Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

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Impenitent
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Impenitent »

Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 3:52 am
Impenitent wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 2:58 am
Immanuel Can wrote: Fri Feb 21, 2020 2:49 am
Did you have a chance to read the book, actually? Or are you talking more about what you would do...
I've read it (several years ago)
Fair enough. I had no reason to doubt you.

I was only addressing that question to Nick, because his comments suggest that he really has no idea at all what Camus says. I think he never read Camus, but is just looking for a chance to rhapsodize about Simone.
if camus finds his life an absurd misery, good for him - it's his life, let him embrace his fate

if someone enjoys their apparent "drudgery" then that which one as an external observer "sees" might look absurd from a fatalist's perspective...

and those who love their fate... but that's a question for fast freddy
Right.

I think he's wrong about it being possible to make the rock "my rock." He's really just counselling a kind of elaborate self-deception...no more.
elaborate self deception? no... an admission of the egocentric predicament

-Imp
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Immanuel Can »

Impenitent wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 8:45 pm elaborate self deception? no... an admission of the egocentric predicament

-Imp
Well, he probably thinks he's being a realist. But he thinks that he can keep exactly the same "realism," while simultaneously morphing it, inside his noggin, into a win instead of a loss.

That looks pretty self-deceived to me. However, if we can see it differently, I'm open to hearing how.
Nick_A
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Nick_A »

Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 3:52 am
Impenitent wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 2:58 am
Immanuel Can wrote: Fri Feb 21, 2020 2:49 am
Did you have a chance to read the book, actually? Or are you talking more about what you would do...
I've read it (several years ago)
Fair enough. I had no reason to doubt you.

I was only addressing that question to Nick, because his comments suggest that he really has no idea at all what Camus says. I think he never read Camus, but is just looking for a chance to rhapsodize about Simone.
if camus finds his life an absurd misery, good for him - it's his life, let him embrace his fate

if someone enjoys their apparent "drudgery" then that which one as an external observer "sees" might look absurd from a fatalist's perspective...

and those who love their fate... but that's a question for fast freddy
Right.

I think he's wrong about it being possible to make the rock "my rock." He's really just counselling a kind of elaborate self-deception...no more.
For some reason you are annoyed by intelligent women with universal understandings. You are not alone. I had to read the book in a philosophy class some twenty years ago. I've since learned there is more to it than I thought then Your closed mind is far more frightening.

Still there is n obvious question which must be avoided at all cost by the rigid and by the book types. If life is concluded as meaningless, why did Albert Camus call Simone wheel, a Christian mystic, the only great mind of our times?

IC likes to huff and puff but to think out of the box is not his saving grace.
Nick_A
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Nick_A »

Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 9:29 pm
Impenitent wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 8:45 pm elaborate self deception? no... an admission of the egocentric predicament

-Imp
Well, he probably thinks he's being a realist. But he thinks that he can keep exactly the same "realism," while simultaneously morphing it, inside his noggin, into a win instead of a loss.

That looks pretty self-deceived to me. However, if we can see it differently, I'm open to hearing how.
Same question to you. If life is meaningless, why did Camus call Simone Weil the only great mind of our times.
Impenitent
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Impenitent »

Immanuel Can wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 9:29 pm
Impenitent wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 8:45 pm elaborate self deception? no... an admission of the egocentric predicament

-Imp
Well, he probably thinks he's being a realist. But he thinks that he can keep exactly the same "realism," while simultaneously morphing it, inside his noggin, into a win instead of a loss.

That looks pretty self-deceived to me. However, if we can see it differently, I'm open to hearing how.
from an external perspective, the endless toil appears the ultimate in torture; yet if Sisyphus loves that which he does, the torture aspect evaporates...

all is a matter of perspective... and that which is imposed externally is seldom matched by that which is imposed internally; however, not all are artist enough to impose their will...

-Imp
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Immanuel Can »

Nick_A wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 10:58 pm For some reason you are annoyed by intelligent women with universal understandings.
No, I'm annoyed by you being off topic. Nothing else.
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Immanuel Can »

Nick_A wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 11:01 pm Simone Weil
Not interested. Not relevant.
Nick_A
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Nick_A »

Immanuel Can wrote: Sun Feb 23, 2020 4:00 am
Nick_A wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 11:01 pm Simone Weil
Not interested. Not relevant.
Classic IC hypocrisy. I began thread called individualism vs collectivism which IC quickly turned it into socializing with RC. So much for respecting threads. Now we have a profound question concerning the value of nihilism. Since it includes Camus respect for Simone it must be condemned since she is woman regardless of how it relates to Camus ideas concerning nihilism. Truly a sick and low form of snobbish hypocrisy
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Immanuel Can
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Immanuel Can »

Nick_A wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 11:01 pm Simone Weil
We're going to have to call it at this point, Nick. It's just not profitable or relevant to the topic.

Sorry. I'm out.
Nick_A
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Nick_A »

Immanuel Can wrote: Sun Feb 23, 2020 4:52 am
Nick_A wrote: Sat Feb 22, 2020 11:01 pm Simone Weil
We're going to have to call it at this point, Nick. It's just not profitable or relevant to the topic.

Sorry. I'm out.
you are out in more ways than one.
Nick_A
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Nick_A »

If you are a woman and a philosophy student and you have an open minded Prof, you may ace the course with this novel idea which features a brilliant woman. Albert Camus in the myth of Sisyphus defends nihilism. He asks:
HERE is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy. All the rest— whether or not the world has three dimensions, whether the mind has nine or twelve categories—comes afterwards. These are games; one must first answer. And if it is true, as Nietzsche claims, that a philosopher, to deserve our respect, must preach by example, you can appreciate the importance of that reply, for it will precede the definitive act. These are facts the heart can feel; yet they call for careful study before they become clear to the intellect. If I ask myself how to judge that this question is more urgent than that, I reply that one judges by the actions it entails. I have never seen anyone die for the ontological argument. Galileo, who held a scientific truth of great importance, abjured it with the greatest ease as soon as it endangered his life. In a certain sense, he did

right.1 That truth was not worth the stake. Whether the earth or the sun revolves around the other is a matter of [4] profound indifference. To tell the truth, it is a futile question. On the other hand, I see many people die because they judge that life is not worth living. I see others paradoxically getting killed for the ideas or illusions that give them a reason for living (what is called a reason for living is also an excellent reason for dying). I therefore conclude that the meaning of life is the most urgent of questions. How to answer it? On all essential problems (I mean thereby those that run the risk of leading to death or those that intensify the passion of living) there are probably but two methods of thought: the method of La Palisse and the method of Don Quixote. Solely the balance between evidence and lyricism can allow us to achieve simultaneously emotion and lucidity. In a subject at once so humble and so heavy with emotion, the learned and classical dialectic must yield, one can see, to a more modest attitude of mind deriving at one and the same time from common sense and understanding.........................
Does the meaning of life for man initiate on the earth? All the battles that have caused so much horror in the world indicted that for the majority, the world creates meaning for our species. Yet the absurdity of the world indicates meaningless lacking any sort of reasonable morality. Morality becomes subjective

It all makes sense for all those who agree that the world is the source of both subjective meaning and absurdity. Consider how Simone Weil takes the minority position that the world is not the source of meaning for man. She takes us beyond the world by acquiring the ability for conscious attention to objectively move beyond the shadows which govern our lives and “see”

"...It is not for man to seek, or even to believe in God. He has only to refuse to believe in everything that is not God. This refusal does not presuppose belief. It is enough to recognize, what is obvious to any mind, that all the goods of this world, past, present, or future, real or imaginary, are finite and limited and radically incapable of satisfying the desire which burns perpetually with in us for an infinite and perfect good... It is not a matter of self-questioning or searching. A man has only to persist in his refusal, and one day or another God will come to him."
-- Weil, Simone, ON SCIENCE, NECESSITY, AND THE LOVE OF GOD, edited by Richard Rees, London, Oxford University Press, 1968.- ©
The world is a barrier. Can a person feel the absurdity of the world sufficiently to let it go and invite the experience of higher consciousness? Anyone with friends in AA for example has heard the effect of hitting bottom. This is a profound topic which should be spoken of in philosophy If the men are totally engrossed in arguing give a woman a shot. Rather than arguing who is right, what is gained by letting go and perhaps experiencing higher consciousness which offers the third alternative to the duality of nihilism. Some call the experience "revelation."
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Arising_uk
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Re: Albert Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus

Post by Arising_uk »

Just a small point about Camus's Sisyphus.

His freedom comes on the walk down as he is compelled by the 'Gods' to push the boulder up and he has no time for thinking about anything else but it is on the walk down where he is free to scheme, plot, plan, dream of a time of change in his situation. After all the 'Gods' or 'God' won't last forever.
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