{"id":15884,"date":"2012-04-14T10:04:23","date_gmt":"2012-04-14T17:04:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/?p=15884"},"modified":"2012-04-14T10:04:34","modified_gmt":"2012-04-14T17:04:34","slug":"from-man-alive-a-calculus-of-morality-on-a-first-grade-number-line","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/15884\/from-man-alive-a-calculus-of-morality-on-a-first-grade-number-line\/","title":{"rendered":"From Man Alive! – “A calculus of morality on a first-grade number line.”"},"content":{"rendered":"

From: Man Alive! A survival manual for the human mind.<\/em><\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

Extract from Chapter 7. A calculus of morality on a first-grade number line.<\/a><\/h3>\n

You live an easy life, and that has made it easy for you to be thoughtless and glib about your values. You say things like “Whatcha gonna do?” and “Life’s a bitch and then you die,” and you don’t realize that you are making outrageously misleading statements about ontology and teleology – about your own unchangeable nature as a human being. If you are casting about in your mind for a slang expression that would have meant something to the father of Fathertongue, the man who gave you the first treasure in that huge cache of incomparable wealth that you could never have produced on your own, try this on for size: “Some days you eat the bear, some days the bear eats you.” But even that doesn’t fit, because once the bear eats you, it’s lights out. Game over. Forever.<\/p>\n

When you are starving, there is no room in your mind for cynicism or boredom or superciliousness or ennui. You don’t waste your time crafting ridiculous arguments conflating unlike things, and you don’t deface, deride, damage and denigrate the very values you need to sustain your tenuous survival. A starving human being can think of many different things, but it seems hugely unlikely to me that any of those notions would win the approval of the smug jackasses down at the Student Union. They – and you – have the luxury of living off of a legacy of inherited wealth, in the form of the accumulated intellectual and economic power of thousands of years worth of carefully-curated Fathertongue. And like most heirs of unearned wealth, they have lived their lives – at least the life of the mind – as unrepentant wastrels.<\/p>\n

And the truth of the matter – and I’m willing to acknowledge it, even if you are not – is that the only reason you are willing to attend to what I have to say now is that the people you trusted to manage your inherited wealth of Fathertongue Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From: Man Alive! A survival manual for the human mind. Extract from Chapter 7. A calculus of morality on a first-grade number line. You live an easy life, and that has made it easy for you to be thoughtless and glib about your values. You say things like “Whatcha gonna do?” and “Life’s a bitch […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,212,29],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-15884","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-egoism-in-action","7":"category-flourishing","8":"category-group-therapy","10":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":15889,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/15889\/unchained-melodies-then-what\/","url_meta":{"origin":15884,"position":0},"title":"Unchained Melodies: “Then what?”","author":"Greg Swann","date":"April 14, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"A great song for Morality Day with Man Alive!. This is Clay Walker doing \"Then what?\"","rel":"","context":"In "Egoism in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Egoism in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/egoism-in-action\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":17308,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/17308\/overnight-news-baby-killers-riot-enablers-and-vehement-haters-of-hatred-lecture-captive-audience-of-one-on-morality\/","url_meta":{"origin":15884,"position":1},"title":"Overnight News: Baby-killers, riot-enablers and vehement haters-of-hatred lecture captive audience of one on\u00a0morality.","author":"Greg Swann","date":"October 13, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"The worst part about yesterday's SCOTUS hearings? They'll get worse... The news: Housing Wire: The forbearance crash bros spoke too soon. CNBC: Disney says its \u2018primary focus\u2019 for entertainment is streaming \u2014 announces a major reorg. Bye, bye, cinemas. Bye, bye, malls. All of this was already in motion. The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Group Therapy"","block_context":{"text":"Group Therapy","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/group-therapy\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Ya think it's easy?","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/BHBNewTopImage-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":15895,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/15895\/from-man-alive-the-high-cost-of-mindlessness\/","url_meta":{"origin":15884,"position":2},"title":"From Man Alive! – “The high cost of mindlessness.”","author":"Greg Swann","date":"April 16, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"From: Man Alive! A survival manual for the human mind. Extract from Chapter 9. The high cost of mindlessness. Because you never trained your mind to think about the ontology of human nature \u2013 don\u2019t fault yourself for that; no one else did, either \u2013 you thought they were just\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egoism in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Egoism in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/egoism-in-action\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":16387,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/16387\/rock-me-mama-egoism-in-action-the-link-from-art-to-human-values-and-back\/","url_meta":{"origin":15884,"position":3},"title":"Rock Me Mama Egoism In Action: The link from art to human values and back.","author":"Greg Swann","date":"September 3, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Everything is all one thing, so this is a video essay about art about music about morality about song-writing about marriage about redemption \u2013 simple stuff. This is egoism in action, me being me. This video connects directly to the argument I made on Friday about \u2018conservative\u2019 art, and all\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egoism in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Egoism in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/egoism-in-action\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":15892,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/15892\/from-man-alive-the-integrity-of-art\/","url_meta":{"origin":15884,"position":4},"title":"From Man Alive! – “The integrity of art.”","author":"Greg Swann","date":"April 15, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"From: Man Alive! A survival manual for the human mind. Extract from Chapter 8. The integrity of art. When I talk about Mothertongue and Fathertongue, I know that many people are straining to divide them up in their minds, to separate them and to regard them somehow as being opposites.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egoism in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Egoism in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/egoism-in-action\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":15835,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/15835\/from-man-alive-youre-in-this-all-alone\/","url_meta":{"origin":15884,"position":5},"title":"From Man Alive! – “You’re in this all alone.”","author":"Greg Swann","date":"April 8, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"From: Man Alive! A survival manual for the human mind. Extract from Chapter 1. You\u2019re in this all alone. Each individual human being is his own first and best philosopher, like it or don\u2019t, for this simple reason: You are not born knowing how to stay alive, and, absent some\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egoism in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Egoism in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/egoism-in-action\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15884"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15884\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15886,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15884\/revisions\/15886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}