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On Human(ist[ic])Thought

Three popular poets.  Rilke, Neruda, Rumi.

Like water language flows downhill, seeking the easist path.

The Cartesian cogito ergo sum is itself part of consciousness hence unreliable, as any logician can tell you. Its either/or excluded middle proposition falls preys to Russell’s paradox, since it includes itself in what it ex- / in-cludes….

Law of excluded middle

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-is-russells-paradox/

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Zermelo

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zermelo_set_theory

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Incomplete Dialectics of the Woke

I would love to have the chance to lecture the offended Ottawaian anglo-students, many of whom are not black, that their attack on racism is essentially racist. Exactly the case in the US with the Woke, who are surprisingly though incompletely “dialectical” in their reactions. Thesis –> Antithesis –> …  but NO SYNTHESIS.

At least in the Sartrian (Hegelian) reading of Négritude there was a Aufhebung, a sublimation, an erasure, if you like, of the conflict, a transformation of its terms, per Sartre though not in fact, into universal post-racial citizenship and thus into class conflict.

https://dl1.cuni.cz/pluginfile.php/489096/mod_resource/content/1/03b%20-%20Orphée%20noir%20-%20Sartre.pdf

Dammit, I said all this clearly in my 1977 dissertation, which has had zero effect in/ on the World 😉

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Loaded Diplomatic Words

The Chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel, crafted or had crafted a superb note of official congratulation to the newly-elected US President. Dripping with irony but absolutely correct in terms of expected language, formula and cliché, Kantian to boot.

“Germany and America are bound by their values: democracy, freedom, the respect for the law and the dignity of human beings, independent of their origin, skin color, religion, gender, sexual orientation or political position. On the basis of these values I offer the future president of the United States, Donald Trump, close cooperation.”

„Deutschland und Amerika sind durch Werte verbunden : Demokratie, Freiheit, Respekt vor dem Recht und der Würde des Menschen, unabhängig von Herkunft, Hautfarbe, Religion, Geschlecht, sexueller Orientierung oder politischer Einstellung. Auf der Basis dieser Werte biete ich dem künftigen Präsidenten der Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika, Donald Trump, eine enge Zusammenarbeit an.“

Full report in the FAZ: http://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/inland/deutschlands-politiker-reagieren-gemischt-auf-trump-14520543.html