RSS
 

Arquivo para a ‘Information Science’ Categoria

Anguish, existence and vanity

12 Jan

As we have already discussed, the anguish of our time is the tension with Being, maintaining “authenticity with oneself”, not being carried away by the current of expectations and impositions of temporal powers, and thus dealing with the frustrations of holding firm perennial values ​​and dealing with oneself. with the transients.

From this stems the search for an existence where there is Fortune (our happiness), but the Greeks who used reference to the goddess Fortuna (picture), knew well that it was not related to the possession of goods, as stated Heraclitus of Ephesus: “if the If happiness were in the pleasures of the body, we would say happy oxen when they find peas to eat”, some prefer peas.

When we do not live the repetition as expounded by Professor Giacóia in the sense of seeking the essence, we enter the repetition of sameness that lives from fear, which leads us to live in impropriety, we do not attribute meaning (or meaning some prefer), we let others and circumstances attribute it, we live the worst alienation, the alienation of ourselves, running everywhere with full and empty agendas at the same time, frivolities said Sloterdik.

We live for a purpose that has no end, in the sense of goal, but “borrowed” meanings of daily life, conjunctures and contexts. Anguish produces the opposite effect. It opens up the possibility of finding what I am within a proper sense of life.

It is the reunion with the Self, open to the world and the Other, without implying either individual closure or depersonalization of the environment, today with the strong pressure of psychopower, as thinker Byung Chul Han defines the essential pressure of this time.

What we seek, what is our goal, should ultimately be seen as end, never as temporal: money, power, wealth or simply some vanity.

 

Joy and dialogue

05 Jan

It is practically impossible to think of opposite poles, but in hermeneutic dialogue it is possible to put preconceptions aside to fuse horizons.
They are opposite poles that produce energy, for example, they are opposing forces that maintain equilibrium, the imbalance is precisely one force breaking the other as is the case of atomic fission, which produces a bomb, but still dominated is an energy.

Respect for the Other, in times of a pandemic, means observing the distance, wearing masks and showing solidarity with those who suffer the effects of the pandemic, also in the social question.

The importance of principles, or spirituality or even the divine among us, is necessary for this to be done without the possibility of rupture being the only alternative, and sometimes it is.
The joy we experience when we open ourselves to others, giving up even our own preconceptions (we all have concepts about life, the truth, etc.) is inconceivable, but always real.
The problem raised by the philosophy of the Other, which is not the same, is the first principle for authentic dialogue, in times of global citizenship it will be more than necessary, it will be the only rich source for dialogue and harmony between peoples and cultures.
The non-acceptance of the Other, whether culturally, socially or ethnically is the reason for current conflicts, beyond acts done without any ethics, but that Spinozian ethic that each has its purpose. Joy is possible even in dark times,

 

Between fear and trust

04 Jan

The struggle for power and the greed of great profits invaded all environments and a factor that leads to an environment is mistrust, in general it is the result of fears that the pandemic generated and anxiety about the vaccine.

Fear of the different, the unconventional and dare, think in frontier areas or even outside the sciences, the mysteries, spiritualities and the human.

There is a distance between trust and fear is discernment, almost always tied to the conventional.

To trust is to dare, it is to go against the Other, the different and the mystery.

The pandemic revealed two faces of humanity, a good one which is the capacity for resilience, respect for health and care for the Other, and a dark side of let it happen and see what happens. The posts will be shorter due to the vacation period, always providing some reflection .

 

 

Human-only eschatology

08 Dec

Two misconceptions about Christmas are that it is only the birth of Jesus, at least the historical Jesus must be admitted as a man who exists because there was a census when he was born, the second is what came and what will come, the advent is like that that (or that) that comes and will come.

Rereading the work Homo sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari presents a Darwinian evolutionary perspective showing how man imposed his life on the planet, contemplating three phases: the collector, the agricultural (and sedentary), the industrial and the modern phase of information intensive, and search align the structural elements that connect with the cultural order and its foundations.

In terms of its culture, the general beliefs shared in each phase, which he calls fictional myths, to which he attributes the indispensable social cohesion and the undertakings of each period.

Even though he is a Jew, who has a strong abramic eschatology, he refuses the existence of the soul, conscience and individuality, considering that science has not detected this, and that the remarkable achievements of contemporary science dispense with these existences.

His long and elaborate work which, in denying these metaphysical existential facts, takes the same path as the neologicists, of algorithms that would regulate even biological life, but consciousness is something so disconnected from intelligence and is that organisms are just algorithms.

The classic sense of the cosmos, explored since Plato, the energy required to trigger an algorithm of creation, the energy without which the very idea of ​​an algorithm cannot be sustained, is something that already pre-existed before the hominization of the cosmos (nature became himself) and what will be the future of this process about which Harari himself asks, without soul and awareness of this end.

These questions point to an eschatology, beginning and end, and we do not have a bet on a distant or near end if we do not have answers on a principle, the eschatological logic of Being.

Although Harari’s eschatology is not complete, there is no transcendence, he realizes that we are close to a very dangerous civilizing threshold, both in the human aspect and in the balance of nature, and that man will be able to accomplish this task alone without something superior.

 

 

 

Possible pax

05 Dec

It is not social, political or ethical peace that is always in conflict, although there are integrative movements and a worldwide tendency towards global citizenship, living in the village (with communications is global) and feeling a citizen of the world.
The next generation will be able to accomplish this, the “mature” generation now has setbacks in reading the present, and this has caused fear and distrust by breaking feelings of respect and otherness.
The measures of force are discouraging and reprocessing of the social process, moving towards autocracies and arbitrariness, they are never democratic.
The pax roman was submission to the central power of Rome, the peace of Westphalia was a treaty of religious tolerance among Christians and eternal peace the idealistic dream in the power of the modern state.
Possible peace is tolerance of differences and acceptance of human limits in times of crisis, depends on some dose of the spiritual.

 

Vaccines under test and an economic dispute

30 Nov

Even recognizing flaws in the theses, Pfizer’s vaccines against covid-19 should be approved within a few days, the Financial Times reported on Sunday, so the United Kingdom becomes the first country in the west to have a vaccine, and vaccination can begin. on December 7, in Brazil, the race is for Coronavac, no matter which one is safer, behind the vaccines there are economic deals and investments made in the manner of betting and not really scientific criteria.

In Brazil the authorization is made by Anvisa, in Europe by the European Medicines Agency and the departure of the United Kingdom from the European Union, a final Brexit transition is for December 31, but the Regulatory Agency for Medicines and Health Products in the United Kingdom has the power to temporarily authorize the products, and there is an obvious interest in the UK even though it is in partnership with German BioNTech.

The process could be applied to the vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford (Brazil participates in FioCruz), on Sunday, Friday (27) the government asked the regulator to review the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine, thus showing the real interest .

Current data on the efficiency of Coronavac, a medical vaccine by the Chinese company Sinovac and which has a partnership with the Butantan Institute, should be announced in early December, and an approval in record time would be for January, however the effectiveness is different from the tests that verify side effects, contraindications and long-term efficiency, also a Pfizer was questioned recently due to the tests.

The long-term effects studies indicated that perhaps a single vaccine would not solve the pandemic problem, an article was published in October in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, which lit up a warning sign about vaccines, and said that he did not know until that time. data if vaccines were candidates were effective in severe forms of the disease, the warning sign remains on.

What defines an efficacious COVID-19 vaccine? A review of the challenges assessing the clinical efficacy of vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 – The Lancet Infectious Diseases

 

 

 

 

Eschatology and being-to-death

24 Nov

Where we came from and where we are going, each culture has its own eschatology, modernity and especially idealism is characterized by disregarding the idea of ​​the infinite, of mystery and consequently of death, seen as fatality or simple finitude of life.

From the philosophy of Lévinas (Totality and Infinite) to the poetry of Goethe (Faust), from the novel by Tolstoy (The death of Ivan Ilitch) to the ontology of Heidegger (Being and Time) death is more than a concept or a theme, it is the own questioning of being, in Lévinas the infinite is proper to the transcendent being as transcendent, the infinite is the absolutely other, so one cannot think of the infinite, the transcendent, the Foreigner (in Lévinas) as being an object, but as an Other that does not it is something other than Being.

Idealism, in wanting to always live above the real, wants to ignore or “transcend” death (in the false sense of an object) and for this reason is quibble about it, but in the face of the tragedies of a pandemic, of a crisis that can become civilizing, he is immobilized or part of psychology, in this field there is also an adequate phenomenological treatment, after all Franz Brentano father of social psychology reopened phenomenology in modern times, the psychiatrist Kübler-Ross (About death and dying, Martins Fontes, 2002) studied that stage of the disease in which the patient asks “Why me” and deepened the theme.

The analysis in Heidegger, in order not to be superficial, must address three related themes: Care, Impersonality and silence, otherwise it is the analysis that we call epistemology or incomplete eschatology, since they face only pessimism in the face of death, nor the good psychology sees it that way.

Before a clarification, the term ontological refers to questioning the fact of existing, Dasein (being-there) is not only, but has a perception that it is, for phenomenology, it is not thought of itself first and then in the world, because the two things are inseparable, and so is an ontological epistemology.

To help what this being-there is, we need to deepen what Heidegger calls overcoming the factual world, and as for the super the world of impersonality, he manages to free himself from a structured reason endowed with meaning, in a way already given the to exist and to be.

Safranski, an authorized biographer of Heidegger, interprets it this way: “Anguish does not tolerate another god besides itself, and isolates in two ways. It breaks the relationship with the other, and makes the isolated individual fall out of relations of familiarity with the world ”, she is felt by the“ fall ”, by the dark horizon.

Thus, in impersonality, the idea of ​​“everyone dies” is abandoned, which in life evades being-for-death, for its thinking about its solitary death, falls into that anguish described in Ivan Ilitch de Tolstoi.

Regarding Care, Heidegger appropriates the Greek fable in which Jupiter and Care that is shaping clay fight over the name that will be given to the created figure, and called Saturn as a judge he says that Jupiter will belong to the spirit because it was he who gave it the form, while Care will have the land, since it formed it, the German philosopher will use this sense, very ingenious, to say the being-for-death to find something beyond the finitude of the form.

Finally, the aspect of silence nad loneliness are invoked to discover the self, and then to return to the world already master of itself, and open to the relationship with others, which is no longer utilitarian ( so characteristic of idealists) or even by means of fixed guidelines (characteristic of incomplete eschatologies), there is thus a Being beyond the finite and open to the infinite, there is no pessimism, which says it is bad reading

 

 

Native culture networks and post-colonialism

23 Nov

Archaeological and paleontological research indicates that Africa is the probable continent that gave rise to the human species, fossils of hominids found in Africa (for example, in Tanzania and Kenya) indicate that the primitive species inhabited that region about five million years ago .

However. in historical literature, when speaking of originating cultures, there is talk mainly of ancient cultures such as the Maya in Mexico, the Incas in the Andean region, the indigenous people mainly from the Brazilian Amazon region, in Colombia the population is almost two million inhabitants, 4 , 4% that has the Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC), which are organizing according to covid-19.

In the Amazon, the Sahu-Apé indigenous community is only 80 km from Manaus, and organizational data (such as Terra Viva) show that 65% of the indigenous population is in poverty and 30% in extreme poverty.

In Peru, a large number of indigenous cultures are returning to the mountains due to food scarcity and fear of covid-19, often only with the clothes of the body, in Chile and Bolivia the influence of indigenous culture is very strong to dominate the colonial.

Thus, these peoples form communication networks for the preservation of their culture and the self-defense of their cultural values, and it is necessary to think about sustainable development, not massacres, as savage colonialism did, not only with violence, but also with their cultural values.

Modern electronic networks, which are social media, do not eliminate or overlap existing cultural networks, it is necessary not to ignore them and respect their values ​​and culture.

The question of Being also involves the sociability and networking of native cultures, a good part of contemporary culture in crisis ignores or quibbles about the ontological values ​​that are at the root of many works around native cultures, it is necessary to think post- colonial that does not see the civilizing process only from the Eurocentric and colonial point of view.

See my interview in USP Radio, University of São Paulo, at 10 h (in New York) at link: www.radio.usp.br/?page_id=5404 .

 

 

An incomplete epistemology and eschatology

22 Nov

What phenomenology and ontological philosophy seeks is at the center of the scientific crisis and of the thought that the West is experiencing, and whose epicenter is European, in Peter Sloterdijk’s enlightened saying that Europe is no longer the center as in the colonial period (empire of the Center) and looks for other forms of colonialism to take idealism forward, what in literature has been called epistemicide. In denying the cultures originating from other peoples, he thinks he is finding his own diffusion between barbarism and classical antiquity, he tries a new renaissance exploring the Greek culture in a diffuse way.

At the religious level the disaster is greater, Slavov Zizek recently wrote about the religious concept in Hegel, and the latter of the thinkers who tried to revive classical Marxism, reworked the Hegelian religion, but which was already present in Feuerbach and Marx himself criticized, in the bottom is an atheistic theology, a dead eschatology.

Dead because this is in fact the great mistake of idealistic eschatology, there is no transcendence for it without the separation of subject and object, it needs to deny the substantiality to affirm its “subjectivity” where the subject must always be dead, it denies being-for-dead Heidegger’s motto, but affirms death in life (it isnt epoché).

Every form of original culture, it is obvious that it includes those non-Christian cultures, has an origin (the name says it), the eschatological life and end, which is not where it is going, and at this point this incomplete theology diverges on the that in fact is death, in times of a pandemic one could say the disease that can kill.

For this reason, even if the appeal to phenomenology will be incomplete, it will lead those who incorporate it to exhaustion, to contempt for life, which even in the religious sense is something deeply sacred, its “biós”, its substantiality, to be clear to idealists, its objectivity, fall into theoretical abstractionism.

The only substantiality of this incomplete eschatology is to deny religion in order to make it idealistic and to ask for what is inhuman, what in biblical terms he calls “putting heavy burdens on the shoulders of others” and which they themselves refuse to carry in times of pandemic neither enter nor let others in.

The final exam will be substantial: “I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink…” and you will not be asked whether you have developed a good epistemology or theology, the one that made colonialism the terror of original cultures.

 

Civilization crisis and death

05 Nov

Returning to Pablo Picasso’s thought that the worst loss of life is not dying, but dying while we live is the one that best explains the civilizing state, even those who owe fraternity, dialogue, the planet as a common home seems hopeless and therefore tired , not that tiredness of the Society of Tiredness that is also a crisis, but that of those who have failed to find what unites, the positive and the true.

To speak of the post-truth, the sophistry is pre-Socratic, and the public lie has also been conveyed by newspapers and television channels, according to the political side they take, in the end everyone agrees that if you are not on the politically correct side, it is not true, so we remain in relativism and dualism, even those who preach against it, Edgar Morin is right is a crisis of thought, and Peter Sloterdijk is also “not a favorable time for thinking”, it is easier to take a side, although there are mistakes and successes on several sides, because there are only two.

I saw on Instagram that two very popular videos are of a young artist who makes puppets with skeletons, birds and funeral figures and another of a girl whose hair was decorated like a cemetery (figure above), it is a sad reality the post-Goths seem to dominate youthful fantasy.

In a BBC report on October 31, poor banker Muhammad Yunus stated: “We need to redesign the system by guaranteeing a new economy of three zeros: zero poverty, zero unemployment and zero net carbon emissions. And we know how to do it. The problem is that we are very lazy and we are very comfortable in the system we have, we don’t want to leave our comfort zone ”, is a new thinking may not work, but without a doubt people, the poor and the planet need answers, the old ones create more polarization and misunderstandings, in addition to post-truths, in this case with a new meaning, from an ideological point of view they were once true, today they are post-true.

There are situations and I think that the planet itself can react, an aortic reaction, the inorganic one over the organic one, after all we came from the dust, from some chemical reaction and certainly if we don’t change the route we will go back to the dust, not that life’s fatality physical personal death, but dying in life.

The question that remains is whether this reaction from the inorganic planet could change something in the human organic, your mind, your being, for something better.