Gudakesha means 'conqueror of sleep'. It is an epithet of Arjuna who mastered archery by practicing it through the long watches of the night. This is not to say that Sleep is a bad thing. It has been called the tamasic form of sadhana. Even a lazy bum can dream of Divine worship and wake to some less quotidian, or downright criminal, purpose than has happened hitherto.
However, from the Philosophical point of view, Arjuna's status as one who has conquered sleep means that, by the Craig interpolation theorem, his trajectory is a model of every coherent deontic logic.
Yet, the Mahabharata tells us, Arjuna isn't so very different from worthless shitheads like you & me.
Much is made, in the Mahabharata, of the fact that he too receives the benefit of 'tamasic sadhana'- the night before his duel with Jayadratha. In his dream, Krishna- whom he had already accepted as the Lord of his Yoga- helps him propitiate Lord Shiva & Goddess Shakti, who jointly preside over this type of sadhana, thus enabling Arjuna to keep his vow and avenge the killing of his son, Abhimanyu, who is also Krishna's nephew.
Jayadratha is a comic book villain. He is cowardly and lustful. He tried to abduct Draupati. We feel angry, not so much with her- she is, after all, a mother- but with her goody goody husband, Yuddishtra, for not permitting Jayadratha to be killed there and then.
The episode of Arjuna's dream- this tamasic sadhana of the archetypal rajasic sadhaka- shows ordinary people like me that our epimethean impulses are constrained, not by a Nietzhchean 'slave morality' but all mind's equality in the heart's deep cave of sleep such that there is a voice within us, a melody, which has the power to put us in harmony with this waking world which otherwise imposes itself upon us only as continuous, cacophonous, contumely.
Why may we not experience the Universe as orchestral of our own sublimity? Why should we not be capable of what Nelson Goodman called 'World Making' such that we ourselves would be the Krishna of our own Gita, the Napoleon of our own self-enfranchising Revolution, the Hitler of a Thousand Year Reich which would permanently avenge our own, exponentially massing for exiguously trivial, ever more lumpen for more atomised, humourless rancour & characterless ressentiment?
The answer, of course, is nothing stops us. We could take 'speed' or join a brain laundering cult or simply contract a psychotic illness and 'conquer sleep' that way.
But, what we lose thereby is our own capacity to dream our own Arjuna's dream and know that, when we wake, we can keep our vow before the fall of night or the pain of once again being fulminated in sleep. Our Jayadratha might be addiction, it might be an impulse of unkindness to those whom we are put in authority over, or- in my case- it may be eating too much and writing pseudo-Hindutva shite when I could easily not eat so much and, given that my cacoethes scribendi arises from dyspepsia simply, not write at all.
Yet, for a reason Noam Chomsky has, not given, but incarnated, the Schopenhauerian Mara of Recursivity is powerless against a true Buddha precisely because us worthless bums deploy it even more promiscuously. Craig's theorem cuts both ways. I-languages must exist but at the price of being, save by some intuitionist, id est oneiric, protocol- wholly meaningless. Why? Ask Razborov Ruditch. Blame Randomness for, like Kant's God, defying proofs of its ipseity. Thus, at best, an oneiric economia establishes such oikumene as we share such that even Chomsky's chauvinistic nightmares can have some utile, alethic, and, only thus, ethical, id est properly action guiding, effect. But there too only in the manner of those dreams where responsibilities begin.
For smart people acting selflessly, things that matter- and matter coz they matter to everybody, could we but see it- can have 'univalent foundations'. Everything else gets dammed up behind gates of ivory as 'capacitance diversity'. But smart people acting selflessly, thanks be to God, don't exist. Dreams do and, so the Bible tells us, presage the Paraclete.
I suppose Nelson Goodman's notion of 'World Making' links to our power of simulation. But Craig's interpolation theorem had already told us that either our simulation fulminated us- rendering us that sorcerer of Novalis- or shaman of Borges- who has forgotten that he made his own world- but, it can do so, in the sense that a gaslighting, pederastic, psilosophy forgets that making one's own world means being made wholly by it- which entails, not becoming the horcrux of late Capitalism's, Cohn Bendit, P.I.E Crisis, but being blown away by every bubble blowing Lysis and his elder brother who will kick your fucking head in- pedo scum that you are- regardless of colour, class or creed.
Of course, this is not to say that the late Sixties produced only pedophiles, drug addicts and anorexics. There were stupid cunts too same as there always have been. Careerism is like that. It has no genealogy. It just is.
Which is another way of saying one has conquered sleep only to be defeated by a silly dream.
This is not to say 'simulation', like 'i-language', can't 'carve up the world according to its joints' and yield a day-dream of perfect Social felicity.
The truth is, early in his career- before ever he dreamed of Shiva- Arjuna received the boon of 'chakshushi vidya'- the ability to see anything he desired in the manner he desired- from a demi-god. Arjuna chose not to accept this boon but the demi-god didn't take it back either. Thus the boon was 'asvamika svatva' (unvested property). However, Vishada (aboulia or depression) is a situation where one is no longer master of oneself. Thus an 'asvamika svatva' can vest in the man who is no longer his own swami. Thus, when Arjuna desires to see (avekshe') whom he must fight at Kurukshetra, he gets more than he bargains for- thus setting in train the events of the Bhagavad Gita which culminates in a dread theophany.
However, from the Philosophical point of view, Arjuna's status as one who has conquered sleep means that, by the Craig interpolation theorem, his trajectory is a model of every coherent deontic logic.
Yet, the Mahabharata tells us, Arjuna isn't so very different from worthless shitheads like you & me.
Much is made, in the Mahabharata, of the fact that he too receives the benefit of 'tamasic sadhana'- the night before his duel with Jayadratha. In his dream, Krishna- whom he had already accepted as the Lord of his Yoga- helps him propitiate Lord Shiva & Goddess Shakti, who jointly preside over this type of sadhana, thus enabling Arjuna to keep his vow and avenge the killing of his son, Abhimanyu, who is also Krishna's nephew.
Jayadratha is a comic book villain. He is cowardly and lustful. He tried to abduct Draupati. We feel angry, not so much with her- she is, after all, a mother- but with her goody goody husband, Yuddishtra, for not permitting Jayadratha to be killed there and then.
The episode of Arjuna's dream- this tamasic sadhana of the archetypal rajasic sadhaka- shows ordinary people like me that our epimethean impulses are constrained, not by a Nietzhchean 'slave morality' but all mind's equality in the heart's deep cave of sleep such that there is a voice within us, a melody, which has the power to put us in harmony with this waking world which otherwise imposes itself upon us only as continuous, cacophonous, contumely.
Why may we not experience the Universe as orchestral of our own sublimity? Why should we not be capable of what Nelson Goodman called 'World Making' such that we ourselves would be the Krishna of our own Gita, the Napoleon of our own self-enfranchising Revolution, the Hitler of a Thousand Year Reich which would permanently avenge our own, exponentially massing for exiguously trivial, ever more lumpen for more atomised, humourless rancour & characterless ressentiment?
The answer, of course, is nothing stops us. We could take 'speed' or join a brain laundering cult or simply contract a psychotic illness and 'conquer sleep' that way.
But, what we lose thereby is our own capacity to dream our own Arjuna's dream and know that, when we wake, we can keep our vow before the fall of night or the pain of once again being fulminated in sleep. Our Jayadratha might be addiction, it might be an impulse of unkindness to those whom we are put in authority over, or- in my case- it may be eating too much and writing pseudo-Hindutva shite when I could easily not eat so much and, given that my cacoethes scribendi arises from dyspepsia simply, not write at all.
Yet, for a reason Noam Chomsky has, not given, but incarnated, the Schopenhauerian Mara of Recursivity is powerless against a true Buddha precisely because us worthless bums deploy it even more promiscuously. Craig's theorem cuts both ways. I-languages must exist but at the price of being, save by some intuitionist, id est oneiric, protocol- wholly meaningless. Why? Ask Razborov Ruditch. Blame Randomness for, like Kant's God, defying proofs of its ipseity. Thus, at best, an oneiric economia establishes such oikumene as we share such that even Chomsky's chauvinistic nightmares can have some utile, alethic, and, only thus, ethical, id est properly action guiding, effect. But there too only in the manner of those dreams where responsibilities begin.
For smart people acting selflessly, things that matter- and matter coz they matter to everybody, could we but see it- can have 'univalent foundations'. Everything else gets dammed up behind gates of ivory as 'capacitance diversity'. But smart people acting selflessly, thanks be to God, don't exist. Dreams do and, so the Bible tells us, presage the Paraclete.
I suppose Nelson Goodman's notion of 'World Making' links to our power of simulation. But Craig's interpolation theorem had already told us that either our simulation fulminated us- rendering us that sorcerer of Novalis- or shaman of Borges- who has forgotten that he made his own world- but, it can do so, in the sense that a gaslighting, pederastic, psilosophy forgets that making one's own world means being made wholly by it- which entails, not becoming the horcrux of late Capitalism's, Cohn Bendit, P.I.E Crisis, but being blown away by every bubble blowing Lysis and his elder brother who will kick your fucking head in- pedo scum that you are- regardless of colour, class or creed.
Of course, this is not to say that the late Sixties produced only pedophiles, drug addicts and anorexics. There were stupid cunts too same as there always have been. Careerism is like that. It has no genealogy. It just is.
Which is another way of saying one has conquered sleep only to be defeated by a silly dream.
This is not to say 'simulation', like 'i-language', can't 'carve up the world according to its joints' and yield a day-dream of perfect Social felicity.
The truth is, early in his career- before ever he dreamed of Shiva- Arjuna received the boon of 'chakshushi vidya'- the ability to see anything he desired in the manner he desired- from a demi-god. Arjuna chose not to accept this boon but the demi-god didn't take it back either. Thus the boon was 'asvamika svatva' (unvested property). However, Vishada (aboulia or depression) is a situation where one is no longer master of oneself. Thus an 'asvamika svatva' can vest in the man who is no longer his own swami. Thus, when Arjuna desires to see (avekshe') whom he must fight at Kurukshetra, he gets more than he bargains for- thus setting in train the events of the Bhagavad Gita which culminates in a dread theophany.
Avekshe, which means 'let me see' but which also has the sense of deliberating or pondering on a matter, is related to Darshan Gyan- philosophy. It has the power to change your preferences. It may lead you somewhere you don't want to go. Is this what happens to Arjuna? Some contemporary academics believe it is. Arjuna has a principled objection to violence but Krishna, a consequentialist, overcomes this deontological scruple of Arjuna's by using his Divine power of 'shock and awe'.
The problem with this view is that Arjuna was a happy warrior who had never displayed any aversion to fighting or killing. There is nothing 'deontological' about not wanting to kill your own beloved Guru or great-Uncle. Nor, contra Sen, can there be a 'consequentialist' objection to fighting them, because they were mighty warriors and thus their being killed was by no means a foregone conclusion. Indeed, Bhishma's true killer is Shikhandin (who was born for no other purpose) while Drona was laid low because Yuddhishtra permitted himself to tell a lie. Arjuna does kill Karna- but had he known Karna was his eldest brother, not only would he not have fought him, there would have been no war in the first place.
If the philosophy in the Gita isn't about 'deontology vs consequentialism', then what is it about?
Let us look at the exact words Arjuna uses to set in motion the actions of the Gita-
योत्स्यमानानवेक्षेऽहं य एतेऽत्र समागता: |
धार्तराष्ट्रस्य दुर्बुद्धेर्युद्धे प्रियचिकीर्षव: || 23||
yotsyamānān avekṣhe ’haṁ ya ete ’tra samāgatāḥ
dhārtarāṣhṭrasya durbuddher yuddhe priya-chikīrṣhavaḥ
dhārtarāṣhṭrasya durbuddher yuddhe priya-chikīrṣhavaḥ
yotsyamānān—those who have come to fight; avekṣhe aham—I desire to see; ye—who; ete—those; atra—here; samāgatāḥ—assembled; dhārtarāṣhṭrasya—of Dhritarashtra’s son; durbuddheḥ—evil-minded; yuddhe—in the fight; priya-chikīrṣhavaḥ—wishing to please
Karna, Arjuna's eldest brother, not Drona or Bhishma, is the only warrior who fits the bill. He and he alone wishes to please Duryodhana. The others are obligated to do so- or, indeed, have been tricked into it- Karna alone is as attached to Duryodhana by a strong a bond of friendship as is Krishna to Arjuna.
Karna's secret is known to Krishna. If the Pandavas learn it, there will be no war. Obedient to their eldest brother, they would be vassals to Duryodhana. Of course, Duryodhana may still want the war to go ahead- but he could always change his mind if his side begins to lose.
Thus everything comes down to Karna. Yet, Karna himself wants the war to go ahead in a manner such that the one brother of his he has sworn to kill, or to be killed by, will fight him in the grip of 'manyu' (dark anger) rather than in obedience to his order. Karna's unfortunate history, his resentment at the many insults and injuries he has had to bear, makes him desire this agon.
Whom does Arjuna wish to please?
Whom can he- in a reliable manner?
Only some co-evolved 'being pleased' module within himself.
Fuck! Appaya Dikshita's Atmarpana is the Craig interpolation of Tirupati's trap!
Vadamam muthi Vaishnavam!
When the tsunami came, eldest scions- big, broad shouldered, karmayogis like my Dad- wept for their Akkas and that was King Ranthideva's counter-tsunami of compassion against the indefeasible Justice of Varuna- the Pralaya of the Flood.
Yet, like Bhishma, like Drona, they and they alone are disclosed by every Arjuna's 'avekshe 'ham'.
Karna, Arjuna's eldest brother, not Drona or Bhishma, is the only warrior who fits the bill. He and he alone wishes to please Duryodhana. The others are obligated to do so- or, indeed, have been tricked into it- Karna alone is as attached to Duryodhana by a strong a bond of friendship as is Krishna to Arjuna.
Karna's secret is known to Krishna. If the Pandavas learn it, there will be no war. Obedient to their eldest brother, they would be vassals to Duryodhana. Of course, Duryodhana may still want the war to go ahead- but he could always change his mind if his side begins to lose.
Thus everything comes down to Karna. Yet, Karna himself wants the war to go ahead in a manner such that the one brother of his he has sworn to kill, or to be killed by, will fight him in the grip of 'manyu' (dark anger) rather than in obedience to his order. Karna's unfortunate history, his resentment at the many insults and injuries he has had to bear, makes him desire this agon.
Whom does Arjuna wish to please?
Whom can he- in a reliable manner?
Only some co-evolved 'being pleased' module within himself.
Fuck! Appaya Dikshita's Atmarpana is the Craig interpolation of Tirupati's trap!
Vadamam muthi Vaishnavam!
When the tsunami came, eldest scions- big, broad shouldered, karmayogis like my Dad- wept for their Akkas and that was King Ranthideva's counter-tsunami of compassion against the indefeasible Justice of Varuna- the Pralaya of the Flood.
Yet, like Bhishma, like Drona, they and they alone are disclosed by every Arjuna's 'avekshe 'ham'.
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