Friday, October 07, 2022

Dashed Off XXIV

 Much, although not all, of the success of mathematics is tied to the notion of regular sequence, without which many discoveries could never be made or understood.

Scouting is most effective when it structures the actual adventure-ideals of the young.

As society degenerates and grows corrupt, people grow to expect the legislature to serve the political parties rather than vice versa.

the corruption of philosophy into sophistry as an effect of original sin

kinds of FIND game: GUESS, DRAW-FROM, SEARCH

It is notable that technology is often marketed as a means for reclaiming what nostalgia remembers.

Every being is intelligible within an intelligible context.

"Every element in conscious experience contains within itself the reference to other elements, and however much we may try to simplify any element of conscious experience, we find this reference still present, in however imperfectly defined a form." JS Haldane (on Kant)

tax collection inefficiency as a protection against tyranny

The wise in many cultures have commended asceticism, although often recognizing that one must avoid excess.

People will always find things to argue about.

signs -> system of signs -> universal interpretant

All particular goods must be contextualized by or referred to some common good.

Physicists have had a long history of confusing either the precision or the accuracy (or both) of their theories with exhaustiveness.

Luke : lover of God :: John : beloved disciple

Mark as a study of 'good news' -- note the consistent interplay from people blurting it out when they are not supposed to (messianic secret) and not proclaiming it when they should (e.g., the women at the end of the shorter ending).

Mk&Lk: voice in Baptism addressed to Jesus
Mt: voice in Baptism witness to Jesus

Birth introduces us not into humanity but into the "common air" of human life.

Much of actual work in physics consists of thinking in mathematics and talking in analogies.

Critical theories of society and social problems often have a sort of conservation of enmity; all problems are attributable to enemies, and when no specific enemy is identifiable, to a generic enmity -- unbelief, priestcraft, patriarchy, colonialism, capitalism, communism, or whatever -- of which specific enemies are just particular manifestations.
-- NB it seems this conservation property is what distinguishes these from general conspiracy theories; both are totalizing narratives but in conspiracy theories enmity is not conserved -- there are only specific enemies.

In nonliterate societies, lore tends to pool in secret or semi-secret societies, within which intensive memorization is maintained in a well-defined way; this adds prestige to a role essential for survival.

matching games and classification

evangelization by co-diffusion (e.g., diffusion of Christianity in 'Western learning' in Jesuit missions in China)
-- this was deliberate, but this can occur spontaneously (e.g., through reading or contact)

evangelization as transportation and communication
(1) evangelizer resident, evangelizee fluent
(2) evangelizer fluent, evanglizee fluent
(3) evangelizer fluent, evangelizee resident
----
(A) active communication (e.g., preaching and particular conversion)
(B) passive communication (e.g., diffusion and co-diffusion)
(C) dispositive (pre-)communication (e.g., presence)
____
e.g.'s
(1A)  preaching in Church
(1B) co-diffusion by way of institutions
(1C) visible presence of churches
(2A) preaching to co-travelers
(2B) traveler to traveler in passing
(2C) visible presence of Christians in travel
(3A) itinerant missionary preaching
(3B) itinerant missionary almsgiving
(3C) institutions with Christian travelers

marriage and virginal celibacy as the two equilibria for just relations between the sexes

personal communication vs projected communication (books, pamphlets, tracts, television shows)

Seeing things in proportion requires seeing them abstractly, in drawing and ethics alike.

Newton's Rules for Philosophizing as analogy-guiding principles

Modern physics can be characterized as the rigorous study of analogies between formal systems and systems of change.

In social matters, there is power, true power, in just enduring.

relation of ideas by forum-contiguity

"All men, if traced back to their original source, spring from the gods." Seneca

identity of indiscernibles as most properly pertaining to measurements

Hierarchy exists for subsidarity that is solidary in common good

Freedom requires stable procedures for its exercise.

person to person, centralized, and federated correspondence network structures

holistic synopsis
(1) by average (mean, median, mode)
(2) by type
(3) by unified effect
--- (a) cooperative
--- (b) external interaction
--- (c) internal interaction ('temperature')

Society is gathering at a shrine.

Victors are written into being by historians.

punctuation as a meaning-deepening act

citizen : Aristotle :: junzi : Confucius

the note-of-doubt element in magic tricks -- deliberately establishing a ground for doubt and then subverting it

The very world itself is understanding enacted and enlivened by love.

The story of the twelve sparrows in the Infancy Gospel of Thomas seems to be a parable of the twelve apostles. Likewise the discussion of alpha seems a symbolic representation of Christ's divinity.

"each of us is an allegory, embodying in a particular tale and clothed in the garments of time and place, universal truth and everlasting life." JRR Tolkien to Auden (7  June 1955)

the punctuation signature of a text

Many things must be tried before solutions can be found and established.

It is usually easy to see one side of the problem; it is seeing the other sides that is key.

"It is more blessed to give than to receive" in Acts shows the author of Luke recognizing a saying of Jesus not in the gospel of Luke.

"Be wise [dokimos: tested/testing, discerned/discerning] money-changers" is a common patristic  attribution to Jesus; Clement of Alexandria attributes it to "Scripture" and takes it to be about being discriminate in knowledge. Cassian applies it to thoughts.

Scripture is handed down to us in a context of saints using it and living according to it.

apocryphal gospels as witnesses to what people found narratively memorable or interesting about Christian message -- the backbround apostles (with the implication of non-obvious teachers), Pontius Pilate, the new covenant, Jesus himself

philosophy in a Christian context vs Christianity in a philosophical context

--the story of Thecla in the Acts of Paul seems to have links with the pastoral epistles

input price inflation
(1) hide increase
--- (a) quality reduction
--- (b) quantity reduction ('shrinkflation')
(2) pass on increase (output price inflation)

There is no violence except where there is a norm; violence is always a particular kind of violation of a norm.