Saturday, April 5, 2014

I, We, Elasticity

Between rigidity and fragmentation there is elasticity, and We is a condition of elasticity amongst its constituent Is.  Thus, We is inconceivable on the basis of either the concept of an Atomistic I, e. g. Russell's, or of an illusory I, e. g. Schopenhauer's.  Instead, the Is that constitute a We are mutually variably diverse and variably uniform, so that it is neither contradictory nor paradoxical to posit that one's maturation into an I is, at the same time, an entry into a We.  Now, Kant attempts to formulate that the thesis by equating Autonomy and submission to Universal Law, but his system lacks the resources, e. g. the possibility of a plurality of noumena, for distinguishing one such I from another, i. e. for conceiving a We.  Conversely, the 'rugged' individual of American mythology is merely an adolescent Me in arrested development. So, to render 'elasticity', as 'interdependence', e. g. here, previously, is inadequate, since the latter is constrained by the rigid antitheses that constitute it, i. e. by 'dependence' and 'independence'.

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