# data[].attributes.headline
Week #10              CS Lewis loves Objectivivty

# data[].attributes.subject
Week #10              CS Lewis loves Objectivivty

# data[].attributes.body
CS Lewis combats the notion that subjectivity is freedom by explaining how subjectivity is more shifty than the sand on the beach. By agreeing that things are subjective to whoever is speaking, there is no way to verify anything. An example of this is a popular movement known as the sovereign citizens movement. The people backing this movement claim they are not held to accountable to the US laws. This seems obserd, however, under subjectivism any and all things become relative. My questions to a relativist or subjectivist, is how can this philosophy be reasonable and defendable?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Descriptive ethical relativism describes the fact that in different cultures one of the variants is the sense of morality: the mores, customs and ethical principles may all vary from one culture to another.There is a great deal of information available to confirm this as well.What is thought to be moral in one country may be thought to be immoral and even made illegal in another country.

# data[].attributes.headline
Week #9              Lyotard's Technology

# data[].attributes.subject
Week #9              Lyotard's Technology

# data[].attributes.body
One of Lyotard's motifs is the economy of knowledge. Those who are allowed to control knowledge, repackage it, and distrubute it are superior. Companies and governments find themselves in positions to limit what information they release. At the same time and by the design of the internet, people are capable, though capitalist means such as Wordpress, to release free knowledge for anyone to view on the internet. Lyotard wrote his Postmodern Condition in 1979, four years before the internet was relesed to the public. To what degree is information controlled and who is the untimate authority that governs what content is dispersed? (Below is the website belonging to the domain registration body. Every website accesible though basic http/https cis registered though this non-profit.)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The ICANN Board published its FY22 Annual Report for the fiscal year period of 1 July 2021 to 30 June 2022. This report documents ICANN Board, community, and org activities from the past year, recounts regional achievements and milestones, and previews ICANN's plans for the next fiscal year. Click the title to access a PDF copy of the report.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The ICANN Board published its FY22 Annual Report for the fiscal year period of 1 July 2021 to 30 June 2022. This report documents ICANN Board, community, and org activities from the past year, recounts regional achievements and milestones, and previews ICANN's plans for the next fiscal year.

# data[].attributes.body
Foucault claimed that enlightenment was a philosophical ethos that permanently critiqued the historical era. This is similar to Kant's definition being the bravery that pushed an individual to think for theirselves. The end goal leads to someone who is skeptical about what the past is or with what others tell them of the past. Is this attitude productive? Can people function while maintaining skepticism? At what level of skepticism is an individual functional while still being enlightened?

# data[].attributes.headline
Week #7               Neitzsche's Claim for God's Death

# data[].attributes.subject
Week #7               Neitzsche's Claim for God's Death

# data[].attributes.body
Below is an image of Nietzsche and God. The image is enthymematic as it is relating Nietzsche's phrase, "God is dead" to a visual novel and television series that ran from 1983 to 1988. The visual novel and television series titled, Fist of the North Star, featured a character who's famous one-liner can be translated as "You are already dead," or "You were dead before you even realized it." The other characters would respond with asking the character what he meant by that before they were defeated. In the image, Nietzsche is telling God that he is already dead. Is this level of assurance of God's destruction able to be obtained by a human? Is it possible to know that God does not exist?

# data[].attributes.headline
Week #6                Minimalist Postmodern Art

# data[].attributes.subject
Week #6                Minimalist Postmodern Art

# data[].attributes.body
Below is a website that lists a few good examples and explains what minimalist art is. Minimalism comes from the postmodern idea of rejecting or questioning the constructs that have been built previously. Minimalism removes the detail and precision of art and reduces pieces by as much as possible. What is left is something that may not seem like art to someone. Does this style of art seem appealing? Why do people pay millions for art which they could make themselves?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Important Art and Artists of Minimalism

The below artworks are the most important in Minimalism - that both overview the major ideas of the movement, and highlight the greatest achievements by each artist in Minimalism. Don't forget to visit the artist overview pages of the artists that interest you.

The X (1965)

Artist: Ronald Bladen

Artwork description & Analysis: Bladen was older than the other Minimalists and is sometimes considered a father figure for the movement. This work is typical of his output, which is characterized by large-scale sculptures that are often monochromatic and made up of simple shapes, much like the works of other artists in the group. Bladen's works differ slightly at times from more mainstream Minimalism, as his pieces frequently moved beyond basic geometric shapes that were most often used by others in the group. The finish on the works was, however, typically slick, retaining a factory-made quality that erased the hand of the artist, thus setting the work apart from AbEx and modernism. The "X" is an inherently negative symbol, as the letter is used to eliminate or "x things out." Its use here, along with the choice of monochrome black as a color, suggests the negation of traditional art, while its imposing size (24 feet) towers over the viewer to an even greater extent than works by Serra, something which is more evident in a gallery or museum setting.

Painted Aluminum - Estate of the Artist

Like The Art Story on Facebook

Related Art and Artists

Black Square (c. 1915)

Movement: Suprematism

Artist: Kazimir Malevich

Artwork description & Analysis: Once described as Malevich's "living, royal infant," the Black Square has been seen as a major landmark in the history of abstract art, a point of both beginning and ending. Malevich would paint four versions of it between 1915 and the early 1930s, and it is said that the last version was carried behind his coffin during his funeral. Pared down from a design he painted for the Victory Over the Sun (1913), this first version depicts a purely black square against a thin border of white, further obscuring any sense of normal space or perspective. At the 0.10 exhibition in 1915, Malevich emphasized its status by hanging it across the corner of a room, emulating the Russian tradition for the placement of religious icons.

Oil on canvas - Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow

Corner Counter-Relief (1914)

Movement: Constructivism

Artist: Vladimir Tatlin

Artwork description & Analysis: Tatlin's Counter-Reliefs were a vital part of his developing ideas, and they form a bridge between the influence of Cubism on his work, and the birth of Constructivism. It is typical of this development that Corner Counter-Relief conforms neither to the conventional format of painting or sculpture, because Constructivism would aspire to display those old fashioned forms. However, its placement in the corner of a room also echoed the traditional site of religious icons in a pious Russian household - hence Tatlin suggests that modernity and experiment should be Russia's new gods. The idea for the series may have come from the Technical Manifesto of Futurist Sculpture (1912), a volume by the Italian Futurist Umberto Boccioni, in which he calls on sculptors, "Let's split open our figures and place the environment inside them." The way in which the object spans the corner changes the space of the room, and establishes a unique relationship to the surrounding environment. The diagonal wires are evocative of a musical instrument, and they were perhaps inspired by Tatlin's experience as a musical instrument maker.

Iron, copper, wood and strings - State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg

Untitled (1970)

Movement: Post-Minimalism

Artist: Eva Hesse

Artwork description & Analysis: Eva Hesse was one of the artists included in Lucy Lippard's ground-breaking 1966 show Eccentric Abstraction. She was profoundly influenced by the Minimalist Carl Andre, yet her work is characteristic of feminist responses to that earlier movement. This Untitled piece uses soft and malleable materials like as cloth, latex and wire mesh. They are unconventional for an artwork of this period, combining the Minimalist industrial, with the somewhat domestic. The effect they create is organic, the two dangling appendages at the center of each square evoking wobbly legs. The bulging, irregular frames of the four squares seem to mock the perfect straight angles of Minimalism, even as they hang on the wall like conventional paintings. Hesse's work is typical of those among her peers who borrowed the anonymous language of Minimalism, but rejected its austere formalism, reintroducing emotionally expressive qualities.

Fiberglass, wire mesh, latex, and cloth - Des Moines Art Center, Iowa

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Minimalism Most Important Art and Artists | TheArtStory

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The below artworks are the most important in Minimalism - that both overview the major ideas of the movement, and highlight the greatest achievements by each artist in Minimalism. Don't forget to visit the artist overview pages of the artists that interest you.

# data[].attributes.headline
Week #5                  American Communism

# data[].attributes.subject
Week #5                  American Communism

# data[].attributes.body
Below is the link to the website of the Communist Party in USA. Scrolling through their website they do not make it obvious as to what exactly communism stands for. The "about" page lists social injustices that most moral Americans would also be against. It also has a page where all communist party members must pay dues. Thankfully modern communists have the luxury of using PayPal. If communism makes everyone on an equal footing, then who is given the higher authority to use the money from the communist dues?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Have a question about CPUSA and our stance on issues? Our CPUSA experts are standing by to give you an answer!

I am writing to you, knowing that you will probably delete this email instantly, to express my opinions and ideas on communism. In a picture from your website, here, you portray two young boys, one with a sign saying "Youngsters need a future too", and the other saying "Pro young future"....

Hi Braden, Before I get to your allegations of censorship, I want to clear up a couple of misconceptions. First, we do not seek to rule a single-party state. Socialism in the United States will almost certainly involve multiple parties, sharing a basic vision of society even though they differ on how to best implement those principles (just as most Democrats and Republicans basically agree on capitalism). Second, socialism doesn't mean that everyone makes the same amount of money. It means that the working class, which includes everyone from fast food workers to doctors and engineers, will receive the full value that its labor produces. Since we'll no longer have to hand over half of the value we produce to...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Have a question about CPUSA and our stance on issues? Our CPUSA experts are standing by to give you an answer! I am writing to you, knowing that you will probably delete this email instantly, to express my opinions and ideas on communism.

# data[].attributes.headline
Week #4                 Capitalism & Monopoly

# data[].attributes.subject
Week #4                 Capitalism & Monopoly

# data[].attributes.body
When I stumbled across this image of Rich Uncle Pennybags, I knew I had to post it to pallet. Monopoly is a game that teaches economics. Depending on how you view capitalism or socialism, it can be a great way to study economics on a smaller, more observable scale.
Does Monopoly teach that capitalism is bad? If not they how does monopoly teach that capitalism is good?

# data[].attributes.headline
Week #3          Sigmund Freud's Oedipus Complex

# data[].attributes.subject
Week #3          Sigmund Freud's Oedipus Complex

# data[].attributes.body
Freud in the 1890's suggested the idea that explains the observed affinity of the son towards the mother. While he himself admitted that he didn't fully understand how the daughter was drawn towards the father, his complex also applies. In light of the article, how would a similar theory be received by modern scientific journals? Would Freud have been accepted in today's scientific community

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The Oedipus complex, also known as the Oedipal complex, describes a child's feelings of desire for their opposite-sex parent and jealousy and anger toward their same-sex parent. The concept was first introduced by Sigmund Freud in his theory of psychosexual stages of development.

In simple terms, a boy feels that he is competing with his father for possession of his mother, while a girl feels that she is competing with her mother for her father's affection. According to Freud, children view their same-sex parents as a rival for the opposite-sex parent's attention and affection.

History of the Oedipus Complex

Freud first proposed the concept of the Oedipus complex in his 1899 book " The Interpretation of Dreams," although he did not formally begin using the term Oedipus complex until 1910. The concept became increasingly important as he continued to develop his theory of psychosexual development.

Freud named the complex after the character in Sophocles' "Oedipus Rex," who accidentally kills his father and marries his mother.

In the Greek myth, Oedipus is abandoned at birth and thus does not know who his parents are. It is only after he had killed his father and married his mother that he learns their true identities.

How Does the Oedipus Complex Work?

In psychoanalytic theory, the Oedipus complex refers to the child's desire for sexual involvement with the opposite sex parent, particularly a boy's attention to his mother. This desire is kept out of conscious awareness through repression, but Freud believed that it still had an influence over a child's behavior and played a role in development.

In Freud's theory, children progress through a series of stages of psychosexual development. At each stage, the subconscious mind is centered on pleasure related to a certain region of the body. These stages are:

Oral stage: From birth to 18 months

Anal stage: From 18 months to three years

Phallic stage: From ages three to five

Latency: From ages five to 12

Genital: From ages 12 to adulthood

Freud suggested that the Oedipus complex played an important role in the phallic stage of psychosexual development. He also believed that successful completion of this stage involved identifying with the same-sex parent, which ultimately would lead to developing a mature sexual identity.

During this stage of development, Freud suggested that the child develops a sexual attraction to his or her opposite-sex parent and hostility toward the same-sex parent. According to Freud, the boy wishes to possess his mother and replace his father, who the child views as a rival for the mother's affections.

At what age does the Oedipus complex occur?

The Oedipal complex occurs in the phallic stage of psychosexual development between the ages of three and five. The phallic stage serves as an important point in forming sexual identity.

Signs of the Oedipus Complex

Freud believed that all children go through this process as a normal part of development. Some signs that a child is experiencing the Oedipus complex include:

Becoming overly attached to one parent

Fixation on one parent

Hostility toward the other parent

Jealousy of one parent

Possessiveness of one parent

Freud suggested that there are a number of behaviors that children engage in that are actually a result of this complex. Examples of behaviors a child might exhibit include:

Acting angry or hostile toward the rival parent

Becoming angry or jealous when the rival parent shows affection to the desired parent

Indicating that they want to marry the desired parent

Trying to get the attention of the desired parent

It is important to note that not every conflict that occurs between a child and parent is caused by the Oedipus complex.

The Electra Complex

The analogous stage for girls is known as the Electra complex in which girls feel desire for their fathers and jealousy of their mothers. The term Electra complex was introduced by Carl Jung to describe how this complex manifests in girls. Freud, however, believed that the term Oedipus complex referred to both boys and girls, although he believed that each sex experiences it differently.

Freud also suggested that when girls discover that they do not have a penis, they develop penis envy and resentment toward their mothers for "sending her into the world so insufficiently equipped." Eventually, this resentment gives way to identification with her mother and the process of internalizing the attributes and characteristics of her same-sex parent.

It was Freud's views of female sexuality that were perhaps his most heavily criticized. The psychoanalyst Karen Horney refuted Freud's concept of penis envy and instead suggested that men experience womb envy due to their inability to bear children.

Freud himself admitted that his understanding of women was perhaps less than fully realized.

How Is the Oedipus Complex Resolved?

At each stage in Freud's theory of psychosexual development, children face a developmental conflict that must be resolved in order to form a healthy adult personality. In order to develop into a successful adult with a healthy identity, the child must identify with the same-sex parent in order to resolve the conflict of the phallic stage.

Influence of the Id and Ego

So how does the child go about resolving the Oedipus complex? Freud suggested that while the primal id wants to eliminate the father, the more realistic ego knows that the father is much stronger. In addition, the boy also has a positive attachment to the father.

The id is the primal source of energy that seeks to immediately satisfy all of the unconscious urges.

The ego is the part of the personality that emerges to mediate between the urges of the id and the demands of reality.

Castration Anxiety

According to Freud, the boy then experiences what he called castration anxiety which is a fear of both literal and figurative emasculation. Freud believed that as the child becomes aware of the physical differences between males and females, he assumes that the female's penis has been removed and that his father will also castrate him as a punishment for desiring his mother.

Emergence of the Superego

In order to resolve the conflict, the defense mechanism known as identification kicks in. It is at this point that the super-ego is formed. The super-ego becomes a sort of inner moral authority, an internalization of the father figure that strives to suppress the urges of the id and make the ego act upon these idealistic standards.

In "The Ego and the Id," Freud explained the child's superego retains the character of the child's father and that the strong feelings of the Oedipus complex are then repressed.

Outside influences including social norms, religious teachings, and other cultural influences help contribute to the repression of the Oedipal complex.

It is out of this that the child's conscience emerges, or the overall sense of right and wrong. In some cases, however, Freud also suggested that these repressed feelings could also result in an unconscious sense of guilt. While this guilt may not be overtly felt, it can still have an influence over the individual's conscious actions.

What If the Oedipus Complex Is Not Resolved?

As when conflicts at other psychosexual stages are not resolved, a fixation at that point in development can result. Freud suggested that boys who do not deal with this conflict effectively become " mother-fixated" while girls become "father-fixated."

When someone says that a person has an Oedipus complex, it often describes an unhealthy attachment or dependence on their opposite-sex parent in adulthood. An unresolved Oedipus complex can lead to challenges in achieving mature adult romantic relationships, and conflicts with same-sex competitiveness. Psychoanalysis focuses on helping resolve these conflicts.

Criticisms and Other Explanations

Is the Oedipus complex a real thing? Freud's theory was controversial in his own time and remains controversial, criticized, and not widely accepted today. Other theories have emerged to describe parent-child attachments.

Attachment theory, in particular, offers an alternative explanation for many of the behaviors that Freud described. This approach emerged during the 1950s through the work of psychologists John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth.

According to attachment theory, early childhood emotional bonds serve as a source of safety and security. Children may bond with one parent more or express jealousy of the rival parent as a result of these early attachments that are tied to safety, security, and survival.

A Word From Verywell

Freud's concept of the Oedipus complex remains highly debated today and other theories are generally preferred as explanations for some of the attachment behaviors that children experience.

If your child is experiencing symptoms that are disrupting their functioning and creating distress, talk to your child's pediatrician or a mental health professional. They can evaluate these symptoms and make recommendations that can help your child.

Additional Reading

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Oedipus Complex: One of Freud's Most Controversial Ideas

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Oedipus complex is a child's feelings of desire for their opposite-sex parent and resentment toward the same-sex parent. Learn more about Freud's theory.

# data[].attributes.body
A great site to read up on actual accounts of individuals "bettering the gene pool by removing themselves" The name Darwin Award refers to Darwin's concept of Natural Selection. Throughout history, people have died in many ways. Some more "simple" than others. Giving someone the Darwin Award is congratulating them on their poor collection of genes seeing as they failed that individual. A question might arise, is it always the individual's inherited gene's that determine a person's worth? Are some people born to be used as comedic material?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Darwin Awards. Chlorinating The Gene Pool.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Darwin Awards boldly track the Human Evolution Revolution. Humankind is a devolving species, Homo sapiens sapiens isn't so smart, and with the intelligence of the species MIA and presumed dead, the impending extinction of the human race seems assured.

# data[].attributes.body
If we remember from Sartre's life, he wrote "Existentialism is a Humanism" in 1946. As the years progressed, many lead French philosophers began to shift their view point. This however, didnt stop the public from holding to existentialism well into the 60's.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The Stone is a forum for contemporary philosophers and other thinkers on issues both timely and timeless.

Last year I published a book on French philosophy since 1960 with a chapter entitled "What Ever Happened to Existentialism?" The title referred to the fast and apparently complete fall of existentialism from favor among leading French intellectuals, beginning at least as early as the 1960s. My chapter analyzed the fall, asked whether it was as decisive as it seemed, and ended with suggestions that the movement may have had more long-term influence than it seemed to.

Why does a philosophical movement that many have written off still retain its allure?

Adam Gopnik's recent New Yorker essay on Albert Camus and his relation to Jean-Paul Sartre reminded me how irrelevant my title's question appears from a broader cultural standpoint. Whatever the ups and downs of Camus's or Sartre's stock on the high cultural exchange, their existentialism (not to mention that of their 19th-century predecessors, Kierkegaard and Nietzsche) has continued to spark interest among the larger population of educated people. The point is also illustrated by the strong reactions, both for and against Sartre and Camus, in the comments on Andy Martin's recent piece in The Stone. And, of course, the enduring sign of interest has been the perennial popularity of undergraduate college courses on existentialist philosophy and literature.

Gopnik shows the reason for this continuing attraction. I would not recommend his essay as an accurate technical presentation of existentialist thought. For example, Sartre's magnum opus, "Being and Nothingness," is not an effort to "reconcile Marxism and existentialism"; that comes much later in his "Critique of Dialectical Reason." Nor did Sartre reason to his support of Marxist revolution through an atheistic version of Pascal's wager. But Gopnik has a ready response to such philosophical quibbles. The popular appeal of existentialism lies more in its sense of drama than in careful analysis and argument. As Gopnik exclaims: "Philosophers? They [Sartre and Camus] were performers with vision, who played on the stage of history."

This is not to say that existentialists - particularly Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir - are not intellectually serious thinkers. But in contrast to most other philosophers, they work out of a continuing sense of human existence as a compelling drama. In part this derives from the heightened stakes of the war and occupation from which their mature work emerged. Recall Sartre's example of his student who was trying to decide whether to abandon his mother and join the Free French army. On the conventional view, the student's decision would depend on whether he loved his mother or his country more. But Sartre insisted that the decision itself would create the greater love the student might later evoke to justify it.

The war even intrudes into the thorny ontological analyses of "Being and Nothingness." Arguing for the absoluteness of our freedom even in the face of severe constraints, Sartre - no doubt thinking of members of the Resistance captured by the Gestapo - insists that, even under torture, we are free. Those who yield and betray their comrades afterwards live in guilt because they know that, at the moment of betrayal, they could have held out for at least another minute.

But existentialism also ties into the drama of everyday life. Sartre's study of "bad faith" (self-deception) is driven by striking vignettes like that of the woman torn between her psychological desire for a man's attention and her lack of sexual interest in him, who allows him to caress her while thinking of herself as a pure consciousness, with no essential tie to the body he is touching. Similarly, Sartre describes an overly zealous waiter, so self-consciously intent on doing everything just right that he winds up as much pretending to be a waiter as being one.

Drama can always distort, and Sartre's examples are open to criticism for ignoring ambiguities and complexities for the sake of a vivid impact. When an interviewer much later confronted him with a passage expressing his stark early view of freedom under torture, Sartre replied that what was remarkable was that, when he wrote such things, he actually believed them. In another vein, feminist critics have noted the relentlessly masculine standpoint of Sartre's descriptions of what is supposed to be "human reality."

An emphasis on drama also has the advantages and the disadvantages of inevitably connecting the philosophy with the personal life of the philosopher. Gopnik rightly emphasizes how Sartre and Camus's theoretical disagreements over political philosophy are reflected in the sad history of their lost friendship. This personal drama illuminates their philosophical differences and vice versa. Similarly, it is fair to look at Sartre's and Beauvoir's philosophy of freedom in the light of their famous pact to maintain an "essential love" for one another, while allowing for any number of "contingent lovers." Still, too much concern with the messy and ultimately impenetrable details of a life can lure us across the line between philosophical insight and titillating gossip.

Despite its dangers, the drama of existentialism has kept some of the deepest philosophical questions alive in popular intellectual culture and provides students with remarkably direct access to such questions. I am always impressed by the frisson in my class when students realize that there's a sense in which Sartre is right: they could, right now, get up, leave the classroom, drop out of school, and go live as beach bums in a perpetually warm climate. But it's equally impressive to see them - still stimulated by what they're read in Sartre and other existentialists like Camus and Merleau-Ponty - reflect on why this sense of radical freedom is far from the whole story of their lives as moral agents. This combination of drama and reflection is the reason existentialism will always be with us.

Gary Gutting is a professor of philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, and an editor of Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews. He is the author of, most recently, "Thinking the Impossible: French Philosophy since 1960," and writes regularly for The Stone.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Stone is a forum for contemporary philosophers and other thinkers on issues both timely and timeless. Last year I published a book on French philosophy since 1960 with a chapter entitled "What Ever Happened to Existentialism?" The title referred to the fast and apparently complete fall of existentialism from favor among leading French intellectuals, beginning at least as early as the 1960s.