Absurdism and the Ironic

-Our Weekly Coffee

Key-

[]= Editorial addition after the discussion

+ = A new topic

– = Continuation or addition to a topic

M = Metaphysically Conceited

T= Takezo

+General Overview of Absurdity and Irony

T: “Absurdity is when there is a dissonance between pretension and aspiration. …an example would be that, when you are being knighted, your pants fall down.”

M: “Most of the time, explaining the absurd is very difficult, because of the nature of the object. It’s sort of inexplicable. The reduction to the absurd–it’s a sort of non-existence for abstract concepts. When we say, ‘That’s absurd’, most of the time we’re talking about the abstract existence of something, rather than its actual existence. Particularly its relationship with a construct of logic.” [I think what I’m getting at here, is that since the existence of abstract concepts relies on a sense of purpose for them, cutting the purpose out from under them using the reduction of the absurd renders them into a sort of non-existence.]

+Discussion of Scientific Assumptions

M: “The nature of non-existence [for the absurd] is that things can’t not exist, because then we wouldn’t be able to refer to them. It’s sort of this basic idea that underlies a lot of science, it is sort of the ‘necessity of purpose for things that exist’, which is that if something exists, it must have a purpose, because if it didn’t have a purpose it must not exist. It is survival of the fittest, where things that are advantageous become more common and things that are not advantageous or have no purpose disappear.”

+Discussion of Entropy

M: “There is this interesting aspect of entropy that is that a system can only be organized in a limited number of ways, but the number of ways that it can fall into chaos and disorder is limitless. Entropy is a matter of probability more than anything else. That’s the reason things fall into disorder.”

T: “Except for life, which becomes more and more ordered.”

M: “Yeah, I think the stated exception they make to that rule is that it is all ‘spontaneous’ processes that fall into greater and greater disorder. So, since life is not spontaneous, it is not subject to the rule.”

T: “Absurdity is a product of self-reflection, so for my dog it doesn’t exist. That’s what separates animals and humans, self-reflection.”

+Discussion of Irony

T: “Irony is a discrepancy between what your intention is and what actually happens, like if you wore an OU shirt, but you hated OU, you would be wearing your shirt ironically.”