Every word is an empty signifier. When a word like politics or ethics is used in commonsensical sense, one takes it as certain, as if something is there, which can be defined as such. To refer Derrida, it is "metaphysics of presence", which is known as logocentrism, is taken for granted. A term such a politics has no fixed meaning. Words are never meant to signify any fixed reality. It is always already absent in its presence, just like an arche-type of difference. History of philosophy has been obsessed with a question, "who experiences the world?" Is there any fixed identity in me? I have never been familiar to myself. How can I be a fixed "I"? Fixation and definition are just like an amusing act by logician, lawyers, and mathematician. They take their being for granted, as if, being has been implanted in the world to experience deceit and insurmountable sorrow and fear of unknown. Being is an interpretative function, which remains and effaces itself in fragments, whose memorial is united by memory. Just like Bergson' time is a fiction. Second as a basic unit of time may be divided further into its subatomic level and then it disappears in its infinity. Politics is not a transcendental signifier like Heidegger's Being, it has seen rainbow of colours. Aristotelian politics was a conduct of ordinary affairs, an important facet for a civilian, a guiding monad for society and cooperation, Gandhian politics was the fundamental tool for ethical affirmation of truth, non-violence, and love force. Ambedkar's politics was fundamentally rooted against the daily experiences of voiceless and subaltern. Nehruvian socialism emerged out of colonial and anti-colonial politics, especially from the experience of European wars, gross inequality, suffering from religious animosity. The fundamentals of politics have never been static, it is for some "will to power", for others a means to choose appropriate vocation. For few, it's emancipatory for others it's just like an opportunity to enjoy name, reputation, fame. There is no fixed definition of politics. There can't be one. It is progressing, decomposing, and recomposing into a temporary concept, which needs a constant alertness to feel its fragrance of existence. The 21st century of human's world has already witnessed so many upheavals, and the clamour of politics and justice is still on like it has ever been.
Student: I want to excel in my life. Over the years, my graph of success is achieving a new height. I am doing hard work to become one of the smartest and richest persons on the Earth. Teacher: Wonderful! Who is achiever and what is achieved? Student: I am the achiever. My name and fame are shining day by day. Teacher: Who is this ‘I’? What is the material by which it is produced? Student: I is the ego which is the agent achieving successes and facing failures. Teacher: Whether ego is real or imaginary? Student: It is made of name, form, and function. Teacher: Whether name, form, and function are eternal? Student: No, they are changing. Teacher: Anything changes does it exist? Whether these are real or merely fictitious images appearing and disappearing before the sightscreen of mind? Student: They are the images constructing my identity as a person. Teacher: Well said! What is the stuff by which these images are made of? Who is maker and what is made? Student: They ar...
Great thought process
ReplyDeleteThank you so much!
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