Social promotion and public goods
26
Jul
The promotion of social life and the true 
administration of public goods (water, energy and sanitation) are the true basic inputs for the social promotion of human life, but this is what is only seen in electoral advertisements, they show riches that will be accessible to everyone , but few and only at election time.
Talking about hunger is the slogan of many elections around the world, but the conditions that are sustainable for this are little or almost never understood, and they depend on a greater balance in world markets and guarantees for imports and exports of basic inputs, including for health.
Economic crises, basically, are an imbalance between the production and distribution of essential goods and consumption, and arise in isolated sectors of the economy, it is not necessary for there to be a shortage of various goods, it is a cascading imbalance and capital and stock exchanges are more reflections of the origin of these crises, which include wars and revolutions.
Natural factors can also influence (droughts, floods, epidemics or some major event such as an earthquake or an atomic crisis that is now possible).
Therefore, the true treasures must be those that lead humanity to greater balance and sustainability, including care for nature, as the production of food, energy and even less essential consumer goods depend on it.
The true treasures, even if we only think about the earthly ones, forgetting the spiritual ones that give us comfort and true joy, are those that provide greater civilizing understanding, tolerance between races and cultures, and those that include the spiritual plane.
The increasingly growing culture of individualism, hatred (of different types), the accumulation of goods as a symbol of happiness, the consumption of even the human body and mind lead to the opposite path of those who want to build real treasures.
Illusions pass away, moths consume, time rusts or rots, but what remains is essential and a true spiritual asceticism depends on it, a good that glimpses into future generations, and for those who believe, eternity.
Illusions pass away, moths consume, time rusts or rots, but what remains is essential and a true spiritual asceticism depends on it, a good that glimpses into future generations, and for those who believe, eternity.
Thus, the current crisis is, at its base, a crisis of thought, of ethical and solidarity values, of mutual respect and of clarity about what it means to build true treasures.
In the Bible, Jesus takes a few loaves and fish and distributes it, the meaning is very direct and simple: little distributed feeds everyone, and poorly distributed causes opulence for some and hunger and misery for many.
Spirit and power
25
Jul
Power and autorithy seem to get confused, but this is not true
as authoritarian governments are growing in the world and this has always been a bad symptom of civilization because it indicates both disputes and, at their limit, wars.
Byung-Chul Han in his book “In the Swarm” explains after saying about the necessary distance in the public sphere, that the “waves of indignation indicate, moreover, a weak connection with the community” (Han, In the Swarm, 20,18, pg. 22) and he has a specific book about power.
The book What is Power? (2019) has a long analysis of the issue in Hegel, this is justified both by the influence on Western thought and by the incidence of the vision of power that affects the entire public sphere, but we highlight his vague concept of the Absolute and the influence even religious , seen in the previous post.
Its analysis is important when it refers to ontological concepts, thus defining that “the entity is, even when it is finite, surrounded by the other” (Han, 2019, p. 110) and the Being must generate a negativity in itself, this is not the case here of “bad thoughts” but the concept that cites in Paul Tillich (1886-1965) that the power of being as “the capacity of living beings to overcome negativity, or as he says, “non-being”, that is, the who does not involve it in self-affirmation” (pg. 111).
Quoting him, Han states: “one has more power to be, because it must have been overcome but not to be, and as long as one can overcome it. When you can no longer bear it or overcome it, then it is total impotence, the end of the power of being, the event. This is the risk of every living being” (Han, 2019, p. 111).
He cites Foucault’s thesis that the human being would be “the result of submission” (pg. 118) and Hegel who thinks that power should act primarily in a “non-repressive way” (pg. 119) however, both do not abandon the idea from the Absolute, which actually comes from Machiavelli’s Prince and Thomas Hobbes’ Leviathan, and as the author says: “power promises freedom” (pg. 121).
The need to create a “neurotic” religion of power, for Hegel, would come from the idea of God, the power that He has the power to “be himself”, this comes from idealism that does not overcome the division between subject and object, or be the Creator and the created (beings and entities) are not composed.
There is no doubt that power, without the necessary negativity of non-being (the inclusion of the Other) is a neurosis as Hegel says, and thus its “god” or “the spirit” “would still be an appearance of this neurosis” (Han, 2019 , p. 121).
“The pain of finitude can perfectly be the pain of any limit that separates me from the other, which can only be overcome by the creation of a particular continuity… it does not have the continuity of the self that power creates. She does not have the intention of returning to herself” (Han, 2019, p. 121).
Hegel’s neurotic power is not that of the Creator, it is of the being caged in the self, incapable of looking at and serving the Other, of leaving the self, of denying oneself to serve the Other, it is a neurotic power.
The idealistic religion
24
Jul
Among the Young Hegelians, those who along
with Marx criticized the “old Hegelians”, especially David Strauss and Bruno Bauer, was Ludwig Andres Feuerbach (1804-1821) much better known for Karl Marx’s “Theses on Feuerbach” than for his own work, but his concepts, although criticized by Marx, also influenced him in addition to the other “new Hegelians” also known as the “Hegelian left”.
Feuerbach, coming from a Catholic environment, was educated in Protestantism, from a young age he was oriented towards religion, beginning his studies at the University of Heidelberg, but upon meeting Friedrich Hegel, he abandoned theology and became a student of this philosopher for two years, which provoked profound changes in his thinking and creates what I call here “idealistic religion”, but the God of Christianity is no longer Feuerbach’s god.
Hegel’s idea of the absolute is well known, where his “in itself” which is his “one” is not alienated from matter to finally emerge as “Absolute Spirit”, but man, as a conscious species, is the infinite itself and absolute, being man’s reason for his “liberation” to the detriment of indoctrination or Christianization (Feuerbach, 2013, p. 2-23) this God that man “imagines” is for the young Hegelian now in fact his own being, its own essence, it is necessary to understand that Being for idealists is not ontological Being, but rather an “anthropological” being.
Thus, religiosity, in the idealist analysis, would not be linked to an immaterial being, which transcends the human (idealist transcendence is the knowledge of the object), it is not a timeless and creative Being, but nature itself, in another way Spinoza also explored this .
Thus Feuerbach understands that man’s relationship with his “god”, which is different from other “young Hegelians” (Marx will criticize him), his god or gods, is founded on his own ex-sistence, a subject also explored in ontology, but seen as a relationship with “time” or temporal being.
The idealistic god is the one that man externalizes “is nothing more than the divinized essence” (Feuerbach, 2009, p. 29), in a way even more so as “the history of religion is the history of man” (Feuerbach, 2009 , p. 30) and here lies the dividing line with Marx because he sees history as his “mode of production”, the relationship with work and the means of production to carry it out: feudalism, capitalism, etc. Thus Feuerbach understands that man’s relationship with the supersensible, which for him “exists”, that is, has its ex-sistence, is in fact an “aesthetic pathology”, an amalgamation of mystical feelings that are at the same time the foundation and promoter of religiosity. : “Mourning and pain at the death of a person or at the diminution of light and heat, joy at the birth of a person, at the return of light and heat after freezing winter days or at the harvest, terror at phenomena in themselves terrible or at the least in man’s imagination… (Feuerbach, 2009, p. 49). So the big mistake, even for “religious people”, is to separate substantiality from spirituality, which is, in our view, the essence of false contemporary asceticism.
Feuerbach, Ludwig. (2009) Preleções sobre a Essência da Religião. Trad. José da Silva Brandão. Petrópolis/RJ. Editora Vozes.
Feuerbach, Ludwig. (2013) A Essência do Cristianismo. Trad. José da Silva Brandão. Petrópolis/RJ. Editora Vozes.
Common good and society
23
Jul
Those who imagine that the word is only linked
to religious, socialist views or natural goods (air, water and social well-being) are mistaken.
In fact, many economic theories have focused on the topic, from moral philosophers to public economists, in a list that includes Thomas Aquinas, Niccolò Machiavelli, John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Adam Smith, Karl Marx, although opposed Marx reread Adam Smith, John Stuart Mill in a utilitarian vision until John Maynard Keynes, in a vision of state interventionist in the economy.
Thomas Aquinas considered “the common good” (bonum commune, written in Latin) to be the goal of law and government; John Locke declared that “the peace, safety, and public good of the people” are the aims of political society, and further argued that “the welfare of the people shall be the supreme law”; David Hume argued that “social conventions” are adopted and receive moral support due to the fact that they serve the “public” or “common” interest, this in the social theory that structured the modern state.
The most advanced vision, within the framework of contractualism, was the vision defended by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, his theory does not do without two legitimizing components: the idea that everyone’s participation in the sovereignty of the social body (political equality) must be accompanied by a certain level of substantial equality, and second, a rational principle of political morality, which maintains the general will of the interests of those who are different from the true common interest.
If this vision were pursued: freedom, equality and fraternity would be composed in such a way as to adjust to the interest of the common good, however, recalls Edgar Morin in his book “Fraternity: to resist the cruelty of the world” (in Brazil published by Editora Palas Athena ) that the motto of the French revolution are not complementary, but need an effort, a practical and reflective human action to integrate and interact with each other.
There is also a modern discussion about the idea that the common good is never well managed except in private hands, the so-called Tragedy of the Commons, which was contested by economist Elinor Ostrom, the first female Nobel Prize winner in economics.
It does not mean that everything will pass into the hands of the state, or as Keynesian theory says the state should intervene in the economy, this does cause great tragedies and in Brazil good economists have goosebumps remembering the historical facts of these interventions: Collor plan, price freeze , etc. all caused great losses to the popular economy.
Tragedy of Communs was an initially successful text by Garrett Hardin, but he used environmental themes to justify this type of “tragedy”: the increase in consumption of natural resources, and on the other hand the way in which human beings organize themselves to extract these same resources, and this is part of the justification for the misuse of environmental resources.
The learning that Elinor Ostrom’s studies brought us is that the sustainable use of common good resources are alternative solutions to Hardin’s fatalism, for her both state ownership and privatization are subject to failure depending on the circumstances (Ostrom et al . 1999).
Ostrom et al (1999): Revisiting the Commons: Local Lessons, Global Challenges, Science, Vol. 284. no. 5412, pp. 278 – 28
Cyber blackout and wars
22
Jul
The blackout that happened last week is one of
the biggest in history, it caused confusion in many airports (see the US Flights chart bisede), TVs, banks, hospitals and services that depend on digital communication, but it was not with military motivation, the The company CrowStrike, behind the blackout, declared Friday (19) that “this was not a cyber attack” and that the company’s team “is fully mobilized to guarantee the security and stability of the company’s customers”.
According to an interview with Rob D’Amico, a former FBI agent, despite there being no military motivation: “They may not be involved in what happened, but they are observing what happened, what the reactions were, the response times, how this has been corrected, so that if they consider an offensive cyber operation against the United States, they can map what was done”, he said in a statement to CNN.
It is worth remembering that the historic beginning of the Internet was a project with DARPA, an American department for strategic projects that envisaged network operation that did not harm communication, so the first electronic network was called Arpanet.
This is extremely strategic because a cyber failure can leave both the communication system and the defense itself defenseless, which depends on communications to be activated, extremely weakening the system that is under attack.
Ukraine has announced that it has managed to directly affect Russia’s command and defense systems, while Russia seeks to weaken Ukraine’s energy supply system and land communication channels, it also plans a railway in its domains on Ukrainian soil, revealing tactics differentiated defense and attack.
As war rhetoric and everyday political and ideological wars advance, a greater than cybernetic blackout is announced, minds and souls become increasingly cloudy and the dark horizon hides hopes, refuges and clearings.
Those who fight and desire peace lack nothing, not even what war and hatred try to take away from everyday peace, the moment of rest and leisure, not that fantasy of orgy and false freedoms that destroy a fruitful and happy life, there is always a shadow, a clearing and a pause for breath in the midst of modern acceleration.
“Even if I pass through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil” (Psalm 23:4) says the psalmist of the dark period of the Hebrew people, and thus those who desire and fight for peace sing joyfully.
Painless society and the midnight library
19
Jul
Byung-Chul Han wrote the Palliative Society,
not only about the Pandemic, but also and above all about the search for a world without pain, we are even capable of suffering and great efforts due to narcissism and personal aesthetics, what Peter Sloterdijk called of “the exercise society”, but a despiritualized asceticism.
The novel by English writer Matt Haig: The Midnight Library, tells of a 35-year-old woman full of talents and few achievements, regretting her bad choices in life, she wonders if she could have lived differently, after losing her job and his cat is run over, he decides to take his own life, in the stage between life and death he finds the Midnight Library (picture illustration brazilian cover), with the possibilities of lives he could have lived.
With the help of an old friend, she decides to move to Australia and renew old relationships, discovering that it is possible to review life and undo something that we regret, to have hope.
Among Nora’s initial dramas, I highlight the part where she says: “I get a headache looking at… cell phones”, it’s not just her, it’s a lot of people, this takes away the capacity for reflection and silence that Byung-Chul Han claims, the one that can make us reflect on life and our actions.
Palliative society, according to Byung-Chul Han, has nothing to do with palliative medicine, explains the Korean-German philosopher: “Thus, every critique of society has to carry out a hermeneutics of pain. If pain is left solely to the burden of medicine, we miss its character as a sign” (Han, 2011).
It reminds me of a saying by Ernest Jünger: “Tell me your relationship with pain, and I will tell you who you are!”, so every social or social suffering must precede and precede moments of reflection, or as Byung-Chul likes it, a “Contemplative Life ” another essay by the author.
“The survival society completely loses the meaning of the good life. Enjoyment is also sacrificed to health elevated to an end in itself” (Han, 2021, p. 34), that is, the very absence of a “hermeneutic” of pain can lead to the end of the meaning of life.
It also clarifies Agamben’s meaning of homo sacer and via nude: “Without resistance we subject ourselves to the state of exception that reduces life to bare life” (Han, 2021, p. 34).
Anguish, loneliness and depression do not only have social causes, but what we feed our souls on, in the biblical passage that the prophet Isaiah goes to visit Ezekiel who is stricken with a deadly disease (Is 1,1-6) after the supplications of Hezekah through the word of Isaiah God frees him not only from the disease, giving him another 15 years of life, but also “I will free you from the hands of King Assyria, together with this city, which I place under my protection” ( Is 1:6).
Of course, the social solution is not magical, but we face it better if our pain is understood.
Haig, M. (2020) A Biblioteca da meia-noite (The midnight library). Translation: Adriana Fidalgo, Brazil, RJ: Editora Record, 2020.
Han, Byung-Chul. (2021) A sociedade paliativa: a dor hoje (The palliative society: pain today). Trans. Lucas Machado. Brazil: Rj, Petrópolis: Vozes.
Fatigue and true rest
18
Jul
Giving a psychological and sociological picture
of contemporary society Byung-Chul Han describes her as having “Neural diseases such as depression, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), borderline personality disorder (BPD) or Burnout Syndrome (SB) determine the pathological landscape of the beginning of the 21st century (HAN, 2017, p. 7).
Using a concept from his PhD advisor (he did his thesis on Heidegger) Peter Sloterdijk, his analysis extends to what he calls “the object of immunological defense is strangeness as such” (p. 8), the book was written before the pandemic ( also wrote about it in the Palliative Society, the one that rejects pain) and the concept of immunology here is one that states that the last century was a time in which a “clear division was established between inside and outside… the Cold War I followed the immunological regimen.”
Thus the book will explore the mystical concepts of Saint Gregory of Nazianzen, master of the contemplative life (of which Han also wrote a book), explores fundamental aspects of the inner life that combats the serious problems of the Active Life, which pushes us towards efficiency and tiredness under the pressure of demands and the cultural war that has taken place.
The immunological paradigm says “it is not in line with the process of globalization… also hybridization, which dominates not only the theoretical-cultural discourse, but also the feeling we have in today’s life, is diametrically contrary precisely to immunization” (p. 11).
His concept of resistance goes in the direction of Edgar Morin’s “resistance of the spirit”, but in our view it reaches the heart of the matter: “the dialectic of negativity is the fundamental feature of immunity” (p. 11), where the discourse of “engagement” is actually the void, as it is absent of true alternatives, as current immunology is one that accuses the Other, we remember here the distance from the pandemic (after the book as we said), a good “metaphor”.
Baudrillard quotes, speaking of the “obesity of all current systems”, in a time of overabundance, “the problem turns more to the rejection and expulsion” (pg. 15) of the Other.
His accurate elaboration on page 27 is that current “disciplinary systems” (or pseudo-ethical) seek the logic of production “what causes depression and exhaustion is not just the imperative to obey only oneself, but the pressure of performance” (p. 27).
Thus, meditating and completing is not distancing oneself from reality, but the possibility of looking at it with different eyes, seeking a true human and spiritual asceticism, where we can truly find rest and peace (despite and against daily wars and wars) because in truth is only possible through it.
I remember the biblical passage that says “come to me, all you who are tired” (Mt 11,28) and in a reinterpretation for today, in addition to seeking the divine, it is also about finding true interiority, which should not be disconnected from the vita activa, under penalty of tiredness.
Han, Byung-Chul. (2017) A Sociedade do Cansaço (Burnout Society), trans. Enio Paulo Giachini, 2nd. ed. Ampliada, Brazil, RJ: Petrópolis, Vozes.
Wisdom and simplicity
17
Jul
Among the various contemporary narratives,
one of the most absurd is the praise of ignorance as if it were an ally of simplicity and humility, from the “cultural” to the religious world this is transformed into narratives: he did not attend college, he did not read a book, did not walk among wise men, etc. Do not confuse this with the ability to live simply and among simple people.
It’s not a sign of the times, it’s not “generational”, it’s just a lack of interest in true asceticism, in an inner and outer growth that gives your human nature that something more that is the only thing capable of removing depression, anguish, anxieties and other illnesses. current.
The wise man is an observer, and observes not only the everyday scenes, those that different types of people live in, especially the simplest ones, but also the one who searches in the history of humanity for those peaks of civilizational moments that made us more people, more human. and more supportively, there are many examples, authors and people who gave us this.
We posted yesterday about fresh water and hot food, but in several regions this has interesting contours and cultural aspects, for example, in many countries there is no breakfast, an African told me, in Portugal there is breakfast which is a breakfast. simple morning, and in Brazil what is called breakfast is actually a small lunch.
What to read beyond is of course your personal belief, read the Bible, the Quran, the Vedas or what is sacred or culturally read in a certain culture, the red book in China for example, the second most read book in Brazil is The little prince, although Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist is 5th. in the world, but Iliad and Odyssey are still little read, King Lear and Othello by William Shakespeare are increasingly less known.
Of course, wisdom does not mean literary culture, but far from it it also becomes narrative in the sense that it ignores cultural history, the modern model of the novel is present throughout Western culture, and Honoré de Balzac and Gustave Flaubert are representatives for different tastes, but even for social criticism they should be read.
Someone can launch the philosophical argument, it is an entire Eurocentric culture, true, but it has been incorporated into everyday thoughts, nationalism through national colors is all over the world, freedom of expression, as the romantic Victor Hugo (Les Misarables (photo), in my opinion, the best of romantics said: “Not even a rule, nor models” is also an expression of individualism and personal heroism, but historical.
We made several posts about being, interiority and the complement of Contemplative Life with Active Life (Hannah Arendt and Byung-Chul Han in particular), about the methodology of the hermeneutic circle where we must listen to the text (and also the dialogues) for fusion of horizons and also the disaster of our Western culture and the need for resistance of the spirit.
Some fresh water and hot food
16
Jul
While the powerful fight for dominance,
colonization and power ignore the lives of simple people, of basic service workers who are necessary in any country and culture because they have forgotten true community and moral values.
They can talk about this in everyday life, but their minds, articulations and efforts are focused on achievements and power, not the achievement of a good friendship, of a few hours of relief and pleasure in a day to day life and in a society that pushes us towards maximum efficiency and fatigue. to the limit of strength.
When hiring some construction service workers, they told me that they would like that in order to work they needed good fresh water and hot food, lunch boxes needed to be reheated and sweat was restored with simple fresh water.
They are also grateful for a dignified treatment and a little rest after lunch, it is incredible that a large part of the affluent society is unaware of these simple things that can bring great happiness, balance and peace, the tired society ignores this.
The centers of power are surrounded by ambitious people who know (or think they know) how to deceive simple people, but they are unaware of the day-to-day lives of these people.
I see when they form conversation circles, the issues and concerns, there are almost always concerns about relationships that are lost, the use of violence and chemicals that permeate their family life, as human values crumble and fall as well. upon them the worst degradations and inhumanities.
A good word, it is also a little fresh water now in a figurative sense, but no less true, true cultures and religions keep this “fresh water” in their thermal jugs and where the food of the soul can be digested and provide energy for everyday life. .
The biblical passage in which Jesus speaks to the crowds, and his family seeks him, he has a surprising answer Mt 12,49-50: “And stretching out his hand to the disciples, Jesus said: “Here are my mother and my brothers. whoever does the will of my Father who is in heaven is my brother, my sister and my mother” “, does not mean that he ignores his family, but he wants to give those people some good food and fresh water.
The world we live in is not ignored, in fact those in power ignore it, but its good to bring a little peace and hope to the souls that survive in a society of tiredness, hatred and neglect.
Insecurity in Europe and attack in the USA
15
Jul
NATO decided to place American missiles in
Germany, the Tomahawk ballistic missiles, which can hit targets up to 2,500 km away and carry nuclear ammunition, there are also hypersonic weapons in development, which increase European firepower, Russia already has weapons of this type and which are already spread out in strategic locations.
The Russian reaction came through Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov “Europe is in the crosshairs of our missiles, our country is in the crosshairs of American missiles in Europe. We have already experienced this. We have enough capacity to contain these missiles, but the potential victims are the capitals of these European countries”, which would be the trigger for a 3G.
The fighting continues hard, a secret document reveals that the death toll is already immense in the war and Russia would have 750,000 soldiers killed or injured, the number in Ukraine, although unknown, must be close to this figure, and neighboring countries Poland, Latvia and Lithuania and the Scandinavians threaten to send troops if Ukraine becomes more fragile.
Former president and presidential candidate Donald Trump was attacked when he was holding a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, several shots were fired, killing one person and injuring another, Trump was hit in the ear and removed from the scene by his security guards, the shooter was killed and the FBI investigates the motivations, the first is clearly political.
Although the scenario is frightening and there is no shortage of warmongering spirits, at this moment there is a civilizing crisis installed because from the center of power to ordinary citizens there is an animosity that does not perceive the danger of intolerance, violence like this not only awakens more authoritarian spirits but also strengthens them, and should not receive applause from anyone.
The good news comes from Iran where the moderate Masoud Pezeshkian, President-elect of Iran claims to be willing to hold ‘constructive dialogue’ with the European Union, the announcement was made in an English-language newspaper bringing great hope.
