On Instances of the Sinking House and Another Possible Explanation.

On Instances of the Sinking House and Another Possible Explanation.

 

The Sinking House Problem, as a theory, is corroborated in individual circumstances by the evidence of neurological science. In states of stress, especially when one is challenged with a threat to one’s views*, the Reasoning faculty, which is in essence the Ordering faculty, has been proven scientifically to shut down.

 

Heidegger was ahead of his time when he pointed out that we are only cast into the Void betwixt all Beings when we are in a state of Anxiety. To him, Anxiety was the fundamental human predicament, and it appears that, in Heidegger’s view, he believed, as Freud seemed to, that civilization was a mere veneer for the underlying, unreliable animal nature of the human predicament.

 

*Criticism may have such an ancient origin and so profound and widespread a use and abuse that it would reach deeply into the Unconscious with its primitive origins, touching upon the Survivalistic tendency that usurps all civilized judgment, including our leaps of faith in regards to the “structure of time” and, above all, the common sense view we take for granted (in conventional conversation) in regards to the continuity of our own minds and specifically our memories over time.

 

To the degree that one wishes to simulate a perfectly Certain microcosm in the snow-globe of one’s mind, to that degree subjective factors such as Memory have a God-like Authority. Yet in the very process of flexing this muscle for the sake of flexing it, beyond the perceived necessity of having done so, as though one were a gymnast of the mind, one finds, as does the gymnast, the limits of that muscle. The benefit to the gymnast of the exercise is that the muscle becomes sore, with luck and all the necessary safety precautions, in a controlled setting, as it were, and not by surprise in the use of these muscles in practical life.

 

Memories are servants, but like quantum particles they are fickle. No pedestal has an impenetrable fortitude in a post-modern world.

 

One logical explanation for the fallibility of memories is that memories themselves change over time, as do we their subjects. Were our minds themselves constant, we would lend them the authority of gods. Yet our minds themselves change, and so it seems that any Constant is merely a Temporary lapse in Perception and/or Reason: The result of a disconnect between the Mind and the Facts at Hand. Yet naturally this runs its course in time. No one is really ever hopelessly insane, because we never know in what fashion the mind will grow.

 

If Memory, as a function of Consciousness and of Lucid Reason, itself changes over time, then it is open to distortion and substitution. If it is our memory itself that motivates all sorts of neurotic behaviours, then it is quite sensible to presume that our success or failure in the execution of these neurotic behaviours would be indistinguishable from the “incontrovertible” presence of the original impetus.

This is why, as I have stated, the Sinking House is often constructed from the rotting matter of useless thoughts. Yet why do we persist in the absurdity of trying to construct a house from useless thoughts? Why do we entertain all manner of fruitless calculations and put on all sorts of superficial masks to act out more and more absurd acts?

It is because, as Nietzsche observed precisely, we cannot rid ourselves of the Bad Conscience without directing it at the very ideals that established it. Society in superficial culture imposes upon us all sorts of cognitive distortions by sheer force of habit. This is nothing for one to be ashamed of if one aims to change the culture or to live in accord with it, yet with lucidity and maybe some disgust. Some degree of madness is symptomatic of the civilized man who is active in society.

If, as Camus put it, Intelligence envelops and transcends Lucid Reason, then the sense of Uncertainty that comes about with the untangling of a web of neuroses is only to be seen as a symptom of health. This must be done in the privacy of one’s own mind. Intersubjectivity offers no reprieve from the Sinking House. The words we use with which to relate the most personal of our uncertainties fall short of touching upon that ineffable ground. We can only Describe to those who have shared the experience; we cannot Express to those who have not had it. This is the predicament of Directed Thinking; it can only depict the Non-directed process to those who have had the same Non-directed experience. It is quite likely that someone who has not had the experience that I have described and has not ventured into the issue of memory loss will only have a hint as to what I am talking about.

 

Dm.A.A.