaken.

3) Baudrillard has misused and misunderstood, or distorted certain scientific concetps. Sokal and Bricmont are right to label this as psuedo-science.

Lets look at the implications of these three possibilities. If 1) is correct then in this case the definitive claims of science are wrong, the edifice has been undermined and science and technology may be about to collapse. I am sceptical about the probability of this outcome (you will be glad to know). If 2) is correct, and I suspect Baudrillard may defend himself along these lines, then the accusations of Sokal and Bricmont are wrong, for they are misunderstood. However Baudrillard does not get such an easy reprieve, for if he has coined new neologisms for old standardly accepted scientific terms, and he has not provided a ready definition then he is responsible for the misunderstanding, and he has done the cause of philosophy a great disservice by creating (rather than destroying) confusion. Finally, if 3) is correct then Baudrillard is guilty of overstepping the barrier between language games and the criticisms levelled against him are justified and correct.

Like I have said, I believe Baudrillard is guilty of causing confusion as opposed to deception. Either way though if in the case of Baudrillard there has been confusion or error then this should not delegitimise the entire pomo approach to science, as Butler would seem to imply. What it does mean is that postmodernists when investigating the epistemological claims of science must be more careful and more vigorous in their critiques. This new sense of caution should not distract pomo philosophers from the fundamentally important task (which is even admitted from within the scientific community) of anlaysing and criticising the sociological and political basis and motivations behind science and scientific research. Particularly where such research has negative technological uses.

Orpheus Emerged, written by Jack Kerouac in 1944/45 was only published posthumously in 2002 following the death of his wife. Friend, Poet and contemporary Robert Creeley wrote in his introduction that this was an momentous occasion, the rediscovery and publication of a lost classic by the ‘voice of a generation’ Beat author Jack Kerouac. Yet despite the positive reviews printed on the dust covers the book was near universally panned by the critics. Dull. Achingly Stiff. Pretentious. Immature. Pedantic. Critics clearly did not like it.

This was the second time I had read this novella, and for the second time I managed to finish it in a couple of hours. And for the second time I was left wondering what was it I had just read. I had my ideas, but I felt somehow cheated that I had read a book, somebody elses creation which was yet so ambigous that its value and meaning depended upon my interpretation of it, as though it were in fact my book. My greatest dissappointment though (first time round) was, like the critics, reserved for the fact that it just wasnt anywhere near as good as Kerouac’s seminal work ‘On The Road‘. Looking for some guidance, and some hint of what it all meant I ploughed the internet for literary criticisms. All I found, as you can see from the perjorative descriptions listed above, were equally confused and disappointed readers.

Orpheus Emerged is the story of a group of young bohemian intellectuals studying at university. It is a chronicle of their passions, conflicts and dreams, and ultimately is a record of their search for truth through art and philosophy.

Michael is the artist, desperately seeking happiness, and wallowing in his own artistic model of the aesthete. He is a bohemian whose poetry infers an experimentation with drugs, a dabbling with mystical religion, and sexual experimentation. Paul (whose relation to Michael is unknown, see later on for my theory) is an out of town bum, with little money, an intellectual who annoys everyone he touches, and yet with whom that cannot do without. He is not registered as a student, but he attends lectures anyway, and the professors politely ignore him until he speaks up and makes his contributions in a class on Nietszche. Arthur, Leo, Anthony and Julius are ensemble characters who weave through the story. Arthur is a budding poet who aspires to Michael’s aesthetic heights. Leo likewise is in awe of Michaels work, but is critically aware of deeper trains of thought. Julius is an observer, and a shrewd one at that, described by the others as a ’super-voyeur’ he alone guesses at the complex relationship between Michael and Paul. Arthur is an emotional wreck, an alcoholic and a wife beater, married to Marie, who being a more dominant character cares not about the violence, loves Anthony dearly, but seeks to explore her own sexuality in an affair with Michael. Finally Maureen is Michael’s mistress in her late twenties, seeking commintment and security from the young bohemian, she is mature, wise and singularly uninterested in the pretentious artsy world of Michael and his friends.

When you read the book, set over a couple of weeks, nothing much happens, and there is no coherent plot or exploration of character. Chance meetings are always just around the corner and everything seems so utterly contrived. They meet, they eat, they drink copiously, they hold a party, they attend lectures, they talk pretentious waffle about art and philosophy, often subconsciously aware that they dont know what they are talking about. They conduct affairs, they gossip, they suffer emotional crises, they seek oblivian in drink and plumb the depths of despair and talk of suicide.

It is easy considering all this, the shallowness of the characters, the pretentious rubbish that they spout, the numerous references to Nietszche, Rimbaud and other counter-cultural figures in literature, the meandering pace of the plot, to simply say ‘who cares?’

Then I had a revelation. Within the book was hidden a kernel of truth, within the very motif of the search for truth. Michael the poet is frustrated with the aesthetic life, Paul mocks him relentlessly as a failure. Michael is aware of the pretentiousness of much of his work, yet recognises the need to continue as a prophet for the sake of Arthur and Leo (at least). Michael is troubled by his amoral nature in conducting his affair (destroying his relationship with Maureen and near killing Anthony who drinks himself to oblivion), yet as Paul hints at, by being troubled he is clearly not amoral.

Throughout the novel there is one continous battle, between Michael the aesthete and Paul the iconoclast. Michael feels the need to touch God, and to impart in his long winded poetry an essence of the divine. Paul ridicules his work, calls him a failure, enrages him, goads him, steals his work and threatens to burn it. The two of them are constantly at daggers drawn. Michael attacks him with a lampstand, then later when blind drunk and contemplating suicide decides to murder Paul at the same time.

In the novel, which is set in no particular time or place (it could easily be here and now) Kerouac is himself searching for truth. He is looking to find his voice, the voice of a generation. This book is the beginning of the genesis of the beat movement. He wrote it at the end of the second world war, at columbia university shortly after he met Allan Ginsberg, Lucien Carr and the other artists who would become the leaders of the beat movement. It is an early postmodern work of art, it is an existential masterpiece of self-analysis. The movement that was to spawn rock and roll, the hippy movement, pacifism, the anti-war generation and free love, was born out of this novel, this chronicle of existential angst. Dissillusionment with the war and the world, the rejection of authority and conventional morality.

No wonder Orpheus Emerged reads so badly, it is unfinished, its merely a particle of the developing Kerouac. Too caught up in the real world who has been there to teach Kerouac how to write? Nobody has, he has had to develop all by himself, find his own voice, his own identity. As he says of Wagner in the novel, he has had to spend years sorting out his intellectual grounding before he can produce his art.

Who is Paul? My reading is that he is the alter-ego of Michael, his shadowself. He has a ghostly ethereal character to him. When Michael disappears for a week (conducting his affair) Paul leaves town and ’sleeps on the grass and eats fruit for breakfast’. When Michael reappears so does Paul. When one goads the other, the other always responds ready for a fight. When Michael falls ill with a fever (at the climax of the novel) so too does Paul. Michael never attends lectures, but Paul does. And the greatest hint, when Michael resolves to commit suicide he decides he can only do so after killing Paul. In the end, Michael storms to Pauls apartment, wherein is the mythical ‘Helen’ a character about whom we know nothing about, other than she is the love of both of them. Helen and Paul are seen catching the streetcar and leaving town. This scene witnessed by Arthur, Leo and Julius concludes the novel, and they like the reader are left uncertain who the man is, Michael or Paul? The shrew observer Julius, earlier concludes that Paul must be Michaels brother, so we can assume some physical resemblance between the two.

In conclusion I see that the book is much deeper than many critics give it credit for. Yes it is poor in comparison to his other works, but it is meant to be, it is an existential biography in which Kerouac embarks on a sincere quest to find his own voice.

Michael, the artist-man, wants to achieve literary perfection, Paul his shadowself mocks and scorns his efforts, such perfection cannot be achieved by affecting the habits and manners of great artists, it can only be found in self-discovery. The search for truth can only be resolved by being true to oneself. Michael and Paul are meant to be the same character, shadows of each other, Michael and Paul are Jack Kerouac. Their struggles are his struggles. This work is the chronicle of his existential journey. It is through this existential journey, through writing this book, that Kerouac can begin to find his true voice. Jack Kerouac is Orpheus Emerged, and once he has found himself the mature writer, the writer for whom the critics are full of praise, can finally emerge.

Taking no more than two hours, its an easy read. But (and it took me a long period of contemplation) you may feel as though you have witnessed nothing of any import. I cannot recommend this book on its own merit. But can recommend it as a source for contemplative guidance in the existential sense. Michael and Paul remind me very much of me at the same age.

It is commonly said now that we live in a postmodern age or situation. This literally means that we no longer live in the modern age, or the age of modernity.  Some of my thoughts have been described (by myself and AC-1) as being postmodern. What does this entail? The following is a brief outline of the major principles. But first a caveat: in common with the applicable definition of postmodernism, my explanation is but one of many, supporters (Jacques Derrida) and opponents (Richard Dawkins) alike may offer a differing description to the one that I provide.

Why Postmodernity. This is a reference to the abandonment of modernity, which occured through a loss of confidence in its values. This loss of confidence followed instances of global trauma that blighted the 20th century; fascism, communism, world war, terrorism, the holocaust, ethnic cleansing, nuclear weapons, pollution, the unjust effects of science and industry, trivialisation of life, racism and sexism. Postmodernism infers that modernity took an arrogant view of premodernity that was unjustified and wrong. It explicitly states that: Change does not mean Progress. Postmodernism has directed a near revolutionary suspicion towards three facets of human existence.

• Our collective understanding of ourselves in history.
• Our personal understanding of ourselves.
• The values of Reason and Rationality.

We, Ourselves, in History. Multiple areas of thought (including Philosophy, Theology, History, Science, Literature etc.) have attempted to make sense of life in the context of an overarching history or drama. “The story of man”. Such stories take the form of metanarratives, take for example the Marxist critique of Capitalism, or the Christian concept of the consummation of history. These stories share one thing in common, namely that human history is a story of progress and improvement. Culminating in the idea that the modern is a better time and place to be than the pre-modern or the primitive. And that those cultures and societies that are yet to be fully modernised (pre-industrial) are primitive and inferior, have nothing to teach us and would be better off modernising and embracing science, capitalism, democracy, marxism, monotheism or whatever value system is in vogue.

Postmodernists suspect that such metanarratives are devices whereby the powerful impose views of reality which serve their own interests. Consider the motivations for the U.S. led invasion of Iraq; both those publicly expressed (regime change/weapons of mass destruction) and those privately suspected by the common person (oil, increased funding to the defence industry). The Postmodernist (similar to and in common with the Existentialist) lay their stress upon the fragmentary and absurd nature of experience and history.

Who am I, the Self? The notion of a coherent and identifiable self is rejected. And a fragmentary interpretation is adopted. Me, I, the Self are terms we use to attempt to describe differing pressures that affect our experience of life; historically by ones genetic inheritance, internally by virtue of your unconscious and subconscious mind, and externally by virtue of coincidence and circumstanc. Thus the idea of who I am, and of what constitutes the self, differs from person to person, across continents, and over time. Me, I and the Self are therefore arbitrary and unfixed inventions.

Knowledge is Power. One of the fundamental expressions of postmodernity is its suspicion and loss of confidence in reason and rationality. It is seen (like the metanarrative) as an exercise in control and domination. Rational argument and debate are seen as weapons of manipulation, that can easily be used by powerful groups for the furtherance of their own ends. Such groups control education, the direction of academic research, the means of communication. These groups use rationality and reason to establish criteria as to what counts as knowledge, who can be considered authoritative (consider the case of scientific ‘experts’ being called to give witness in legal proceedings, particularly where two experts disagree) and what is regarded as being conceivable or even true.

Postmodernists pay particular attention to language. Does it refer to reality (picture theory of words, Wittgensteins Tractatus) or is it rhetoric in the service of power and control (propaganda, Wittgensteins Language Games). The problem with language is that without an ability to identify reality and to create a trustworthy shared world of meaning, reasoning is impossible.

Consequences of Postmodernity. Include the rehabilition of premodernism and so called primitive societies. Consequently this results in an interdisciplinary ‘method’ of thinking. And ultimately provides a critique that challenges the notion that change is progress and that we should always be on-guard against a cultural superiority complex.

Chad Varah was the founder of the Samaritans, a charity that espoused listening therapy for the suicidal and despairing.

When founded in 1953, suicide was still viewed as a symptom of mental illness and moral depravity, Varah preffered to view it as a symptom of circumstance, whose genesis in individuals could vary for enormous reasons.

He was motivated to found this charity when as a newly ordained priest in the Anglican church he conducted a funeral for a 13 year old girl who had committed suicide upon experiencing her first menstrual cycle. Uninformed about adolescence and sexual development she had assumed it to be a symptom of a sexually transmitted disease and in despair and shame, took her own life. He vowed from that moment to help all people in despair and to offer therapeutic advice on sexual matters without judgement or condemnation.

Consequently upon founding the movement, named by the media after the ‘Good Samaritan’ of Christian scriptures he established certain fixed rules.

• The Charity was to be secular.
• It’s therapy was to be listening based.
• It’s members were to be taken from all branches of society.
• They should be neither “prudish” nor “preachy” as the problems they would encounter would be of an extremely personal nature, and the aim of the therapy was to listen to the person in need, and not to lecture them.

Chad Varah, mirroring Augustine of Hippo centuries before, freely admitted in his biographies to sexual experimentation before his marriage and his ordination in the church. This he saw as giving him an insight into the angsts and emotions encountered by those who suffered turmoil in an age where sex and sexuality was never openly discussed. He was an advocate of open and thorough sex education. And in later life whilst continuing to minister as a priest he also sat on the board of reference for the Adult magazine ‘Forum’.

He died aged 95 on the 7th November 2007, if not a “saint” as classically defined then perhaps a “model” and “Iconic” figure of the postmodern-paradigm.

Many philosophical and religious movements have divided the world between our thoughts and the external world of the senses. The world of logic and there fore thought was considered pure while the senses where thought to lie. This was expressed famously by Descartes and his idea of dualism.

But this has an earlier precedent of shamanic religions and founders of religions having direct access to spirits. The unseen world was thought to cause good harvests, fertility and victory in war. In these religious systems, the shaman has direct access to the metaphysical world. In the observed world, the spirits where invisible because our senses are not capable of seeing them (at least outside certain rituals inducing trace like states).

With the rise of various monotheistic religions, the world of divine beings and insight into the metaphysical world is promised to the good believer. For example the Christian teaching that good people shall go to heaven.

“Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God” Matthew 5:8. “Two cities have been formed by two loves: the earthly by the love of self; the heavenly by the love of God.” St. Augustine.

These views are still propagated by a strict interpretation of Catholicism and most evangelical movements.

Modernist and progressive religious belief has rather less emphasis on metaphysical causes impacting on our physical world. God is not normally considered to have taken a direct hand in our lives but people believe he is standing on the sidelines watching over us. This thought of the metaphysical world is a comfort to many people but the metaphysical world is not directly accessible.

“Happy are they that have not seen, and yet believe.” John 20:29 “But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty” 1 Corinthians 1:27

Now the metaphysical world can be considered in the context of post-modernism and anti-realism. Idealists, in particular, hold that only our thoughts have reality and a mind independent reality is an illusion. There is no concept in anti-realism that actually causes anything in the physical world - since the physical world is an illusion or just part of our personal interpretation. I would ask, what does anti-realism, as an explanation, actually explain? If there is no rains to summon, no paradise waiting or no God to comfort us (at least according to the axiom of anti-realism: there is no world of the senses), then this idea is redundant. Or to put more directly, if Anti Realism - effectively saying “nothing is externally true” - has any truth (and there fore it is externally true), it is self refuting. (If Anti Realism is only subjectively true, then again, it is not universally true. But I already said that in a previous post.)

Since I do not agree with Anti-realism, what remains? The world of our lying senses? No - because the “true” world of thought was a myth the whole time!

Major disclaimer: the skeleton of this argument is a rehash of Nietzsche chapter called ‘How the “True World” Finally Became A Fable‘ but I did bring it up to date and add examples.

Anti Citizen One

PS. I am now thinking this is an unoriginal argument for several reasons but perhaps interesting in context. I was considering Descartes thoughts on dream worlds and the unreliability of the senses - but is not our own thoughts also distorted in dreams? For example, doubting things in dreams that we would consider true normally? Doubt is there fore unreliable. Conclusion: there is no dualism. I don’t think I read that idea anywhere… (but still someone else probably said it first!)