Edges
By Noel Gray
()
About this ebook
Read more from Noel Gray
Fall of the Ax Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn the River of Lost Footsteps Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPoverty's Window Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Dead Gondolier: and other crimes of Venice Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFy-Sy Fables: Colonising Creativity Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWar of the Web: Book One: The Battle of the Clouds Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRealities Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Last Reverse Tale Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Prisoner of Fata Morgana Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHiding from Time Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsExits Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFrog Legends Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWord World: The Adventures of Piano and Ditto - a story for lonely children Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVirtual Crimes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Edges
Related ebooks
Realities Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAvailable Light: Anthropological Reflections on Philosophical Topics Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The DNA of Prejudice: On the One and the Many Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPoetics as a Theory of Everything Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDictionary of Mithology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Science of Fairy Tales Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings1000 Mythological Characters Briefly Described Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings1000 Mythological Characters Briefly Described Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWitches, Werewolves, and Fairies: Shapeshifters and Astral Doubles in the Middle Ages Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Theory of Identities Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDelimitations: Phenomenology and the End of Metaphysics Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Triangle of Representation Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Verge of Philosophy Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPhilosophy in the Elements Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFriendship: The Future of an Ancient Gift Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMiddling Romanticism: Reading in the Gaps, from Kant to Ashbery Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlood, Soil, Paint - Imperium Press Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBad Mouth: Fugitive Papers on the Dark Side Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Colours of the Mind: Creative Intelligence, Biases and Prejudices Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGenesis and Validity: The Theory and Practice of Intellectual History Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Dictionary of Symbols Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cloud of the Impossible: Negative Theology and Planetary Entanglement Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5After Life in Roman Paganism Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsProgressive Secular Society: And Other Essays Relevant to Secularism Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Presence of Myth Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Myths and Dreams Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCitations: A Brief Anthology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Religion of Socialism: Being Essays in Modern Socialist Criticism Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDialectical Rhetoric Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Square Root of God: Mathematical Metaphors and Spiritual Tangents Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Philosophy For You
Daily Stoic: A Daily Journal On Meditation, Stoicism, Wisdom and Philosophy to Improve Your Life Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Bhagavad Gita (in English): The Authentic English Translation for Accurate and Unbiased Understanding Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Little Book of Stoicism: Timeless Wisdom to Gain Resilience, Confidence, and Calmness Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Art of Loving Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Allegory of the Cave Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Inward Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Bhagavad Gita Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Egyptian Book of the Dead: The Complete Papyrus of Ani Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A Course in Miracles: Text, Workbook for Students, Manual for Teachers Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How to Think Like a Roman Emperor: The Stoic Philosophy of Marcus Aurelius Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fear: Essential Wisdom for Getting Through the Storm Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tao Te Ching: A New English Version Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Mindfulness in Plain English: 20th Anniversary Edition Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Lessons of History Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tao Te Ching: Six Translations Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Buddha's Guide to Gratitude: The Life-changing Power of Everyday Mindfulness Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Meditations: Complete and Unabridged Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Experiencing God (2021 Edition): Knowing and Doing the Will of God Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Art of War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Courage to Be Happy: Discover the Power of Positive Psychology and Choose Happiness Every Day Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Brain Training with the Buddha: A Modern Path to Insight Based on the Ancient Foundations of Mindfulness Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Beyond Good and Evil Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Four Loves Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Edges
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Edges - Noel Gray
References
Editor's Note
Edges is the third book in a series that covers a period of twenty-five or so years of academic writing by the author. Some of the essays in this series have previously appeared as book chapters in other scholars' publications, while several have appeared as articles in numerous American, Australasian, Middle Eastern, and European academic journals. Other essays originated as conference papers, and several as invited responses to keynote and conference speakers; a few have been re-drafted from guest lectures given by the author. The last in the series, Screens , is a scaled-down version of the author's doctoral thesis in which he initially developed his early ideas concerning the philosophy of geometry. Other elements from the thesis also appear throughout the rest of the series.
The themes included in the entire series range from philosophy to geometry, from aesthetics to cultural studies, and from science to fine arts. Many have either as a central or as a cursory element the role that geometry, and by extension, the image, play in the production and construction of meaning in both the sciences and the humanities. Others touch on the truth claims made by various disciplines, while a few seek to examine in an oblique fashion the porous nature of what many disciplines consider their boundaries. The role and mercurial nature of specific metaphors is also a recurring theme in many of the essays.
In most cases, the texts have been wholly or partially trimmed of their original academic format in the hope of making their contents more appealing to a wider audience.
Laura Fabbris
Series Editor
FOREWORD
Among his countless other attributions, the messenger Hermes (Mercury) is also the god of transitions and boundaries. The second youngest of all the gods, he is the only one who can travel through the three realms of existence: Olympus, Earth, and Hades. As the god of borders, (literally and figuratively), and the carrier of souls to the underworld, he can breach the divide between the material and spiritual dominions. On one occasion he dons the famed cap of invisibility, enabling him to cross enemy lines undetected and slay a formidable foe of his father, Zeus. Hermes' multi-faceted, mercurial personality, alloyed to his love of trickery, inventiveness, deceitfulness, and confidentiality earned him the sobriquet, the god of contradictions. An apt appellation, for the symbol of this fleetest of all ancient divinities is the unhurried tortoise. An irony further enhanced by the fact that this amphibian creature can exist both inside and outside its own skeletal boundary, at one and the same time. It therefore seems an ideal image to portray the one force that can violate all borders yet leave them intact: the incalculable speed of simultaneity, the duration of which, as the Greeks well knew, is best imagined divinely, best left to the Gods.
Certain ideas are axiomatic to navigating and defining existence. As necessary markers they are generally considered to be unproblematic in their everyday use and understanding. This is rightly so, because any unbridled and ceaseless challenge to their obvious necessity would result in a constantly stalled experience of existence. This danger is no more graphically illustrated than in the Centipede's Dilemma:
A centipede was happy – quite!
Until a toad in fun
Said, Pray, which leg comes after which?
Which threw her mind in such a pitch,
She lay bewildered in the ditch
Considering how to run.
As aptly indicated, abilities that become automatic often cease to function in an effortless manner when brought back to the conscious level. This is also true of certain formative ideas that govern the comprehension of existence. As the renowned scientist, Arthur Eddington, once amusingly said: I know perfectly well what time is until I try to explain it to someone else.
One other such experiential necessity, and perhaps even the most important one at the level of the everyday, is that of the Edge. All concepts of difference, from the ethereal to the material, from the ideal to the empirical, from words to things, from desires to actions, from past to present to future, demand some form of border in order to differentiate each from each, this from that. Acting to both define and separate, when these edges are challenged or even erased, then the resounding clash often generates an unavoidable sense of uncertainty and