Your Bible

[maldoror]

Thus Spake Zarathustra works for me.

Also, the Bible is never far from hand. I am not religious at all, but the Good Book is like, THE cultural touchstone, for people in my part of the globe. I just can't imagine reading it straight through. I wouldn't mind trying my hand at editing it, for like, non-believers. Dude begat dude, who begat dude, etc... uh, lol, wut?

I really like that your two touchstones are nietzsche and the bible. can't imagine anything more schizophrenic.

[theetruscan]

ayn rand.

Shit. You win.

[maldoror]

ayn rand.

perfect

[destroyed]

^ Maldoror would make a good bible... for a flying octopus!
BWOUHAHAHAHAHAHA!


:cough:

[Faust]

just noticed this, sorry for the delay in responding.

in the simplest sense, my problem with the categorical imperative is its disregard for grey zone context in favor of hard edged absolutism. imo, in practice, morality is anything but black and white. it's also important to note that I'm not a religious individual, but I understand how the categorical imperative could have particular resonance with certain religious doctrine (especially the ten commandments). though I believe that in general, e.g., one should tell the truth, I also believe that there are times when one should not tell the truth. for example, let's imagine that this is the holocaust and you are secretly harboring jews in your basement. if the gestapo knocked at your door and asked if you were harboring jews in your basement I would say that lying is not only appropriate, but the morally responsible thing to do. kant would disagree with me, and that, in a nutshell, is why I disagree with kant.

i agree with maldoror there, zamb. i mean, the whole definition of the word "tragedy" hinges on it (as Hegel described). wow, i just said something with regards to philosophy (runs and hides)

[Faust]

I really like that your two touchstones are nietzsche and the bible. can't imagine anything more schizophrenic.

My turn - ZING!

[Faust]

faust, i rate your selection! one of my favourite books.

for me i dont know what would be my bible. hard to tell, dr.Suess's childrens books maybe, theres a depth in them which i cant explain. umm... also notes from underground - dostoyevsky is up there, but nothing that really takes the plate.

Thank you!

Also, Camus' The Fall would be up there. Or The Rebel (sans all the metaphysical masturbation in the middle - the beginning and the end I can live by).

[destroyed]

^ great call on those two Camus jawns. Come to think of it, Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus gets me out of bed in the morning, and helps me manage any self-destructive compulsions.

I have always tended towards philosophy that tackled issues of how or why to live, instead of the rather more dusty, onanistic, strain (analytic philosophy).

[Faust]

^ great call on those two Camus jawns. Come to think of it, Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus gets me out of bed in the morning, and helps me manage any self-destructive compulsions.

I have always tended towards philosophy that tackled issues of how or why to live, instead of the rather more dusty, onanistic, strain (analytic philosophy).

Thank you for correcting me, I MEANT The Myth of Sisyphus, not The Rebel.

[destroyed]

^ thank heaven for little girls? j/k


at faust: Ah, so! The Rebel is good stuff, too, though.

I just learned yesterday that there are recordings of Nietzsche's, like, musical compositions. I had no idea that they existed. My friend advised that they are terrible, but I am curious.

[Faust]

An odd choice maybe and not as clearly relevant as some of the other choices here, but truthfully the text that has influenced and helped form my world view the most is probably Nabokov's Lolita. It's a bit of a fixation.

Do tell us...

[Real Real]

An odd choice maybe and not as clearly relevant as some of the other choices here, but truthfully the text that has influenced and helped form my world view the most is probably Nabokov's Lolita. It's a bit of a fixation.

Incredible novel.

[Faust]

/\ indeed. but a bible? i need some elaboration here...

[destroyed]

Your answer is acceptable.

[Faust]

Well, first and foremost, I do a fair amount of creative writing, and his stylistic and formal choices have influenced me incredibly, so I suppose in that sense it is sort of biblical for me.

Beyond that, however, I take his self-conscious reverence of aesthetics very seriously. Lolita is perhaps the perfect example of finding significance and meaning in places where there shouldn't be any at all. And when that is combined with what I think is a stellar application of Nabokov's theory about chance vs fate and the unresolvable nature of life's inexplicable highs and lows (outlined in a really wonderful essay of his called The Tragedy of Tragedy), one is presented with a very unusual yet helpful and universally applicable way of looking at the world. One way of explaining this is to look at the never ending debate between scholars about whether or not Lolita is a love story. Truthfully, I don't believe there is a way to answer this question, because the mutability of all of the factors one must take into account in order to do so makes such a definitive answer impossible. The idea permeates the book and I find it really comforting to think about as it applies to my own life - that there isn't really a good and a bad, per se, because sometimes things are both, or neither. That there isn't always an answer to the question that you're asking, and that sometimes things happen for absolutely no reason and will never be resolved.

I don't know if that was clear enough or not, but thats a brief sketch, and I hope it answered your question to a degree.

Let me get your rationale straight. An old manipulative man who continually takes sexual advantage over an adolescent girl, whose only other choice is foster home, so much so that in the end she chooses to runaway with a child porn impresario rather than endure Humbert Humbert - that situation is not black and white enough for you?

I know exactly what you are saying about his acute mind and the hilarity of an educated European thrown into the fatuous Mid-West, and I enjoyed that very much, but that has nothing to do with the immoral conflict at the center of the book.