There's Glory for You

“There’s Glory for You”

Like Humpty Dumpty, I’m always looking for a “nice knockdown argument” —as though my thinking’s aim is to have to not think anymore.

Plus, it’s hard to come up with a nice argument because what seems obvious has no meaning anymore:

•     Humans need clean air and water, but we have to make laws to force humans to provide clean air and water.
•     ‘Laughter is the best medicine’ and that’s all most of us can afford.
•     A house in the country might be nice —fresh vegetables, et al— but when I lived in a rural area, only the markets had produce.

At my age, I should have plenty of nice arguments that would solve all the world’s problems.

Unfortunately the world doesn’t need nice arguments; it needs a new way of thinking that includes something besides a nuclear knockdown,— or maybe something like a free free market.

Jason Bourne gained popularity because he could knock down. Thor can knock down until he can’t (which might be the real theme of Norse myths). I think the Latin for this style of philosophy is argumentum ad baculum.

I guess the moral of Lewis Carroll’s episode about Humpty in Through the Looking-Glass is that a “nice knockdown argument” only works until you get knocked down yourself.