Strange Doctrines

Blessed Are the Pasta Makers

Skeptics of the Flying Spaghetti Monster are missing the point. Obviously, it isn't meant to be taken literally. It refers to any divinity in wheat products.

Drake's Principle

Every principle will break down under arbitrarily close scrutiny except for Drake's Principle.

Theogony

In the beginning, there were no meanings.

And then Man said, “Let there be Meaning!”

And on that day, God was born.

Profoundest Last Words

"Why should my words now be more esteemed merely because they are my last?"

Alas, to utter these words is to violate their spirit.

Why We Are Here

"We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us."
 -- Bukowski

"I don't know why we are here, but I'm pretty sure that it is not in order to enjoy ourselves."
 -- Wittgenstein

"[W]e are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different."
 -- Vonnegut

"We are here to provide the world with a little dramatic material and a lot of comic relief."
 -- Me

"We are here on earth to do good for others. What the others are here for, I don't know."
 -- Auden

Consolation of the Imperilled

The Greeks, in a way of life in which great perils and upheavals were always present, sought in knowledge and reflection a kind of security and ultimate refugium. We, in an incomparably more secure condition, have transferred this perilousness into knowledge and reflection, and we recover from it, and calm ourselves down, with our way of life.

Nietzsche, Daybreak 154.

And Be Sure to Blog Every Now and Then

[W]here are you hurrying to?
You will never find that life for which you are looking.
When the gods created man they allotted to him death.
But life they retained in their own keeping.
As for you, Gilgamesh, fill your belly with good things;
Day and night, night and day, dance and be merry, feast and rejoice.
Let your clothes be fresh, bathe yourself in water.
Cherish the little child that holds your hand.
And make your wife happy in your embrace.
For this too is the lot of man.

From The Epic of Gilgamesh (Sandars, Nancy K., trans. )

(Via Brad DeLong.)

Ought from Naught

Moral antinaturalists claim that we cannot derive an ought from an is. And so they propose, instead, that we derive an ought from an isn't.

The Metaproblem of Evil

Given considerations adumbrated here, it seems clear that the Problem of Evil is not an argument against Christianity.

But that is an argument against Christianity.

Looking Away

Some days I find it impossible to affirm life. And it makes me feel guilty.

Against Narrativity

[Life] is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
--William Shakespeare, Macbeth

Maybe it's just a bad stretch, but I'm beginning to think reality might have a Macbethian bias.

Optimism and Ontology

"Why is there something rather than nothing?"

The optimist provides an answer: Because nothing is impossible.

Terrible Art

"[T]yranny comes more naturally than art to mediocre men."

- Camus

(Via Cliché Reality.)

Concord

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. If only I had their composure.

The Last Theorem

I've discovered a truly marvelous proof of nihilism. Of course this margin is more than wide enough to contain it. It's just...what would be the point?

The Taming of the Shrill

"Words ought to be a little wild, for they are the assaults of thoughts on the unthinking."
        --John Maynard Keynes

(Via Paul Krugman.)

On Containing Multitudes

For a few moments, the secrets of the universe are opened to us....

But then the genius, the savant, has to hand over the controls to the next guy down the pike, most likely the guy who just wants to eat potato chips, and insight and brilliance and salvation are all entrusted to a moron or a hedonist or a narcoleptic.

The only way out of this mess, of course, is to take steps to ensure that you control the idiots that you become.

--Jonathan Nolan, "Memento Mori"

Odin's Compromise

Odin, through his sorcery, divined that the secret the Æsir needed to overcome the Frost Giants at the Ragnarök was held by a certain witch. When Odin approached the witch and asked her the price of the secret, she said "Your left eye."

The All-Father, knowing better than to try to bargain, promptly plucked out his left eye and laid it on the table between them, demanding the secret.

The witch replied: Watch with both eyes.

(Via Mark Kleiman, via...Mark Kleiman.)

With Apologies to Molière

Shorter property dualism: Consciousness arises in the material world because matter contains a phenomenal virtue.

No Respect

"Whoever despises himself still respects himself as one who despises."
    --Nietzsche, BGE 78.

Discussion. Nietzsche is arguably wrong. For instance, just the other day I had the following conversation with myself:

Self: You suck.
Self: Oh yeah? Well what do you know, you moron?

(H/T Your Daily Nietzsche!)