spent

'I began to realize how much audacity, patience, and solitude are required to express one's experiences.'

'the world, my life, binds the dark and light

together, reconciles and separates

in lucid day the chaos of my darkness.'

---S. Spender.

The great language animal has run out of things to say. Which is not true, of course. More like: I've run out of things to say and of copied lines.

Have western institutions run out of steam? The ability to go on requires energy and a blind will, hope -against the odds. [Aside: no point talking about the 'Arab Spring' or other places such as China since you don't believe they have much to offer]. Well, all instituions decline. That's just par for the course. But what, if anything, can stem the rot, lead to a fresh sense of renewal and purpose? As at the personal level, one can only dig deep if one has available resources stored up. Does an increasingly exlusive focus on our predicament, the sataisfaction of our desires and goals,indicate the weakness of instituions? Surely one of the aims of any instituion is to provide background set of norms and values that spans the generations? If our relations are viewed as being fundamentally of a contractual nature then what relation do we stand in with regard future generations when they do not even exist now! 

~~~

G. Steiner: the great importance of 'if', to think north of the future.