What maketh a man?
Reading maketh a full man and writing an exact man. So said someone. But thats not what was thinking about. Quite different in fact.
What maketh a man? Is it the man or the men around him? Sounds rather trivial... clearly its the man you say. But surely, as it did it with me after I first reflected on this rather philosophical question, one would be rather unsure. The same feeling as you get when you look at a true/false question whose contents you're vaguely familiar with and you're inclined towards one of the choices but not confident enough. Thank you PH101,PH102 and PH103 for the apt parallels you have provided.
So, for ye in support of the Man and pooh-pooh my ostensibly weak attempt claiming that it is but the man who makes the men around him, I say cease and desist, O ignorant one. For do you not see the recursive way that the human soceity works. Do you not see that which is so blatantly obvious to one even as naive to the workings of Man as myself that most of the time, (quantifier used to stress on the exceptions as must be in any system generalisable with an universal rule), that most of the time, a man befriends another because of the company he keeps or sometimes even to further a mutual interest.
No man does anything which does not directly or indirectly benefit him. Or so I feel. Or, a little stronger claim, or so I know. *gulp* . Ok, compromise, or so I claim. A normal socially active human being lives for himself and it is still unknown to the thinking Helmet why he should not lead such a selfish existence. And the generous souls involved in charities and other activites supposedly not for their own gain, they do so only to further their own impression with the Guy up there or perhaps to earn themselves nirvana or good karma or something like that. Again, its all for themselves.
On an afterthought the above para looks like an aside. That or my thoughts which were affected by a blinking IM from one of my friends seems too lazy to bring about the connection which I thought was brilliant enough to include the above para. Ah, you win some you lose some.
So back to makething a man. I was thinking about how popular such sites as orkut and other such nefariously similar sites are and I realise that man craves for much attention. Even the so called introverts who sign on and add no one as their friends perhaps only as an attempt to get noticed. Man needs men around him who he can say known him. It is often not even necessary for him to reciprocate the other person's existence as long as the latter knows him. This is the very basis of the concept so inconspicuously termed fame.
Feels elated on writing the above line. It almost sounds like having written a large thesis and saying "...and thus we have proved that there are aliens out there" or " ... and thus we can find the optimal distance between the eyes and the board at which you will sleep the fastest" .
Almost like proving some Open Problem and writing QED. Unfortunately for me, what I did above constitutes at best a prize in the Ignoble awards.
Its strange that a man's contacts mean more of him than himself. But thats the world out there. Dog eat dog and other men make man world. Strange.
Note: the fact that I used man everywhere and not man/woman even once does not prove that I am a male chauvinist. This note, for one clearly goes to prove my "innocence" if that term does suit this noun in this context. And moreover if it really relevant , it did perturb me a lot that I did not involve the woman. So much so that I will write here. Man/Woman. Satisfaction....
Yours
SS
What maketh a man? Is it the man or the men around him? Sounds rather trivial... clearly its the man you say. But surely, as it did it with me after I first reflected on this rather philosophical question, one would be rather unsure. The same feeling as you get when you look at a true/false question whose contents you're vaguely familiar with and you're inclined towards one of the choices but not confident enough. Thank you PH101,PH102 and PH103 for the apt parallels you have provided.
So, for ye in support of the Man and pooh-pooh my ostensibly weak attempt claiming that it is but the man who makes the men around him, I say cease and desist, O ignorant one. For do you not see the recursive way that the human soceity works. Do you not see that which is so blatantly obvious to one even as naive to the workings of Man as myself that most of the time, (quantifier used to stress on the exceptions as must be in any system generalisable with an universal rule), that most of the time, a man befriends another because of the company he keeps or sometimes even to further a mutual interest.
No man does anything which does not directly or indirectly benefit him. Or so I feel. Or, a little stronger claim, or so I know. *gulp* . Ok, compromise, or so I claim. A normal socially active human being lives for himself and it is still unknown to the thinking Helmet why he should not lead such a selfish existence. And the generous souls involved in charities and other activites supposedly not for their own gain, they do so only to further their own impression with the Guy up there or perhaps to earn themselves nirvana or good karma or something like that. Again, its all for themselves.
On an afterthought the above para looks like an aside. That or my thoughts which were affected by a blinking IM from one of my friends seems too lazy to bring about the connection which I thought was brilliant enough to include the above para. Ah, you win some you lose some.
So back to makething a man. I was thinking about how popular such sites as orkut and other such nefariously similar sites are and I realise that man craves for much attention. Even the so called introverts who sign on and add no one as their friends perhaps only as an attempt to get noticed. Man needs men around him who he can say known him. It is often not even necessary for him to reciprocate the other person's existence as long as the latter knows him. This is the very basis of the concept so inconspicuously termed fame.
Feels elated on writing the above line. It almost sounds like having written a large thesis and saying "...and thus we have proved that there are aliens out there" or " ... and thus we can find the optimal distance between the eyes and the board at which you will sleep the fastest" .
Almost like proving some Open Problem and writing QED. Unfortunately for me, what I did above constitutes at best a prize in the Ignoble awards.
Its strange that a man's contacts mean more of him than himself. But thats the world out there. Dog eat dog and other men make man world. Strange.
Note: the fact that I used man everywhere and not man/woman even once does not prove that I am a male chauvinist. This note, for one clearly goes to prove my "innocence" if that term does suit this noun in this context. And moreover if it really relevant , it did perturb me a lot that I did not involve the woman. So much so that I will write here. Man/Woman. Satisfaction....
Yours
SS
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