The Unmaking of God — Part III

The Unmaking of God, by Dr. William F. Nietmann, University Press of America, Inc. © 1994 and The NIV Bible, © 1978, The New York International Bible Society (My Image © 2020 F. P. Dorchak)

Dr. Nietmann’s stated goal in the Preface was to “…reformulate religious authenticity…[and] show that human existence is essentially religious.”

As I approached the last third of The Unmaking of God, Dr. Nietmann did, by way of Søren Kierkegaard, broach the subject of uncertainty of philosophical thought, in that “The task of evolving meaning reflects what is involved in being human.” Basically, that we’re not perfect and that thought evolves over time and consideration. He also later stated that “Ideas are produced by persons.” I liked to see these two sentiments stated. I also liked this statement: “There is no finality to thought.” And other thinkers, some religious, were also presented, but one thing that kinda bothered me was his notion of “the meaninglessness of human existence.” That was a bit too Nihilistic to me, and I do not subscribe to Humanity being any kind of meaningless. Maybe he was merely presenting trains-of-thought, but it was hard, at times, discerning what was Dr. Nietmann’s thoughts and what was being shown as others’ thoughts.

Dr. Nietmann presented much “evidence” to prove his stated goal (I underlined many passages in the last half of the book), and it was all quite thought provoking, but when he went on to state that “Philosophy often seeks the objective grounds for understanding existence,” well, that caused me to pause. I’m sorry, but all thought is subjective. It all originates from human minds, and given the changes in philosophical and religion thought on the “same topics” over the years changing, how can anything be considered “objective?” Sure, some things may be “more right” than others, but it’s all subjective and therefore subject to interpretation. Granted, he says “seeks,” but religion seeks to give us comfort and answers, seeks answers to the Whys, as well…of course even considers itself to be objective.

All of humanity seeks to do something.

Absolutely everything starts as thought and manifests (seeks to be) physical, depending on the amount of attention given.

So I maintain the same can pretty much be said of religious thought as well, once you disentangle yourself from any Wittgensteinian, Derridian, et cetera constructions/deconstructions/definitions. I am amazed at the thought put into words and signs and meaning, but I think there is an overcomplication that frequently occurs in philosophical thought.

There is a lot more that is presented, but since I’m at odds with much of it, I really don’t want to take the time to detail it all. It’s a continuation of philosophical evidence against religious evidence. To me much of philosophy should be utterly obvious, when it is not, and as I mentioned in my posts on Herr Wittgenstein, I do believe that words are symbolic to the thoughts they represent. As are symbols. As if corporeal existence representative to what’s going on in the incorporeal.

However…I do heartily agree that philosophical thought is far more rigorous (and critical!) than religious thought. Philosophical thought holds no constraints on where it should go and what it should deconstruct, while religious thought is highly constrained to only that material that is within the given-religion’s worldview and canons. There are so many other sources that contradict each and every religion from each and every other religion. And there is this little term of “faith” that pervades them all, when external sources directly contradict religious sources. Yes, this was brought up in the book.

Søren Kierkegaard

In Chapter VI, we get into Kierkegaard, whom I’ve always enjoyed. I like the way he thought…though there are elements in many philosophers I liked (including Plato), but, overall, I think Kierkegaard has perhaps been my favorite in the deconstruction of religious thought. To Kierkegaard, he viewed religion as beginning and ending as a reflection upon one’s existence as a human being. Søren appears to agree with much of Dr. Nietmann’s positions, such as that religion describes our finitude and not the metaphysical. Kierkegaard defines “subjectivity” as human existence (Ha! Further fuel for my fire, see the above paragraphs!). And as such that we all need to “…find a way into subjectivity without becoming objective“…by way of confronting ourselves through “indirect communication.” And that further, which I liked when I first read about it in Dr. Nietmann’s “Philosophy of Religion” class, back in 1983, Kierkegaard says that “For Christianity is a fine belief to die in, the only true comfort, and the moment of death is the appropriate situation for Christianity.” In other words, to profess your belief in God and accept Christianity at death is the way to go.

Life Is Essentially Religious

Dr. Nietmann did lay this out by saying that religious thought should be better defined as addressing one’s existence (or “finitude”), and not be bothered with defining God. That instead, religion should be more concerned with the searchers for God. To “…[be] there to see a person who perpetually exists in his/her own thinking.” How are they living their lives? Dealing with each other? That religion should leave it to philosophical thought to answer all the more esoteric concerns. He goes on to state: “The truth of religious language is to be found in its capacity to frame and unfold human existence, not in whether its propositions are objective enough to be believed.” He says that not doing this, but in continuing to depict objective “truths” about the Universe hides and even obliterates the world of human experience…and it is exactly that human experience that religions should be addressing. Nothing more. But, instead, religion has became “subverted” by “philosophical theorizing.” And his book has tried to build that case.

Agape

Agape is a Greco-Christian term that referred to the highest form of love…the love of God for Humanity and of Humanity for God. Dr. Nietmann feels that agape should not entail concern for the realities of the Divine or an Ultimate Being, but should instead be the “…shaping force in the articulation of one’s being….”

Again, it all comes down to one’s finitude.

Revelation

In his section titled Revelation, he goes where I was dying to see him go: he flat-out stated that “Ideas are produced by persons,” and said that if religious language were to see itself as providing knowledge, revelation would be a “sneaky way” of claiming religious imagery/dogma as facts, and never being held accountable for doing so. Basically just saying something is real without needing to provide any proof whatsoever. Again, this is not religion’s mission. It’s mission is to address Humanity’s subjectivity.

I also really liked how he ended his Unmaking of God dissertation in “The Silence of God” section, but I will not recount them here, because they are powerful to his entire claim, and I don’t want to steal anymore of his thunder without readers reading the book for themselves. I’ve borrowed quite enough of his salient quotes already. I do feel he actually has done a great job of proving his point, yet I question how much actual philosophical consideration were employed in reality over the two-thousand-year creation and management of Christian religion. There is so much I want to get into with this point, also about religious origins, but am not going to for one reason or the other. Maybe in some other post. So, while I do appreciate what Dr. Nietmann presented regarding the philosophical and religious…

Yes, But…

When I studied under Dr. Nietmann at NAU (1979 – 1983), I would constantly engage him in counterpoints. This would then invariably lead into fifty-minute discussions of much back-and-forth…usually between him and me. So…as I read The Unmaking of God, I was instantly struck by a counterpoint that something seemed “off” about his entire argument. As I stated above, Dr. Nietmann wanted to “…reformulate religious authenticity…[and] show that human existence is essentially religious,” and while that is a lofty, most noble (and I maintain, largely academic) goal, I don’t see that ever happening, if not for the most basic reason that religion (and since Dr. Nietmann limited his discuss to Christian versions of it, that’s what I’ll also refer to here) has become utterly not only ingrained into a formidable emotional, politicized, and weaponized institution, but also heavily monied. You think it’s tough to change or reign in tremendously large corporations that rake in huge amounts of remuneration from their ills forced upon the environment and Humanity, well, religions are far larger than all of them put together, and not in a numbers way.

In a notional way.

And notions are hard to kill let alone change. Once you get away from the “Holy Seats” of religions, where the leaders physically reign, you also have to get past the emotional and faith-based anchors of all the followers: people have been unapologetically killed for speaking out against religious orders, and let’s not even talk about all the torture inflicted in the name of religions and their Gods. When you start picking at one’s internal and core beliefs (and I’m not talking religious leaders, here, I’m talking the masses), you cut to the quick, and things turn ugly fast. As Dr. Nietmann also said in his Preface that his wife likes to avoid all things philosophical because “It creates dissention, and she believes in living with peace with others.”

Yes.

Unfortunately, very few people can calmly and intelligibly discourse with those of conflicting faiths and beliefs. But that notwithstanding, people of faith simply discount any provable facts that go against their religious tenets, because of their faith, so it is usually an exercise in futility to even try to, unless you are trying to mine their beliefs and not challenge them. This is from my experience. I simply no longer go there.

But I sensed a deeper, perhaps more insidious counterpoint that took me the length of the book to more positively formulate, because, well, I did have to finish the book to see where he was going with it all. And, yes, he did eventually bring in some external sources, but still not much in the way of the Biblical creators and heavy religious thinkers. The Dead Sea Scrolls, or more of the apostles. Those who actually built Christianity from the sand up. And perhaps that is sparse and dangerous territory, because there are so many theories about exactly how the Bible was physically written, and how Christianity was physically manifested, including all the many religions of Christianity, once you look away from the Bible as a factual source. There are even Biblical scholars who question taking the Bible as literal, so it’s not just one or two of us.

Dr. Nietmann wanted to create a more sterilized version of not only philosophical, but religious thought. Again, noble, but again, not gonna happen. It’s a great academic goal for universities and the like, but it just will not gain any traction until some global “inciting incident” (yes, here I’m talking about an actual, no-shit, you-can’t-avoid-it, “Second Coming”)…or, maybe, once most of the Old Guard die off and such new thought percolates through all institutions and becomes the new quorum. Who knows how long that might take. I could go out on a limb and maybe say if not a hundred or two-hundred years, maybe 1-2,000 years?

But even more so than all of the above, I have this issue with Dr. Nietmann’s well-thought-out and well-presented arguments: all of this…religious thought, philosophical thought, and all their permutations thereof…are all human-derived considerations.

Obvious, you say? Perhaps it’s so obvious it actually does bear pointing out. He did mention it above (“Ideas are produced by persons“), though didn’t take it as far as it really should have been taken.

And in terms of religious and philosophical thought, I also disagree with Dr. Nietmann in the limitations he had placed upon what religious and philosophical thought are supposed to be. In my experience neither of the two can ever be sterilized, because both are human generated. And from what I have discovered and researched since taking an interest in the subject as a teenager, both religion and philosophy came about precisely because of trying to explain our place in the universe. Period. You can tweak and dial and contort everything anyone has ever said about both, mess with word and symbol definitions, but the reality I see and experience is that both factions have been trying to explain Why and Where and Who since humans first began reflective thought. They are two arms of the same curiosity. One is called “religion” and one “philosophy.” One is more rooted in the emotional and the other in logic. One is more rigorous, the other simply is not.

But you see, as I learned long ago and experienced in the workforce, that the same set of numbers can be used to both prove and disprove the same set of “facts”…and so can words.

Absolutely everything can be twisted around to prove a conflicting set of facts. It’s about interpretation and repetition. Some don’t even bother with trying to logically deconstruct anything, but just feel if they SAY it…say it enough…say it loudly…it’s Truth. A fact. Even in the face of outright contradictory “factual,” logical, and empirical evidence. It’s simply and patently ignored. And some feel that placing certain words before and around other words logically proves their points-of-view.

But, for crying out loud, how do you explain all these differing factions claiming to be right? They all cannot be “right” given the same sandbox they’re all playing in.

People continue to believe what they believe. And so it goes.

Is that wrong?

I used to think it was entirely incorrect. Obfuscating proper living.

What I now believe and what I’m pointing out in my counterpoint here is that both religious and philosophical thought should not be about who is “right”…but about how humans deal with their finitude, if I may borrow Dr. Nietmann’s term. What it is to be human.

One is not…less-right…than the other, for they are all about beliefs. Even philosophy. You have to believe something in order to discuss anything, especially to pick something apart (e.g., believing in one thing over another in order to be critical about the other). Philosophy and religion are both attempts at humanity to comes to terms with itself: God, violence, origins—you name it. The premise that religions should keep God out of it, I find well-meaningly flawed, I’m sorry, Dr. Nietmann. All I have ever learned and researched about religious origins was that was precisely why religions originated, and to remove that aspect from religion is the major reason why religions sprang up to begin with, despite all your well-presented arguments. That was why I was looking forward to more religious-thinkers presented. Whether or not Christianity originated from the oppressed seeking personal or spiritual valuation or piggybacking upon current philosophical considerations of the day (or…something else…), pretty much most of the religions I can think back to started because of some different God Concept. Or, if they didn’t start out that way, quickly migrated toward it and wholeheartedly embraced it. And doing that is still, as I see it, an inherent part of defining our “finitude,” and to surgically remove that one aspect of religion predicated upon all your presented just seems utterly artificial, and none of it came together enough for me at the end of the book to really believe it. Given all your presentations, all the definitions and hermeneutics, none of it dealt with that version of Why you say philosophy should be one way and religion another.

But that doesn’t make The Unmaking of God a wasted effort!

You are contributing your own version of Humanity’s understanding of Finitude.

Unlike you, I don’t blame philosophy for incorrect religious thought. I don’t blame religion for being “incorrect.” Both are exactly what they are, and perfectly so.

Both are necessary and critical paths to each of us understanding our place in the Universe. In understanding ourselves. And just like there are followers of Freud or Kierkegaard or Christ…they are all trying to do the best with what they have…what they know. Believe to be true. And in understanding either or all of the above, just the intent of doing so is part of the learning experience of BEING HUMAN. What we must all go through while walking this rock. It is the intent of bettering our lives…giving due consideration to what we believe in and how we behave.

How we treat others.

So, Dr. Nietmann—in my most humble of opinions—your dissertation on philosophical versus religious thought is one more way that we learn how to deal with both issues. As Humans.

And, hopefully, lead better lives because of it.

The Unmaking of God Posts

• The Unmaking of God — Part I
• The Unmaking of God — Part II
• Dr. Nietmann’s 2019 Interview

The Unmaking of God – Part II

The Unmaking of God, by Dr. William F. Nietmann, University Press of America, Inc. © 1994 (My Image © 2020 F. P. Dorchak)

As I continue to read The Unmaking of God, by Dr. William F. Nietmann, I’m amazed at how philosophy really does seem to have directly influenced religious doctrine. Unless I’d forgotten about being instructed in this back in my university days, I don’t ever remember learning this. I just thought that whatever religion was created was by whomever created it (and I mean the Earthly representatives who actually “codified” the religion-in-question, notwithstanding the Divine Word inspiration attributed to religions). In this book, it’s mainly directed at Christianity. But the more I read and consider these arguments, the more it makes total—if inferred—sense: whomever was alive at a certain era will most likely have been somehow impacted by the current trains-of-thought to their era. How could they not? If they’re aware enough of a perceived need for a new religion [at the time], I’m pretty sure they’re also aware of at least some of the philosophical considerations of the day, because they would have been quite aware that something was missing from those other points-of-view, thereby impelling them to create a new train of thought-cum-belief. Yeah, it makes sense.

So when I read what Dr. Nietmann presents, I have to take it for granted that he did his research and wasn’t just stitching together philosophical considerations of the time into a “thread” that was then presented alongside Christian thinking in an attempted circumstantial synchronization of philosophies.

A Concern

Yet…I do wonder…because, so far, while there are a smattering of Biblical quotations, I haven’t seen any direct presentation from the Christian “theorists” of the eras under discussion, e.g., those of the author Apostles, Biblical authors (here comments relating to the Dead Sea scrolls would be useful) and any of the in situ theologists/scholars, wholly or in part, besides the early Platonic or Aristotelian considerations when people created the religions of Christianity. Granted information exchange back then was sparse and mostly limited, but still, word gets around in enlightened circles. Anyway, I do hope that Dr. Nietmann presents them later in the book, though I am halfway through it now and see no evidence of that—even when scanning through the advance pages. There are plenty of quotes from the likes of Kant, Hegel, et cetera, with a smattering of biblical quotations, but still, some 100 pages into the book, and I don’t see the same considerations given to the creators of the Christian religions. Nothing from those who created Catholicism, Lutheranism, Protestantism, et cetera. Perhaps they will come later.

Also, the more I consider the above, I very much also consider that he perhaps constructed this book so that he used philosophical inductive reasoning to prove his point and then never had to get into the heads of the humans behind Christianity, which thereby mitigated heated arguments over what so-and-so “might have been thinking.” This I see could very well be his point, though (unless I missed it) I don’t see that stated in the opening.

Having said all of the above, I did really like one section I just read in Chapter V, page 90:

World Spirit and Religion

There is much at the beginning of this chapter that talks about how impossible (even futile) it is to get behind Reason and the Divine, because all we can know are our interpretations of it, not any so-called ultimate actuality of It, because, how could we? We are not able to “glimpse behind the curtain” (my term), and so all we can see is what we can see in front of our faces…things we can touch. And further (again my words), I say that since we have so many philosophical interpretations by all the Great Thinkers of our Humanity, how can they all be right? They (just as with all religions) even contradict each other. So, there is obviously a mechanism to Life that allows all these High Philosophies to exist, whether in thought or action. No discussion is given to that here, or even, as I think back to my philosophical instruction at NAU, in my classroom instruction. Since all this is “in the mind” I feel that is an extremely salient point. How can “How The World Is” keep changing? Philosophers place such a premium on their thoughts and logic yet no one attacks this very basic, I maintain obvious, conundrum. And given that all of it is focused on only the corporeal—though arguments are made for the incorporeal—all philosophy is corporeally based, and therefore subject to debate.

How can such discussion be anything other than corporeal based?

Good question—hence the birth of metaphysics—which, of course is roundly decried by the corporeal thinkers. Humans love their “Logic”…as long as it proves their points.

But…there is one section, as I mentioned above, that I really liked that starts at the bottom of page 90 and continues onto page 91:

That everyone and everything may be properly understood as a manifestation of the Divine.

The next page then goes off in that direction, and that section ends with “Life in its entirety was religious.”

That, actually is how I look at The Divine, short of the “religious” designation, but more so it lines up with Dr. Nietmann’s statement about religion being about one’s finitude.

I see that everything about life is metaphysical. The incorporeal as expressed in the corporeal.

Consider my belief this way: that whatever is going on in the background of Life at a nonphysical, metaphysical/theological level is “pressing up against and into the materialism of physical expression (the corporeal). It would look exactly like pressing into an opaque piece of malleable rubber and looking at it from the opposite side (physical Life) to which the pressure is applied. The FORM (the corporeal) there is what it is as a result of being pressed into the material. So all that is going on in the background to Life takes on the forms we see and experience as they are expressed (“pressed into”) physical existence.

Hence all of physical life is as expressed from the metaphysical, therefore all of Life is metaphysical—or, in this case, “religious.” Granted, perhaps not exactly as Dr. Nietmann may have meant it, but still….

So, yeah, I really liked that section.

Back To The Beginning

Now, all of the above stated…it still, according to Dr. Nietmann’s wonderful premise, does not matter!

Because he states that religion is not about finding answers…it’s about addressing “our finitude“!

That just means religion in the strictest terms, according to the good doctor, is about explaining our personal lives…how we live and die, make our Life choices, and define our personal place within it on a daily living basis. Our personal relationship with LIFE. Are we ethical? Are we good? Are we striving for the better in all things? There are no answers, per se, but a constant drive toward Human betterment. An active hermeneutical dialogue.

The Unmaking of God – Part I

The Unmaking of God, by Dr. William F. Nietmann, University Press of America, Inc. © 1994 (My Image © 2020 F. P. Dorchak)

A Little Background

I had begun reading a book I’d started back in 2015. It’s called The Unmaking of God, and it’s written by a professor emeritus I’d studied under at Northern Arizona University, Dr. William F. Nietmann. The book appears out of print, given the heinous pricing, so I consider myself fortunate to have an original—and signed—hardcover. As I’d mentioned in a previous post, I’d greatly enjoyed my philosophical studies at NAU, far more than my major and minor of Physics/Astronomy and German. As I look back on my life I would have changed my major to Philosophy were I even half the “who I am” I am now…then…but obviously that sentiment is ridiculous, since I was not then who I am now, and obviously had different goals and a different mindset.

Okay, let’s just say that in another life, I would have pursued a Philosophy degree…a Ph.D (in an effort to bolster that claim I present that in my senior year of high school, one of my [printable] nicknames was “The Philosopher“).

Now…while working my current Work In Progress (WIP), I’d referenced Dr. Nietmann and his book as a form of respect and thanks for all that he’d impressed upon me back then. And since thinking about Dr. Nietmann, I’ve since picked his book up again to complete reading it. As I write this, I’m four chapters into it. When I first began the book back in 2015 (or earlier), I never got beyond the Introduction. To be honest I was just too mired in my day job (which had been a handful) and working on my own books—novels—so time was fastidiously limited. What I was reading involved the novels I was researching. I’ll also admit that Dr. Nietmann’s words were (and are), well . . . challenging.

Yes…he’s a career academician, so, of course he’s going to use “big words”—even for me! So I thought I’d have to have a dictionary on-hand while I read it and would be referencing it every other word, and that was just a wee bit too much at the time. But…as I am presently retired and finishing up my current WIP, I have taken it back up…and I’m glad to have done so, for it’s not as difficult as I thought it would be. Sure, it’s not an “easy” read, but I never expected it to be, and these kinds of topics never are.

Dr. Nietmann, by necessity, employs terms most of us do not come into even a periphery of contact—nor ever will! He uses terms associated with “hard” philosophical investigation, secular, religious, and academic (such as “hermeneutics” and “eschatological“).

This is as it should be.

I am now four chapters into it and I am once again enjoying his instruction and “arguments.” I really do find myself virtually feeling I am back in one of his university sessions! How I’ve come to…remember…missing those years of instruction! His was such a wonderful mind to engage didactically!

In doing some research on the good doctor, I found very little! And I found that as frustrating as that was, I also found that I actually liked that, because it showed a man NOT socially connected, and I took rather great comfort in that! Wished I were the same, actually. As much as I enjoy contact with my friends and family, especially in this heinously instigatedly surreal world we currently live in. It harkened back to the “good old days” where everyone was not “connected” except by hardcopy letters and landline phone calls, which, yes, I miss. I don’t write as many letters as I’d like (e-mail takes care of that), but I will curtail my comments on that for now. What I did find on the Professor Emeritus was a blog he was interviewed for in 2019 and a section to some NAU FAQs he had written, so I’ve presented them here:

NAU Philosophy Overview: https://nau.edu/philosophy/about-overview/

A Philosophy of Religion Blog (there’s a great image of him in this post, which was terrific to find!): http://philosophyofreligion.org/?m=201903

Note

Though Dr. Nietmann breaks his book up into two parts, and though I have labeled this post “Part I,” my posts are not going to mirror his book structure. I will post as I get to good breaking points.

The Unmaking of God

On to the book!

If I may borrow the opening phrase from the Preface, Professor Emeritus Nietmann states:

“The religious concepts of Christianity have a checkered pedigree, essentially because its framers moved beyond authentic religious concerns to seek philosophical legitimation.”

How’s that for some mental fodder?

It brings up all kinds of issues, not the least of which are:

• What “checkered pedigree?”
• “framers?”
• “authentic religious concerns?”
• “philosophical legitimation?”

All valid terms for those ensconced within the religious framework. After all we have all been taught that religion was bestowed upon Humanity by the Word of God (or Buddha or the Angel Moroni, or…). But what Dr. Nietmann shows is that religion—mainly the Christian religions—and philosophy are oil and water, yet religion was greatly influenced by philosophy. He also contends that one (philosophy) should not define the other (religion), but, yet, that has indeed been the case, as much as many out there might not like to consider this. But even if this is the case, none of that matters, because as Dr. Nietmann postulates it is that religion is about describing the finitude of Humanity’s existence…not about explaining Life, the Universe, and everything in it. Religion is about explaining one’s life. Anything else religion may try to explain in terms of God or reality, according to Dr. Nietmann, is in the realm of philosophy: the nature of knowledge, the “I” who knows, Truth itself, and parameters of that which are “ultimately real.” And further, that the search for God has nothing to do with religion, but instead “plays to our philosophical desires.” That Christianity has used philosophy to its own ends, to justify a “God,” as I interpret his discussion up to this point, is incorrect.

Interesting, to say the least.

And none of this lessens the value of religion. Its human impact. What it (religion) should do, as I read these pages, is better focus what the real Zen of religion should be: about one’s limited self in a limited world. Not about the secrets of the universe or the proving or disproving of God or defining ultimate rights and wrongs.

This is how I see Dr. Nietmann’s journey evolving.

Now, I might be slightly off, but this is how I’m seeing his book shape up.

The professor begins by showing the influences of Plato and Aristotle, which I am not even going to try to duplicate here, but which describe “why things move,” or strive, which was, indeed, adapted into religious theories, as one can clearly imagine . . . “striving” leads to “finding God” . . . which leads to “perfection.” He also goes into other discussions about other philosophers , including the Greeks who “laid claim” to deriving the “true nature of reality” that First- and second-century Christianity did, indeed, incorporate into their ways of thinking. I am now at the point where he describes Immanuel Kant’s ethical and moral theory, which is also fascinating.

So far, all in all, Dr. Nietmann, I love where you’re going with this discussion!

 

Philosophical Investigations, 3rd Ed. — Part III

I cannot continue reading this book.

I mean no disrespect to Herr Wittgenstein’s Erinnerung, but his 232 pages seem to me to be utterly repetitive of all he tried to say in the first handful of pages. I get that he was trying to define the meaning of meaning and words and their context as associated with meaning, but it’s far too repetitive for me.

As I read more about the man and this and his other work, I’d found that he’d even pulled the book from the publisher! That this book had been published after his death in 1951 and that the second part of the book had been added by the editor. So, I’m not really clear what he’d meant for this book to be comprised of. These all seem to me to be notes he’d written to himself over time to try to philosophically ferret out what he was trying to get across, and I simply cannot bear to keep reading the same trope over and over again (which may thoroughly be the fault of the publisher)…even if I do largely agree with some of his statements. I do feel that words and language are defined according to their use (if I put that right)…and not so much on their own. I do feel that words mean something and to theoretically try to use them otherwise would be unintelligible. Maybe that’s too much of a simplification of his efforts, but that seems to sum it up for me. If that is not the case, then I’m sorry but I cannot muddle through his journey up to his epiphany, because it’s far too repetitive and provides no further enlightenment for me. I have skipped ahead and read sections, and they’re no better.

And at times, he even seems to be making things up, like saying that philosophy is not meant to explain things, but is to instead state the obvious and “assemble reminders.” That it explains nothing but “simply puts everything before us.” And that since “everything lies open to view, there is nothing to explain.”

Then why is he and others explaining everything?

If everything so exists and there is nothing to explain, and that if one were to advance any so-called “theses” it would never be debatable, because everyone would agree to it, then how does he explain not only his own behavior, but the behavior of every other philosopher out there? Unless I am missing something so hideously basic, this is exactly contradictory to what is and has been done through time immemorial. There are so many philosophers because everyone does, indeed, have their own—different!—take. How did he not see this? What am I missing?

So the upshot is, I could go into more detail, but I do not want to spend the energy. Philosophy may be a verb and not a noun to him, but it is something that does, indeed, try to explain something else, or it wouldn’t exist. Nothing is obvious. Everything is perception. And there is not only one pure way of defining anything, by the very evidence of so many disparate philosophical theses proves (explains, reminds, or otherwise clarifies…) this to be the case.

And that I’m no longer in college and no longer have to read something beyond my exhausted interest anymore. I’ve studied my philosophy, found my own…wisdom…and am perfectly comfortable with it. I’m more into the metaphysical aspects of life and philosophy, where his seems more oriented toward logic and language. I am not. Again, I could go deeper, but just don’t feel the need to do so at this stage in my life. I’m not writing a paper that needs to be incorporated into a grade.

So, I leave his book and will go on to something else. It’s not that he lost me…he exhausted me with repetition and nothing new that I haven’t already heard, read, lived, or studied before, and I really do not feel the need to revisit…especially at this level of detail…but I thank him for defining it for those who need this journey.

Here is an explanatory link to the Philosophical Investigations.

Here is a definition of philosophy.

Here is another definition of philosophy.

Here is a link to Wittgenstein’s life.

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Philosophical Investigations, 3rd Ed. — Ludwig Wittgenstein

Philosophical Investigations, 3rd Ed. — Part II

Philosophical Investigations, 3rd Ed. — Part II

As I’d stated in my previous post, I am reading Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations (the 3rd edition), and it seems to me that he continued to ask the same question over and over and over: how to define the meaning of meaning. He obsessively approaches his attack from all possible angles and even tries to invent new ones, but they are all the same in my view. I mean the man and his memory no disservice, but I do wonder if he had been plagued with a form of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD).

Having said that, he does take on a point of view that I am describing as a foundation to the Human Zen of Communication: yes, the definition of meaning. For some Power either separate or very much a part of us surely had to define the subatomic building blocks of how “all this” most surely should operate: when any one of the corporeal world is to utter a “thing”…how do other members of said corporeal existence relate to and address said “thing.” And further, exactly what is a “thing”?

But to me, he did that in the initial pages of his 250-page treatise. I am only to page 46e, Section 108, and it is an utterly exhausting rehash of the first section or three. And the fact that his brilliant mind had not discerned that is bothersome and therefore warrants my earlier conviction: philosophical OCD.

On the other hand, I could very well see that what this book is a compilation of, is, that these are simply on-the-fly (if you will) notes where Wittgenstein is trying oh-so-desparately to firmly define exactly what it is he is trying to say about “meaning.” And by this I mean (pardon the pun) that they were never all meant to be included in the same binding. That they were meant to be read, distilled, then reframed into the most specific form of corporeal definition and what it is to do when we utter a “thing” between one or more of us in our corporeal existence.

To put it another way: it is like a writer who jots notes to him/herself as they go about their living. They then take their notes, meditate upon their storyline, their accumulation of “meanings”…then distill their multiple accumulations into one coherent and arranged story. All of their notes were never meant to be included “as-is,” but are meant to be assimilated into the end product.

But in Wittgenstein’s case this is not what I’m seeing, and since the book was published after his lifetime, this very well could have been his intent. So, to have included all of this constantly rehashed minutiae clearly must have been the publisher’s intent…and furthermore…his specific intention to allow all his specific ruminations to remain “as-is” to further “advance” his attempts in defining “meaning.” Since the content was in book form during Wittgenstein’s life, it would seem that this was also his intent to some degree. I mean, once you’ve said it…you really do defeat its purpose by continually restating it. It goes fantastically beyond the case of implying the reader is stupid and cannot grasp what has already been said and (and as I do here) into the realm of a philosophical OCD. It is truly stunning to me the utterly repetitive nature of his dissertation. It is exactly like Kierkegaard’s graphomania, where he (Kierkegaard) had an OCD of having to write to the extreme’s of all else in his life, including the ditching of his upcoming marriage to a woman he loved and who loved him and his own mental and physical well-being, dying at the age of 42.

But even having stated all this, I can also understand the questioning mind wanting—oh, so desperately needing—to utterly quantify and categorize what it is to communicate, in such a way that it, on the most primordial level, it is clearly laid out for the philosophical scientist, so that somewhere it is documented the specifics of “meaning,” just like physical scientists define and categorize Life. The lay person does not need to know its minuitea to operate within its corporeal confines, but it is withing the very nature of the Zen of Humankind to understand it’s origins so as to benefit its existence in Space and Time.

To put it basely, it is the nature of the beast to understand itself.

And I submit…that this, in turn does benefit the race as a whole in incorporeal ways as I’d previously discussed in my first post. No action, no thought is ever wasted, though we may never see that from our corporeal point of view. Everything we do has an equal an opposite reaction, as it were. Even the more basest and “evil” of actions help define us in a way that it helps us better understand what not to do…and which, therefore, further advances the Zen of Life. On the one hand it is sad to inflict such evil, but on the other hand, if it so inflicted, it must therefore “need” to be inflicted so that we, as a race, properly learn what not to do. I’m somewhat straying from the main point of this post, but I look at it this way: actors who take less-savory roles state that it expands their knowledge of themselves and Humankind on-the-whole in ways that could never have done by just reading about it. That such roles end of changing them to some (and one would hope…) good degrees in ways I’m not going to get into now, because that would be an entirely new and lengthy post. But at the very least, it clarifies the so-called “Yin and Yang” of life.

Again, as I have stated, I am nowhere near complete with this work, and again I refer to Kierkegaard (I do so because I have a slight affinity for him, having studied him in college in a “Philosophy of Religion” course with Professor Nietmann), as he states that life can only be understood “backward” yet must be lived “forward”…so I cannot truly define my thoughts on Wittgenstein’s work without having completed reading it…but these are my thoughts as I forge my way through it (though an “informed implication” of his work can well be made based on having read “so much” of what I have already read…I am giving him the benefit of the doubt). I just wish Wittgenstein had used less words (as others might also wish of me at this point!)…but in truth then it would not have been Wittgenstein.

So, that is where I currently am with Philosophical Investigations (3rd Ed.).

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Philosophical Investigations, 3rd Ed. — Ludwig Wittgenstein

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If you like what you read, please share—and join in my journey and check out my other work!

Thank You!

 

Philosophical Investigations, 3rd Ed. – Ludwig Wittgenstein

Philosophical Investigations, Third Edition, by Ludwig Wittgenstein (Image © 2020 F. P. Dorchak)

I cracked open a book I’ve had since my Northern Arizona University philosophy classes. Though my degree of study was astronomy, with a German minor, I also loaded up with philosophy courses—and I excelled at them. In fact, I’m one class short of having gained a double minor with philosophy.

I loved my philosophy courses! In my senior year I had two courses instructed by the same professor, Dr. William F. Nietmann, who published his own work long after I’d graduated, in 1994, called The Unmaking of God. I’d started reading it, but long ago got sidetracked. I plan on continuing my reading of it. This post is not about his work, which will come later, after I’ve finished reading his work (and I’d managed to get him to autograph through the mail; we’d corresponded a little at that time). I mention Dr. Nietmann because he was an incredible man and I loved discussing philosophy with him. In my senior year I received an “A” in both of his classes, and (at the time) he told me I was his only student to have ever taken more than one class from him at the same time and receive “A’s” in both classes. Professor Nietmann was my kind of people. And I am pretty positive that it was in his “Man and Ideas” class that I had bought Wittgenstein‘s book. I’m sure I must have read portions of it, though I no longer remember doing so. But I’d read a New Yorker article last week about Frank Ramsey, who influenced Wittgenstein, and it piqued my interest to reexamine his work.

So I am.

I am only ten pages in, but it gives me pause for consideration at his current discussion about the meaning and use of words, which—so far—I’ve largely agreed upon. In short, they are not absolute, but dither between plenty of variables. And I do want to discuss this further, but should very well give Herr Wittgenstein his due course and “read him out” before launching forward. But I will say that while I agree with most of what he puts forth at present up to page 10…I add a metaphysical element to my arguments.

Beispiel:

Words are defined by humans for use. And depending upon the use ascribed…even the same words can be attributed different meanings and employment, depending on how exactly used.

Take the word “Frank.”

Obviously it means open, sincere, clear, straightforward, evident, et cetera. But it can also be used as a form of address, as in a name. And as such, when you address someone as “Frank,” in terms of nomenclature and not as an adjective or adverb, you are addressing a person. In this case said individual now becomes the definition of the word. All that you know (and do not know) of this person has come to define the “Frank” that you know…that is THIS or THAT (Wittgenstein also gets into the use of those two words) person. So, to you, the “Frank” you address that is me, defines THAT version of “Frank,” while another more grammatically defined “frank” is not the same as me, anymore than a “Frank Ramsey” is the same as Me Frank.

But I take this further:

From where do we come…and to where do we go?

Things keep dying and things keep birthing, so by direct inference we can say that something exists “beyond” “life and death.” And no, I’m not going to get into the proving of this, there is plenty of such discussion already out there. To me the simplest answer is usually the answer: however defined, something is beyond the corporeal boundaries that buoys corporeal existence.

This being the case, there is more to each of us—and everything in life—than we can see or know…and therefore there is far more to the definitions of words (e.g., “Frank”) than we know, so that when we employ any defined thing we do not know ALL of what it is we are employing. When you say “Frank” to me, you don’t really know my definition…yet you know enough of it to adequately convey the intention of getting my attention.

Which is a splitting hairs with what Wittgenstein is currently discussing, but I’m taking it into an entirely different dimension than I see him employing (so far).

And further…it brings up the condition of “agreements.” That in this life, in this existence, we make certain corporeal and incorporeal agreements in order that we can interact with this existence and understand each other.

In another example, it’s like addressing an iceberg.

We see the tip of it, we employ the term “iceberg” and we know enough about it to make the inference that we are talking about something that only displays 1/7 to 1/10 of itself at any one time (in corporeal existence, not to mention what is missing from incorporeal display!). And that is suitably  sufficient…depending upon your intent. For most of us, it suffices. For scientists, it may not.

So, as you can see, this is all pretty basic, and pretty rarefied for most discussions, but it is where my thoughts are presently going with the first parts of Wittgenstein’s arguments. That no matter how you define anything, there are incredible depths to each consideration that we just cannot know from our current perspectives…which may not even matter on the face of it…but which are very much a part of each and every definition. So we use what suits us to the best of our abilities to navigate communication…and I haven’t even gone into the telepathic implications that surely must also be present in all communications that aid in definition-understanding (Which you may see in some of your own conversations, where someone you are talking with says something to you that could go “either way”…and you consider that—and don’t physically raise the concern—but end up figuring it out for your self. Was that logic? Telepathy? A combination? Arguments can be made that logic—as in the flip of a coin—does not necessarily define the outcome just because it is a “flip” or fit a mental algorithm; it must have direct bearing, direct merit of some kind that inherently reflects the required outcome, and doesn’t just “happen to get it,” based on some physical “mechanic.”).

That was fun. Haven’t “gone there” in a quite a while….

By the way, while in high school, I had the nickname of “The Philosopher.”

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If you like what you read, please share—and join in my journey and check out my other work!

Thank You!