Reality

Everything you take for granted, everything that makes you, you; your sensory experience. All of it: every time you see something, hear something, touch something, feel something. Over time it has been built up and archived in a vast rhizomatic network spreading throughout your entire body, and made up of cells called neurons. This build up of connecting neurons is what give’s you that sense of self. Your entire concept of “I” or being an individual comes from a culmination of sensory experienced throughout your life, gained and stored. Every time you move, a completely new signal/pathway is literally wired into your neurological channels; leaving an imprint of growth in its passing. This process affects every other related experience that comes in the future, as previous experiences are saved, but every experience is a still completely new experience; meaning it isn’t really “hard wired” so to speak. It’s more of a “soft” wiring with great plasticity, i.e., it’s defined and grown by its function, but is never absolute in its structure. There is always room for growth and change—the amount of cells given to us to use are almost uncountable. No matter what perspective we set ourselves in there is always room to create a new one or wipe some dirt off the lens and expand our awareness.

            The very architecture of these single neurons is a very beautiful thing that implies a “twoness” or “multiplicity”. On one end there are rhizomatic branches of dendrites that receive flows of current and on the other end are axons that rhizomaticly branch out and pass energy along. This structure doesn’t make sense as a single entity; they are designed to connect with an uncountable number of other neurons. They become one with communication, but are separated by a gap called a synapse. This lacuna gives rise to a desire for connection built within their very architecture, but they never truly connect or become one; they retain their distinctness—a container that doesn’t want to be contained. It wants to branch out and connect, to touch, to become something more than what it simply is, to reach ecstasy[ekstasis].  Why consider the basic neuronal structure at the basis of our being allowing it to function?  This archetypal functionality happens on every scale we as human beings can possibly imagine!

 

            By sensing and by experiencing we create everything that makes us and even the whole of “reality.” We are influenced and grown by the environment around us, especially by our movements and our culture or our societal/communicative environment. Outside reality comes in and flows through the body in an action potential wave of energy and is reflected back out into the outside reality to be experienced by other perceivers. Reality creates us and we create reality in a constant duel arching process linking everything into one—there is an oneness in the multiplicity of everything—as a constant flow of energy through sensory experience and the production of reality back out into the world. Every time you move, and it’s seen or every time you speak, and it’s heard is the process of reality in creation.

            Consider that feeling you get when it’s cold outside and you think, “burrr I’m cold” or you’ll say to a friend “it’s cold outside.” That’s the outside/other reality coming in and creating a feeling of cold, which in turn, is reflected back out in various energetic forms. Be it saying, “I’m cold” to the people or observers around you or even certain bodily movements like shivering or rubbing your hands together, which actually are used to generate heat through friction and movement; outside reality was sensed and created various responses that in turn changed the outside reality in an ever constant flow. 

            When you normally think of language you probably think merely of speech. The way we all communicate with spoken symbols, given meaning by social norms and formed of sound produced by the voice box vibrating air and sending it past the tongue and out the mouth, which changes the characteristic of the noise into recognizable patterns. You might say it’s what separates us from the animals or other animate organisms or that it’s what makes us special, right? It is what has allowed us to do everything we’ve done and everything we continue to do, right? We use it as our primary medium of language, and (seemingly) for most people, it is our only medium of communication. I believe this is extremely limiting. As we only utilize audible symbols to try and make a map that we hope someone else can follow to the exact meaning we were trying to articulate. But all that is left is a map to be interpreted by the sensory system of another, who will perceive it in any number of ways. The original meaning is gone, but imagine the potential if we did not limit ourselves to this single form of communication by placing it at the top of a hierarchy. What if we could truly communicate fullness of meaning?

 

Perhaps a fuller understanding of what’s going can help us do just that.  Communication is possible on so many more levels.  Be it a touch that communicates love between mother and child or a simple recognition of bodily postures or the reality one puts out.  What about these ever constant multidirectional flows of current transforming energy into all the manifestations of possible existence I just talked about.  Isn’t that behind the very basis of how we communicate on every possible level?  What if all of existence is nothing but language?  Everything flows in order to communicate, to connect, to touch, to become one, to resonate with the other.

            Imagine the change in perception as me moved from no speech, to oral language, to cave drawings, to written symbols, to manuscripts, to movable type, and to the internet on handheld devices that can access information on the vast rhizomatic network that connects almost all of humanity. I have used the word ‘rhizomatic’ a few times now and I feel that it may need some explanation and I believe it to be a wonderful word that will sum up any point I may have been trying to put in this written one way sham of a conversation. Think of the internet, a network of connections spanning the globe. It is used for the communication of information, and works by sending electrical signals or bits of energy arranged in patterns to mean certain things. Not only can we see this structural pattern of the internet in our own physical neurobiology, but also the least studied form of life on our planet, i.e, the mycelial networks of what most of us ignorantly know merely as mushrooms—and even the very cosmos and galaxies beyond.

 

Did all this just make sense?  Do you feel as if I transmitted beyond just the boxes placed on this page? Did I communicate something?  Was it the truth?  If so then what did I communicate?  Absolutely nothing you didn’t already know because you are constantly experiencing it happening even now as I write this and even now as you read this.  We are connected in time through this frozen piece of my words on a white page.  My part of the transmission will forever remain static, but yours however, yours is dynamic! What will you do with this new awareness I may or may not have successfully grown into your existence as a participating member of the human experience?

 

Crows and Ravens

Beautiful Crow, Dignified Raven

                See all this beautiful land around you? How did it get here, and who or what created it?  The common answer in the west would be God, being that Christianity is the overriding religion in this region of the world, but for some tribes such as the Koyukon, it is the raven who created all that we see around us. He [the raven] is the contrast, the enigma, the one.  He shares his appearance with crows, who have much of the same power if to a lesser degree.  They are the tricksters and clowns who play in the gaps of reality.  You’ll find these cunning black birds everywhere, “going about their dubious ways.”(Nelson 79)  Their possible home spans from the mountains in winter to the deserts in summer and everywhere in between.  Through a different lens, it is not God and his “mysterious ways” in the background of our reality, it is the raven and his cousins.  

                These birds are scavengers finding food the lazy way, as in they do not hunt for themselves, but rather wait for something that is already dead.  They will help a hunter find and make a kill, but then distract them taking the prize for themselves.  All the other animals in the forest share their kills with the raven, even wolves and the vicious wolverine.  He just flies right up, flapping around the meat and fouls “it with excrement.”(N 81)  The wolves do not seem to mind and eventually just walk away.  He seems to be the lord of the forest and is due reverence, but ironically makes his living at the expense of others through trickery. Sometimes he gives and sometimes he takes away, but the natives of this land do not worship him with every fiber of their being.  They realize they have power too and sometimes play his game; by knowing his tricks they can gain power, but no one out tricks the raven.

                In the story Raven Finds the Daylight, retold by Paul M. levitt and Elissa S. Gurlack, we see the foolish use of our power comparable to the ravens and how the raven had to trick us to bring out the sun.  Someone stole the sun, putting everything into darkness and all the animals complained.  Raven finally grew tired of their wining, got off his lazy bum and went out to find and bring back the sun.  He found it in the tent of a human chief, who knew of the raven and all his tricks.  The only way he could find to get into the tent was when the chief’s daughter came out everyday to grab drinking water, so he transforms himself into various forms: a leaf, a black berry, and finally a grain of sand that allows him to be swallowed by the chief’s daughter.  Once inside the girl, raven turns himself into a baby, impregnating her and is eventually born as a human boy. The creator impregnated a virgin girl and a human child was born, an incarnation of the creator in human form.  Sounds like Jesus to me, if we look through our common lens.

                The child began to grow up and all he wanted to do was play with the box that held the sun.  Of course no one would allow him to and one day the chief told him why he hid it away in the first place.  In the light everyone is absorbed in appearance and wealth, arguing over who is better looking and what not.  But in the darkness, none of that matters; everyone is equal and depends on each other to get by in the darkness.  This sounds like a good idea, but the sun is needed and this can never be. 

                The boy eventually gains the chief’s trust and manages to get a hold of the box and frees the sun back into the world, asking that it only comes out half the time. That is how raven restored night and day, correcting the foolish trickery of man through his own transformative mischief.  The raven is held in reverence, but paradoxically they use his name to denote someone else’s deceitful trickery or label something that is worthless and not worth one’s time.

In a survey on the miscellaneous small plants used by the Koyukon tribe, Nelson mentions their limited use of mushrooms.  They consider them almost useless and call the fruiting bodies by many creative, but demeaning names: deeltsa ‘babba is “mouse food,” dotson’ kkuskkoya’ means “ravens spear” for shaggy mane, dotson’ k’idiltsina is “raven’s snuff” for puffball.  They are not very useful and as such gain a tone of mystery about them, which seems to be why the name of the raven is placed upon them.  Mushrooms are mostly underground, running things from behind the scenes without you knowing about it; just like our favorite trickster.

                According to Nelson the only fungus they regularly use today is kk’ eyh anee’ona  or “lump on a birch.”  The story behind this one is interesting as it of course involves the raven.  Apparently this fungus was initially just wads of fat on all the trees, providing a surplus of easy available food, “but Raven that was too easy for people; they could just eat without working.  So he made his urine go on it, and after that it became birch fungus.”( N 56) Mushrooms made life too easy for us so our creator defiled them and hid them away.

Fungi regulate the ecosystem and without them forests would not exist. We would not exist.  What if fungi allowed us to evolve by providing an environment of plenty and then realized life was too easy for us, so changed and hid itself?  This tribe just attributed the change to the raven because it seems like a dick move the raven would pull.  Of course this is all speculation and it could easily just be a myth created to define the raven as a trickster and explain how he made the world the way it is.  Nelson gives the impression the story holds little importance so the later is more likely, but I would not count out the former as a possibility, as fungi are essentially our ancestors and creators; just like the raven.

While the raven is a rare sight, crows are everywhere, especially here in boulder.  They are lesser spirits but still have great power in their own right.  Enacting evil ways upon the power twins the crow is defeated and in order not to lose his life vows to have an attitude of “responsibility” and be “dependable.” (R 105) The crow sacrifices himself in a war ceremony, “my whole person, even my feathers, may be burned to blacken a person troubled by enemy ghosts,” and since then soot has been used to represent an area of protection.  Help and protection from the crows can be found and utilized; one only needs to ask and perform the ritualistic smudging.  I was not aware of this at first, but after noticing some coincidences I have begun to enact this practice and have found it beneficial.

                A few years ago I started noticing crows everywhere I went; just cawing away.  They were there outside my house every morning, in between classes, and even followed me around at some points.  I got curious and asked a few key people.  They all pretty much told me to start saying, “I’m listening” in my head, communicating through thought so to speak.  I was told they were trying to communicate and provide me with messages or lessons from the Great Spirit and that I only needed to become aware of it.  Since then I have been paying much more attention and have finally begun to understand what they are trying to tell me and the lessons I am being given.  One of these lessons stands above the rest.   

On the night of Thursday April the 4th, I met a bum named Bruce and a traveler, Jon and his dog, Navajo the Navigator.  Bruce called me over with what I feel like was a sincere question.  He honestly asked, “can you help someone like us/ourselves (sometimes ‘me’)?”  This was his question to anyone who walked by, just a plea for help without any judgment placed upon him.  He did however soon begin to fish for exactly what he needed: some spare change and of course and some “pot”.  I did in fact have a joint, but the weed I had was mixed with red willow bark, which strongly overtook the flavor.  This meant it did not give him that conditioned sensual response from just pot that he craved/required at that very moment.  The only difference between Bruce and ourselves being that in the morning, he was going to buy a bottle at exactly 8 a.m. to start his day. 

                Due to my past experience and understanding of addiction, I understood this and left it alone.  Jon however, could not.  And I don’t mean this in any negative manner; he balanced me out and provided a contrast to learn from.  Jon would humbly ask “why?” and say stuff like “in the morning I like to buy a banana or spinach.”  None of this reached Bruce as he would reply with some drunken nonsense integrated with some form of pointing out that the only difference between us and him was that he was going to buy a bottle with the spare change he managed to acquire.

                That was his reality and he was a sincere and honest commentator on the world around him that he was experiencing.  He was really pissed that I didn’t have any pot and made it very clear, almost getting in my face and yelling at me about it, “bitching” as he put it.  His anger did not faze me at all, I understood it and in that moment I really did not mind.  He could “bitch” as much as he wanted to for all I cared and I told him so.  I merely listened and wouldn’t let it get to me or change my perception of this man whose reality consisted of pretty much constant drunken oblivion. 

                His output did however, bother my new friend Jon.  He did not like how Bruce was treating me, as I was only trying to help and he brought that fact up to Bruce.  Bruce must have listened, because at that point Bruce stopped his anger/rant and changed tone and demeanor completely.  He sincerely thanked me for helping him out. Sadly, this switch only lasted a few seconds and he reverted back to his drunken “bitching”. 

                Near the end of our conversation, Bruce said something that I will not be forgetting anytime soon.  Out of the blue, he just pointed at me, looked me right in the eyes, and said something like, “fuck that crow” or “I hate that crow.”  When the crow pops up I tend to listen and in that moment I knew everything he said, or rather, my entire experience surrounding this individual could be seen as a message from the crow.  As a trickster, it makes sense that the crow would manifest its message into reality through a very unlikely source—a drunken man who lived outside. 

                Bruce talked of what he called “sincerity.” Acting or speaking truly in line with ones own feelings, thoughts, and desires; its being exactly who you are without a mask of some personality.  This man Bruce provided a perfect example of sincerity and I am glad I was in the right state of mind to stick around with such an unlikely teacher to learn something.   

                Lessons are everywhere, I find many from crows; the raven is a very rare sight however.  The messages are hard to understand and sometimes I end up doing the exact opposite of what I’m supposed to do, but that’s the way it should be.  I do not want everything to be handed to me.  Life would be too easy and I wound not learn anything or develop as a distinct entity.  However, I am not one to reject assistance. I look for teachers wherever I can find them.  I would much rather put my faith in a mischievous black bird that I can understand; He is obviously a trickster, not some all knowing, all powerful, and apparently all loving being in the sky.

 I think its fitting I end with a prayer.

I bless the four directions

all that they bring and

all that they take away

 

may they bring me nothing

but the way

may they take me to

the stars and heavens

above

 

Let the crow be my guide to

Finding my wings

so that I may soar

with the dancing Wind

on the road to

the sky

 

I come from the earth

but grasp for the stars

In that endless void that

looks down upon us all

 

Let the dance be my guide

my ride

my vessel

 

may it bring me to the

undulating dragon

 

may it take away

any aversion to symbiosis,

so that

we may never be alone.

Bibliography

 

Levitt, Paul M., and Elissa S. Guralnick. Raven Finds the Daylight and other American Indian Stories. Sante Fe: Clear Light Publishing, 2012. Print.

 

Nelson, Richard K. Make Prayers to the Raven: A Koyukon View of the Northern Forest. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1983. Print.

 

Reichard, Glayds A. “Navaho Religion: A Study of Symbolism.” Tucson: The University of Arizona Press (1983): 105-22. Print.

 

the dragon eats me ,

Flight Report, penis envy

I started with a prayer, asking for harmonization within myself, nature, and all of the people in my life. I spoke to the magical children, “los ninõs,” or if you prefer, the two grams of penis envy mushrooms as if they were alive, as if they have a will and influence over more than we know. As if they hold the gnosis. I ate the vile alien substance and sat down to watch as the communion with the symbiotic life form began. Very soon, what I can only describe as pulsating waves of energy began to emanate from my digestive track sending tingling sensations everywhere. An indescribable inner meaning that was not my own as far as I can tell, arose within me and I could sit still no longer.

I threw on my Vibram toe shoes, as my fear of hurting my feet had not yet been overcome by my absolute realization that I must be barefoot as much as possible, and ran off west into the mountains. I crossed the threshold into nature and instantly felt liberated. Finally away from the screaming cars, the blinding lights, and suffocating pavement I found peace. This is where we all belong, out in the nature that produced our kind. Not in some silly box. This is where we can truly learn the news.

By now the world was awake in a sparkling radiance of green and purple light, connecting all that grows and all that flows. I voiced a phrase, “I can see better without my glasses, but I need my glasses to see.” This tool that allows me to look into the visually dominated material world we have created for ourselves, holds no weight in this state and so I put them away. I noticed I was being watched. This was not the normal feeling that one might get when they feel they were being watched, this was quite literal. I was seeing eyes everywhere. Every leaf, every hole, every roll in the clouds contained an eye, phasing in and out—a literal manifestation of the exchange of visual information between the world around me and myself. I felt the world around me, creating everything I am through observation as I created all of it through my own power of seeing—a validation of existence.

Every rock contained a face. They are alive, but the difference is their form of consiousness is condensed into a static existence. Unable to move, they are unable to act and as such are unable to change any fate the winds or waters may flow. Some might call that hell, but some might call it immortality. I thanked as many as I could for being there, for allowing me to walk all over them and gave many a heartfelt apology for never noticing their animated existence before now. Up and up I climbed till I found the perfect cliff to spin around on.

Dancing with the wind warped trees I saw the flow that grew them into a beautiful twist. Catching the same wind of divine growth I spun around fearlessly on the edge of this cliff with the notion held that the mountain would do me no harm. Submitting myself completely to the flow of visions that inundated my body, I moved effortlessly along with the universe. Letting go completely I noticed my spinning arms were directing my visions, creating vortexes, spirals, which gave me an ecstatic feeling of pure joy. Realizations poured into my mind. My movements influence the flow. All movement influences the flow. By submitting oneself completely to this flow one gains great influence over it. This is Daoist non-doing. This is wizardry.

The clouds parted, revealing the brilliant full moon. I was bathed in an ethereal light, which seemed to pull me out into the sky. The reticulated eyes all around me began to dance and I watched in awe as everything turned into to spinning coils of radiant eyes, giving the impression of a snake, flowing into and out of everything—fractalizing into novelty. Instantly thoughts of Shiva beggining to dance as he wraps the snake around his neck awoke in my mind. This is the dance of Lord Nataraja, becoming one with the universe and dancing beyond duality. Becoming self and other.

Closing my eyes I could see everything in even greater brilliance. I flew inward down to the very basic levels of existence inhabited by the all-familiar double helix, dna. I watched them combine, building upon each other creating reality on every scale. I saw what we understand to be the blue prints of life coming together to create all there is in a completely ordered yet absolutely chaotic pattern. Layering and layering until the double helix evolved into every possible form. I zoomed all the way out to a void beyond voids, a blackness with a depth beyond conception. What I can only describe as an immaculately detailed Chinese fire dragon outlined by the coiling snakes, roared into my eyes. There were no words, but a meaning was received. “Stupid monkeys.” I accepted this as truth and it shoved reality in my face. Bathing me in incandescent fire, he consumed me and I found my self warping down its throat into the gigantic mass of coil-istic flowing energy that contains our universe. Splitting apart into eight aspects, I zoomed down these tunnels of reality from eight perspectives simultaneously and observed the universe observing itself from 8 different angles. It was like I was 8 different jewels in Indra’s web of chaotic reflection, each able to see every other particle in the universe. I’m a chimp in the matrix and this is number 8 whereas the movie told the story of number 7.

Instantly I recombined back into myself, sitting there staring at the rabbit in the moon, which created a kaleidoscoping vortex of recycled light throughout the world around me. There is no death, there is no time and now that I think about it, the giant spaghetti monster and all of his noodliness is a humorously accurate depiction of this vision of divinity.

The fungal children brought me into communion with an entity that rhizomatically connects and supports all life in our universe. This being is like a library of gnosis with all the information life in our universe contains. To this entity time and death are nothing more than silly monkey concepts we’ve created for ourselves, vastly controlling and limiting our experience of existence. Energy is a constant, it merely changes form. The vessel may die, but the energy goes on to come back around in one form or another.

On the spiritual path one wishes to find teachers to guide them along the way. Some learn from priests, some learn from gurus, but why only learn from human beings? Why can’t I find my teacher in an alien life form that was on this planet before even plants evolved? It is the perfect symbiont, the joker, the architect, the recycler, and the holder of gnosis: the goddess, yet contains the creation of male. It shows me what’s impossibly possible, what I am to become, and who I really am. Now I just have to put in the work to get there.

and so i failed . silly monkey. its like, the time it took for me to comprehend and then forget and its only now sinking in. I wouldn’t even like to explain it was all contained within that one vision every time i eat them now the answer is. ” well what do i show you.” you take mercy yet i’m so sensitive. i wonder why fear isn’t used. ” you solved that” then what is it this time? “that i never forgot” shitty i forgot. “thats ok do it now though.” again with the what but then hopefully i fall into it. “that’s the way its done, couldn’t be any other way.” what if i have a show to do ? “it wouldn’t be done.” i’m sorry. “its well thank you”

‘you either want to be in congress or the bible. settle down.’
-army of the homeless

Note: grow your own shrooms… the gang laces em with Crack or worse. And doesn’t grow them right. They also lie and like the word penis too much. If it doesn’t look even more like a dick than other cubensis, then it’s not penis envy strain. There are many different strains and they all do something slightly different, have their own character. Penis envy, named by TM are short and curly when not grown right yet a big thick dick when done right cause the veil does not break from the stem. They do not grow wildly because they don’t release spores. They are mutants. created this century by Terence McKenna. I got lucky and got some grown wrong but still good enough the first time to have this vision. Only need to try these once in a lifetime. My friend that took em with me was unlucky enough to have been given a crackspell in alcohol to never have a vision with shrooms cause the gang knew I was into them and he was my friend. The 2nd time I had em in Florida they were definitely laced with Crack and spelled not to have a vision so we just had a conversation. Usually the gang of dipshits just calls their b+ or golden teachers, all small thin white not blue, penis envy cause of the “potency” fame. 2 g led to the most intense flight experience I’ve had. Almost more intense than 14 g of Mexicans I grew myself and ate for the 2012 solar eclipse cause my friends weren’t really my friends, even though it lasted longer and never wore shoes again… sort of. Most of you won’t be able to eat more than the “heroic dose” of 5g. And b+ are stupids mutated by the gang to cause more waves and be more crackwhippable…

Why Argue?

Argument

What is it that we do in academic writing? Apparently it’s all about the argument: “a formal presentation of evidence that supports a particular claim or position regarding an issue of interest to a specific audience.” (csu writing website) By writing these conventional arguments we enter into the vast written discourse of academia throughout its known history. We cite what others have written about a certain topic and respond based on what they said or did not say. We are instructed to adopt a position of authority and make an assertion based on the assertions of those that came before, which in turn are based on the assertions of previous scholars and so-on. If this is the case, then how did all this “evidence” based assertion making process of answering questions begin? Does it even have a begging?

The assertions seemingly go on forever so there is no way an origin can be pinpointed, but perhaps we can look at the arguments that Socrates, “our first smart guy,” put forth. He never wrote anything down, believing that only face to face communication was worth anything—all the records we have of him are from his students. The ambiguity of these records form the basis for most criticism of Socratic thought, meaning we accept that we cannot fully define the beliefs of the one who is commonly said with little exception to be the initiator of western knowledge.

From Plato’s works we can make an assertion as to what this pioneer of thought believed. The most important, I feel, is the notion that he “knew nothing.” He was aware of his own ignorance and most likely by extension, the ignorance of the whole human race. If the guy that “started” this whole academic discourse held this concept that nothing can be known, then why are we making assertions like we know them to be true? This all “began” with a man who knew nothing, asking questions of all kinds, inspiring the people of his time to wonder and begin asking questions themselves. Why then are we constantly and solely arguing for certain answers over others? Why not simply get better at asking questions?

I make no claim as to why we’ve gone in this argumentative answering direction, but I think it would be important to consider the fact that the people of his time sentenced Socrates to death by a democratic vote. His crime: heresy and corrupting the youth, giving them a nihilistic and disrespectful attitude. The powers at be were terribly afraid of the people questioning their monopoly on the answers to religious questions and ideals of governance. They, as we still seem to today, cling to the established structure of conventional thought and practice. We cling to what we think we know and fear the un-known, but there is no difference because we don’t know anything.

We attempt to put a structure to things because it supposedly allows us to define, make distinctions, and say we “know” things. However, this is not the case. There is a free flowing movement involved that cannot be tied down into words. Derrida discusses this very issue and coins a new term, “Structure—or rather structurality of structure—although it has always been involved, has always been neutralized or reduced, and this by a process of giving it a center or referring it to a point of presence, a fixed origin.”(327) Structurality is a much better word for what is going on as it gives a sense of some stability, but with the vitality of movement inherent within the system. Even this word however does not get to the full picture as we cannot actually “know” anything. The words we use can never truly be what we wish to represent by using them, so maybe the problem lies within words and the language they create.

Derrida might agree with words being an issue as he claims, “language bears within itself the necessity of its own critique.”(331) Instead of falling into the same old trap of language and the standard convention of the argument that really does not get us anywhere at all, Derrida and as he claims Levi-Strauss follow a slightly different option. They play with “conserving in the field of empirical discovery all the old concepts while at the same time exposing here and there their limits, treating them as tool which can still be of use.” (331) We have no other way to enter the discourse, so even though we realize the fallacy of what we are engaged in. We still must forge ahead, but with an awareness and a disclamation of said flaws.

What if we adopted a voice of complete ignorance in writing and forming an argument? Would anyone take what we were trying to say seriously? I doubt it, but then how do we educate the “educated” that they are in fact ignorant so that I can say something while claiming to know nothing? How do we return to the sheer questing and wonder that started our whole academic quest for knowledge in the first place?