by Christopher Fulkerson
CF at the Grave of Arnold Schoenberg
"You may never get to touch the Master,
but you can tickle his creatures."
Proverbs for Paranoids, I
from Gravity's Rainbow, by Thomas Pynchon
Quoted in CF's CELESTIAL SIXTIES I
Aristotle
I wonder what we're all doing here. I see everybody walked, and is looking around for illustrations to talk about. We've got stone blocks, that's some kind of verisimilitude for you. What do you call a group of us? We can't call ourselves a "gaggle" or a "pride" of philosophers, those terms are taken by geese and lions.
Plato
You've said it. If a sense of wonder is the mark of a philosopher, then a group of philosophers is a "wonder" of philosophers.
Descartes
I have a great pick-up line we can start with.
Plato
You dolt, we just got us started with our own favorite pickup lines, about "wonder" and philosophizing.
Descartes
That's just naming, and rather solipsistic I must say.
"A Wonder of Philosophers" isn't going to help us pick up women. Let's use my pick-up line. You can use it in all kinds of situations. It goes like this: I think, therefore I am.
Husserl
Clearly, you have something in mind.
Descartes
I told you, it's about picking up girls. Come on, I'm French, cut me some slack.
My method got me into the Court of Queen Christina, and trust me, a tall glass of cold vodka was part of the deal.
Sartre
So he does
have something in mind.
Socrates
This situation is beginning to sound all too familiar.
The insinuations about young girls, the beverage. What next?
Plato
What else was in the deal?
Descartes
Leave the girl some secrets. You of all people should understand that.
Leibnitz
It’s all good.
Schopenhauer
Except that it’s all miserably bad, with occasional brief aesthetic relief.
Descartes
The place was cold, that's for sure. It's no secret I wasn't happy. Nobody could be happy in those conditions.
Hutcheson
That's not good.
Russell
The secret of happiness is to face the fact that the world is horrible, horrible, horrible.
Descartes
My pick-up line is better than yours.
Nietzsche
Happiness is best in large amounts. Let’s live it up. We can do it again and again.
Derrida
Let’s do it just the once, on film, and then go out for dinner. We can decide later, watching as many times as we like, what meaning it has each time we watch. Every dinner means something different, too.
McLuhan
Watching television is not about meaning. It's about watching television.
Derrida
OK but it's different every time you do it.
Heraclitus
Not only can’t we do it many times, we can’t even do it the once.
Hegel
That’s because nothing ever stays the same. You should read my books, they’re the best. I know all about being right.
Anselm
If you can even imagine it, it’s already been done.
Plato
The imaginary version is better.
Occam
You’ve said too much.
Aristotle
Let’s just talk about doing it here and now, shall we.
Augustine
Let’s do it now, before it’s too late. I have to be a saint later on.
Heidegger
It’s time for a campus be-in.
Arendt
I think I’ll pass.
Schopenhauer
It will be one big mess.
Socrates
How do you know?
Rousseau
Messy is good.
Fichte
Only if you like messy.
Leibnitz
That’s obvious. You’re not even off first base.
Kant
I agree, except about the mess itself. Don't even try to put that in a good light.
Wittgenstein
For every mess there at least two cleanups. But at least the second time, we’ll have jobs, and can do some travel. Let me show you how the solar system works, it’s my funniest skit.
Schopenhauer
We’re all going to wind up in a big mess anyway. Let’s sing a song.
Nietzsche
We need a really uplifting, tragic song.
Whitehead
We all need one.
Russell
How many would that be?
Whitehead and Leibniz together:
ONE!
Spinoza
They're singing my song.
Kant
Two can be singular, if the view is generally valid.
And if it's in the proper light.
Heraclitus
Well done, one duet!
Bradley
It works.
Derrida
It will be different next time.
Ward
I like it.
But I didn't say that.
Plato
I can imagine a better duet.
Althuser
They are overbearing.
Foucault
They are trying to get their way.
Nietzsche
You talk about their will to power like it's a bad thing.
Schopenhauer
Maybe they are gay, but surprise! that’s OK with me.
Plato
It would be best if we were all gay, since I figured out we are going to be women next, and animals after that.
Plotinus
I thought that's only if we continually degenerate.
Marx
You could have it the wrong way round.
Rousseau
You mean we're animals, becoming women?
I want a new contract.
Hegel
Let’s keep it a guy thing.
De Beauvoir
You men always put us women second.
Schopenhauer
I still say we need another song.
Nietzsche
I don't mind repeating myself. What we need is another tragic, uplifting song.
Schelling
It would give us a sense of purpose.
Derrida
What are you trying to say, when you say you don't mind repeating yourself?
Kant
I have done some work with categories and there is no category of “tragic, uplifting” song. You will never hear one, because it cannot exist.
Popper
If anyone sings even one, you’re wrong.
Althuser
You are overbearing.
Adorno
He’s also wrong, unless the song is a good song. But I didn’t quite say that. That would be too banal, even though it is true.
Arendt
You are the overbearing one, Wiesengrund. About the duet, it adds up to something bad.
Russell
Can you prove what it adds up to?
Bradley
How can "one" add up to anything other than "one?"
Wittgenstein
Exactly.
Hegel
Everything always adds up to three. Trust me, I'm right.
Althuser
You are overbearing.
Marx
One plus one sang one, that’s three.
Derrida
Next time it will be one hundred eleven.
Passmore
You don't think that. Levi-Strauss thinks that.
Derrida
Maybe I will think that next time I think of something.
Arendt
The total doesn't add up.
Adorno
Cut them some slack. Maybe they're on holiday.
Hegel
Now we’ll sing it as a trio. Marx, you’re on my left.
Heraclitus
Well done, bravo! You kids deserve a prize.
Sartre
No we don’t.
Frege
I don’t care what anybody thinks, that was all bad.
Wittgenstein
Don’t talk to them, they will only pretend among themselves that it made sense.
Schopenhauer
Until it leads to the inevitable undistinguished mess, if they sing it as a trio, it will be helpful.
Socrates
Are you sure of that? We need to talk.
Fichte
I can imagine it being sung as their own kind of song.
Hegel
If they sing it right now, it will make the most sense. But not as much sense as the next song will make.
Frege
It is impossible to understand how the two songs are related.
Pythagoras
Do the math.
Marx
Someone should do something about you Frege. It’s wrong to take people’s trios from them, the trios they make themselves and sing with their own voices.
Godwin
Everyone should sing regularly. Once a week, without fail. It is all we will need.
Marx
Godwin thinks a full-time job is a work camp.
Locke
No one is going to send Godwin to a work camp. America, maybe.
Adorno
Trust me, I've deciphered him, Frege worships Satan.
Arendt
You mean he worships you, Wiesengrund?
Plato
Let’s not say anything we’ll regret.
Wittgenstein
Yes, I think there is room for a second opinion here.
Popper
That’s good to hear. What an exception to the other day.
Wittgenstein (brandishing a poker)
Back off! I don’t like you any more.
Socrates
Maybe we need a change of locale. Let’s get peripatetic.
Plato
It's talk like that that got you into trouble.
Husserl
I take it there’s a place we can walk.
Leibnitz
I know one. It goes around that way. I was the first one to find it.
Magee
Everybody knows that that’s not what we’ve decided everyone has agreed.
Russell
Let’s go to the sit-in at the be-in.
Decartes
The what-in?
By the way, you're a crappy mathematician.
Heidegger
If you sit-in at my university, you do the cleanup, or your time is up!
Sartre
I know nothing, nothing! Look, I need to catch up on my reading.
Heidegger
I'd like to see that happen.
Hume
None of us knows anything.
Socrates
I sure don't.
Popper
Me neither.
Locke
Take it easy everybody. We weren’t born with agendas. There is no harm in talking about going to lots of different places.
Adorno
I also have a lot of experience with the number three, you know. I know when someone is up to something.
Heidegger
Only if it messes with one of your agendas.
Schopenhauer
We really are headed for a big, big mess. Another song would help.
Adorno
But we need better songs.
Plato
I imagine they exist.
Aristotle
What we really need is for somebody to actually sing a song.
Peirce
That’s right. Let’s keep it real.
Dewey
Make it a song we all can sing.
People of all ages.
Marx
Everybody is just philosophizing. We need action.
Dalai Lama
Or not.
Hegel
Now would be a good time for that third, better song.
Frege
Nothing anybody is saying makes any sense at all.
Antisthenes
I want no part of it.
Heidegger
This is doggerel.
Diogenes
You called, master?
Arendt
You’re not teacher’s pet. I am. Maybe.
Wittgenstein
You should have passed over that in silence.
Adorno
No need to say what everybody knows, that Heidegger is a bad man for saying certain things. I've deciphered what he meant, and he's suggesting Antisthenes is a dog.
I didn't say that, and I'm not in denial about it.
Crowley
Everybody should say what they like, and I am definitely not in denial about it.
Russell
What are you doing here?
Adorno
Pretentious charlatan, avant! Go back to the market place from which you came.
Popper
This is going to go on forever.
Peirce
I wouldn't be too sure of that.
Epicurus
Nothing to worry about, it will all end with our deaths.
Wittgenstein
But we will never know it.
Leibnitz
It’s no problem. I know, since I was the first to work it out.
Magee
No you weren’t. I have an illustration almost as good as one of Heidegger’s. Let me say that we know the chicken came before the egg. The fact that the egg got delivered first doesn’t matter. That’s what we all agreed.
Husserl
It appears to me that that's what you agreed on your side of the English Channel.
Schopenhauer
This is getting messy. There is going to be one vast undistinguished mass of albumen everywhere.
Schoenberg
Not even albumen. Carbon.
Schelling
Don’t forget the yokes at the core.
Augustine
That's a good yoke.
Whitehead
Everyone gets one.
Descartes
One egg? I'll take mine next week.
I hate fresh eggs.
Heidegger
He is not even going to pay attention when he cracks the egg with that spoon. But that's a good thing.
Hume
We don’t know that the spoon ever touches the egg. You have to admit we can’t even prove that we have personalities. We don’t know that we’re alive. Do you notice how cheerful I am about all this?
Rousseau
I like the things you say. You are such a decent person, I am moving in with you.
Fichte
There is no spoon.
Dalai Lama
That’s your Dharma.
Plato
I imagine there is a better life. This is just a rehearsal for death.
Wittgenstein
There's no need to rehearse death. It's not even an event in life.
Aquinas
Are you sure you're not a Jesuit?
Epicurus
Let’s enjoy life while we can. We need some women.
Mill
Damn straight we do. We need them right here, close up, all the time. No more of this putting off the women.
Russell
That's my kind of godfather.
Ayer
Your lay godfather.
You don't believe in God.
Leibnitz
Enough about eggs.
De Beauvoir
We women can make ourselves available. But you have to have the right philosophy, because we’re not here to solve all of your problems at the last minute, and forever. We're not here to save you from your own mistakes.
Hegel
I have the right philosophy.
Arendt
Behind every philosopher is a phenomenal woman. Maybe. But don’t be overbearing.
Althuser
I guarantee you, they are overbearing.
Skinner
They are just exibiting behavior.
Quine
No, they are manifesting behavior.
Hefner
Behavior is not exhibited, it's manifested? So if I do not stare at a well-endowed girl's big boobs, that must mean I did not notice them, and am not thinking about them.
Quine
What are you doing here?
Hefner
I wrote the Playboy Philosophy, and as you can see I smoke a pipe at least as cool as Bertrand Russell's, cooler maybe. He and I share certain philosophies. Oh Russell, would you like to do the Playboy Interview?
Russell
Nice pipe. I'd be delighted.
Do you want me to come to Chicago, or Los Angeles? Or do you want to send someone to Penrhyndeudraeth?
Ayer
Great idea. Now I'm going to have to plan a trip to Los Angeles or Chicago.
Wittgenstein
Does the Playboy Philosophy take into account my Picture Theory of Meaning?
Hefner
Picture Theory is very important at Playboy.
Wittgenstein
What is the meaning of that proposition?
Schlick
The meaning of a proposition is the method of its verification.
Hefner
So if she comes upstairs only to look at my etchings, we were talking about art all along.
Anyone from Oxford
The Playboy Philosophy is not philosophy.
Wittgenstein
On second thought, I think it is unimaginable that this discourse could be enjoyed. We need to sort things out. We need to drain the swamp of all these creepy philosophers.
Aquinas
And of all this talk about sex. I have understood every pun anyone has made here.
Zeno
Stop complaining. Someone take charge.
Marcus Aurelius
I suppose that would be me.
Aquinas
We need a Higher Authority.
Nietzsche
There is no higher authority. He is dead. What we need is Superman.
Anselm
We’ll just think of a new Higher Authority, and he will be there.
Crowley
Only if we’re ready for him. Better study up. Here is a crib sheet I made up on my own. Here is another one, but I did not write it, it is from that other world you guys always talk about, but whose characteristics you can never agree on. I'm in touch with some bigshots there.
Aquinas
Like who?
Crowley
Wittgenstein. And the doorman at the Schoenbrunn.
Aquinas
You do know that Wittgenstein is dead.
Crowley
His death never occurred in
his lifetime.
Aquinas
Right. Why is the doorman a big shot?
Crowley
If he knows why you are about to knock he opens the door without your having to.
Dewey
How professional.
Adorno
Oh magickal sophist, what do you know about studying up? Just shut up, or I guarantee, you’re going to be interrogated by a hostile journalist that I just happen to know but am not even going to have to talk to about it, and then all your stupid magic wand waving will be on the front page.
Crowley
I could use a front page.
Socrates
He’s not as expert at wand waving as he thinks. We talked about this, and I made him see.
Dewey
He needs a hands-on course.
Arendt
Wiesengrund, are you sure you're not in the Mafia?
De Beauvoir
Different people wave different wands in different ways.
Dalai Lama
She waves the wand of no wand.
Fichte
She waves the wand she made her own in her own way.
Sartre
I'll say she does.
Plato
How about your service of Aphrodite, is your natural force still unabated?
Sartre
If you don't know that, you know nothing.
Aristotle
Careful, he is baiting you into making a non-natural motion.
Archimedes
He's forcing the issue.
Abelard
I don't like this discussion.
Socrates
Don't be hard-headed.
Heloise
This is the best discussion I've heard in a long time. Who has the best theory about all this?
Hegel
That would be me.
Descartes
My pick-up line is better than yours, too.
Plato
I can imagine a better higher authority.
Descartes
But not a better pick-up line.
Plato
The Thracians do it best. No pick-up lines, it's all done by appointment.
Aristotle
Watch what you’re saying, somone will overhear you. Remember what happened to Socrates. First there are the journalists. Then the bartenders.
Dewey
It’s about time someone with a practical skill was mentioned here.
Socrates
If you think that’s practical, this is definitely a rehearsal for death.
Plato
You're referring to that time you had one drink too many.
Peirce
Keep it real.
Heraclitus
There is a way to bring this all together.
Whitehead
That’s an adventurous idea.
Heraclitus
And it doesn't involve stepping in anything.
Leibnitz
That would be best.
Sartre
You're talking merde!
Heraclitus
Let’s not let the opportunity slip away.
Marcus Aurelius
This is becoming difficult to endure, but I'm not complaining. It is good to be Emperor.
Crowley
I will
endure to the end.
Wittgenstein
If we sort it out properly we won’t have these problems.
Dalai Lama
Sorting things out? Are you the laundry master?
Pythagoras
Do the math.
Frege
I don’t get the connection there.
Hume
That’s no surprise. Everybody has to admit there is no connection.
Heraclitus
Don’t you understand why you can’t see the connection?
Russell
There could never be a connection.
Frege
There is no connection, and I am not in denial about it.
Whitehead
There could be a connection. Maybe a little one.
Adorno
It’s a scandal.
Leibnitz
It’s the best possible scandal.
Adorno
It will be in all papers. We’ll do a discussion about it on television. Then we'll do a special journal issue. Then we'll go on vacation to Italy.
Schopenhauer
That will only result in more scandals.
Derrida
If you do a TV special, the rerun won’t mean the same thing as the first time you show it.
Quine
If you say too much, you’ll only have to say more. Russell, I think this is about you. Tell us there is no connection.
Hefner
Yes, now would be a good time for that interview.
Russell
If I gave an interview, I would begin by talking about how much I like Fregeian philosophy. Then I would move on to more advanced positions. To get a better Fregeian philosophy.
Heraclitus
That’s excellent. Really well done. Bravo!
Aristotle
I’m surprised you went there with that.
Wittgenstein
He likes puns on names. It's an inside joke.
Ayer
Ahem, Russell, Mill put you up to that, didn't he?
Whitehead
Where's my wife?
Schopenhauer
You’ve stepped in it now, Russell.The vast, undistinguished mass, I mean.
Sartre
There it is.
Derrida
Watch your step.
Heraclitus
No one is stepping in anything, not even once.
Fichte
Nobody.
Wittgenstein
We’re not even talking about stepping. When you talk about stepping, you are just talking to yourself, and it means nothing.
Schelling
Everybody is always stepping in everything everywhere. It’s only natural.
Schopenhauer
This is really all dreck. Really drecky dreck. The dreckiest. I need an aesthetic experience. I think somebody here is gay.
Sartre
It's nothing.
Heidegger
That's dreck too.
Ryle
It's just talk about talk.
Hawken
It's unsustainable.
Popper
Except that it never ends.
Foucault
I agree that somebody here is gay.
But I wasn't talking about myself. I don't want to go to jail.
Locke
Nobody's going to send you to jail. Australia, maybe.
Schelling
We truly need another song.
Hegel
A third song to resolve this conflict. Right now.
Imhotep
Then we’ll build a monument to it.
Bentham
No, a university. I promise to stay on the committee. I don’t need to cast a vote.
Lenin
That's my kind of man.
Marx
Votes are a waste of time.
Kant
We’ll need textbooks. Better write some quickly.
Aquinas
We'll need a whole syllabus. Maybe two. I’ll need time, and a quiet place to write. With no women around, of course.
Heidegger
There’s time, if you’re down for it. There's a hut on the next hill over from mine.
Russell
I’ll take care of the women. Huts, you say?
Hegel
No need to write anything. We’ll just use my books. After all, my philosophy is best.
Dewey
But the textbooks should be practical.
Peirce
That's right, keep them real.
Wittgenstein
We’ve done this all before. I had it all worked out. Why do we still need philosophy?
Whitehead
Don't you know where you are in your own process?
Popper
Trust me, sometimes he gets confused.
Nietzsche
If it’s worth doing at all, it’s worth doing again.
Plato
I wonder.
************
c Copyright 2010 by Christopher Fulkerson