The Return of Gods and Grand Narratives

The speed at which our technology is moving is an outgrowth of the Enlightenment when supposedly we pushed God and gods to the sidelines. They are making their return. We should hear the signals in the noise.

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Life at the Speed of Computation
Life at the Speed of Computation

The new gods we are creating wield actual power that we once believed were the province of imaginary gods. The imaginary is becoming real.

The Return of Fate
The Return of Fate

The more we have sought to bring nature’s processes under our control, the more we live within a lack of control.

New Gods for a New Time
New Gods for a New Time

The Enlightenment pushed God and gods to the sidelines, but as our time continues to evolve, are we letting them back in?

Ressentiment is not a psychology. It is a composition of time. We have yet to come to terms with its movements.

Essays on Time as Practice
Bataille, Religion, Experience
Bataille, Christianity, Religion and Time, Religion, moral compass, Nietzsche
Bataille, Religion, Experience
Bataille, Christianity, Religion and Time, Religion, moral compass, Nietzsche

What is to become of religion in our incandescent time? In this essay, I begin a descent into Bataille’s speculations on the contingent birth of consciousness out of the ‘water in water’ of pure experience. This is essential work for rejuvenating our moral compass.

Bataille, Christianity, Religion and Time, Religion, moral compass, Nietzsche
Ressentiment Unbound
Nietzsche, Girard, Ressentiment, Christianity
Ressentiment Unbound
Nietzsche, Girard, Ressentiment, Christianity

Nietzsche treated ressentiment as a consolation for a desire for vengeance that is too weak to act. But what happens when it finds itself in power? In this essay, I explore the consequences of empowered ressentiment on the woke left.

Nietzsche, Girard, Ressentiment, Christianity
Reading the Iliad: Mênis and the Moral Compass
Iliad, Ressentiment, moral compass, Nietzsche, Eternal Return, mênis
Reading the Iliad: Mênis and the Moral Compass
Iliad, Ressentiment, moral compass, Nietzsche, Eternal Return, mênis

Descending into Achilles passive mēnis in the Iliad leads to a better understanding of the birth of our democratic moral compass.

Iliad, Ressentiment, moral compass, Nietzsche, Eternal Return, mênis
Reading Zarathustra: The Three Metamorphoses
Nietzsche, Eternal Return, Ressentiment, Zarathustra
Reading Zarathustra: The Three Metamorphoses
Nietzsche, Eternal Return, Ressentiment, Zarathustra

The three metamorphoses Zarathustra describes in his first speech after the prologue moves us beyond any knee-jerk philosophical and religious musings of ‘being and becoming’. The vision presented here is far more sophisticated.

Nietzsche, Eternal Return, Ressentiment, Zarathustra
Reading Zarathustra: The Speeches of Zarathustra
Nietzsche, Zarathustra, Buddhism, Eternal Return, Ressentiment
Reading Zarathustra: The Speeches of Zarathustra
Nietzsche, Zarathustra, Buddhism, Eternal Return, Ressentiment

The second installment of my series of Reading Zarathustra. This focuses on the problem of teaching, discipleship, truth telling, and companionship in ‘The Speeches of Zarathustra’ from Book I.

Nietzsche, Zarathustra, Buddhism, Eternal Return, Ressentiment

A collection of works on the physics, religion, philosophy, and history of how we’ve composed time

Time as Practice Reading List
Myth and Thought among the Greeks - Jean-Pierre Vernant
History of Science, Religion and Time
Myth and Thought among the Greeks - Jean-Pierre Vernant
History of Science, Religion and Time

An exceptionally detailed and compelling investigation into the evolution of Greek philosophical thought out of myth.

History of Science, Religion and Time
Powers of Time - David Lapoujade
Historical Consciousness of Time, Philosophy of Time, Practices of Time
Powers of Time - David Lapoujade
Historical Consciousness of Time, Philosophy of Time, Practices of Time

One of the best explanations of Bergson’s thought. Lapoujade connects duration with motion and in the process exposes why Bergson’s thought is more than conceptual philosophy. It is the transformation of how we experience ourselves and the world.

Historical Consciousness of Time, Philosophy of Time, Practices of Time
The Radical Philosophy of Saint Paul - Stanislas Breton
Religion and Time, Historical Consciousness of Time, Practices of Time
The Radical Philosophy of Saint Paul - Stanislas Breton
Religion and Time, Historical Consciousness of Time, Practices of Time

Breton set in motion the philosophical and theological reconsideration of Paul (which was already underway in more scholarly investigations into ‘the historical Paul’). This book is crucial to the reconsideration of Paul that found in his letters the power to suspend the weight of culture to find ‘new horizons’ of salvational experience.

Religion and Time, Historical Consciousness of Time, Practices of Time
The Natural Contract - Michel Serres
Historical Consciousness of Time, History of Science, Philosophy of Time, Science of Time, Religion and Time
The Natural Contract - Michel Serres
Historical Consciousness of Time, History of Science, Philosophy of Time, Science of Time, Religion and Time

Michel Serres at his most political. This 1990 book is a defining work in the modern understanding of the climate crisis. I've written a long essay inspired by the depth and breadth of Serres vision.

Historical Consciousness of Time, History of Science, Philosophy of Time, Science of Time, Religion and Time
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The Natural Contract - Michel Serres
The Natural Contract - Michel Serres
The Parasite - Michel Serres
The Parasite - Michel Serres
Birth of Physics - Michel Serres
Birth of Physics - Michel Serres
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The Earth in Time
The Earth in Time
Words and Things
Words and Things
Vesuvius: Time as Contingency
Vesuvius: Time as Contingency
At the Edge of le Grand Récit
At the Edge of le Grand Récit
L’Incandescent
L’Incandescent

Practices of Time in the New Testament

Chronology

A running list of posts