Heavens and earth

The School of Athens was painted by Raphael sometime in 1510-1511. Here you will find all the philosophers of ancient times. The center figures are Aristotle (384BC-322BC) and his teacher Plato (424BC-347BC). Aristotle is pointing to the earth, reflecting his belief that knowledge was derived from experience, that materia prevailed over idea, that physical reality dictated our existence. Plato, on the other hand, points to the heavens, suggesting that in fact the opposite is true that the ideals shaped and configured our material world. These two philosophical currents, materialism of Aristotle and idealism of Plato shaped the Western philosophy through the ages, culminating in Hegel and Kant, Hegel influenced by Aristotle and Kant by Plato. Kant once said, ‘I am not saying anything new. I am only organizing and conceptualizing what Plato said in ecstasy.’


Of course, these philosophical trends were more complicated to be coined just by the names of ‘materialism’ and ‘idealism’. After all, both Aristotle and Plato knew very well the absurdity of oversimplification. The world is driven by both the physical earth-grounded elements and non-earthly, non-material elements. That is why ideals that cannot be materialized or realized in the real world are not relevant. It was Jose Ortega y Gasset , the great existentialist, who suggested that a theory that is incapable of being put into practice should be deleted and replaced with another. In other words, the theory that fails the practical experiment is not a good theory. That is why, there soon came the disillusionment with Communism. Marxist ideology, a theory, failed the practical experiment of mankind.

We all dream. In fact, the prerequisite of success and achievement is dreaming. Without dreaming, we do not have a clear vision where we are going, and why we are going. Without dreaming, we do not even have willingness to make a step forward. Dreaming entails passion, obsession, some degree of mental frenzy and restlessness. Nothing is impossible. Generally, the sky is the limit. But dreams that are not capable of being materialized in the world we live in, are not good dreams. Specifically, we all know that the world and society erect many barriers to our individual ideals day after day. Also, the lifespan of a mortal human being, the limitations of our physical existence are internal barriers that we simply are not in control of. So, there are external and internal barriers to realization of our dreams. What do we do then? Do we stop dreaming? Do we stop obsessing over our ideals? Do we simply give up? If Aristotle points to the earth, does that mean we should only settle for what is around us, forsaking Plato’s direction to the heaven?

That is the constant human struggle and no one of us will have the answer. Each of us will formulate own response to this ‘Aristotle-Plato’ dichotomy. But one thing is clear, without dreaming there will never be hope for better. Without hope for better, there is no meaning in life. But because there is a wide gap between the real world and our dreams, dreaming takes a lot more courage than you think. When you are crawling in the darkest tunnel with no light ahead, fearful to fall into the unseen pit ahead, in that darkest hour, if you can envision in your mind that light ahead, and smile, continuing to walk, that is courage, that is strength, that is spiritual power.

The Will to Live

A great German philosopher, Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) wrote in his famous "Will to Live":

Awakened to life out of the night of unconsciousness, the will finds itself an individual, all striving, suffering, erring; and as if through a troubled dream it hurries back to its old unconsciousness. Yet till then its desires are limitless, its claims unexhaustible, and every satisfied desire gives rise to a new one. No possible satisfaction in the world could suffice to still its longings, set a goal to its infinite cravings, and fill the bottomless abyss of its heart. Then let one consider what as a rule are the satisfactions of any kind that a man obtains. For the most part, nothing more than the bare maintenance of this existence itself, extorted day by day with unceasing trouble and constant care in the conflict with want, and with death in prospect. Everything in life shows that earthly happiness is destined to be frustrated or recognized as an illusion.

There is only one inborn error, and that is, that we exist in order to be happy. It is inborn in us because it is one with our existence itself, and our whole being is only a paraphrase of it, nay, our body is its monogram. We are nothing more than will to live and the successive satisfaction of all our volitions is what we think in the conception of happiness.

... Our life is like a payment which one recieves in nothing, but copper pence, and yet must then give a discharge for: the copper pence are the days; the discharge is death.

Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980), a great French philosopher and existentialist wrote similarly in "The Age of Reason",

I am my own taste, I exist. That is what existence means: draining one's own self dry without the sense of thirst.

... For nothing: this life had been given him for nothing, he was nothing and yet he would not change: he was as he was made. He yawned: he had finished the day, and he had also finished with his youth. Various tried and proved rules of conduct had already discreetly offered him their services: disillusioned epicureanism, smiling tolerance, resignation, flat seriousness, stoicism-- all the aids whereby a man may savor, minute by minute, like a connoisseur, the failure of a life. He took off his jacket and began to undo his necktie. He yawned again as he repeated to himself: "It is true, it is really true: I have obtained the age of reason."

Well, existentialism that was born and developed by writings of these philosophers and others, including Nietzsche, Kafka, Gasset was a product of nihilism, another trend in philosophy. Nihilism-- rejection and negation of everything, reduction of certain settled things into nothing. At the same time, existentialism raised the human being and sanctified its existence by postulating that there is nothing wrong with selfish and self-centered human 'existence'. That people have a right to live their lives to the utmost, to the most ridiculous fullness and richness... That narcissism and epicureanism were not that bad... Existentialism was also affected by voluntarism, another trend in philosophy, which promulgated the willpower as the basis of human life... It must be known that existentialism was a philosophy to counter Marxism. Since Marxism was focused on the 'community', not the individual, the existentialism felt that individualism was under an assail and thus needed support. Idealism and materialism of the 18th century philosophy were replaced by Marxism and existentilism in the late 19th and 20th centuries.

But of course, one of the necessary by-products of individualism was the lonely and depressed individual, stranded on the road all alone, and in despair. The communitarianism on the other hand provided the joyful 'community', a mass of people, at the expense of one individual's needs and wishes... Thence, the writings of all existentialists were filled with this longing for happiness and satisfaction of inner dreams... Perhaps, the only existentialist, who truly understood this was Soren Kierkegaard (see on this blog). He is considered the father of existentialism. Yet, he wrote in contrast with most who followed him,

The great thing, as I regard it, is to live in the congregation, to bring something finer out of it, if one is able; at all events to subordinate oneself to it and put up with it if one is unable to better it.

Freedom and its Attainability

Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855), a Danish philosopher, wrote in his famous "Either/Or," "For freedom, therefore, I am fighting... I am fighting for the future, for either/or. That is the treasure I desire to bequeath to those whom I love in the world; yea, if my little son were at this instant of an age when he could thoroughly understand me, and my last hour had come, I would say to him, 'I leave to thee no fortune, no title and dignities, but I know where there lies buried a treasure which suffices to make thee richer than the whole world, and this treasure belongs to thee... This treasure is deposited in thine own inner self: there is an either/or which makes a man greater than the angels."
These words of the existentialist equate freedom with choice. Ability to choose is freedom and freedom is the ability to choose... Self-realization of the individual is the prerequsite to the ability to choose and therefore, freedom. But self-realization comes only after knowledge of oneself. "Know thyself" is the old sage's advice... Therefore, freedom is unattainable without self-knowledge... The question then becomes, is freedom possible when most people by virtue of their surroundings, upbringing and other factors are simply not capable of learning who they are... Because of this, true freedom also becomes simply absurd and a figment of our imagination...