Beyond the Horizon: Plotinus on Eternity and Time
Kali Tribune’s Department for Philosophy in conjunction with Laboratory of Broken Mics and Fractured English proudly presents an interpretative reading of Ennead III, 7. “On Eternity and Time” by Plotinus. The purpose of our inquiry is to demonstrate a peculiarities of the method of what we call “traditional metaphysics”, aptly disclosed in this famous treatise by great Platonist philosopher. As this video is a direct follow up to our previous video on interpreting Martin Heidegger’s introduction to Sein und Zeit, it is advisable to see them both. We attempt to demonstrate, by contrasting Plotinus’ approach to Heidegger’s, how modern philosophy, even at its pinnacle, tends to completely invert the traditional way of thinking.
Branko Malić
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That was a good reminder of the original goal of philosophy. I think those ancient philosophers and theologians were in a completely different realm to our present day philosophers. It’s odd that nowadays if the word ‘being’ is used in a discussion the first connection in peoples minds will be to the works of Heidegger or Sartre or perhaps Daniel Day Lewis in The Unbearable Lightness of Being. Very rarely would the Church Fathers or Platonism be evoked by the word. When the far-right or the far-left feel the need for some intellectual weight they will name-drop Heidegger and Sartre respectively. They won’t have read the works but they act as a sort of background image which will intimidate the listeners.
I think the shallowness and nihilism of the population today is linked to technocratic dominance and subservience. I was recommended to read the Unabomber Manifesto after the BBC did a podcast about him. It’s actually quite interesting. He was a mathematics professor at Berkeley who went a bit crazy and sent mail bombs to universities and airlines (hence the the name) and he published this tract which discusses the irreconcilable conflict of technology and freedom and comes to the conclusion that the only solution is to destroy modern technology. I’m working on a piece about Fight Club and nihilism and the unabomber was part of the inspiration for Tyler Durden in that film. It’s a rambling piece of work and he has no gift with language but he touches upon some important problems. It’s a shame he took that road of violence.
I’ve also been listening to this guy Joseph Pearce who turned from violence and converted to Catholicism via G K Chesterton and C S Lewis. He lectures on Tolkien and other subjects. Great speaker in my opinion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3ScPz0xa98
Je li utemeljeno govoriti o beskonačnosti kao o krugu. Kad je već u predavanju rečeno da moramo, ako želimo doprijeti do istine o svijetu i nas samih, slijediti vlastitu intuiciju i misli, meni je oduvijek krug bio polazište sagledavanja beskonačnosti.
Vječnost/beskonačnost je, za mene, sinonim postojanju kao takvom. Sve što je trenutačno, konačno, posjeduje početak i kraj, za mene zapravo ne može postojati. Ja bih rekao da u tom smislu vrijeme ne postoji, iako, prema Plotinu, vrijeme postoji “unutar” vječnosti. Navedena tvrdnja me zbunjuje.