Práxis and Theory

(Coseino enters the aula magna. All over he registers lively faces, rosy with expectations, but somehow flabbergasted. Perhaps this academic panorama just reflects the after effects of the intellectual showdown of the previous week. With a broad, friendly smile, he begins to calm the troubled minds.)

Coseino: Today we will dedicate the whole session to revision of all the things which we have studied and thought until now. Hence, please relax, and as always, enjoy your class to the fullest. There are so few things in life which one can really enjoy, hence do not miss this lovely opportunity. I welcome all comments and contributions. Karl, do you have any ideas how we could improve our thinking faculties, our memory and emancipatory endeavours?

Karl: In order to develop new ways of thinking, a person must recognize and understand his/her emotions that inhibit and stimulate the thinking process. An adaptation of the technique of the Strasberg school of dramatic acting called "affective memory" will help accomplish this.

Coseino: Excellent. Please, tell us how the technique of affective memory, how emotions and feelings, could assist us in improving our mental capacities and faculties.

Karl: The person stimulates in him/herself about a dozen major real life emotional experiences, which he/she could call up for all possible thinking situations. He/she identifies which of these emotional experiences will inhibit and which will stimulate his/her development of new ways of thinking about a particular subject. After acquiring an understanding of why he/she is affected by these experiences, through self-analysis, the person rejects the inhibitors and uses
the stimulators.

Coseino: I note that our unilogical method of "identification", of "self-analysis", that is, to analyse yourself and also to analyse anything all by yourself, is demonstrated here in an exceedingly fertile manner. But, please, proceed!

Karl: Rehearsing this technique by talking/listening, using an audiocassette recorder/player, should provide excellent feedback. We all recognize that the process of learning about improving how we think is quite complex; however since the "affective memory" technique has helped various actors improve their on-stage performance, this adaptation should help us enhance our thinking process. This technique and its adaptation should involve tapping a certain type of mental energy; so identification and exploring this energy should facilitate our thinking process improvement activities.

Albert: I find this a magnificent method to improve our thinking in general, and our affective memory in particular. I am sure that Prof. Coseino will agree with us.

Bill: What kind of "data" should we remember, should we" store" as "zip-files" in our "data-base", giving these data the most efficient, affective and effective "paths"? So, that when we urgently need this information, that we simply could "unzip" it? In this way, at the very wink of an eye, it could very easily reach our conscious mind, our thinking; consequently, at the spur of the moment, reproductively we would be able to process this information in our thinking and emancipating endeavours.

Albert: Surely, Karl was not suggesting that you should convert your "brain" into a "Giga-Computer"! Bill, we will have to delete our Patrian "data base", saving the few "mini-folders" which could serve as a permanent "warning signal", reminding us of the previous cataclysmic, formal-logical "deluvium". The trouble is, that we have to search in our own "Infoseek" for new Unigories, Diagories, Triagories, etc., we have to replace all the useless "data", "facts" and "absolute truths", which we have inherited from our capitalist socialization, and which hovers like a Damocles Sword over our heads.

Patricia: I am very suspicious about all patrian "concepts" which we have inherited from our socialization process, which have already been identified as the tragicomic "Swan's Song" of Thinking and Thought. For scientific a n d philosophic Thought, we have already identified how useless terms like "race", "racism", the "human being", "democracy", "world peace", "instincts", etc., could be. I am just wondering what are the real origins, the ideological contents of "concepts" such as "feelings", "emotions", "love", etc.?

I find these concepts in operation wherever the vilest forms of indoctrination, manipulation and brain-laundering, in one word, where Mind Control can be detected. Perhaps, we should dedicate a future philosophic class to this topic. Thus, we would be able to fill these words with new emancipatory contents, hence generating our own percepts, concepts and trancepts. These would surely serve emancipation purposes. The ones which we use daily, which pertain to "common sense", logically can only serve the interests of the very exploitative, dominating, discriminatory and alienating system. I am not an enemy of feelings and emotions, but what I experience daily, what I witness around me, simply generates a sado-masochistic inferno. For sure, Karl would agree with me; he definitely meant another type of "affective memory".

Coseino: Yes, Patricia, in a future seminar we will surely discuss this topic.

Alfred: Prof. Coseino, I find it very sweet that you want us to relax, to recover from the last ontic onslaught. Nonetheless, the only way to tranquillize us, is to summarize very simply what has been dealt with in our previous class. Would you please be so kind as to oblige?

Concerning Intellect a n d Reason, among other things, there are three major ways in which we can do something a n d think about something. Firstly, we simply do the thing. And in our sense, the slogan : "Do It Yourself !" is very appropriate here. This implies that our Cosmic Being (generally known as our body) acts; and being a cosmic being, it is Cosmos itself which acts. We are natural, and naturally we act. What is Cosmos ? Precisely this is Cosmos! This is Praxis!

Secondly, we exist, therefore we are conscious, and as result of this, we think about our cosmic being, about our body, about our acts; we, as Einai-In-Itself, think about our essential acts, about Cosmos acting, about Cosmos itself, about our corporeal acts. Contrary to Plato’s Vision, which is purely passive and receptive, we actively exist consciously a n d we thoughtfully perceive our Action. This is the content of our Percept. As such Theory exists! As such we understand: Think it Yourself!

Coseino: We are scientific: We act in Cosmos and Cosmos acts in Us, a n d , We think about our scientific Acts a n d We consciously act scientifically. We are natural, we are being intellectual, We praxis (practice) Natural Science. How does Einai-In-Itself exist ? As such Einai-In-Itself exists, as Natural Science, as Intellect.

In the Patria, Einai-In-Itself exists perverted; its a n d -Relation has been reduced to a simple and-Relation. For this reason, Labour in general, and Intellectual Labour in particular, have become Private Property, Commodities on the Global Market.

Karl: I suggest for consideration that we discuss Labour and Property in a future seminar.

Thirdly, we do not only think about acts and actions, we are not only scientific, we also theorize, we philosophize, we socialize, we reason. We think intellectually
a n d rationally. Rationally we question our own thinking, our ideas and our thoughts, we transcend them, we renovate and surpass them.

Coseino: Beyond doubt, Bill; but we will "hack" and "crack" all the "absolute truths", we will insert our own "serial numbers", our Percepts a n d Concepts AND Transcepts. We will design our own Method, our own Web Site; rationally, we will transcend our very "Home Page".

Nothing that we expound here is absolute, exists as an absolute truth ; within its specific context, methodologically, on a certain level, some statement can be "true", in another context, on another degree, it could be "false", and on another mension, it will be "neither true, nor false". This is what we understand by "thinking about thinking", by thinking about thought, by Reason a n d Reasoning, by Einai-For-Itself. In this sense, we are formal-logical, we exist dialectical, but we reason far beyond these realms ; we uni-, dia- , tria- and zil-logize, we excel, we transcend all "absolute truths". But to excel an "absolute truth", we must first identify it, affirm it, only then we can negate and superate it. This, Reason as Intellect a n d Reason, as Natural Science a n d Social Philosophy performs. In this way, Einai-For-Itself, Reason, exists as a Gegensatz, as Intellect a n d Reason, as Science a n d Philosophy.

I sincerely "hope", Alfred, that this summary is what you all wished to hear.

(The faces are more rosy than ever. The fragrant perfume of spring roses slowly faints into flagrant oblivion, into Nothing, into Transcendence.)