गुरु पूर्णिमा

 गुरु पूर्णिमा - रणधीर कुमार गौतम, सहायक प्रोफेसर, जीएसडीएस, आईटीएम विश्वविद्यालय ग्वालियर

यह भारत में अपने गुरुओं (आध्यात्मिक शिक्षकों) और सलाहकारों के प्रति सम्मान और कृतज्ञता व्यक्त करने के लिए मनाया जाने वाला एक पवित्र त्योहार है। "गुरु" शब्द एक ऐसे व्यक्ति को संदर्भित करता है जो हमें प्रबुद्ध करता है, हमारा मार्गदर्शन करता है, और ज्ञान और बुद्धि प्रदान करता है। यह त्योहार बहुत महत्व रखता है क्योंकि यह शिक्षक और शिष्य के बीच बंधन का प्रतीक है।

गुरु पूर्णिमा एक श्रद्धा का त्यौहार है जो गहरा सांस्कृतिक और आध्यात्मिक महत्व रखता है। यह एक ऐसा समय है जब लोग अपने गुरुओं के प्रति अपनी श्रद्धा व्यक्त करते हैं और अपने जीवन में उनकी भूमिका को स्वीकार करते हैं। यह त्योहार शिक्षक से शिष्य तक ज्ञान और ज्ञान संचारित करने की प्राचीन परंपरा का जश्न मनाता है। यह व्यक्तियों को उन लोगों से मार्गदर्शन और सीखने के महत्व की याद दिलाता है जिन्होंने किसी विशेष क्षेत्र या आध्यात्मिक पथ में महारत हासिल की है। गुरु पूर्णिमा प्राप्त ज्ञान और मार्गदर्शन के लिए आभारी होने और गुरु के मार्गदर्शन में ज्ञान और व्यक्तिगत विकास की खोज जारी रखने के लिए एक अनुस्मारक के रूप में कार्य करती है।

बौद्ध परंपराओं में भी गुरु पूर्णिमा का महत्व है। ऐसा माना जाता है कि इस दिन, गौतम बुद्ध ने अपने पांच शिष्यों को अपना पहला उपदेश दिया था, जिसे धम्मकप्पावत्तन सुत्ता के नाम से जाना जाता है। इस उपदेश ने बौद्ध समुदाय, या संघ की शुरुआत और बुद्ध की शिक्षाओं के प्रसार को चिह्नित किया।

यह त्योहार विभिन्न अनुष्ठानों और रीति-रिवाजों के साथ मनाया जाता है। शिष्य फूल, फल और अन्य प्रसाद चढ़ाकर अपने गुरुओं को श्रद्धांजलि देते हैं। वे आशीर्वाद मांगते हैं और प्राप्त ज्ञान और मार्गदर्शन के लिए आभार व्यक्त करते हैं। सत्संग (आध्यात्मिक सभाएं) आयोजित किए जाते हैं, जहां शिष्य शिक्षाओं को सुनते हैं, भक्ति गीत गाते हैं, और प्रार्थना ओं में संलग्न होते हैं।

गुरु पूर्णिमा सीखने के महत्व की याद दिलाती है, ज्ञान की तलाश करती है, और उन लोगों के प्रति सम्मान दिखाती है जिन्होंने हमारे मार्ग को रोशन किया है। यह शिक्षक-छात्र संबंधों और पीढ़ी से पीढ़ी तक ज्ञान के संचरण के महत्व पर जोर देता है।

गुरु पूर्णिमा गुरुओं द्वारा प्रदान किए गए ज्ञान और मार्गदर्शन का सम्मान और सराहना करने के लिए एक अनुस्मारक के रूप में कार्य करती है। यह व्यक्तियों को आध्यात्मिक विकास के महत्व पर विचार करने और धार्मिकता के मार्ग पर प्रगति के लिए आशीर्वाद लेने के लिए प्रोत्साहित करता है।

गुरु पूर्णिमा एक अनूठा पर्व है जो व्यक्तियों के जीवन को आकार देने, आध्यात्मिक विकास को बढ़ावा देने और ज्ञान का प्रकाश फैलाने में गुरुओं के योगदान का स्मरण कराता है। यह ज्ञान और आत्मोपलब्धि के मार्ग को वरण करने की प्रेरणा देता है।

Camus and Sartre

 Camus and Sartre - The Debate 

Camus first writing was 'The Myth of Sisyphus' in which he discussed his philosophy of "absurdity" in the context of his well-known claim that the problem of life was whether or not to commit suicide. He established that suicide was wrong - the point of life is to survive, he said.  His next work, "The Rebel" established that he felt mistaken about his claim and that the real problem was murder particular the French Resistance's outright murder of the German Nazi soldiers and any French collaborationists in the years following the August 1944 liberation of France.

In the 1952 Sartre-Camus dispute, both freedom and violence were debated. Sartre’s notion of freedom was interpreted by Camus as an excess - for Sartre there is freedom of choice, everyone has plenty of freedom. Camus felt that freedom was absurd - there was no absolute freedom. This difference was enlarged in the primary aspect of their dispute - the issue of violence. Namely, the problematic actions were assassination and terrorism. Camus argued for ‘mesure’ or measured revolutionary violence, counterterrorist violence - he dismissed assassination as absolutely unethical! Sartre appeared to permit unrestrained violence. Beauvoir mediated this contrast with her essay on “Ethics of Ambiguity.” Even their friend Merleau-Ponty engaged Sartre in debate over his ultra-Bolshevism.

The problem that no one addresses is the effect of physical violence, psychological abuse and verbal aggression including symbolic violence on the personality of each member of entire populations during the early socialization process - the formation of the traumatic core of personality. Every parent traumatizes their child with physical violence, threats and abuse!

Is there any doubt that the core of personality is not ethical or moral because of the aggression experienced and internalized/identified in early childhood? Therefore, the question of freedom, violence and ethics is at the heart of the cultural socialization of each child!

Camus was a believer of 'inexistentialism.' His version of "absurd freedom" was opposed to Sartre's freedom of choosing where not choosing is still the freedom to choose not to choose. Sartre recognizes the complexity of freedom and consciousness and limits the freedom to choose to situations, not to an ontological being in-itself - there is no absolute obstacle for Sartre.

In "The Plague," Camus' characters complain of life dictated by the fear of infection. Isolation occurs for the individual, for cities, regions and entire nations. One interpretation of Camus' "La Peste" is that the foreign invader is not merely lice that kills rats and even humans, but other humans, namely the Nazi's. A very famous 1945 film by Marcel Carne, "Children of Paradise" produced during WWII also used a different time and place to criticize the Nazi's using displacement and irony - the Boulevard of Crime and the theatre.

Camus used the metaphor of 'little-ease' to characterize daily life during the 'plague,' the occupation: one could not stand-up and freely stretch, everyone was bent over as if working in a cave or mine. The isolation of towns and cities was also an internal exile: there was no dissent, everyone was obedient. However, more were dying than victims from the virus. The political order predicated on intimacy: marriage and family was also dying. There was no deliberation or plurality, no negotiations - everyone accepted the nihilism of the conditions - there was nothing that could be done! The state and medical response to the plague was terrifying - blind obedience was coerced. The ethical was suspended - adherence to a faceless telos!

Camus misinterpreted Sartre's practical in-situ existential freedom, or absolute freedom of choice, as ontological or factual freedom. Sartre was very clear that ontological freedom was absolute, complete, total destruction of values and freedom, objectification of human beings, domination, totalitarianism, the dangerous freedom without restraint. Sartre later said, "The moral attitude appears when technical and social conditions render positive forms of conduct impossible. Ethics is a collection of idealistic tricks intended to enable us to live the life imposed on us by the poverty of our resources and the insufficiency of our techniques." This passage is an unpublished note of Sartre's quoted by Simone de Beauvoir, Force of Circumstance (New York, G.P. Putnam, 1965), trans. Richard Howard, p. 199. 

Sartre also retreated from his absolutist position in later years. We must always remind ourselves that the French Resistance was fighting the Nazi’s, but this did not console Camus.

Existential freedom for Sartre was practical: the mode in which we choose to practice, exist or live our existential freedom within the practical limitations that our activities impose upon us as though it were ontological freedom. Camus thought Sartre's notion of freedom was useless and accused his characters of having too much freedom - alone, enclosed in his freedom; freedom is loneliness and the others restrict it.

Camus did not realize that freedom was a quest for values. Camus believed that freedom for Sartre meant 'to obtain what one has wished,' but Sartre said that success was of no importance to freedom, what mattered was the autonomy of choice. Choice, however is not wish or dream, but acting - choice and acting are the same. Camus was simply off the mark when he interpreted Sartre as meaning that freedom meant the ability to do or obtain whatever one wants.

Handling Hate

 Handling Hate

Marshall Sahlins discusses how each culture, or society, deals with its hate.  For example, militaristic societies accept combat murder and soldiers are not held liable but this position has been changing slightly since WWII. Some cultures have ritual genocidal clashes. Others permitted cannibalism or murder as passage to adulthood!  Some cultures permit psychotic bullying with minimal consequences.  

Handling hate is a matter of norms that today considers how we understand the development of aggression during individual socialization including occupational training. One major factor related to hate and aggression is intelligence which is minimized by reproductive matches that are too close genetically. Hence there has been a concerted (concealed?) effort to minimize cousin marriages in cultures which had been for millennia based on first cousin matches as the preferred.

Lastly, the effect of crowdedness, overpopulation, on aggression and competition is palpable.  In this case, states are trying to limit reproduction economically and medically. However traditional customs dictate reproduction for everyone by valorizing marriage and family. This was called ‘gemeinschaft’ in late 19th century sociology.

What can be done to extricate oneself from being the victim?

Judgement and Crisis

 Judgment and Crisis

One has to choose if one has principles or follows certain rules.  Following principles determines one’s own character, defines one own’s morality and values.  Where being true or being false are the criteria for judgment, there are criteria for the finality of judgment. Knowledge sets the criteria for the finality of judgment. The criteria for knowledge is limited and may be challenged. Finality is the ultimate expression of the intellect and will - the exercise of their absolute freedom of choice. Intellect and will are absolute. Absolutism and realism together produce self-regulation. Self-regulation means self-imposed limitations. Self-imposed limitations mean balance between extremes, self-control.   Justice means being a judge of your own self. Being your own self means your personal identity. Your personal identity is your character. Being yourself by yourself means total honesty, being honest to yourself is to act according to self-imposed limitations.  Crisis is the conflict between your character and reputation.

Art

 ART

Art cannot be dismissed quickly - it is not true that artists are naïve and die young. There are many old artists and the understanding of art is quite complicated. One conundrum to think about is whether art reflects nature or nature reflects art, that is, human works of art.

Generally speaking, modernity does not reject realism but art always reframes it. Modernity, or modern art, however, is often misunderstood. Modernity refers primarily to symbolism, that is, in film, music, paintings, etc. Symbolism is the internal meanings attributed to what we perceive or what we envision in our minds!

Classical art is about realism, painting and writing as if it is real. The Classical art of the 16-17th centuries for example were paintings that were like photographs! Modernity is composed of 3 aspects: realism, representation and abstraction. The key issue is meaning, and involves contexts.  Realism contains some meaning but it conceals too much and is either the artists perspective or a replication of the subjects painted and written. With representation, different perspectives are contrasted and with abstraction inner and external meanings are juxtaposed. So to think art is to consider quite a few concepts at the same time.

Rock and roll is very materialistic music with limited sound sources and strong similarities between the beat, the melody and the lead, there is also always a riff in every song. But, the lyrics supply the meaning unlike classical music where the shift in tone, volume, and instrument combinations, and solo or combinations of highly skilled displays produce affective meanings or feeling. 

Classical music underwent a significant change in the early 1900's when a modernist effect emerged; the tones and sounds in classical modernist music attempted to more clearly imitate strong emotion of fear and fright. Later in the century, Rock and Roll emerged as a return to realist elements in feelings and representation. Only opera comes close to lyrical meaning which has a story line. Rock and roll almost always involves a love-sex angle, a realist perspective.

Rock and Pop might be considered as ‘neorealist’ as a transformation of blues and gospel with some classical elements. The abstract nature, subtlety, of classical music and ‘pop’ involve following codes where certain sounds and words have common meanings which desubjectivizes the meaning - integrates the individual into a social frame - but there is no substitute for reading the lyrics! One complaint about the feelings related to music from the modernist eruption to jazz and blues, and through Rock and Pop was the strong beat from the base and drums. 

Rock and Pop is a driving pressure of desire and sexuality but involves the conventional processes of dating/marriage and breaking up/divorce or separation. Two poles are falling in love and breaking up/cheating! The Romanticism in modern music is quite evident.

The media, sometimes called the culture industry of music, movies, novels/stories, ads, shows of all kinds is considered to be a very contradictory force increasing consumerism and population density which stresses everyone out.

But, the one rule of this cultural effect is ‘be vulgar’ to show that you are “normal” which is a great way to overproduce mental illness and jack up the crime stats.

Art is often used as the ‘performing’ aspect of cultural identity. For example, art is often thought of in barely materialist forms as texts and images, eg books, films and digital forms. But more materialist forms of art like fashion (consider jerseys, shoes, dresses and suits), architecture of houses and public buildings, and cars are deeply involved in identity formation especially with regard to citizenship and national experience - these objects resonate with national politics more than ceremonies and beliefs!

Art has the effect of deindividuating people and dedifferentiating the social situation. Art serves as a frame cohering everyone under its theme.

Art as a performance in the making and in the art object/product affects identity and experience. The issue is whether the markets for art objects shape national identity. Notice how “tactical gear” as fashionable clothing resonates with nationalist jingoism.

However what is more incisive is that these material expressions affect individuals and the ideology of individualism is what is a paradoxical effect of drawing boundaries around national identities, eg party affiliation, left or right wing resonance, generation gap, social status, type of capital being externalized, eg economic, cultural, social, human, etc.

Truth, Goodness and Facts

 Truth, Goodness and Facts

Horkheimer’s critique of Kant was over the assumption that the good brought happiness!   Kant believed that we must do our duty even if it meant every person on earth would suffer. Kant is a non-consequentialist and happiness, as well as suffering, are consequences. Kant does not care one whit about consequences, he cares about motives, intentions, good will; he cares about what happens BEFORE the action is performed, not about what happens after duty is fulfilled.

‘Good or happiness’ - many philosophers believe that “good” means happiness, which is not always clear cut. Good is too often a non-cognitive term - good cannot be perceived. And, good does not necessarily lead to happiness.

Truth also is vague. Truth as truth-telling is different from truth as factual. One can be telling the truth in terms of their emotional state of mind or consciously while being completely erroneous about the facts. But, many philosophers equate truth and rightness, that in being “right” they articulate the truth which is not appropriate. 

Truth may not require evidence. Truth may forever be unknown because of a lack of evidence or because reasoning cannot establish necessity. Knowledge requires evidence. According to the foremost epistemological theory, knowledge is "justified true belief." True belief alone is not sufficient for knowledge because one might hold a belief which is true by accident or coincidence. 

A "justification" usually involves the presentation of evidence.

The standard for truth is rationality which means that a truth or rightness claim is motivated by a justified, warranted and grounded consensus which includes the perspectives of all, hence rational. In other words, evidence is necessary.

There are preventions of nature’s wrath. Humans are part of nature, can understand nature and rationally control it. Humans can prevent catastrophes.

Truth adds values to 'facts.'  The term "fact" has two easily conflated meanings. The first is simply "true statement"; truth cannot be understood without redundancy. The second meaning can be compressed as "the way the world is," which includes objects, events, situations, etc., in the universe, including truths about an individual's state of mind: what a person knew about a state affairs at a given time and their intentions.

Truth addresses the accuracy, or adequacy of descriptions about facts. Truth includes several dilemmas beyond the fact-value difference. To explain an event or a happening - why it emerged and how to formulate it, truth must address both teleology or goal-directedness - how certain goals or aims determined or influenced the event, and causality, the causes, reasons and intentions that led to the effects and consequences. 

Formulating the truth about events or change involves interpretation and reinterpretations - properly attributing the teleological and causative elements of the event.

Destruction or Destructuring in Heidegger's Being and Time (1927)

 Destruction or Destructuring in Heidegger's Being and Time (1927) from p23

"In thus demonstrating the origin of our basic ontological concepts by an investigation in which their 'birth certificate' is displayed, we have nothing to do with a vicious relativizing of ontological standpoints. But this destruction is just as far from having the negative sense of shaking off the ontological tradition. We must, on the contrary, stake out the positive possibilities of that tradition, and this always means keeping it within its limits; these in tum are given factically in the way the question is formulated at the time, and in the way the pouible field fOr investigation is thus bounded off. On its negative side, this destruction does not relate itself towards the past; its criticism is aimed at 'today' and at the prevalent way of treating the history of ontology, whether it is headed towards doxography, towards intellectual history, or towards a history of problems. But to bury the past in nullity [Nichtigkeit] is not the purpose of this destruction; its aim is positive; its negative function remains unexpressed and indirect." Macquarrie translation 1962

"This demonstration of the provenance of the fundamental ontological concepts, as the investigation which displays their "birth certificate," has nothing to do with a pernicious relativizing of ontological standpoints. The destructuring has just as little the negative sense of disburdening ourselves of the ontological tradition. On the contrary, it should stake out the positive possibilities of the tradition, and that always means to fix its boundaries. These are factually given with the specific formulation of the question and the prescribed demarcation of the possible field of investigation. Negatively, the destructuring is not even related to the past: its criticism concerns "today" and the dominant way we treat the history of ontology, whether it be conceived as the history of opinions, ideas, or problems. However, the destructuring does not wish to bury the past in nullity; it has a positive intent. Its negative function remains tacit and indirect." Stambaugh translation 1996

The fundamental or elementary concepts were given just earlier by Heidegger as "Insofar as certain distinctive domains of being become visible in the course of this history and henceforth chiefly dominate the range of problems (Descartes' ego cogito, subject, the "I," reason, spirit, person), the beings just cited remain unquestioned with respect to thebeing and structure of their being, which indicates the thorough neglect of the question of being. This sort of list was also found in Nietzsche's "Twilight of the Idols" as unity, identity, permanence, substance, cause, thinghood, being which catches us in error.