When something
becomes nothing, the odd thing is it at the same time becomes highly
convincing. There was the atom bomb quote in P133 which could almost
represent the triumph of ego-calculation over mundane normality.
That was a
deliberate act of war, whereas the nitrate explosion in Beirut was an act of
carelessness. Yes, but to “them” the carelessness has managed to take-out Ottoman
and French-colonial areas of elegance and slight dereliction.
To “them” the
ideal city is Neom, the prospective Saudi Arabian desert metropolis of straight
lines and algorithmic drones (I mean, inhabitants.)
I’m not saying
any of these acts save Hiroshima are deliberate acts of flattening, just that
the mindset cares nothing for ancient dereliction – or even art-deco (the
careless act of the “restorers” of Glasgow School of Art, prev.)
What they want
is a type of new nothingness that is clean and clever, ascetic areas of
prosperity. It’s highly convincing to the ego, being composed of the Black sun
of calculation; the immaterial that cannot deny the physique, and that shines
where the sun don’t shine.
The logic has an
illogic at its core. Namely that time – the symmetries of the body and the
universe – is illogical and “just is (prev). The symmetries produce male and
female, back and front, and the cycles of fertility that constitute life and
death.
The cold mirror
of logic is simply a name for a sterile system that persuades the ego with
facts (numerical, monetary) but cannot revive from dereliction or decay.
The strength of
dereliction is like the stench of death; it’s just a fact whatever one thinks
of it. There is another area of facts that come from empirical tradition (see
prev Mosaic Law), and that are true in the cyclical sense of recovery, of dirt
and cleanliness (see Buffy quote on dried buffalo manure, prev.)
Traditions are
born of universal rhythm, rather than of inductive reason (see The New
Atlantis, prev.) Tribal apothecaries, the uses of buffalo hide, and the
stars themselves.
On the latter, I
read that Nasa announced a 13th Zodiac constellation called
Ophiuchus, owing to the Earth’s wobble over millennia. Astrologer Sally Kirkman
says,
“No-one is going to have Ophiuchus as their star sign, it means nothing. All the star signs remain as they have since ancient times.
“In brief, western astrology, which is the standard in many countries in the world, is based on the tropical zodiac. The 12 star signs of the zodiac are fixed and they connect to the Equinoxes and Solstice dates which are the same year in, year out and are linked to the seasons. They do not change - the dates of each star sign remain the same.
“There is a beautiful symmetry in the 12 signs of the zodiac which ancients knew about and their hidden knowledge has been passed down throughout time.” (DT)
In other words, the Zodiac is not strictly factual, it is symmetrical. The facts that ARE there come out of the rhythm of the cosmos; first rhythm, then information (the physical and the psyche).
This is the empirical tradition which science overthrew, and has now reached the stage of the vanishing point of technique – or ones and zeros (algorithm).
1960s/70s Glasgow’s “grim” tenements and children playing – could be Harlem (Daily Record)