Category Archives: nineteenth-century
Dreams about Real Life
The night before we left for California, I had what may be the strangest dream I ever dreamed: I was in a passenger plane – flying who knows where – until the airplane was split in two by a lightning … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, eighteenth century, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, Industrial Revolution, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, Married Philosophers Discuss Confessions, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, Renaissance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, seventeenth century, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, Suicide, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Trauma, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged age of reason, anti-semitism as anti-colonialism, anti-semitism in the Age of Enlightenment, anti-semitism in the Romantic period, anti-semitism inventing deicide, anti-semitism reflecting the Zeitgeist, anti-semitism the same through outward changes, anti-semitism through history, cast thyself down, decoding dreams, don’t test God, dream figure representing anti-semitism, dreams, dreams decoded by experts, dreams self-decoded, dreams that fulfill diagnostic expectations, Freudian dreams, Freudian psychoanalysis, Freudians and New York fashions, God and air travel, God not liking ugly, God’s anger at anti-semitism, gospel hymn I Know Who Holds Tomorrow, history of anti-semitism, I Know Who Holds Tomorrow, interpreting one’s own dreams, Jesus declines to test God, Jew-hatred unchanged in a changing world, Jewish assimilation and the Holocaust, Jungian dreams, lightning and God’s anger, lightning as heaven-shattering, lightning splitting the sky, meaningful dreams, newest form of oldest hatred, oldest hatred, plane crash, post-Darwinian anti-semitism, precognitive dreams, rabbinic Judaism denies concept of collective guilt, rabbinic Judaism denies concept of hereditary guilt, reproaching Holocaust victims, reproaching Israelis as colonialists, reproaching Jews in their ancient home as colonialists, sibling rivalry as theology, Temptation of Jesus, testing God’s believed favoritism, the chosen people, the Chosen People and perennial resentment, turnover-gendered person, undiscovered island, veridical dreams
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Traumatic Memories: Past and Future
I used to take pride in my excellent memory. But sadly, it got somewhat less excellent after my first marriage. Perhaps my psyche decided that certain scenes from that part of my life story were best left un-remembered. With regard … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, Confessions of a Young Philosopher, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, eighteenth century, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, Married Philosophers Discuss Confessions, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, Renaissance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, seventeenth century, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, Suicide, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Trauma, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged abused children and PTSD, anti-semitism and higher education, anti-semitism as cultural inheritance, anti-semitism as ongoing trauma, anti-semitism as the return of the repressed, anti-semitism in universities, biochemical markers of Holocaust trauma, biochemical markers of trauma, brain function and trauma, C-PTSD, consciousness-raising groups, cultural attitudes toward trauma, domestic abuse and law, global anti-semitism, healing trauma, Herzl’s vision of a Jewish state, Holocaust trauma, Holocaust victims, increasing anti-semitism, inherited trauma, intergenerational trauma, Israel’s resistance to anti-semitism, Israeli Nobel Prize winners, Jewish resistance to anti-semitism, Judith L. Herman’s Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence – from Domestic Abuse to Political Terror, laws against marital rape, laws against wife-beating, lighting a candle vs cursing the darkness, memories of suffering, memory, memory loss, Oct 7 2023, Oct 8 2023, October 7-8, ongoing traumatizing events, past trauma, Peter A. Levine’s Trauma and Memory: Brain and Body in a Search for the Living Past, political history of trauma, post-Holocaust suppression of anti-semitism, psychic forgetting and trauma, psychic oubliettes, PTSD, PTSD and combat veterans, return of the repressed, social anti-semitism, Theodore Herzl, therapy for memory loss, therapy for trauma, third-generation Holocaust trauma, training trauma healers, trauma after Hamas atrocities, trauma and brain malfunction, trauma and memory, trauma healing before and after, trauma therapy, traumas past and present, traumas present and future, traumatic memory, unbearable psychic wounds, universities and anti-Israel demonstrations, world-wide anti-semitism, Zionism
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Women Who Want To Kill Themselves
Some years ago, when I was still working full time as a philosophy professor, I got a late-afternoon call from E.S. He was a senior colleague and good friend. We’d exchanged just a few words when he remarked, with concern, … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, Confessions of a Young Philosopher, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, Married Philosophers Discuss Confessions, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, Suicide, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged a daughter’s suicide, academic colleagues, academic friends, arguing a friend out of suicide, career setback, classic suicidal motivation, collegial friends, dishonor and Iberian culture, dishonor and suicide, feminist objections to “honor”, honor and modernity, honor as premodern concept, honor for men vs honor for women, impressing a romantic partner, loss of honor, loss of honor for men vs loss of honor for women, lost honor and suicide, official feminism and women’s reality, payback for the seducer, philosophical defense of “honor”, philosophical friends, philosophical objections to “honor”, philosophy professor, planning suicide, professional defeat, professional setback, psychological objections to “honor”, reasons for suicide, reasons women kill themselves, responding to a friend in crisis, restoring honor, romance and status, romantic eligibility, romantic setback, saving a friend at the cost of losing her, seducer, seducer as pretended supporter, seducer in self-help group, seduction and abuse of power, seduction and wanting to die, setbacks in work and romance, suicidal woman, suicide, suicide aftermath, suicide and counterargument, suicide and losing face, suicide and loss of honor, suicide and professional setback, suicide and tarnished image, suicide threat, taking advantage of a woman, taking advantage of vulnerability, taking threats seriously, talking a friend out of suicide, vulnerability and the seducer, witnessing a friend’s defeat, worthiness for romance
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Civilization and Me
There seems to be something at the heart of historical existence that’s probably incurable. It gets the name of envy or sibling rivalry. And it’s the insurmountable fear that God might love my brother or sister more than God loves … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged Abrahamic religions, Athens and Jerusalem, Biblical narrative, Cain and Abel, conflict across generations, cultural conflict, envy, envy in human nature, Ethics, foundations of Western thought, hatred, historical conflict, history of antisemitism, human nature, Jewish identity, Matthew Arnold, moral philosophy, philosophy of religion, Plato, religion and culture, roots of antisemitism, sibling rivalry, sibling rivalry in the Bible, The Academy, truth and history, Western Civilization, why are Jews hated
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