| Paradox of Oscillating Over-Analyses A speech on the topic of my choice - it was almost too tempting to print out a copy of one of my high school essays, and compare Machiavelli's The Prince to the thoughts of early existentialists. But I decided I'd rather once and for all explain my 'Paradox of Oscillating Over-Analyses' because my current explanation, I have been told, is confusing. So what is this paradox I speak of? It is an analogy I devised when I first started thinking about philosophy. It turned out to be just another way of explaining the world from a nihilist's perspective, but it takes into account the aspects of Existentialism that suggest the importance of self-given meaning. The message is similar to Nietzsche's 'Thus Spoke Zarathustra', but this speech will most likely be easier to understand. To understand the nothingness, first a distinction must be made between cognitive and biological happiness. To be cognitively happy is to prefer one thing to another. However objects in our world have no adjectives built into them. A rock is a rock. As Nietzsche said, "It is we alone who have devised cause, sequence, for-each-other, relativity, constraint, number, law, freedom, motive, and purpose" The biblical heaven and hell cannot have any inherent properties; and to prefer heaven to hell is only a cognitive decision. Biological happiness (along with depression) is the result of chemicals, neurotransmitters and hormones, and is often very hard to overcome with cognitive facilities. Natural selection has made us avoid things that stop gene propagation, but otherwise decisions of non-biological origin are up to the individual, and the properties of objects are relative and for the individual to decide. The nothingness IS the relativism of the world and lack of inherency. And so finally, I present the first level of analysis: As we go about our day-to-day life, we are distracted from the nothingness by biological emotions and numerous societal creations such as responsibility and recreation. We are unconsciously blissfully ignorant of the nothingness. But reflection over this realization will lift you up a level of analysis. We are now aware of our ignorance, and are effectively consciously blissfully ignorant. It is in this level of realization that the shallowness of cognitive happiness comes into focus. Happiness is just an illusion. Those who reach this level of analysis usually stop, and derive at this somewhat depressing conclusion. But that is a mistake. There is rationality in irrationality: a paradox that is only fully understood with experience. To return to a level where happiness exists, the only options are to suppress one's wisdom and return to the former ignorant state (which occurs biologically with the passage of time) or to analyze further and convince one's self that it is preferable to be consciously blissfully ignorant - that the nothingness doesn't matter. This as I found much later, is the message of Zarathustra, the Dionysian embodiment of Nietzsche's philosophy: "This crown of the laugher, the rose-wreath crown: to you, my brothers, I throw this crown. Laughter I have pronounced holy: you higher men, learn - to laugh!" Of course the message of Zarathustra is also but an illusory cognitive view, and the analysis can continue upwards to the 4th level, and continue to oscillate between odd-numbered distracted levels of analysis, and even-number aware levels of analysis. At the heart of the paradox is the idea that cognitive preferences are meaningless, and yet as a result of biological processes, happiness is itself a preferable state. Life is indeed void of purpose, and the world meaningless, but if you find yourself in an even-numbered level of analysis, listen to Zarathustra, or Bob Marley. Either way, tomorrow you'll wake up distracted. Works Cited Nietzsche, Friedrich. Beyond Good and Evil. Trans. Walter Kaufman. Published 1992. Random House, Inc. Nietzsche, Friedrich. Attempt at a self-criticism. Trans. Walter Kaufman. Published 1992. Random House, Inc. |