In His Eyes

“Before God we are all equally wise – and equally foolish.”

- Albert Einstein

Deuteronomy 7:13

13 And he will love thee, and bless thee, and multiply thee: he will also bless the fruit of thy womb, and the fruit of thy land, thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil, the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of thy sheep, in the land which he sware unto thy fathers to give thee.

One Christian

“In truth, there was only one Christian, and he died on the cross.”

- Friedrich Nietzsche

Philebus

The Philebus, composed between 360 and 347 BC, is among the last of the late Socratic dialogues of the ancient Greek philosopher Plato. Socrates is the primary speaker in Philebus, unlike in the other late dialogues. The other speakers are Philebus and Protarchus.

The dialogue’s central question concerns the relative value of pleasure and knowledge, and produces a model for thinking about how complex structures are developed. Socrates begins by summarizing the two sides of the dialogue:

Philebus was saying that enjoyment and pleasure and delight, and the class of feelings akin to them, are a good to every living being, whereas others contend, that not these, but wisdom and intelligence and memory, and their kindred, right opinion and true reasoning, are better and more desirable than pleasure for all who are able to partake of them, and that to all such who are or ever will be they are the most advantageous of all things.

But he then goes on to dismiss both pleasure and knowledge as unsatisfactory, reasoning that the truly good life is one of a measured and sensible mixture of the two.

The dialogue is generally considered to contain less humour than earlier dialogues, and to emphasize philosophy and speculation over drama and poetry.

Faithfulness and Sincerity

“Hold faithfulness and sincerity as first principles.”

- Confucius

Fecundism

Fecundism is the politics of wilfully promoting high birth rate among a group for the sake of enlarging its numbers related to other groups and, consequently, its political influence.

In practice, it is difficult to prove whether a group is conducting fecundism, or if high birth rate is natural consequence of a group’s beliefs or actions and would therefore exist even if it would not result in higher political influence. The religious groups involved most often have long-standing principles and family structures that pre-date any democracies in which they may take part, although some, such as the Quiverfull movement, openly acknowledge it, and use Psalm 127:5 in its justification. Nonetheless, some groups commonly claimed to practice fecundism include:

- The Quiverfull movement (Minor Protestant movement in the United States)
- Latter-Day Saints (Mormons)
- Ultra-Orthodox Judaism
- Islam

Fecundity

Fecundity, derived from the word fecund, generally refers to the ability to reproduce. In demography, fecundity is the potential reproductive capacity of an individual or population. In biology the definition is more equivalent to fertility, or the actual reproductive rate of an organism or population, measured by the number of gametes (eggs), seed set or asexual propagules. This difference is due to the fact that demography considers human fecundity which is often intentionally limited, while biology assumes that organisms do not limit fertility. Fecundity is under both genetic and environmental control, and is the major measure of fitness. Fecundation is another term for fertilization. Super fecundity refers to an organism’s ability to store another organism’s sperm after copulation and fertilize its own eggs from that store after a period of time, essentially making it appear as though fertilization occurred without sperm.

Fecundity is important and well studied in the field of population ecology. Fecundity can increase or decrease in a population according to current conditions and certain regulating factors.

For instance, in times of hardship for a population such as a lack of food, juvenile and eventually adult fecundity has been shown to decrease.

Fecundity has also been shown to increase in ungulates with relation to warmer weather.

In the philosophy of science, fecundity refers to the ability of a scientific theory to open new lines of theoretical inquiry.

In sexual evolutionary biology, especially in sexual selection, fecundity is contrasted to reproductivity.

In obstetrics and gynaecology fecundability is the probability of being pregnant in a single menstrual cycle, Fecundity is the probability of achieving a live birth within a single cycle.

Prometheus

In Greek mythology, Prometheus is a Titan, the son of Iapetus and Themis, and brother to Atlas, Epimetheus and Menoetius. He was a champion of human-kind known for his wily intelligence, who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to mortals. Zeus then punished him for his crime by having him bound to a rock while a great eagle ate his liver every day only to have it grow back to be eaten again the next day.

Prometheus

Prometheus, in eternal punishment, is chained to a rock on Mount Elbrus, the highest peak in the Caucasus, where his liver is eaten out daily by an eagle, only to be regenerated by night, which, by legend, is due to his immortality. Years later, the Greek hero Heracles would shoot the eagle and free Prometheus from his chains.

His myth has been treated by a number of ancient sources, in which Prometheus is credited with – or blamed for – playing a pivotal role in the early history of humankind.

Perhaps the most famous treatment of the myth can be found in the Greek tragedy Prometheus Bound – traditionally attributed to the 5th-century BC Greek tragedian Aeschylus. At the center of the drama are the results of Prometheus’ theft of fire and his current punishment by Zeus; the playwright’s dependence on the Hesiodic source material is clear, though Prometheus Bound also includes a number of changes to the received tradition.

Before his theft of fire, Prometheus played a decisive role in the Titanomachy, securing victory for Zeus and the other Olympians. Zeus’s torture of Prometheus thus becomes a particularly harsh betrayal. The scope and character of Prometheus’ transgressions against Zeus are also widened.

In addition to giving humankind fire, Prometheus claims to have taught them the arts of civilization, such as writing, mathematics, agriculture, medicine, and science. The Titan’s greatest benefaction for humankind seems to have been saving them from complete destruction. In an apparent twist on the myth of the so-called Five Ages of Man found in Hesiod’s Works and Days – wherein Cronus and, later, Zeus created and destroyed five successive races of mortal men – Prometheus asserts that Zeus had wanted to obliterate the human race, but that he somehow stopped him. Moreover, Aeschylus anachronistically and artificially injects Io, another victim of Zeus’ violence and ancestor of Heracles, into Prometheus’ story.

Finally, just as Aeschylus gave Prometheus a key role in bringing Zeus to power, he also attributed to him secret knowledge that could lead to Zeus’ downfall: Prometheus had been told by his mother Gaia of a potential marriage that would produce a son who would overthrow Zeus.

Fragmentary evidence indicates that Heracles, as in Hesiod, frees the Titan in the trilogy’s second play, Prometheus Unbound. It is apparently not until Prometheus reveals this secret of Zeus’ potential downfall that the two reconcile in the final play, Prometheus the Fire-Bringer.

On Beauty

“Everything has its beauty but not everyone sees it.”

- Confucius