a new understanding of today, time and space.

I have written about freedom and justice, but the questions comes at
some point, freedom for what? justice for what? what is the value of
freedom and what is the value of justice? I have argued that we have
a limited amount of freedom and let us say, that we reach the
biggest expansion of freedom we are going to get… the most freedom
we are going to get and then, then we must ask ourselves, ok, we have
this freedom, what are we going to do with it?

let us say, we have the most justice we are going to find in society, we ask ourselves,
ok, now what? we have this justice, what are we going to do with it?

what is the point of getting freedom or justice if, if we don’t know
what to do with it…that is part of our modern problem, we don’t
know what to do with freedom or justice if we actually have it…

so, you have as much freedom or as much justice as you are ever going to
get, so what do you do with it?

Kropotkin

how do we think of this freedom?
how do we think of this justice?

is freedom or justice an individual concept
or, or is it a culture, political concept?

we seem to have muddled the idea of freedom
and justice by not clearly defined it individually and
by not defining it culturally or politically… or perhaps
the real problem is the idea of freedom and justice, both
individual and politically within the society is confused and muddled…

and we don’t know what to do with either, individually or societally…
much of our confusion lies with the fact, we really haven’t clearly
stated and worked out many different concepts… an example of this
is punishment… are we punishing people or are we rehabilitating
people… we as a people have never really answered this question…
what is the point of punishment? if we are punishing, then hell’s bells,
let us punish… if we are rehabilitating then let us rehabilitate…
but we have never decided… as a people…

we have this freedom and we as a people have never decided
what we are going to do with this freedom…
freedom and justice are not just individual concepts, but
cultural and societally…so as a people, what are we going to do
with freedom and with justice?

Kropotkin

the question of philosophy is not just what is freedom but
what are we going to do with that freedom?

so along with understanding what a concept is, we must then decide what
we are going to do with that concept…

Kropotkin

so we have this concept of private property…
and we must not only understand what is private property,
but what is its value… what are going to do with private property?

one of our muddled concepts is private property…
private property makes sense when there are only a few
people in a certain location, but when you have millions
of people on limited land, private property no longer makes as
much sense…think of New York city… what sense does
having private property makes in a location like NYC…

take a piece of land in, Montana for example, and given its location,
land isn’t as pricey as land in NYC, but it might be the exact same piece
of land and in NYC, the cost of that land could be worth millions
and in Montana, it might be worth $500 bucks… the same land, just different
locations and worth vastly different amount… this shows us the artificial nature
of land and private property is no different…we have a small, two bedroom condo,
roughly 1700 square feet, and it is worth over $800,000 just because it is on the
San Francisco Peninsula… put that condo almost anywhere else and it is
a couple of hundred thousand, at best…every single house in my little city is
worth over a million bucks, no matter how bad of shape it is in because of where
it is… put that same house anywhere else and it is maybe 200,000 or 250,000 bucks,
maybe… this show us the artificial value we put on private property…
given the nature of housing prices, we might as well be growing tulips
and selling them… that is an historical reference… see the Dutch…

it isn’t real… so what is the point of private property? to feel safe from
the government? well that ship sailed a long, long time ago…
we have no reason for private property outside of ego, vanity drives
our quest for private property and for no other reason…it isn’t real…

yet much of our laws and our ideologies are driven by this ego driven
quest for property…this property we can’t even explain why we want…

Desiderius Erasmus once said, home is wherever my books are…I actually
agree… so why is private property so important to you?

Kropotkin

ok, we have written about private property, but what
about the other concepts we have written about like justice?

Justice is the act of equality… either bringing someone up to be equal,
like rules that give the handicap equal access that others have or
to treat others equal either politically or legally…

so let us discuss justice and private property…

justice is the act of treating equally and private property is just
the opposite…there are those who can never be able to afford
property in my city and yet others who by no other reason then being
born rich can afford it… I have heard it said, that life isn’t fair…
which is another way of saying life isn’t just… but why not?
what is stopping us from having a just, equal, society?
simple greed would be one answer…also that the fact that
we accept the idea of political equality but we don’t accept the
idea of economic equality… economic justice is no different then
political justice and just as important…we don’t require someone to
accomplish something before we give them political equality…
someone gets political equality by virtue of birth… you get all the rights
and privileges just by being born an American… a privilege offer just
by being born within certain artificial lines… lines that have been changeable
in the past and are easily changed in the future because they don’t really exist…

How can we rationalize political equality without accepting economic equality?

now one may make the argument that by equalizing everyone economically,
we take away their incentive to work… as if work was the thing we live for…
the battle is not to posses material goods or buy a bigger TV… the battle
is to become human… the march in mankind is not in technology or in GDP,
but in becoming better human beings and in creating a better society…

better human being and better society can be one whereas
there is more order and unity and a worse human being and a worse
society is a disorder society and a disorder human being…

the sign of a functional society and a functional human being is
tending toward order and unity… look at functional societies
and functional individuals… they are ordered and have unity
and there is less chaos and randomness…that is a sign of
a functional society and a sign of a functional human being…

Sweden is a far more functional society then Kenya and that is
a sign that there is order and unity in Sweden and more chaos and randomness
in Kenya… look at history… the societies that lasted are the ones that
have more order then disorder… think of systems and systems that
function better are ones that hold their order better… think of a car…
a car that functions better is one that has order and runs when you want it
to run and works the way it supposed to… a disorder car, one that doesn’t run
when you want to and is chaotic is a less functional car…is less likely
to last…order and unity are partly the reason for systems lasting longer…
the reason our cars and our solar system and the human body last
is because there is order and unity… when there is disorder and chaos
and randomness… the system is in danger of failing…be it a car or a body
or a solar system…

justice is a form of order and unity… the amount of justice in a political system
will help decide how long that system, be it Rome or Egypt or China or Sweden,
will decide how long that system will last… because without justice there is
disorder and chaos and randomness in the system…and that will decrease the
length of time a system, a political system for example will last…

so if we allow injustice in the economic system, we increase disorder and chaos
and that threaten the structure of society which means the system may fail…

we must have justice or the system might fail from chaos and randomness
caused by the lack of equality…think of inequality as a scale… put too much
weight on one side and it is no longer in balance and that balance is needed for
any system, be it a car or a solar system or a political or an economic system
to survive…justice and equality and balance are all the same thing…
and all are needed to make a system work, any system…

so we must have political equality as well as economic equality
for our system to work, to be balanced, to last…

private property threatens that balance of equality
and must be addressed…

Kropotkin

The Buddha said that suffering was being sick and aged and death…
those aren’t suffering, they are just natural events in our lives…

Real suffering is what humans do to other humans…if you want to end
the suffering of people, be kind to human beings…follow the path
of love instead of hate and anger…suffering, real suffering is caused
by humans acting on other humans…be the person who helps end suffering…

Kropotkin

as I wrote, the Buddha felt that we must escape suffering
and that suffering was growing old and being sick and dying…
but these things are normal and expected… how can they be
suffering if everyone becomes sick or grows old or dies?
I have been sick, I needed three operations to heal, did I suffer?
hell yah, the pain was overwhelming at times, but I, eventually,
became healthy…but that kind of suffering is part and parcel of the
human experience… I suffer from pain from a bad back and have for
years and will suffer until the day I die… and yet, I realize it is what it is…
and as for growing old, I am 58 and I grow older every single day and yet
it is what it is and nothing I can do will stop that process… I just consider
it being part of the price of being alive and as for death, I have no choice, no freedom
in the matter, so how can that be suffering?
I will die… it doesn’t matter how I feel about the matter, I will die…
I just don’t know when…

all of these are natural occurring event in life we all go through… it is
what it is and that there is nothing I can do about it. period. end of discussion…
why lament that which I have no control over… I cannot control that “suffering”
even if it isn’t really suffering, it is just part of the gig of being human…
deal with it…

but what about the suffering of millions who don’t have the necessities of life?
while some have billions of dollars, in fact the top 10 wealthiest people
on planet earth have as much wealth as the bottom half of the population or
have as much wealth as 3 billion people… how is that just? how is that equality?
by having the economic system we have, we have billions, BILLIONS, of people who
lack the basic necessities of life…they are suffering, not from age or sickness or death,
but from the actions of their fellow human beings…

Justice demands that we treat people equally but if we don’t do that due to economic
reasons, we are engaged in injustice… a society cannot last engaging in injustice…
it becomes unbalanced, unstable, it becomes threatened… so where is the justice
for those who suffer from lack of resources? if all men are created equal, then we
need justice, equality, for everyone regardless of their politics or their religion or
their race or their color… equality is the answer for suffering… you want to end
suffering… end injustice, end inequality…to follow the Buddha and end suffering,
you must end the suffering of our fellow human beings… who suffer under a unequal
political and economic system…every single reformer since before Jesus has had
the same message…to heal thyself… one must begin by healing those who suffer…
because their suffering is your suffering because we humans… we are
of that universal classification… HUMAN BEING…we are one and the same…
individually and collectively…we have an economic system that demands suffering as
a price for our couch and our TV and our nice car and house… we can go with less
and end the suffering for others… equality… is justice for all…

Kropotkin

I am reading a book called: History of Philosophical Systems…
it is edited by Ferm… Published in 1965…
a group of writers write about various Philosophical systems from
the earliest times, it begins with the “Story of Indian Philosophy”
and works it way through various systems up to recent events like Pragmatism
and Logical Positivism and into recent events in Philosophy, well recent as
of 1965…

I thought about our American system and what is in that system…

we have a representative democracy and we have capitalism as our economic system
and we have three distinct and equal branches of government and we have as our basis
a equal justice system, whereas the symbol is the women wearing blindfold and
using a scale which means she judges blindly and without discrimination or benefit
to anyone…this is our American system writ large and not getting into the weeds
with all the other stuff that our system will entail…

now our system like any other system must be balanced, to work it must
be equal and fair and honest… the failure of our American system lies in the
fact that it has introduced chaos and uncertainty into our system and within
that chaos lies the means to threaten our American system…

think of our political system like the solar system… it works smoothly
and easily until something throw the system into chaos like for example,
let us say a planet comes into our solar system or a nearby sun has some
gravitational influence on our system that would throw our solar system into
chaos and make it unbalanced and threaten its equilibrium…

we have caused chaos and unbalanced into our system with rulings like
hobby lobby and citizens united and thus we have a system that is out of
balanced and we have justice that is no longer blind but she sees exactly
which people are on trial and money talks and justice walks…

we have threaten the system in large part by our own actions
and it is by our own actions we must save our system…
when politicians make millions of dollars from campaign contributions
and then get a small salary from American’s, who do you think the
politicians will listen to…the millions of dollars or the citizens
who put them there… there is no doubt who the politicians listen
to and answer to and it ain’t their constituents, that’s for sure…

the bottom line seems to be money and there where the danger of,
and the threat comes from, money influencing and changing
the dynamics of justice and the dynamics of democracy…

money makes the blindfolded lady see and makes justice becomes
a system of money, justice is simply the person with the most money,
and thus threatens the balance of the American system…

justice is no longer equal and justice is no longer practiced
from a position of blindness…

want to know how America is being threaten, it is money that
has unbalanced the American system

this morning it was reported that a homeless man asked a woman
to move her Porsche… and she shot him…how much you want to bet she
gets off scott free…better then even money, she doesn’t spend a day in jail…and
that is the new American justice system…money talks and justice walks…
you want to rail against something, try this inside of dumb discussions of
liberals and their alleged hatred of America… you want to fix America,
help fix the systems that have become corrupt and unbalanced, thus
threating American stability…

Kropotkin

most people approach philosophy with
such seriousness that is entirely unwarranted…

becoming who you are, isn’t about drama and seriousness
that drains all the life out of the process…

Nietzsche was right, we can dance and laugh and cry
on the path to becoming…

Philosophy isn’t about a set series of exercises like
studying the verb “to be” in another language…

I am
you are
he/she/it is
we are
you are
they are

Ich bin
du bist
er/sie/es ist
wir sind
ihr seid
sie/Sie sind…

philosophy exists in both the joy and terror of discovering
who we are and who we might become…
it is about finding out what is possible
and singing a song about that…

we can become… all we have to do is understand that…
I can become something better then I am today and that
something is to be found in the study of life of which philosophy
is part of…I have learned things about myself lately, at my advance
age of 58, that has surprised me and frankly, has brought shame to my
heart, but that is part of the journey… not to learn safe and comfortable
things but to learn everything, not just the fun and safe stuff and that
sometimes leads us to feel shame and terror and joy about who we are
and then who we can become, and that can bring us the same feelings of shame and
terror and joy… if we don’t feel something about our journey, it isn’t much
of a journey…we are simply engaged in a very safe exploration of who we are…
it is like thinking that traveling is going to a safe place and thinking you are really
traveling, but real traveling is about stretching who you are by going beyond
what is safe and going beyond your comfort zone… going to the local, nearby street
is safe and predictable, but going to some new country and going out of your comfort
zone is really what traveling and philosophy is about the same thing… go beyond
your comfort zone and challenge yourself just like you would if you were
traveling…

safe and boring is Kant and Hegel, stretch who you are by engaging in
Nietzsche or engage in your own exploration of who you are and challenge
who you are and who you are becoming…

Kropotkin

in my journey of being and becoming…
I have discovered I have a mean streak a mile long…
and that is my being… but do I simply accept that or
do I try to become, becoming, something better…

I can simply accept that I can be mean but that is not
a choice, that is simply accepting or I can make a choice,
which is freedom, choices means freedom, and I can choice
to become something better, which is not being mean and being
nicer and a kinder Kropotkin… what I choose defines me as
a person and I choose to be a nicer, kinder person…

so, I just have to practice being nice and being kind,
every single day… and it will be hard because
being is easier then trying to become something else,
being is easier then becoming…so what route do I take?

the easy path of being or the hard path of becoming?

Kropotkin

now one might say, but Kropotkin, you are espousing new age nonsense or
religion or utter nonsense or whatever you seem to be babbling about…

but the truth is… it doesn’t matter what we call it…

a journey is never about the destination, but about the trip, the journey…

the human journey is never about the end, the destination, which is death,
but about the journey and it doesn’t matter what we call death, be it death
or non-existence or non-being or passed on or gone to a better place…
it is about the journey we take before that final experience…

so if after death and you could report your journey of life, what would
you want to be able to report back about your journey?

I did this or I was that or I traveled or I became this on my way to…
being or becoming? did you engage in simple being or did you engaged
in becoming? which one would you rather report back to the living?

I was or I engaged in becoming?

Kropotkin

so, my “system” is one of order vs disorder…
that which improves the order of the system is
approved of and that which increases disorder is disapproved of…

we, each of us, exists in a series of systems, politically, economically
and socially…so in the political, that which improves the order of the
system is approved of and that which increases the disorder is disapproved of…
but does that “disapproval” include dissent?
dissent does cause disorder within the society and so, theoretically must
be disapproved of…

not at all, even if dissent does cause disorder within the society/system…
dissent must be part and parcel of any political system, either officially
or unofficially and it would be better if dissent were part of any
political system officially…if fact, it is the genius of the American
political system that the use of dissent is officially protected by
the bill of rights…

the value of dissent is for what must be avoided at all cost, which is
the natural conservatism of “people” to codify values and beliefs and
actions…values in fact, must be changeable and adaptable to
to fit any new changes in society…values are meant to be of value to
to serve the people in their pursuit of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”
values are a tool, nothing more, and values must be flexible enough to enable
people to navigate life…dissent is also a tool to help people navigate life…

occasionally we must dissent, to increase disorder to the overall benefit of
the society to which we belong as benefitting society does benefit us
personally…and occasionally, dissent is the means to improve society…
the trick is to know when dissent is the answer and when it is not…
this understanding of when dissent is needed and not needed is the
understanding of political science…

I believe that this is the time for dissent for the forces of government
are engaged in the acts of disorder, which is the exclusion of, the
discrimination of, the refusal to integrate people within society…

laws that discriminate against people, laws that exclude people,
that laws don’t integrate people are acts of disorder against
the benefit of society…and must have dissent against them…
disorder…for to pursue laws against people and their values
is really an act of nihilism… for that is nihilism, the negation of
human values and negating human rights, negating people’s
right to act in their own interest is nihilism…and being able
to pursue one’s own values within such values as tolerance,
and respect and freedom to act is paramount…

in other words…we must pursue justice and freedom as
fundamental properties of a society… justice is the act of
equality and inclusion and freedom is the choices allowed…
and any actions which deny justice or freedom must be fought…
give dissent to…

so laws which deny justice or freedom must have dissent
as their response…we cannot codify any attempt to
deny justice or freedom…we must fight, dissent in any attempt
to legitimize denying justice or freedom…thus we have
a course of action… we allow voting rights, we allow abortions,
we increase toleration and increase justice for all…
freedom and justice is our template for actions as that
is the path to order in our political system…and anything
that denies freedom and justice must have dissent
as it consequences…

Kropotkin

I want just mention Hegel who says, that philosophy is the conceptualization of one owns time. This is a way to concile the truth while being human and making Errors. The dissent culminates in critique. Philosophy is built in this way: making Errors which survive time by it s performative value.

Been on vacation and doing this on my
cell phone, soooooo

Was thinking last night about existentialism and it’s
Understanding of angst, anxiety and despair.
We have in opposition to or to combat angst, religion
and philosophy and science. I have felt angst over
the years and one way for me to deal was
philosophy. The Greeks used philosophy as a
way of life. It wasn’t academic as we use philosophy
but genuine means to finding a way of living.
Each school, platonic, Stoic, Aristotle, epicurean ,
was a way of life and understood to be such by everyone. The Christians took this idea from the
Greeks and meant Christianity to be a way of life.
So which ancient school best fit your way of life?

Kropotkin

So in my last post, I mentioned existentialism
And I mentioned philosophy as a way of life…
Now can we used existentialism as a way of
Life? To have anxiety and despair and angst
as a way of life would get old, real fast…
That is why existentialism failed as a way
of life, it cannot exist as a way of life. So
the one possibility for a way of life
in the last 150 years failed…

So what are our options? Or is even
finding a way of life not practical? The question
of how we live our life found in finding a
a way of life or is it something else?

This idea of, how is one to live, is not
just an individual one, it has social,
political, economic, cultural impact…
Our individual decisions impact society…
If I have a child, that impacts society…
Every choice we make, leaves our
footprint on society… so we must understand
How we are to live, in a wider context, that
of how it impacts society. We live in a spider web
where all parts of the web, society, is
connected.

Kropotkin

Yes there is a web; it is holistic. The riddle of intentionality (Husserl) could be solved (Lévinas). It does mean that the constitution of some singular Event is mirrored within the whole. And the whole says to the singular: you are false if you restrict yourself to the singular. That’s the definitive. And you are right, as a part of the whole. That’s performative. So we can understand history: all instances have a self-understanding as truth, but in the course of history it is false. The performative binds the two perspectives.

As I have been on Vacation for the last week and a couple of days,
I have a notebook full of thoughts and idea’s…

So what does it mean to this question of “how to live one’s life”
in regards to say, patriotism? some here have made ill defined
and ill conceived statements about patriotism…
How standing for the flag is patriotism because it supports
the military but that leaves the problem of why do the
military stand? is it for themselves? No, the truth of the matter
is that we stand for the values that this country represents…
but that leaves a secondary problem… .which values?

I stand for the values that the flag represents and what values are those?

It has been said, truth, justice and the American way of life…
or perhaps it is freedom and honesty…
that is part of the problem… our values have never been clearly
defined or stated…so what are patriotic values… I am sure the
64 year old guy who shot up that festival last night felt he was
a super patriot and doing his patriotic duty…and without any
clear values to point to, I can’t say for sure if he was actually right…

so how are we to live?

Kropotkin

K: this statements leaves me with many questions for the simple reason, I have no idea
what you said…note the language I use… it is simple language of a simple man…
which leaves me with a question I have had for a long time… why the need
for such complicate language? why not simply say what you mean without
all that gooblegook? for example, “That’s performative” I have no idea what that
means and I shouldn’t have to look up every word to understand what someone
means…I make it a point to keep my language simple and clear…
I use language that any kid in high school might understand. I think
this language use is part of the failure of philosophy… it very language meant
to hide and confuse the actual thoughts involved…read Hegel or Kant,
its unreadable crap designed to hide the fact that they are, Hegel and Kant,
trying to pretend to be smarter then we are by using language we don’t understand…
its a game, nothing more…when reading Kant or Hegel, all I can think of
is the old story of the emperor new clothes…with Kant and Hegel being
the emperor…

Kropotkin

system: is a regularly interacting or interdependent group
of items forming a unified whole. Every system is delineated by its
spatial and temporal boundaries, surrounded and influenced
by its environment, described by its structure and purpose
and expressed in its functioning…

Holism: is the idea that systems emphasize the priority of the whole
over its parts…

the word system means “something to look at” you must have
a very high visual gradient to have systematization… or so says wiki…

Boundaries: berries that define a system and distinguish it from other
systems in the environment.

Homeostasis: the tendency of a system to resist change and maintain
status quo.

adaptation: the tendency of a system to make the changes needed
to protect itself and grow to accomplish it goal…

Reciprocal transactions: circular interactions that systems
engage in such that they influence one another…

feedback loop: the process by which systems self-correct
based on reactions from other systems in the environment…

Throughput: energy in the system to accomplish its goals…

these are the important ideas we need to understand to make
sense of my next number of posts…

Kropotkin