The tree has fallen and the vine has withered. The men again build wooden houses. They do not learn from those down South and their adobe, real adobe, or rammed earth. The wood house lasered to ash, but the tree and vine remains standing, it's leaves intact. A small fire grows within. It is the metal that burnt into molten. What would the sage say to this?
Xunzi diagnosed the main cause of disorder as a breakdown of the social hierarchy. When hierarchical distinctions are confused and people do not follow their proper roles, they compete indiscriminately to satisfy their desires. The way to put limits on this competition is to clarify social distinctions: such as between ruler and subject, between older brother and younger brother, or between men and women. When everyone knows their place and what obligations and privileges they have, they will not contend for goods beyond their status. Not only will this result in order and stability, it actually will allow for greater satisfaction of everyone’s desires than the competition of the state of nature. This is the primary purpose of ritual: to clarify and enforce social distinctions, which will bring an end to contention for limited resources and improve social order. This, in turn, will ensure greater prosperity. The ritual tradition not only emphasized reciprocal obligations between people of different status, it had extremely precise regulations concerning who was allowed to own what kind of luxuries. There were rules concerning what colors of clothing different people could wear, who was allowed to ride in carriages, and what grave goods they could be buried with. The point of all these rules is to enforce the distinctions necessary for social harmony and prevent people from reaching beyond their station…
Perhaps you speak sarcastically, perhaps not. Ah, well, perhaps in the East and India. But for this striving beyond station, we would not have known Abe Lincoln, or BB Thornton, Shawn Connery, or David Bowie. My Dad could never have become an architect, poor boy from Quebec, while his brothers toiled on the auto line. They could only afford to send one son to college. Why strive for improvement if there is no tangible return?
Sure. I understand though by this idea moderns have of station is an outcome of a process leading to our quite obvious degradation as persons. The modes of music changed say not only with Dixieland Jazz but with Stockhausen and DADA on to Swing, Big Band, Negro Jazz, Elvis and Rock. Life is not democratic. We are post-Christian, and it is a legacy, a residue, of concepts drawn forth from Christianity used by our eyes see out on the social world. The notions we hold of the human person are only feasible if all humans are spiritually equal. And there is no need to presume such universality outside of the Christian humanist imprint.
I am not ancient Chinese, however I believe station in the Confucian eye is more like Greek arete. Aristotle deliberated on the various goals of education: including practical skills, arete, and theory.
Educating towards arete means boys would be educated towards things that are useful in life. However, there is no agreement about what constitutes arete, which leads to disagreement about how to train students for arete.
The phrase 'what am I here for' comes to mind, in the sense of asking how the self fits uniquely into current puzzles called life. No two of us are meant for the exact same things, and yet, we are in so many ways exactly the same. It is a challenge to fufill the potential one has in the most natural, direct way possible. Discernment vs programming. Thank you for expanding your answer, Steigel. I appreciate it.
Mighty Odin, what we have here is a loser, a whiner, a whinger. A man watching a mighty opponent on the battlefield and his first words are "fukk me retreat". The question is will he retreat to re-engage or is this the last we see of him? What we have here is a man who pledged his allegiance to the King of England as soon as the Redcoats marched ashore. Unfortunately, this man hasn't even bothered to lift his fingers from the keyboard to join the resistance. Now, I have no idea what's happened in his life to squash his life force but it's sad to read.
Meet the Old Boss pawn, same as it ever was. Freedom remains firmly a fetish for Trumptards. And under the other team a mockery of a public too stupid to overthrow. “There is no objective Right or Wrong: each race or class can invent its own code or ‘ideology’ just as it pleases,” Lewis wrote. “[N]ow if the post-Christian view is the correct one, then we have indeed waked from a nightmare.”
And if not? “Day after day the wind blows away the pages of our calendars, our newspapers, and our political regimes, and we glide along the stream of time without any spiritual framework, without a memory, without a judgment, carried about by “all winds of doctrine” on the current of history, which is always slipping into a perpetual past. Now we ought to react vigorously against this slackness—this tendency to drift. If we are to live in this world we need to know it far more profoundly; we need to rediscover the meaning of events, and the spiritual framework which our contemporaries have lost.”
—Jacques Ellul, The Presence of the Kingdom (p. 138)
The tree has fallen and the vine has withered. The men again build wooden houses. They do not learn from those down South and their adobe, real adobe, or rammed earth. The wood house lasered to ash, but the tree and vine remains standing, it's leaves intact. A small fire grows within. It is the metal that burnt into molten. What would the sage say to this?
Xunzi diagnosed the main cause of disorder as a breakdown of the social hierarchy. When hierarchical distinctions are confused and people do not follow their proper roles, they compete indiscriminately to satisfy their desires. The way to put limits on this competition is to clarify social distinctions: such as between ruler and subject, between older brother and younger brother, or between men and women. When everyone knows their place and what obligations and privileges they have, they will not contend for goods beyond their status. Not only will this result in order and stability, it actually will allow for greater satisfaction of everyone’s desires than the competition of the state of nature. This is the primary purpose of ritual: to clarify and enforce social distinctions, which will bring an end to contention for limited resources and improve social order. This, in turn, will ensure greater prosperity. The ritual tradition not only emphasized reciprocal obligations between people of different status, it had extremely precise regulations concerning who was allowed to own what kind of luxuries. There were rules concerning what colors of clothing different people could wear, who was allowed to ride in carriages, and what grave goods they could be buried with. The point of all these rules is to enforce the distinctions necessary for social harmony and prevent people from reaching beyond their station…
Perhaps you speak sarcastically, perhaps not. Ah, well, perhaps in the East and India. But for this striving beyond station, we would not have known Abe Lincoln, or BB Thornton, Shawn Connery, or David Bowie. My Dad could never have become an architect, poor boy from Quebec, while his brothers toiled on the auto line. They could only afford to send one son to college. Why strive for improvement if there is no tangible return?
https://youtu.be/QymJI00mlSs?si=u0cTdw1ZPA2SqNf5
Station to Station D. Bowie
[Chorus 1]
The return of the Thin White Duke
Throwing darts in lovers' eyes
[Verse 1]
Here are we, one magical moment
Such is the stuff, from where dreams are woven
Bending sound, dredging the ocean
Lost in my circle
Here am I, flashing no colour
Tall in this room overlooking the ocean
Here are we, one magical movement
From Kether to Malkuth
There are you, drive like a demon
From station to station
[Chorus 1]
The return of the Thin White Duke
Throwing darts in lovers' eyes
The return of the Thin White Duke
Throwing darts in lovers' eyes
The return of the Thin White Duke
Making sure white stains
See upcoming rock shows
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[Part 2]
[Verse 2]
Once there were mountains on mountains
And once there were sun birds to soar with
And once I could never be down
Got to keep searching and searching
And oh, what will I be believing
And who will connect me with love?
Wonder who, wonder who, wonder when
Have you sought fortune, evasive and shy?
Drink to the men who protect you and I
Drink, drink, drain your glass, raise your glass high
[Verse 3]
It's not the side-effects of the cocaine
I'm thinking that it must be love
[Chorus 2]
It's too late to be grateful
It's too late to be late again
It's too late to be hateful
The European canon is near
[Verse 4]
I must be only one in a million
I won't let the day pass without her
[Chorus 2]
It's too late to be grateful
It's too late to be late again
It's too late to be hateful
The European canon is here
[Verse 5]
Should I believe that I've been stricken?
Does my face show some kind of glow?
[Chorus 2]
It's too late to be grateful
It's too late to be late again
It's too late to be hateful
The European canon is here, yes it's here
It's too late, It's too late
It's too late, It's too late
It's too late
The European canon is near
[Interlude]
[Verse 3]
It's not the side-effects of the cocaine
I'm thinking that it must be love
[Chorus]
It's too late to be grateful
It's too late to be late again
It's too late to be hateful
The European canon is here
[Verse 4]
I must be only one in a million
I won't let the day pass without her
[Chorus]
It's too late to be grateful
It's too late to be late again
It's too late to be hateful
The European canon is here, yes it's here
[Verse 5]
Should I believe that I've been stricken?
Does my face show some kind of glow?
[Chorus]
It's too late to be grateful
It's too late to be late again
It's too late to be hateful
The European canon is here, yes it's here
It's too late, It's too late
It's too late, It's too late
It's too late
The European canon is here
Sure. I understand though by this idea moderns have of station is an outcome of a process leading to our quite obvious degradation as persons. The modes of music changed say not only with Dixieland Jazz but with Stockhausen and DADA on to Swing, Big Band, Negro Jazz, Elvis and Rock. Life is not democratic. We are post-Christian, and it is a legacy, a residue, of concepts drawn forth from Christianity used by our eyes see out on the social world. The notions we hold of the human person are only feasible if all humans are spiritually equal. And there is no need to presume such universality outside of the Christian humanist imprint.
I am not ancient Chinese, however I believe station in the Confucian eye is more like Greek arete. Aristotle deliberated on the various goals of education: including practical skills, arete, and theory.
Educating towards arete means boys would be educated towards things that are useful in life. However, there is no agreement about what constitutes arete, which leads to disagreement about how to train students for arete.
Wiki observes-The meaning of the word changes depending on what it describes since everything has its own excellence; the arete of a man is different from the arete of a horse. This way of thinking originates from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plato, where it can be seen in the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory_of_the_Cave.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arete#cite_note-4 In particular, the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristocracy was presumed, essentially by definition, to be exemplary of arete:
The root of the word is the same as aristos, the word which shows superlative ability and superiority, and aristos was constantly used in the plural to denote the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobility.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arete#cite_note-5
The phrase 'what am I here for' comes to mind, in the sense of asking how the self fits uniquely into current puzzles called life. No two of us are meant for the exact same things, and yet, we are in so many ways exactly the same. It is a challenge to fufill the potential one has in the most natural, direct way possible. Discernment vs programming. Thank you for expanding your answer, Steigel. I appreciate it.
I take it to mean that we are free to do wrong.
Actually deeper still than my yes. We are free. Beyond then Good and Evil acts lies the human being in existential freedom.
Yes.
Nope. Not a clue. Being in a basement too long does that to a man.
Mighty Odin, what we have here is a loser, a whiner, a whinger. A man watching a mighty opponent on the battlefield and his first words are "fukk me retreat". The question is will he retreat to re-engage or is this the last we see of him? What we have here is a man who pledged his allegiance to the King of England as soon as the Redcoats marched ashore. Unfortunately, this man hasn't even bothered to lift his fingers from the keyboard to join the resistance. Now, I have no idea what's happened in his life to squash his life force but it's sad to read.
Sucker born every minute smokin’ that hopium and drinking that MAGA wine. https://visupview.blogspot.com/2017/10/goodfellas-hidden-history-of-resorts.html
Meet the Old Boss pawn, same as it ever was. Freedom remains firmly a fetish for Trumptards. And under the other team a mockery of a public too stupid to overthrow. “There is no objective Right or Wrong: each race or class can invent its own code or ‘ideology’ just as it pleases,” Lewis wrote. “[N]ow if the post-Christian view is the correct one, then we have indeed waked from a nightmare.”
And if not? “Day after day the wind blows away the pages of our calendars, our newspapers, and our political regimes, and we glide along the stream of time without any spiritual framework, without a memory, without a judgment, carried about by “all winds of doctrine” on the current of history, which is always slipping into a perpetual past. Now we ought to react vigorously against this slackness—this tendency to drift. If we are to live in this world we need to know it far more profoundly; we need to rediscover the meaning of events, and the spiritual framework which our contemporaries have lost.”
—Jacques Ellul, The Presence of the Kingdom (p. 138)