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| Thursday, December 31st, 2009 | | 3:07 am |
on how Pseudo-Dionysius modified Neoplatonism
Most important was a change in theodicy. Whereas being itself, life itself and thought itself in Proclus were subordinated emanations from the One, PD identified them with God; thus returning to the position of Aristotle which Proclus had rejected. God is the one who gives substance, the substantifier of every single existing thing, giving it total existence; everything... [preview ends] Aristotelian aporetic ontology in Islamic and Christian thinkers, By Edward Booth p.77 | | 2:24 am |
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link to PD chapter under cut
<tr class="metadata_row"><td class="metadata_value"> Speaking the incomprehensible God: Thomas Aquinas on the interplay of positive and negative theology Gregory P. Rocca ( Read more... ) | | Wednesday, December 30th, 2009 | | 6:15 pm |
PKD quote
Actually, a person's authentic nature is a series of shifting, variegated planes that establish themselves as he relates to different people; it is created by and appears within the framework of his interpersonal relationships. from Selected Letters, 1972 - 1973 http://www.palmereldritch.co.uk/pkd/index.asp?works=12&id=52 Current Music: I Palindrome I-They Might Be Giants-Apollo 18 | | Tuesday, December 29th, 2009 | | 9:43 pm |
Bob Ross quote
"if you don't think everyday's a good day, try missing a few"" | | 12:27 am |
rough sketch of an abstract for my Pico thesis (umpteenth try)
Pico Chapter One In Pico's oration man is exhorted to become like angels. But not much work has been done on Pico's conception of angels. He gets his angel primarily from Dionysius and Aquinas. Plenty of work (much mistaken) has been done on his magic and Kabbalah, but less has been done on his Christian sources. Yates thought Pico was grafting Kabbalah onto Magic in order to "tap forces" ... Copenhaver vs. Yates: Pico's magic was orphic-cabalist not hermetic-cabalist. Farmer, Allen and Copenhaver have highlighted Pico's employment of the neoplatonic metaphysics of Proclus. In my chapter on the Oration I will discuss how doing philosophy leads to angelizing, focusing on
the ways Pico uses Dionysius to make this fundamental point. In the 900 theses Pico does not treat
Dionysius but he does go into the neoplatonic metaphysics that underlies Dionysian angelology. In my chapter on Heptaplus I will discuss how the allegory theory of Dionysius and Proclus shows
that Pico uses neoplatonism to understand Kabbalah. In my chapter on Being and the One I will discuss how Dionysius and Thomas impacted Pico's critique
of Neoplatonic metaphysics. Pico understood how Dionysius Christianized neoplatonism, and how Thomas
further mitigated the platonism of Dionysius to come up with an original, Christian-friendly metaphysic. I will conclude that Pico is consistent in using Dionysius to interpret and assimilate all his influences
into an original, fundamentally and deeply Christian system. Further research will need to look more
deeply into Pico's understanding of the neoplatonic background behind Dionysius's angelology. This will
not only help us understand Pico but it will give us purchase on the "Christian Cabalists" who followed. Current Music: ghost house in new mario | | Sunday, December 27th, 2009 | | 2:05 pm |
READ me Dr. Memory
Aristotle and Plotinus on Memory (Quellen Und Studien Zur Philosophie) By Richard A. H. King Two treatises on memory which have come down to us from antiquity are Aristotle's "On Memory and Recollection" and Plotinus' "On Perception and Memory" (IV 6); the latter also wrote at length about memory in his "Problems Connected with the Soul" (IV 3-4, esp. 3.25-4.6). Both authors treat memory as a 'modest' faculty: they assume the existence of a persistent subject to whom memory belongs; and basic cognitive capacities are assumed on which memory depends. In particular, both theories use phantasia (representation) to explain memory. The two short treatises on memory by Aristotle and Plotinus which are the subject of this study raise interesting conceptual questions about memory. There is an intuitive view of memory which one could describe very briefly as follows. A living thing perceives something; residues of this perception are preserved and may serve an act of memory. Very roughly, this is Aristotle’s view. Plotinus opposes it, above all because he thinks the subject of memory is simply the incorporeal soul, and this cannot be affected and so preserve residues in itself. The present study is an attempt to describe and contrast these two ancient theories of memory. Current Mood: I see coins and bricks when I close my eyesCurrent Music: new mario | | Friday, December 25th, 2009 | | 8:24 pm |
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Aquinas's Platonic insights into Soul
"Thomas Aquinas used Platonic insights in order to explain what the soul is and how it functions in extraordinary situations before and after death. Such Platonism typically occurs when Aquinas sets out to explain why and how it is that the human soul needs to function independently of the senses. The reason for such independence is that the mind can see God unhindered by any sensory input when God is seen face to face. How it occurs is explained by Aquinas in terms of an intense intellectual attentiveness to God which occurs with the necessary aid of a supernatural disposition which allows God to be seen in the divine essence itself. In order for the mind to operate in this way, sensory activity must, according to Aquinas's account, cease since, according to Thomas, if the senses continued to operate in their natural way of providing potentially intelligible data for mental abstraction, this would prevent the possibility of such an encounter occurring." in Dillon, ed. "The Afterlife of the Platonic Soul" p.179 | | 7:45 pm |
Plotinus on Nous, from Dennis Clark on neoplatonism e-list
Plotinus, Enn. V.3.17, my translation: What then is better than a life most thoughtful, without misstep and mistake, and better than Nous holding all things, better than complete life and complete Nous? If we say "that which made those things", then "how, made them?" And if something better were to appear, reasoning will not proceed to something else but will stay at Nous. But we must go higher, for many reasons, and by virtue of the fact that it is self-sufficient arising out of all things from without itself, though each of those things singly is clearly insufficient; and because each of those things has participated and participates in the One itself, though Nous is not the One itself. What is it then in which it participates, which makes it to be and along with it all things? If it makes each thing to be, and by virtue of the presence of the One the multitude of each thing in it and itself are self-sufficient, it is clear that it, as maker of existence and self-sufficiency, is not itself existence but beyond it and beyond self-sufficiency. Is it enough then after saying these things to make an end, or does the soul still have more labor to endure? Perhaps then now she must give birth in full labor surging towards the One. But must we not sing another incantation if we can find from somewhere some other charm for her birthing? But perhaps one might appear from the things we have said already, if it were chanted repetitively. Then what other charm would be that extraordinary? For the soul chasing after every truth at the same time takes flight from those truths we partake of, if someone wants to speak and think them through, since for sure intellect, if it asserts anything, must take each thing one by one. For this is indeed disquisition. But what disquisition is there for the wholly simple? But it is enough to fasten upon it intellectually. And once fastened upon, as it is fastened upon, it is wholly without the ability or opportunity to speak, but later it can reason concerning it. At that point we must believe that we have seen, when the soul suddenly receives the light. For this is from the One and it is the One. And at that point we must consider the One to be present, just as when some other god calling us into his house comes shining forth: for if the One had not come it would not shine. And even so the soul without god is unillumined of the One, but illumined it has what it was seeking, and this is the true end for the soul, to have fastened onto that light and behold it by itself and not by the light of another but itself through which the soul sees. Through that which illumines it, that it is, which the soul must behold: for we do not behold the sun through the light of another. How then would this come to be? Get rid of everything. Current Music: new mario | | 1:48 am |
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thanks to Flavor Dave for the quote
"Then for another moment it seems that all the Christmas bells in the creation are about to join in chorus--that all their random pealing will be, this one time, coordinated, in harmony, present with tidings of explicit comfort, feasible joy." --Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow | | Thursday, December 24th, 2009 | | 3:07 am |
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CFP Pynchon's CA SF May 27-30 deadline Jan 25
http://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/node/35420With the publication of Inherent Vice (2009) it becomes possible to speak of Thomas Pynchon’s “California novels.” Unlike Pynchon’s pagemonsters, which are set around global historical crises, The Crying of Lot 49, Vineland, and Inherent Vice are set in California in the present or recent past; they are also shorter and somewhat more traditionally plotted, and two revolve around Pynchon’s only female protagonists. Two of his longer, globetrotting works, Gravity’s Rainbow and Against the Day, also wind up in California. Papers are invited for this proposed panel on any aspect of Pynchon’s “California novels” or his use of California as a setting in his writing. | | 2:27 am |
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