Search results

Extra plug - the Kafka stories are very short ;) "Before the Law", one page, "The Problem of Our Laws" two... Of course, you'll be pondering them for years. (I have been, anyway.) The strength of the Derrida that I mentioned is precisely that it alerts you to the opaque profundities in Kafka's...

Re: the Eagleton, Zizek, Jameson love: the post-Marxists write good intros, no? All that dialectically incorporating everything, Hegel-style... It makes them comprehensive, if nothing else ;)

Two comments. Firstly, as regards Ukraine, I've been struck by just how explicit Western governments have been in proclaiming the elections fraudulent. The Australian government, for example - though they refused to even consider allegations that its allies (read: 'the U. S.') have been...

Sure, the introductory things are an abridged version of the menu, rather than the meal itself, but I still think it's helpful to have some idea (even if the idea is revised radically at a later date) of what the terrain is. It saves you pulling out your hair, if you are of the disposition to...

Fredric Jameson is a good place to start, for a general entry (The 'Postmodernism' one), as is Eagleton's 'Literary Theory'. I suggest these because they are a handy way to fill yourself in on the most general shape of the conversation, before getting into the very 'meaty' stuff. Or perhaps just...

I do think that you can say this of most specialised knowledge, including that of academia. Extreme specialisation tends to kill societies. There are some quite convincing arguments put forward for this by John Ralston Saul (though I think he gets lots of other things quite wrong) - and so he...

Oh, and one more... Forgot to mention before: Kafka's story/parable "The Problem of Our Laws" is also highly relevant here. Thanks for the posts - a number of my good friends are currently doing law degrees, so I've been looking at 'the problem of vocation' over their shoulders. You describe...

Lawyers aside... No doubt as to the law's existence? In one sense - in the everyday manner of saying that 'there is such and such' - this is undisputable. But in another sense, the law has no material existence. Which I find quite fascinating. It doesn't exist like a chair or a table. It...

I guess this is where you see Mark's Spinozist position - that you can mechanically break down 'what is best' for people. I think it is difficult, at best, to justify any sort of 'political action' (crusading, teaching, campaigning...) without having a sense that a) there is a set of conditions...

I'm not quite sure if the analogy between communism and Christ's ethical call works in this case, for the reason that the communist cause seeks to realise itself on earth, in this life, while Christ, despite all the militating that takes place on this side of death, predicates his claims on a...

it's not tennis As a general comment, I wonder why it is that some people are so quick to bat unfamiliar ideas and suggestions away as soon as they come within hitting distance. Though you may disagree with some theory or find it illogical/counterintuitive, it seems rather presumptuous to label...

Well if we take a pantheistic view of things, and believe even ourselves to be parts/aspects of God, then I wonder if such self-service (and indeed even the more social variety of sex) could be construed as a sort of divine auto-eroticism? So that we are all lips, forever rubbing against each other?

Nummer Zwei I think I'm in the second category, Mark, while looking quizically and somewhat indecisively at the possibility of an ascendance to the third. Which particular group of Gnostics uses these categories, historically speaking? And who/what are their philosophical ancestors? I was...

Hello all. I've never read any Borges before, and I am out to buy my first copy of his work. I was wondering if anyone could recommend some good translations/collections to start with?

Damn straight - how can you look upon and contemplate your own writing, when your eyes are glued to your hit counter? Hats off to people who compose things offline for their blogs - not doing so, I always feel that what I write is premature, not having had the benefit of an "internal monologue"...

What's that Nietzsche quote that I always think of? "If (man) will not be satisfied with truth in the form of tautology, that is to say, if he will not be content with empty husks, then he will always exchange truths for illusions."

I know - I loved it how she was so tired and rumpled-looking in the photos of the last day of campaigning... Like a snoozy child in the back of the car. Except with a lion's mane of hair and wrapped in an imposing coat.

Reminds me of something I was thinking while reading echo friendly's posts in the 'Mark K-P and the Catholics' thread. What is this "it's easy" business? I don't find it easy if I think about it. But perhaps this is just because nothing is easy, if you think about what you are doing. Action is...

Two queries - But would you agree with the statement that one can't help but 'believe' in any one of these reality tunnels? That infinity can't be faced, that we need to place our foot somewhere and thus limit ourselves? And to mark k-punk: how can experience/feeling (if this is how they are...

I agree completely. I have always said that there is conflict inherent in the law. But I have also stated that there is a common conception of the law which holds that, although there is interpretation of laws, these laws form a coherent body. My points have been about how the inevitability of...