mind doesn’t matter, matter doesn’t mind
Picked this up recently, don’t remember where, but I think it is a nice way to capture parts of present times
Autore: Peter Herrmann's Blog
Dr. Peter Herrmann is a sociologist of German origin -- well, he was, before moving forward, being now ..., well, some say: social philosopher, permanently crossing borders between arts, economics, jurisprudence, philosophy, political science and .., yes, still sociology ... and having lost many links to the origins as fasr as nationality is concerned, trying to imagine that there is no border ...
the same or not …?
‘My dear child, they would have loved you if you had had two hundred thousand pounds,’ George replied. ‘That is the way in which they have been brought up. Ours is a ready-money society. We live among bankers and City big-wigs, and be hanged to them, and every man, as he talks to you, is jingling his guineas in his pocket. There is that jackass Fred Bullock is going to marry Maria—there’s Goldmore, the East India Director, there’s Dipley, in the tallow trade—OUR trade,’ George said, with an uneasy laugh and a blush. ‘Curse the whole pack of money- grubbing vulgarians! I fall asleep at their great heavy dinners. I feel ashamed in my father’s great stupid parties. I’ve been accustomed to live with gentlemen, and men of the world and fashion, Emmy, not with a parcel of turtle- fed tradesmen. Dear little woman, you are the only person of our set who ever looked, or thought, or spoke like a lady: and you do it because you’re an angel and can’t help it. Don’t remonstrate. You are the only lady. Didn’t Miss Crawley remark it, who has lived in the best company in Europe? And as for Crawley, of the Life Guards, hang it, he’s a fine fellow: and I like him for marrying the girl he had chosen.’[1]
So, did nothing change? Don’t we live also today in a
ready-money society. We live among bankers and City big-wigs, and be hanged to them, and every man, as he talks to you, is jingling his guineas in his pocket.
Sure there are differences. Searching on the www, using google[2], just “vanity fair” [one difference: there had not been anything like the internet in those years], brings a reference to Thackeray’s masterpiece on the 10th position, by linking to a film from 2004. Though admittedly earlier entries, especially concerned with the journal of that name, makes reference to the work of the novel.
The rest is on “Show, Star, Costume e Cultura” “Star e Gossip” “Abbonati a Vanity Fair” costumes ecc. And on the journal’s website there is a section on “VanityFairConfidential” which seems to be somewhat a contradiction in terms – may be this is new too, another difference. And we have more “global guineas”, jingling on TV-shows, political stages and the like.
But there are also these obvious similarities – I will think about it and probably will re-write the preface to the second edition of my earlier work on “The Organisation” which is to be published soon.
Taking it from the context of another discussion, the difference may be that today the (upper) middle class is very much involved in this jingling. But it is so not by way of redefined values, greed talking over but by a very “simple” mechanism of an accumulation regime that shifted away from its productive base towards finance, though necessarily happening when we look at the inherent mechanisms of capitalist accumulation. Such casino capitalism, as it is frequently called, makes “their great heavy dinners” possibly not more intelligent, but the willingness and instruments to make them publish are developed much further – and even reachable for (sure, only part of) the masses
me-domains, suggesting
“You are one step away from owning the domain name of your dreams.
Personalize your blog, business or website. The possibilities are endless. Get creative!”
also some encouragement
I luoghi – Spazi dove imparare, esercitarsi e discutere
and ultimately the
selfie
Talking about the latter, we should, of course, remember what Kant once wrote about Enlightenment:
Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-incurred immaturity. Immaturity is the inability to use one’s own understanding without the guidance of another. This immaturity is self-incurred if its cause is not lack of understanding, but lack of resolution and courage to use it without the guidance of another. The motto of enlightenment is therefore: Sapere aude! Have courage to use your own understanding![3]
And understanding surely does not equal exhibition.
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[1] William Makepeace Thackeray, 1847: Vanity Fair
[2] google Italy; 6/12/2014: app. 2:29)
[3] Immanuel Kant, 1784: An Answer to the Question: “What is Enlightenment?”; Koenigsberg in Prussia, 30th September, 1784.
Why does a Professor have to be treated like that? One of my colleagues here at the College whom I told my story looked at me, there was a silence, …
Publish and perish at Imperial College London: the death of Stefan Grimm
Shocking — the story itself; and that in so many ways we accept it, refrain from massive resistance …
And even already little resistance bears harsh consequences …
if we then add those who retire at an early stage, looking for something else, working outside of academia etc., the picture is quite frightening …
Still, also One scholar’s crusade may matter, is at least necessary …
The Church and Economy
I just finished the draft of another article which may one day end up in a small collection of theological writings – actually already my three volumes “Writings on Philosophy and Economy of Power”
New Princedoms; God, Rights, Law and a Good Society and Rights – Developing Ownership by Linking Control over Space and Time are reasonably full on this topic.
This time it is on Liberation Theology, a contribution written for an edited volume on Social Pedagogics in Latin America (Edited by Jacob Kornbeck and Xavier Úcar)
While writing, I came across this passage, from an article by Rachel Donadio in the New York Times (Francis’ Humility and Emphasis on the Poor Strike a New Tone at the Vatican; 25.5.2013:
“The economy has picked up again here,” said Marco Mesceni, 60, a third-generation vendor of papal memorabilia outside St. Peter’s Square. “It was so hard to sell anything under Benedict. This pope attracts huge crowds, and they all want to bring back home something with his smiling face on it.”
Much could be said – and is said already – on this pope, his charisma and his meaning for the development of catholicism; and much had been said about unintended consequences of action. In this case it is amazing in which way and to which extent we – even being pope – cannot escape commodification. of course, there is also a meaning for papal politics in it: the demand to take up responsibility in the world in which we live.
Indeed, we may then be grateful to read in the same article:
He has repeatedly returned to the euro crisis and the suffering it has caused in Greece and the Catholic countries of Southern Europe.
“If investments in the banks fail, ‘Oh, it’s a tragedy,’ ” he said, speaking extemporaneously for more than 40 minutes at a Pentecost vigil last weekend, after a private audience with the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, the architect of Europe’s austerity policies. “But if people die of hunger or don’t have food or health, nothing happens. This is our crisis today.”
Still, all this remains very limited: as important as moral statements are, it is important to work towards real redistribution, public responsibility and a new approach towards global economy, based in human rights:rights that have to go beyond protection and need to be enhanced by a fourth generation of Human Rights.
forgotten rights
Well, toilets are not the most favorite topics: we all use them, but we usually do not talk about them.
Did I say we all use them? Actually I received the other day a mail, linking me to a website with the heading
An amazing and alarming figure. Much has been done, but a lot remains to be done, indeed.
But looking at what is actually done is not less alarming: the use of “public” toilets is increasingly also absorbed in the stream of privatisation, i.e. you have to pay in train stations etc.; last year I used such facilities in a coffeeshop (one if not the one of the most widespread places not only in Germany) and read something like:
I am cleaning this toilet without being paid by the owner. I appreciate your donation.
Yes, I remember the word donation had been used and that the lady had not been paid by the owner.
All this, by the way, gets an additional slant if we think that more and more people in the so-called developed countries are homeless – for them this kind of privatisation is another obstacle in their life.
And there is another additional remark that may usefully be made: the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation are supporting the UN-initative: the 19th November now being World Toilet Day. Do something good and talk about it … – why not: don’t do any harm initially, then there is not so much reason for doing good to repair the damage.
wage – poverty – death rate II
After having recently written about wage, poverty and death rate, I just want to make readers aware of a post in another blog, by Paul Spicker, titled Feeding Britain. it is especially remarkable that it is about the situation in claimed “triumphant Britain” – some claims are just shames….
Where are we going?
Looking at the edition of the 25th of November 2013 of L’Osservatore Romano, and the online version of the article
Between Dignity and Transcendence
we read the report on the pope’s visit in Strasbourg, where he addressed the European Parliament and the Council of Europe.
Opening that page, I saw on the top one of Raphael’s most beautiful frescoes:
Now, one may take it simply as nice ornament. And actually meaningful as it is frequently claimed that Europe today has the still strong roots in ancient history in particular of Athens and Rome. Looking at Plato and Aristotle at the centre — it is surely a remarkable reference to European tradition then: can we interpret their appearance together as hinting to the claim for a “moral, ethical state”? Plato’s obviously pointing on a merger of dialectics and the trinity – we may take from the book in his hands: the Timeaus the famous passage:
“For whenever in any three numbers, whether cube or square, there is a mean, which is to the last term what the first term is to it; and again, when the mean is to the first term as the last term is to the mean—then the mean becoming first and last, and the first and last both becoming means, they will all of them of necessity come to be the same, and having become the same with one another will be all one”.
And we see Aristotle, holding the Nichomachean Ethics in his hands, as a kind of secular challenge, asking for the goodness in the here an now, guided by the two sets of virtues
- moral virtues are in his view prudence, justice, fortitude, courage, liberality, magnificence, magnanimity, temperance;
- intellectual virtues are in his view justice, perseverance, empathy, integrity, intellectual courage, confidence in reason, autonomy.
There is so much more in it, even the positioning of the various colleagues of the two central figures is telling: For instance Diogenes – the personification of putting into practice of complete modesty and self-sufficiency – somewhat degraded on the stairs, “scientists” as Heraclitus, Euclid or Parmenides somewhat sidelined, working “on the ground”, though it is left open if this is meant to be a positive or a negative reference to the “exact sciences”.
But there we may actually hesitate, assuming that is not so open.
Obviously, at Raphael’s time such fresco had not been a standalone work, and indeed we all know that it is part of La Stanza Della Segnatura, The Room of the Signature. And such “being part of” means nothing less than the different sides of the room being in a “communicating relationship.
This means that the Scuola di Atene is actually only one part of a wider dispute: it is confronted with
accompanied on the one side by the
and on the other side by
Taken together it reflects the dispute between philosophy, theology sidelined by jurisprudence and poesy.
It may be open for dispute in which way La Stanza actually is mainly a reference to humanism and universalism. And it may be left open in which way each of them finally has to be defined. In any case the perspective in particular of the two main sides is eye-catching: the philosophers, “walking out” of the painting, into the room and slightly stepping down … passing the realities: “exact science” science (Heraclitus, Euclid or Parmenides) and “self-chosen modesty” (Diogenes), from there taking us – all of us who are standing in the middle of La Stanza, and thus being part of the entire scene, part of this history – with them: now “ascending”, open for the dispute of the sacrament which is not much different from the last judgement (for that, of course, my favourite is that by Rubens — former students of mine may remember the tour I made with them through the Alte Pinakothek and the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich.
Having read the speech in Strasbourg and the interview Francesco gave on the return trip, I realise that … – I think I realize just some surprise. Of course, Im a not against reference to some ancient philosophers — but I am surprised if we stepped from there only about 300 to 500 years (I know, generous with figures) forwards.
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Coming back to one on the lower levels, Parmenides. He reflected on
According to him there are two realities: the one of truth, i.e. the one that objectively is and cannot be changed; according to him, the other is a reality of opinion and appearances – deceitful and tempting on the basis of nothingness.
Sure, the solution sounds simple: acceptance of reality, rejection of appearance.
The tricky thing however is …, well, a world in which appearance is reality. In other words: a world in which a virtual economy: speculation on financial markets, faked insurance of risks which is assessed by corrupt systems … where such a world is the world of Parmedian truth.
Indeed, we have to return to Plato here, and to what he said about dialectics — and to how dialectics had been put on its feet, much later.
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Raphael, surely one of the most outstanding artists of the renaissance … —
— … the pope’s visit in Strasbourg under the umbrella of La stanza della Segnatura … —
— … the positioning of the event under the heading Between Dignity and Transcendence … —
all this may be a reminder to think about some aspects of what I wrote under the title
Prolegomena. Encore Citizenship – Revisiting or Redefining? in the book I edited under the title
World’s New Princedoms. Critical Remarks on Claimed Alternatives by New Life
(Amsterdam: Rozenberg Publishers, 2010 and Bremen/Oxford: academicpress, 2012)
Worrying and enlightening is in particular what had been said at the end of the interview, and it should be the Italian (as far I know original) version. It is about a certain denial of the past, of having been archbishop of Buenos Aires – though this personal history remains as such present, the emphasis is now laid on being successor of St. Peter which is strangely interpreted in a highly Eurocentric way. Is there so little from Latin American historical experience – past and present – that is worth to arrive at a truly global respective, a perspective that is inspired also by the wealth of indigenous people?
So, where are we going? And to where is the pope actually leading us?
It is something that needs to be discussed further – not so much the Vatican’s perspective but the perspective for instance emerging from the socialist movements in Latin America.
A tiny contribution may be found in a chapter I wrote for a book. The chapter is on
Social pedagogy and liberation theology,
written for a book titled
Latin American Social Pedagogy: relaying concepts, values and methods between Europe and the Americas”?
and
edited by Jacob Kornbeck and Xavier Úcar (forthcoming)
questionable beauty
Economists using mathematical expressions to decorate arguments about the perfection of market systems may believe that their work is beautiful. Outsiders see instantly that it isn’t. Quite apart from the messy problems and ugly realities of the economic world (capitalist or otherwise), no one with a sense of aesthetics would take the clumsy algebra of a typical professional economics article as a work of beauty. The main purpose of the math is not to clarify, or to charm, but to intimidate. And the tactic is effective. An idea that would come across as simpleminded in English can be made “impressive looking” with a sufficient string of Greek symbols. A complaint about the argument can be deflected, most easily, on the ground that the complainer must not understand the math.
(Galbraith, James K., 2014: The End of Normal. The Great Crisis and the Future of Growth; New York et altera: Simon & Schuster: 67)
But it being identified as not being an economist may also be perceived as praise.
wage – poverty – death rate
Yesterday the ILO published the Global Wealth Report 2014/2015. Wages and income inequality
As much as it is about income, it is also about inequality, and in any case it has to be read in the context of non-income. Too often we forget this side: lack of access to resources: to water, health services, food, education, even to the very basics.
Too often we forget it, and still sometimes it is remembered. These days in the Italian press:
- Emergenza banlieue: ecco le città italiane a rischio conflitti sociali
- Periferie, Bologna quella con più disagio sociale. Il “rischio banlieue” è al Nord
- Sicurezza, Merola: “Aumentano gli sbandati, ma Bologna non è a rischio banlieue”
- Bologna a rischio “banlieue”? Una possibilità per la Bologna Meticcia
- Censis: «Italia a rischio banlieu», il 60 per cento ha paura della povertà
- ecc.ecc.
Isn’t it remarkable that our societies can easily “cope” with poverty … – as long as for instance an increasing number of people are sleeping rough, at the train station Termini, in some way tolerated, and occasionally individually sanctioned – and “gets aware” of poverty not because of the people’s hardship but because of the “danger” they are “for society”.
Yes, this economy kills – and this is economy is not “this capitalism” but capitalism as brute system, the varieties of capitalism being especially a matter of the death rate.
But we know this, right? It had been stated in a footnote of an important work:
“Capital is said by a Quarterly Reviewer to fly turbulence and strife, and to be timid, which is very true; but this is very incompletely stating the question. Capital eschews no profit, or very small profit, just as Nature was formerly said to abhor a vacuum. With adequate profit, capital is very bold. A certain 10 per cent. will ensure its employment anywhere; 20 per cent. certain will produce eagerness; 50 per cent., positive audacity; 100 per cent. will make it ready to trample on all human laws; 300 per cent., and there is not a crime at which it will scruple, nor a risk it will not run, even to the chance of its owner being hanged. If turbulence and strife will bring a profit, it will freely encourage both. Smuggling and the slave-trade have amply proved all that is here stated.‖ (T. J. Dunning, l. c., pp. 35, 36.)
Indeed, one of the essential statements of the detailed analysis which is still valid today.
Economics and the redefinition of human experience
To analyze the world in this way, requires, in effect, the redefinition of human experience into a special language. That language must have a vocabulary limited to those concepts that can be dealt with inside the model. To accept these restrictions is to be an economist. Any refusal to shed the larger perspective – a stubborn insistence on bringing a broader set of facts or a different range of theory to bear – identifies one as “not an economist.” In this way, the economists need only talk to one another. Enclosed carefully in their monastery, they can speak their code, establish their status and rankings and hierarchies, and persuade themselves and one another of their intellectual and professional merit.
(Galbraith, James K., 2014: The End of Normal. The Great Crisis and the Future of Growth; New York et altera: Simon & Schuster: 64)
Well, this is just another, and better formulated reflection of what I presented …
