Can we all agree that he was a mediocre sci fi writer, and that jurassic park was just lightning in a bottle?
>>24986421yes, he was horrible I read some of his stuff by chanceall status and pseudo science, rule of cool
>>24987722Irrelevant, maybe even detrimental, to literary talent.
>>24988920You’re right: a real author is microscopic. If I can’t swallow you whole, are you even worth reading?
>>24986421He had a lot of hits and what I love most about him is that they were different ideas (except for the JP sequel). Eaters of the Dead is extremely different from Sphere and Jurassic Park. Andromeda Strain again something different to The Great Train Robbery. Half the books he wrote became movies.>>24987543Unlike a cunt like this who writes the same shit over and over, and even farms out his name to ghostwriters so they can produce endless trash. See also Patterson, Clancy and a host of other airport book regulars.
>>24988965Since you mentioned Patterson and airport books: summer of 2016 I came across his book (Filthy Rich) in the Ottawa airport. MFW I was already writing a book about Epstein 1.0Mofo is one of the richest, most prolific contemporary writers and he had to snatch my pearl! Probably dodged a bullet -figuratively as literally- don't need to give the rundown of all the mystery deaths... including the ole lech himself. Ask any Qs if you think I'm larping.
So the One is absolutely simple yet has the power to overflow itself and generate the Indefinite Dyad/Nous, just because? This power doesn't violate it's absolute simplicity? And then the Forms of the Nous don't formally exist in the One, but somehow eminently. They begin to exist formally and distinct when the Nous reflects back on the One, but the Nous is ultimately perceiving and reflecting back the Forms that exist eminently in the One. This seems like a cop out to me. Nothing comes from nothing, but Plotinus wants the One to have all the forms yet free of the consequences that his axioms would imply (ie multiplicity, which is bad and evil). Aristotle was more honest to say that God/the One is thinking. Even if this introduces some kind of multiplicity, Plotinus thinks he gets to avoid that by having the Forms exist, but not really, in the One.
>>24987619OP BTFO’Dwell done lad
>>24987619>>24988321What are you talking about? He never answered OP's question in a substantial way. I am not even sure if the first reply even understood what OP was talking about or why it is a problem. This is the main problem with neo-Neoplatonists on the internet. They have some knowledge of the Neoplatonist landscape, but only to the extent that is comparable to the knowledge of, let's say, some anime fan's knowledge of their favorite series's universe. They can string words together regularly and argue that x leads to y, but this amounts to no more than an assertion because they have no understanding of the underlying logical principles that leads someone to deducing that One is capable of producing Many, or why there ought to be several "hypostases" (again a metaphysically vague term: is this a universal, a particular, a "layer of reality" or type of element or substance in the early modern sense, the ambiguity allows them to take advantage of whatever meaning suits their particular argument). It's a hermetically-sealed semantic container that is completely incapable of addressing any objection from the outside. This is probably because they read no philosophy besides the Neoplatonists, or maybe some "esoterics of the month" like Guenon or Coomaraswamy. They get one-shotted by something they can use to lord over other people while having no functional insights of their own.
I. Main Objections Raised by the First PersonThe first poster is raising several distinct and fairly standard critiques of Plotinian metaphysics. They can be cleanly separated as follows:1. Simplicity vs. Causal PowerObjection: How can the One be absolutely simple and yet have the “power” to overflow or emanate Nous? Wouldn’t any causal power introduce differentiation or multiplicity into the One?2. “Just Because” / Arbitrary EmanationObjection: The overflow of the One seems unmotivated or arbitrary. Why does emanation happen at all, rather than not? Saying it happens “by necessity” risks sounding like a handwave.3. Eminent vs. Formal Existence of FormsObjection: Claiming that the Forms exist “eminently but not formally” in the One appears to be a conceptual dodge. If the One has all Forms in any sense, how does it avoid multiplicity?4. Nothing Comes from NothingObjection: If the Forms do not formally exist in the One, then Nous seems to get determinate multiplicity from nowhere. This looks like a violation of the principle ex nihilo nihil fit.Comment too long. Click here to view the full text.
II. Does the Second Person’s Reply Address These Objections?1. Simplicity vs. Causal PowerStatus: Partially addressed (implicitly)The reply states: “Unqualified ‘Being’ does not need to partake of Intellection…” and insists that emanation is “in analogy but not in reality.”This gestures toward the standard Plotinian move: causality in the One is non-discursive and non-intentional, unlike ordinary efficient causation.However: The reply does not clearly explain how causal fecundity avoids ontological differentiation. It asserts the doctrine rather than resolving the tension the objection highlights.Verdict: Not decisively answered.2. Arbitrariness of EmanationStatus: Weakly addressedComment too long. Click here to view the full text.
III. Overall AssessmentDoes the second person decisively answer the first person’s objections?No.More precisely: The response reiterates Neoplatonic positions rather than defending them against the specific critiques raised.Several objections are acknowledged indirectly but not resolved.Others are not addressed at all.The style is evocative and symbolic, which may persuade sympathizers but does not function as a decisive philosophical rebuttal.IV. Summary TableObjection Addressed? Quality of ResponseSimplicity vs causality Partially Assertive, not explanatoryArbitrary emanation Weakly Appeals to necessityEminent vs formal Forms Implicitly MetaphoricalComment too long. Click here to view the full text.
Reading Translations is not reading.
>>24989170>Immigrants are good for the economyEven if that was true, why should I do things for that reason alone?
>>24984662>autism is truly a mental diseaseIncredible insight anon
>>24985855they used to shoot defeatists such as yourself
>>24989253Learn a real skill or start a company, dipshit. "Average people" is a code word for unskilled white trash.>>24989265You don't have to but at least be honest about it.
>>24989329>immigrants good>white Americans bad>all hail economic growthHow exactly does a person become a husk like this?
Can you grind to get good at writing? Did niggas like Hemmingway and McCarthy actually practice?
>>24984104Yes. Its not forever. Just. Be silent for a moment.
>>24982791It's the only way to get good, talent alone won't carry you. You need to grind life experience, style, voice, character, imagery, metaphor, yadda yadda. Takes about a decade or two.l even if you think you have chops after a few years.
I like coming up with rough outlines and never putting them on paper. I get all the dopamine i need by just daydreaming about the idea.
Hunter S Thompson used to type out the novels of F Scott Fitzgerald for the rhythm of the text.
>>24984088pain
i have never met anyone my age [zoomer] who has watched the disney alice in wonderland cartoon movie. my chances of meeting someone who has read the original alice's adventures in wonderland text is even lower. thread to discuss how younger people do not care for "Classic" media or literature
>>24987908https://arch.b4k.dev/v/thread/727540903/#727541927https://arch.b4k.dev/v/thread/727540903/#727543107https://arch.b4k.dev/v/thread/728981512/#728996180
>>24988057easily compared to discussions of alice: madness returns, another video game. thread is about widespread zoomer ignorance of classical literature, not it's imbued corpse in your vaugely pedophilic rpgmaker weeb trash
>>24988057at least they read a book
>>24988095
>>24987695You shouldn't wish to like someone for what you have in common in such a superficial way. Strive to match with someone with what you have **in you**. "Having watched/read a specific piece" is something outside of you, like a possession. If you come to someone and say "I have you watched this? No? Well, It's one of my favorite piece, I love this and that from it, and how it connects to these other pieces in such a way, and how it connects to my life and my values in such a way" you can connect with that person. And they might share with you their favorite piece aswell, and tell you how their mind works, and what their sensibilities are. What you have as object, what you have seen, this is all irrelevant if you want a friend or someone to love you seek someone whose sensibilities you like, whose way to look at the world is fascinating to you. Sure, someone corpus of watched/read work might already tell you about what they're like, but again, there is a 1000 ways to like a movie; there are movies I love for a few specific scenes, or for one specific character, you can't really know until you ask.
HarperCollins is going to use AI to translate novels, and they’ve already fired all of their translators.It starts with romance novels, which admittedly have a formulaic structure to them already, but soon it’ll be all genres.That new translation of Crime and Punishment? AI. The new weird European writer that just won some literary award? AI those books into English. The Bible? Hell, why not use AI?
Not my problem
>>24989263Someone someone has half a brain to realize this is a horrible idea? Even with language similar enough you can use competent enough models. Translation is never 1:1.
>>24989263Another reason to not buy anything published after 2022.
>>24989263>HarlequinNothingburger.
>>24989317Honestly this
/lit/ memes
Crocodile Tears edition.OLD: >>24978375
>>24989262Not reading any of your mindless vapid shit addressed at fantasies in your mind.
>>24989271Funny, I thought you were an intelligent thoughtful articulate person, and I was just a judgemental normalfag, what happened? If you had something of merit to say you'd do so. If you had control over your situation, you'd change it. You have neither, you have prosthetic faith as a crutch and you're pretending someone else's belief justifies your own. You could exercise your agency and improve, but that involves the possibility of failure and apathy is easier.Nothing wrong with having faith. Nothing wrong with having belief in a higher power. But look in your heart. You know if the perfect temptation arrived you'd fold like a house of cards the first chance you got. Your religion teaches forgiveness in spite of that as a central tenant; being a dogmatic retard and hoping that earns you nebulous eternity points by denying your humanity is fine if it's an eternal conviction or redemption for a higher purpose. That's not you. What's your purpose? Seems to me it's mostly bitching, but what do I know.
>>24989292I don't go to reddit and don't want to read your braindead reddit posts.
>>24985980Barnes & Noble is down wtf
>>24989331Fun fact: I am an ancient faggot once banned by snacks himself. Precaptcha. I only post here since I migrated from Gorgish. This is my home, in the abyssal depths of the ocean of piss, and I love it here. The irony is, you're still outsourcing your agency to excuses, making up stories exactly like you claimed I was doing. Ain't mad about it. I don't take it personal. Not going to stop me from telling you the truth. And now you know, what you do with it is up to you.
I have been reading Chinese classics lately and finished this one. Out of all of the ones I've read so far, this has to be the greatest.Has /lit/ read traditional Chinese classics like Romance of the 3 kingdoms, Journey to the west, Dream of Red Chamber, Investiture of the Gods, and others?
>>24988642>5 volume onethat is too long. i would never read a 5 volume novel
>>24986823what soft power does the US have today? everybody under the age of 30 hates the US
>>24988869Even Chinese people love the US. White men are literally worshiped in China. That's how powerful US soft power is. We're talking a hundred years of movies, sports, stars, literature, technology and so on. And English is the global language.
>>24988869And despite the US wringing their neck for the last 50 years, half of Iran is pro-US. Now that is soft power.
>>24958227I tried reading Journey to the West and it was awful. The proto-example of litrpg cultivationslop where the protagonist meditates for 100 days to learn the SuperDuperBuddhaDragonFistSnakePalm Technique that allows him to blow up the sun and turn back time. >The novel is a fictionalized and fantastic account of the pilgrimage of the Chinese Buddhist monk Xuanzang, who went on a 19-year journey to India in the 7th century AD to seek out and collect Buddhist scriptures (sūtras).[The first guy to get scammed by Indians lol
Updike lost me with this oneWhat was he thinking?
>>24988780I thought the characterization was phenomenal. And some real lovely bits of prose. The first and last installments are the best imo. I'd put them against any American novels
In Redux, Updike lets his affinities for cuckoldry, wifeswapping, and chubby girls take second stage to what is clearly a deeper-held and more private fantasy: when the underage hippy girl gets BLACKED as Harry reads aloud the works of Frederick Douglas, it's obvious that this is Updike's deepest and darkest fantasy put to paper.
>>24988724updike?
>>24988724What's Updike?
>>24989305nm hbu
What do you read when you’re going through a really bad anxiety episode / panic attack / paranoia spiral?
>>24988436>panic attacks happen when you dare leaving the slavery drugstruly curious
>>24988329>>24988429I used to think like that too before I had an episode myself. Like, just chill, go drink some tea and take a nap, nothing is going on, etc. It's hard to describe to someone who hasn't experienced it.Panic attacks usually come from holding on for too long onto an unbearable situation. I had mine when I was already in major debt, had fights with my wife everyday, then lost my job, my cat died and then covid started, all of that in a couple of months. In my mind, I would simply not recover from all of that, I was ready to die right there, not in a suicidal way, but more like giving up, I stopped taking care of myself, I couldn't sleep and it turns into a snowball. Then the fight or flight response kicks in and you can't lower your cortisol levels no matter what you do. Paranoia is like taking that panic and fixating on something, in my case I was certain that my building would fall at any moment and crush us all. I would feel it swaying in the wind, and a small crack on the painting would make me imagine huge infrastructure collapse. If I talked to anyone about it, they would be rational and say that's very unlikely, if there were major problems like that, others would notice, even in a worse case scenario, the building would be evacuated. But in my mind it was easy to disregard all of that "they don't know" and "no one is paying more attention to this as I am".The mind is powerful. Once it's gone, you look back and it's just as silly as it sounds to someone who never went through any of that. The building is still standing, I got other jobs, things change and you move on.
Read something funny, if you must read. But you can also watch a comedy or play a video game. Get warm, get cosy, get hydrated, get a snack.No medical emergency is occurring you're just fixating on every teeny tiny twinge and flutter in your body.Do a press up. Stretch. And ask yourself, what is stressing me out?If you have work then you kinda need to fake it til you get home.If you're not at work then you need to ask, seriously, why am I anxious? What am I missing to feel content?It's usually no friends or shit job at the root.The above is for your garden variety panic attack, which is mostly sudden short lasting irrational fear of losing control or dying - it's fast onset and intense.If you're paranoid then that's different... Comment too long. Click here to view the full text.
>>24988414I once drank too much weed milk and I went through hours of psychic torment. I started watching Community but I couldn't focus on the dialogue or the plot at all. As I was watching, I started having extreme thoughts that manifested through the show itself, like visualizing the abrupt and gory death of a character, or Brie Larson suddenly getting naked and spreading her cheeks to take a huge shit.
>>24987965Exercise. Its about the only thing that helps that's not drugs.
Not sure if "boredom" is the right word. It's more like equanimity.I have no passions in life. I don't strive for anything, nor am I overly attached to the things that I do. I have hobbies and interests, and a job of course, but I don't feel any particular way about them. They're just things that I do. If I had to quit tomorrow, I wouldn't care much.I'm content with my life as it is, but sometimes I wonder what it would be like to have some great aspiration, some ambition that pushes me forward. Artists and writers often talk about having some burning need to do what they do. I've just never found anything so compelling.
Seek Buddhism. Let go of your ego.
Obermann by Senancour
>>24988972Go skydiving.
Is he right about religion?
>>24985554>>spends lifetime philosophising>>fails to find God>He was a dysgenic retardyou missed the ending where he did find god and realized the perennial Tat Tvam Asi as transmitted via the Upanishads and Schopenhauer, it is kind of interesting how the Upanishads got to Schopenhauer and then Schopenhauer to Nietzsche"Are we content? I am the God who created this farce!" - Nietzsche 1889 Turin
>>24986133>I'm just asking what you guys think of his criticisms of the big religions like Christianity and Buddhism, since I've been drawn to those religions and their practices for quite some time now, but Nietzsche made me want to reconsider it. I know this board is big on Nietzsche so you're probably more familiar with him than I am.he is valuable on analyzing the sick psychology of the priesthood, and the cult of the priest as an obstacle to actual religious experience, plus he had a sense of humor about it, but his excessive sarcasm gets boring at times
>>24988341
>>24988366>"Are we content? I am the God who created this farce!" - Nietzsche 1889 TurinI actually read it in an actual book ahahahsee also:http://www.thenietzschechannel.com/correspondence/eng/nlett-1889.htm
>>24986133Which criticisms specifically? Your questions are vague and if one philosopher would make you reconsider religion, that'd be incredibly retarded.
>Civilizations may last for centuries and be extremely eventful; Imperial Rome is a prime example.>…>But autumn ends, and a civilization becomes a culture gone frozen in its brains and heart, and its finale is anything but grand. We are now far into what the Chinese called the period of contending states, and the collapse of Caesarism.>In such a period, politics becomes an arena of competing generals and plutocrats, under a dummy ruler chosen for low intelligence and complete moral plasticity, who amuses himself and keeps the masses distracted from their troubles with bread, circuses, and brushfire-wars. (This is the time of all times when a culture should unite — and the time when such a thing has become impossible.) Technology flourishes (the late Romans were first-class engineers) but science disintegrates into a welter of competing, grandiosely trivial hypotheses which supersede each other almost weekly and veer more and more markedly toward the occult.>Among the masses there arises a “second religiousness” in which nobody actually believes; an attempt is made to buttress this by syncretism, the wrenching out of context of religious forms from other cultures, such as the Indian, without the faintest hope of knowing what they mean. This process, too, leads inevitably towards a revival of the occult, and here science and religion overlap, to the benefit of neither. Economic inequity, instability and wretchedness become endemic on a hitherto unprecedented scale; the highest buildings ever erected by the Classical culture were the tenements of the Imperial Roman slums, crammed to bursting point with freed and runaway slaves, bankrupts, and deposed petty kings and other political refugees.When will cesaerism start in europe?
>>24987925On further consideration, this briggs character OP likely got the quotes from seems like a politics peddler of some sort. I doubt Spengler would be pleased to know his philosophy would be mobilized by legions of megalopolitan male prostitutes to advance their petty journalistic ends, but he would not be surprised.
>>24987182You know how “psychics” and “fortune tellers” really just say very general things that are applicable to almost anyone
>>24987925>And from the summarizing excerpts, I would dispute his interpretationsWhy?
>>24987994Its a matter of being incorrect you absolute nigger
>>24988106I would say Blish misappraises what Caesarism is. His characterization of ' an arena of competing generals and plutocrats, under a dummy ruler chosen for low intelligence and complete moral plasticity, who amuses himself and keeps the masses distracted from their troubles with bread, circuses, and brushfire-wars. ' is a synthesis entirely his own, I do not recall Spengler ever questioning the agency of the rulers, on the contrary he asserts their real power over such covert dealings. What I am trying to say is that this is a much more apt description of the democratic epoch than anything later than that. Likewise, I do not believe Spengler ever characterized the Second religiousness as a dishonest religiosity. In my reading, he actually reinforces how primally real the weary soul's return to the womb is. Now, he does speak of a false, consciously enjoyed religion for the civilized man. But that comes expressly before the second religiousness, it is a facet of megalopolitan civilized life, not of the second religiousness. Of course, the second religiousness, wrench exotic and archaic motifs from the world. That is correct. The rational sciences do dissolve into mystic gibberish, however this is science melting back into religion (Spengler expressly speaks of how the sciences and religion spring forth from the same seed and mirror eachother in every culture).The next section > Economic inequity, instability and wretchedness become endemic on a hitherto unprecedented scale; the highest buildings ever erected by the Classical culture were the tenements of the Imperial Roman slums, crammed to bursting point with freed and runaway slaves, bankrupts, and deposed petty kings and other political refugees.is of a deeply socialist bent. He is not necessarily wrong here, but it is deeply unimportant. And also it is also a vastly more fitting description of the Roman Republic than imperial Rome. Funnily enough the highest insulae ever built were during the late republic because Augustus restricted their height. The true urban staple of Imperial Rome was a decline in organizational complexity and a severe population reduction. This went into the Fellaheen stage where the petrified Apollonian civilization was smashed by germanic barbarians in the North and consumed by the Magians in the South.
I'm doing a Nabokov chronological read through for 2026, starting with The Real Life of Sebastian KnightAm I missing much by going straight for his english works? I study Russian and so I figure I'd prefer to read his Russian works laterAny tips for books which will help me understand Nabokov better?Which books are going to be ones which may kill my read through attempt?
>>24985803He's a literal /lit/ pseud before /lit/ was even conceived in the mind of the earth archon.>all style; no depth>thesaurus abuse>purple dense prose for the sake of being dense and intellectual>shat on authors he considered below him based on arbitrary criteria (popularity, readability, moral messages, aesthetics)>considered himself better than other writers while writing books about pedophilia>convoluted tricks for the sake of convoluted tricks>every major novel is like Ready Player One of literature: references on top of references on top of references: the true Riddler of the meme trilogy>shat on Freud while not understanding Freud>shat on Einstein's relativity while not understanding Einstein (the fourth part in Ada is the most purplest, up your own ass criticism of Einstein's space and time while being also the most retarded - it's wrong because it doesn't agree with my personal concept of time)>pedoLike, prototypical /lit/ 4channer.Compare to Joyce, who should have been an engineer. Comment too long. Click here to view the full text.
I wish he was still alive so I could run him over. I've never hated a lit motherfucker like this piece of shit.
>>24986539>all style; no depthdepth doesn't mean philosophical posturing and he is highly rereadable.>purple dense prose for the sake of being dense and intellectualoutside of Ada, which has his most hateable narrating voices, his prose is much more economical. he balances out the longer more complex sentences with the opposite: "I rolled over him. We rolled over me. They rolled over him. We rolled over us.">shat on authors he considered below him based on arbitrary criteriai don't know how aesthetics is arbitrary to him saying a book isn't beautiful, especially if he's making a point of the triteness or conventionality of the style. but when critiquing he engages with a book on its own terms as well, tackling the wider points being made if there is any.>considered himself better than other writers while writing books about pedophiliawhile writing books about bad pedophiles that do bad things like all those characters in other books that do bad things.>convoluted tricks for the sake of convoluted tricksit's fun. maybe it might also be relevant that the books are about deception.>references on top of referenceshe's less allusive than joyce. especially outside of Ada (where the point is to build an alternate history with the counterparts of all those things), even in his later works. i think transparent things has a few references to romeo and juilet and that's it.>shat on Freud while not understanding Freudthe bait is too obvious here, no fun.Comment too long. Click here to view the full text.
what is your reading list?
>>24986497What
