Enjoying the view from Limbo
We spend a lot of time (which is itself an illusion) hemming and hawing with mock-profundity about what we are going to do, as though we were making decisions, rather than merely waiting to do what we must do. We must either flow with the wave in which we inevitably find ourselves, or struggle to remain standing and resistant against its force. But...
Ideas and Reflections / What is Progressivism?
by Daren Jonescu · Published November 22, 2023 · Last modified November 24, 2023
There is no living politician I know of whom I would trust unmonitored with my wallet or my cell phone. Why in the world would I trust one with my liberty or my need to know the truth about anything? Steps are being taken, in every advanced country on Earth, towards establishing the latest manifestation of the totalitarian dream, a cashless society, which...
When the alternative to being what they hate is being what you hate, you must ask yourself which of those alternatives you would prefer to avoid. All and Some.– If you want any of your life, you must accept all of it. Coming to terms with that fact and its deepest implications is perhaps the greatest challenge of the serious life, and its...
Knowing all the facts in the world grants not the least bit of understanding of what is actually happening, let alone what is likely to happen, anymore than reciting the dates and numbers of history grants the least wisdom about why events transpired as they did. What is needed, rather, is an understanding of human nature, including its most common weaknesses, defensive postures,...
Late modernity, having adopted naïve materialism as its religion, has dismissed the belief in the immortality of the soul, not merely as a logical consequence of rejecting the soul itself, but rather morally, objecting to the belief in an immortal soul as a kind of cowardice, specifically a refusal to accept the “hard truth” of life’s brevity and the absolute finality of death...
The future.– Everyone will die soon, and no one knows how soon, unless he is the one facing that moment right now. You might be next, for all you know. And yet you allow your life’s worth to be reduced by coercive authority and condescending experts to the refrigerated prolongation we call security and comfort, as though it were enough, “for the time...
Every human being who was ever born on this planet has either died or is currently in the process of dying. Those currently in the process of dying will certainly complete their process successfully, if the entire history of all living species is any grounds for prediction. To approach life, then, as though the avoidance of death were the primary goal or ultimate...
In his book, O.J. Simpson says that he would have taken a bullet or stood in front of a train for Nicole. Man, I’m going to tell you, that is some bad luck, when the one guy who would have died for you…kills you.
— Norm Macdonald, “Weekend Update,” Saturday Night Live
The darkness of the concept, the patient, deliberate set-up, the bluntness of the punchline…
Franklin Delano Roosevelt famously said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” As the human race has more than amply proved in recent times, Roosevelt’s warning was exactly correct — though not exactly in the sense that he intended.
For Roosevelt meant that men’s fear of paternalistic government and socialist legislation was the only thing preventing them from escaping economic depression…
From a student who likes to fire random “meaning of life” questions at me, I received an e-mail with this reflection: Even if I will die tomorrow, is it meaningful for me to learn something? If not, I don’t want to. My reply: To learn is to improve your soul. So your question also means, “Even if I will die tomorrow, is it...
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