From: Michael M. Butler (mmb@spies.com)
Date: Tue May 20 2003 - 22:38:23 MDT
I stand corrected. Thanks, Damien.
On Wed, 21 May 2003 13:10:54 +1000, Damien Broderick
<damienb@unimelb.edu.au> wrote:
> At 07:12 PM 5/20/03 -0700, Lee Corbin wrote:
>
>>> I'm guessing it was the Prophet Bokonon and the other guy, forgot his
>>> name,
>>> who was the military dictator of the island where Cat's Cradle is set.
>
>> Oh, yes. Sounds right.
>
> No need to guess.
>
> `Bokonon, cynically and playfully, invented a new religion... Truth was
> the
> enemy of the people, because truth was so terrible, so Bokonon made it
> his
> business to provide the people with better and better lies.'
> When all life on Earth is destroyed by the apocalypse of ice-nine, no
> divine judgement has been rendered: this is brute contingent absurdity,
> facilitated by the irresponsibility of its inventor and the philosophy of
> industrial militarism. While `no cradle, no cat' is precisely and
> chillingly the metaphysical truth of the world, vicious lies like karass
> and Pro Patria enable human beings to abandon any sense of personal
> responsibility. Bokonon hurls his mountebankery in the world's face:
>
> Don't be a fool! Close this book at once! It is nothing but foma!
>
> and
>
> `I thought this was trash.'
>
> `Of course it's trash!' says Bokonon.
>
> ================
>
> Damien Broderick
>
>
-- I am not here to have an argument. I am here as part of a civilization. Sometimes I forget.
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