Re: The Universe May Not Be Universal

Matt Kozusko (mkozusko@parallel.park.uga.edu)
Tue, 14 Jul 1998 21:03:52 -0400 

Arne Moll wrote:
 
> Although I don't understand what all this has to do with the literary
> meaning of "universal", i still think you miss my point. I think
> 'universal' should mean: of all time and places. So, death, love etc. etc.
> ARE of all time, and of all places. No need to point that out again, now,
> is there?

Quite the opposite, actually.  They are precisely *not* of all times and
all places.  Consider the difference, for example, between death for
Buddy, as the narrator of B-fish, and death for Teddy, at the end of
"Teddy."  Do you suppose death--the physical cessation of the
body--means the same thing for them both?    

"Universal" should indeed mean "of all time and all places," but no
thing meets those requirements.  Not one.  Not even, I was hoping you
would point out, the insistence that nothing is universal.  The very
theory I am advocating is not universal.  (Welcome to postmodernity).  

> >But see, while we (members of this list, most of our friends and
> >colleagues, and most people we encounter in the media and in
> >economically stable free western countries) all have these experiences,
> >there are lots of people who don't.
> 
> Don't what? Don't die ? Don't experience loss or love? Show them, please.

You are working with a rather narrow conception of death and love.  As
far as we know, all living bodies eventually stop moving and decompose. 
This is what you are calling death.  But as you note below, each
experience with death is individual ("interpretation and ideas about
these things"), and while many such experiences may be similar enough to
merit classification together, there is no fundamental-universal
experience called "death" that is identical for everyone.  Perhaps we
can settle on "true for most people, as far as we know, so far."  

 
> Indeed, it is not. But that is not important. Relevant is only the fact
> that a writer, or any artist, or someone cleaning shoes in Calcutta (who
> knows?) gives his interpretation and ideas about these things. It's *these
> things* (feelings, etc.) that are universal, NOT the ideas that are
> attached to it by the (any) artist itself ! 

> They may BECOME universal,
> though, like (in my view) Salinger's and Shakespeare's. On the other hand,
> they may not, like (I hope) Marx's. 

They may become widely accepted.  Do you see the distinction I am
getting at?  

> Only time will tell whether these ideas
> will stand the "test of time".

How will we know?  Because people will still buy copies of _Macbeth_? 
All the test of time can do is verify that there is still a vaguely
measurable interest in a writer whose writings are bought or read or
discussed.  And that test is only good up until the present.  

Where is there epistemological space for objective understanding and
interaction with the spectrum of phenomena we can register with our five
(+) senses?  Someone who knows Kant and Hegel please come in and clean
up.


-- 
Matt Kozusko    mkozusko@parallel.park.uga.edu