Author Archives: MeridaGOround

BOOK w/ BELLY LAUGHS for thinkers

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Apparently, nobody arrives on this planet with a round-trip ticket — or perhaps we all have one without knowing it?  Yes, “End Times” could snuff life here in a grand ka-boom steming from various factors, perhaps in concert. (“Death” is a fellow traveler on this author’s train, and becomes an amusing companion.)  The book takes us on many train rides in pursuit of haunts of various philosophers, wryly questioning whether we’ve lived well, and learned anything while in life’s classroom.  All aboard!

Pay attention, and you might find yourself enjoying the ride a bit more.  I suggest taking the free Kindle sample for a spin. (If you don’t have a Kindle reader, you can download a free Kindle app for your laptop.)  The author, Eric Weiner, is a former NPR correspondent, and world traveler. His author page includes another fun title, MAN SEEKS GOD.

 

¿¿ GOT SPIRITUAL APPETITE ??

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This spiritual biography completes what other biographers have largely glossed. The author, a neuroscientist, has mounted a masterful effort at research, grasping Einstein’s thoughts along with various major thinkers across the ages, organizing “walk-ons” by Pythagorus,  Socrates, Jesus, Shankara, Galileo, Bruno, Spinoza, Schopenhauer, et al. Einstein asserted that he was not an atheist, but rather, a student of “cosmic religion” – without hierarchy, dogma, or creed. There is something here for anyone with an open mind, a spiritual appetite, and deep curiosity about the Nature of reality. (This book pairs well with THE ONE: How an Ancient Idea Holds the Future of Physics, by Heinrich Päs.)

The Einstein book is also available in Italian.

Book Review : : OPEN SOCRATES : the Case for a Philosophical Life

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If I say CHECK, and you begin moving your King into an eternal dance, offering DRAW rather than conceding, you dishonor the game.  You lost, but instead you replied “let us agree to disagree”.  Boring!  Any referee of a wrestling match would declare you PINNED, no matter how much you flop and wiggle your shoulders. (A few friends have replied that I’ve disrespected chess — neither my intent, nor my point.) The point is to quit distracting ourselves, instead focusing on real learning, as the book mentioned below argues for, compellingly.

SOCRATES thrived equally on refutation and being refuted.  He loved them both; he was deeply interested in conjecture, inquiry and science (“true knowledge”) insisting that he knew nothing, but was deeply curious. He was identified by the Delphic Oracle, the spokeswoman for the god, Apollo, as the wisest man in Athens..

Agnes Callard, a philosophy professor at University of Chicago, has written a commentary on Sok’s life which is (mostly) thrilling to read. I’ve been reading philosophy books for many decades, ever since taking two courses in my final undergraduate semester, two of the best courses, ever. (Her book slows a bit in the middle, but press ahead, as there is gold in them thar hills!). Her book is one not to miss.  (It’s very accessible, unlike so many philosophy texts written for other academic philosophers.) If you don’t already have a free Kindle App on your laptop, go to Amazon and download it, then read her free sample.

Open Socrates

PRAYING FOR OUR LEADERS? // USA: BUILT BY GENIUSES > RUN BY IDIOTS ?

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Photo by Thomas Wolf (user Gs970) via Wikimedia Commons.

The Greek word translated as idiot/fool (moros: see Matt5:21-26, on anger management) means someone who cares mostly about himself, having little or no interest in community beyond what they might extract. But Christians are instructed to pray for those having authority over us (1Tim2).  This is not an easy assignment when those in authority seem so foolish and selfish.

SO, how to go about praying for our enemies, as instructed by Rabbi Jesus? He says “love them” — but how? What is love? (I’m certainly not pretending to love what Trumpty-Musky are doing to our democracy!) Here’s a troubling quote posted by Musk, which doesn’t sound like anything anyone in a democracy should ever do:

After a judge blocked a Trump executive order, Elon Musk shared a post with his more than 200 million followers on X that included the judge’s daughter’s name, photo and job, allegedly at the Department of Education.  [source]

Democracy is delicate and imperiled by such ugly behavior.  (If that judge’s daughter were your daughter, how would you feel?)  The “Founding Fathers” were educated, wealthy and elite. They “gave us a republic, if you can keep it” according to scientist/inventor Benjamin Franklin.  Yet today science and education are scorned by many Republicans.  

History repeats.  The Russian revolution had two factions seeking to overthrow the monarchy. Labor, called Mensheviks ; and Lenin’s “internationalists” which funded their organization by robbing banks. US Republicans have two factions seeking to “starve the beast” of government bureaucracy: Steve Bannon’s MAGA ; and Elon Musk’s billionaire’s club, deploying young hackers presently burrowing into Treasury, IRS, Medicare, Social Security, etc.  Guess who will win.  (Asked why he robbed banks, Willie Sutton said “…because that’s where the money is.”)

TOUGH LOVE from Republican voters is needed to arrest this impending disaster, yet few elected Republicans are willing to stand up to Musk/Trump, as they know they will be “primaried”.  They value their jobs and fear for their families if they resist.  Yet our military veterans risk their lives daily to defend our nation and our families ; however Republicans in congress cower, doing nothing to defend the Constitution. Jesus said “greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13)

If Republican voters don’t protest this takeover to their Republican officials our nation will surely descend into chaos.  Absent courageous officials, we have a veritable shituation in which democracy will die in a financial coup d’état perpetrated by billionaires. (Does anybody know what the penalty is for not filing a tax return?)  Letting Musk steal our tax dollars is intolerable!

 

King DonOLD II

GOT EGG$ ?

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“Grocery prices have skyrocketed. When I win, I will immediately bring prices down, starting on day one.” (~DJT, Liar, Liar!).   FAIR USE: photo borrowed from Paul Krugman’s FREE Substack blog, of Feb.14, 2025.

Crowds should be throwing eggs at TrumptyDumpty and MuskOx !  But voters who put them in office deserve to be wearing the aroma of rotten eggs.  What chumps!  Q: How can you tell if those billionaire pols are lying?  A: You can see their lips moving!

In grade school (long ago) I was taught that the Dutch bought the island of Manhattan for $24 dollars-worth of “wampum” beads.  (From 1950’s to 2020’s, adjusting for inflation, maybe that’s $240 today.)  Elon MuskOx contributed over a quarter of a billion dollars to the Trump campaign, because John Roberts and The Supremes said “money is speech” and voters should have “free speech.”  RIP: One [person] / one vote!  Conclusion: Republicans sold our democracy on the cheap to a guy who has over $400 billion dollars, and chumpy voters bought that stink! 

EXTRA CREDIT:  Professor Timothy Snyder, today at his free substack THINKING ABOUT… examines the risk of hasty appeasement between Russia and Ukraine, by imagining “what if” the Chech Slavs had defended themselves against Hitler in 2938.

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!!  Czar DON-the-CON, is NAKED   !!                    [book mention]

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FAIR USE

I’ve never been troubled by being thought a fool for Christ (Paul’s descriptor) — but Christianity itself can be downright embarrassing!  Less than a majority of US voters elected a violent sex-abuser and perpetual cheater, to our highest office. But a huge majority of those voters apparently claim to be Christians. So this contrarian, me, is now calling himself a born-again Socratic.  “Why?” you might ask. Have I traded Jesus for Socrates? No, I’m just ashamed. And I’m publicly rejecting the Biggest Heresy of all time, about Jesus, my Lord. 

It all got started by another emperor to settle a church fight (and he wasn’t even a Christian until he was on his death-bed decades later when he accepted Christ, in what might be seen as a superstitious bet). Emperor Constantine, in 325 A.D. , asserted that the Son was the Father of himself!  Like G.W.Bush, he told the bishops at the first Council of Nicaea that he, Constantine, was the decider.  Half of them said “Amen”!  And so it became “settled doctrine”. They had been arguing for years about whether Jesus was of the same substance as the Creator of the universe, or of similar substance as the Creator. (Thus entered into our idiom the phrase of “not making an iota of difference” – the battle centered on the spelling of two nearly identical words, one having an extra letter  i  called iota in Greek.) 

“Such a deal” said the bishops, realizing they would no longer risk being fed to the lions if they agreed with CONNIE that politics and religion could marry each other. Thus Christian “sharia” was born!  Suddenly Christian futures were highly valued; church-boy stock was up!  And any bishop, minister, pastor, or theologian who dared to disagree was suddenly potential CatChow, or maybe just out of a career. (They still teach this today to preachers in grad school and seminary: don’t touch the third rail of Jesus-as-God!)  Yeah, the Text says “I and my Father are one” — but ancient Greek had two words for “one”, while English struggles with just a single word for it.)

Well, Socrates spoke Greek; but like Jesus, neither of them wrote anything (that we know of). And nobody has yet declared Sok’ to be God in the flesh.  Both men had divine connections, to be sure.  But Jesus, it is little noticed, said “He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on him that sent me” (John 12:44). And Socrates often commented on his “divine sign” which guided him to avoid going forward at certain points — which brings us to the point of this blogpost: a new book, OPEN SOCRATES: The Case for a Philosophical Life, by Professor Agnes Callard, of University of Chicago. (I’m awaiting arrival of my hardcover copy, after reading the free Kindle sample, which you might also examine and enjoy.)

Hold it to your ear, and listen. You will hear we are on the wrong path.

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Photo by MeridaGOround

My prediction for tonight’s inauguration —


The Bannon-Musk battle is likely to be electric, unless Trump derails their throw-down via clever scheduling!  I hope TEAM RED are prepared to witness MAGA get plowed under by BigMoney tonight, and over the next few years.  History repeats.  

Maybe MAGA voters noticed (doubtful) what happened leading up to the Russian revolution:  the revolutionary workers opposed to the Tsarist “deep state” back then were the losers.  Those workers were essential to get the revolution rolling; but Lenin soon hired “professional” revolutionaries and had them rob banks to make their payroll, and foment his/their turn against the workers. Those “hires” were the guys who became the Bolsheviks — which then formed the Communist Party.  Hitler made a similar move, replacing his thuggish brown-shirted Hitler Youth “boy-scout” security apparatus with elite SS troops.  

Workers often tend to lose in a contest of muscle versus money.  MAGA can expect to see it happen again.  Musk and the billionaires will likely defeat Bannon / MAGA .  Enjoy the show, if you can stand it. (It’s a rerun which will end the same.)  Sadly, the middle-class taxpayers will be the big initial losers.  Trump will extend his tax cuts to his rich buddies in BigCapital, and the real workers (those who still have adequate jobs with a living wage) will foot the bill. But then society as a whole will eventually choke.  Institutions are the skeleton of our society. A starvation diet will digest that support system, sapping its strength, leaching value from the whole, into gated communities. Ronnie Raygun told a cruel joke: “I’m from the gov’t and I’m here to help.”  We need government more than we need billionaires! Civilization withers when citizens stop communicating and cooperating.  We are a social species, by nature!  (Curtis Yarvin and Bronze Age Pervert not-withstanding.) 

 

Poem : : OUR WHOLENESS

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Fair use. Myth, from Plato’s Symposium, speech by Aristophanes.

 

OUR WHOLENESS

Gazing into the sacred mirror, 

Rearward, focused on the past, 

examining lessons had,

We often struggle…

 

What’s the point of instant-replay? 

He fumbled, dropped the ball — 

watching again won’t change that day. 

But wait!  Can it change today…if

we win a lesson learned?

 

Greek myth says humans once were whole,  

four legs, four arms, two faces, too,

but gods split them in half.

So now we look for…

who?  Is my soulmate you?

 

I am one, and you are one, and one plus one is two. 

But only One is real, says math. All else is fractions, 

split, divided. The Whole is holy, wholey complete, entire, 

One, which cannot be undone, divided: 

Alone originally spel’t and said allone.

 

The beauty in the mirror looks back at you

to tell you, gently, true:  You were always One:

Completely you. 

(~eric.)

 

 

GEO-POLITICS > “FROM MANY, ONE”

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FAIR USE

Geo-politics:  E PLURIBUS UNUM > “from many, one” appears on the Great Seal of The United States.  At the moment there does not seem to be much oneness (unity) in evidence anywhere in USA, or across the globe. Nearly half of American voters pardoned DJT for attempting to crash Congress so he could remain in office and stay out of jail!  And on our currency it says “In God We Trust”. Really?

Emeritus law professor Jay Dratler comments on this lack of unity currently (“Now or Never”  04 December 2024), offering a “what-if” observation:

Can politics (many-ness) “sit down together” to become one? Well, religion and politics have much in common. Spinoza got kicked out of synagogue by Amersterdam’s chief rabbi for daring to question the concept of “chosen-ness” which he seems to have perceived as precocious-ness, instead.  “Off with his head!” said the rabbi, further stipulating that no Jew was to speak with him, ever, not even his brother, who was his business partner — no room to “sit down together to solve” anything in that edict!
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The central tenet of Jewish religion, the Christian religion, and the American sense of “chosen-ness” — (“a city set on a hill; an experiment in the wilderness” etc) — seem stuck in a ditch, presently.  So, allow me to attempt to unpack and re-translate what I perceive as a sticking point — found originally in Deuteronomy 6:4 —  (here’s my attempt, as Jacob’s new name, Israel, variously means “God-wrestler” or “God is in charge” — a pregnant reminder for us to stop quibbling, and focus! :  Listen up, you who say that God is in charge:  I AM is God, [ultimate good]; I AM is ONE.   This One-Thing concept is key to solving our messes.  Presently I’m proof-reading a lengthy piece of writing for a friend, naturalist Jim Conrad, a Nature Study Meditation, in which he considers One Thing. (I think he’s onto something vital.)  I’m also re-reading an excellent book, SOCRATES: A Life Examined, by philosophy professor Luis E. Navia. (You could read the free Kindle sample on your laptop.)