Born on October 22, 1920, in Springfield, Massachusetts, and died on May 31, 1996, Timothy Leary became a major, highly controversial advocate of psychedelic drugs during the 1960s.
Timothy Leary was the only child born into an Irish Catholic household. His father was a dentist who left his mother Abigail Ferris when he was 14. As a young man cursed with too little discipline and too much enthusiasm for women, he bounced around in various universities and military institutions. Eventually, because of his mother's appealing to a family friend, State Senator David I. Walsh, head of the Senate Naval Affairs Committee, he found a place to work as a civilian in an army psychological hospital in Pennsylvania during World War II. He then managed to finish his studies in psychology at the University of Alabama via correspondence courses.
In 1941, he was accepted to the University of Alabama through the Reserve Officers' Training Corps but he was expelled a year later for spending the night in the female dormitory. Then Larry remained in the non-commissioned track while enrolled in psychology subsection of the Army Specialized Training Program, including three months of study at Georgetown University, and six months at Ohio State University.
Georgetown University is a private research unit and the oldest Catholic and Jesuit-affiliated institution of higher education in the United States. The university has always been governed independently of the church. Founded in 1789, the program has grown to comprise 9 undergraduate and graduate schools, among which are the School of Foreign Service, School of Business, Medical School and Law School. Its main campus is located on a hill above the Potomac River, the 4th largest River along the Atlantic coast and form the borders between Maryland and Washington D.C. Notable alumni include Bill Clinton, Antonin Scalia (Supreme Court Justice), George Tenet (CIA director, and King Felipe of Spain, as well as the royalty and heads of state of more than a dozen countries.
Ohio University is a large, primarily residential, public university, founded in 1870 as a land-grant meaning a federal controlled land to focus on the teaching of practical agriculture, science, military science and engineering.
Leary received an M.S. in psychology at Washington State University, a public research university, through the Reserve Officers' Training Corps.
In 1950, he received a Ph.D in clinical psychology from Berkeley. At this point of his life he started to belief that the only route to true psychological cure lay in the authentic insight into the nature of one's self.
By this time Leary stayed in the Bay Area as an assistant clinical professor at UCLA, San Francisco;
concurrently he co-founded Kaiser Hospital's psychology department in Oakland, California and maintained a private consultancy. In 1952, the family spent a year in Spain, subsisting on a research grant. He was at the starting point of constructing the conventional middle-class life.
Despite his nascent professional success, his marriage was strained by multiple infidelities and mutual alcohol abuse. Then everything shattered in a million pieces on his 35th birthday, in October, 1955, when Marianna, his first wife, decided to kill herself on the morning of that specific day by starting the family car, shutting the redwood garage door and inhaling the exhaust. When Leary woke up on that Saturday morning with a hangover he discovered his wife dead. The couple's two children -Susan 8, and Jack 6 panicked as they saw their father shouting for help, but there was nothing there that anyone could do. In the aftermath, he took his children and left for Spain again. After spending a few years in Europe he developed a new version of him with a wild and an exciting character.
On a vacation in Mexico he was offered the chance to try one of the magical mushrooms that had recently being discussed in an article in Life magazine. He told to his friend, the novelist Arthur Koestler, that he had learned more in those 6 hours of interaction with the mushrooms than in the previous 16 years of his life. Leary now felt that he had found a way to bring the insight he experienced to his close patients as well as to his circle of friends. He went to Harvard in 1959 not to join the academic club, but to challenge it. In that sense, he seemed the perfect man to conduct psychedelic drug experiments at Harvard's Center for Personality Research. As a clinical psychologist he conducted his experiments under the Harvard Psilocybin Project in 1960-62, resulting in the Concord Prison experiment and the Marsh Chapel experiment.
When the Swiss pharmaceutical company Sandoz made lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) available in the late 1940s, researchers were encouraged to try it themselves to better understand madness. Later Leary began his research with a milder Sandoz product, synthetic psilocybin, and started to distribute it to fellow faculty members, divinity students and even prisoners, and everyone he could find who might be interested in trying it, including students in the undergraduate program, all with their consent. Although still technically legal in the late 1950s and early 1960s, giving LSD to students of any kind was considered extremely unethical. Things got out of hand. By 1963, Harvard was a hotbed of indiscriminate acid use. Larry and his colleague, Richard Alpert, a so called spiritualist, were fired from Harvard in the same year. They both used LSD to develop a philosophy of mind expansion and personal growing using the chemical reaction of the drug to block some areas of the brain and induced themselves in a strong persuasion in their minds that they found the path for spiritual enlightenment when they really got the enhancement of the pleasures of the flesh.
The chemical involved in the LSD was simply unpredictable. it produced hallucinations and paranoia, yet also proved to be helpful in controlled therapy, relaxing patients and sweeping away neuroses and even cure chronic alcoholism. Business executives and various luminaries began boasting of taking the LSD cure.
By this time, the cultural revolutions of the time were in full swing and Leary was becoming one of the principle intellectual gurus of the hippie movement. He was an audacious risk-taker. Briefly he ran for Governor of California against Ronald Reagan. John Lennon wrote the song, "Come Together" to be Leary's political theme song that says: "I know you. You know me. One thing I can tell you is you got to be free." Leary's campaign was abandoned when he was convicted of possession of marijuana and sent to prison. During the 1960s and the 1970s, Leary was arrested often enough to see the inside of 36 prisons worldwide. He later escaped using his political connections.
Until then, Leary had been seen standing up in front of thousands at anti-war protesters, telling them :
"Turn yourself on, take LSD, tune yourself in, get the message, and drop out, leave your normal life behind." This was, after all, exactly what he had done. He became a crusader in the aim to turn the world on to LSD, a chemical compound derived from a fungus that grows on rye.
In 1966, as the Federal Government moved to ban LSD, Leary testified in the Senate that LSD was dangerous if used improperly -just like alcohol. When they outlawed it, Leary lashed back and wrote in his book "High Priest" in 1967, "They are right. It is as it should be."
Wednesday, October 31, 2018
Sunday, October 28, 2018
THE LIFE OF ALDOUS HUXLEY.
From this influential Huxley British family, several members have excelled in science, medicine, arts, and literature. The family also includes members who occupied senior positions in the public service of the United Kingdom.
Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-1895) was a biologist known as "Darwin's Bulldog" for his defense of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. Mostly a self-educated man, he had an extraordinary influence on the British educated public. He was instrumental in developing scientific education and opposed those Christian leaders who tried to stifle scientific debate. A noted unbeliever, he used the term "agnostic" to describe his attitude to theism.
Aldous Huxley (July26, 1894-November22, 1963) was a prominent member of the Huxley family and the grandson of Thomas Henry Huxley. He was the son of a schoolmaster and writer, Leonard Huxley and his mother was Julia Arnold, niece of poet and critic Matthew Arnold and sister of Mrs Humphry Ward, a known writer. He was instructed by his own mother until she became terminally ill. His mother died when he was 14, in 1908. In 1911 Aldous contracted the eye disease (keratitis punctata) which left him practically blind for 3 years. In January 1916, he volunteered for the British Army in the World War I, however was rejected on health grounds, being half-blind in one eye. During the War he spent much of his time at Garsington Manor near Oxford, home of Lady Ottoline Morrell, a society hostess, working as a farm laborer. There he met several Bloomsbury figures, including Bertrand Russel Alfred North Whitehead, and Clive Bell. He caricatured the Garsington lifestyle. At the time when jobs were very scarce, John Middleton Murry was reorganizing the literary magazine, The Athenaeum, and invited Huxley to join the staff. He accepted quickly and quickly married the Belgium refugee Maria Nys, also at Garsington.
Huxley used this time of his life to write as much as he could and became the author of nearly 50 books, He became best known for his novel Brave New World that shows the influence of drugs. The citizens of the future are nearly all hoped up on Soma, a powerful hallucinogen that allows "a holiday" from reality, imparts a tremendous feeling of well-being, softens up the mind and poisons the body. In the climactic scene in the book, when the character John the Savage rebels against the Fordist Society, his anger is concentrated on Soma, which has come to symbolize all that is rotten in this future-state.
Back in the 1930s, Huxley even described mescaline as a worse poison than Soma, rendering the poor character Linda as vomitous and even dumber than usual. And for nonfiction works The Doors of Perception recalls his experiences taking drugs whose primary action was to trigger experiences that altered the state of consciousness. He thought that he was expanding the fences of awareness momentarily like the opening aperture of a camera lens.
On Christmas Eve 1955, he took his first dose of LSD, an experience he was to repeat often and he claimed allowed him to plumb even greater depths than mescaline. Huxley's experimentation continued right through his death bed, when he asked his wife to inject him with multiple doses of uncut LSD. He died later that day, just hours after Kennedy's assassination. Three years later, LSD was officially banned in California.
In the late stage of his life before he died, Huxley became interested in paranormal and psychic phenomena, including telepathy, precognition, clairvoyance, psychokinesis, near-death experiences, reincarnation, and apparitional experiences. Also he became an universalist, a concept that emphasizes the universal principles of most religions and centered around the belief in an universal reconciliation between humanity and the divine.
Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-1895) was a biologist known as "Darwin's Bulldog" for his defense of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. Mostly a self-educated man, he had an extraordinary influence on the British educated public. He was instrumental in developing scientific education and opposed those Christian leaders who tried to stifle scientific debate. A noted unbeliever, he used the term "agnostic" to describe his attitude to theism.
Aldous Huxley (July26, 1894-November22, 1963) was a prominent member of the Huxley family and the grandson of Thomas Henry Huxley. He was the son of a schoolmaster and writer, Leonard Huxley and his mother was Julia Arnold, niece of poet and critic Matthew Arnold and sister of Mrs Humphry Ward, a known writer. He was instructed by his own mother until she became terminally ill. His mother died when he was 14, in 1908. In 1911 Aldous contracted the eye disease (keratitis punctata) which left him practically blind for 3 years. In January 1916, he volunteered for the British Army in the World War I, however was rejected on health grounds, being half-blind in one eye. During the War he spent much of his time at Garsington Manor near Oxford, home of Lady Ottoline Morrell, a society hostess, working as a farm laborer. There he met several Bloomsbury figures, including Bertrand Russel Alfred North Whitehead, and Clive Bell. He caricatured the Garsington lifestyle. At the time when jobs were very scarce, John Middleton Murry was reorganizing the literary magazine, The Athenaeum, and invited Huxley to join the staff. He accepted quickly and quickly married the Belgium refugee Maria Nys, also at Garsington.
Huxley used this time of his life to write as much as he could and became the author of nearly 50 books, He became best known for his novel Brave New World that shows the influence of drugs. The citizens of the future are nearly all hoped up on Soma, a powerful hallucinogen that allows "a holiday" from reality, imparts a tremendous feeling of well-being, softens up the mind and poisons the body. In the climactic scene in the book, when the character John the Savage rebels against the Fordist Society, his anger is concentrated on Soma, which has come to symbolize all that is rotten in this future-state.
Back in the 1930s, Huxley even described mescaline as a worse poison than Soma, rendering the poor character Linda as vomitous and even dumber than usual. And for nonfiction works The Doors of Perception recalls his experiences taking drugs whose primary action was to trigger experiences that altered the state of consciousness. He thought that he was expanding the fences of awareness momentarily like the opening aperture of a camera lens.
On Christmas Eve 1955, he took his first dose of LSD, an experience he was to repeat often and he claimed allowed him to plumb even greater depths than mescaline. Huxley's experimentation continued right through his death bed, when he asked his wife to inject him with multiple doses of uncut LSD. He died later that day, just hours after Kennedy's assassination. Three years later, LSD was officially banned in California.
In the late stage of his life before he died, Huxley became interested in paranormal and psychic phenomena, including telepathy, precognition, clairvoyance, psychokinesis, near-death experiences, reincarnation, and apparitional experiences. Also he became an universalist, a concept that emphasizes the universal principles of most religions and centered around the belief in an universal reconciliation between humanity and the divine.
Sunday, July 1, 2018
PEISIS'TRATUS, THE TYRANT.
Peisis'Tratus, also spelled Pisis'Tratus, (born 6th BC-died 527BC), a cruel and oppressive ruler who seized power unconstitutionally over ancient Athens, the birthplace of Western civilization. Athens lies 8km/5mi from the Bay of Phaleron, an inlet of the Aegean Sea where the port of Athens is situated, in a mountain-girt arid basin divided North-South by a line of hills. The Kifi'Sos River, only a trickle in summer, flows through the Western half; the Ili'Sos River, often dry, traverses the Eastern half. Mountains that surround the area add the impression of barrenness. Yet, when compared with the fecundity of Athen's bequests to the world, such as its philosophy, its architecture, its literature, and its political ideals, that impression becomes superficial.
In 594BC Peisis'Tratus' mother's relative, the reformer Solon, had improved the economic position of the Athenian lower classes, but it did not eliminate bitter aristocratic contentions for control the chief executive post (archonship). Lycurgus, the lawgiver who founded most of the institutions of ancient Sparta, controlled the Plain, one of the two major political factions, and Megacles, grandson of the Megacles who directed the slaughter of Cylon and his supporters on the Acropolis (612BC), was the leader of the other faction who controlled the Coast. Peisis'Tratus organized his own faction, named the Hills'Men, a group that included noble families from his own district, the Eastern part of Attica, and also a very considerable part of the growing population of the city of Athens.
During a war with the city of Megara (565BC), Peisis'Tratus gained military fame by taking the harbor. At one point he slashed himself and the mules of his chariot and made a dramatic entrance into the agora (marketplace) to show how 'his enemies' had wounded him. The people voted in favor of him and let him use a bodyguard of citizens armed with clubs, which aided him to seize the Acropolis and held power briefly (560-559BC). Megara, an ancient settlement on the Sar'On'Ikos Gulf within Attica, that sat on the Southern slopes of two hills that served as citadels (acropolises), had commercial colonies that were established on Sicily. Megara colonized Northward and Eastward on the Bosporus River and Sea of Marmara at Chaledon and Byzantium.
To increase the popular support of his power he contracted a short-lived marriage with the daughter of Megacles, the political leader who controlled the Coast, and again acquired temporal power in Athens (556-555BC). Lycurgus and Megacles united their powers to force him out. Peisis'Tratus became an exile in Northern Greece for several years, exploiting the silver and gold mines on Mt. Pang'Aeum and gaining the support of the conservatives in Thebes, Argos, Naxos, and elsewhere. He laid a solid base for his return.
In 546BC Peisis'Tratus went to Eretria on the Island of Euboea, the largest island in Greece, after Crete, in the Aegean Sea, with a force founded by his own funds and by his friends in high circles, and from this base invaded Attica. At Pallene, near Mt. Hymettus, he launched a surprise attack on the Athenian army in the heat of midday, while his enemies were gambling or sleeping. After a complete victory, he became master of Athens for the 3rd time and remained in power until his death in 527BC.
In 594BC Peisis'Tratus' mother's relative, the reformer Solon, had improved the economic position of the Athenian lower classes, but it did not eliminate bitter aristocratic contentions for control the chief executive post (archonship). Lycurgus, the lawgiver who founded most of the institutions of ancient Sparta, controlled the Plain, one of the two major political factions, and Megacles, grandson of the Megacles who directed the slaughter of Cylon and his supporters on the Acropolis (612BC), was the leader of the other faction who controlled the Coast. Peisis'Tratus organized his own faction, named the Hills'Men, a group that included noble families from his own district, the Eastern part of Attica, and also a very considerable part of the growing population of the city of Athens.
During a war with the city of Megara (565BC), Peisis'Tratus gained military fame by taking the harbor. At one point he slashed himself and the mules of his chariot and made a dramatic entrance into the agora (marketplace) to show how 'his enemies' had wounded him. The people voted in favor of him and let him use a bodyguard of citizens armed with clubs, which aided him to seize the Acropolis and held power briefly (560-559BC). Megara, an ancient settlement on the Sar'On'Ikos Gulf within Attica, that sat on the Southern slopes of two hills that served as citadels (acropolises), had commercial colonies that were established on Sicily. Megara colonized Northward and Eastward on the Bosporus River and Sea of Marmara at Chaledon and Byzantium.
To increase the popular support of his power he contracted a short-lived marriage with the daughter of Megacles, the political leader who controlled the Coast, and again acquired temporal power in Athens (556-555BC). Lycurgus and Megacles united their powers to force him out. Peisis'Tratus became an exile in Northern Greece for several years, exploiting the silver and gold mines on Mt. Pang'Aeum and gaining the support of the conservatives in Thebes, Argos, Naxos, and elsewhere. He laid a solid base for his return.
In 546BC Peisis'Tratus went to Eretria on the Island of Euboea, the largest island in Greece, after Crete, in the Aegean Sea, with a force founded by his own funds and by his friends in high circles, and from this base invaded Attica. At Pallene, near Mt. Hymettus, he launched a surprise attack on the Athenian army in the heat of midday, while his enemies were gambling or sleeping. After a complete victory, he became master of Athens for the 3rd time and remained in power until his death in 527BC.
Saturday, June 30, 2018
GERARD DE NERVAL.
Gerard La'Brunie was born in Paris on May 22, 1808. His father, Etienne La'Bruine, was a young doctor who had volunteered to serve as a medic in the army under Napoleon, his mother, Marie Marguerite Antoinette Laurent, was the daughter of a clothing salesman.
In June 1808, soon after Gerard was born, Etienne was drafted. While they traveled East, the parents left their newborn son in the care of the mother's uncle Antoine Boucher. On November 29, 1810 the mother died before she could come back to France. Gerard was 2 years old. The father was reunited with his son in 1814, in Paris. The boy lived with his father but often stayed with the mother's uncle in Morte'Fontaine and with Gerard Dublanc, his father's uncle, and Gerard's godfather, in Saint Germain-en-Laye, West of Paris.
In 1822, at the age of 14, Gerard enrolled at the Lycee Charlemagne. Here he met and befriended Pierre Jules Theophile Gautier, a French poet, dramatist, novelist, journalist and art and literary critic.
This was also where he began to take poetry more seriously. He was specially drawn to epic poetry.
At the age of 16, he wrote a poem that recounted the circumstances of Napoleon's defeat. Later, he tried out satire, writing poems that took aim at Prime Minister Villele, leader of the Ultra-royalist faction during the Bourbon Restoration; the Jesuit Order; and anti-liberal newspapers. His writings started to be published in 1826.
At the age of 19, with minimal knowledge of the German language, he began the ambitious task of translating Goethe's Faust, a tragic play in two parts. Part One takes place in multiple settings, the first of which is heaven. A demon makes a bet with God by saying that he can lure God's favorite human being, who is striving to learn everything that can be known, away from righteous pursuits. In Faust's study room, he turns to magic for the showering of infinite knowledge, despairing at the vanity of scientific, humanitarian and religious learning. He feels that his attempts are failing. Frustrated, he ponders suicide, but rejects the idea as he hears the echo of nearby Easter celebration. He goes for a walk with his assistant and is followed by a dog similar to a sheep dog. In his studio, the dog transforms into the demon. Faust makes an arrangement with the demon in which it will do everything that he wants while he is here on Earth and in exchange he will serve the devil in hell. Faust's arrangement is that if he is pleased enough with anything the demon gives him that he wants to stay in that moment forever, then he will die in that moment. When the demon tells Faust to sign the pact with blood, Faust complains that the demon does not trust Faust's word of horror. In the end, the demons wins the argument and Faust signs the contract with a drop of his own blood. Then he meets a woman that was attracted to him, and the demon draws her into Faust's arms. With the demon's aid he seduces her and her mother dies from a sleeping potion, administered by her daughter to obtain privacy so that he can visit her. She becomes pregnant. Her brother condemns Faust, challenges him and fall dead at the hands of Faust and the demon. The woman drowns her illegitimate child and is convicted of murder. Faust tries to save her from death by attempting to free her from prison. Finding that she refuses to do so, he and the demon flee the dungeon. Faust remains unsatisfied.
In part two Faust wakes in a field of fairies and initiate a new cycle of adventures and purpose. The first part represents the small world and the second part represents the wider world or macrocosm. Faust goes to heaven, for he loses only half of the bet. Angels declare at the end: "He who strives on and lives to strive can still earn redemption."
Gerard's prose translation appeared in 1828, doing a great deal to establish his poetic reputation. It is the reason why Victor Hugo, the leader of the Romantic movement in France, felt compelled to have him as a guest in his apartment. Victor Hugo asked him to support his play Hernani, under attack from conservative critics, he was more than happy to join the fight.
The French Revolution of 1830, however, was an event that didn't caught his attention. Instead, he set himself into two projects: German and French poetry. Alexandre Dumas and Pierre-Sebastien Laurentie arranged a library card for him so he could carry out his research.
Gerard, following Hugo's lead, started to write plays and used the pseudonym Gerard de Nerval, inspired by the name of a property that belonged to his family.
In January 1834, Nerval's maternal grandfather died and he inherited around 30,000 francs. In May of that year, he created Le Monde Dramatique, a luxurious literary journal that made him squander his inheritance. Debt-ridden, he finally sold it in 1836.
In 1837, Gerard worked inthe project 'Piquillo,' but Dumas was the only name on the libretto. Nerval may have fallen in love with the actress. His unrequited love for her is what inspired many of the female figures that appeared in his writing. In the summer of 1838, he traveled with Dumas to Germany to work on another project 'Leo Burckart' which was eventually premiered on April 16, 1839, six days after the premiere of another play the pair worked on together 'L'Alchimiste.
In November 1839, Nerval travelled to Vienna, where he met the pianist Marie Pleyel. Back in France in March 1840, Nerval took over Gautier's column at La Presse. After publishing a 3rd edition of Faust in July, he travelled to Belgium in October. On December 15, 'Piquillo' premiered in Brussels, where Nerval crossed paths with the actress and the pianist once again.
After his 1st nervous breakdown on February 23, 1841 he was cared for at the Sainte-Colombe Borstal (maison de correction). After a 2nd nervous breakdown, Nerval was housed in Docteur Esprit Blanche, a clinic in Mont'Martre, where he remained for 8 months.
On December 22, 1842 he set off for the Near East, traveling to Alexandria, Cairo, Beirut, Malta, Naples and Constantinopla. Back in Paris in 1843, Nerval started to publish articles about his trip.
Between 1844 and 1847, he traveled to Belgium, the Netherlands, to London, producing a significant amount of travel writing. At the same time, he wrote novellas and opera librettos and translated poems by his friend Heinrich Heine, publishing a selection of translations in 1848.
Gerard's last years were spent in dire financial and emotional straits. Following his doctor's advice, he tried to purge himself of his intense emotions in his writings. This is when he composed some of his best works.
Nerval was said to have taken his pet lobster for a walk in the gardens of the Palais-Royal in Paris one day, using a blue ribbon for a leash. He said, 'Why should a lobster be any more ridiculous than a dog? or cat, or a gazelle, or a lion, or any other animal that one chooses to take for a walk? I have a liking for lobsters. They are peaceful, serious creatures. They know the secrets of the sea, they do not bark, and they do not gnaw upon one's privacy like dogs do. And Goethe had an aversion to dogs, and he was not mad.
On January 26, 1855, during the night time, he committed suicide at the age of 46, by hanging himself from the bar of a cellar window in the Rue de la Vieille-Lanterne, a narrow line in a squalid section of Paris. He left a brief note to his aunt: "Do not wait up for me this evening, for the night will be black and white."
Gerard died in the darkest street that he could find.
In June 1808, soon after Gerard was born, Etienne was drafted. While they traveled East, the parents left their newborn son in the care of the mother's uncle Antoine Boucher. On November 29, 1810 the mother died before she could come back to France. Gerard was 2 years old. The father was reunited with his son in 1814, in Paris. The boy lived with his father but often stayed with the mother's uncle in Morte'Fontaine and with Gerard Dublanc, his father's uncle, and Gerard's godfather, in Saint Germain-en-Laye, West of Paris.
In 1822, at the age of 14, Gerard enrolled at the Lycee Charlemagne. Here he met and befriended Pierre Jules Theophile Gautier, a French poet, dramatist, novelist, journalist and art and literary critic.
This was also where he began to take poetry more seriously. He was specially drawn to epic poetry.
At the age of 16, he wrote a poem that recounted the circumstances of Napoleon's defeat. Later, he tried out satire, writing poems that took aim at Prime Minister Villele, leader of the Ultra-royalist faction during the Bourbon Restoration; the Jesuit Order; and anti-liberal newspapers. His writings started to be published in 1826.
At the age of 19, with minimal knowledge of the German language, he began the ambitious task of translating Goethe's Faust, a tragic play in two parts. Part One takes place in multiple settings, the first of which is heaven. A demon makes a bet with God by saying that he can lure God's favorite human being, who is striving to learn everything that can be known, away from righteous pursuits. In Faust's study room, he turns to magic for the showering of infinite knowledge, despairing at the vanity of scientific, humanitarian and religious learning. He feels that his attempts are failing. Frustrated, he ponders suicide, but rejects the idea as he hears the echo of nearby Easter celebration. He goes for a walk with his assistant and is followed by a dog similar to a sheep dog. In his studio, the dog transforms into the demon. Faust makes an arrangement with the demon in which it will do everything that he wants while he is here on Earth and in exchange he will serve the devil in hell. Faust's arrangement is that if he is pleased enough with anything the demon gives him that he wants to stay in that moment forever, then he will die in that moment. When the demon tells Faust to sign the pact with blood, Faust complains that the demon does not trust Faust's word of horror. In the end, the demons wins the argument and Faust signs the contract with a drop of his own blood. Then he meets a woman that was attracted to him, and the demon draws her into Faust's arms. With the demon's aid he seduces her and her mother dies from a sleeping potion, administered by her daughter to obtain privacy so that he can visit her. She becomes pregnant. Her brother condemns Faust, challenges him and fall dead at the hands of Faust and the demon. The woman drowns her illegitimate child and is convicted of murder. Faust tries to save her from death by attempting to free her from prison. Finding that she refuses to do so, he and the demon flee the dungeon. Faust remains unsatisfied.
In part two Faust wakes in a field of fairies and initiate a new cycle of adventures and purpose. The first part represents the small world and the second part represents the wider world or macrocosm. Faust goes to heaven, for he loses only half of the bet. Angels declare at the end: "He who strives on and lives to strive can still earn redemption."
Gerard's prose translation appeared in 1828, doing a great deal to establish his poetic reputation. It is the reason why Victor Hugo, the leader of the Romantic movement in France, felt compelled to have him as a guest in his apartment. Victor Hugo asked him to support his play Hernani, under attack from conservative critics, he was more than happy to join the fight.
The French Revolution of 1830, however, was an event that didn't caught his attention. Instead, he set himself into two projects: German and French poetry. Alexandre Dumas and Pierre-Sebastien Laurentie arranged a library card for him so he could carry out his research.
Gerard, following Hugo's lead, started to write plays and used the pseudonym Gerard de Nerval, inspired by the name of a property that belonged to his family.
In January 1834, Nerval's maternal grandfather died and he inherited around 30,000 francs. In May of that year, he created Le Monde Dramatique, a luxurious literary journal that made him squander his inheritance. Debt-ridden, he finally sold it in 1836.
In 1837, Gerard worked inthe project 'Piquillo,' but Dumas was the only name on the libretto. Nerval may have fallen in love with the actress. His unrequited love for her is what inspired many of the female figures that appeared in his writing. In the summer of 1838, he traveled with Dumas to Germany to work on another project 'Leo Burckart' which was eventually premiered on April 16, 1839, six days after the premiere of another play the pair worked on together 'L'Alchimiste.
In November 1839, Nerval travelled to Vienna, where he met the pianist Marie Pleyel. Back in France in March 1840, Nerval took over Gautier's column at La Presse. After publishing a 3rd edition of Faust in July, he travelled to Belgium in October. On December 15, 'Piquillo' premiered in Brussels, where Nerval crossed paths with the actress and the pianist once again.
After his 1st nervous breakdown on February 23, 1841 he was cared for at the Sainte-Colombe Borstal (maison de correction). After a 2nd nervous breakdown, Nerval was housed in Docteur Esprit Blanche, a clinic in Mont'Martre, where he remained for 8 months.
On December 22, 1842 he set off for the Near East, traveling to Alexandria, Cairo, Beirut, Malta, Naples and Constantinopla. Back in Paris in 1843, Nerval started to publish articles about his trip.
Between 1844 and 1847, he traveled to Belgium, the Netherlands, to London, producing a significant amount of travel writing. At the same time, he wrote novellas and opera librettos and translated poems by his friend Heinrich Heine, publishing a selection of translations in 1848.
Gerard's last years were spent in dire financial and emotional straits. Following his doctor's advice, he tried to purge himself of his intense emotions in his writings. This is when he composed some of his best works.
Nerval was said to have taken his pet lobster for a walk in the gardens of the Palais-Royal in Paris one day, using a blue ribbon for a leash. He said, 'Why should a lobster be any more ridiculous than a dog? or cat, or a gazelle, or a lion, or any other animal that one chooses to take for a walk? I have a liking for lobsters. They are peaceful, serious creatures. They know the secrets of the sea, they do not bark, and they do not gnaw upon one's privacy like dogs do. And Goethe had an aversion to dogs, and he was not mad.
On January 26, 1855, during the night time, he committed suicide at the age of 46, by hanging himself from the bar of a cellar window in the Rue de la Vieille-Lanterne, a narrow line in a squalid section of Paris. He left a brief note to his aunt: "Do not wait up for me this evening, for the night will be black and white."
Gerard died in the darkest street that he could find.
Sunday, January 29, 2017
PHI BETA KAPPA SOCIETY.
The Phi Beta Kappa Society, widely considered to be the nation 's most prestigious honor society, is the oldest rank organization that recognize excellence among peers for the liberal arts and science in the United States.
The Phi Beta Kappa Society was founded at the College of William and Mary, a research institute located in Williams'Burg, Virginia, on December 5, 1776. The College was royally founded in 1693, by King William III and Queen Mary II. The group consisted of students who frequented the Raleigh Tavern. The Tavern was one of the largest in colonial Virginia. It gained some fame in the pre-American Revolutionary War Colony of Virginia as a gathering place for legislators after several Royal Governors officially dissolved the House of Burgesses, the elected legislative body, when their actions did not suit the crown. It was named after Walter Raleigh, an English landed man, writer, soldier, politician, courtier, and spy. He was a Protestant that became a landlord after confiscating lands from the native Irish. He rose rapidly in favor of Queen Elizabeth I and was knighted in 1585. He was instrumental in the English colonization of North America and was granted a royal patent to explore Virginia, which paved the way for future English settlements. A Masonic lodge also met at this tavern).
In the Phi Beta Kappa Initiation of 1779, the new member was informed, "here then you may for a while disengage yourself from scholastic care and communicate without reserve whatever reflections you have made upon various objects; remembering that every thing transacted within this room is transacted in secrecy and in confidentiality. Here, too, you are to indulge in matters of speculation that freedom of enquiry which ever dispels the clouds of falsehood by the radiant sunshine of truth..."
William and Mary, the founders of the College, were the co-regnants over the Kingdoms of Eng'Land, Scot'Land, and Ire'Land, namely the Dutch Prince of Orange King William III (&II) and his spouse (and 1st cousin) Queen Mary II. Their joint reign began in February 1689 after they were offered the Throne by the assembly of the Parliament of England irregularly summoned by William after his victorious invasion of England in November 1688, the Glorious Revolution.
The Glorious Revolution was the overthrown of King James II of England (James VII of Scotland) by a union of English Parliamentarians with the Dutch stadholder William III of Orange. William invaded England with a Dutch fleet and an army led to his ascension of the English Throne, jointly with his protestant wife Mary II of England, James's daughter, in conjunction with the documentation of the Bill of Rights. This action signaled the end of several centuries of tension and conflict between the crown and the parliament, and the end of the idea that England would be restored to Roman Catholicism.
The Dutch Reformed Church was the largest denomination in the Netherlands. It spread to the United States, South Africa, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Brazil, and various other World regions through the Dutch colonization. With Dutch naval power rising rapidly as a major force from the late 16th century, they dominated global commerce during the 2nd half of the 17th century known as the Dutch Golden Age.
There had been earlier Fraternal Societies in the College, including the well-known "Flat Hat Club, in allusion to the mortarboard caps they wore, founded in November 11, 1750, and twice revived there in the 20th century. The initials of F.H.C. Society stand for a secret phrase, "Fraternitas, Humanitas, et Cognitio" (Brotherhood, Humanity, and Knowledge). The brotherhood devised and employed a secret handshake, wore a silver membership medal, issued certificates of membership, and met regularly for discussion and fellowship. William & Mary alumnus and 3rd American president Thomas Jefferson may be the most famous member of the F.H.C. Society. Other notable members of the original Society included George Tucker, professor of Law and Judge of the General Court of Virginia, and George Wythe, also professor of Law and a prominent opponent of slavery, and the 1st of the 7 Virginia signatories of the United States Declaration of Independence.
The Phi Beta Kappa Society was founded at the College of William and Mary, a research institute located in Williams'Burg, Virginia, on December 5, 1776. The College was royally founded in 1693, by King William III and Queen Mary II. The group consisted of students who frequented the Raleigh Tavern. The Tavern was one of the largest in colonial Virginia. It gained some fame in the pre-American Revolutionary War Colony of Virginia as a gathering place for legislators after several Royal Governors officially dissolved the House of Burgesses, the elected legislative body, when their actions did not suit the crown. It was named after Walter Raleigh, an English landed man, writer, soldier, politician, courtier, and spy. He was a Protestant that became a landlord after confiscating lands from the native Irish. He rose rapidly in favor of Queen Elizabeth I and was knighted in 1585. He was instrumental in the English colonization of North America and was granted a royal patent to explore Virginia, which paved the way for future English settlements. A Masonic lodge also met at this tavern).
In the Phi Beta Kappa Initiation of 1779, the new member was informed, "here then you may for a while disengage yourself from scholastic care and communicate without reserve whatever reflections you have made upon various objects; remembering that every thing transacted within this room is transacted in secrecy and in confidentiality. Here, too, you are to indulge in matters of speculation that freedom of enquiry which ever dispels the clouds of falsehood by the radiant sunshine of truth..."
William and Mary, the founders of the College, were the co-regnants over the Kingdoms of Eng'Land, Scot'Land, and Ire'Land, namely the Dutch Prince of Orange King William III (&II) and his spouse (and 1st cousin) Queen Mary II. Their joint reign began in February 1689 after they were offered the Throne by the assembly of the Parliament of England irregularly summoned by William after his victorious invasion of England in November 1688, the Glorious Revolution.
The Glorious Revolution was the overthrown of King James II of England (James VII of Scotland) by a union of English Parliamentarians with the Dutch stadholder William III of Orange. William invaded England with a Dutch fleet and an army led to his ascension of the English Throne, jointly with his protestant wife Mary II of England, James's daughter, in conjunction with the documentation of the Bill of Rights. This action signaled the end of several centuries of tension and conflict between the crown and the parliament, and the end of the idea that England would be restored to Roman Catholicism.
The Dutch Reformed Church was the largest denomination in the Netherlands. It spread to the United States, South Africa, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Brazil, and various other World regions through the Dutch colonization. With Dutch naval power rising rapidly as a major force from the late 16th century, they dominated global commerce during the 2nd half of the 17th century known as the Dutch Golden Age.
There had been earlier Fraternal Societies in the College, including the well-known "Flat Hat Club, in allusion to the mortarboard caps they wore, founded in November 11, 1750, and twice revived there in the 20th century. The initials of F.H.C. Society stand for a secret phrase, "Fraternitas, Humanitas, et Cognitio" (Brotherhood, Humanity, and Knowledge). The brotherhood devised and employed a secret handshake, wore a silver membership medal, issued certificates of membership, and met regularly for discussion and fellowship. William & Mary alumnus and 3rd American president Thomas Jefferson may be the most famous member of the F.H.C. Society. Other notable members of the original Society included George Tucker, professor of Law and Judge of the General Court of Virginia, and George Wythe, also professor of Law and a prominent opponent of slavery, and the 1st of the 7 Virginia signatories of the United States Declaration of Independence.
Sunday, January 22, 2017
IMMANUEL KANT.
Immanuel Kant is best known for his work in the philosophy of ethics and metaphysics, but he made significant contribution to other disciplines. He made an important astronomical discovery about the nature of Earth's rotation.
According to Lord Kelvin, physicist, 1897: "Kant pointed out what had not previously been discovered by mathematicians or physical astronomers, that the frictional resistance against tidal currents on the earth's surface cause a diminution of the earth's rotational speed. The discovery attracted little attention until about 1840, when the doctrine of energy began to be taken to heart."
According to Thomas Huxley, biologist, 1869: "The sort of geological speculation to which I am now referring (geological aetiology, in short) was created as a science by Immanuel Kant, when, in 1775, he wrote his "General Natural History and Theory of the Celestial Bodies; or , "an Attempt to Account for the Constitutional and Mechanical Origin of the Universe, upon Newtonian Principles."
Kant laid out in "General History of Nature and Theory of the Heavens, 1755, the Nebular hypothesis, in which he deduced that the Solar System formed from a large cloud of gas, a nebula. Thus he tried to explain the order of it, which Isaac Newton had explained as imposed from the beginning by God. Kant also correctly deduced that the Milky Way was a large disk of stars, which he theorized also formed from a much larger spinning cloud of gas. He further suggested that other nebulae might also be similarly large and distant disks of stars. These postulations opened new horizons for astronomy, for the 1st time extending astronomy beyond the solar system to galactic and extragalactic realms.
From then on, Kant turned increasingly to philosophical issues, although he continued to write on science throughout his life. The issue that vexed Kant was central to what 20th-century scholars called "the philosophy of mind." The flowering of the natural science had led to an understanding of how data reaches the brain. Sunlight falling on an object is reflected from its surface in a way that maps the surface features (color, texture, etc.). The reflected light reaches the human eye, passes through the cornea, is focused by the lens onto the retina where it forms an image similar to that formed by light passing through a pinhole into a obscure tent. The retinal cells send impulses through the optic nerve and then they form a mapping in the brain of the visual features of the object. The interior mapping is not the exterior object, and our belief that there is a meaningful relationship between the object and the mapping in the brain depends on a chain of reasoning that is not fully grounded. But the uncertainty aroused by these considerations, by optical illusions, misperceptions, delusions, etc., are not the end of the problems. Kant saw that the mind could not function as an empty container that simply receives data from outside. Something must be giving order to the incoming data. Images of external objects must be kept in the same sequence in which they were received. This ordering occurs through the mind's intuition of time.The same considerations apply to the mind's function of constituting space for ordering mappings of visual and tactile signals arriving via the already described chains of physical causation.
Immanuel Kant was born in 1724 in Konigs'Berg, East Prussia. His mother, Anna regina Reuter (1697-1737), was also born in Konigs"Berg. His father, Johann Georg Kant (1682-1746), was a German harness maker from Memel, at that time Prussia's most North Eastern city (now Lithuania).
The Kants got their name from the Village of Kant'Waggen and were of Curonian origin. Curonians were known as fierce warriors, excellent sailors and pirates. They were involved in several wars and alliances with Swedish, Danish, and Iceland Vikings. During that period they were the most restless and richest of all the Balts. Curonians were an especially cultic people, worshiping several gods and their sacred animal, the Horse. In 1075 CE, Adam of Bremen, a German chronicler, described the Curonians in his "Deeds of Bishops of the Hamburg Church"as the World famous pagan diviners:
"... gold is very plentiful there, the horses are of the best. All the houses are full of pagan soothsayers, diviners, and necromancers, who are even arrayed in monastic habit. Oracular responses are sought there from all parts of the world, especially by Spaniards and Greeks."
Immanuel Kant was the 4th of 9 children (4 of them reached adulthood). Baptized "Emanuel," he changed his name to "Immanuel" after learning Hebrew. He was brought up in a Pietist household that stressed devotion and a literal interpretation of the Scripture. Pietism was an influential doctrine within Lutheranism that combined Lutheran emphasis on Scriptural doctrine with the reformed emphasis on individual piety and living a vigorous Christian life. Although it was active within Lutherans, it had a tremendous impact on Protestantism worldwide, particularly in North America and Europe.
Kant showed a great aptitude for self study at an early age and his education was strict, punitive and disciplinarian, and focused on Latin and religious instruction over mathematics and science. Despite his religious upbringing, he was skeptical of religion in later life. He first attended the Collegium Fridericianum in 1732, a prestigius German school, while Johann Gottfried, German philosopher, theologian, poet, and literary critic, taught there from 1763 to 1764. Theodor Gehr (died 1705), an official of Branden'Burg-Prussia, founded a Pietist private school in Sack'Heim (11 August 1698) using the Francke school of Halle (Saale). The school consisted of a Latin school, a German school, and a boarding school often used by foreign students. It also contained a wooden tower utilized as an observatory and a small church in service until 1853. It became a royal school of Frederick I, King in Prussia and was designated the Collegium Fridericianum in honor of Frederick . The Pietist school was the first in Konigs'Berg not to be affiliated with a Parish Church. Over 50 Baltic German students went to the school before attending university in the 18th century. Alumni were known as "Friderizianer."
Kant graduated from the Collegium at the end of the summer of 1740, aged 16, and then he enrolled at the University of Konigs'Berg, founded in 1544 as second Protestant academy (after the University of Mar'Burg) by Duke Albert of Prussia, and was commonly known as the "Albertina." Kant spent his whole career in this place. He studied the philosophy of Gottfried Leibniz and Christian Wolff under Martin Knutzen (Associate Professor of Logic and Metaphysics from 1734 until his death), a rationalist who was also familiar with developments in British philosophy and science and introduced Kant to the new mathematical physics of Isaac Newton. Knutzen dissuaded Kant from the theory of pre-established harmony, which he regarded as 'the pillow for the lazy mind." He also dissuaded Kant from idealism, the idea that reality is purely mental, which most philosophers in the 18th century regarded in negative light. The theory of "transcendental idealism" that Kant developed in the "Critique of Pure Reason" is not traditional idealism and the Critique's 2nd part even argues against traditional idealism.
Kant became a private tutor in the Towns surrounding Konigs'Berg, but continued his scholarly research. In 1749, he published his 1st philosophical work, "Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces" (written in 1745-47).
It is often held that Kant lived a very strict and disciplined life, leading to an oft-repeated story that neighbors would set their clocks by his daily walks. He never married, but seemed to have a rewarding social life -he was a popular teacher and a modestly successful author even before starting on his major philosophical works. He had a circle of friends he frequently met, among them Joseph Green, an English merchant in Konigs'Berg. A common myth is that Kant never traveled more than 16 kilometers (9.9 mi) from Konigs'Berg his whole life.
It is often claimed that Kant was a late developer, that he only became an important philosopher in his mid-50s after rejecting his earlier views. At age 46, was an established scholar and an increasingly influential philosopher. In correspondence with his ex-student and friend Markus Herz, Kant admitted that, in the inaugural dissertation, he had failed to account for the relation between our sensible and intellectual faculties -he needed to explain how we combine sensory knowledge with the reasoned one, these being related by very different processes. He also credited David Hume with awakening him from "dogmatic slumber." Hume had stated that experience consists only of sequences of feelings, images or sounds. Ideas such as "cause", goodness, or objects were not evident in experience, so why do we believe in the reality of these? Kant felt that reason could remove this skepticism, and he set himself to solving these problems. He did not publish any work in philosophy for the next 11 years. Kant emerged from his silence in 1781, the result was the "Critique of Pure Reason." Although fond of company and conversation with others, Kant isolated himself. He resisted friend's attempts to bring him out of his isolation. In 1778, in response to one of these offers by a former pupil, Kant wrote:
"Any change makes me apprehensive, even if it offers the greatest promise of improving my condition, and I am persuaded by this natural instinct of mine that I must take heed if I wish that the threads which the Fates spin so thin and weak in my case to be spun to any length. My great thanks, to my well-wishers and friends, who think so kindly of me as to undertake my welfare, but at the same time a most humble request to protect me in my current condition from any disturbance."
Kant published a second edition of the "Critique of Pure Reason" in 1787, heavily revising the first parts of the book. Kant's health, long poor, worsened, he died at Konigs"Berg on 12 February 1804, uttering "It is good" before expiring.
Kant wrote a book discussing his "Theory of Virtue" in terms of independence which he believed was "a viable modern alternative to more familiar Greek views about virtue." The book is often criticized for its hostile tone and for not articulating his thoughts about autocracy comprehensibly.
In the self-governance model of Aristotelian virtue, the non-rational part of the soul can be made to listen to reason through training. Although Kantian self-governance appears to involve "a rational crackdown on appetites and emotions" with lack of harmony between reason and emotion, Kantian virtue denies "self-conquest, self-suppression, or self-silencing." They dispute that "the self-mastery constitutive of virtue is ultimately mastery over our tendency of will to give priority to appetite or emotion unregulated by duty, it does not require extirpating, suppressing, or silencing sensibility in general.
While it is true that Kant wrote his greatest works relatively late in life, there is a tendency to underestimate the value of his earlier works. Recent Kant scholarship has devoted more attention to these pre-critical writings and has recognized a degree of continuity with his mature work.
According to Lord Kelvin, physicist, 1897: "Kant pointed out what had not previously been discovered by mathematicians or physical astronomers, that the frictional resistance against tidal currents on the earth's surface cause a diminution of the earth's rotational speed. The discovery attracted little attention until about 1840, when the doctrine of energy began to be taken to heart."
According to Thomas Huxley, biologist, 1869: "The sort of geological speculation to which I am now referring (geological aetiology, in short) was created as a science by Immanuel Kant, when, in 1775, he wrote his "General Natural History and Theory of the Celestial Bodies; or , "an Attempt to Account for the Constitutional and Mechanical Origin of the Universe, upon Newtonian Principles."
Kant laid out in "General History of Nature and Theory of the Heavens, 1755, the Nebular hypothesis, in which he deduced that the Solar System formed from a large cloud of gas, a nebula. Thus he tried to explain the order of it, which Isaac Newton had explained as imposed from the beginning by God. Kant also correctly deduced that the Milky Way was a large disk of stars, which he theorized also formed from a much larger spinning cloud of gas. He further suggested that other nebulae might also be similarly large and distant disks of stars. These postulations opened new horizons for astronomy, for the 1st time extending astronomy beyond the solar system to galactic and extragalactic realms.
From then on, Kant turned increasingly to philosophical issues, although he continued to write on science throughout his life. The issue that vexed Kant was central to what 20th-century scholars called "the philosophy of mind." The flowering of the natural science had led to an understanding of how data reaches the brain. Sunlight falling on an object is reflected from its surface in a way that maps the surface features (color, texture, etc.). The reflected light reaches the human eye, passes through the cornea, is focused by the lens onto the retina where it forms an image similar to that formed by light passing through a pinhole into a obscure tent. The retinal cells send impulses through the optic nerve and then they form a mapping in the brain of the visual features of the object. The interior mapping is not the exterior object, and our belief that there is a meaningful relationship between the object and the mapping in the brain depends on a chain of reasoning that is not fully grounded. But the uncertainty aroused by these considerations, by optical illusions, misperceptions, delusions, etc., are not the end of the problems. Kant saw that the mind could not function as an empty container that simply receives data from outside. Something must be giving order to the incoming data. Images of external objects must be kept in the same sequence in which they were received. This ordering occurs through the mind's intuition of time.The same considerations apply to the mind's function of constituting space for ordering mappings of visual and tactile signals arriving via the already described chains of physical causation.
Immanuel Kant was born in 1724 in Konigs'Berg, East Prussia. His mother, Anna regina Reuter (1697-1737), was also born in Konigs"Berg. His father, Johann Georg Kant (1682-1746), was a German harness maker from Memel, at that time Prussia's most North Eastern city (now Lithuania).
The Kants got their name from the Village of Kant'Waggen and were of Curonian origin. Curonians were known as fierce warriors, excellent sailors and pirates. They were involved in several wars and alliances with Swedish, Danish, and Iceland Vikings. During that period they were the most restless and richest of all the Balts. Curonians were an especially cultic people, worshiping several gods and their sacred animal, the Horse. In 1075 CE, Adam of Bremen, a German chronicler, described the Curonians in his "Deeds of Bishops of the Hamburg Church"as the World famous pagan diviners:
"... gold is very plentiful there, the horses are of the best. All the houses are full of pagan soothsayers, diviners, and necromancers, who are even arrayed in monastic habit. Oracular responses are sought there from all parts of the world, especially by Spaniards and Greeks."
Immanuel Kant was the 4th of 9 children (4 of them reached adulthood). Baptized "Emanuel," he changed his name to "Immanuel" after learning Hebrew. He was brought up in a Pietist household that stressed devotion and a literal interpretation of the Scripture. Pietism was an influential doctrine within Lutheranism that combined Lutheran emphasis on Scriptural doctrine with the reformed emphasis on individual piety and living a vigorous Christian life. Although it was active within Lutherans, it had a tremendous impact on Protestantism worldwide, particularly in North America and Europe.
Kant showed a great aptitude for self study at an early age and his education was strict, punitive and disciplinarian, and focused on Latin and religious instruction over mathematics and science. Despite his religious upbringing, he was skeptical of religion in later life. He first attended the Collegium Fridericianum in 1732, a prestigius German school, while Johann Gottfried, German philosopher, theologian, poet, and literary critic, taught there from 1763 to 1764. Theodor Gehr (died 1705), an official of Branden'Burg-Prussia, founded a Pietist private school in Sack'Heim (11 August 1698) using the Francke school of Halle (Saale). The school consisted of a Latin school, a German school, and a boarding school often used by foreign students. It also contained a wooden tower utilized as an observatory and a small church in service until 1853. It became a royal school of Frederick I, King in Prussia and was designated the Collegium Fridericianum in honor of Frederick . The Pietist school was the first in Konigs'Berg not to be affiliated with a Parish Church. Over 50 Baltic German students went to the school before attending university in the 18th century. Alumni were known as "Friderizianer."
Kant graduated from the Collegium at the end of the summer of 1740, aged 16, and then he enrolled at the University of Konigs'Berg, founded in 1544 as second Protestant academy (after the University of Mar'Burg) by Duke Albert of Prussia, and was commonly known as the "Albertina." Kant spent his whole career in this place. He studied the philosophy of Gottfried Leibniz and Christian Wolff under Martin Knutzen (Associate Professor of Logic and Metaphysics from 1734 until his death), a rationalist who was also familiar with developments in British philosophy and science and introduced Kant to the new mathematical physics of Isaac Newton. Knutzen dissuaded Kant from the theory of pre-established harmony, which he regarded as 'the pillow for the lazy mind." He also dissuaded Kant from idealism, the idea that reality is purely mental, which most philosophers in the 18th century regarded in negative light. The theory of "transcendental idealism" that Kant developed in the "Critique of Pure Reason" is not traditional idealism and the Critique's 2nd part even argues against traditional idealism.
Kant became a private tutor in the Towns surrounding Konigs'Berg, but continued his scholarly research. In 1749, he published his 1st philosophical work, "Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces" (written in 1745-47).
It is often held that Kant lived a very strict and disciplined life, leading to an oft-repeated story that neighbors would set their clocks by his daily walks. He never married, but seemed to have a rewarding social life -he was a popular teacher and a modestly successful author even before starting on his major philosophical works. He had a circle of friends he frequently met, among them Joseph Green, an English merchant in Konigs'Berg. A common myth is that Kant never traveled more than 16 kilometers (9.9 mi) from Konigs'Berg his whole life.
It is often claimed that Kant was a late developer, that he only became an important philosopher in his mid-50s after rejecting his earlier views. At age 46, was an established scholar and an increasingly influential philosopher. In correspondence with his ex-student and friend Markus Herz, Kant admitted that, in the inaugural dissertation, he had failed to account for the relation between our sensible and intellectual faculties -he needed to explain how we combine sensory knowledge with the reasoned one, these being related by very different processes. He also credited David Hume with awakening him from "dogmatic slumber." Hume had stated that experience consists only of sequences of feelings, images or sounds. Ideas such as "cause", goodness, or objects were not evident in experience, so why do we believe in the reality of these? Kant felt that reason could remove this skepticism, and he set himself to solving these problems. He did not publish any work in philosophy for the next 11 years. Kant emerged from his silence in 1781, the result was the "Critique of Pure Reason." Although fond of company and conversation with others, Kant isolated himself. He resisted friend's attempts to bring him out of his isolation. In 1778, in response to one of these offers by a former pupil, Kant wrote:
"Any change makes me apprehensive, even if it offers the greatest promise of improving my condition, and I am persuaded by this natural instinct of mine that I must take heed if I wish that the threads which the Fates spin so thin and weak in my case to be spun to any length. My great thanks, to my well-wishers and friends, who think so kindly of me as to undertake my welfare, but at the same time a most humble request to protect me in my current condition from any disturbance."
Kant published a second edition of the "Critique of Pure Reason" in 1787, heavily revising the first parts of the book. Kant's health, long poor, worsened, he died at Konigs"Berg on 12 February 1804, uttering "It is good" before expiring.
Kant wrote a book discussing his "Theory of Virtue" in terms of independence which he believed was "a viable modern alternative to more familiar Greek views about virtue." The book is often criticized for its hostile tone and for not articulating his thoughts about autocracy comprehensibly.
In the self-governance model of Aristotelian virtue, the non-rational part of the soul can be made to listen to reason through training. Although Kantian self-governance appears to involve "a rational crackdown on appetites and emotions" with lack of harmony between reason and emotion, Kantian virtue denies "self-conquest, self-suppression, or self-silencing." They dispute that "the self-mastery constitutive of virtue is ultimately mastery over our tendency of will to give priority to appetite or emotion unregulated by duty, it does not require extirpating, suppressing, or silencing sensibility in general.
While it is true that Kant wrote his greatest works relatively late in life, there is a tendency to underestimate the value of his earlier works. Recent Kant scholarship has devoted more attention to these pre-critical writings and has recognized a degree of continuity with his mature work.
Friday, January 29, 2016
NICHOLAS COPERNICUS
Nicholaus Copernicus was a Polish Astronomer who believed in the existence of a Supreme God. He was a Renaissance mathematician and astronomer who put forward the first mathematical model of the universe that placed the Sun rather than the Earth at the Center of the Universe. The publication of his findings in his book (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres) just before his death in 1543 is considered a major event in the History of Science, triggering the Copernican Revolution and making an important contribution to the Scientific Revolution.
Copernicus was born on 19 February 1473 in the city of Torun (Thorn) and died in 1543, in the Province of Royal Prussia, a Region that had been part of the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland since 1466. His father was a Merchant from Krakow and his mother was the daughter of a wealthy Torun merchant. The father's family name can be traced to a Historic Village in Silesia near Nysa (NeiBe). The Village's name has been spelled Koperniki. In the 14th century, members of the family began moving to various other Silesian cities, to the Polish capital Krakow (1367), and to Torun (1400). The father, Mikotaj the Elder, came from the Krakow line. Nicolaus was named after his father, who appears in records for the first time as a well-to-do merchant who dealt in copper, selling it mostly in Dan-zig (Gdansk).
Nicholaus was the youngest of 4 children. His brother Andreas (Andrew) became an Augustinian Canon at From-Bork (Frau-Enburg). His sister Barbara, named after her mother, became a Benedictine nun and , in her final years, Prioress of a Convent in Chelmno (Kulm); she died after 1517.
His sister Katharina married the businessman and Torun City Councilor Barthel Gertner and left 5 children, whom Copernicus looked after to the end of his life. Copernicus never married or had children.
He was a polyglot and polymath who obtained a doctorate in Canon Law and also practiced as a Physician, Classics Scholar, Translator, Governor, Diplomat, and Economist. Like the rest of his family, he was a third order Dominican.
The Dominican Order came into being in the Middle Ages at a time when Religion began to be contemplated in a new way. Men of God were no longer expected to stay behind the Walls of a cloister. Instead, they travelled among the people, taking as their examples the Apostles of the ancient Church.
He attended various European universities, and became a Canon in the Catholic church in 1497. His new system was actually presented in the Vatican gardens in 1553 before Pope Clement VII who approved, and urged Copernicus to publish it around his time.
Copernicus was never under any threat of religious persecution, instead he was urged to publish both by Catholic Bishop Guise, Cardinal Schonberg, and the Protestant Professor George Rethicus.
Copernicus referred to God in his works, and did not see his system in conflict with the Scriptures.
Copernicus was born on 19 February 1473 in the city of Torun (Thorn) and died in 1543, in the Province of Royal Prussia, a Region that had been part of the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland since 1466. His father was a Merchant from Krakow and his mother was the daughter of a wealthy Torun merchant. The father's family name can be traced to a Historic Village in Silesia near Nysa (NeiBe). The Village's name has been spelled Koperniki. In the 14th century, members of the family began moving to various other Silesian cities, to the Polish capital Krakow (1367), and to Torun (1400). The father, Mikotaj the Elder, came from the Krakow line. Nicolaus was named after his father, who appears in records for the first time as a well-to-do merchant who dealt in copper, selling it mostly in Dan-zig (Gdansk).
Nicholaus was the youngest of 4 children. His brother Andreas (Andrew) became an Augustinian Canon at From-Bork (Frau-Enburg). His sister Barbara, named after her mother, became a Benedictine nun and , in her final years, Prioress of a Convent in Chelmno (Kulm); she died after 1517.
His sister Katharina married the businessman and Torun City Councilor Barthel Gertner and left 5 children, whom Copernicus looked after to the end of his life. Copernicus never married or had children.
He was a polyglot and polymath who obtained a doctorate in Canon Law and also practiced as a Physician, Classics Scholar, Translator, Governor, Diplomat, and Economist. Like the rest of his family, he was a third order Dominican.
The Dominican Order came into being in the Middle Ages at a time when Religion began to be contemplated in a new way. Men of God were no longer expected to stay behind the Walls of a cloister. Instead, they travelled among the people, taking as their examples the Apostles of the ancient Church.
He attended various European universities, and became a Canon in the Catholic church in 1497. His new system was actually presented in the Vatican gardens in 1553 before Pope Clement VII who approved, and urged Copernicus to publish it around his time.
Copernicus was never under any threat of religious persecution, instead he was urged to publish both by Catholic Bishop Guise, Cardinal Schonberg, and the Protestant Professor George Rethicus.
Copernicus referred to God in his works, and did not see his system in conflict with the Scriptures.
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