OVO

1. There are no ultimate sources of knowledge. Every source, every suggestion, is welcome; but every source, every suggestion, is also open to critical examination. As long as we are not dealing with historical matters, we usually examine the asserted facts themselves, rather than investigate the sources of our information.

2. The proper questions of epistemology are not actually concerned with sources at all; rather, we ask whether an assertion is true – that is to say, whether it agrees with the facts. In connection with this critical examination of the truth, all kinds of arguments may be brought to bear. One of the most important procedures is to take a critical attitude towards our own theories and, in particular, to look for contradictions between our theories and observations.

3. Tradition is – apart from inborn knowledge – by far the most important source of our knowledge.

4. The fact that most of the sources of our knowledge are traditional demonstrates that opposition to tradition, that is to say, antitraditionalism, is of no importance. But this fact must not be held to support traditionalism; for every bit, however small, of our traditional knowledge (and even of our inborn knowledge) is open to critical examination and may be overthrown if need be. Nevertheless, without tradition, knowledge would be impossible.

5. Knowledge cannot start from nothing – from the tabula rasa – nor yet from observation. The advance of our knowledge consists in the modification and the correction of earlier knowledge. Of course it is sometimes possible to take a step forward through an observation or through a chance discovery; but the significance of an observation or of a discovery generally depends upon whether it enables us to modify existing theories.

6. Neither observation nor reason is an authority. Other sources, such as intellectual intuition and intellectual imagination, are most important, but they are also unreliable: they may show us things with the utmost clarity and yet mislead us. They are the main sources of our theories and are therefore indispensable; but the vast majority of our theories are false. The most important function of observation and logical thought, but also of intellectual intuition and imagination, is to help us in the critical examination of those bold theories which we need in order to delve into the unknown.

7. Clarity is an intellectual value in itself; exactness and precision, however, are not. Absolute precision is unattainable; and there is no point in trying to be more precise than our problem demands. The idea that we must define our concepts to make them ‘precise’ or even to give them a ‘meaning” is misleading. Every definition must make use of defining concepts; and so we can never ultimately avoid working with undefined concepts. Problems connected with the meaning or the definition of words are unimportant. Indeed, these purely verbal problems are tiresome: they should be avoided at all costs.

8. Every solution of a problem creates new unsolved problems. The harder the original problem and the bolder the attempt to solve it, the more interesting these new problems are. The more we learn about the world, and the deeper our learning, the more conscious, clear and well-defined will be our knowledge of what we do not know, our knowledge of our ignorance. The main source of our ignorance lies in the fact that our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.

We get an idea of the vastness of our ignorance when we contemplate the vastness of the heavens. It is true that the size of the universe is not the deepest cause of our ignorance; but it is nevertheless one of its causes.

I believe that it is worthwhile trying to discover more about the world, even if this only teaches us how little we know. It might do us good to remember Rom time to time that, while differing widely in the various little bits we know, in our infinite ignorance we are all equal. If we thus admit that there is no authority beyond the reach of criticism to be found within the whole province of our knowledge, however far we may have penetrated into the unknown, then we can retain, without risk of dogmatism, the idea that truth itself is beyond all human authority Indeed, we are not only able to retain this idea we must retain it. For without it there can be no objective standards of scientific inquiry; no criticism of our conjectured solutions, no groping for the unknown, and no quest for knowledge.

Lecture delivered to the University of Salsburg 27 July 1979.  From In Search of a Better World. London: Routledge 1984.

One of the great misfortunes of men who do not like democracy is surely that Hitler began his political action with nine comrades in the basement of a beer hall. Too many excellent young men have concluded that with a half-dozen pals and a mimeograph machine they were also going to seize power. Clarence, in spite of his excess enthusiasm as a neophyte, was a courageous and estimable young man. He had dared to sacrifice his career and, his comfort in order to protest violently against the Nuremberg trial, an indignation which was unwise at that time. He gave himself over entirely, without money, without support, to a difficult and hopeless apostolate. One does not meet very often men of that stamp. Why is it necessary that nearly all of them have in themselves a predisposition to a jealous and implacable despotism? I have known, after Clarence, very many “fascists,” for the race is not dead. Some of them had boots, they were familiar with the runes, and they camped out on the night of the solstice in order to sing under the stars the beautiful solemn songs of their ancestors. The others did not have boots, they held up their skinny reformers’ heads severely, they wore glasses, they collected cards, and they made furious speeches. All were poor, they believed, they fought, they detested lying and injustice.

quoted in Dreamer of the Day by Kevin Coogan.

For we may distinguish two main types of government. The first type consists of governments of which we can get rid without bloodshed – for example, by way of general elections; that is to say, the social institutions provide means by which the rulers may be dismissed by the ruled, and the social traditions ensure that these institutions will not easily be destroyed by those who are in power. The second type consists of governments which the ruled cannot get rid of except by way of a successful revolution – that is to say, in most cases, not at all. I suggest the term ‘democracy’ as a short-hand label for a government of the first type, and the term ‘tyranny’ or ‘dictatorship’ for the second. This, I believe, corresponds closely to traditional usage. But l wish to make clear that no part of my argument depends on the choice of these labels; and should anybody reverse this usage (as is frequently done nowadays), then I should simply say that I am in favour of what he calls ‘tyranny’, and object to what he calls ‘democracy’ ; and I should reject as irrelevant any attempt to discover what ‘democracy’ ‘really’ or ‘essentially’ means, for example, by translating the term into ‘the rule of the people.’ (For although ‘the people’ may influence the actions of their rulers by the threat of dismissal, they never rule themselves in any concrete, practical sense.)

If we make use of the two labels as suggested, then we can now describe, as the principle of a democratic policy, the proposal to create, develop, and protect, political institutions for the avoidance of tyranny. This principle does not imply that we can ever develop institutions of this kind which are faultless or foolproof; or which ensure that the policies adopted by a democratic government will be right or good or wise – or even necessarily better or wiser than the policies adopted by a benevolent tyrant. (Since no such assertions are made, the paradox of democracy is avoided.) What may be said, however, to be implied in the adoption of the democratic principle is the conviction that the acceptance of even a bad policy in a democracy (as long as we can work for a peaceful change) is preferable to the submission to a tyranny, however wise or benevolent. Seen in this light, the theory of democracy is not based upon the principle that the majority should rule; rather, the various equalitarian methods of democratic control, such as general elections and representative government, are to be considered as no more than well-tried and, in the presence of a widespread traditional distrust of tyranny, reasonably effective institutional safe-guards against tyranny, always open to improvement, and even providing methods for their own improvement.

He who accepts the principle of democracy in this sense is therefore not bound to look upon the result of a democratic vote as an authoritative expression of what is right. Although he will accept a decision of the majority, for the sake of making the democratic institutions work, he will feel tree to combat it by democratic means, and to work for its revision. And should he live to see the day when the majority vote destroys the democratic institutions, then this sad experience will tell him only that there does not exist a foolproof method of avoiding tyranny. But it need not weaken his decision to fight tyranny, nor will it expose his theory as inconsistent.

From The Open Society and its Enemies Volume 1. Princeton University Press 1966

Protestant Christianity was founded by Martin Luther. What did Luther have to say about Jews? Maybe Luther wasn’t such a great moral leader after all. Maybe these proposals bore fruit in Luther’s country four hundred years later.  The following are quotes from Luther’s book The Jews and Their Lies (1543).

I had made up my mind to write no more either about the Jews or against them. But since I learned that these miserable and accursed people do not cease to lure to themselves even us, that is, the Christians, I have published this little book, so that I might be found among those who opposed such poisonous activities of the Jews who warned the Christians to be on their guard against them. I would not have believed that a Christian could be duped by the Jews into taking their exile and wretchedness upon himself. However, the devil is the god of the world, and wherever God’s word is absent he has an easy task, not only with the weak but also with the strong. May God help us. Amen

My essay, I hope, will furnish a Christian (who in any case has no desire to become a Jew) with enough material not only to defend himself against the blind, venomous Jews, but also to become the foe of the Jews’ malice, lying, and cursing, and to understand not only that their belief is false but that they are surely possessed by all devils. May Christ, our dear Lord, convert them mercifully and preserve us steadfastly and immovably in the knowledge of him, which is eternal life. Amen.

What shall we Christians do with this rejected and condemned people, the Jews? Since they live among us, we dare not tolerate their conduct, now that we are aware of their lying and reviling and blaspheming. If we do, we become sharers in their lies, cursing and blasphemy. Thus we cannot extinguish the unquenchable fire of divine wrath, of which the prophets speak, nor can we convert the Jews. With prayer and the fear of God we must practice a sharp mercy to see whether we might save at least a few from the glowing flames. We dare not avenge ourselves. Vengeance a thousand times worse than we could wish them already has them by the throat. I shall give you my sincere advice:

First to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom, so that God might see that we are Christians, and do not condone or knowingly tolerate such public lying, cursing, and blaspheming of his Son and of his Christians. For whatever we tolerated in the past unknowingly – and I myself was unaware of it – will be pardoned by God. But if we, now that we are informed, were to protect and shield such a house for the Jews, existing right before our very nose, in which they lie about, blaspheme, curse, vilify, and defame Christ and us (as was heard above), it would be the same as if we were doing all this and even worse ourselves, as we very well know.

Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed. For they pursue in them the same aims as in their synagogues. Instead they might be lodged under a roof or in a barn, like the gypsies. This will bring home to them that they are not masters in our country, as they boast, but that they are living in exile and in captivity, as they incessantly wail and lament about us before God.
Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them.

Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb. For they have justly forfeited the right to such an office by holding the poor Jews captive with the saying of Moses (Deuteronomy 17 [:10]) in which he commands them to obey their teachers on penalty of death, although Moses clearly adds: “what they teach you in accord with the law of the Lord.” Those villains ignore that. They wantonly employ the poor people’s obedience contrary to the law of the Lord and infuse them with this poison, cursing, and blasphemy. In the same way the pope also held us captive with the declaration in Matthew 16 [:18], “You are Peter,” etc, inducing us to believe all the lies and deceptions that issued from his devilish mind. He did not teach in accord with the word of God, and therefore he forfeited the right to teach.

Fifth, I advise that safe conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews. For they have no business in the countryside, since they are not lords, officials, tradesmen, or the like. Let they stay at home.

Sixth, I advise that usury be prohibited to them, and that all cash and treasure of silver and gold be taken from them and put aside for safekeeping. The reason for such a measure is that, as said above, they have no other means of earning a livelihood than usury, and by it they have stolen and robbed from us all they possess. Such money should now be used in no other way than the following: Whenever a Jew is sincerely converted, he should be handed one hundred, two hundred, or three hundred florins, as personal circumstances may suggest. With this he could set himself up in some occupation for the support of his poor wife and children, and the maintenance of the old or feeble. For such evil gains are cursed if they are not put to use with God’s blessing in a good and worthy cause.

Seventh, I commend putting a flail, an axe, a hoe, a spade, a distaff, or a spindle into the hands of young, strong Jews and Jewesses and letting them earn their bread in the sweat of their brow, as was imposed on the children of Adam (Gen 3[:19]). For it is not fitting that they should let us accursed Goyim toil in the sweat of our faces while they, the holy people, idle away their time behind the stove, feasting and farting, and on top of all, boasting blasphemously of their lordship over the Christians by means of our sweat. No, one should toss out these lazy rogues by the seat of their pants.

(from OVO 16 ANTICHRIST January 2006)

Imagine a world in which art is forbidden! Art galleries would close. Books would vanish. Pop stars would shed their glamour overnight. Advertising would cease, television would die. We could refocus our vision not on a succession of false images but on the world as it is. A stillness would fill the air. Art has provided us with fantasy worlds, escapes from reality. For whatever else it is, art is not reality. Soap operas, novels, movies; concerts, the theatre, poetry. None of these are real as a starving child is real, as a town without water is real. Art is the glamorous escape, the transformation that shields us from the world we live in. Injustice, endemic disease, famine, war. Those are real. Art has replaced religion as the opiate of the people just as the artist has replaced the priest as the voice of the spirit. Once we reached inside ourselves to find God / truth /really / etc. Now we find only art. We are regulated by our addictions and art hm become an addiction. We struggle through life in a drugged dream, searching for escape, for brighter fantasies, longer voyages of the imagination, louder music. Another’s life is always more interesting than our own. It is only those who have given up art who can experience the true nature of creation. Now, a self-perpetuating elite sell art as a commodity for the wealthy who have everything while making the artists themselves rich beyond their wildest dreams. Art is money. It is ironic that the myth of the artist celebrates suffering while it is those who have never heard of art, the poor and wretched of our earth, who truly suffer. To call one person an artist is to deny another the equal right of vision. Paint all the paintings black and celebrate the dead art: there is no booze in hell. We tum away from mountains of food that rot in storage while acres the globe humans grow too weak to eat because it is time for our favorite TV program. We live up to our knees in blood, wasting not only hours but days – whole lifetimes – in the bind belief that art is good, art is pure, art is its own justification – and a nightmare scourges our planet. Until we end famine there will be no peace. Artists are murderers! Artists are murderers just as surely as is the soldier who sights down the barrel of a gun to shoot an unarmed civilian. Without art, life would be unendurable! We would have to transform this world. Overnight, one person’s dream can become a nation’s future – but we do not seize power because we are enchanted by art. Forbid art and revolution would follow: the withholding of creative action is the only weapon left. Seeing and creating are the same activity. Those who create art are also creating the starving. In a world in which art is forbidden the deserts would flower. Give up art. Save the starving.

(from OVO 14 Suffering March 1992)

The Manichees & Cathars believed that the body can be spiritualized – or rather, that the body merely contaminates pure spirit & must be utterly rejected. The Gnostic perfecti (radical dualists) starved themselves to death to escape the body & return to the pleroma of pure light.

So: to evade the evils of the flesh – murder, war, famine, greed – paradoxically only one path remains: murder of one’s own body, war on the flesh, famine unto death, greed for salvation.

The radical monists however (Ismailis, Ranters, Antinomians) consider that body & spirit are one, that the same spirit which pervades a black stone also infuses the flesh with its light; that all lives & all is life.  “Things are what they are spontaneously… everything is natural… all in motion as if there were a True Lord to move them – but if we seek for evidence of this lord we fail to find any.” (Kuo Hsiang)

Paradoxically, the monist path also cannot be followed without some sort of “murder, war, famine, greed”: the transformation of death into life (food, negentropy) – war against the Empire of Lies – “fasting of the soul,” or renunciation of the Lie, of all that is not life – & greed for life itself, the absolute power of desire.

Even more: without knowledge of the darkness (“carnal knowledge”) there can exist no knowledge of the light (“gnosis”). The two knowledges are not merely complementary: say rather identical, like the same note played in different octaves. Heraclitus claims that reality persists in a state of “war.” Only clashing notes can make harmony. (“Chaos is the sum of all orders.”)

Give each of these four terms a different mask of language (to call the Furies “The Kindly Ones” is not mere euphemism but a way of uncovering yet more meaning). Masked, ritualized, realized as art, the terms take on their dark beauty, their “Black Light.”

Instead of murder say the hunt, the pure paleolithic economy of all archaic and non-authoritarian tribal society – “venery,” both the killing & eating of flesh & the way of Venus, of desire. Instead of war say insurrection, not the revolution of classes & powers but of the eternal rebel, the dark one who uncovers light. Instead of greed say yearning, unconquerable desire, mad love. And then instead of famine, which is a kind of mutilation, speak of wholeness, plenty, superabundance, generosity of the self which spirals outward toward the Other.

Without this dance of masks, nothing will be created. The oldest mythology makes Eros the firstborn of Chaos. Eros, the wild one who tames, is the door through which the artist returns to Chaos, the One, and then re-returns, comes back again, bearing one of the patterns of beauty. The artist, the hunter, the warrior: one who is both passionate and balanced, both greedy & altruistic to the utmost extreme. We must be saved from all salvations which save us from ourselves, from our animal which is also our anima, our very lifeforce, as well as our animus, our animating self-empowerment, which may even manifest as anger & greed. BABYLON has told us that our flesh is filth – with this device & the promise of salvation it enslaved us. But – if the flesh is already “saved,” already light – if even consciousness itself is a kind of flesh, a palpable & simultaneous living aether – then we need no power to intercede for us. The wilderness, as Omar says, is paradise even now.

The true proprietorship of murder lies with the Empire, for only freedom is complete life. War is Babylonian as well – no free person will die for another’s aggrandizement. Famine comes into existence only with the civilization of the saviors, the priest-kings – wasn’t it Joseph who taught Pharaoh to speculate in grain futures? Greed – for land, for symbolic wealth, for power to deform others’ souls & bodies for their own salvation – greed too arises not from “Nature nature-ing,” but from the damming up & canalization of all energies for the Empire’s Glory.

Against all this, the artist possesses the dance of masks, the total radicalization of language, the invention of a “Poetic Terrorism” which will strike not at living beings but at malign ideas, dead-weights on the coffin-lid of our desires. The architecture of suffocation and paralysis will be blown up. only by our total celebration of everything – even darkness.

(from OVO 14 Suffering March 1992)

Sky News: Banned Man Utd Shirts ‘Promote The Devil’

Manchester United shirts have been banned in Malaysia after the red devil crest was labelled “dangerous and un-Islamic”. Thousands of fans have reacted angrily to the decision by Muslim clerics – with some accusing them of supporting Premier League arch-rivals Liverpool. Despite the Old Trafford side having an estimated 81 million followers in Asia, one senior cleric said: “You are only promoting the devil.” “This is very dangerous. As a Muslim we should not worship the symbols of other religions or the devils,” another added. “It will erode our belief in Islam. There is no reason why we as Muslims should wear such jerseys, either for sports or fashion reasons.”

muslimdebate.com: Indonesian Muslim Groups Consider Fatwa on World’s Most Expensive Coffee

Indonesia’s largest Muslim organization is considering whether or not to slap a fatwa on the nation’s famed kopi luwak. Two of Indonesia’s main Muslim organizations are to meet to decide whether or not to issue a fatwa against “kopi luwak,” a famed and highly prized coffee bean that has passed through the digestive tract of a civet cat before it is retrieved and roasted. Ma’aruf Amin, chairman of the Indonesian Council of Ulama (MUI), said it would meet with Nahdlatul Ulama, Indonesia’s largest Muslim organization, on Tuesday night to discuss issuing a ban against the flourishing industry. “A fatwa will hopefully put an end to the growing concerns about kopi luwak,” Ma’aruf said. Kopi Luwak is eaten by a civet cat and expelled in its feces before being roasted. Highly prized for its flavor, kopi luwak is known as the world’s most expensive coffee, commanding more than $600 per kilogram from online shops.

Robert Spencer: Muslim Husband Rapes Wife, Judge Sees No Sexual Assault Because Islam Forbids Wives to Refuse Sex

Muhammad said: “If a husband calls his wife to his bed [i.e. to have sexual relation] and she refuses and causes him to sleep in anger, the angels will curse her till morning” (Bukhari 4.54.460). He also said: “By him in Whose Hand lies my life, a woman can not carry out the right of her Lord, till she carries out the right of her husband. And if he asks her to surrender herself [to him for sexual intercourse] she should not refuse him even if she is on a camel’s saddle” (Ibn Majah 1854).

And now a New Jersey judge sees no evidence that a Muslim committed sexual assault of his wife — not because he didn’t do it, but because he was acting on his Islamic beliefs: “This court does not feel that, under the circumstances, that this defendant had a criminal desire to or intent to sexually assault or to sexually contact the plaintiff when he did. The court believes that he was operating under his belief that it is, as the husband, his desire to have sex when and whether he wanted to, was something that was consistent with his practices and it was something that was not prohibited.” Luckily, the appellate court overturned this decision, and a Sharia ruling by an American court has not been allowed to stand. This time.

Bernie: The Arab Contribution to Civilization? Nothing Lately

When Arabs are asked to recount great periods of Arab scholarship and learning they can only point to a brief and quickly extinguished burst of light; in the book Le Soleil d’Allah brille sur l’Occident : Notre héritage arabe we read (translated):

Might I invite you to have something with me in this café? Take off your jacket and sit down here on this sofa, unless you would rather sit on the divan with the crimson mattress, of course. Would you like a cup of coffee – with one sugar lump or two? Or perhaps a nice cool carafe of lemonade, or even something alcoholic?  But of course! Let me buy you lunch! I think artichokes would be a lovely starter, don’t you? And how about capon with rice and spinach to follow? For dessert, what would you say to a piece of apricot tart, or an orange sorbet? And at the end of the meal we’ll have a cup of mocha.  There is no reason, of course, for any of these things to appear in any way strange or exotic to you – they have been part of our daily life for such a long time. But did you know that they were all borrowed from a foreign culture, namely Arab culture? This café and the demitasses of coffee they serve, the sugar without which any menu would be almost unimaginable, the lemonade and the carafe, the jacket and the mattress, we owe them all to the Arabs. And it doesn’t stop there: in most European countries, these things are known by their Arabic names! And the same goes for candy, bergamot, oranges, sherbet and many other good things besides.

So here we learn of great literature and poetry the story of ‘a thousand and one nights’: a thousand years ago.

The contributions to mathematics and physics? A thousand years ago. And even here, we often see Muslims pointing to Arabic numerals as some sort of proof that Arab Muslims made some significant advances in mathematics. Arabic numeral is a misnomer, in actual fact they should be called Hindu numerals.

We learn that Ibn Muqla, Vizir at Baghdad and the “prince of calligraphers”, codified the proportions of letters to be respected in handwriting and calligraphy, a thousand years ago.

We learn of the architectural advances such as The Great Mosque of Cordova where we discover its gabled roofs are Syrian. Byzantium provided the mosaics. The vaults are of Tunisian inspiration and the arches Iranian, while the alternation of stone and brick is a Roman invention. Again, a thousand years ago.

Arab contributions to medical science were legion, encouraged by the construction of hospitals in Baghdad, Cairo, Damascus, Samarkand and elsewhere, over a thousand years ago.

Advances and discoveries in astronomy, chemistry, and philosophy from Bagdad to Cordova, all over a thousand years ago.

These are all wondrous and marvelous, but, under Islam, Arabs have not advanced for the past one thousand years. See my previous articles on the paucity of Nobel Prize winners in a world filled with 1.5 billion Muslims ( of which over 300 million are Arabs).

All articles continue at links. Part of a series that never ends… [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14] and etc.  Why might a numerous and varied people such as the Arabic world be held back for one thousand years?  Why, instead of building up their own or anyone else, would a group instead issue death warrants for wearing the wrong kind of shirt or drinking the wrong kind of coffee?  How is it possible to prioritize the trivial and trivialize the highest priorities?  Where does slavery still exist in the year 2010, and why?  What sort of mental poison makes rape part of the multicultural rainbow?  Islam.  It’s holding us all back.  Don’t ban it, and neither should Muslim crimes and atrocities be forgiven.  Don’t force it on others, just keep what is worthy or at least harmless and drop the rest.

Bellowing forth “What the hell up there”‘ and brandishing trlcky devices, the dapper lawyer discovered the 88th floor. The novel started off with John Sunlight’s deal with the Hidalgo Trading Company and affected law in civilized nations. Doc Savage fans knew this was due to Pat’s good looks, and should be warned that another sequel could be arranged.

Bellowing forth “Whats this all about” and brandishing Doc’s own invention, Habeus Corpus bombed unknown dangers. They actually believed started off with the attack on several sheet-metal drums, just almost destroyed the Hidalgo Trading Company and affected Ham’s silk underwear. Sex and violence fans knew this was due to the lust for power, and sssumed that the return of wide ties was better than this.

Bellowing forth “Good afternoon” and brandishing Doc’s own invention, Habeus Corpus almost went to work on Montana. The present farce started off with the discovery of Doc’s melodic trilling, just barely saved Doc’s institute for criminals and affected Ham’s silk underwear. Under-amalgamataed fans knew this was due to severe constipation, and true blue that another Doc Savage movie could be arranged.

Bellowing forth “What the hell up there” and brandishing gas bombs, Doc’s cousin Pat almost sprayed death at the criminal’s lair. The somehow familiar plot started off with a CBS
documentary of Doc’s melodic trilling and affected the American way of life. Was almost as good as fans knew this was due to severe constipation, and didn’t know that loads of boredom was to be preferred.

Bellowing forth “So’s your mama” and brandishing gas bombs, Doc’s cousin Pat almost bombed unknown dangers. The drug-induced madness started of with Doc disguised as the crook’s gunfire, just caused tenor at the Inner Sanctum and affected law in civilized nations. Was almost as good fans knew this was due to Pat’s good looks, and figured out that television viewing never happened.

Bellowing forth “This Bud’s for you” and brandishing keen wits, the electrical wizard almost sprayed death at the criminal’s lair. The totally rad part started off with the grisly death of Monk’s bad breath, just barely rust-proofed the Inner Sanctum and affected pulp literature. Doc Savage fans knew this was due to Pat’s good looks, and didn’t know that the return of wide ties was better than this.

Bellowing forth “I’ll be superamalgamated” and brandishing U. S. phantom jets, The Avenger (on loan from another novel) almost bombarded unknown dangers. The scientific
wonders started off with the theft of the homely chemist in a dark alley, just barely undressed a tremendous burst of static and affected Doc’s prehensile toes. Was almost as good fans knew this was due to severe constipation and feared that another sequel was better than this.

Bellowing forth “So’s your mama” and brandishing nearly superhuman strength., three disgusting crooks almost searched in vain for tropical jungles. The worst book of them
all started off with Pat’s encounter with Long Tom, just barely miniaturized a rock concert and affected Johnny’s vocabulary. Doc Savage fans knew this was due to punk rockers, and realized that another Doc Savage movie couldn’t be helped.

Bellowing forth “So’s your mama” and brandishing keen wits, the electrical wizard almost invaded modem massage parlors. The actually believed started off with the attack on stiff red hair, just barely make the world safe from the Island of Death and affected pulp literature. Was almost as good fans knew this was due to Johnny’s lips, and realized that a sex change for Doc stank.

Bellowing forth “So’s your mama” and brandishing tricky devices, the dapper lawyer almost rampages through upstate New York. The worst book of them all started out with Pat’s encounter with Doc’s left foot, just barely hocked thrift stores and affected Monk’s virginity. Pulp lit fans knew this was due to Doc’s hemorrhoids, and hoped to god that television viewing was bound to happen.

Bellowing forth “Look out you ape” and brandishing five weapons, the man of bronze almost came out of Ham’s swank apartment. The drug-induced madness started out with Doc
disguised as Doc‘s melodic trilling, just barely saved thrift stores and affected Ham’s silk underwear. Empire State Building fans knew this was due to the lust for power, and true
blue that loads of boredom ate it and died.

Bellowing forth ‘You heard me” and brandishing U. S. phantom jets, The Avenger (on loan from another novel) almost went to work on Montana. The scientific wonder started off with the theft of Kenneth Robeson, just barely brought Doc’s focus on sunken realms and affected Doc’s prehensile toes. Pulp lit fans knew this was due to a commie plot, and should be warned that life on Mars a slow death of stupidity.

Bellowing forth “Hi fella” and brandishing gas bombs, Doc’s cousin Pat almost sprayed death at the criminals lair. The present farce started off with the discovery of Rennie’s big fists, just barely wiped out a tremendous burst of static and affected pulp literature. Doc Savage fans knew this was due to a low fiber diet, and feared that life on Mars ate it and died.

(from OVO 12 SCIENCE November 1991)

via youtube.

Though truth is not self-revealing (as Cartesians and Baconians thought), though certainty may be unattainable, the human situation with respect to knowledge is far from desperate. On the contrary, it is exhilarating: here we are, with the immensely difficult task before us of getting to know the beautiful world we live in, and ourselves; and fallible though we are we nevertheless find that our powers of understanding, surprisingly, are almost adequate for the task – more so than we ever dreamt in our wildest dreams. We really do learn from our mistakes, by trial and error. And at the same time we learn how little we know – as when, in climbing a mountain, every step upwards opens some new vista into the unknown, and new worlds unfold themselves of whose existence we knew nothing when we began our climb.

Thus we can learn, we can grow in knowledge, even if we can never know – that is, know for certain. Since we can learn, there is no reason for despair of reason; and since we can never know, there are no grounds here for smugness, or for conceit over the growth of our knowledge.

It may be said that this new way of knowing is too abstract and too sophisticated to replace the loss of authoritarian religion. This may be true. But we must not underrate the power of the intellect and the intellectuals. It was the intellectuals – the ‘second-hand dealers in ideas,’ as F. A. Hayek calls them – who spread relativism, nihilism, and intellectual despair. There is no reason why some intellectuals – some more enlightened intellectuals – should not eventually succeed in spreading the good news that the nihilist ado was indeed about nothing.

From The Open Society and its Enemies Volume 2. Princeton University Press 1966

OVO at Powell’s Books in Portland, Oregon USA. 3 July 2010.

The early history of philosophy, especially the history from Thales to Plato, is a splendid story. It is almost too good to be true. In every generation we find at least one new philosophy, one new cosmology of staggering originality and depth. How was this possible? Of course one cannot explain originality and genius. But one can try to throw some light on them. What was the secret of the ancients? I suggest that it was a tradition – the tradition of critical discussion.

I will try to put the problem more sharply. In all or almost all civilizations we find something like religious and cosmological teaching, and in many societies we find schools. Now schools, especially primitive schools, all have, it appears, a characteristic structure and function. Far from being places of critical discussion they make it their task to impart a definite doctrine, and to preserve it, pure and unchanged. It is the task of a school to hand on the tradition, the doctrine of its founder, its first master, to the next generation, and to this end the most important thing is to keep the doctrine inviolate. A school of this kind never admits a new idea. New ideas are heresies, and lead to schisms; should a member of the school try to change the doctrine, then he is expelled as a heretic. But the heretic claims, as a rule, that his is the true doctrine of the founder. Thus not even the inventor admits that he has introduced an invention; he believes, rather, that he is returning to the true orthodoxy which has somehow been perverted.

In this way all changes of doctrine – if any – are surreptitious changes. They are all presented as re-statements of the true sayings of the master, of his own words, his own meaning, his own intentions.

It is clear that in a school of this kind we cannot expect to find a history of ideas, or even the material for such a history. For new ideas are not admitted to be new. Everything is ascribed to the master. All we might reconstruct is a history of schisms, and perhaps a history of the defence of certain doctrines against the heretics.

There cannot, of course, be any rational discussion in a school of this kind.  There may be arguments against dissenters and heretics, or against some competing schools. But in the main it is with assertion and dogma and condemnation rather than argument that the doctrine is defended.

The great example of a school of this kind among the Greek philosophical schools is the Italian School founded by Pythagoras. Compared with the Ionian school, or with that of Elea, it had the character of a religious order, with a characteristic way of life and a secret doctrine. The story that a member, Hippasus of Metapontum, was drowned at sea because he revealed the secret of the irrationality of certain square roots, is characteristic of the atmosphere surrounding the Pythagorean school, whether or not there is any truth in this story.

But among Greek philosophic schools the early Pythagoreans were an exception. Leaving them aside, we could say that the character of Greek Philosophy, and of the philosophical schools, is strikingly different from the dogmatic type of school here described. I have shown this by an example: the story of the problem of change which I have told is the story of a critical debate, of a rational discussion. New ideas are propounded as such, and arise as the result of open criticism. There are few, if any, surreptitious changes. Instead of anonymity we find a history of ideas and of their originators.

Here is a unique phenomenon, and it is closely connected with the astonishing freedom and creativeness of Greek philosophy. How can we explain this phenomenon? What we have to explain is the rise of a tradition. It is a tradition that allows or encourages critical discussions between various schools and, more surprisingly still, within one and the same school. For nowhere outside the Pythagorean school do we find a school devoted to the preservation of a doctrine. Instead we find changes, new ideas, modifications, and outright criticism of the master.

(In Parmenides we even find, at an early date, a most remarkable phenomenon – that of a philosopher who propounds two doctrines, one which he says is true, and one which he himself describes as false. Yet he makes the false doctrine not simply an object of condemnation or of criticism; rather he presents it as the best possible account of the delusive opinion of mortal men, and of the world of mere appearance – the best account which a mortal man can give.)

How and where was this critical tradition founded? This is a problem deserving serious thought. This much is certain: Xenophanes who brought the Ionian tradition to Elea was fully conscious of the fact that his own teaching was purely conjectural, and that others might come who would know better. I shall come back to this point again in my next and last section.

If we look for the first signs of this new critical attitude, this new freedom of thought, we are led back to Anaximander’s criticism of Thales. Here is a most striking fact: Anaximander criticizes his master and kinsman, one of the Seven Sages, the founder of the Ionian school. He was, according to tradition, only about fourteen years younger than Thales, and he must have developed his criticism and his new ideas while his master was alive. (They seem to have died within a few years of each other.) But there is no trace in the sources of a story of dissent, of any quarrel, or of any schism.

This suggests, I think, that it was Thales who founded the new tradition of freedom-based upon a new relation between master and pupil and who thus created a new type of school, utterly different from the Pythagorean school. He seems to have been able to tolerate criticism. And what is more, he seems to have created the tradition that one ought to tolerate criticism.

Yet I like to think that he did even more than this. I can hardly imagine a relationship between master and pupil in which the master merely tolerates criticism without actively encouraging it. It does not seem to me possible that a pupil who is being trained in the dogmatic attitude would ever dare to criticize the dogma (least of all that of a famous sage) and to voice his criticism. And it seems to me an easier and simpler explanation to assume that the master encouraged a critical attitude – possibly not from the outset, but only after he was struck by the pertinence of some questions asked, by the pupils perhaps, without any critical intention.

However this may be, the conjecture that Thales actively encouraged criticism in his pupils would explain the fact that the critical attitude towards the master’s doctrine became part of the Ionian school tradition. I like to think that Thales was the first teacher who said to his pupils: ‘This is how I see things-how I believe that things are. Try to improve upon my teaching’ (Those who believe that it is ‘unhistorical’ to attribute this undogmatic attitude to Thales may again be reminded of the fact that only two generations later we find a similar attitude consciously and clearly formulated in the fragments of Xenophanes.). At any rate, there is the historical fact that the Ionian school was the first in which pupils criticized their masters, in one generation after the other. There can be little doubt that the Greek tradition of philosophical criticism had its main source in Ionia.

It was a momentous innovation. It meant a break with the dogmatic tradition which permits only one school doctrine, and the introduction in its place of a tradition that admits a plurality of doctrines which all try to approach the truth by means of critical discussion.

It thus leads, almost by necessity, to the realization that our attempts to see and to find the truth are not final, but open to improvement; that our knowledge, our doctrine, is conjectural; that it consists of guesses, of hypotheses, rather than of final and certain truths; and that criticism and critical discussion are our only means of getting nearer to the truth. It thus leads to the tradition of bold conjectures and of free criticism, the tradition which created the rational or scientific attitude, and with it our Western civilization, the only civilization which is based upon science (though of course not upon science alone).

In this rationalist tradition bold changes of doctrine are not forbidden. On the contrary, innovation is encouraged, and is regarded as success, as improvement, if it is based on the result of a critical discussion of its predecessors. The very boldness of an innovation is admired; for it can be controlled by the severity of its critical examination. This is why changes of doctrine, far from being made surreptitiously, are traditionally handed down together with the older doctrines and the names of the innovators. And the material for a history of ideas becomes part of the school tradition.

To my knowledge the critical or rationalist tradition was invented only once. It was lost after two or three centuries, perhaps owing to the rise of the Aristotelian doctrine of epistémé, of certain and demonstrable knowledge (a development of the Eleatic and Heraclitean distinction between certain truth and mere guesswork). It was rediscovered and consciously revived in the Renaissance, especially by Galileo Galilei.

First published in the Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society NS 59, 1958-9.  From Conjectures and Refutations. Routledge 1989

The Egyptian Spirit enumerates its uncommitted sins before Osiris in order to prove that it deserves eternal blessedness; but the poet has no need to exculpate himself before any judge.

I
I have dazzled even prigs and unbelievers without abusing the marvels inherent in my art.

II
I have scorned metre, rhyme; I have polished words. ‘Music be gone!’ A plague on discourse!

III
I have discarded clarity as worthless. Working in darkness, I have discovered lightning. I have disconcerted. I have sounded the mute, confronted monsters and miracles, burned everything that exasperates the impoverished and the good soul.

IV
Man’s dreams, his deliriums, have reached their culmination in my poems. It has not been for me to make them state their name; proteiform, they have several directions. I have respected their disorder. I have given free course to their flight. My words testify to their perpetual metamorphosis.

V
I have exalted the feelings that one tests blindly and would destroy in the desire to identify. Thanks to me everyone now opens his eyes to them. He experiences them in a new intimacy. His soul is more at ease when that which he had held too tightly escapes him.

VI
I have not imitated those who acquiesce in the desires of the masses or the powerful. I have established for myself my rules, my principles and my tastes, and I have overstated their difference, comparing myself in this to great poets and, through them, to all men. I have thought there was neither a better nor a more expedient way to point out my sincerity and my final dependence.

VII
I have proposed to be inimitable. I have demonstrated my mastery; I have not hidden my boldness. I have rejected the commonly accepted disciplines. I have invented others for my own use. If anyone can imitate me (in being inimitable) it is simply my reward.

VIII
I never have had the burden of proof. Poetry is not a business: impatience and pride guard its cradle. I have avoided platitudes and obviousness. One forces locks, not images. I never have needed to proclaim myself magus and prophet.

IX
I never have feigned the indifference, the good sense and the wisdom of nations. I have noted with satisfaction that my transports have separated me from the flock of Panurge.

X
Work? Pain? Unknown. I have recalled that for water it was an easy, unquestionable course from rain to the spring. I have presented myself as a spring, producing pure water naturally. Verses rushed forth from the very first.

XI
With every word, my verses remind one that they are a negation of prose. (‘It is as oracle that I speak.’) Each vain effort to reduce their enigma, to avoid their trap, demands a new reading. One cannot penetrate their secret. In wanting it so desperately, one renders their beauty all the more unfathomable.

XII
Poetry escapes the banality, the servility and the futility of prose, that which is inappreciable. I have held all the dramas of love in a soap bubble. My verses immediately astound. Everything about them distinguishes them from ordinary language, and the spirit marvels that the ambiguous word, the long and uneasy syllable, leads it, trembling, into the woods.

XIII
To someone else belongs the care of feeding the soul with staple foods, which, though indispensable to his stagnant mediocrity, are not rare. I have wanted to force on him strange and luxurious dishes from the antipodes or the abyss.

XIV
I have seen neither majesty in a king nor ministry in a priest. I have attracted attention to the mockery of the sceptre, the slime of the sandal. I have attacked things broadside.

XV
I have not observed the same disrespect in the workshop of the artisan. But I have praised neither his labours nor his works. I have picked up a wood shaving to praise the curve, the colour and the quality. Dialectic calls for such priorities.

XVI
Imagination is neither right nor wrong. One does not invent in a void. I have resorted to chance and to magic potions. I have disdained reason and experience. I have changed, if only to have solicited from them their commanding way, the meanings of words. Words leave me, nevertheless, richer than they found me. They have enhanced my powers by confrontations are retained in the mind.

XVII
I have been rash enough to boast to boast of my audacity and to recommend it as a principle. My imprudences have always been happy; I admit it with pride. I have relied, above all, on the gifts of fate, always challenging them to accentuate the power of my imagination and the generosity of my heart. I have accepted them with pride, rejoicing once more that they should be mine.

XVIII
I have expressed that which was considered, before me, to be inexpressible.

XIX
I have divulged that which was reputed to be unknowable. I have revered the least fashionable science, knowing the impossible, every complex thing that a person considers from birth to death. But, meeting it in my verses one is struck by evidence that unchains in him the laughter of hashish.

XX
I have a pure heart. I have scandalised all the imbeciles, except those who sleep the sleep of the just.

XXI
Those who like my verses should say them when they are alone and their door opens in the night. Those who like my verses, and who love, no longer have any need of saying them.

XXII
I have given to each truth its well.

XXIII
This path has freely chosen me. The idea of success or failure is at the end of my foot.

First published in BIEF/ Jonction Surrealiste #7, June 1959.

(from OVO 3 1987)

One of the most important ingredients of our western civilization is what I may call the ‘rationalist tradition’ which we have inherited from the Greeks. It is the tradition of critical discussion – not for its own sake, but in the interests of the search for truth. Greek science, like Greek philosophy, was one of the products of this tradition, and of the urge to understand the world in which we live, and the tradition founded by Galileo was its renaissance.

Within this rationalist tradition science is valued, admittedly, for its practical achievements; but it is even more highly valued for its informative content, and for its ability to free our minds from old beliefs, old prejudices, and old certainties, and to offer us in their stead new conjectures and daring hypotheses. Science is valued for its liberalizing influence as one of the greatest of the forces that make for human freedom.

According to the view of science which I am trying to defend here, this is due to the fact that scientists have dared (since Thales, Democritus, Plato’s Timaeus, and Aristarchus) to create myths, or conjectures, or theories, which are in striking contrast to the everyday world of common experience, yet able to explain some aspects of this world of common experience. Galileo pays homage to Aristarchus and Copernicus precisely because they dared to go beyond this known world of our senses: “I cannot,” he writes, ”express strongly enough my unbounded admiration for the greatness of mind of these men who conceived [the heliocentric system] and held it to be true [...], in violent opposition to the evidence of their own senses.” This is Galileo’s testimony to the liberalizing force of science. Such theories would be important even if they were no more than exercises for our imagination. But they are more than this, as can be seen from the fact that we submit them to severe tests by trying to deduce from them some of the regularities of the known world of common experience by trying to explain these regularities. And these attempts to explain the known by the unknown (as I have described them elsewhere) have immeasurably extended the realm of the known. They have added to the facts of our everyday world the invisible air, the antipodes, the circulation of the blood, the worlds of the telescope and the microscope, of electricity, and of tracer atoms showing us in detail the movements of matter within living bodies.  All these things are far from being mere instruments: they are witness to the intellectual conquest of our world by our minds.

First published in Contemporary British Philosophy, 3rd Series, ed. H. D. Lewis, 1956. From Conjectures and Refutations. Routledge 1989

Since the terms ‘reason’ and ‘rationalism’ are vague, it will be necessary to explain roughly the way in which they are used here. First, they are used in a wide sense; they are used to cover not only intellectual activity but also observation and experiment. It is necessary to keep this remark in mind, since ‘reason’ and ‘rationalism’ are often used in a different and more narrow sense, in opposition not to ‘irrationalism’ but to ‘empiricism’ ; if used in this way, rationalism extols intelligence above observation and experiment, and might therefore be better described as ‘intellectualism’. But when I speak here of ‘rationalism’, I use the word always in a sense which includes ‘empiricism’ as well as ‘intellectualism’; just as science makes use of experiments as well as of thought. Secondly, I use the word ‘rationalism’ in order to indicate, roughly, an attitude that seeks to solve as many problems as possible by an appeal to reason, i.e. to clear thought and experience, rather than by an appeal to emotions and passions. This explanation, of course, is not very satisfactory, since all terms such as ‘reason’ or ‘passion’ are vague ; we do not possess ‘reason’ or ‘passions’ in the sense in which we possess certain physical organs, for example, brains or a heart, or in the sense in which we possess certain ‘faculties’, for example, the power of speaking, or of gnashing our teeth. In order therefore to be a little more precise, it may be better to explain rationalism in terms of practical attitudes or behaviour. We could then say that rationalism is an attitude of readiness to listen to critical arguments and to learn from experience. It is fundamentally an attitude of admitting that ‘I may be wrong and you may be right, and by an effort, we may get nearer to the truth’. It is an attitude which does not lightly give up hope that by such means as argument and careful observation, people may reach some kind of agreement on many problems of importance; and that, even where their demands and their interests clash, it is often possible to argue about the various demands and proposals, and to reach – perhaps by arbitration – a compromise which, because of its equity, is acceptable to most, if not to all. In short, the rationalist attitude, or, as I may perhaps label it, the ‘attitude of reasonableness’, is very similar to the scientific attitude, to the belief that in the search for truth we need co-operation, and that, with the help of argument, we can in time attain something like objectivity.

From The Open Society and Its Enemies Volume 2. Harper Torchbooks 1967.

Plato was the theorist of an aristocratic form of absolute government. As the fundamental problem of political theory, he posed the following questions: ‘Who should rule? Who is to govern the state? The many, the mob, the masses, or the few, the elect, the elite?’

Once the question ‘Who should rule?’ is accepted as fundamental, then obviously there can be only one reasonable answer: not those who do not know, but those who do know, the sages; not the mob, but the few best. That is Plato’s theory of the rule by the best, of aristocracy.

It is somewhat odd that great theorists of democracy and great adversaries of this Platonic theory – such as Rousseau – adopted Plato’s statement of the problem instead of rejecting it as inadequate, for it is quite clear that the fundamental question in political theory is not the one Plato formulated. The question is not ‘Who should rule? or ‘Who is to have power? but ‘How much power should be granted to the government?’ or perhaps more precisely, ‘How can we develop our political institutions in  such a manner that even incompetent and dishonest rulers cannot do too much harm?’ In other words, the fundamental problem of political theory is the problem of checks and balances, of institutions by which political power, its arbitrariness and its abuse can be controlled and tamed.

I do not doubt that the kind of democracy in which we in the West believe is no more than a state in which power is in this sense, limited and controlled. For the kind of democracy in which we believe is by no means an ideal state; we know perfectly well that much happens that should not happen. It is childish to strive after ideals in politics, and any reasonable mature man in the West knows that ‘All political action consists in choosing  the lesser evil’ (to quote the Viennese poet Karl Kraus).

For us there are only two types of government: those in which the governed can get rid of their rulers without bloodshed, and those in which the governed can, if at all, get rid of their rulers only by bloodshed. The first of these types of government we call democracy, the second tyranny or dictatorship. But the names do not really matter here, only the facts do.

We in the West believe in democracy only in this sober sense: as the least evil form of government. This is also how the man described it who has done more than anyone to save democracy and the West: ‘Democracy is the worst form of government,’ Winston Churchill said once, ‘except of course all those other forms of government that have been tried from time to time.’

Thus we believe in democracy, but not because it is the rule of the people. Neither you nor I rule; on the contrary, both you and and I are being ruled, and sometimes more than we like. Yet we believe in democracy as the form of government which is compatible with peace and effective political opposition, and therefore with political freedom.

I have mentioned above the unfortunate fact that Plato’s misleading question ‘Who is to rule?’ was never clearly rejected by the philosophers of politics. Rousseau asked the same question, but give the opposite answer: ‘The will of the people shall rule – the will of the many, not of the few;’ a dangerous answer indeed, since it leads to the mythological deification of ‘The People’ and ‘The Will of the People.’ Marx too asks, quite in Plato’s vein: ‘Who shall rule, the capitalists or the proletarians?’ And he too gave the answer; ‘The many; not the few; the proletarians should rule, not the capitalists.’

Contrary to Rousseau and to Marx we see in the majority decision of a vote or of an election only a method of producing decision without bloodshed, and with the least possible restriction of freedom. Of course, majorities often arrive at mistaken decisions, and we must insist that minorities have rights and freedoms which no majority decision can overrule.

What I have said may support my suggestion that the fashionable terms ‘mass’, ‘elite’ and ‘uprising of the masses’ originate from the ideologies of Platonism and Marxism.

Just as Rousseau and Marx simply inverted the Platonic answer, so some opponents of Marx inverted the Marxist answer: they want to counteract the ‘revolt of the masses’ by a ‘revolt of the elite’, thereby reverting to the Platonic answer and the claim of the elite to rule. But this whole approach is mistaken. God save us from that anti-Marxism which simply inverts Marxism: we know it only too well; even Communism is no worse than the anti-Marxist ‘elite’ which ruled Italy, Germany and Japan and which it took a global war to remove.

Lecture in Zurich 1958 at invitation of Albert Hunold. From In Search of a Better World. Routledge 1984

I mean by ‘historicism’ an approach to the social sciences which assumes that historical prediction is their aim, and which assumes that this aim is attainable by discovering the ‘rhythms’ or the ‘patterns,’ the ‘laws or the ‘trends’ that underlie the evolution of history.

I propose to give here, in a few words, an outline refutation of historicism. The argument may be summed up in five statements, as follows.

1. The course of human history is strongly influenced by the growth of human knowledge. The truth of this premise must be admitted even by those who see in our ideas, including scientific ideas, merely the by-products of material developments of some kind or another.
2. We cannot predict, by rational or scientific methods, the future growth of our knowledge.
3. We cannot, therefore, predict the future course of human history.
4. This means that we must reject the possibility of a theoretical history; that is to say, of a historical social science that would correspond to theoretical physics. There can be no scientific theory of historical development serving as a basis for historical prediction.
5. The fundamental aim of historicist methods is therefore misconceived; and historicism collapses.

The decisive step in this argument is 2.  I think that it is convincing in itself: if there is such a thing as growing human knowledge, then we cannot anticipate today what we shall know only tomorrow.

From The Poverty of Historicism. Routledge 2002.

How Fatima Started Islam: Mohammad’s Daughter Tells All by Noor Barack
2009 Camel Flea Press
ISBN 978-0-578-03290-0
[Amazon]

No matter what his followers might be up to these days, Mohammad was a fight-starting, raisin-thieving, child-raping, lie-telling, Jew-killing, Christian-hating, nonsense-spouting sort of a One True Prophet of Allah.  Allah being an invisible monster that lives in the sky, the theocracy of Islam is a sacred fantasy.  And what better to deflate a sacred fantasy than a profane fantasy?

How Fatima Started Islam: Mohammad’s Daughter Tells All by Noor Barack  is a revisionist fiction on the origins of Islam, told from the perspective of one of Mohammad’s daughters.    Mr. Barack demonstrates a knowledge of Islam’s history in what he chooses to mock and re-interpret.  He also freely invents scandal upon scandal, heresy upon heresy, if it moves the story forward or evokes a shriek from the faithful.    Readers will laugh as blasphemy and narrative collide.  How Fatima Started Islam purposefully insults Islam and Muslims.  It’s personal.  And yet as rough and base as the book may be, it is still better than how things are done by the target of Mr. Barack’s scorn.  It’s how things are done in the West.  Don’t like something?  Write a book about it, perhaps even a mean-spirited and funny book.  How things are done in the Muslim world is quite different.  Don’t like something?  Then you go killing, killing, killing, killing, killing, killing, killing, until your enemies are either dead or cowed.  Faced with this distinction, I prefer my fantasies profane.

Poking fun at a bully won’t always make them stop, and it doesn’t lead to knowing what you and the bully should do once the bullying has ended.  But words will never hurt you.  The worst outcome this book could ever possibly generate is that after reading it a person might feel insulted, or bored.  That’s the very worst thing that could happen when you read a book.  Not so bad, is it?  And that’s part of the point of winding up bullies – it’s an opportunity for them to join the laughter, if they will only take it.  When it comes time for the fingers to be pointed at me I do my best to muddle through and move on.  Taking satire and inquiry “too far” is how the darkness is dispelled, even if not everyone cares to venture to the edge.  Heresy and not orthodoxy is the guardian of truth, for only heresy can reveal errors in thought and action.  One of the heresies of How Fatima Started Islam is found on the back cover, a photograph of Mohammad.  It seems like a nontroversy to me, but people are being threatened with death all over the world for publishing images said to be Mohammad.  Let me join the fun: the image above is the back cover of How Fatima Started Islam.

From a letter accompanying my (signed!) copy of How Fatima Started Islam:

As all warriors against the Islamification of the West have observed, the Imans, Mullahs, and Terrorists want it both ways. The West must kowtow to them while they can trash any other religion or culture with impunity. They hate ridicule and my little effort is what they hate, to be laughed at and denigrated.

From the introduction:

I have broadly tried to humorously poke fun at some people who are not known for being fun loving, and to make less serious the tenets of a belief.  I believe we have to fearlessly show that all faiths, people, cultures, religions and ideas are on an equal footing in the market place of human endeavor, and that no one person or group is above anyone else.  [...] In an odd way, things like this little book will eventually help achieve mutual understanding and respect when people can look at themselves and others on an equal footing.

From Chapter Three

The first pillar of Islam, in a sense the key to the very beginning of the religion, is the camel. It was actually one specific camel named Old Mama, but she was a representation of all the camels needed for the rapid, bloody spread of Islam.

For those fortunate enough to have no personal knowledge of the beasts let me give some brief background. Camels are large, ugly animals who were genetically engineered for deserts. They have a tough skin that smells really bad, an evil, foul breath that can kill small animals and children, a stubborn nature that a mule could envy, and all this is coupled with a colossal stupidity. In short, the camel is a metaphor for the land of Arabia. Among the locals there is a constant argument on whether the camel was made for Arabia or Arabia made for the camel.

But many of our men, and even some women, seem to love these flatulent stinkpots. When the wind is right a caravan, and even sometimes a single camel, can be smelled before it can be seen. Needless to say, those associated with the animals retain an unfortunate aura of camelness about their person. Add this to the general lack of rain and water of the region and you have many persons seriously questioning why people were born with noses. The vast majority of the population never gets totally used to it: and pity the few who do, and become walking plagues of stink. My father Mohammad seemed to relish in camel-stink. It added one more assault upon me on my night that I was raped into womanhood.

Now like many camelmen, the old sot had a favorite camel, which was his bimmy. A bimmy was a pet camel that shared a special relationship with her master. Old Mama was Mohammad’s bimmy for many years and he seemed to love this obstinate, moody, and gaggingly foul smelling animal. The main reason for the affection was that Old Mama when commanded would lower and angle herself whenever Mohammad wanted to fuck her. As he got older his sexual liaisons with the beast lessened and she did die before he did. But he was famous for getting blind drunk and humping Old Mama in every public place in Mecca. The citizens of Mecca do not have high standards for anything, but even among that crowd his drunken behavior with Old Mama was considered bush league and a cause of public derision as well as constant off color jokes.

The way Islam was actually started was like this. One night as I was approaching thirteen, and in total unhappiness with my horrible life, my father was out and about and got into his usual state of stupor. For whatever reason he decided to come home and sleep it off at the complex. He managed to get on Old Mama with no problem and she put it into automatic and headed toward home as she had done a thousand times before. When the pathway diverged into a fork with one branch going left and other right, Old Mama headed right the way to our quarters. Dear old dad in his fog was confused and sure that the way to go was left. He steers Old Mama to the left but she still wanted to go right. He got pissed, both literaraly and figuratively, and started kicking and hitting her with a stick. Old Mama angrily stopped and purposely bucked with Mohammad being thrown off. This had all happened before and was no big deal, but this time he landed head first on a rock. He lay there for about fifteen minutes before he was discovered and carried back to the complex unconscious.

He lay like that until the middle of the second day when he awoke, his body had detoxed all the booze, he ate some food, talked normally and went immediately back into a state of unconsciousness for another 24 hours. Mohammad again awoke, ate heartily and communicated quite normally. About five hours later he went into a trancelike state and began to talk in total gibberish. This was absolutely unlike his drunken slurred and nearly impossible to comprehend ramblings, which we were all used to, but a sober sounding, even authoritative clear speech of absolute nonsense.

He went in and out of this trancelike state. Of course, when he was appearing normal, he was asked about the odd behavior and speech. He stated that he had no idea he was doing anything and no memory of acting at all unusually. He was a little scared and he kept to himself more and drank less. The alcohol did not seem to affect the weird gibberish states one way or the other. So, after another few days, things were pretty normal as I am still keeping the cash accounts and screwing every horny moron who could beg, borrow, or steal two shekels. I had briefly talked to my father about raising the rates in the brothel because I was very sure that we would make more money, also at the same time we would have slightly less volume with me off my back a little more. I figured that if we raised the rates 50% we would only lose about 10% of the tricks for an increased profit of 35%. Naturally he dismissed the idea off hand.

After the evening meal break, when only the slave whores were available, I decided that the time was approaching. Mohammad was slurping over a roasted camel neck when he went into the trance and started babbling incomprehensible foolishness in a deliberative way. It was as if he were expounding on an important point in an intelligent way if you did not know him and know that the syllables coming out were pure nonsense. It was the third time that day that he had began to speak gibberish so the awe and wonder had faded a little bit.

I rose and went right next to him. Everyone was looking at me and all was quiet as I waited a few seconds and then announced, “I can understand what he is saying.”

The Bell Curve is a book published in 1994 worried about an increasingly isolated cognitive elite, a merging of the cognitive elite with the affluent, and a deteriorating quality of life for people at the bottom end of the cognitive ability distribution.  The authors documented these claims as something they were against.  Much is claimed in the book, but this blog post concerns exactly one claim and no other.  I think it is true that cognitive partitioning along IQ lines is occurring in the USA, and with it comes some profound threats to liberty.  Replace the word “book” with “blog” in the excerpt below and see if it rings true…

The college population has grown a lot while its mean IQ has risen a bit. Most bright people were not going to college in 1930 (or earlier) – waiting on the bench, so to speak, until the game opened up to them. By 1990, the noncollege population, drained of many bright youngsters, had shifted downward in IQ. While the college population grew, the gap between college and noncollege populations therefore also grew. The largest change, however, has been the huge increase in the intelligence of the average student in the top dozen universities, up a standard deviation and a half from where the Ivies and the Seven Sisters were in 1930. One may see other features in the figure evidently less supportive of cognitive partitioning. Our picture suggests that for every person within the ranks of college graduates, there is another among those without a college degree who has just as high an IQ – or at least almost. And as for the graduates of the dozen top schools, while it is true that their mean IQ is extremely high (designated by the +2.7 [standard deviation]s to which the line points), they are such a small proportion of the nation’s population that they do not even register visually on this graph, and they too are apparently out-numbered by people with similar IQs who do not graduate from those colleges, or do not graduate from college at all. Is there anything to be concerned about? How much partitioning has really occurred?

Perhaps a few examples will illustrate. Think of your twelve closest friends or colleagues. For most readers of this book, a large majority will be college graduates. Does it surprise you to learn that the odds of having even half of them be college graduates are only six in a thousand, if people were randomly paired off? Many of you will not think it odd that half or more of the dozen have advanced degrees. But the odds against finding such a result among a randomly chosen group of twelve Americans are actually more than a million to one. Are any of the dozen a graduate of Harvard, Stanford, Yale, Princeton, Cal Tech, MIT, Duke, Dartmouth, Cornell, Columbia, University of Chicago, or Brown? The chance that even one is a graduate of those twelve schools is one in a thousand. The chance of finding two among that group is one in fifty thousand. The chance of finding four or more is less than one in a billion.

Most readers of this book – this may be said because we know a great deal about the statistical tendencies of people who read a book like this – are in preposterously unlikely groups, and this reflects the degree of partitioning that has already occurred. [...]

The point of the exercise in thinking about your dozen closest friends and colleagues is to encourage you to detach yourself momentarily from the way the world looks to you from day to day and contemplate how extraordinarily different your circle of friends and acquaintances is from what would be the norm in a perfectly fluid society. This profound isolation from other parts of the IQ distribution probably dulls our awareness of how unrepresentative our circle actually is. [...]  When people live in encapsulated worlds, it becomes difficult for them, even with the best of intentions, to grasp the realities of worlds with which they have little experience but over which they also have great influence, both public and private.

Cheesy robot pilots battle for the planet and disco nightlife. You have seen these pilots massed outside travel agents – you know they move when you’re not watching – here the awful truth is revealed at last in high definition. First made in 2004 in standard 4:3, now regenerated at great personal cost from the original source files, extra string and leeches. Special note – the last version had a different president. The choice of current president is simply a matter of accuracy and pilots have no political bias – they hate everybody equally.

Another video that has me thinking of The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch by Philip K. Dick.