Skip to main content

Events dear boy, events.


Here you can see the shed on another gloomy morning. Very apt for this wretched building.

I was going through an old book the other day and found a sentence scribbled in my handwriting in the margin. I hadn't thought about the topic in some time, but I think I still agree with the younger me (although in general I am a little more sanguine these days).
"This Descartes needs a good fucking kicking."


What do you reckon? Does Descartes deserve a damn good thrashing?

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Colette Amelia said…
Not a fan of Rene myself. the mind body disconnect does not hold water to me.
9 March 2009 at 12:04
Miles McClagan said…
As long as you leave Deschamps alone...
9 March 2009 at 20:05
KL said…
ABSOLUTELY NOT especially for his contribution to Mathematics.
9 March 2009 at 22:24
Kris McCracken said…
Colette, here here!
10 March 2009 at 12:50
Kris McCracken said…
Miles, why? He was rubbish at Chelsea...
10 March 2009 at 12:50
Kris McCracken said…
KL, but what about the animals, that's what I want to know?
10 March 2009 at 12:51
KL said…
Animals!!?? As far as I know and remember, he was famous for his philosophy and mathematics. Where did animals come? Okay, I need to read him and about him again then..yuck...yuck..yuck...[never going to happen].

Mui have no idea about connection between him and animals. Honest fact about me - I am a hardcore math and science person. From humanity side, I love art, literature, music and also participating in them. But those other subjects of sociology, philosophy don't interest me much :-(. I like to daydream and think about my own philosophies but not reading and discussing others. Very ignorant and uneducated in those fields :-(:-(.......

So, what is it with Descartes and animals?
10 March 2009 at 23:56
Kris McCracken said…
KL, Descartes argued that animals were simple automata that might act as if they are conscious, but really are not so.

This mechanistic approach allowed for abominable treatment of animals (cruelty as sport, vivisection etc) and influenced generations of attitudes and behaviour that should make many 'rational' human beings ashamed of themselves.
11 March 2009 at 06:23
KL said…
Ah! you have brought back memories of my undergrad days. I now remember all these discussions. Cruelty against animal or anything is disgusting. And Descartes should be vilified for that, but then he was a man of that time. And, also cruelty against animals had been going on centuries before him - they were/are butchered for food, forced to carry heavy loads and work on fields and what not!!!!!!!! :-|....
11 March 2009 at 23:30
Kris McCracken said…
KL, as I have expanded upon today, it's not that Descartes endorsed poor practices, he established a 'scientific' rationalisation for the such practices. The Cartesian view of animals dominated European thought for a good few hundred years, and - to my mind - is ethically, morally and scientifically unsound.
12 March 2009 at 12:12
KL said…
Agree and very much agree. But such ideas are still prominent, unfortunately. Recently i was reading that a rare white deer has been spotted in the UK and people are getting ready to pay a minimum of 5000 pound (!!!) to hunt and kill that animal down and get his head as a souvenir. I don't get all these human psychology :-|....

Ok, gotta go now. Good night (good afternoon). With my spring break, I have been enjoying your blog (need to find out what was your first entry). But come monday, work starts and all the fun will vaporize.
12 March 2009 at 13:26
Kris McCracken said…
KL, how depressing!

I'll write shorter posts for you.
12 March 2009 at 14:19
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Hold me now, oh hold me now, until this hour has gone around. And I'm gone on the rising tide, to face Van Dieman's Land

Theme Thursday again, and this one is rather easy. I am Tasmanian, you see, and aside from being all around general geniuses - as I have amply described previously - we are also very familiar with the concept of WATER. Tasmania is the ONLY island state of an ISLAND continent. That means, we're surrounded by WATER. That should help explain why I take so many photographs of water . Tasmania was for a long time the place where the British (an island race terrified of water) sent their poor people most vile and horrid criminals. The sort of folk who would face the stark choice of a death sentence , or transportation to the other end of the world. Their catalogue of crimes is horrifying : stealing bread assault stealing gentlemen's handkerchiefs drunken assault being poor affray ladies being overly friendly with gentlemen for money hitting people having a drink and a laugh public drunkenness being Irish Fenian terrorist activities being Catholic religious subversion. ...
62 comments
Read more

But when the strong were too weak to hurt the weak, the weak had to be strong enough to leave.

Can you believe that it is time for Theme Thursday already? Today we are not talking chocolate , toddlers , mess or ignominy . No, today we're dealing with ANIMAL . Now I could have posted a picture of a possum, numbat, wombat, wallaby or any other furry killing machine that roams our fair isle, but I figure that I'd use a far more deadly creature as an example of an animal . Some people - I know them as fools - have chosen to embrace that highfalutin idea that human beans are for some ungodly reason superior to animals. Of course, what these imbeciles seem to forget is that were are simple animals ourselves ! Anyone with a baby, toddler, teenage boy or Queenslander in their household could tell you this. Look at Henry [above]. One chocolate frog in the back of the car on a sunny day and all of a sudden it's Elagabalus meets Bacchus for a quick shandy in the Serengeti and we're down on all fours carrying on like a cat in heat. Fair dinkum, anyone who chooses to ...
42 comments
Read more

Something unpleasant is coming when men are anxious to tell the truth.

This is the moon. Have I mentioned how much I adore the zoom on my camera? It's Theme Thursday you see, and after last week's limp effort, I have been thinking about how I might redeem myself. Then I clicked on the topic and discover that it was BUTTON. We've been hearing a lot about the moon in the past couple of weeks. Apparently some fellas went up there and played golf and what-not forty-odd years ago. The desire to get to the moon, however, was not simply about enhancing opportunities for Meg and Mog titles and skirting local planning by-laws in the construction of new and innovative golf courses. No, all of your Sputniks , "One small steps" and freeze dried ice cream was about one thing , and one thing only : MAD Now, I don't mean mad in terms of "bloke breaks record for number of scorpions he can get up his bum", no I mean MAD as in Mutual assured destruction . When I was a young man you see, there was a lot of talk about the type of m...
50 comments
Read more