Nilsi

I've recently started getting into Latin music, which led me to become obsessed with Arca. She’s pushing Latin music into deeply experimental, avant-garde territory. I highly recommend her five-part "KiCk" album series (KiCk i–v).

One of my favorite albums and bands of all time! The opener is sooo fucking good: .

My god, how unimaginative can you be? Is there truly nothing you could find joy in doing? If spirituality means being so existentially bored that you slip into nihilism, I’ll gladly pass. I’m overflowing with desire and motivation, fully aware that life is far too fleeting to see and do it all. That’s my kind of spirituality

I take my Phenibut first thing in the morning to get into flow from the moment I leave the house until I’m back in the evening. I used to overdo it to the point of experiencing mild withdrawal symptoms on weekends. Now, 500mg, five days on and two days off, is my sweet spot. I wouldn’t use it for longer than a couple of crucial months though (like Q4 when performance is key). Phenibut can improve your sleep even if you take it early in the day. Add melatonin 30 minutes before bed, and you’ll sleep like a baby. If you stop drinking coffee 10 hours before bed, you should be fine. I’ve actually started substituting much of my coffee intake with yerba mate and Schmachtenberger’s Qualia energy shots, which are based on green tea leaf extract - they don’t make me as jittery and don’t interfere with sleep as much as loads of coffee tends to do.

Phenibut, lots of coffee, and hard work are the ultimate cheat-code – it feels like you just blink, and suddenly a couple of months have passed, and your bank account is full.

GABAergics/GABA agonists (e.g. Phenibut). Melatonin. Those are the ones that work for me.

Ken Wilberism.

In Human, All Too Human, Friedrich Nietzsche presents a nuanced critique of metaphysics and its role in human development. He writes: Nietzsche critiques a purely deconstructive stance toward metaphysics, describing the overcoming of metaphysical beliefs as an "intense effort" that necessitates a subsequent "retrograde movement." This movement involves understanding the "historical and psychological justification" of metaphysical ideas. He warns that without this backward step, one risks "rob[bing] himself of mankind's finest accomplishments to date." The metaphor of the ladder - where one should "look out over the last rung... but not want to stand on it" - suggests a careful balance between transcending metaphysical thought and appreciating its contributions. At first glance, this passage could be interpreted similarly to Jordan Peterson's critique of postmodernism. Peterson often argues that deconstructing traditional metaphysical and moral frameworks leads to societal chaos and moral decay. He emphasizes the importance of these structures in maintaining order and meaning, cautioning against the wholesale abandonment of established beliefs. However, Nietzsche introduces a crucial element that Peterson seems to overlook: the concept of the Eternal Return, implicit in the imagery of the hippodrome. The hippodrome - a circular racetrack where competitors loop back to their starting point - symbolizes a process of repetition rather than linear dialectical progression. Nietzsche's reference suggests that the "retrograde movement" is part of a cyclical journey where revisiting and re-evaluating past ideas leads to continual transformation. This cyclical journey reframes the notion of the "retrograde movement" as a dynamic progression without relying on dialectical opposition. The act of "climbing back down a few rungs" is not a retreat but an essential phase in the evolution of thought. It acknowledges that while metaphysical constructs may be deconstructed, they also hold historical and psychological significance that have propelled human advancement. Thus, the enlightened individual must revisit and reassess these ideas to fully comprehend their value and limitations. Jordan Peterson appears to remain at a more literal level of "retrograde movement." This could be seen as a manifestation of Freudian repetition compulsion, where individuals unconsciously repeat past behaviors or patterns despite them being unproductive or harmful. This "false repetition" perpetuates the same cycles without leading to genuine transformation or advancement. In this context, the "trauma" is the radical deconstruction and potential dissolution of all established knowledge. This can also be likened to a freeze response to this trauma, where instead of processing and integrating the experience, an individual becomes stuck in patterns of avoidance or re-enactment. Clinical psychology teaches us that to resolve such trauma, one must not only intellectually acknowledge it - talk about it, as Peterson does so fervently - but also embody and act out the unresolved experiences, much like a horse majestically galloping through the hippodrome. As Gilles Deleuze elucidates: This distinction clearly separates the Eternal Return - the true repetition that affirms life - from the "blockage" of false, compulsive repetition that prevents such an affirmation and "threatens life from within." By embracing this cycle of deconstruction and reconstruction without the framework of dialectics, individuals move beyond the limitations of both excessive deconstructionism and reactionary conservatism. This process allows for the preservation of humanity's "finest accomplishments" while also making room for new insights and higher forms of understanding. It is a moral prescription that exists "beyond good and evil," emphasizing growth through perpetual self-overcoming and affirmation of life.

I couldn't care less. I don’t invest this much effort into thinking just so I can be understood. I have no issue communicating in a way others understand. I do it at work (I literally communicate for a living, and I'm highly successful by any standard), in relationships, and in everyday life. But again, I’m pursuing something sublime in thought - a process that’s ultimately between me and myself. This platform serves as a medium to refine my thinking, to test it against interesting, generally intelligent people, and to stay open to other perspectives. But I’m not about to compromise my pursuit just for a pat on the back.

Oh, so as long as my worldview is compatible with this pet value of yours, I earn the honor of your approval? It’s not a question of impossibility; the kind of communication I'm interested in collapses the moment it tries to deliver a single truth, as if it harbored some underlying identity, or some Platonic idea. My aim isn’t to communicate a fixed truth, but to generate difference - to open up perspectives, to create new possibilities. And whether or not you’re interested in these perspectives is irrelevant; I do it, above all, for myself, and for the intensification of difference itself.

Again, you’re assuming there’s some underlying Platonic idea or truth in what I’m saying, just obscured by my idiosyncratic use of language, which you could uncover through some dialectical process of “clarifying.” But, as I’ve been saying, the entire point of this “big ass tangent” was to argue why I hold difference as a more fundamental category than identity (or truth, for that matter) - a point I illustrated with several analogies, like the absurdity of asking an artist to clarify their art. You’re projecting your metaphysical framework onto mine, when all I asked was to keep yours and let me keep mine, if you’re not interested in engaging with my argument.

You’re acting as if one’s subjectivity and metaphysics aren’t deeply enmeshed with each other. You can’t just ignore my argument and then pretend you’ve concluded that it has nothing to do with what we were discussing.

It actually would have been relevant to understand why I’m not interested in that form of communication.

At the end of the day, it just pisses me off because I communicated exactly what I meant in the way I wanted. If I use the word “difference,” it’s because I want to use that word. When you ask me to use different words instead, it loses all its meaning. I’d much rather give - and receive - the benefit of the doubt that the words used were intentional. I’m sure Carl specifically chose the word “omniscience” in that context, and I’d much rather inquire into why he used that word than ask him to use something else, or superimpose my own conceptual framework on it. Although he admitted to "finding different words for the same thing," so maybe I should just let you two play your transcendental idealist games, if that's what get's you off. To me this is like asking Van Gogh to repaint The Starry Night in a more realistic and "clear" style - as if that wouldn’t entirely defeat the purpose of his art.

Yes. It’s a self-affirmation loop. But each repetition is different, because it’s difference affirming itself. And that’s far preferable to a self-negation loop - which is what most of Western metaphysics is concerned with.

Again, I'm affirming difference in itself, not some particular identity of "difference." My whole point is that it’s impossible to “capture infinity.” Every affirmation is a singularity that doesn’t affirm anything but itself. This is what I take Bob Dylan to mean when he says, “Inside the museums, Infinity goes up on trial.”

Yes, but it’s a way of looking at existence that reconciles the singularity of your immediate existence with eternity, without relying on external validation or symbolic mediation. If you want your life to be meaningful only in relation to some transcendent reality, or the bottomless pit that is counter-intuitive scientific reasoning, you're welcome to do that.

But you're never just "bringing up the sun." You create a singular text that might include the word “sun,” which, sure, we could both agree refers to a certain empirical reality - and we could do this word by word. But this is exactly where I’m saying that all intent would be lost. You’re clearly not using your limited time and energy just to point me toward some empirical reality. There’s a unique, non-fungible intensity that wants to express itself. This expression, this release of energy, is the point itself; it’s not some instrumental act meant to achieve a specific goal, but an act of self-affirmation. Just as an artist doesn’t draw “the sun” to convey the empirical reality of “the sun” (which, in itself, is not a stable identity but an ever-changing intensity - you never experience the sun in the same way twice; or as Heraclitus said, “you never step into the same river twice”). What I’m saying is: there is no stable reality I could clarify for you. If you ask me why I did what I did or said what I said five minutes ago, there’s no way to truly explain it. Reality has completely shifted by that point. Sure, we could analyze this from an evolutionary perspective, exploring why humans might have developed the need to suppress this constant flux of reality, and that would be an interesting discussion. But my interest lies in this kind of metaphysical framing, as opposed to the traditional Western view, with its stable identities and universal truths.

I see this forum more like a gallery, where I put up a metaphorical image for you to experience, rather than a place where we come together to uncover some divine logos that exists beyond the two of us, or whatever idealist bullshit. Of course, I can wonder what prompted you to place this image here, and I might strike up a conversation with you. But it feels as inappropriate to ask an artist at their vernissage what they “meant” as it does here. Instead, I’d rather share a glass of wine, talk about whatever feels alive, and maybe catch a sense of what this person really is up to. And to me this is just a microcosm of all human interaction.

I think we’re in disagreement about what we’re actually doing here. You think this is about truth; I see it as about power - but not in the vulgar sense of me wanting to dominate you. Rather, there’s something here (a “will to power”) that wants to assert itself through this text. That’s what I’m interested in understanding, while you seem focused on the text itself, which for me is meaningless on that level. It’s like you’re working within a realist linguistic framework, where words and their combinations inherently mean something. I don’t share that view. For me, words don’t mean anything in themselves; they’re just the surface expressions of something deeper, something that resists “clarification.” This is why I don’t see this dialectical attempt to clarify our texts getting us anywhere - in fact, I think it takes us further from the actual intent.

I’m sorry, but I can’t help dramatizing this even further. I’d argue that it’s fundamentally impossible for me to truly grasp what you mean - or for you to fully grasp what I mean - through any act of “clarification.” If you pressed me for clarity, I’d inevitably double down on the particular discourse I’m engaging in, desperately trying to circle back to the original; without this grounding, I’d lose its meaning entirely. And this is where I think you're still assuming that a given X remains the same X when reframed or translated into another context. It’s akin to asking an artist to “clarify” a painting. There’s nothing he can do but point you back to the work itself, if you’re truly interested. X, in this sense, is a singularity; it resists any kind of clarification. There’s an endless range of interpretations, but none will fully capture what X “means.” Because X doesn’t mean or want anything - it simply exists as pure self-affirmation, an eternity unto itself. This is where Nietzsche’s method of “Genealogy” comes into play. Rather than asking, “What does it mean?” he asks, “Who does it?” - thus bypassing the search for universal meaning, exposing the drives, motives, and “wills” that lie behind values. This is what Nietzsche calls the “Will to Power,” the underlying force driving each perspective or interpretation.

That’s assuming quite a lot, though. I firmly believe that if you want to understand a particular discourse, the responsibility is on you to engage with its specific language and framework. For example, you could never fully grasp a Marxist discourse through psychological terms. To understand what Marx means by "alienation," you have to examine the historical material conditions of labor and production. Trying to frame it within Ken Wilber's quadrants would entirely miss the point. Marxist discourse is a singularity, and it’s up to you to engage with it seriously - or not at all. This is why I’m much more interested in a Deleuzian metaphysics of difference, which he aptly calls "Transcendental Empiricism," rather than the usual "Transcendental Idealist" (I like to call it "Transcendental Imperialism") approach, where everything gets interpreted through some universal "Theory of Everything" or reduced to a reflection of some underlying identity or logos.