The Great Conjunction

One last thing to look forward to in 2020, besides this whole Annus Horribilis ending, is the conjunction of the two great planets, Jupiter and Saturn, on the winder solstice on December 21. The near approach of Jupiter to Saturn will be in the southeastern night sky and be visible by binoculars. The appearance under magnification might resemble Saturn appearing like a set of great horns upon the Great Lord of the Solar System.

I have not found an astrological significance to what such a great pairing can produce, although such an event must have produced a state of at least profound dread to ancient skywatchers. I have found a more prosaic, though no less ominous significance, in that a similar formation four centuries ago preceded the Maunder Minimum. This was the solar minimum that initiated a period of climate fluctuation, that probably devastated agriculture throughout the planet.

The fall of the Mongol Yuan dynasty in China, the devastation and misery in Central Europe during the Thirty Years War, the collapse of Irish agriculture that drove that unfortunate island's first immigration wave, all of these were probably attributable to this climate change. It really can't be hoped in this era that we won't avoid the same fate, as Solar Cycle 25 reportedly began about now, at the start of winter. Already, grain crops and soybeans in China, the Midwest, the Pampas and elsewhere, have been gravely impacted. 

One can only hope we react to this current crisis and act according to real world information and observation, not doctrine and supposition.

 Republican and Democratic

After both of us endured talk from well-meaning and well-informed people about how our nation was a 'democracy,' Some people use the terms interchangeably, which is somewhat understandable. After all, they are both representative forms of government. 

These days, it is impossible for the majority not to answer, if asked the question, what sort of governmental system is the United States of America under. Indoctrinated by their schooling, the media and eventually casual conversation, the answer comes back, 'We are a democracy.' Actually, we are a federal republic.

So what are the differences between the two systems? Such a question can fill volumes. For the sake of expediency,  I came up with a little empirical lesson to tell the two systems apart.

Question: As this is a constitutional republic, how do you vote?

Answer: Well, I make sure to register to vote, research the issues, consider the candidates and issues presented, do they represent my views, my interests, my particular take on public life, etc., etc.. Thus, when I go to the polls, I am informed and convinced as much as possible of how I am going to vote.

Good, now how do you vote in a democracy.

Answer: Why, the same way of course, they're the same system.

Me, speaking in a shocked voice: Well that's selfish of you! Haven't you considered the views of your family, your area, your fellow members of such and such union? Didn't you take into account the history of your ethnic identity, how your ancestors would want you to vote, how your faith calls you to vote, how truly small-minded it is to think only of your position, your interests, your self!

The conversation I just laid out is reminiscent of friends and acquaintances of mine who have returned to their native societies, democracies decades old or years old. While they long ago gave up the right to vote there, wherever there is, nonetheless the straitjacket of tradition that once confined them to one particular segment of society, one particular world view, is there to give them its cloying embrace, even as they exit the plane.

The unique sense of autonomy and opportunity, the self-reliance and yes, necessary uncertainty that is truly unique here in America, is largely the product of a system of rule of law. That law in turn, is enunciated by a constitutional framework based on individual rights that are considered both inalienable and intrinsic to the human condition. When one votes in this country, in theory at least, one votes as a constituency of one.

Things are different in a democracy. The Greek word 'demos' is usually translated as people, but a more direct translation is group. In fact, ancient Athens was divided into 'demos' of Piraeus, or those of such and such district, much like old-style wards of American cities. 

Such a system counts 'individuals' not as themselves, but as members of particular identities. In fact, modern-day identity groups can be seen as democracy in its purest form. In such a system, power is still the primary fixation of society, much as in earlier autocratic systems.

The primary difference is that whereas such systems are run by a small elite or narrow power structure, power in a democracy is divided among social identities, each with their particular interests and causes. If something unites these groups, there is no more stable, efficiently functioning system. If not, or if interests start to clash, the central society is subverted, and eventually civic order may be lost entirely.

Here in America, we tend to see the traits of foreign democracies in both positive and negative lights. On one hand, we might see an annoying groupthink, positive in its sense of community and social belonging, negative in the behavior it enforces among its members, as anyone who has endured a European strike for example, can attest. On the other, we see other peoples much more informed and socially active than their counterparts in this country, without appreciating the sense of obligation, if not outright coercion, that can be exerted in such communities.

One thing should be clear however, whatever the pros or cons of a democracy, the United States is most certainly not one.

 Adventures in French

Ah, French transitive conjunctions, I'm sure I'll get the hang of them, one of these days. This week's lesson covered the following:

Pour: for, as in the amount of time for something to either have happened or will happen.

Pendant: during, covering the two points of time, between which, something happened.

Depuis: since, or from a point in the past, to the present.

I suppose I could write: 'J'ai loue un appartment dans le ville de Calistoga pour deux mois.'

I rented an apartment in Calistoga for two months.

Or: 'J'ai etudie la Japonaise pendant Juin-Aout, 2011.'

I studied Japanese from June to August, 2011.

Something like that. 

Eventually, this will get natural.

 Dialectical Materialism

My name not being Karl Marx and the real fellow in all his boils, physical and mental, having been gone from us for almost a century and a half, I thought I might taking a stab at a description of the most famous thesis of his vast philosophical vision. After all, what is he going to do, return from some nonexistent Marxist hell and upbraid my analysis? Oh well Uncle Karl, here goes!

Now the important epistemological thing to take away from the doctrine, is the term itself. Neither 'Dialectical' nor 'Materialism' are defined conventionally. Dialectical does not refer to a system of mutual learning by conversation, nor does Materialism really have to do with random run-ins with countertops or other angry dogs or other objects with a definable presence of their own. 

Rather, dialectical in Marxian terms has to do with the classic Hegelian triad of Thesis, Antithesis, Synthesis. Marxian thought may be the furthest anyone has ever put Hegel to a practical application and history has confirmed it's as scary a consideration as it sounds.

As for Materialism, in Marxian terms, it's actually something of an odd hybrid of materialist and metaphysical principles. That is to say, matter that is taken into an intellectual frame of reference ceases to be ordinary matter and instead is transfigured into an abstract state. This last seems drawn from a peculiar German fixation on ascribing spiritual properties with material attributes and vice versa.

Therefore, a bunch of guys working at a factory, with families, cultures, dreams and aspirations of their own, are not merely a gang of people who happen to be working together. They are transformed by the ideology into producers of labor, the fundamental value in Marxism, workers who can be united into a power of their own, the Proletariat!

Say they are the thesis, the central figure in the vision of the Marxist. Since Marxism is a confrontational structure, this power has to be set against a power and authority that both defines it and grants a purpose to its existence, to be that which it is not. That antithesis is Propertied Capital, the exploitive class whose actions lead to the destruction of peoples and communities, namely the Bourgeoisie. 

These are shorn of their existence as trades, as families, as even individuals of variations in character and talents. Rather, is one lives by mind and connections, one is immediately branded as an exploiter and set within this class, no exceptions. That is the ruthless edict of Marxist social thought, that distills all it sees to labels that are to magically convey whatever it is that thing truly is, to reveal it totally, without any tiresome subtleties or reference.

Finally, the synthesis is the Class Struggle, the supposedly inevitable conflict between these two categories of human phenotypes that produces the Dictatorship of the Proletariat, the ultimate eschatology of human history. A society blessed by the high traits possessed by the Proletariat of selflessness, mutual support and community, traits that will apparently thrive after the old bourgeoisie structures based on exploitation, property and finance cease to be. By the way, according to the violent nature of this conflict as explicated by Marx, apparently proletarian virtues do not include compassion for one's enemies and respect for all human existence, oh well.

Well they would probably have to. Because frankly such a utopian scheme, and as much as either Marx or Engels tried to escape the utopian label, that is precisely what it is, has never really succeeded. As is the fate of any society that obviates the need for human activity, labor value if you would, to be compensated by some type of incentive, usually of a monetary nature.

But again Uncle Karl, that's just my take.

 When the Ground Turned to Jello

This Friday the 31st of October, a quake hit the Aegean Sea, beside the Turkish city of Izmir. It toppled buildings and caused the water to pour in both on the Turkish mainland and on the Greek island of Samos. Sadly, the casualties are in the hundreds, with dozens of dead, mostly Turkish. 

According to the USGS, the quake hit the Richter scale at 7.0. Like Proust's madeleine, it is odd how a spare detail or two can conjure an entire world of memories. For any native of the California North Bay Area of a certain age, memories are jogged of another quake that occurred two weeks to the day, thirty-one years ago. 

This was the Loma Prieta quake of 1989, an event marked by indelible images of cars falling into gaps in broken freeways, millions of people evacuating a World Series game and numerous buildings, sometimes remarkable efforts later to restore institutions and businesses sorely affected by this event. "Where were you when the shift hit the land" indeed! This writer remembers vividly traffic lights swaying on the Alameda in San Jose, and stopping by the side of the road as that transient but unforgettable feeling of the ground turning to jello came yet again into his life.

Yet another memory, one even farther into time and space, was the Great Lisbon Earthquake, whose anniversary happens to fall today, All Saints' Day, 1755. A day when all of the populace and guests of Lisboa was primed to festively mark a great Catholic festival, only to find themselves put through a three and a half minute hell that saw the very ground underneath them break and swallow lives, the great waters of the Atlantic gush into the Great Plaza itself. Such was the strength of the quake, at 8.5 to 9.0 on the current scale, that for many years, it was the most powerful quake ever recorded. It is said that even lakes in North America roiled in the aftershock and a great tsunami is recorded by the then inhabitants of the Azores.  The final death count may never be known, but is believed to be around 30,000-50.000.

Every once in a while, we humans cloaked in our hubris at the civilization we created, are brought down to remember that we may exist on this earth, but we don't control it. Please extend your thoughts and prayers for the people of the Aegean, as they struggle to cope with the traumatic aftermath of this latest reminder. In situations such as this, small things make a bigger resonance than we can ever imagine.