« Putting the "I" in "ill"... | Happy New Year! »

December 30, 2005

Impudent children, indeed...

I ran into this a few weeks ago, but didn't get around to posting it until just now. It's from Joseph Campbell's 1961 article (or speech--I don't remember in which incarnation it originally appeared) "The Impact of Science on Myth":

"With our old mythologically founded taboos unsettled by our own modern sciences, there is everywhere in the civilized world a rapidly rising incidence of vice and crime, mental disorders, suicides and dope addictions, shattered homes, impudent children, violence, murder, and despair."

Can I even tell you how much I love that impudent children made the list?

I'll put up some other Campbell quotes later, when I have the gumption to track them down anew. There was one in particular about the idea that sensory organs serve to limit, to filter out, sensory info in order to let us live sane, structured, live-long-enough-to-mate lives--ultimately, that they're designed to limit our intake, not let us know everything that's going on around us. Heady stuff.

Posted by patrick at December 30, 2005 04:07 PM

Comments

Post a comment

Name:

Email Address:

URL:
Remember Me? YesNo

Comments: