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    Teen Philosophy
    Teen Philosophy
    Teen Philosophy
    Ebook136 pages1 hour

    Teen Philosophy

    By Carl Schoner

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Teen Philosophy - My thoughts on Life, Death, Infinity, and Delusional Ideation. This is a weird yet intriguing look back at the philosophical thinking expressed in my personal diaries. In this book you will find writings delving into such subjects as a definition of the "will" of life, the powers and intentions of God, the meaning of "infinity," a philosophical discussion of the difference between life and death, and the implications of recognizing that the Being we think of as "God" may be prone to error. This is a profoundly personal and introspective glimpse into the mind of a young man, who emerging from his teens is just beginning to search for answers to the questions of life, death, God, and his own existence.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherLulu.com
    Release dateOct 1, 2011
    ISBN9781304886194
    Teen Philosophy

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      Book preview

      Teen Philosophy - Carl Schoner

      Teen Philosophy

      Teen Philosophy

      My Thoughts on Life, Death, Infinity, and Delusional Ideation

      A look back at the philosophical thinking

      expressed in my teenage diaries.

      By Carl Schoner

      Published by Carl Schoner

      P.O. Box 4462

      Diamond Bar, CA 91765

      cschoner@netzero.com

      dreampsycles@yahoo.com

      www.lulu.com/carl_schoner

      © Copyright 2014, by Carl Schoner

      ISBN: 978-1-304-88619-4

      All copyrights reserved by the author. No part of this publication may be reprinted, reproduced or copied in any way without the express written permission of the author.

      Printed in the United States of America.

      Lulu Version 686116-E

      This book is dedicated

      to everyone

      who loves to think

      about things.

      INTRODUCTION

      About thirty five years ago, when I was still a teenager, I began keeping a daily journal of my thoughts, observations, and personal philosophy of life. At that time, my thoughts seemed brilliant to me, and I imagine to this day that many of them were, for the teenage years and early twenties is when brilliance spawns grandly in people, and as we get older, this propensity for seeing the world in novel ways begins to fade. By the time we reach our 50's, there are very few among us who still have the vocabulary or the energy to tackle the big questions of existence, let alone the brilliance to do so in with depth and passion in a lengthy yet coherent argument.

      Well, I wasn’t all that coherent back then, but I thought I was, and I really cherished writing in my diaries. I wrote in them daily, almost religiously, and as I remember I had filled at least five or six 300 page spiral binders by the time I was 22 years old. I wrote of science, art, philosophy, sex, fiction, and occasionally, nothing more than nonsensical hemming and hawing to kill the time. Eventually my life took on new direction, and I tucked my binders into the lower drawer of my desk, where they rested in peaceful repose for decades, save my occasional moments of reverie when I dig them out to relive my youth.

      Now 52 years old, my mind is not nearly as quick witted as it was 30 years ago. The trials and tribulations of thirty years of grinding employment, two marriages, and raising kids from infancy through college and beyond have taken their toll on my free thinking spirit. Still, in times when I find myself questioning the meaning of life and existence, I remember those diaries, for in those pages I answered all of those questions, at least in my mind, and I did so from a youthful, open minded, philosophical point of view.

      So imagine my horror when - for the first time in about 12 years - I went to retrieve my diaries, and found that they were almost all missing! In my second marriage I found myself living in much, much smaller quarters, and for a while my books and binders were encased in several cardboard boxes buried deep in a hall closet. Eventually, those boxes found their way into the garage, where I know they stayed for at least several years. But then my mind goes blank. What happened to those binders beyond that point in time? I know I would never have intentionally thrown them away. And yet, I can almost see myself looking for more space and - coming across those binders - rationalizing to myself, I will never read these again and tossing them into the trash!

      What a horrible waste that would be, if I did in fact do that. It is possible. It seems like a possibility, but it may also be a false memory. At this point in my life, anything is possible in my own memory. I remember fetching my father's army hat from my mother's house after she passed away. I knew my brother would cherish that hat, so I took it home and distinctly remember setting it in some secure location while murmuring to myself, "I hope I don't forget I put it here!" Sure enough, two or three days later I remembered telling myself this, yet still forgot where I put the hat, and I have not been able to find it since. The funny thing is, I also found a shoulder patch at the same time that I found the hat at my mother's house, and the patch did not get lost in the movement to my home.

      The point is this: I know my mind is not failing me concerning the facts of these diaries because at least of few of them DID survive, and are still in my possession. They sometimes make references to the other diaries, but the one diary that I consider most important - the one I would call the Mother of all Diaries - at least so far as my own writing is concerned - seems gone forever. And I feel terrible that I allowed this to happen.

      So what I have done to console myself is to take some of my other writings that did survive, and consolidate them in this one little book, which I shall title My Thoughts on Life, Death, Infinity, and Delusional Ideation.

      I am not going to paraphrase or comment on my original writings at all. Instead, I am going to transcribe them here exactly as they were originally written in my diary, poor formatting, mistakes and all. The only difference is that while in my diary they were written in long hand using a fountain pen, here they will be represented in contemporary computer fonts. It is unfortunate that a great deal of emotional affect is lost by computer generated fonts (in as much as fonts do nothing to reveal through the author's own handwriting the emotional state or personality of the writer) but this is the best than I can do given the circumstances at hand.

      My goal in putting this little book together is nothing other than to preserve at least some of the thoughts of the troubled teenager who would later grow up to become me, an admittedly troubled and still soul searching adult.

      I may offer just a few thoughts and remembrances from my other binders, but only if I am certain that those memories are accurate. Memory, you know, has a tendency to rewrite itself with time. I know that as I transcribe this, many of my old memories will come back to haunt me, but again, I will only include them if I can do so with a reasonable degree of certainty that they are accurate, and I will include them in brackets, perhaps, to separate them from the current diary. The content of this binder, however, will be entered exactly as I originally wrote it in my personal diary.

      I have kept many diaries in my life. Some have been written in longhand, some have been drawn, some have been audio recordings, and some have been video recordings. I have been fortunate enough to preserve at least some of this work in formal publications.

      It can probably be argued that my Mother of all Diaries is or was in reality little more than more of the same of what you will read in these pages. It may or may not be. Maybe it did contain writings of genuine genius. I really can't remember anymore. All I can remember is my enthusiasm for all I wrote in those pages, and how nothing that I have written since has even come close to capturing the sense of spirit and imagination and inquisitiveness that I enjoyed back then. It must have been a very special book indeed. It is too bad it was lost, or what's worse, discarded by me, myself. But at least I did preserve some of it, and who knows? Perhaps some time in the future I will find more of my diaries buried in the garage or perhaps hidden in some closet somewhere. I hope my family will remember how important those binders are to me, and will save them too, if they find them after my passing. But in the meantime, I can only work with what I have at hand, and so here, without any further fanfare or explanation, is the content from my 1970's diary.

      Book One – On My Teen Philosophy

      On Delusional Ideation

      What, sir? You say you have found the ultimate truth? That reality according to which all things, physical and social, must dutifully

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