[Peace-discuss] simple-minded, metaphysics, fatuous

[C G Estabrook]

Perhaps we should pay attention to the person Dante called “the master of those who know”: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Categories_(Aristotle)>.

And his modern epigoni: <http://www.smilepolitely.com/opinion/the_master_of_those_who_know/>.

Yours in perfatuity, CGE


> On Nov 15, 2018, at 1:15 PM, e. wayne johnson via Peace-discuss <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net> wrote:
> 
> Pirsig writes:
> 
> ...another kind of high country now in the world of thought... the high country of the mind.
> 
> If all of human knowledge, everything that's known, is believed to be an enormous hierarchic structure, then the high country of the mind is found at the uppermost reaches of this structure in the most general, the most abstract considerations of all.
> 
> Few people travel here. There's no real profit to be made from wandering through it, yet like this high country of the material world all around us, it has its own austere beauty that to some people makes the hardships of traveling through it seem worthwhile.
> 
> In the high country of the mind one has to become adjusted to the thinner air of uncertainty, and to the enormous magnitude of questions asked, and to the answers proposed to these questions. The sweep goes on and on and on so obviously much further than the mind can grasp one hesitates even to go near for fear of getting lost in them and never finding one's way out.
> 
> What is the truth and how do you know it when you have it? -- How do we really know anything? Is there an "I,'' a "soul,'' which knows, or is this soul merely cells coordinating senses? -- Is reality basically changing, or is it fixed and permanent? -- When it's said that something means something, what's meant by that?
> 
> 
>> -------Original Message-------
>> From: Szoke, Ron via Peace-discuss <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>
>> To: Peace Discuss <peace-discuss at anti-war.net>
>> Cc: Bill Strutz <bill.strutz at gmail.com>
>> Subject: [Peace-discuss] simple-minded, metaphysics, fatuous
>> Sent: Nov 16 '18 02:23
>> 
>> 
>> Keywords 111518
>> A review of some terms useful in political analysis & polemics
>> 
>> SIMPLE-MINDED, METAPHYSICS, FATUOUS
>> 
>> sim·ple-mind·ed or SIM·PLE·MIND·ED (sĭm′pəl-mīn′dĭd)
>> _adj._
>> 1. Lacking in subtlety or sophistication; artless or naive: _a
>> simple-minded horror movie; simple-minded generalizations._
>> 2. Stupid or silly; foolish.
>> 3. _Offensive_ Intellectually disabled.
>> 
>> sim′ple•mind′ed _adj._
>> 1. lacking in mental acuteness or sense.
>> 2. artless or unsophisticated.
>> [1735–45]
>> 
>> metaphysics
>> My simplistic, nontechnical definition:
>> all talk about things that are invisible & intangible (cannot be seen
>> or touched): abstractions such as thoughts, beliefs, motives,
>> intentions, meanings, numbers, souls, spirits, gods, essences, truth,
>> reality, tendencies, causes, patterns, structures, potentialities,
>> etc.
>>> Note that I only suggest appropriate caution in dealing with these
>> elusive abstract entities & do not mean complete disapproval or
>> rejection. It seems impossible for people to think or reason
>> effectively without them. ~ RSz.
>> 
>> metaphysical (adjective)
>> _Beyond measurement ; transcendent; supersensible._
>> Those who rail against it do so for the most practical reason: They
>> have not mastered its use. They strive for metaphysical formulations
>> to justify their hidden little secret (sloth and fear).
>> — William F. Buckley Jr., _The Lexicon_ (Harcourt, 1996), p. 97.
>> 
>>> Now do you see how contemptible you are, according to the late Mr.
>> Buckley, if you “rail against” anything metaphysical? Is that your
>> shameful, hidden little secret? Have you done that lately? Confess! ~
>> RSz.
>> 
>> fat·u·ous (făch′o͞o-əs) _adj._
>> Foolish or silly, especially in a smug or self-satisfied way: _"an
>> era of delicious, fatuous optimism shaped by the belief that enough
>> good will on the part of people like ourselves could repair anything"_
>> _(Shirley Abbott)._ See Synonyms at FOOLISH.
>> [From Latin fatuus.]
>> 
>> fatuous (ˈfætjʊəs) _adj_
>> complacently or inanely foolish
>> [C17: from Latin _fatuus_; related to _fatiscere_ to gape]
>> 
>> * * *
>> 
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>