While you’re busy making other plans

Renewed from December 15, 2009

By Moristotle

Was John Lennon quoting Schopenhauer when he said:

Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.¹

Goines On: Ringing

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Goines was late putting out bird seed one morning. He had maundered during breakfast, thinking dreamy apple thoughts, and missed the time by which he usually had their seed out.
    As he raised the silhouette shade over the door from the kitchen onto the back porch, he fantasized – he hoped – that some birds were watching, waiting until he brought out their treats. He hoped they now noticed the shade being raised and were beginning to announce the event. Goines imagined them tweeting, “He’s coming, he’s coming!” Did each species have its own sentinel?

13 Years Ago Today: All in or All out

By Moristotle

[Originally published on September 9, 2007.]

I have talked approvingly of what I understood to be Søren Kierkegaard’s view, on the question of belief in God, that it was nobler (as well as more accurate) to hang with one hand from one ledge of the narrow chasm of religious belief and with the other hand from the opposite ledge than to transfer either hand to join the other on the same ledge. Hanging precariously from both ledges symbolized doubt. Kierkegaard thought doubt nobler because it consigned the doubter to the perpetual angst of his uncertainty whether to believe or not to believe, since, as a matter of accuracy, the person could not be objectively sure which belief was right.

Ten Years Ago Today: All in or all out

By Moristotle

[Originally published on September 9, 2007, not a word different, same image as then, but with an author’s note at the very end.]

I have talked approvingly of what I understood to be Kierkegaard’s view, on the question of belief in God, that it was nobler (as well as more accurate) to hang with one hand from one ledge of the narrow chasm of religious belief and with the other hand from the opposite ledge than to transfer either hand to join the other on the same ledge. Hanging precariously from both ledges symbolized doubt. Kierkegaard thought doubt nobler because it consigned the doubter to the perpetual angst of his uncertainty whether to believe or not to believe, since, as a matter of accuracy, the person could not be objectively sure which belief was right.

To dance

A philosophical friend of many years the other day quoted Nietzsche approvingly ("isn't this great!") as having written that

True freedom is being able to dance in your chains.

I suppose that the statement might remind us that, whatever our circumstances, we should try to make the best of them. Mother Nature has worked out the matrix of our fundamental situation, including the consciousness by which we have intentionality and choice. That is, we have some free choice within the bounds (bonds) of our various genetic hard wirings. We are "enslaved" by the same process that evolved our "freedom." But Nietzsche's motto adds nothing to that; we do as Mother Nature created us to do. Or, in the words of spiritual guide Anthony de Mello (1931-1987), "All is well."

However, we are also enslaved by our particular cultural situations, the indoctrinations of our parents and local surrogates, the ethos of our cohorts, our cliques of friends and associates. To the extent that we have bought into sentimental (and largely false) beliefs, the better alternative to "dancing" within them is to throw them off and, as Anthony de Mello also said, "Wake up to life!"
    True freedom from a false belief system comes from shattering it for one that accords with reality. Only then can we stand tall and dance truly, with spirit. To continue in the bonds of religion or cultural or political servitude is to march in lock-step. It is not to dance.

...while you're busy making other plans

Was John Lennon quoting Schopenhauer when he said:

Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans¹.

According to the character Philip, a "philosophical therapist" in Irvin D. Yalom's novel, The Schopenhauer Cure, quite a few others have "quoted" Schopenhauer:

And not only Thomas Mann but many other great minds acknowledged their debt to Arthur Schopenhauer. Tolstoy called Schopenhauer the "genius par excellence among men." To Richard Wagner he was a "gift from Heaven." Nietzsche said his life was never the same after purchasing a tattered volume of Schopenhauer in a used-book store in Leipzig and, as he put it, "letting the dynamic, dismal genius work on my mind." Schopenhauer forever changed the intellectual map of the Western World, and without him we would have had a very different and weaker Freud, Nietzsche, Hardy, Wittgenstein, Beckett, Ibsen, Conrad. [p. 50]

The Schopenhauer quotation [on p. 91 of The Schopenhauer Cure] that reminded me of John Lennon's famous statement was:

When, at the end of their lives, most men look back they will find that they have lived throughout ad interim [for the intervening time, temporarily]. They will be surprised to see that the very thing they allowed to slip by unappreciated and unenjoyed was just their life. And so a man, having been duped by hope, dances into the arms of death.

    Lennon's is easier to take and more memorable, isn't it? Without that final sentence.

But we need that sentence, to be reminded not to let our lives just slip by unappreciated while we're busy making other plans.
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1. He might have said this in an interview with Rolling Stone Magazine about 1970. At any rate, a citation in a Google hit list included both the part of the quotation I searched on and a reference to Rolling Stone.

A sad irony of the First Amendment

Irvin D. Yalom is one of my favorite authors. Not only have two of his collections of "tales of psychotherapy" richly rewarded my reading¹, but also two and now a recently started third of his three novels², The Schopenhauer Cure, with dozens of quotations from the works of Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) sprinkled throughout.
    The theme of the book might be phrased, "how to face death," same as Yalom's most recent non-fiction book, which I read a few weeks ago: Staring at the Sun: Overcoming the Terror of Death. In The Schopenhauer Cure, Yalom fictionalizes himself as of course also having to face death. Sounds grim? Well, know this: it's a compelling read for discriminating readers.

Anyway, what's this about the First Amendment? And just what is the First Amendment?

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof [emphasis mine]; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

    In both of Yalom's books cited above, religion is acknowledged as having a use for people in facing death—even though Yalom will have nothing to do with it personally. So, on the first page of Chapter 8, Yalom places this quotation from Schopenhauer:

Religion has everything on its side: revelation, prophecies, government protection [emphasis mine], the highest dignity and eminence...and more than this, the invaluable prerogative of being allowed to imprint its doctrines on the mind at a tender age of childhood, whereby they become almost innate ideas. [p. 55]

Therein lies the irony, that the United States Constitution, in protecting "religious freedom," practically denies religious freedom (including the ability to say "no" to religion) to children!
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1. I have read these collections: Love's Executioner and Other Tales of Psychotherapy (1989) and Momma and the Meaning of Life: Tales of Psychotherapy (1999).
2. His other novels are: When Nietzsche Wept (1992) and Lying on the Couch (1996). The first has been made into a movie (2007), with Armand Assante in the title role.

Moristotle and Sheepandgoats: A friendly set-to

Tom Sheepandgoats's February 4 post, "Elijah Crashes the Atheist Hall of Fame!," sparked an extended dialogue between him and Moristotle—all conducted in comments on that post and concluded yesterday by mutual consent.

The gist of "Elijah Crashes" is Tom's friendly contention that in the debate between atheists and theists, it's no contest, the theists (ably represented by Tom himself) will always win. The post wittily likens their debate to some ancients' pissing contests over whose god was the better. Tom rhetorically identifies the Biblical Elijah with the atheists in mocking the heathen followers of the god Baal. You might start by reading Tom's entertaining post. You can follow the debate either through the comments there or in what follows here:

[Posted by: Moristotle | February 5]:

All in or All out

I have talked approvingly of what I understood to be Kierkegaard's view, on the question of belief in God, that it was nobler (as well as truer) to hang with one hand from one ledge of the narrow chasm of religious belief and with the other hand from the opposite ledge than to transfer either hand to join the other on the same ledge. Hanging precariously from both ledges symbolized doubt. Kierkegaard thought doubt nobler because it consigned the doubter to the perpetual angst of his uncertainty whether to believe or not to believe, since, as a matter of truth, the person could not be objectively sure which belief was right.

But I've now given up nobility. I've shifted the hand that was clinging to belief over to the other ledge and am now hanging with both hands from un- or non- or disbelief, and I feel ever so much better. And those who have done just the opposite—and cling to belief with both hands—feel better too, I assume.

I suppose that being either all in or all out of anything is more comfortable. A juror who just can't make up her mind whether the man accused of murder is guilty or not will be in agony over it. If deliberations go overnight, she might not be able to sleep. I used to agonize over whether or not to approve of the death penalty. I feel better now that I've come down unshakably against it. In general, humans find relief and feel better after they stop roiling and make up their minds!

On "the religious question" (which is essentially whether God exists and can be approached through some form of worship or prayer), believers who cling to their belief with both hands usually try to fortify their position by applying to a particular "holy scripture" which they accept as containing "the revealed Word of God." This could be The Torah, The New Testament, The Qur'an, The Book of Mormon, or whatever. A belief in a particular divine revelation, it seems to me, works this way in "fortifying" their fundamental belief: if the scripture in question is true, then of course God is...this or that, for The Book says so. But note the "if" regarding the scripture. No one can know objectively whether it's the "Word of God" or not. A noble doubter will cling to the two opposed ledges on that question.

I said that believers in God "try to fortify" their belief through application to a holy scripture. "Try" because of course such application is no real help at all. They still have to face Kierkegaard's question. The leap of faith has to be taken on the question whether there really was a revelation or not...

...just as the disbeliever takes his leap of faith that religion is false, that God (in the personal sense) does not exist, that Jesus was not the Son of God, that Muhammad was not a Messenger of God, that Joseph Smith's golden plates were an elaborate hoax motivated by greed and venality, that the various similarities of religious belief and practice around the world show, not that God has revealed Himself to peoples everywhere, but that evolved man tends to project the same gods everywhere, that most of those beliefs and practices flatter neither the assumed gods nor the actual men, and so on.

And, to be honest (which I hope I always am), I admit that I make an application myself to try to fortify my nonbelief. My application is to rationality, or common sense. Thomas Paine, Bertrand Russell, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens seem to me to make a very great deal more sense (in their books The Age of Reason, Why I Am Not a Christian, The End of Faith, and God Is Not Great, respectively) than the "holy books" I'm familiar with. It seems ever so much more reasonable to me that religion is a childish fantasy than that it is a serious adult vision. But some of the things said in scripture are nevertheless apt:

When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. [The First Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians, 13:11]

I do have at least one remaining question. It has to do with the distinction between religion and spirituality. As a noble doubter, I felt that I could "be spiritual" even though I found it ridiculous to try to "be religious." The question is: Now that I've opted for being all out when it comes to religion, is spirituality still an option for me, and what does that mean?