Heidegger

In a message dated 22/03/2009 01:31:18 GMT Standard Time,
silicaceous at yahoo.com writes:

thanks for confirming the obvious, Bern,

chao,

john

— On Fri, 3/20/09, Bernx at aol.com wrote:

From: Bernx at aol.com
Subject: Re: OIKEIOSIS, PHRONESIS and EUDAIMONIA**
To: heidegger at an-archos.com
Cc: Bernx at aol.com
Date: Friday, March 20, 2009, 7:57 PM

In a message dated 3/20/2009 3:33:51 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
GEVANS613 at aol.com writes:

In a message dated 15/03/2009 15:13:40 GMT Standard Time,
gottlos752004 at yahoo.com writes:

PHRONESIS

Hi Gary:
Thanks for all the Greek goodies. The account of the Stoic relish for
reification was very interesting. Reification is one of the gifts that the Greeks
and others (not to mention Plato or: *Reificatrix Rex,* bequeathed to us.
It is still arguable whether the freeing-up of human thought that the benign
aspects of thingification enabled was worth the tremendous loss of human
life that its negative aspects engendered and continue to do so (another major
bomb in Iraq recently.)

I find all that you write fascinating from a historical POV and your
sometimes your insights make me gasp with sheer delight. Having a rather a
jaundiced view of entification, I tend to liken the introduction of reification to
the instauration of the plague into Europe, which was said to have happened by
black rats shinning along the mooring ropes of middle-eastern trading
vessels and dropping off onto the quay sides of Italian merchant ports. The
disease, caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, is best known for killing
roughly one fourth of the population of Western Europe - an estimated 20 million
people. Of course as employed by competive savagery of competing religions for
which reification forms their life-blood and the various vicious
nationalisms that thrive on thingification, the concretisation of ideas has been
responsible for many more dead bodies than the black death - but it did bring
about all these lovely abstractions that allow us to conceptualise with greater
ease and speed to make up for it, as we stand in the check-out queues in the
supermarkets and discuss the latest transcendentalist terrorists and their
evil acts..

It was interesting to read what Arius had to say about *the Perfect Good*
and that he thought that the term might refer to the telos. The
writer/philosopher Iris Murdoch thought the same thing and I have written an essay about it
which I can’t remember if you have read?

Yes, Jud, the “perfect good” does refer to the telos insofar as both refer
to the ens, the final term that never comes and is beyond “reification.” In
the MEANTIME Bush bangers, global warmerers and Obama will save the worlders
still dream in the Stoic Logos Spermatikos, the final coming, the load that was
never dropped in eternal coitus interruptus. In short, the best way to
prevent reification is by abortion of the fetus. And only then there will be no
one or thing to blame for having been born to face death. In the same old
meantime move to the high ground or forerver hold your breath– the ice is
melting and eudaimonia is at hand on earth as it is in heaven.
sincerely;
Bernard

Jud:
The way forward is not to abort reification as you suggest, but to simply
make people aware of it - elimination by education rather than education by
reification.

Posted on Sunday, March 29th, 2009 at 6:00 am
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