Pynchon & Math (Aristotle vs. Plato)

[Paul Mackin]

On 1/29/2013 11:07 PM, Michael Bailey wrote:
> Paul Mackin wrote:
>
>> Pragmatists accept religious experience, but only as just another
>> experience.   They say that just because we might EXPERIENCE something as
>> spiritual and immaterial, that does not mean we MUST posit immaterial man as
>> a definitive choice, as opposed to a strictly material one. Percy's writing
>> seems to disagree.
>>
> well, in Pynchon's writing there are references to immaterial bodies
> ("their auras, for the record, are green" and so forth) which blossom
> in various places in AtD and in the
> perhaps-not-so-lightweight-as-may-be-thought IV.
> While this isn't exactly the same as "immaterial man", still it does
> extend the concept of human being out beyond the "five senses world"
> as some may have at times called the rationalistic experiencI

To my way of thinking the proper pragmatist will only be interested in 
what was the EFFECT of these perceived auras, etc., on what was 
happening in the novel--their USE or PURPOSE, in other words. The 
question of whether or not there is "really anything out there" won't 
interest him.

Chodat seems to go beyond this, with the "proverbs of admonition" 
business.  Pynchon isn't Percy, of course.

P


>> Just a brief reaction to the discussion.  Probably totally out to lunch.
>>
> where?  how about that Deux Magots?  its mention in AtD caused me - a
> longtime non-looker-upper - to actually confirm that its name has
> nothing to do with the offspring of flies...
>