It's been a while since my last blog so in a way this is a resurrection.
February... a month full of reds (not communist though, sorry Marx) and chocolates (happy feast day to Ferrero and Kisses!). If ever the number of newborns on November will increase you'll know why... Well, traditionally, for better or worse, February has been known for two things: (1) it is the only month composed of 29 days and it only happens every leap year and (2) it's the month of hearts i.e. Valentine's day. So let me shatter your sweet clingy-wingy day with a philosophical reflection or rather a book review. A newly ordained Jesuit, Fr Patrick Vance S. Nogoy, SJ, has just published his book, Touching Love: Thoughts and Stories (Pasay: Paulines, 2016). Last Friday, February 10, 2014, I attended his public lecture in Xavier University Cagayan de Oro. So basically this essay is just a re-echo of what has been discussed (though not that comprehensive since I haven't finished the book yet). Fr Pat reflects on what is the place of love in this world characterized as a Post-truth society. But before anything else, what's Post-truth? "Post-truth" is Oxford Dictionary's 2016 word of the year; it simply means that facts and evidences no longer possess much influence over public opinion than emotions and feelings have. Well, we can easily see this. The "Brexit", Donald Trump's anti-immigrant stance, Marine Le Pen's nationalism, Mocha Uson's wisdom, Alvarez's Death penalty and so on. So, in a sense, Fr Pat's question is: where is love in this whirlwind of emotions? Fr Pat equates love not with sex or just mere feelings but with the Truth. Love is aletheia i.e. love is uncovering (yes, Heidegger's fans will like the book, as well as Jean-Luc Marion's and Emmanuel Levinas'). Love is opposed to totalization precisely because it is aletheia. Love is collaboration: "Collaboration is opposed to totalization - an aggressive and violent promotion of one's own plan" (p 17). In love, the lover lets the beloved strip herself and reveal who she really is (aletheia) yet in this stripping I still cannot own and dictate her she is forever an infinity enclosed in a finite being (of course the metaphor of stripping is mine not Fr Pat's, hehe). For Fr Pat the essential question is not "Why is there something rather than nothing?" but "Should I love or not?" "Yet despite its demands, it is almost impossible to not love" (p 70). Love creates possibilities and for Fr Pat possibilities are always more important than actualities (unlike Sartre's there is really no potentiality bu only actuality) because in love's promise possibilities become real. This is the reason why it hurts when promises are broken, when the beloved goes away or finds another. It hurts not because of the unfulfilled promises but because "of abandonment - I am left alone. It is the experience of being forsaken - the denial and rejection, especially by the one I love" (p 73) The choice to continue loving is left to me. Thus it no longer matters if love will go back what matters is that I love you... in this act of loving the I finds himself truly as he is: "Self-becoming is achieved ironically because of an Other, unique and mysterious, an Other that exerts an opposite or counter-force" (pp 46-47). In our society who loves emotions and feelings, love stands as wisdom's beacon. To love is to let the Other unfold - let her be - though this will take until forever since I will always be surprised of new things that I will discover about her. This is truly aletheia! Love then is not just an emotion or feeling such that define the Post-truth society, Love is a decision. Now the question is: will you love? Happy Valentines! (for those who want a copy of the book, it is available at all ST PAULS Libreria and Pauline Media Centers nationwide or just visit stpauls.ph) The night is eerily quiet and dark. Only the soft sounds from the keyboard and the occasional bing of the messenger can be heard. Scrolling down the newsfeed of my social media account, rarely do I find posts about matters-of-great-importance. Suddenly, the silence of the lambs was broken. Suddenly laughter filled the room. Someone just laughed as if there will be no tomorrow, as if all the laughter the world ever has is nothing but a sorrowful cry. The cause? A #hugot post just captured the solemnity of the night. The Filipino social media phenomenon known as “hugot” or “#hugot” can be roughly translated as “pulled out”. It is a one or two-liner that usually evokes sarcasm from a broken-heart like “Ako: Pabili naman po nang pain reliever; Vendor:Ilan?; Ako: Isa lang po. Ako lang naman ang nasaktan sa aming dalawa” (Me: Can I buy a pain reliever?; Vendor: How many?; Me: Only one please for I am the only one that has been hurt between the two of us). “Hugot lines” are usually funny for it evokes sarcasm and utilizes witty logic. As the laughter subsided (n.b. I have partaken on it), the spell of the night was erased in an instant. Smiles were already drawn in our haggard faces. Why do #Hugot lines evoke laughter even if in fact it is a sarcastic tirade of a broken-hearted person? Why is it so trending and why do we like and share it at all? What is so funny in being a broken heart? The answer might just be strolling on the streets of our cities, hiking on the mountains and planting the farms of our people. Yes, the answer is the people themselves or if one be very particular, the culture. Filipinos might be said to be undergoing a cultural “identity crisis” but the entire world knows well how the Filipino can smile amidst things that evoke tears and despair. We have spent more than three centuries in the convento, about two scores in Hollywood, and around five years in the dojo, but still our smiles and laughter are just like how our Malayan ancestors might have had (please excuse my wild imagination). This innate joyfulness and candidness, for me, is the reason behind the “virality” of the #Hugot phenomenon. Some psychologists or other mind-mystery-loving persons might be tempted to diagnose us and say that we are an escapist people. They might argue that our culture of turning the sad events in our lives into a laughingstock is a kind of turning our backs to the real essence of the problem. But I dare say no. When we started laughing about our own misfortunes and broken heartedness, we are not just appreciating our witty logic and sarcasm but we are seeing the eidos – the essence – of our problems. What is this essence you ask? The essence of our problems and heartaches might differ from case to case but there is a common ground that they share. That ground is the realization that everything in this world is passing and so is one’s problem. Why do I have to problematize my problem? I should rather laugh on it and display my witty logic otherwise it will be a waste of time.
So far so good. But all these revolve only around the egoistic existence of the Self. Is there something much deeper about the social media phenomena of #Hugot lines? In the point-of-view of the broken hearted, it is really hard to laugh about the very things which torn your heart apart but when you are able to transcend this, you have also transcended yourself. This is the phenomenon of the classic comedian. I used classic, not the modern ones who try to evoke laughter out of downgrading other people. The classic comedian downgrades himself and might even accept pain so that others might laugh. This seems foolish but this is the origin of comedy – a fooling about of what in reality is unjust, unfair, and at times unhappy events. The classic comedian, thus, is someone who had already transcended the egoistic shell of existence. He is no longer mourning about his pains; rather he uses these pains to invest smiles on the face of the Other. He acknowledges his infinite responsibility to the Other whose Face he faces in every single moment of his life. He is no longer in the Cartesian “cogito ergo sum” (I think therefore I am) but already a being-for-the-other! This is the life of the one at the sending end of the communication process of the phenomenon called #Hugot. It might seem a bitter reminiscence of the past gone wrong but the #Hugot phenomenon is used not to cry over the past but to ensure the sweetness of the Other’s future, or at least of the moment that he smiles and laughs even if it is at the cost of my own bitter remembrance. Is this suicide? Maybe. But what is the reason of our existence if not to die and die as long as there is a chance before our final death and resurrection? To die does not only mean to die physically, it can also mean death of one’s ego. As we have said above, “hugot” can be roughly translated as “pulled out” and yes it is a pulling out – a pulling out of something from inside to give outside. Sometimes, I think, it is wiser to be at the sending end rather than the receiving end of the #Hugot phenomenon for the sender does not only exhibit his wit, logic, and humor, rather he is transcending the communication process and in that process gives not only the message but himself too. Indeed, it was his Self that is being pulled out inside and is given to you. And so I posted my #Hugot. Does man have soul? This question have boggled philosophers' minds through the ages. Since Socrates, this question has been tried to be answered. Socrates believes in reincarnation. For him, and for his student Plato, the soul is immortal unlike the body which logically means for Socrates that the soul can transport to another body when its original body dies (but this is not just Socrates' and Plato's idea, even the Hindus have the concept of the Karma wherein a person's soul can be transported to an animal's body when he dies). In fact, Socrates argues that the soul actually knows everything it just enters a state of "amnesia" or "drunkenness" when embodied. Plato actually got more further. Plato argues that reality can be seen through two ways: the sensible world and the World of Forms. The former is like a mold wherein the latter was molded and formed into being. Thus, the mold is logically greater than the molded. For Plato the sensible world is just a copy of the World of Forms. The World of Forms is eternal and immutable while the other is not. Walang forever. The soul, for Plato, participates in the World of Forms and thus the body is just a "copy" of it and the value between the two is clearly seen. Asserting the existence of the soul, the question remains: what is the relationship of the soul and the body. Following this ancient tradition, our favorite mathematician, Rene Descartes, argued that the soul and the body have no relation at all. In fact, you can actually doubt the existence of your body! The only thing that you cannot doubt is the existence of doubt which means that there is a I who doubts. The ego or the self for Descartes is equivalent to the mind, psyche in Greek, or can also be called the soul. Thus, cogito ergo sum! This view known as dualism. For Descartes the soul/mind works independently from the body (they are just like two synchronized clocks that's why you think they have a connection). In fact, another philosopher by the name of Leibniz adopted this view and even asserted that what only exists are monads (you can call them the mind/soul). This view got the attention of the Englishman, David Hume. Hume, along with other empiricists, would argue that things which do not have empirical evidence should be "committed to the flames!" and so is the idea of the soul. What persists now is the body. But even the body does not persist. The body's components (i.e. cells/tissues) are degenerating and regenerating over time. Your cells when you were born will be completely replaced by newer cells at the age of 20's. Thus the existence of the Self or personhood is put into question. Hume asserts that there is actually no self but Selves in the plural. "There is no you that is the same person from birth to death". Having seen the extreme let us now examine the middle.
The phenomenologists, led by Edmund Husserl, reacted to these extremes. The lowly treatment on the body is an injustice to it and the non-existence of the soul is problematic. Gabriel Marcel an existentialist and phenomenologist argues that the relation of the soul to the body is seen in two ways: "I have my body" and "I am my body". The former connotes property but not a normal possessive element. In everything one owns he do not have only control over it but responsibility as well. This can be clearly seen in material possessions but what more is the body? Of all one's possessions the body is the most personal, thus it connotes a higher responsibility. This brings us to the second view: I am my body. My body is part of who am I. I cannot experience the world (and know who am I) if I do not have the body. The human person is historical, that is, he have a story behind his every move - he experienced, experiences, and will experience the world. But this world can only be experienced through the body. Taking from this cue, Maurice Merleau-Ponty would argue that the body is essential especially in relating to other people. It is through what he calls "phenomenology of perception" that we experience the other. It is through the body that we know another. Just like Jean-Paul Sartre in his article "The Look" (from his great book, Being and Nothingness), Merleau-Ponty argues that the very reason we cannot objectify the other person is because of the experience of seeing him looking at me and this can only happen if we have and are bodies. From this, we should now view the perspective of another type of monism: i.e. the soul and the body composes man. This view has been held by St Augustine of Hippo, St Thomas Aquinas and other Christian Philosophers. For them, a man is a human being if he is composed of both body and soul. Without one of them he is no longer human. Thus the soul alone we can call a "ghost" or "spirit" and the body alone is a "mannequin". This was furthered by Karol Wyjtola (a.k.a. St John Paul II) who do not only followed the Christian /Scholastic Philosophers but also subscribed to the ideas of the Phenomenologists. Wyjtola would say to us that what makes man truly human is the combination of both body and soul. This is the reason why man is an "embodied spirit". Because of this, the body is no longer a disposable vessel for the soul as we have seen Descartes and Leibniz would imply and the soul is still there unlike Hume's assertion. Only one problem remains unspoken. Is there an afterlife? The answer lies in your hands. |
anonymous lenzJust a traveling someone in this reality we have fallen in love with... this we call our world... "What is essential is invisible to the eyes..." Tags
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September 2018
"There is only one corner in the universe that you can be certain of improving and that's your own Self" |