O.G. Rose | Core Thinking by O.G. Rose @O.G.Rose.Michelle.and.Daniel | Uploaded January 2024 | Updated October 2024, 1 day ago.
Ivan Illich was a great man, but he is relatively unknown and certainly not well-studied. I have referred to Nietzsche as a "Core Thinker of Critiquing Bestow Centrism," and I think we might say that Illich was also a "Core Thinking of an Apocalypse of Nonrationality for the Art of Living." I unfortunately think there might be an academic bias against "Core Thinkers" in favor of those who are perceived to be "Systematic Thinkers" (which I think has contributed to us missing many of the Counter-Enlightenment and Modern Counter-Enlightenment thinkers), which is to say we favor philosophers who we perceive as building systems upon large ideas or axioms like "Being" or "Absurdism," perhaps because they are easier to paraphrase and teach to larger groups of people (which is considered a standard of success by many systems), and if we do teach Core Thinkers, we have likely found a way to think them through a category, concept, or summary (arrived at "top-down" versus "bottom-up," omitting too much). A "core" of Nietzsche and Illich though is never explicitly stated (perhaps more so intuited), perhaps because Core Thinkers may hesitate to defend an overarching theme in fear that it might bias their observations. They also aren't so much looking to "make a point," but to instead describe what they see (like Martin Buber depicting himself as someone who stood at a window and pointed), but for me the very fact they do this and a pattern emerges is all the more reason to believe this pattern is substantive versus self-imposed. Although "the overarching theme" of Core Thinkers can be harder to grasp and is usually only implicit, the likelihood of its validity I think is higher, precisely because it has been observed so widely and through so much variance.
Core Thinkers tend to observe many fields closely (an interdisciplinary and generalist approach that systems might also be biased against), and with their gaze describe and seek to understand what they see. Flannery O'Connor once said a great writer isn't afraid to stare, and Core Thinkers are like writers in that they look closely at what "unfolds" before them. As a writer who wants to be sure a certain message or meaning comes across in his or her story can risk turning the work into propaganda, so the philosopher who wants to assure a certain idea or notion comes through can risk forcing the world to conform to his or her thinking versus the other way around. Philosophers like Nietzsche and Illich don't worry about this (as don't great writers), and they are instead just focused on what they see (as great writers are just focused on telling a story). They actually probably don't even intend to be "Core Thinkers," but instead that is simply the emergent result of their faith and trust in doing the work of observation and phenomenology. As a good writer has ideas and intentions but ultimately trusts the interpretation of the reader (and so doesn't make things overly-explicit), so a great philosopher and phenomenologist can ultimately leave it up to others to see and excavate what is implicit in their work - that is if there is something to excavate and if people see it...
For the full essay, please visit:
open.substack.com/pub/ogrose/p/a-new-core?r=nqh4n&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcome=true
Medium:
o-g-rose-writing.medium.com/a-new-core-9fed13b3fe7b
Also, see the Philosophy Portal and the Conference "Thus Spoke Zarathustra: Spiritual Leadership for Our Time" for a presentation on "Bestow Centrism" in Nietzsche:
https://philosophyportal.online/thus-spoke-zarathustra-2022
For more by O.G. Rose:
ogrose.com
Photo by Buzz Andersen
Ivan Illich was a great man, but he is relatively unknown and certainly not well-studied. I have referred to Nietzsche as a "Core Thinker of Critiquing Bestow Centrism," and I think we might say that Illich was also a "Core Thinking of an Apocalypse of Nonrationality for the Art of Living." I unfortunately think there might be an academic bias against "Core Thinkers" in favor of those who are perceived to be "Systematic Thinkers" (which I think has contributed to us missing many of the Counter-Enlightenment and Modern Counter-Enlightenment thinkers), which is to say we favor philosophers who we perceive as building systems upon large ideas or axioms like "Being" or "Absurdism," perhaps because they are easier to paraphrase and teach to larger groups of people (which is considered a standard of success by many systems), and if we do teach Core Thinkers, we have likely found a way to think them through a category, concept, or summary (arrived at "top-down" versus "bottom-up," omitting too much). A "core" of Nietzsche and Illich though is never explicitly stated (perhaps more so intuited), perhaps because Core Thinkers may hesitate to defend an overarching theme in fear that it might bias their observations. They also aren't so much looking to "make a point," but to instead describe what they see (like Martin Buber depicting himself as someone who stood at a window and pointed), but for me the very fact they do this and a pattern emerges is all the more reason to believe this pattern is substantive versus self-imposed. Although "the overarching theme" of Core Thinkers can be harder to grasp and is usually only implicit, the likelihood of its validity I think is higher, precisely because it has been observed so widely and through so much variance.
Core Thinkers tend to observe many fields closely (an interdisciplinary and generalist approach that systems might also be biased against), and with their gaze describe and seek to understand what they see. Flannery O'Connor once said a great writer isn't afraid to stare, and Core Thinkers are like writers in that they look closely at what "unfolds" before them. As a writer who wants to be sure a certain message or meaning comes across in his or her story can risk turning the work into propaganda, so the philosopher who wants to assure a certain idea or notion comes through can risk forcing the world to conform to his or her thinking versus the other way around. Philosophers like Nietzsche and Illich don't worry about this (as don't great writers), and they are instead just focused on what they see (as great writers are just focused on telling a story). They actually probably don't even intend to be "Core Thinkers," but instead that is simply the emergent result of their faith and trust in doing the work of observation and phenomenology. As a good writer has ideas and intentions but ultimately trusts the interpretation of the reader (and so doesn't make things overly-explicit), so a great philosopher and phenomenologist can ultimately leave it up to others to see and excavate what is implicit in their work - that is if there is something to excavate and if people see it...
For the full essay, please visit:
open.substack.com/pub/ogrose/p/a-new-core?r=nqh4n&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcome=true
Medium:
o-g-rose-writing.medium.com/a-new-core-9fed13b3fe7b
Also, see the Philosophy Portal and the Conference "Thus Spoke Zarathustra: Spiritual Leadership for Our Time" for a presentation on "Bestow Centrism" in Nietzsche:
https://philosophyportal.online/thus-spoke-zarathustra-2022
For more by O.G. Rose:
ogrose.com
Photo by Buzz Andersen
