My answers to #s 1-14 (297-306)

I am going to take a stab at the questions on Thought at the Meridian here...

What attitude? The attitude is simple: "we are." It is the group dynamic. The individual has "need for others who have need of me and of each other"(297). Camus is no silly hippy singing Kum ba ya. He admits that this individualism is "in no sense pleasure," but he "cannot allow either myself or others to debase" our common dignity. Whose struggle might this be? Yours. Mine? Sisyphus'. It is the struggle of any individual in a group. Is Sisyphus alone? Yes, just like you and I are alone in our personal struggles, but we are not alone in that we all are alone. Paradoxical, but true?

What has happened to revolutionary trade-unionism? Camus says that despite the great gains of unions for improved working conditions, the "ideological Empire has turned socialism back on its tracks"(297).

Rebellion's association with with truth is that "Rebellion...relies on reality to assist it in its perpetual struggle for truth"(298), but it is an inverse relationship. Rebellion goes from top to bottom and truth works from bottom to top.

Thus, "if it (rebellion) wants revolution, it wants it on behalf of life" (298).

Commune against the state, concrete society against absolutist society, deliberate freedom against rational tyranny...altuistic individualism aginast the colonization of the masses"(299). Camus explains that these contradictions (oppositions) express the larger opposition of moderation and excess. This becomes a major theme for Camus. He is returning to a Greek ethos (See Aristotle's Means between Extremes) that encourages finding a limit to rebellion. Camus denies excess. The rebel rebels in order to pronounce an all or nothing philsophy, but in the end, this results in uncontrolled violence.

The other big dichotomy he brings up on page 299 is between "German dreams" and "Mediterranean traditions". The German dreams are "violent", "adolescent", nostalgic and based on knowledge and books. The Mediterranean is "virile strength" and courage reinforced by the experience of life. Camus clearly approves of the second set of values. The first set (the German) can be connected with excess. The second (the Greek) is characterized by moderation.

Historical absolutism collides with an irrepressible demand of human nature: rebellious thought. The rebel continues to deny reason and struggles even though it seems pointless. Rebellion is moderation, says Camus. To insist on moderation is "nothing but pure tension" (301). Keep this tension image in mind for later, when Camus gets out his bow string later...

Camus says that nature always takes up the fight against history. The Russians inspire Europe with their "potency of sacrifice"(300), while the Americans have "a necessary power of construction"(300).

Lucifer died with God, and from his ashes has a risen a spiteful demon who does not even understand the object of his venture.

Camus' stance toward excess (characterized earlier as the adolescent nostalgic German value system based on reason a la Hegel) is that it eventually wears itself out. He says it finds its limit and sacrifices itself, returning eventually to moderation (characterized earlier as the Greek virility based on the experience of life. This moderation is a perpetual conflict that finds its equilibrium through the "impossible" and the "abyss". The impossible is (in my view) the ideal we aim for, a utopia perhaps. The abyss is its mirror negative image. It is the pit of despair (Princess Bride!). It is the absurd condition, it is Sisyphus' rage at the gods.

This brings you to the line on the sheet, folks... good luck.