Month: December 2013

• December 31, 2013

  Skyping blindfolded

  Yesterday, I advanced the counterintuitive thesis that my philosophical friends and I are better off having philosophical conversations over Skype than we would be were we to have philosophical conversations in person. I promised that I would prove why this thesis is nonetheless true and, in so doing, that I would show how Skype can serve as…
• December 30, 2013

  Skyping as living discourse

  All of my philosophical conversations are held over Skype, and my philosophical friends (formerly called conversation partners) and I are the better for it. The claim that ‘we are the better for it’ is counterintuitive, yet it turns out to be true. The object of these posts will be to establish both why this is…
• December 18, 2013

  Via negativa toward second-order beauty

  These questions would have to be asked of oneself during meditation or during a philosophical conversation. I What is not movement? What is at rest. What is not rest? What is in movement. Then, what is neither in movement nor at rest? What dwells. All-encompassingness. Spiritual Exercise: To be all-encompassing. To be whole. II. What…
• December 17, 2013

  The second aspect of reality revisited

  I am thinking of radiance, thinking radiantly. So far, I have argued that reality consists of beings (finitude), being (totality), and non-being (infinity). I wish to revisit totality today. Before, I claimed that the feature we perceive in totality is wholeness. In terms of ethics, we would want our souls to be as whole as…
• December 14, 2013

  Ultimate stillness

  Quails honk at sunrise, stop honking, honk some more. / All sounds we hear come and go. All sounds ever heard or to be heard form a  storehouse of sound and temporary silence. / Then, what is not all-sound and all-silence? The source of all sound and soundlessness is the without-sound, the beyond-sound. Nameless, ultimate…