Stranger on Earth

Dear Bumming philosopher-wannabe, Yes, the lesson does continue once more! The good news is lessons are the very stuff that makes life compelling; the bad news is no matter how many lessons you put yourself through there will always be new questions... You have asked the central question in philosophy in your previous mail: To what extent should one question life? How many philosophers have spent whole lifetimes trying to figure out the answer only to find out that it's a dead end? Since I am not a professional philosopher, I will have to refer you to two great thinkers who asked the same question: John Locke (1632-1704) and David Hume (1711-76). It would of course be silly to think that I could succinctly sum up the vast philosophies of these two men here. I will attempt to give you only what is relevant to the question posed above. Locke states that the only things humans are capable of perceiving are the contents of their minds. This means there are limits...

There is nothing more exciting than having an ex-student writing to you expressing the wish to discuss what you have written ( http://ed-is-a-stranger-on-earth.blogspot.com/2011/01/now-learning-how-to-live-through.html ). Below is my rambling response to his rather lengthy mail. If there are any untruths or falsities, I am the one to blame... Have fun reading it! ;-) Now we are talking! Since you have taken the time to compose such a long response, which I thoroughly enjoyed reading, I will do it justice by giving you a detailed response. First off, Gaarder's Sophie's World . This is the Bible of us amateur philosophers. I read it more than ten years ago, and it still remains one of my all-time favoruites. If you feel like reading something equally thought-provoking but a lot less transparent, try Milan Kundera's The Unbearable Lightness of Being . The Empedocles argument (earth, fire, water and air being the basic elements of the world) is interesting ...

Throughout our short lives on Earth we are often told (by unctuous types) to "seize the day" and "live in the moment", but to what extent is that possible? Let us reel in two early Greek philosophers, Heraclitus (535-475 BC) and Parmenides (540-? BC), and see how far these two gentlemen will get us. Heraclitus is mainly known for stepping into a river and drawing a revelatory conclusion: One can never step into the same river twice. Apply that to our daily existence, and you will instantly see how true it is. To Heraclitus and his disciples, change (motion) is the only truth or constant in our reality. No material object can escape change. If it exists, it must undergo change, sooner or later. This, too, applies to human life. If someone told me to "live in the NOW", I would have trouble realising it. That is because what constitutes the present me is already on its way to becoming something else as we mull over this subject.   What makes NOW...