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Monthly Archives: July 2015
Why Social Security Could Be Bankrupt In 12 Years
In short, this year’s untrustworthies report amounts to an accounting and forecasting house of cards that is camouflaging an impending social, political and economic crisis of a magnitude not seen since the Great Depression or even the Civil War. So here follows an unpacking of the phony accounting edifice that obscures the imminent danger.
Buddhist Philosophy as Philosophy
This conclusion sets up the presentation of one of the central concerns that will drive the dialectic in the subsequent chapters: the concern that the doctrine of emptiness entails metaphysical and moral nihilism. If all phenomena are empty and thus conventional, then there is no ultimate reality to serve as the foundation to support the accuracy of the distinctions we draw between true and false, real and unreal, and right and wrong. The asymmetrical dependence of the conventional on the ultimate presented in chapter 2 is collapsed in a way that seems to threaten the whole Buddhist project.
How can one develop better discipline?
Gonzo Strategies of Deceit: An Interview with Joaquin Segura
I am interested in the nature of power and the rise and fall of totalitarian ideological and political apparatuses nowadays. But I guess, going even further, I’m essentially fascinated by the fissures and contradictions that have made these structures spectacularly crumble to the ground. I do believe extreme ideologies have played a crucial role in the globalization of socio-political crisis. In the end, our world is nothing more than a fading monument to all things gone wrong—the inspiring triumph of failure, in every sense. I see this as an exciting parable. And of course, it is an undeniable fact that the US, through their influence in world economy, international policies and general attitude towards the rest of the planet is the largest structure waiting to collapse. I think we are all secretly awaiting that moment of splendor, even americans. It’ll be disastrous and as nasty as it can get, but it will also be liberating and incredibly inspirational. Not just because it’s the US but because it’ll prove that absolutely everything is susceptible to fall. And not only that, most importantly, it would confirm that radical change may actually be possible and not just one more of the unfulfilled promises modernity has left us to struggle with on our own.
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The Hacker Ethic of Work
In recent David Graeber’s book called “The Utopia of Rules” the well known American anthropologist explores what he calls “Capitalism’s secret love affair with bureaucracy“.
The book, released in February, seems more a natural evolution of Graeber’s thought about capitalism and the world of modern management: indeed he already touched the topic of corporates and large organizations in 2013 thanks to a short but incredibly profound essay called “On the phenomenon of bullshit shit jobs”. The essay was focused on explaining how the conservative power of modern capitalism is exercised through false incentives. Graeber spoke bluntly of the world’s largest organization, the corporations, as an army of workers: “basically paid to do nothing, in positions designed to make them identify with the perspectives and sensibilities of the ruling class (managers, administrators, etc) – and particularly its financial avatars – but, at the same…
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Ataraxiom – the Philosophy of Ataraxia as an Axiom
meme – ataraxiom
noun; hybrid of “ataraxia” (Ἀταραξία “tranquility”)+ “axiom“.
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~<{{will be seriously challenging to modern ‘skeptics’ and people of faith alike! }}}>~
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Definition
Ataraxia is the entelechy (inner purpose and inherent end) of philosophy – or at the least of the philosophies of Epicurus the materialist and Pyrrho the skeptic alike. Depending on your view, ataraxia is the goal or at least the result of philosophy and the physical sciences.
In Pyrrho’s skepticism, nothing is known with certainty and there seems to be no way to ever come to certainty. There is no rock-bottom reality as far as we can perceive. Since everything would have to be proved by everything else, all argument is either circular or a chain that hangs from nothing and never ends. In other words, if we start with any positive statement, such as “I…
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