06/9/21

Looking at Kirk Kanzelberger’s Essay (2020) “Reality and the Meaning of Evil” (Part 15 of 18)

0060 In sections four and five, Kanzelberger pulls more threads through the loops of Poinsot’s scholasticism and Peirce’s postmodernism. He does so well, that I continue in parallel, like a harmony to his melody.

0061 I turn to privation of judgment_2c.

Consider an example.

0061 Crooked lawyers love the sin of omission. They love to omit the evidence that would cause them to lose the case. This love is justified by the doctrine of total satisfaction for the client. The crooked lawyer does not serve justice. The crooked lawyer serves only his client, even when his client is guilty as charged.

In the domain of morals, the doctrine of total client satisfaction stands in opposition to an oath to serve justice. Lawyers take an oath to serve justice. This doctrine deprives the oath of its merit. Evil is a privation of good.

Legal theory contextualizes a lawyer’s cupidity, even as the lawyer’s exploits defy the attainment of justice.

0061 Is there a hierarchy here?

Crime is what happened_3a. A trial is what is happening_3a. Victory in court is what it means to me_3b. Someone really depraved constructs the legal process that permits it all_3c.

There is a hierarchical difference between a corrupt lawyer_3b, who objectifies what is happening_3a in the pursuit of total victory for his client_1a, and a legal theorist_3c, who formulates the consensus of what is legally permissible_1c. Legal theorists_3c fashion suprasubjective entities, concocting law-determining judgments_2c that alter, tweak, nudge, correct and re-configure the intersubjectivity_2b within which a moral agent_3b signifies. Legal theorists_3c alter the machinery of justice_2c. Evil ex academia_1c.

The well-educated cutting-edge legal theorist_3c offers norms_2c that may oppose the rule of reason and the divine law_1c, just as parody opposes tragedy. The projection of alternate meaning into words_1c, such as “client interests”, “service”, “mandates” and so on, mocks the hard-won projection of true meaning_1c, where the client’s interests do not outweigh justice and true justice ultimately furthers the interests of us all, including the client.

0062 Here is a picture.

06/8/21

Looking at Kirk Kanzelberger’s Essay (2020) “Reality and the Meaning of Evil” (Part 16 of 18)

0063 What is the catch?

Alternate legal theories_2c cannot endure in the absence of the original truth of justice_1c. There are two types of immoral actors. The practitioners of concupiscence_2b, like crooked lawyers, struggle with self-justification_1c. The self-justified_2c, like opportunistic legal theorists, strain to defy right reason and divine law_1c. They offer better alternatives_2c. They_3coffer them_2c in droves. A multitude of alternatives_2c swarm with betterness.

Kanzelberger writes, “Purposeful evil is not a matter of ignoring the moral context of courses of action, but a semiotic disorder involving… a fictive construction… that functions as… an imagined future.”

0064 You mean, like that approaching cloud of legal locusts?

Imagine a world where the rule of reason_2c and the divine laws_1c are partially, then totally, eclipsed by a swarm of organizational objectives_2c, each declaring its own righteousness_1c, each supported by its own theoretical imperatives_1c and each relying on the power of the state to enforce its dictates.

Imagine a world where certain words_1a are made flesh_2a, and this winged flesh_2a fills the air with what is happening_3a, so that all things and events_2a actualize theory-distorted subjectivities_1a.

Imagine a world where our phantasms_2b are not grounded in truth, but in the projection of meaning_2b into once truth-filled speech-alone words_2a.

0065 Surely, we have eaten from the tree of the knowledge of good an evil.

Like locusts.

There will be hell to pay.

06/7/21

Looking at Kirk Kanzelberger’s Essay (2020) “Reality and the Meaning of Evil” (Part 17 of 18)

0066 Kanzelberger writes, “Moral evil is a dark image. It weaves a web that bewitches its author, then ensnares others.”

But, the author and the ensnared do not necessarily stand on the same level.

0067 Natural evil makes no sense. Natural evil is privation of the subject.

Moral evil makes sense. Moral evil is privation in phantasms. We selectively use word-symbols deprived of their fullness. We seek agreement_1a, not wisdom_1c.

Metaphysical evil defies moral sense, by willfully projecting its own relations between what is and what ought to be_2c, into spoken words_2a, which cannot image or indicate on their own.

0068 Imagine a nest, full of duly-appointed avian-philic crooked lawyers, passing a law decreeing the latest innovation of their premier legal theorist. All cats are to be banished from the sovereign realm, because they are symbols of human maliciousness and cruelty.

Here is a brood worthy of Kanzelberger’s philosophical consideration.

06/6/21

Looking at Kirk Kanzelberger’s Essay (2020) “Reality and the Meaning of Evil” (Part 18 of 18)

0069 Kirk Kanzelberger joins Thomas Aquinas with a basic acknowledgment: Evil is a privation of a good.

He then considers natural and moral evil.

In moral evil, he locates a semiotic disorder, in addition to a privation.

He considers the nature of the sign, as formulated by Charles Peirce.

0070 He publishes his argument in a journal worthy of the reader’s support.

Reality: A Journal for Philosophical Discourse

0071 My comments are not so different. They thread through both Peirce and Poinsot. They pass through the two loops brought to light by John Deely.

Yet, the are different, in that they offer diagrams based on Peirce’s categories.

0072 Typically, Razie Mah’s comments are published in the smashwords website and carried by a variety of e-book vendors.

Start with A Primer on the Category-Based Nested Form.

Add A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction.

That is all that is needed to introduce oneself to the interscope of social construction.

0073 The three-level interscope appears in the chapter on meaning in the masterwork, How To Define the Word “Religion”.

The three-level interscope plays a role in A Primer on the Individual In Community.

The three-level interscope serves as a model of langue, in Comments on Robert Berwick and Noam Chomsky’s Book (2016) Why Only Us: Language and Evolution.

0074 All these works are available at the smashwords website.

So concludes this look at Kanzelberger’s foray into both Aquinas and Peirce, concerning reality and the nature of privation.

Look to Reality.

God bless.

04/16/21

Looking at Jeff Hardin’s Essay (2019) “Biology and Theological Anthropology” (Part 6 of 15)

0032 Here is a mirror picture of Hardin’s argument.

0033 Ah, the current narrative of human evolution cannot account for a twist. All written origin stories of the ancient Near East depict a recent creation of humanity.

What does that imply?

Our current Lebenswelt is not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.

Surely, the phenomena of the Developed Neolithic tell us as much. Once the towns of the Uruk period arise in the Tigris and Euphrates River delta, there is no looking back. Civilization begins.

0034 So, we can pose a question to the origin stories of the Ancient Near East.

What makes civilization possible?

They tell us that humans are recent creations by the gods.

0035 What does this imply?

The manufacture of humans by newly differentiated gods indicates that the ancient scribes and storytellers could not see beyond a certain point in the past. They could not see into the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. I call this time horizon: the first singularity.

The evolutionary sciences do not see what is right in front of them.

Human evolution comes with a twist.

04/15/21

Looking at Jeff Hardin’s Essay (2019) “Biology and Theological Anthropology” (Part 7 of 15)

0036 Human evolution comes with a twist?

What insights do we have from the Bible?

0037 First, there are two origins depicted in Genesis. The Creation Story covers Genesis 1:1-2.3. The stories of Adam and Eve start at Genesis 2.4.

Both comport with the style and content of ancient Near East texts.

0038 Second, those in Abraham’s tradition treat both origin stories as real.

The Creation Story justifies the Sabbath as a day of rest, as codified by Moses.

The stories of Adam and Eve, in contrast, suddenly come into the limelight when St. Paul connects the Jewish revelation, fulfilled in Christ, to all humanity, all the way back to Adam. Adam is where Jews and Gentiles converge.

0039 What does this imply?

The Bible conveys the noumenon of a recent prehistoric change, the first singularity, that alters the course of human evolution.

0040 There are two origin stories in the Bible.

Perhaps, to evolutionary scientists, the leisurely day-to-day development in Genesis One is a better analogy to the origin of our world and ourselves, than the bizarre abrupt manufacturing scenes in the stories of Adam and Eve.

At the same time, the surprising fairy-tale construction of Adam and Eve testifies that the evolutionary scientists miss a crucial turn of events. All the written origin myths of the ancient Near East concur with the stories of Adam and Eve. Humans are recent creations by the divine.

0041 Does Jeff Hardin call for new models of human evolution in light of both science and the Bible?

I suspect he does.

He does not go so far as to call for a new empirio-schematic judgment.

But, he is certainly not shutting the door.

04/13/21

Looking at Jeff Hardin’s Essay (2019) “Biology and Theological Anthropology” (Part 9 of 15)

0048 What about the transition to our current Lebenswelt?

Is there a way that theological anthropology and the anthropology of civilized folk move together?

0049 Here is an interpretation of the Bible.

The fact that all written origin stories of the ancient Near East point to a recent creation of humans implies that the scribes and storytellers cannot see beyond a certain point in time, say 7821 years ago. Adam and Eve are fairy tale figures standing at the portal of our current Lebenswelt.

0050 Here is a corresponding novel approach to evolutionary science.

Our current Lebenswelt is not the Lebenswelt that we evolved in. The transition is called the first singularity. The first singularity begins with the appearance of the first speech-alone talking culture, the Ubaid of southern Mesopotamia. At this time, all other cultures practice hand-speech talk.

Hand-speech talk?

Speech is added to hand talk at the start of our own species, Homo sapiens.

By the time the first singularity initiates, hand-speech talk has been practiced for 200,000 years.

The transition from hand-speech talk to speech-alone talk is simple. Drop the hand-component. But no-one ever thinks of doing so, since hand talk grounds words in the natural sign qualities of icons and indexes. Plus, humans have been enjoying hand-speech talk for countless generations.

0051 So how does the Ubaid culture do it?

By accident. At the start of our current interglacial, the Persian Gulf is dry land, settled by two two unrelated hand-speech talking cultures, one land-loving Neolithic and one coast and river-loving Mesolithic. A significant and rapid rise of the sea marks the start of our current interglacial. The Persian Gulf fills with water, pushing the two cultures together.

The cultures join into one. They develop a pidgin from the two very different languages. After a few generations, the pidgin turns into a fully linguistic creole. The hand-component of hand-speech talk is lost. Sumerian is the first speech-alone language.

Sumerian is a linguistic isolate. It is unrelated to any family of spoken languages.

0052 The semiotic qualities of speech-alone talk are very different from hand-speech talk. Hand-speech talk facilitates constrained social complexity. Speech-alone talk fosters unconstrained complexity.

That is the science in a nutshell.

0053 Three series are devoted to the first singularity at the smashwords website.

The most direct is Crystallizations of the Fall, containing two articles: The First Singularity and Its Fairy Tale Trace, plus Comments on Original Death and Original Sin: Romans 5:12-19. Skeptical science types should start here.

The most accessible is A Course on An Archaeology of the Fall, containing the namesake masterwork and an instructor’s guide. Accompanying literature includes the early chapters of Genesis, chapter 5 of Paul’s letter to the Romans and Sura 5. This is the best path for students and teachers. This course is designed as a seminar. Read and discuss.

Implications and further commentaries are located in the series Reverberations of the Fall. Theologians should consider this series first. Original sin is relevant, again. But, here, I am getting ahead of myself.

04/12/21

Looking at Jeff Hardin’s Essay (2019) “Biology and Theological Anthropology” (Part 10 of 15)

0054 So far, The Human Niche covers the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.

An Archaeology of the Fall covers the first singularity.

In both these exercises, theological and biological anthropology move together, without violating the Positivist’s construction of what is.

What about our current Lebenswelt?

The first singularity initiates our current Lebenswelt.

Speech-alone talk spreads, through mimesis, to adjacent hand-speech talking cultures, on the basis of marginal differences of wealth and power.

0055 Why is the Ubaid wealthier and more powerful than surrounding hand-speech talking cultures?

Speech-alone talk works on symbols, while hand-speech relies on icons and indexes (even though language itself consists in two related systems of differences, that is, symbolic orders). Speech-alone talk can name parts, irrespective of wholes. In hand-speech talk, a part may name the whole. Consequently, speech-alone talk facilitates specialized languages, which supports labor and social specialization.

The Ubaid has more wealth and power because it is further along a path of labor and social specialization.

0056 But, isn’t there a problem with speech-alone words that is not present in hand-speech talk?

Yes, in hand-speech talk, the gesture-word pictures or points to its referent. So, of course, the word and referent go together.

In speech-alone talk, we innately anticipate that a spoken word pictures or points to its referent. But, a speech act does not picture or point to anything.

What happens next?

We project meaning, presence and message into a spoken word. Then, we construct an artifact that serves as a referent and validates the projected meaning, presence and message. As long as the projection-validation works, the artifact is salient, and serves as a referent.

0057 Perhaps, the reader sees a problem with this arrangement.

Indeed, Augustine’s depiction of original sin only scratches the surface of the fallen character of our current Lebenswelt. Some Reformed traditions have a more precise term: total depravity.

If a person is able to construct an artifact that validates the meaning, presence and message that “he” projects onto a spoken word, then what is to stop “him” from um… creating and taking advantage of a situation?

Welcome to our current Lebenswelt, where our own spoken words allow us to name our own “realities”.

0058 Here is another pairing of Biblical interpretations and a new approach to the human sciences.

04/11/21

Looking at Jeff Hardin’s Essay (2019) “Biology and Theological Anthropology” (Part 11 of 15)

0059 Our current world is fallen, yet civilization constantly rises from the ashes of prior self-destructions.

The Bible depicts a cycle of formation, deformation, and reformation.

A new approach to the psychological and the social sciences ought to move in tandem with Biblical interpretation.

0060 Some evolutionary psychologists already stumble in this direction.

For example, today, people are fat, lazy and addicted to sugar.

Is the problem that our ancestors adapt to a world filled with fat-burning, strenuous and sugar-demanding activities?

No, with the benefits of civilization, the pressure is off. We can afford to slow down, take rests and eat desserts. The problem is our current Lebenswelt.

0061 When anyone asks me what I’m doing, I say, “I’m working.”

But, I’m really eating candy.

Yes, I project meaning, presence and message into the word, “work”.

And, my projection is paying off.

My own spoken words create an artifact that justifies my sloth, plus a little extra.

Fat, that is.

0062 Spoken words stimulate the production of artifacts that appear to validate the meaning, presence and message of spoken words.

Doesn’t that sound scientific?

The motif is so versatile.

Augustine proposes that the disorder caused by Adam’s rebellion resides in our privy parts.

Surely, he is on track.

What better incentive to manipulate meaning, presence and message, than to generate artifacts in the service of one’s privy parts?

The current Zeitgeist says, “It’s only natural.”

Augustine’s concept of concupiscence sounds like an orientation that postmoderns want to speak about… er… manage.

04/9/21

Looking at Jeff Hardin’s Essay (2019) “Biology and Theological Anthropology” (Part 12 of 15)

0063 What about the disciplines of modern psychology and sociology?

Do they labor as word-smiths, hammering out the spoken words that will address the tsunami of concupiscence-related disorders that currently plague modern society, or do they construct spoken words that thwart an evangelical’s desire to hear a sermon on Original Sin?

After all, lectures on concupiscence are not justified in a Zeitgeist where concupiscence is labeled “natural”.

0064 Surely, secular experts justify various features of our current Zeitgeist… er… regime, just like they previously (and maybe still do) labored to account for various flavors of mercantilism, various strains of fascism, and various manifestations of communism.

These ideologies all build on foundations of spoken words, specialized disciplinary languages fashioned by academically certified agents.

0065 Spoken words can (somehow) create the artifacts that validate spoken words.

The best way to make that happen is with sovereign power.

Spoken words can generate the righteousness underlying an organizational objective that will allow me (and my fellow travelers) to demand sovereign action. Then, the state implements my organizational objective, thereby validating the righteousness that my spoken words advocated.

Try to get around that.

0066 An example?

May I call the current regime: “big government (il)liberalism”?

Some would call it, “the administrative state”.

Big government (il)liberalism is the latest sovereign solution to the nasty consequences of an enlightened disposition, declaring, “Concupiscence is okay, because it is natural.”

“Tolerance” is key.

Big government experts must be tolerant in order to better manage the citizen’s natural proclivities.

0067 So, the word, “liberal” has been perverted from a focus on freedom and responsibility to a fixation on nonjudgment.

The prefix, (il), celebrates this inversion, because managing citizens is the negation of serving them.

0068 Isn’t that what the word, “government”, ought to mean?

If the citizens are going to do what’s natural, then someone must clean up the mess. What does that mean? Someone must control the citizens, in order to ameliorate the mess that they would produce, if left to their own natures.

Er… not someone, something. Something big.

0069 In a world where government is omnipresent, the message comes across loud and clear.

Look at your television and listen to the talking heads.

We are here to justify your concupiscence.

We are here to manage the consequences.

Please comply with current directives.

An Archaeology of the Fall

A Horror Story by Razie Mah

Category Archives: Our current Lebenswelt is not the Lebenswelt that we evolved in