Preface to the forum readers: To begin verily the only philosophy I have read is a little Plato as I rank Socrates among the ranks of Jesus. In fact I would not even begin to think of this as philosophy, and at most is a personal philosophy which is always on a small, ameba-like scale. The reason I post on this forum is that, presumably, you folks are used to objective thought. Another point I should make before I begin is a note on my writing style. I tend to string a bunch of loose ends as neat as I can manage throughout, and without, frankly, much attention given to structure, that in the end I tie together; but because this work is unfinished, something I tend to come back to, the task of reading it and, I hope, discussing it will be that bit more ardorous. Thus the style for this particular work could be called stream of conscience, due not to my artistry but my lax writing habits. And here begins:
The Human Conflict by Colin Russell Shomo
“Be the change you wish to see in the world.”
- Gandhi
Short preface by said author: My father has an analytical mind, he also dropped out of high-school. I believe I have inherited his affinity for late-night epiphanies and ramblings; I am all too familiar with such actions. I have also inherited problems, though not the same problems, as my father did. I will not attempt to draw a specific correlation between his lack of a diploma to what problems I face; for I myself have only a sort of lyrical sense on mine own trials - I understand them utterly while simultaneously they are obscure to my knowledge, if that makes any bit of sense. Now, I believe that man boils down to this: he has a gift and a problem, both of which are constructed sky-high when into this path he is hurled, and their fathers had respectively the same problems and the same gifts, though objectively these gifts and problems are one in the same; I use the terms father and man to refer to mankind and not the male sex exclusively, mark you. So the fight between casting one’s gift into the world or smoldering in the flames of life is the fight between good or evil, this is the demeanor of life, godless or not. In your own lifetime whether man’s fight seems one of victory or defeat all depends upon that in-deferent, atlas-eating politics of the human condition. But what should be understood from this is that their has never been any more evil than good, or vice-versa. There is only more good or bad revealed than, bad or good; good hides in the shadows as well. My goal is to cast light on such goodness.
Let us think, my friends, as Plato does , of a thin curtain, perhaps a large sheet of wax paper, though less translucent, that is draped in front of our world. Behind it there are shapes, think as simple as a triangle or rectangle, that which behind there is a bright light, casting shadows are put into our world. * Here ends Plato’s thoughts. Anytime that I think of art, speaking with only it’s three basic forms: Literature, which includes only poetry and prose, Music, and Visuals, or aesthetics, including painting, sculptor etc, I think of these shadows. Art is one of the shadow of beauty, it is also the most simple of shadows, simple not at the level one needs to comprehend it, but that it is the least diluted of the shadows. Because of this, art is the next best thing to the true forms, and infact the only distinguishing characteristic between true beauty and it’s shadow, is the fact that it is something man mustered; however it is organic to human nature - more to this later. Now being a man, having his inherent sense of pride, I believe that this the most best part about art. The fact that it is a creation of man gives the human mind the opportunity to relate with his past, in that throughout his history art has always existed to some degree. In each epoch at which art is a created individuals bring human experience into their art. The yearnings and pursuits, the conflicts, the sentiments - everything that person is going through is always found in a poem or story, a panting, or in music. Now these feeling in relation to the epoch he finds himself in create conflict. Hamlet, Madame Bovary, Huck Finn, Holden Caulfield, Raskolinkov, the list is endless, and the characters are most always rejecting and rebelling in some against their society. The conflict between the character and the setting is of course the writer’s own feelings. The external conflict must not be seen, in this context, with fictional characters, but the writer who creates them. That external conflict can be seen as society keeping the person away from his birth right - the cultivation of one's soul with these forms. Just like the turtle must travel to the shore to live on we must live our lives according to our intellectual conscience. The soul is of course always seen as an intangible spirit - I'm not even positive it exists I merely use it as a tool to think, and as it works like a dream, as you can see, you who actually read this, for now it exists to me. So the soul, in the traditional, invisible spirit within us, goes naturally to one of these shadows of beauty. Now love, fortunately, cannot be driven away by the masses, nature of course has always carried the brunt of man's glowing fire. But, what everyone, it seems, fails to see, is that art, a harmony between human experience and expression, is drowned out more than any of the two. So what it is missing, what, I think, is the cause of man's eternal woe is this lack of expression and creation. A human is divided, in my view, into three parts: the soul, the body (the organism's natural responsibilities), and the mind (sense, intellect). Now - and this may seem extreme - the soul is the fulcrum point of the other two. To create and comprehend art one needs a body to empathize with art through experience and a mind to comprehend or create it. I mentioned woman (myself a male), and nature as other forms of beauty a soul may encounter; but - this is the only cynical bit - because a simple life in nature was incompatible with the body from the first human, in that nature has been largely destroyed in man's instinctive avarice, and woman are more pleasing to men in their anatomy, (or vice versa) art is left undefiled, and impossible to defile. The symbiotic comradeship between the body and mind have caused these errors. Chemically man's body wanted more this more that. He used his mind to problem solve and everything has evolved from there. Parking lots and the whole bit. Nature has suffered from this, obviously. Art is all that is left untouched by man. A poem, a sonata, a painting are all left un-touched. Now, when the mind is used to extend oneself through knowledge, namely through the humanities - philosophy, literature, language and history - and the body is used for a experience, a deed which is easily done, to say the very least, and not to drink to elevation, to eat to dullness or, the worst of over-indulgences, television, art can be created as naturally as breathing. I spoke of art., literature specifically, as having conflict the reoccurring theme. This is the soul of one who has what was above described, speaking of the human conflict.
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