Paris, France

Love it.  Friday, or Saturday, I don't know when exactly, I lost my debit card. I agonized about it for ages Sunday morning when I found out I didn't have the card.  I cancelled it, had a shower, worried about how many things could have been bought on the internet by then on my card, got dressed, went out to retrace my steps and hope to find it.  Getting downstairs, I checked my mailbox.  The card was in it.  

Hate it.  Having cancelled the card Sunday morning, I had to go to the bank today to put in a request for a new one.  I get there, the branch is closed.  It closes on Mondays.  

Love it.  France, to everyone's surprise, voted YES for Palestine to join UNESCO today.  Now, this alone makes me love living in this country, especially when everyone and his brother thought France would either abstain or vote NO.  "Be realistic, demand the impossible."  Yes.  Sometimes, someone just has to take a chance and do what seems impossible.   

Hate it.  On the way to the bank, I was walking down one of the poshest avenues in this city, Avenue de Breteuil, when I felt something falling on my right arm.  It was a puddle of spit.  Someone spat out of the window of a building anyone would label as "chic".

The many faces of La Douce France, Marianne

Vox Animus

Man Ray, Hand on Lips, 1929

Shirin Neshat, Hand against lips, 1997

Slow

Hot

Wind

What I really wanted was to have taken a photo of the Southern Cross, but my camera isn't good enough for that, and plus which I'm sure it can be easily found online.  I saw the full moon last night out my window, and remembered I'd taken these pics in Brazil, last month. It got a lot higher&brighter than this, but the battery gave up... 

slow hot?

slow cold?

fast hot?

fast cold?

none at all?

The Word According to Tom Wolfe: Chapter 3 of 5

Darwin, Marx, Freud, (E.O.) Wilson? Tom Wolfe says the common thread there is the power of the word — of ideas that change human history in large and obvious ways. 


The Word According to Tom Wolfe: Chapter 4 of 5
Tom Wolfe says evolution ended when man learned to speak — with the dawn ofhomo loquax. Where status for the beast of the field is determined by power, for man it is determined in innumerable ways because of language. And it is language that gives us rational thought. Wolfe asks, “Have you ever see an animal shrug?” 

Finally, something different from Homo sapiensapiens!

Adventures of Isabel 

Odgen Nash 

 

Isabel met an enormous bear, 

Isabel, Isabel, didn't care; 

The bear was hungry, the bear was ravenous, 

The bear's big mouth was cruel and cavernous. 

The bear said, Isabel, glad to meet you, 

How do, Isabel, now I'll eat you! 

Isabel, Isabel, didn't worry. 

Isabel didn't scream or scurry. 

She washed her hands and she straightened her hair up, 

Then Isabel quietly ate the bear up.

Once in a night as black as pitch 

Isabel met a wicked old witch. 

the witch's face was cross and wrinkled, 

The witch's gums with teeth were sprinkled. 

Ho, ho, Isabel! the old witch crowed, 

I'll turn you into an ugly toad! 

Isabel, Isabel, didn't worry, 

Isabel didn't scream or scurry, 

She showed no rage and she showed no rancor, 

But she turned the witch into milk and drank her.

Isabel met a hideous giant, 

Isabel continued self reliant. 

The giant was hairy, the giant was horrid, 

He had one eye in the middle of his forhead. 

Good morning, Isabel, the giant said, 

I’ll grind your bones to make my bread. 

Isabel, Isabel, didn’t worry, 

Isabel didn’t scream or scurry. 

She nibled the zwieback that she always fed off, 

And when it was gone, she cut the giant’s head off.

Isabel met a troublesome doctor, 

He punched and he poked till he really shocked her. 

The doctor’s talk was of coughs and chills 

And the doctor’s satchel bulged with pills. 

The doctor said unto Isabel, 

Swallow this, it will make you well. 

Isabel, Isabel, didn’t worry, 

Isabel didn’t scream or scurry. 

She took those pills from the pill concocter, 

And Isabel calmly cured the doctor. 

Amo, amas, amat...

...amamus amatis amant...

Amaryllis

Discourse & Truth

Michel Foucault

"Parrhesia" is ordinarily translated into English by "free speech" (in French by "franc-parler", and in German by "Freimüthigkeit"). "Parrhesiazomai" is to use parrhesia, and the parrhesiastes is the one who uses parrhesia, i.e., is the one who speaks the truth.

(...)

Parrhesia and Frankness

To begin with, what is the general meaning of the word "parrhesia"? 

Etymologically, "parrhesiazesthai" means "to say everything – from "pan" (everything) and "rhema" (that which is said). The one who uses parrhesia, the parrhesiastes, is someone who says everything he has in mind: he does not hide anything, but opens his heart and mind completely to other people through his discourse. In parrhesia, the speaker is supposed to give a complete and exact account of what he has in mind so that the audience is able to comprehend exactly what the speaker thinks. The word "parrhesia" then, refers to a type of relationship between the speaker and what he says. For in parrhesia, the speaker makes it manifestly clear and obvious that what he says is his own opinion. And he does this by avoiding any kind of rhetorical form which would veil what he thinks. Instead, the parrhesiastes uses the most direct words and forms of expression he can find. Whereas rhetoric provides the speaker with technical devices to help him prevail upon the minds of his audience (regardless of the rhetorician's own opinion concerning what he says), in parrhesia, the parrhesiastes acts on other people's mind by showing them as directly as possible what he actually believes.

(...)

Parrhesia and Truth

(...)

It would be interesting to compare Greek parrhesia with the modern (Cartesian) conception of evidence. For since Descartes, the coincidence between belief and truth is obtained in a certain (mental) evidential experience. For the Greeks, however, the coincidence between belief and truth does not take place in a (mental) experience, but in a verbal activity, namely, parrhesia. It appears that parrhesia, in his Greek sense, can no longer occur in our modern epistemological framework.

(...)

If there is a kind of "proof" of the sincerity of the parrhesiastes, it is his courage. The fact that a speaker says something dangerous – different from what the majority believes– is a strong indication that he is a parrhesiastes. If we raise the question of how we can know whether someone is a truth-teller, we raise two questions. First, how is it that we can know whether some particular individual is a truth-teller; and secondly, how is it that the alleged parrhesiastes can be certain that what he believes is, in fact, truth. The first question – recognizing someone as a parrhesiastes – was a very important one in Greco-Roman society, and, as we shall see, was explicitly raised and discussed by Plutarch, Galen, and others. The second skeptical question, however, is a particularly modern one which, I believe, is foreign to the Greeks. (...)

Lectures, 1983, Berkeley Uni