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Toleranța și intolerabilul. Criza unui concept
Texte rostite la conferinţa „Despre intolerabil“ organizată de Revista Cuvântul, pe 1 februarie 2005, la Centrul de Presă al Societăţii Române de Radiodifuziune (Sala Radio) Str. Gen. Berthelot, nr. 60-64.
Moderatorul ciclului de conferinţe: Prof.univ.dr. Mircea Martin.
http://editura.liternet.ro/carte/140/...
Moderatorul ciclului de conferinţe: Prof.univ.dr. Mircea Martin.
http://editura.liternet.ro/carte/140/...
50 pages, ebook
First published January 1, 2005
34 people want to read
About the author
Andrei Pleșu
84 books304 followersAndrei Gabriel Pleșu is a Romanian philosopher, essayist, journalist, literary and art critic. He has been intermittently involved in politics assuming the roles of Minister of Culture (1989-91), Minister of Foreign Affairs (1997-99) and presidential counsellor for external affairs (2004-05).
He studied art history at the University of Bucharest and graduated with his bachelor's in 1971. Between 1971 and 1989 he had various jobs like researcher at the Institute of Art History, an institution of Romanian Academy, faculty lecturer in University of Bucharest and consultant for Romanian Artists Union.
After the Romanian Revolution of 1989 that overturned the Communist regime, he was one of the founders of "New Europe College" an institute of advanced studies, and of the cultural magazine "Dilema" (now "Dilema Veche"). He worked as a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bucharest and is now a professor at the University of Bucharest, where he teaches art history and philosophy of religion. He also became involved in politics, serving in various official functions.
Pleşu's early works revolved around art history and theory, but, in time, his essays, published in cultural magazines and elsewhere, became oriented towards cultural anthropology and philosophy. His exuberant writing style gained him recognition as one of the leading Romanian essayists of his age.
Source: Wikipedia.
He studied art history at the University of Bucharest and graduated with his bachelor's in 1971. Between 1971 and 1989 he had various jobs like researcher at the Institute of Art History, an institution of Romanian Academy, faculty lecturer in University of Bucharest and consultant for Romanian Artists Union.
After the Romanian Revolution of 1989 that overturned the Communist regime, he was one of the founders of "New Europe College" an institute of advanced studies, and of the cultural magazine "Dilema" (now "Dilema Veche"). He worked as a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bucharest and is now a professor at the University of Bucharest, where he teaches art history and philosophy of religion. He also became involved in politics, serving in various official functions.
Pleşu's early works revolved around art history and theory, but, in time, his essays, published in cultural magazines and elsewhere, became oriented towards cultural anthropology and philosophy. His exuberant writing style gained him recognition as one of the leading Romanian essayists of his age.
Source: Wikipedia.
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July 5, 2025
New Rules – Polite Musings From A Timid Observer by Bill Maher, author of I’m Swiss http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/02/i... and some other comedies, host of a popular show on HBO
7 out of 10
I used to be a fan of the show Real Time, looking back at the note on the above opus, I said ‘it is outstanding’, but things are different now, either because I am changing (we all do, such a cliché) and becoming more mature (which appears to be an euphemism for older) or the comedian is getting more annoying
There are excellent points to what the smart host has to say, the latest takes on the higher education, no less than The Ivy League, calling Harvard and the rest ‘the expensive universities’, they are not elite anymore, in Maher’s view and he is right, up to a point, which used to mean not really, in an interpretation
Scoop http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/07/s... is one of the stupendous comedies of the divine (albeit pompous, snobbish in real life, apparently) Evelyn Waugh, in which we have a journalist going to cover a conflict in Africa, by mistake, and back home, we have Lord Copper
The latter is the owner of The Daily Beast, the journal that had dispatched Boot to the war, and when the Lord asks a question, the answer from his editor (or maybe he had another role within the paper) is either ‘definetely Lord Copper’, which means it is a sure thing, or ‘up to a point Lord Copper’ that was given for a lie
When Maher refers to the recent enormities that have come out of – I think it is Harvard and some other such prestigious institutions – he is spot on, from what I gather, students and maybe some staff have sigend petitions or the like, to support the Palestinians (which is ok) but they went to extremes
Now, to draw a line and say ‘do not take the trouble to get a degree, enroll in universities’ is already an exaggeration, and wrong…yes, we get that the man is joking, and this is satire, hyperbole emphasizes aspects that are deeply flawed, but there is more in the show that irritates me, over the past months
Or maybe it is more than months, I am not sure when the situation has changed dramatically, from a favorite show, hosted by a talented performer, this has become something I still watch (mea culpa) but it gets really annoying and offensive at times – when saying this, I realize that I add a little bit of argument to the man
He is attacked by right and left, and ergo he maintains that this is proof he is so damn balanced and open, centrist and clever – I used to think that but not so much anymore, I mean, alright, invite the punk from Florida, to have a discussion, but the manner in which he preached those things and his attachments…degoulasse
There is clearly an arrogance there, indeed, ‘power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely’, so it makes sense that with fame -so much money, for what used to be good humor, but increasingly, it looks like it is for the work produced by his writers, he wanted to break the strike by the way, and putting on more and more airs, looking pretentious, and self-absorbed, self-righteous, an ass hole in short – he misbehaves
Let me just give this example from Harvard: the most popular course there is of Positive Psychology, where one in five students enrolled, an furthermore, they have the lectures available on line, where you can watch the fabulous Tal Ben-Shahar http://realini.blogspot.com/2016/04/c... explaining the importance of positivity, telling stories, using passages from movies and books
Indeed, it seems so stupid for Bill Maher to attack some people that do not deserve his wrath, there is so much more on the other side, and yes, he does mock Trump, the latter had taken the comedian to court, asking for damages, because Maher said this is an orange fellow and his father was an orangutan, or something like that
We could also see the argument for criticizing ‘your side’, let us say the democrats, in order to make them better, to prompt them to win elections, and the host keeps saying that, only the feeling I have is he is not sincere, the hypothesis I work with is that the man got too rich, powerful, successful and thus he entered a downfall
The decay set in, he sympathizes with the rich (mind you, I am not poor, all things considered, we belong to the upper middle class here, if not more than that) embraces the vile Musk (and others, like gruesome De Santis)and belongs ‘up to a point’ to the other camp, however much he denies that, playing the balanced sage
On a more ineffable level, there is something (much more, an increasing part maybe) about Maher that is really unlikable, he feels he is so much better than others, and when he mocks the stupidity of various targets, it is often amusing, but that does not make him the philosopher king, he is really quite average
The thing to know would be how much he adds to the show, and what percentage is the work of the writers, for his take on the world, however correct on many, maybe the vital issues, such as Climate Change, he does take horrendous positions…another was the boast about using his private plane (fuck you BM, by the way, for your display of ‘honesty’, which we can read as ‘he does not really care, he is so god damn special’) for travel, along the lines of ‘he has it, can afford it, even to just brag about it and there you go’…selfish sob
Now for a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/u... – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se
As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/r...
Some favorite quotes from To The Heritage and other works
‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life...As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality...Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’
‚parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus’
“From Monty Python - The Meaning of Life...Well, it's nothing very special...Try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations.”
7 out of 10
I used to be a fan of the show Real Time, looking back at the note on the above opus, I said ‘it is outstanding’, but things are different now, either because I am changing (we all do, such a cliché) and becoming more mature (which appears to be an euphemism for older) or the comedian is getting more annoying
There are excellent points to what the smart host has to say, the latest takes on the higher education, no less than The Ivy League, calling Harvard and the rest ‘the expensive universities’, they are not elite anymore, in Maher’s view and he is right, up to a point, which used to mean not really, in an interpretation
Scoop http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/07/s... is one of the stupendous comedies of the divine (albeit pompous, snobbish in real life, apparently) Evelyn Waugh, in which we have a journalist going to cover a conflict in Africa, by mistake, and back home, we have Lord Copper
The latter is the owner of The Daily Beast, the journal that had dispatched Boot to the war, and when the Lord asks a question, the answer from his editor (or maybe he had another role within the paper) is either ‘definetely Lord Copper’, which means it is a sure thing, or ‘up to a point Lord Copper’ that was given for a lie
When Maher refers to the recent enormities that have come out of – I think it is Harvard and some other such prestigious institutions – he is spot on, from what I gather, students and maybe some staff have sigend petitions or the like, to support the Palestinians (which is ok) but they went to extremes
Now, to draw a line and say ‘do not take the trouble to get a degree, enroll in universities’ is already an exaggeration, and wrong…yes, we get that the man is joking, and this is satire, hyperbole emphasizes aspects that are deeply flawed, but there is more in the show that irritates me, over the past months
Or maybe it is more than months, I am not sure when the situation has changed dramatically, from a favorite show, hosted by a talented performer, this has become something I still watch (mea culpa) but it gets really annoying and offensive at times – when saying this, I realize that I add a little bit of argument to the man
He is attacked by right and left, and ergo he maintains that this is proof he is so damn balanced and open, centrist and clever – I used to think that but not so much anymore, I mean, alright, invite the punk from Florida, to have a discussion, but the manner in which he preached those things and his attachments…degoulasse
There is clearly an arrogance there, indeed, ‘power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely’, so it makes sense that with fame -so much money, for what used to be good humor, but increasingly, it looks like it is for the work produced by his writers, he wanted to break the strike by the way, and putting on more and more airs, looking pretentious, and self-absorbed, self-righteous, an ass hole in short – he misbehaves
Let me just give this example from Harvard: the most popular course there is of Positive Psychology, where one in five students enrolled, an furthermore, they have the lectures available on line, where you can watch the fabulous Tal Ben-Shahar http://realini.blogspot.com/2016/04/c... explaining the importance of positivity, telling stories, using passages from movies and books
Indeed, it seems so stupid for Bill Maher to attack some people that do not deserve his wrath, there is so much more on the other side, and yes, he does mock Trump, the latter had taken the comedian to court, asking for damages, because Maher said this is an orange fellow and his father was an orangutan, or something like that
We could also see the argument for criticizing ‘your side’, let us say the democrats, in order to make them better, to prompt them to win elections, and the host keeps saying that, only the feeling I have is he is not sincere, the hypothesis I work with is that the man got too rich, powerful, successful and thus he entered a downfall
The decay set in, he sympathizes with the rich (mind you, I am not poor, all things considered, we belong to the upper middle class here, if not more than that) embraces the vile Musk (and others, like gruesome De Santis)and belongs ‘up to a point’ to the other camp, however much he denies that, playing the balanced sage
On a more ineffable level, there is something (much more, an increasing part maybe) about Maher that is really unlikable, he feels he is so much better than others, and when he mocks the stupidity of various targets, it is often amusing, but that does not make him the philosopher king, he is really quite average
The thing to know would be how much he adds to the show, and what percentage is the work of the writers, for his take on the world, however correct on many, maybe the vital issues, such as Climate Change, he does take horrendous positions…another was the boast about using his private plane (fuck you BM, by the way, for your display of ‘honesty’, which we can read as ‘he does not really care, he is so god damn special’) for travel, along the lines of ‘he has it, can afford it, even to just brag about it and there you go’…selfish sob
Now for a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/u... – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se
As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/r...
Some favorite quotes from To The Heritage and other works
‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life...As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality...Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’
‚parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus’
“From Monty Python - The Meaning of Life...Well, it's nothing very special...Try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations.”
March 2, 2021
Cu un an în urmă, am asistat la Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin la o conferinţă a unui jurist indian despre drepturile omului. Conferenţiarul înţelegea să abordeze subiectul din punctul de vedere al tradiţiei hinduse. În mare, era vorba de a cupla noţiunea de „drepturi” cu aceea de „obligaţii” şi de definirea „obligaţiei” în termenii unui concept străin de habitudinile culturii europene, conceptul de dharma. Dharma e legea universală a existentului, temeiul funcţional al lumii. În acest context, datoria individuală nu se decide în funcţie de exigenţele celorlalţi, ale unor instituţii sau ale unor legiferări imanente, ci în funcţie de dharmă, adică de o ordine cosmică, la care fiecare existent trebuie să participe, dacă nu vrea să se autoanuleze. Mi-am amintit, în timp ce ascultam conferinţa, de un mai vechi colocviu pe aceeaşi temă, organizat de ţările arabe. Colocviul sfârşise prin a ilustra principiul potrivit căruia nu se poate vorbi despre drepturile omului fără a invoca, în permanenţă, „drepturile lui Allah”. Era limpede că, din unghi indian şi din unghi islamic, problema drepturilor omului se punea în cu totul alţi termeni decât din unghi european, ceea ce, fireşte, ridica mari probleme de comunicare.
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