Slack holes are a mystery to us. I am not a cosmologist and deal with black holes in a popular scientific way with a philosophical interest. They mark a limit to our imagination. Gravitational force influences space and time, says science. Concentrated at one point, it compresses matter to its pure substance, squeezes atomic nuclei and electrons together to form a mass [...]
Working on a utopia
Et is definitely time to rethink. What our fathers and grandfathers called progress is destroying our planet. Science is not an end in itself, not everything that is technically feasible is good, not everything that is fun and satisfies our senses is useful. Now we keep hearing from many sides that we should focus on the small steps ahead [...].
Plato's cave
In Plato's allegory of the cave, people sit in front of a wall on which the shadows of real objects in the world can be seen. As they have only seen the shadows in their entire lives, they think that these are reality. The philosopher's task is to explain to the people that they should turn around in order to [...]
Forest
Dhe forest is a wonderful habitat. I recently heard a little story about a man who whistled a tune whenever he entered the forest. The animals recognized him after a while and accepted his presence. They no longer ran away and sometimes even greeted him. We usually don't see the forest as it is, [...]
It takes a village
Im sitting in a café in France. There's a lot of chatter around me. This morning I was 'on the Internet'. How different these experiences are. It's hard to compare pears with apples, and yet we often do. Working in the office and working from home, for example, are similar, searching for community on social networks or on the [...]
Home
II took part in a Zen meditation circle last year. Not so much because I see myself as a Zen Buddhist, but because I was looking for a quiet community to pursue my practice. During the Dokusan, I got involved in actively exploring my questions. I gave up a lot and left a lot behind. It was surprisingly easy. The 'teacher' made [...]
Growing pains
Ein an intense month. Moving, spatial separation, friends parting, the love of godchildren, new friendships, longings, waiting... I could write a screenplay about the last few weeks in Provence. Every day filled with pain, compassion and love - collectively in different constellations. But I don't want to tell these little stories, even though Marcel Pagnol [...]
Imagination
Ihe Kena Upanishad describes how the self as such does not exist. Who sees in seeing, who hears in hearing? This cannot be answered. In the Christian tradition, a self has been constructed for this purpose. I see, I hear, cogito ergo sum, imago ergo sum.... What is this cogito (I think), the imago [...]?
Marx
I have been thinking about Marx for so many years. Who hasn't? The idea of an equal and solidary community, free of ideological superstructures or irrational will-o'-the-wisps. A world that knows only matter and sees in it a scientific, progressive movement. Their goal? A world in which humanity is perfect, i.e. harmonious, [...]
Time
Cézanne drew and painted Mont St. Victoire over 80 times. From different perspectives, but essentially just the mountain. This mountain has been there for a very long time, it exists in another time. The fruit fly has one day to live, then it's all over. If we extend our time horizon, we think in generations. A [...]
Confession
Ahen the Internet became accessible to the public, i.e. in the mid-1990s, there was a phenomenon of people putting their deepest secrets online. The anonymity, simplicity and speed were seductive. Confessions were quickly made, anonymity was largely preserved and perhaps there was even that little thrill that maybe someone you knew [...]
Dreams
Hoday I dreamed that I was cutting myself off. I changed something in my life because I could no longer go along with it. My dream provided me with an image that I could easily understand. Dreams have always preoccupied me. I dream a lot, colorful dreams, whole stories, I work through situations, dream of things that I would like to [...]
Grow
Vany communities around me are currently experiencing a stress test. The word midlife crisis is often used. I think it's a stupid word, as it suggests that life, individual life, is in crisis. This perspective disturbs me. Why should life have a crisis? It seems to be more a case of life communities being called into question [...]
Metamorphosis
Im currently undergoing a metamorphosis. At a meeting the other day, someone said that this was a wonderful group of caterpillars. I was taken aback. He said, yes ... soon they will be butterflies. A friend once said that metamorphosis is proof of God. How else could it be explained that a caterpillar becomes a butterfly in purely evolutionary steps [...]?
Many me
Hoday I heard a quote from Sri Aurobindo. He said that each of us has several selves. That was clear to me. It has been my experience for decades that the different aspects of a personality are many and that the idea of a subjective identity is a construction. I always saw the principles of construction as ideological, which [...]
Farewell
VSome time ago, I was talking to a friend about the fact that I was saying goodbye to many ideas. I told her that I - quite unscientifically - visit my memories and think about why I no longer find certain ideas interesting, that these are often ideas that I dealt with in my studies. Great ideas! [...]
Possible worlds
Dhe best of all possible worlds? When I was studying philosophy in Heidelberg, I read about the logic of possible worlds. Everything possible is also real, just not accessible to me at the moment. This was an answer to a basic problem of propositional logic, namely that an 'if ..., then' sentence - with a false premise and a true [...]
Insight
Ahen I was a teenager, I had lost my heart to someone who lived in Rome. I traveled to the Eternal City with no money, no plan, it was supposed to be a surprise. That went somewhat wrong. We ate a pizza together, otherwise I had a lot of time to myself. I spent many hours on one of the hills [...]
Representation
Ahen I returned 'home' from India for the first time, I looked at my library and saw that almost nothing in it interested me anymore. What had happened? What is in this library and what is not? My library is that of a philosopher and art historian who has taught in Europe and the USA. It contains many [...]
Namaste - The light in me greets the light in you
In Europe, we have an idea of enlightenment as something where an individual recognizes that he or she lives under externally imposed constraints. It is then a matter of overcoming these constraints and placing oneself under a greater law. A light comes on and shines in all the dark corners, so that what is not yet [...]