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Our age of anxiety is not unusual in history


Human beings’ sense of anxiety and alienation is as ancient as the Epic of Gilgamesh, one of our oldest surviving texts, in which humanity is portrayed as threatened with destruction for disturbing the slumber of the gods. For Kierkegaard himself, anxiety can be traced back to the very beginnings of human existence, and the way it is depicted in the biblical stories of humanity “falling” into sin. The quaint subtitle of his book, The Concept of Anxiety, points in this direction: A Simple Psychological Deliberation Oriented in the Direction of the Dogmatic Issue of Hereditary Sin.

Each of us exists with what Kierkegaard terms “objective anxiety” — a core insecurity, which is built into our mortal bodies. In the New Testament, one Christian writer describes human lives as “held in slavery by the fear of death.” Kierkegaard believed that we cope with this soul-level insecurity by seeking security in material goods, status and power, all of which ultimately fail to deliver. It is no wonder we feel anxious when such things are removed or begin to crumble.


Without underestimating the scale of our present crisis, many periods of human history could be termed “an age of anxiety.” In the past the term has been applied to medieval times, seventeenth-century England and the periods following both World Wars. The first-century world could also wear the label, as the Pax Romana slowly gave way to more and more social upheaval. If you doubt the threats to ordinary life in that period, read Damascus by Christos Tsiolkas — the gripping historical novel about the Apostle Paul, who describes the cruel barbarity of everyday life in the Roman Empire in lurid detail.

Read more:
https://www.abc.net.au/religion/kierkegaard-and-coping-with-coronavirus-...


If Gus's memory is correct, I won’t bother to check, this Melbournian writer, Brian Rosner, is channelling or paralleling Rod Dreher, in inviting us to cope with coronavirus anxiety by studying a dead Dane, Søren Kierkegaard… Amazing! The religious mob can’t let pass a moment without mentioning that your angst is real and your happiness is an illusion, and that believing in a delusion will get rid of your angst and provide you with happiness! Thus at the end of a long loony dissertation, we are invited to let the “our father” do the hard work for us. The last one is a doozy:
"Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? … And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labour or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendour was dressed like one of these.”
Said Søren Kierkegaard…

Kierkegaard believed that observing such vignettes of the natural world could be a source of deep joy. To ease anxiety, Kierkegaard recommends focusing your attention on positive and happy things in the natural world as a joyful reminder of God’s care for all of creation. But his call is not just for the practices of ornithology and gardening as a welcome diversion or a form of romantic escapism.
Says Brian Rosner…

Both views are stupid and bathe in complete delusive looniness… But Brian Rosner cannot let go of the infinite value he finds in having been created by god — completely naked. Yes happy little birdy things should make you feel happy while your mate, Jolene, is in hospital dying. Yes gardening is useless, as things grow lovely and fruitful — and the bugs that destroy the garden are happy. And god will provide the rain anytime from the sky, that rain that you haven’t seen for two years and when the god-chosen day comes, all the top-soil happily flows into the dry river bed. Why bother with gardening, as the romantic ideal works better than a hoe? Why do we need to cover our arse with clothes? Solomon? 
Solomon was obsessed with women and fell in love with many. According to the bible, Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines. The wives were described as foreign princesses, including Pharaoh's daughter and women of Moab, Ammon, Edom, Sidon and of the Hittites. His marriage to Pharaoh's daughter appears to have cemented a political alliance with Egypt whereas he clung to his other wives and concubines "in love” (for sex). No wonder Solomon could not afford decent clothes and looked like a fleeting and withered morning lily, every day of his happy life!

But the bible shows disapproval that Solomon permitted his foreign wives to import their own deities, building temples to Ashtoreth and Milcom. Tch tch...

All in all, Søren Kierkegaard was a lovely pain in the arse, a romantic retrograde who possibly ate fruit and nuts he only picked himself and never killed a fly. Who knows, he may have been afflicted with “Angel Disease”, in which everything — including pain is wonderful — like Voltaire’s Candide.

But on 22 December 1845, Peder Ludvig Møller published an article criticising a piece written under a pseudonym (Hilarius Bookbinder) by Kierkegaard, Stages on Life's Way. Møller complimented "Hilarius Bookbinder" for his wit and intellect, but questioned whether (Kierkegaard) could write coherent, complete works. Møller was a contributor to and editor of The Corsair — a Danish satirical paper that lampooned everyone of notable standing. Kierkegaard published two sarcastic responses... So... "Hilarius Bookbinder" could be sarcastic… Hey?

He wrote The Activity of a Traveling Esthetician and Dialectical Result of a Literary Police Action. The former focused on insulting Møller's integrity while the latter was a directed assault on The Corsair, in which Kierkegaard, after criticising the journalistic quality and reputation of the paper, openly asked The Corsair to carry on satirising him.

The Corsair took Kierkegaard up on his offer to "be abused", and unleashed a series of attacks making fun of Kierkegaard's appearance, voice and habits. For months, Kierkegaard felt he was the victim of harassment. In his journal entry of 9 March 1846, Kierkegaard detailed an explanation (was it an excuse to clean his soul?) of his attack on Møller and The Corsair, and also explained that this attack made him rethink his strategy of indirect communication. 

So our Brian Rosner continues:

Kierkegaard might say four things to calm our anxious thoughts during the coronavirus crisis: don’t be surprised that our tranquil times have turned into an age of anxiety; live in the moment; view anxiety as an opportunity for faith; and find joy in the midst of anxiety.


(Brian Rosner is the principal of Ridley College, Melbourne, and a Fellow of the Centre for Public Christianity. He is the author of Known by God: A Biblical Theology of Personal Identity and editor of The Consolations of Theology.)

Ah faith, which is a complete delusion, will help you survive your misunderstanding of what life is about and why you’re coughing your lungs out. So the bloke from Melbourne writes reams and reams of useless drivel to pump your wings so you can soar towards the sun, like an Icarus. And bugger this, we are not anxious. We are angry! We are angry because we are being fooled by caring profiteers, including fooled by those who invent your soul. Even Wikipedia tells us "weirdoes" about this guy from Denmark...

Søren Aabye Kierkegaard (1813 – 1855) was a Danish philosopher, theologian, poet, social critic and religious author who is widely considered to be the first existentialist philosopher. 

Existentialist? Bollocks! One cannot be a theologian and an existentialist at the same time. Sure Kierkegaard wrote critical texts on organised religion, Christendom, morality, ethics, psychology, and the philosophy of religion, but he was delusional with his fondness for metaphor, irony and parablic relationship with god...


Much of his philosophical work deals with the issues of how one lives as a "single individual", giving priority to concrete human reality over abstract thinking and highlighting the importance of personal choice and commitment.

Now we’re getting somewhere… But his commitments always end up with not making a choice and letting god do the heavy lifting. God being an invented character, there is no sense of reality in what Kierkegaard “preaches”. His ideas invite you to jump from the large communal frying pan into a smaller one for one lonely pancake.

Kierkegaard's theological work focuses on Christian ethics, the institution of the Church, the differences between purely objective proofs of Christianity, the infinite qualitative distinction between man and God, and the individual's subjective relationship to the God-Man Jesus the Christ,[which came through faith. Much of his work deals with Christian love. He was extremely critical of the practice of Christianity as a state religion, primarily that of the Church of Denmark. His psychological work explored the emotions and feelings of individuals when faced with life choices.

Here we can see a man trying to seek Enlightenment, like a smoker trying to quit the habit with his mates, being successful in public, but still smokes, individually, in his own lounge-room. 


Søren Aabye Kierkegaard was a poor sod, though he could have been profiteering from fooling people, including Rod Dreher and Brian Rosner… The little birds fight like hell to survive, the fat ones can’t fly and nature is full of cruel moments.

Meanwhile the coronavirus has an upside before you die:

It is a mystery that has left doctors questioning the basic tenets of biology: Covid-19 patients who are talking and apparently not in distress, but who have oxygen levels low enough to typically cause unconsciousness or even death.

The phenomenon, known by some as “happy hypoxia” (some prefer the term “silent”) is raising questions about exactly how the virus attacks the lungs and whether there could be more effective ways of treating such patients.

A healthy person would be expected to have an oxygen saturation of at least 95%. But doctors are reporting patients attending A&E with oxygen percentage levels in the 80s or 70s, with some drastic cases below 50%.

“It’s intriguing to see so many people coming in, quite how hypoxic they are,” said Dr Jonathan Bannard-Smith, a consultant in critical care and anaesthesia at Manchester Royal Infirmary. “We’re seeing oxygen saturations that are very low and they’re unaware of that. We wouldn’t usually see this phenomenon in influenza or community-acquired pneumonia. It’s very much more profound and an example of very abnormal physiology going on before our eyes.”



Read more:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/03/happy-hypoxia-unusual-coro...

listen to dog trumpet instead...

Being originally from New Zealand, modesty is such a driving force with Australian-based brothers Peter O’Doherty and Reg Mombassa that they rarely get their due.

It’s been some decades since Mental As Anything made their astonishing debut, quickly followed by a series of brilliant pop songs.

Dog Trumpet has continued the Mental’s tradition, but steadily improved and steadily further defined their identity. Which is to say that the Trumpet is beyond categorisation.

The love songs here, mostly by O’Doherty, are remarkable for the tenderness that comes through carefully nuanced melody lines.

How to Find My Way Home is a domestic epic. There’s a wistful quality that’s intensely romantic in ways that modern rock so rarely is.

Mombassa contributions, as one expects, are more esoteric. There’s musing on gravity – the concept that the world may be a tiny speck on the hand of a big, big man or a Japanese cleaning company which specialises in cleaning up the corpses and houses of people who have died alone and friendless.

If there is a track that sums the LP up it’s Overseas and Elsewhere. The song starts with an overview of human history and especially the major battles and moments of horror, but the he stops to consider the simple glories of life; to appreciate being human in the face of the long black train and to be thankful that you’re not in a war zone.

That’s what Dog Trumpet is really about; modesty, humility and love.

 

 

Read more:

https://thenewdaily.com.au/entertainment/music/2020/05/05/coronavirus-mu...

so-called democracies suspend fundamental freedoms...



The Global Political Project Imposed on the Occasion of Covid-19


by Thierry Meyssan


The inept reactions of European governments to Covid-19 were dictated by former advisers to Donald Rumsfeld and George W. Bush. Contrary to public rhetoric, they make no medical claims. Far from responding to the reality of the epidemic, they aim to transform European societies in order to integrate them into their political and financial project.


Regardless of whether the Covid-19 epidemic is natural or has been provoked, it offers an opportunity for a transnational group to suddenly impose its political project without discussion or even exposure.


Within a few weeks we have seen so-called democratic states suspend fundamental freedoms: prohibiting people from leaving their homes, participating in meetings and demonstrations, under threat of fines or imprisonment. Compulsory schooling for under-16s has been provisionally abolished. Millions of workers have been deprived of employment and automatically placed out of work. Hundreds of thousands of businesses have been forced to close down and will no longer be able to reopen.


Without preparation, governments encouraged companies to telework. All communications via the Internet were immediately recorded by the Echelon system. This means that the "Five Eyes" (Australia/Canada/New Zealand/United Kingdom/USA) have in their archives the means to unlock the secrets of almost all European manufacturers. For that, it is already too late.


None of the societal transformations have a medical justification. No epidemiology book in the world has discussed, let alone advocated, "mandatory generalized containment" to fight an epidemic.


The political leaders of the European Union Member States have been stunned by delirious mathematical projections of a mass murder in their own countries [1] They were then comforted by the ready-made solutions of a powerful pressure group whose members they had met at the Davos Economic Forum and the Munich Security Conferences [2].


Compulsory generalized containment" had been conceived fifteen years earlier, within the Bush administration, not as a public health tool, but to militarize US society in the event of a bioterrorist attack. And it is indeed this project that is applied today in Europe.


The initial plan, conceived more than 20 years ago around the head of the pharmaceutical laboratory Gilead Science, Donald Rumsfeld, planned to adapt the United States to the global financialisation of the economy. It was a question of reorganising the planet by dividing the tasks of each person geographically. Areas not yet integrated into the global economy would be deprived of a state and become mere reservoirs of raw materials; developed areas (including the European Union, Russia and China) would be responsible for production; and the United States alone would provide the world’s arms and police industry.


To do this, a group was created within a think-tank, the American Enterprise Institute, the "Project for a New American Century". The latter announced a rather crude part of its programme, but only part of it; that intended to convince major donors to support Gorge W. Bush’s election campaign. On September 11 at 10 a.m., when two airliners crashed into the World Trade Center in New York, the "Continuity of Government" (CoG) programme was declared, although the situation was not at all as foreseen in the texts. President Bush was taken to a military base. Members of Congress and their teams were taken to a huge bunker 40 kilometers from Washington. And the top-secret Continuity Government, of which Rumsfeld was a member, assumed power until the end of the day.


Taking advantage of the emotional shock of that day, this group passed a voluminous anti-terrorism code drafted long in advance, the USA Patriot Act; created a vast domestic surveillance system, the Homeland Security Department; reoriented the mission of the armed forces according to the global division of labor (Cebrowski Doctrine); and began the "Endless War. It is in the world they shaped that we have been living in a nightmare for the past two decades.


If we are not careful, the current group, of which Dr. Richard Hatchett is the visible element, will take this agenda from the United States to the European Union. It will impose over time a mobile phone tracking application to monitor our contacts; it will ruin certain economies in order to transfer their production power to the arms industry; and finally it will convince us that China is responsible for the epidemic and must be contained (Containment).


If we are not careful, the NATO we thought was brain dead will reorganise. It will expand into the Pacific with Australia joining as a trading partner [3].


If we are not careful, public schooling will be replaced by home schooling. Our children will become uncritical parrots, knowing everything but understanding nothing.


In the new world being prepared for EU Europeans, the big media will no longer be financed by the oil industry, but by Big Pharma. They will convince us that all the measures taken have been the right ones. Search engines will rate the credibility of the non-compliant media on the headlines of the signatories of their articles, not on the quality of their reasoning.


There is still time to react.


Thierry Meyssan

Translation 

Roger Lagassé

 

Read more:

https://www.voltairenet.org/article209808.html

 

 

This is the real worry... We shall see who comes out with the loot, on the other side of this weird time of isolation... 

 

See also:

 

http://www.yourdemocracy.net.au/drupal/node/38386

music for icarus in flight...

Imagine if the climate crisis was a musical composition oscillating between musical highs and lows, between hope and despair. The ClimateMusic Project, in collaboration with Richard Festinger, a music composer and educator, has written the “science-guided” musical composition “Icarus in Flight” using environmental datasets spanning two centuries.

The composition was recently performed by San Francisco’s Telegraph Quartet to celebrate Earth Day on April 22 in collaboration with the National Academy of Sciences (NAS).

“Icarus in Flight” premiered in 2018 as the second musical composition commissioned by the ClimateMusic Project, a small San Francisco-based organization harnessing the power of music to motivate public action. The datasets used in this musical piece correspond to three main human drivers of climate change: fossil fuel use, population growth, and land use change between 1880—2080.

The data used in the composition was sourced from projections developed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)—the international organization tasked with coordinating global climate research and actions.

Richard Festinger, the composer of “Icarus,” says music is a better way to get people to act on the urgency of climate change compared to scientific lectures and graphs, or data. Talking to TRNN, Festinger said “through ‘Icarus in Flight,’ I wanted to emotionally convey the problems that climate change poses and motivate people to take action.”

 

hear more:

https://therealnews.com/columns/icarus-in-flight-climate-music-to-soothe...

 

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