Paul's Blog

 “.......the central proposition seems to be that there is no “reality” in the world other than one constructed by words. Categories are constructed according to the power interests of groups (white, western, and mostly wealthy and heterosexual, males) advantaged by such constructions and the main intellectual labor confronting the humanities, in fact confronting all of us, is to deconstruct these false categories and show them not to be based on objective reality or knowledge but on ideology generated by a group (usually, and especially, white, western males) wishing to maintain their power advantage........the only way justice will be served is by analysing the modes and techniques of verbal deceit used in the construction of these ideologies to expose their fallacies and implausibilities .......” However, Is this THEORY itself a grab for power and prestige within the academy and the wider community by those who espouse it ? Are many other people correct to feel and know in their...

 For Hegel and Marx (and Foucault and others too) all ideas and concepts must be looked at and regarded historically; as being embedded in ways of life, and thus in societies, and when society changes ideas and concepts change too. Ideas do not exist in the abstract and are not timeless and unchanging but, again, as always embodied in societies and institutions, ie: in historical realities which change..... ......there are no absolute truths, there is no fixed human nature, and what we think of as “reality” is always and only a manufactured reality. There are in fact as many “realities” out there as there are ideologies which construct them......none of us are free, or ever can be free of ideology. All of us are conditioned by inbuilt and often unconscious mindsets to act in certain predictable ways. Our life scripts are, in fact, written for us.... What we are told are “truths” about the world are not really truths but ideological assertions. We need to look at how the so-called “...

 Postmodernism is a late 20th century movement in Western philosophy characterised by broad scepticism, subjectivism or relativism; a general suspicion of reason; and an acute sensitivity to the role of ideology in asserting and maintaining political and economic power. Deconstruction: Is a form of philosophical and literary analysis, derived mainly from work begun in the 1960s by the French philosopher Jacques Derrida, that questions the fundamental conceptual distinctions, or “oppositions”, in Western philosophy through a close examination of the language and logic of philosophical and literary texts. In the 1970s the term was applied to work by Derrida, Paul de Man, J.Hillis Miller and Barbara Johnson, among other scholars. The word has been sometimes used pejoratively to suggest nihilism and frivolous skepticism. In popular usage the term has come to mean a critical dismantling of tradition and traditional modes of thought. The oppositions challenged by deconstruction, which ha...

 Last year I googled “what is past is prologue”. There is so much to know around this famous line from Shakespeare ! Also, I can give a fairly good definition and explanation of the following: Sarcasm, irony, satire and paradox; and simile, metaphor and analogy...... But I want to reread about them what I have read before. I think they are important words and terms. A synopsis of the notes I make re the above might be placed on my blog..... PS - it looks like Joe Biden’s handlers won the 2020 US Presidential election. Kamala Harris should be president by the end of 2022, at the latest. God help us all.... (AMDG).

 “Confess your sins directly to God, not to a priest. Christianity is a relationship not a religion. The Church can’t save you, only Jesus can. Come to our church. There is no Sunday obligation. You can go any day of the week you like. If you miss a few services, it’s no big deal. No need for confession. Come one, come all, and come us you are. If you want to go to Church at home, we can help you with that too.” I read the above recently..... I was baptised and raised Catholic from 1962 to 1980. A lot of the time between 1980 and 2018, I alternated between being a confused agnostic, vaguely Protestant and a half hearted, confused Catholic. For the past 2 years, especially,  I have returned to fully believing the core truths of Christianity, often praying, fairly often reading the Bible and or Christian, mostly Catholic, blogs and websites.....I admit the Catholic Church is in many ways in a real mess in our era; there is much, at times, that makes me doubt if the Catholic Chur...