Archive for category Wholeness
The Globalization of Superficiality
Posted by eweislogel in Education Generally, Wholeness, Wisdom on October 10th, 2011
Adolfo Nicolás, S.J., Superior General of the Society of Jesus, on what he calls the “globalization of superficiality”:
When one can access so much information so quickly and so painlessly; when one can express and publish to the world one’s reactions so immediately and so unthinkingly in one’s blogs or micro-blogs; when the latest opinion column from the New York Times or El Pais, or the new- est viral video can be spread so quickly to people half a world away, shaping their perceptions and feelings, then the laborious, painstaking work of serious, critical thinking often gets short-circuited.
One can “cut-and-paste” without the need to think critically or write accurately or come to one’s own careful conclusions. When beautiful images from the merchants of consumer dreams flood one’s computer screens, or when the ugly or unpleasant sounds of the world can be shut out by one’s MP3 music player, then one’s vision, one’s perception of reality, one’s desiring can also remain shallow. When one can become “friends” so quickly and so painlessly with mere acquaintances or total strangers on one’s social networks – and if one can so easily “unfriend” another without the hard work of encounter or, if need be, confrontation and then reconciliation – then relationships can also become superficial.
When one is overwhelmed with such a dizzying pluralism of choices and values and beliefs and visions of life, then one can so easily slip into the lazy superficiality of relativism or mere tolerance of others and their views, rather than engaging in the hard work of forming communities of dialogue in the search of truth and understanding. It is easier to do as one is told than to study, to pray, to risk, or to discern a choice.
David Christian – Big History
Posted by eweislogel in Feed Your Mind, Life itself, Nature, Science, Wholeness on June 14th, 2011
The story of everything…in 18 minutes.
[You may want to watch this here instead of below, as the video controller does not seem to be working. Below, once you start, you can only stop it by reloading the page (at least in my browser...).]
In Praise of the Useless University
Posted by eweislogel in Education Generally, Feed Your Mind, Life itself, Philosophy, The University, Wholeness, Wisdom on March 5th, 2011
Martha Nussbaum, among many others (including almost everyone who writes college catalog entries for humanities departments) argues that the liberal arts are good for business and democracy. The humanities teach us critical thinking skills and help form in us an “enlarged mind” that is useful for becoming successful in the world of commerce and politics.
But should we proponents of the humanities be making our case in this way?
According to Fencing Bear at Prayer, here’s the case for the humanities: There isn’t one.
Why study the humanities? Not because they will make us better citizens. Not because they will make our lives physically more comfortable or enable us to build better engines or cure cancer. But because one of the things that human beings do is reflect on what it means to be a human being and to wonder at the many forms of expression this reflection has taken. That’s it. Take this reflection away and we might as well be robots. Or beasts. Comfortable, well-built robots or healthy beasts, to be sure, but no longer ourselves. Not human.
Rufus F. at the League of Ordinary Gentleman insists we stop selling the humanities for all of the other things they are “good for” and remember that liberal learning is a good in itself, however “useless.”
The humanities are rooted in the study of texts, which will increasingly put them at odds with a society in which reading is becoming vestigial. People who grow up detached from any cultural/historical context will find academics increasingly alien, if not offensive to their sensibilities. Attacks on the humanities will increase. The way to address them isn’t to trick the public into thinking they’re getting something else for their money, but to repeatedly defend the right of academics to hang back from the passions of the day- to be less-than-useful for whatever desires the society wants satisfied today. That means, by the way, academics in the humanities must drop altogether the pretense of political “activism” and, in their public role, become much more explicitly apoliticaland inactivist; conversely, they need to start expressing quite loudly the worth of this eternal hanging back, instead of flattering and placating a culture that is arguably no culture.
Matthew J. Milliner’s piece, “Useless University,” reminds us that John Henry Newman held that truth has two attributes, beauty and power. The power of truth is expressed in useful knowledge, the knowledge and skills required for business, technology, and government, in short the knowledge useful for getting a job. In the liberal arts, on the other hand, the beauty of truth can be discovered and contemplated for its own sake. Such contemplation is an end in itself, pursued just because we can. Milliner draws the conclusion:
If Newman is right, then to justify the liberal arts, which would now include what we call the humanities, as instrumentally useful, is also to betray them….
Of course, we all have to eat. Which means most of us have to have jobs. But do all of us have to have jobs that preclude our having the leisure for contemplating the beauty of being, of the cosmos, of truth? Here’s an idea (from Toby Ord): live like a graduate student…forever!
In praise of uselessness…
Posted by eweislogel in Education Generally, Life itself, On the soul, Philosophy, The University, Wholeness, Wisdom on February 26th, 2011
A student and I were chatting for a few moments after class on Friday. She told me that she enjoys our class because she gets “to think about and discuss some important things,” things that don’t seem to come up over there in the business school where she pursues her major. She wondered whether she should consider changing her major from something she doesn’t like (business) to something she does (seem to) like (philosophy).
Now, I sharpened up this brief conversation to make a point: this is the moment that any honest and self-aware philosophy professor dreads more than any other. What do I say next?
Do I go on and on about how the humanities are not respected in academia (despite the lip-service paid them), about the miserable job prospects for one who wants to pursue humane learning in a professional capacity, about the viciousness of campus politics (because, as they say, so little is at stake), that academia seems to breed negativity, etc.? Who’d recommend to a young person that way of life? And do I say that the humanities are just something we do for a while, now, while we (at least you) are young, that getting a job is the main thing because so much else in our lives hangs on our economic circumstances, about how the humanities are seemingly useless to living in a consumer society such as ours, about how just because we do not enjoy something does not mean it is not good for us—I teach (about) Aristotelian virtue, after all—etc.?
On the other hand, how do I tamp down the obvious enthusiasm—even love—that I have for philosophy and for what I do with my life? The students can’t miss it. And they want that or something like that. It doesn’t have to be academic philosophy, but they want something that will produce the effusive joy in living and doing in them that they see coming from me. They know I’m not doing it for the money (Lord knows). They know I had a career in business that brought in a very nice income. They know I got to see a little of the world—maybe more than most do. But they see that, after all, here I am.
And they see that how I experience the philosophical life generates a joy in me that is akin to the joy someone else might find in stamp collecting or ice hockey or cooking—but that it’s also more than that. The philosophical life is about life itself, about us, even all about me in a non-superficial, non-egocentric sense. Students in college (and even—maybe especially—the “non-traditional” students, the returning adults) are at a point in their lives where it seems to be “all about me”—again, not just in some superficial, selfish sense. In fact, you might say that the superficial, selfish manifestations of “all about me” arise just because there is no authentic arena for thinking about, wondering about, imagining what “me” means for most of these students. When students find such a space, they gravitate towards it.
And yet, the self-aware, honest philosopher would have to ask: This “joy” you’re referring to—is it genuine? Is it coming from pursuing philosophy itself (if it has an “itself”)? Or does it come from being in charge in the classroom, from being on stage, raptly attended to (if you are any good at performing), from being the know-it-all in the room, from not having to meet payroll anymore, or deal with neurotic funders or board members or troublesome employees, or the bottom line? Is philosophy, for me, “all about me,” in a superficial sense? And am I in any way encouraging the same quest for selfish ego-gratification in others, in perhaps impressionable young people?
Just asking oneself these questions is—inescapably—philosophical, an occupational hazard of the philosophical life, the price to be paid for a joyous pursuit of the good, the true, and the beautiful. It’s all in the game. And the answer is: Sure, it’s selfish. But it is not only selfish. When my students drive away in better cars, I know it is not only selfish. What I do is fun, but it is also serious. It is to me, and it is to the students around me. I should really say fellow-students, because (selfishly, yes!) I am still learning, yearning for learning. I know that I do not know.
Knowing computer programming, accounting, or animal husbandry is useful. Not knowing is useless. Constantly examining one’s life is useless. Philosophy is useless. It gets in the way of the useful, upends efficiency and effectiveness, makes trouble where no one noticed anything troubling.
I think this truth about philosophy infects academic philosophy. I would be willing to bet that most departments might frown upon taking philosophy personally—or at least worry over when it gets “too personal,” as if it is not really about persons, teacher-persons and student-persons. Departments, I would imagine, tend to worry about confusing eros with philia. It is a fair concern. If philosophy is personal—about persons—then some sense of intimacy might develop. And then, call the lawyers! It wouldn’t be useful to make education be so personal—not just for these reasons, but also because we’ve made education all about certification. We have tests and grades and such in order to be able to certify. So a “good” philosophy student is one who knows about philosophy—which one might be even if one is not a philosopher—does well by knowing names and dates, how to define terms, the stock arguments, who influenced whom, etc. Making philosophy to be knowing-about-philosophy is very useful for academic philosophy because you can assess it. If you teach virtue ethics, for instance, you could ask questions about Aristotle and Alasdair MacIntyre. But you could never follow a student around the rest of her life trying to assess how virtuous in living she’s become. That’d be creepy.
Knowing about philosophy might be useful outside the academy…it is hard to see how, though. What would you do…open up your own little philosophy shop? I guess you could engage in interesting cocktail party conversation. You could win big on Jeopardy!, I suppose, being able to ring in fast with, “Who was Descartes?” But it won’t come up on a regular basis in corporate headquarters.
I could try to re-describe philosophy—academic philosophy—in terms that make it appear as if it were useful. In academic philosophy, you learn the art of careful, close reading; argumentation; debate; critical thinking; seeing the “big picture;” etc. All these are eminently useful skills to develop. My students know, for instance, that a big part of the reason I made a buck or two in the business world was simply because I developed these skills. I never had business, information technology, or manufacturing courses, but I ended up having a bunch of people who did have these courses work for me. It would be impossible for me to argue that philosophy—at least academic philosophy—has been useless to me.
But all of that makes up the form of academic philosophy, not the content. You should be learning all of those skills across the liberal arts curriculum. But for me, the content—what philosophy is all about—matters. It would be better if conversations about Aristotle, Kant, and Mill came up on board rooms and shop floors as much as in lecture halls. But they usually don’t. So, for many reasons, philosophy happens intensely only on college and university campuses (if it does at all).
Speaking of Aristotle, he defines happiness as an activity of the soul in accordance with virtue. Happiness is not a feeling or emotion, but an activity, an actualization, a way of being, a state once achieved that is permanent. Aristotle says we do all things for the sake of happiness. What this means is that everything we do we do because it at least seems useful to us for getting what we ultimately want: happiness. But this means that happiness—in the sense Aristotle means it—is useless. It is not for the sake of anything. There is no “in order to” that follows happiness. On the contrary, everything else is “in order to” be happy.
If happiness—again, not to be confused with mere pleasure, although it includes it—is what we want, then what we want is, itself, useless. What students see in me—someone taking joy from the ultimately useless, i.e., someone pursuing genuine happiness, someone working on being happy—is just exactly what they are looking for. I don’t mean me, that it is peculiar or specific to me. There is no cult of personality going on here. I mean they see something in me and what I’m doing that goes way beyond me, that, in fact, makes them forget all about me (in both senses of that—forget about EW and forget about their own superficial “all about me” attitude) and start to be able to grasp who they are and what happiness means to them. And they start to question whether “getting a job”—the most useful thing in the world—will mean happiness for them.
But—again—the problem for me, their teacher and somewhat reluctant advisor—is what to say to them about all this. If I say the most important things are the most useless things (i.e., they are goods in themselves, regardless of whether they are useful for anything else), I don’t want them to think there is nothing useful for getting to the “useless.” Aristotle would be emphatic about this. There are many things that are useful for getting to happiness (even as they should not be confused with being “happiness” itself). But if I emphasize just how important the useful things are (like accounting and computer programming, engineering and law, architecture and culinary arts), I don’t want them to think that we’re just wasting time, then, on this useless philosophy stuff.
So my student friend was wondering, in effect: Should I trade useful for useless?
Now what kind of advisor would I be if I simply were to say: Yes, go for it!? Part of me thinks I ought to be sued for nonsupport were I to do so.
My academic advisor answer is: “You know, philosophy is a great minor. Goes great with business management.”
It’s a useful response. Still, I want to give them something a little more useless because, well, useless is more….
(from the archive: originally appeared October 4, 2009)
True philosophy is the highest state to which nature can aspire…
Posted by eweislogel in Philosophy, The University, Wholeness, Wisdom on February 25th, 2011
Newman Reader – Idea of a University – Discourse 6: “To have even a portion of this illuminative reason and true philosophy is the highest state to which nature can aspire, in the way of intellect; it puts the mind above the influences of chance and necessity, above anxiety, suspense, unsettlement, and superstition, which is the lot of the many. Men, whose minds are possessed with some one object, take exaggerated views of its importance, are feverish in the pursuit of it, make it the measure of things which are utterly foreign to it, and are startled and despond if it happens to fail them. They are ever in alarm or in transport. Those on the other hand who have no object or principle whatever to hold by, lose their way, every step they take. They are thrown out, and do not know what to think or say, at every fresh juncture; they have no view of persons, or occurrences, or facts, which come suddenly upon them, and they hang upon the opinion of others, for want of internal resources. But the intellect, which has been disciplined to the perfection of its powers, which knows, and thinks while it knows, which has learned to leaven the dense mass of facts and events with the elastic force of reason, such an intellect cannot be partial, cannot be exclusive, cannot be impetuous, cannot be at a loss, cannot but be patient, collected, and majestically calm, because it discerns the end in every beginning, the origin in every end, the law in every interruption, the limit in each delay; because it ever knows where it stands, and how its path lies from one point to another.”
OMG!
Posted by eweislogel in Wholeness on February 20th, 2010
Philosopher Andrew Pessin gives us his solution (maybe) to religious intolerance. All religions and their holy books need a “preface.” Not just any old preface, but a very particular one. The preface to religious belief should run more or less as follows: Every word of this is true AND there may be some mistakes here. Pessin calls this the “Paradox of the Preface.”
It’s not a bad thing.
To believe of each and every sentence that it is true is to believe, in effect, that not one of the sentences is false; but to believe that there is at least one error in the work is to believe that at least one of the sentences is false, and thus to contradict the first belief.
And yet both beliefs can seem so plausible! Indeed—and here’s the key—even after we become aware of the implicit contradiction, both the contradictory beliefs remain quite appealing in their own right.
Read his brief essay here:
Every word he writes is true! I think….
In fact, we might boil down the “Paradox of the Preface” to just this: “I think….”
Tattoo this on yourself somewhere (I’m kidding, sort of…):
The first and greatest sin is IDOLATRY; the first and greatest virtue is HUMILITY.
A few words in praise of uselessness…
Posted by eweislogel in Education Generally, Feed Your Mind, On the soul, Philosophy, The University, Wholeness, Wisdom on October 4th, 2009
A student and I were chatting for a few moments after class on Friday. She told me that she enjoys our class because she gets “to think about and discuss some important things,” things that don’t seem to come up over there in the business school where she pursues her major. She wondered whether she should consider changing her major from something she doesn’t like (business) to something she does (seem to) like (philosophy).
Now, I sharpened up this brief conversation to make a point: this is the moment that any honest and self-aware philosophy professor dreads more than any other. What do I say next?
Do I go on and on about how the humanities are not respected in academia (despite the lip-service paid them), about the miserable job prospects for one who wants to pursue humane learning in a professional capacity, about the viciousness of campus politics (because, as they say, so little is at stake), that academia seems to breed negativity, etc.? Who’d recommend to a young person that way of life? And do I say that the humanities are just something we do for a while, now, while we (at least you) are young, that getting a job is the main thing because so much else in our lives hangs on our economic circumstances, about how the humanities are seemingly useless to living in a consumer society such as ours, about how just because we do not enjoy something does not mean it is not good for us—I teach (about) Aristotelian virtue, after all—etc.?
On the other hand, how do I tamp down the obvious enthusiasm—even love—that I have for philosophy and for what I do with my life? The students can’t miss it. And they want that or something like that. It doesn’t have to be academic philosophy, but they want something that will produce the effusive joy in living and doing in them that they see coming from me. They know I’m not doing it for the money (Lord knows). They know I had a career in business that brought in a very nice income. They know I got to see a little of the world—maybe more than most do. But they see that, after all, here I am.
And they see that how I experience the philosophical life generates a joy in me that is akin to the joy someone else might find in stamp collecting or ice hockey or cooking—but that it’s also more than that. The philosophical life is about life itself, about us, even all about me in a non-superficial sense. Students in college (and even—maybe especially—the “non-traditional” students, the returning adults) are at a point in their lives where it seems to be “all about me”—again, not just in some superficial, selfish sense. In fact, you might say that the superficial, selfish manifestations of “all about me” arise just because there is no authentic arena for thinking about, wondering about, imagining what “me” means for most of these students. When students find such a space, they gravitate towards it.
And yet, the self-aware, honest philosopher would have to ask: This “joy” you’re referring to—is it genuine? Is it coming from pursuing philosophy itself (if it has an “itself”)? Or does it come from being in charge in the classroom, from being on stage, raptly attended to (if you are any good at performing), from being the know-it-all in the room, from not having to meet payroll anymore, or deal with neurotic funders or board members or troublesome employees, or the bottom line? Is philosophy, for me, “all about me,” in a superficial sense? And am I in any way encouraging the same quest for selfish ego-gratification in others, in perhaps impressionable young people?
Just asking oneself these questions is—inescapably—philosophical, an occupational hazard of the philosophical life, the price to be paid for a joyous pursuit of the good, the true, and the beautiful. It’s all in the game. And the answer is: Sure, it’s selfish. But it is not only selfish. When my students drive away in better cars, I know it is not only selfish. What I do is fun, but it is also serious. It is to me, and it is to the students around me. I should really say fellow-students, because (selfishly, yes!) I am still learning, yearning for learning. I know that I do not know.
Knowing computer programming, accounting, or animal husbandry is useful. Not knowing is useless. Constantly examining one’s life is useless. Philosophy is useless. It gets in the way of the useful, upends efficiency and effectiveness, makes trouble where no one noticed anything troubling.
I think this truth about philosophy infects academic philosophy. I would be willing to bet that most departments might frown upon taking philosophy personally—or at least worry over when it gets “too personal,” as if it is not really about persons, teacher-persons and student-persons. Departments, I would imagine, tend to worry about confusing eros with philia. It is a fair concern. If philosophy is personal—about persons—then some sense of intimacy might develop. And then, call the lawyers! It wouldn’t be useful to make education be so personal—not just for these reasons, but also because we’ve made education all about certification. We have tests and grades and such in order to be able to certify. So a “good” philosophy student is one who knows about philosophy—which one might be even if one is not a philosopher—does well by knowing names and dates, how to define terms, the stock arguments, who influenced whom, etc. Making philosophy to be knowing-about-philosophy is very useful for academic philosophy because you can assess it. If you teach virtue ethics, for instance, you could ask questions about Aristotle and Alasdair MacIntyre. But you could never follow a student around the rest of her life trying to assess how virtuous in living she’s become.
Knowing about philosophy might be useful outside the academy…it is hard to see how, though. What would you do…open up your own little philosophy shop? I guess you could engage in interesting cocktail party conversation. You could win big on Jeopardy!, I suppose, being able to ring in fast with, “Who was Descartes?” But it won’t come up on a regular basis in corporate headquarters.
I could try to re-describe philosophy—academic philosophy—in terms that make it appear as if it were useful. In academic philosophy, you learn the art of careful, close reading; argumentation; debate; critical thinking; seeing the “big picture;” etc. All these are eminently useful skills to develop. My students know, for instance, that a big part of the reason I made a buck or two in the business world was simply because I developed these skills. I never had business, information technology, or manufacturing courses, but I ended up having a bunch of people who did work for me. It would be impossible for me to argue that philosophy—at least academic philosophy—has been useless to me.
But all of that makes up the form of academic philosophy, not the content. You should be learning all of those skills across the liberal arts curriculum. But for me, the content—what philosophy is all about—matters. It would be better if conversations about Aristotle, Kant, and Mill came up on board rooms and shop floors as much as in lecture halls. But they usually don’t. So, for many reasons, philosophy happens only intensely on college and university campuses (if it does at all).
Speaking of Aristotle, he defines happiness as an activity of the soul in accordance with virtue. Happiness is not a feeling or emotion, but an activity, an actualization, a way of being, a state once achieved that is permanent. Aristotle says we do all things for the sake of happiness. What this means is that everything we do we do because it at least seems useful to us for getting what we ultimately want: happiness. But this means that happiness—in the sense Aristotle means it—is useless. It is not for anything. There is no “in order to” that follows happiness. On the contrary, everything else is “in order to” be happy.
If happiness—again, not to be confused with mere pleasure, although it includes it—is what we want, then what we want is, itself, useless. What students see in me—someone taking joy from the ultimately useless, i.e., someone pursuing genuine happiness, someone working on being happy—is just exactly what they are looking for. I don’t mean me, that it is peculiar or specific to me. There is no cult of personality going on here. I mean they see something in me and what I’m doing that goes way beyond me, that, in fact, makes them forget all about me (in both senses of that—forget about EW and forget about their own superficial “all about me” attitude) and start to be able to grasp who they are and what happiness means to them. And they start to question whether “getting a job”—the most useful thing in the world—will mean happiness for them.
But—again—the problem for me, their teacher and somewhat reluctant advisor—is what to say to them about all this. If I say the most important things are the most useless things (i.e., they are goods in themselves, regardless of whether they are useful for anything else), I don’t want them to think there is nothing useful for getting to the “useless.” Aristotle would be emphatic about this. There are many things that are useful for getting to happiness (even as they should not be confused with being “happiness” itself). But if I emphasize just how important the useful things are (like accounting and computer programming, engineering and law, architecture and culinary arts), I don’t want them to think that we’re just wasting time, then, on this useless philosophy stuff.
So my student friend was wondering, in effect: Should I trade useful for useless?
Now what kind of advisor would I be if I simply were to say: Yes, go for it!? Part of me thinks I ought to be sued for nonsupport were I to do so.
My academic advisor answer is: “You know, philosophy is a great minor. Goes great with business management.”
It’s a useful response. Still, I want to give them something a little more useless because, well, useless is more….
On Superficiality (For Johnna M.)
Posted by eweislogel in Feed Your Mind, Life itself, On the soul, Philosophy, Wholeness, Wisdom on August 24th, 2009
“Superficial” is a swear word for most people. To fire this supposed epithet at an intended victim is to trivialize him, demean him, denigrate him. What is worse than being called “superficial”?
Where does the power of this word come from? Superficial can only be bad in comparison to its opposite, depth or profundity. We’d like to hear from a deep thinker, not a superficial thinker. We’d like to learn from a profound philosopher, not a superficial one. We all crave deep relationships (they are “meaningful”) rather than superficial (“meaningless”) ones. Of course.
But let’s check our thinking on this. The word superficial refers to surfaces, of being on or above the surface. Let’s assume there is something to the binary opposition of “surface” and “depth.” But why do we always privilege depth over surface? There are historical and philosophical reasons. In the beginning of our story of Western philosophy, 2500 years or so ago in Ionia, some thinkers were wondering about what’s “behind” the way the world appears to us. Most of the ancients–just like most of us–experienced trees, rocks, people, animals, buildings, music, colors, smells, food, etc. But some–a very few–wondered whether there was something that tied all these various appearances together, something behind or underneath that despite the apparent diversity at the surfaces of things bound things together as one. This is the birth of the problem of the many and the one, perhaps the single driving force in philosophy. The one was thought to be reality; the many to be (mere) appearance. Profound, deep thinkers wanted to get to the one, lusted after it, perhaps even came to love it. Philosophy–the very word–means love of wisdom, and love is a powerful thing. And this power was tied for evermore with the deep, the profound, that which was beneath the surface. The goal was to leave the world of surfaces, of (supposedly) mere appearances, and venture into the depths of reality, to the Truth-with-a-capital-T.
Some of the historical fallout of this venture led to the birth of modern science. We’ll bypass for now the question of the split that developed between philosophy and science (between wisdom and knowing). We’ll simply note that science–the science we all learned in school–teaches us that the reality of things is in their deep structure, the molecules, the atoms, the quarks and charms, the basic particles that make up all the varied things we experience. We are all taught, for instance, that the table on which we work is “mostly empty space,” according to physics. And we believe it (after all, we believe EVERYTHING that bears the sacred imprimatur of SCIENCE, don’t we?). We don’t fully grasp this “truth,” but we believe it. And then we go on with our lives using the table “as if” it were a solid thing, suitable for working upon. But we never forget that it is the deep, rather than the surface, that is the Truth-with-a-capital-T. Despite the fact that we never encounter the table otherwise than a very useful solid plane upon which to work. Never.
What about superficiality regarding people? We might be forgiven dealing with our world in a “superfical” way, such as writing at our desks and talking about trees and rocks and buildings, etc., as if they were “real.” But what about people? Now we’ve arrived at a moral and not just an epistemological problem (i.e., not just a problem of knowing but of being responsible, able to respond appropriately). What do we say? “Beauty is only skin deep.” “Looks don’t matter.” “Hey, I’m up here!” (Said by well-endowed women when having a “conversation” with some wondering-eyed, scurvy dog.) We want to be loved for who we are, not what we look like. Right? We are not simply what we look like. There is depth to us, below the surface. We are frustrated when things remain at the surface level, left hanging, unfulfilled.
I think all this is true. Nevertheless, I would like to offer praise for the surfaces. I am tempted to say: not in a superfical way, but in a deep way. A deep appreciation for surfaces. I am not going to argue that we should only have relationships based on surfaces. I am going to argue that we cannot have any relationships were it not for the surfaces of things.
I can only come to know things by their surfaces. Without surfaces, there would be no sense to speaking of depths. There is something to the binary opposition of surface and depth, but it must not be forgotten that it is binary, that both surface and depth are inextricably bound together. Further, we might rethink privileging–at least all the time–the deep as opposed to the surface. It’s via the surfaces that we come to the depths. We cannot go the other direction. It is only because there are things like tables that we can have physics at all (think about it!). We cannot start our knowing and, indeed, our loving from the depths. The surface, the superficial, is profoundly, deeply important and meaningful.
I don’t know about you, but I like my surfaces. The largest organ of the human body is the skin–the surface. I am grateful for my surfaces, and I especially like when there is a lot going on with my surfaces. My surfaces love the feel of a cool breeze, of desert heat, of ocean waves, of strong fingers, of tongues, of aromatic oils, of being wrapped up in other people’s surfaces, of muscles at work, of flavors, of scents, of music, of talking, of drinking. Don’t you? Is a person to be called “superficial” who loves these things? Rather, a person who didn’t love these things would be debilitated or deranged.
But am I confusing the issue? Of course we like these things, but don’t we want something more, something deep and profound? Yes, of course we do. But what usually happens when we are deeply and profoundly in love with another person? What is the expression of that love? Isn’t it usually expressed through the surfaces: in eating and drinking together, talking together, enjoying music together, getting our bodies as close together as we can?
Yes, but what about people who “stop” at the surfaces? Aren’t those the ones we are referring to by the term, superficial? No doubt, we want the whole thing, the whole enchilada, so to speak. In short, what we really desire is wholeness. Like that dopey line in that dopey movie, we want to say (and have said to us): “You complete me.” However, we have to get there, don’t we?
Let’s take “superficial” talk. I know a lot of people who say they hate small talk, and by “small” I assume they mean that it is talk that is superficial. Think about the people you know who say something like that. What do you think about those people? Aren’t they a little off-putting, a little less pleasant to be around, a little more crabby, a little too intense? I like small talk. It is the grease of the social machine. I happen to know a little (usually very little) about a lot of stuff. I used to beat myself up because I wasn’t an expert on any one thing. I had surface knowledge, not deep knowledge. However, as it turns out, I have found a great pleasure in being able to wander the world and strike up a conversation on just about anything. This has led to further not so superficial conversation, and, occasionally, in the old days, even the baring of additional surfaces, if you catch my drift. There used to be a wine called Cella (maybe there still is, but I’ve moved on…). The wine was hawked by a character they called Aldo Cella. There was this great commercial with Aldo–short, chubby, balding, with oily Italian features–sitting at the head of a long table with a great feast spread upon it, wine all around, outdoors with a fantastic background, with Aldo surrounded by some fabulous babes. The voice-over said: “He is not tall. He is not pretty. But Aldo Cella knows what women like.” Now aside from the oily Italian features (I have oily non-ethnically-descript features), I am Aldo Cella. But despite appearances (the surface of things), I’m not really talking about me. We are all–if we let ourselves be–Aldo Cella (substitute genders where appropriate). I think we do know what each other wants and we all enjoy getting it and giving it too each other. Our surfaces aren’t all we are, but we are not unless we have surfaces. Our goofy features, our pedestrian looks, don’t look goofy or pedestrian unless that’s the way we’re looking at them. [Don't get me started on my objections to commercially, industrially manufactured ideas of beauty!]
Do you flirt? It’s totally superficial, right? But don’t you flirt? Or, if you are a shy person, don’t you enjoy it when someone flirts with you? A little bit? C’mon, you know you do. I’m not saying you have to look at it the way Zorba (the Greek, from Kazantzakis’ great novel) does, as he recounted to his boss the time he failed to sleep with a woman who wanted him. Zorba was warned by a wise man: “…he who can sleep with a woman and does not, commits a great sin. My boy, if a woman calls you to share her bed and you don’t go, your soul will be destroyed! That woman will sigh before God on judgment day, and that woman’s sigh, whoever you may be and whatever your fine deeds, will cast you into Hell!” Zorba accepted his fate with remorse. He says, “If Hell exists, I shall go to Hell, and that’ll be the reason. Not because I’ve robbed, killed or committed adultery, no! All that’s nothing. But I shall go to Hell because one night in Salonica a woman waited for me on her bed and I did not go to her….” All I’m saying is that even our superficial desires for each other, manifested in flirting or even in just idle banter, have a deep impact on our souls.
Don’t you hate it when a clerk at the grocery store never even looks up from his shoes when you are going through the line? What about a simple Hello? What about eye contact? Would we be satisfied with his answer if, when questioned about this, he says he can’t stand “superficialities”? Some would argue manners are merely superficial custom…but they would have a completely unsupportable argument. If manners are superficial, that only means that the superficial is incredibly important to living our lives together.
A word about the inspiration for this little unpolished, probably superficial essay: Facebook (and other social networking activities). I posed a question about the value of FB that–surprise!–got some people thinking (see earlier post). If FB is as superficial as its (mere) surface appearance might suggest, then why did a post on FB get some people thinking? One friend thought the following: “i’m a pathetic woman for enjoying the many facets of facebook, including sharing what male features are a turn-on and my favorite drinks. therefore, i’m leaving facebook in hopes of a better quality of life…” Well, then I’m a pathetic woman too (so to speak, ahem)! I enjoy (some of) the many facets of FB. I enjoy sharing what male features are a turn-on (well, sharing which of my male features I like to have turned on–just so’s ya know, just in case it were to come up, so to speak…). I love sharing my favorite drinks–although how someone did that on FB is beyond me, but maybe talking about them virtually on FB might well lead to sharing them actually.
So, my little point here is that leaving FB in the hopes of a better life might not work out. Instead, what I think we should desire (I know, “should desire” is a problematic saying…) is a better quality of life, FB or no FB. And to get a better quality if life, I am suggesting that we not overlook the profundity of the surfaces, the deep and abiding value of so-called superficialities.
What do you think?
Paradox and Bedrock
Posted by eweislogel in Wholeness, Wisdom on August 4th, 2009
Listen to Edward Abbey (from Desert Solitaire:Â A Season in the Wilderness)….
Near the first group of arches, looming over a bend in the road, is a balanced rock about fifty feet high, mounted on a pedestal of equal height; it looks like a head from Easter Island, a stone god or a petrified ogre.
Like a god, like an ogre? The personification of the natural is exactly the tendency I wish to suppress in myself, to eliminate for good. I am here not only to evade for a while the clamor and filth and confusion of the cultural apparatus but also to confront, immediately and directly if it’s possible, the bare bones of existence, the elemental and fundamental, the bedrock which sustains us. I want to be able to look at and into a juniper tree, a piece of quartz, a vulture, a spider, and see it as it is in itself, devoid of all humanly ascribed qualities, anti-Kantian, even the categories of scientific description. To meet God or Medusa face to face, even if it means risking everything human in myself. I dream of a hard and brutal mysticism in which the naked self merges with a non-human world and yet somehow survives still intact, individual, separate. Paradox and bedrock.
