tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-57521682011-04-21T17:12:38.436-07:00Groundhog DaysThe timely and untimely adventures of Mister Groundhog. <a href="http://blogger.com/profile/1746151">Author's Profile</a>David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comBlogger271100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1091647303191344762004-08-04T13:08:00.000-07:002005-02-02T07:09:54.400-08:00Re: Yam=Yam Sunday, August 01, 2004
“I have often wondered where you stood on the crucial question: What would your reaction be if a demon were to prove to you that your whole life with all its goods and ills will be endlessly repeated? I pray you will take the question seriously even though it is hypothetical - eternal recurrence is plainly impossible or at least highly improbable given the David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1091565969049374372004-08-03T13:42:00.000-07:002004-08-03T13:53:07.743-07:00Antidote to Objective Materialism Nicolas Berdyaev (Nikolai Aleksandrovich Berdiaev, 1874-1948), dubbed 'the Philosopher of Freedom,' was a religious idealist, a leading Christian existentialist and mystical personalist. His most important notion, of freedom, was derived from the ideas of the astute German businessman and great mystic, Jakob Boehme (1575-1624), whom Hegel identified as the first David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1091202704648214632004-07-30T08:48:00.000-07:002004-07-30T09:13:14.110-07:00A Taste of Reality
Mister Groundhog: The Groundhog issue is too important to be held hostage to semantics, although I realize many would disagree with that last statement. For instance, Nietzsche put forth that our realities are linguistic creations; that is, we reify through language. Appearances that we appropriate through naming eventually become essences and things. T. Beckman (1995) wrote: David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1066073039763488062004-07-29T12:23:00.000-07:002004-07-29T05:30:36.286-07:00Brain Wreck!
Mister Groundhog, To be fair to McTaggart, I must ask you to supply a quote or two from the man on said issues of time, past-present-future, in order to measure for myself whether he was duped by linguistic machinations and failed to see through the transparency so obvious to you and me. Madame Me
Time is hard to think about because we are not used to considering it as separate David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1091025086939238582004-07-28T07:16:00.000-07:002004-07-28T07:41:37.266-07:00McTaggart's Dunderheaded Category of OneMister Groundhog, I couldn't agree with you more, but even though I agree, the argument you put forth makes McTaggart somewhat of a dunderhead, and what are we to make of that? Is it possible to be brilliant and dunderheaded simultaneously? Madame MeA Man's Intuition tells me that McTaggart's mystical predilection disposed him to find his conclusion ("Time David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1090942276017630142004-07-27T08:31:00.000-07:002004-07-27T08:33:11.090-07:00Dear Mister Groundhog, I couldn’t agree with you more — but even though I agree, the argument you put forth makes McTaggart somewhat of a dunderhead, and what are we to make of that? Is it possible to be brilliant and dunderheaded simultaneously? If so, there goes any hope I might place in seemingly brilliant mortals. Therefore, to be fair to McTaggart, I must ask you to supply a quote or two David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1090868907969992742004-07-26T12:06:00.000-07:002004-07-26T12:17:00.963-07:00McTaggart's Series A ContradictionDear Madame Melina: McTaggart's logical contradiction - between past, present, and future - which he asserted to prove that "time" is "unreal", is based on an linguistic error. He posits that the three tenses are three different things which simply cannot exist at the same time. But the tenses are not things but are something that can be said about things. I meanDavid Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1090256755456492422004-07-19T09:12:00.000-07:002004-07-20T09:36:33.206-07:00Christians want progress
The Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence appertaining to the endless and exact repetition of life-cycles was attributed to the Pythagoreans by Eudemas, a pupil of Aristotle. Eudemas, who usually paraphrased Aristotle, wrote a book on physics.
We are not certain that the scientific faction of the Pythagorean brotherhood actually espoused the Doctrine of Eternal Recurrence - David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1088442611608029012004-06-28T10:09:00.000-07:002004-06-28T10:12:57.323-07:00
Friday, June 25, 2004
Dear Madame Melina Again:
Greetings!
Because of my orthodox upbringing, I would fain hope that this message is not identical to countless other messages you have already received in identical worlds or universes or whatever. But such a hope would not be reasonable until I know whether or not this life is in fact identically and forever repeated, and, if it is thus David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1085839979762522302004-05-29T07:12:00.000-07:002004-05-29T07:12:59.763-07:00
My Dear Groundhog,
Thank you so much for your very astute missive. It is I, not you, who should apologize for gross tardiness in writing, and so please accept all and sundry stupid excuses (for they are) for neglecting our correspondence. I could tell you, and it would be true (however stupid), that I am absolutely up to my eyeballs in end-of-the-year school work without a moment to relax, readDavid Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1085776958576118062004-05-28T13:42:00.000-07:002004-05-29T07:26:33.426-07:00
Dear Madame Melina,
I beg your pardon for the long delay in getting back to you on the Doctrine of Eternal Occurrence. Having burrowed into a great deal of material on the subject, I am convinced that we must resort to parallel universes to explain or to excuse the instant doctrine, a doctrine which is, as you know, immoral, at least to the vicious extent of the same damned thing happening overDavid Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1066175238246900362003-10-14T16:47:00.000-07:002003-10-14T16:50:13.370-07:00
Dear Groundhog,
You're absolutely right--it's a total mind screw, but I love it! And yes, thank you for putting it all so directly about McTaggart's omission of a cogent framework for pondering his abstruse
meanderings. Was he smug, or what?
Actually, I think he's onto something (or was onto something, or is that 'will be onto something'), but I can't comprehend it well enough yet to say David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1065812009944367512003-10-10T11:53:00.000-07:002003-10-10T11:53:30.106-07:00
The Plurality of Times
by David Arthur Walters
Logic does not prove that life exists on other planets or, for that matter, that any other proposition corresponds to objective reality. But logic can demonstrate that particular propositions in themselves are false or fallacious, at least according to the assumptions upon which the particular logic is based. Static logic is based on the David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1065647851643792222003-10-08T14:17:00.000-07:002003-10-08T15:00:44.420-07:00
Crazy Mystics
McTaggart's ideas seem to have greater respect among respectable people than Ouspensky's ideas on similar subjects, probably because of their respective credentials and lifestyles. We shall probably find more books by and about Ouspensky than by and about McTaggart in a large library - the ratio is 18 to12 at my five-million volume university library. But we do not find David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1065138180114927772003-10-02T16:43:00.000-07:002003-10-02T16:42:59.653-07:00
Death Clock
"I, too, had a dream about a clock, a clock and death. There were two time realities following very different laws: one governed the physical body, the other the spirit body. In this dream they overlapped, as represented by a clock behind a glass case in a perfectly dark room. My father, who has passed away, materialized in the dark room and pointed to the clock behind the case asDavid Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1064525415767806642003-09-25T14:30:00.000-07:002003-09-25T14:31:13.910-07:00
The People of Byt
by David Arthur Walters
Every one knows Sisyphus' pathetic story: how he cheated time by tying up death, at least for the time being, that is, until the god of war hauled him back to the underworld because Hades complained of the shortage of bodies in the interim; from whence Sisyphus escaped by breaking his oath to Persephone that, if he were allowed to ascend to make sureDavid Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1064447455586227072003-09-24T16:50:00.000-07:002003-09-26T20:22:37.376-07:00
Time is a waste of time
For the life of me I cannot figure out why I am wasting so much time on the subject of time, especially in view of the fact that many thinkers who were and are much better versed than I am swear that time does not even exist in the first place! But others say it does exist. It would take me several lifetimes to catch up to the current position on time.
On the other David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1064096870854657252003-09-20T15:27:00.000-07:002003-10-27T08:12:04.150-08:00
The Mystery of Time
by David Arthur Walters
"In reality, of course, no one knows anything. The mystery of existence before birth and existence after death, if there is such existence, is the mystery of time. And 'time' guards its secrets better than many people think. In order to approach these mysteries it is necessary first to understand time itself." - Ouspensky
Thinking about time boresDavid Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1064018514420608512003-09-19T17:41:00.000-07:002003-09-19T17:41:54.160-07:00
Does anyone have the right time?
The application of the doctrine of eternal recurrence denies the objective existence of time. Its application would destroy the standard spatial and temporal relationships between the births and deaths or lives of different people in their complex surroundings. By 'standard' is meant, for instance, objective time as measured by a unit all sensible observers David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1063907788219925442003-09-18T10:56:00.000-07:002003-09-18T10:56:27.566-07:00
What's going on?
"... it is possible to say that our usual conception of 'dimensions of time' are wrong. For instance, for us time can have different duration - five years, ten years, a hundred years - but it always has the same speed. But where are proofs of this? Why not suppose that time in certain limits (for instance in relation to human life) always has the same duration but DIFFERENT David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1063330954635728932003-09-11T18:42:00.000-07:002003-09-11T18:42:34.620-07:00
Ouspensky answers Madame Me's Question
"Let's say my father, who was born in 1925, dies in 1992. He is once again born in the midwest to Italian immigrants in the same house, on the same street, with the same siblings, yada yada. At some point along the time line, he meets my mom and I am conceived, which would then posit another "me" in the world of form (?) whilst the "me" who is writing David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1063240056207353852003-09-10T17:27:00.000-07:002003-09-10T17:27:36.263-07:00
Madame Me pokes hole in theory
Sir Groundhog Days:
The Eternal Recurrence Theory is fraught with problems. If my memory serves me correctly, there is no mention of parallel realities, which would have to be a part of the equation if we are to satisfy logic.
For instance, Ouspensky postulates that when one dies, he is reborn into the life he just lived, ad nauseum, until he "gets it," whichDavid Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1063075366385589062003-09-08T19:42:00.000-07:002003-09-08T19:42:46.306-07:00
Not again!
The hypothesis of eternal recurrence has enjoyed considerable support throughout the ages and has had an influence on a number of well-known thinkers whether they believed that the hypothesis was valid or not. Ouspensky and Nietzsche are the best-known modern thinkers who expounded the doctrine. The funny movie, Groundhog Day, collapses the concept into a single day. Finnegan's David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1062697376353243462003-09-04T10:42:00.000-07:002003-09-04T10:46:08.100-07:00
Here we go again, Mr. Kant!
Time is a hard nut to crack. Some thinkers who are far more advanced than I am insist that time does not exist; which leaves me to wonder yet again, What I am talking about? Why bother investigating what does not exist? Still the word 'time' has meaning. Why cannot we just accept the notion of time as an absolute presupposition like some people accept the existenceDavid Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1062634557242206692003-09-03T17:15:00.000-07:002003-09-03T17:15:57.310-07:00
Maybe this time is different.
I wish I had left Cold Spring when I was a much younger man, for then it would not have been my last departure: I would be bound to return on yet another train up from Grand Central Station. I would have purchased that little stone house near the Cold Spring railroad station, the one within walking distance from the pub. It would have served as my author's den David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1062565140189614752003-09-02T21:59:00.000-07:002003-09-02T21:59:00.040-07:00
The Case of the Prescient Cock
The Devil's Advocate is Catholic and I don't think Immanuel Kant will be canonized any time soon if the Advocate has his way. Kant's version of the Golden Rule is not bad although overwrought; and it is almost miraculous that he got people to misinterpret his obtuse text, deny common sense, and fancy they were in direct communication with Reason, the David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5752168.post-1062373367292429292003-08-31T16:42:00.000-07:002003-10-27T08:09:07.996-08:00
Yikes, it's Groundhog Day!
I think I've been here before! Oh, now I remember, it's the same old story again, and I can't break out of it. And here we go again, Alter Ego, it's Groundhog Day!
Heavens to Betsy, what is the name of that book about Eternal Recurrence I like to read at moments like this? Thank you, Betsy! Wow, what a coincidence! Here it is! right on top of my dresser - 'twas David Arthur Waltershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704967788002487089noreply@blogger.com