82 replies to this topic

[Algernon]

What philosopher do you identify with most?
There are quite a few philosophers whom I agree with on some point or other.

-Friedrich Nietzsche: he is one of my favourite philosophers. One of his most important concepts is the trans-valuation of values. In this day and age, it must not only (or not anymore) be applied to Christianity, but to society, economics and politics. Other theories, like master-slave morality, the Übermensch and perspectivism have been influential as well. The trans-valuation of values helped me shape my belief and perspectivism helps me rationalise certain things.

-Arthur Schopenhauer: I admire him for his boldness, but not so much for his metaphysical and aesthetical ideas. His views on pessimism and religion helped shape me.

-Erich Fromm: not a philosopher, but a sociologist/psychoanalyst. His name deserves mention for profoundly changing my views on economic, social and political issues. Everyone should read him.

-Carl Gustav Jung: again, not a philosopher but a psychoanalyst, although maybe it would be better to describe him as a scholar. He got me interested in psychology, theology, anthropology and alchemy. One of my greatest heroes.

-Søren Kierkegaard: people tend to discard him too easily because his philosophy was mostly rooted in Christianity, but they don’t know what they are missing. The first existential philosopher, which is important in itself. His writing style might not be all too easy, but it’s still a lot better than that charlatan Hegel, and his ideas – taken out of their religious context – are still valuable today.

-Michel Foucault: one of the most controversial philosophers of the twentieth century, I think, and maybe that’s why I like him so much. He is very difficult to understand. Even Noam Chomsky said he never quite understood what he was talking about, but his concepts of gouvernementalité, biopower and his views on methodology are all powerful and underrated. I would just advise nobody to read him if you are not already well grounded in philosophy and are not used to difficult philosophical garble. That was probably his biggest fault: his inability to speak coherently.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson: again not a philosopher, but a scholar and a poet. He was one of the founders of American Transcendentalism, which I firmly believe in. I consider him to be the smartest American to have ever lived, even if that doesn’t say much these days.

-Valentinus: the founder of Valentinianism, a Gnostic movement and probably the only ‘religious’ order I could see myself join if I weren’t so bitterly atheistic. I can only imagine how different Christianity – and the western world – might look like today if events had turned out differently.

-Rudolf Steiner: a quack to others, a saint to both. Me, I’m in the middle. His connection between the scientific and the mystic has always attracted me.

There are others too, but these are the most important ones. If you want me to elaborate on one of them, let me know.

[Staton]

I'm playing Final Fantasy tactics. What job setup should I go?

[awildfaggotappears!]

Do you think "The Raven" is overrated?
Favorite work of art/poetry?

[Algernon]

I'm playing Final Fantasy tactics. What job setup should I go?
I don’t know. I have never played a single Final Fantasy game.

Do you think ‘The Raven’ is overrated?
No. It is a terrific poem. Just because it has become so popular does not mean that it has lost even a shred of its original poignancy and potency.

Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the raven, ‘Nevermore.’

How could anyone possibly think that those lines are overrated?

Favorite work of poetry?
Oh God. Too many to name, but I will try to give a short list nonetheless.

-William Blake – The Four Zoas
-William Blake – Milton, a Poem
-William Blake – Jerusalem
-William Blake – Book of Urizen
-Charles Bukowski – Charlie, I’m Pregnant
-Ralph Waldo Emerson – Blight
-Ralph Waldo Emerson – A Mountain Grave
-Ellen Sturgis Hooper – The Poet
-Novalis - Hymnen an die Nacht
-Virgil – Aeneid
-John Milton – Paradise Lost
-Dante Alighieri – Divine Comedy
-Goethe – Faust
-William Butler Yeats – The Second Coming
-Alexander Pushkin – I Loved You
-William Cullen Bryant – Thanatopsis
-Edgar Allan Poe – The Raven
-Charles Baudelaire – The Albatross
-William Butler Yeats – A Prayer for my Daughter
-Jorge Luis Borges – The Just
-Osip Mandelstam – A Troubled Sigh of Leaves
-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow – The Day is Done
-Miklós Radnóti – Foamy Sky
-Alfred Tennyson – Ulysses
-Henry Vaughan – I Saw Eternity the Other Night

I’m too tired to go on, but rest assured I have lots and lots more. I love poetry.

Allow me to respond to ‘Favourite Work of Art’ separately tomorrow.

I believe I shall go lie on my bed and stupefy myself with wine. Good day to you.

[akshaygupta]

your favourite drink?

and the most precious thing you possess right now?

[sentient]

What would be the hardest thing for you to give up (relationships with people excluded)?

Are you more of a traditionalist, or do you consider your self to be 'out of the box'?

What's the most 'intimate' thing you've done in an area that's generally considered public?

Ever cheated on a partner? Been cheated on?

What's your favourite thing about the opposite sex? same sex?

What has been the riskiest decision you've made till date? How'd it work out for you?

Are all your friends involved in all aspects of your life (ie everyone goes out together, regardless of where you know who from), or is your social circle a little more sectioned off (work friends, school friends, music friends, etc.)? Would you like to change that?

[Sarcastic_Guy]

Algernon, you said that your moral/ethical framework while is quite loose in details, is actually very structured within it terms of general direction and general philosophy. Can you summarize what that generally entails? (or would such a task require far too much time and typing?

[Algernon]

Favourite work of art?
Limited to visual arts, there are a lot of painters whom I consider to be amongst my favourites: Henry Fuseli, Caspar David Friedrich, William Blake, Francisco Goya, Albrecht Dürer, Gustave Doré, Ilya Repin, Jean Delville, Carlos Schwabe, Mikhail Nesterov, Raphael, Martin Schongauer, Jan Brueghel the Elder, Jan Brueghel the Younger, Théodore Géricault, Hubert Robert etc.

I don’t think I have a favourite piece of art, though. I love all the works of the above mentioned artists and many others.

Your favourite drink?
Cognac is my absolute favourite drink, although I don’t drink it daily – or sometimes even weekly. I always have at least one bottle of high-quality cognac that I sip from occasionally, usually after a day of intense physical activity or just when the mood rings true.

As far as daily beverages go: water. I rarely drink soda and the only juice I drink is fresh orange juice that I prepare myself. I drink two litres of water a day, sometimes three. I started drinking it years ago because of an irrational fear of kidney stones. Now I love the ‘taste’ of water and it’s the only thing I want.

The most precious thing you possess right now?
My piano. If multiple items are allowed: my music collection.

What would be the hardest thing for you to give up (relationships with people excluded)?
Playing the piano, listening to music or reading; in that order.

Are you more of a traditionalist, or do you consider your self to be 'out of the box'?
That depends on what we are talking about. A lot of my friends say I was born too late (some say decades too late, others say a century or more) and some call everything I do and have ‘classical’. That might mean I am a traditionalist, but I really couldn’t tell unless you give me a more narrow field to consider.

What's the most 'intimate' thing you've done in an area that's generally considered public?
I suppose this question is mainly aimed at sexual matters? Well then: I had sex with my ex-girlfriend (who was already an ex back then) in a flower box in an alley. It was New Year’s Eve, everyone was drunk beyond any acceptable excuse, it was dark and very few people were around. This happened four years ago.

Ever cheated on a partner? Been cheated on?
I have never cheated on my girlfriends, mainly because very few girls ever interested me. I just never thought it was worth to cheat on someone whom I considered to be a rarity, i.e. someone who I was fascinated by enough to enter an intimate relationship with.

As far as I know, only my very first girlfriend ever cheated on me. I caught them peeling each other’s tonsils one time while I was making a late-night stroll. I didn’t go over them and they didn’t notice me, but I told her the next day I had seen her.

What's your favourite thing about the opposite sex? same sex?
Tits! Asses!

I will probably sound either ignorant or sexist, but women – at least the women I know well – spend more time thinking about and with their emotions and dealing with them. Men tend to be brazen to the point of shameless brutality while women are more thoughtful. I am a lot more comfortable with the latter than with the former.

On the other hand, men don’t piss in my ear when they break up or if they can’t find a ‘soul mate’.

What has been the riskiest decision you've made till date? How'd it work out for you?
I don’t understand the question. Rephrase?

Are all your friends involved in all aspects of your life (ie everyone goes out together, regardless of where you know who from), or is your social circle a little more sectioned off (work friends, school friends, music friends, etc.)? Would you like to change that?
I never really thought about that. I suppose I have ‘sections’ of friends to some degree with whom I communicate when I ‘need’ them: I talk to friends who I know are interested in psychology when I want to talk about it, I talk to other friends when I want to talk about piano, I call certain friends when I want to go out to a pub etc. These sections aren’t strictly partitioned, though. They overlap for maybe 60% or 70%.

Algernon, you said that your moral/ethical framework while is quite loose in details, is actually very structured within it terms of general direction and general philosophy. Can you summarize what that generally entails? (or would such a task require far too much time and typing?
My morals are founded in a very bare framework inside of which I move about quite freely, but outside of which I never go. I don’t deal in black-and-white situations, e.g. murder is not always wrong; it depends on the situation. I will go one further and say that daylong torture is not always wrong; this too depends on the situation. In that aspect, I am very mutable. People tend to say that this is being erratic, but I don’t agree with that at all. It’s them who think in matters of black and white, good and evil, which I find absolutely foolish to do.

The rigidity of the framework is difficult to explain, largely because I am incapable of illustrating it to myself when I try to (as I often do). There are limits to what a moral being can and cannot do. If he trespasses this limit, he is morally outlawed forever. There is no repenting or making up for it. Never. Obviously what constitutes these borders is utterly subjective, although in my own mind I am arrogant enough to proudly proclaim that – in these matters – I am right and everyone else is wrong. That’s the only way morality works. I wish I could give a clear example, but right now I am unable to. Maybe something will pop up.

[Waylander]

What are your thoughts on me?

(PS i'm reading Anatomy of Human destructiveness first like you said)

[Staton]

If you were going to craft a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, what would you use from the following:

Creamy or chunky?

Strawberry or grape?

And would you put bananas on it?

[Algernon]

What are your thoughts on me?

Sometimes you're an insufferable imbecile with a flaccid, weak sense of humour. Sometimes you say something half worth considering. Overall, I think you try too hard -- way too hard.

If you were going to craft a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, what would you use from the following:

Creamy or chunky?

Strawberry or grape?

And would you put bananas on it?

Never had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I never even tasted peanut butter. But as a theoretical, I'd go with creamy, strawberry and no.

[HeyThereDelilah]

Fried or scrambled eggs?

And I had another really good question I thought of in the shower but I can't remember it....

Which raises another question, bath or shower?

[Algernon]

Fried or scrambled eggs?

Scrambled eggs with some cheese, bacon (or crab), cherry tomatoes, onion and fresh parsley.

And I had another really good question I thought of in the shower but I can't remember it.... Which raises another question, bath or shower?

Shower in the morning, to get clean or to rejuvenate quickly. Bath only to relax with a beer/drop of cognac and classical music.

[LionJess]

If there was one book you could make everyone in the world read what would you pick?

Are you at all religious? Why/why not? What are your views on those who are? 

[Algernon]

If there was one book you could make everyone in the world read what would you pick?

Only one? Damn. There are so many books that everyone in the world should read.

Let’s see... It wouldn’t be any ‘classical’ philosophy work because it would be lost on the vast majority. It wouldn’t be a psychological treatise for the same reason. In fact, all non-fiction would probably be wasted on most people and ‘One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest’ might be a good alternative when it comes to fiction, or ‘The Tartar Steppe’ by Dino Buzzati. The only exception to this would be ‘The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness’ by Erich Fromm. Maybe ‘Walden’ by Henry David Thoreau, which had a profound impact on my interests relatively early in my life. If I could cheat, I might pick the collected essays and speeches of Ralph Waldo Emerson, like the collection published by the American Library of Congress. Obviously I am giving a thoroughly cheating answer by naming possibilities instead of a single book.

I can’t decide on just one book, so I’ll just say the name of a random book that had a deep influence on me and isn’t difficult to understand: ‘The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness’ by Erich Fromm.

Are you at all religious? Why/why not? What are your views on those who are?

I am not religious, but I am a deeply spiritual person. I adhere to no specific religion, but I take appealing aspects from all of them to help shape my beliefs, thoughts and guidance.

I just don’t have the faith to believe in a religion. Once I wished I could – and sometimes I still wish I could – have an undying, all-overriding belief in a God. I guess the reason I don’t is because of my upbringing, which didn’t go very smooth. The majority of my education was in catholic schools, so I was brought up with religion, but as things happened in my life, I started questioning God and why he allowed certain things to happen. This soon expanded in psychological and philosophical questions and I just said, ‘Screw it.’

People may believe what they want, as long as their beliefs do not impose on anyone else in any way. If believing in heaven, sin, hell or anything else gives you a better, more fulfilling life, all the better. That is why I used to wish I had faith: so I might be able to live a better life. Now I know that this is not the case – at least not for me. Believe what you want, just leave other people alone and let them live their lives.

[Rellik San]

Top 5 drinking buddies. Not off of EC though I mean anyone from any time and place.

[Algernon]

Top 5 drinking buddies. Not off of EC though I mean anyone from any time and place.

1)Tom Waits: Back in his drinking days, of course. The conversations would be as sordid and puke-ridden as a Puerto Rican boy-prostitute/heroin-addict in a gutter in Brooklyn.

2)Nick Cave: Same as Tom Waits, but for added psychopathy and general fun.

3)Lord Byron: Bottomless wit and if for some inexplicable reason the women aren't attracted to the rest of the company, he'd have them sucking our cocks in a moment.

4)Carl Gustav Jung: How fun would it be to get one of the most eminent scholars in history drunk? Especially in this company?

5)Leonid Andreyev: He would be suited better in limited company, e.g. with just Byron along for the ride as well. Now that I think of it, Andreyev and Byron having a buddies night out would be so awesome it would tear the very fabric of the universe.

[LionJess]

How did you find EC, why did you join?

Do you see yourself sticking in one "field" or work, or changing your career a few times?

[Algernon]

How did you find EC, why did you join?
I found Emo Corner through an edition of Weekend Web on Something Awful. Every week or so they visit a new pathetic forum and post screenshots of the most ridiculous posts they find. Obviously Emo Corner had quite a few hilariously pathetic posts. I decided to join for no real reason except sheer boredom. Pretty soon I realised that not everyone was as retarded as those witnessed in the Weekend Web post so I hung around to fill empty moments.

Do you see yourself sticking in one "field" or work, or changing your career a few times?
My plan is to float around in the humanities and social sciences sectors, i.e. psychology, anthropology, sociology, linguistics etc. Next year I will join a senior psychologist’s private practice. Depending on how that goes, I might stay there a couple of years before I decide to try my hand at my own practice. On the other hand, I am always on the lookout for other jobs that might be of great interest to me. Some of the things I have found and would want to do as well include assistant in an American university’s anthropological research in Kenya, an ecological project in Slovakia... Things like that. I wouldn’t mind being, say, a construction worker or an administrative clerk for a short time, but I could never do it for more than a couple of months.

[Sarcastic_Guy]

if you ask me, I can totally see Algernon be a literature lecturer in some college town.