Wisdom (Metaphysics 2016)
5. Metaphysics Proemium I: Reason as Looking Before and After — Anaxagoras, Homer, Boswell, and 'All Men by Nature Desire to Know'
Class of 2016-09-15
https://berquistcourse.com/course/philosophy/7c-wisdom-2016/005-metaphysics-proemium-i-reason-as-looking-before-and-after/

[0:00] Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Amen. God, our enlightenment, help us, God, to know and love you. Guardian angel, strengthen the lights of our minds, order our images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor, help us to understand what you've written. Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Amen. So you never know when your angel is helping you. You know, sometimes I get this idea. I got to go reread that text that text, you know, there is something in that text that I was in need of.

[0:37] You know, and so say, how did that happen? You know, I suppose my guardian angel is laughing at me, right? My my first grade teacher there, Kasurik, said, you know, the angel watching you make a decision is like you watching an angleworm make a decision

[1:07] want to connect this proemium of Aristotle on wisdom with the definition of reason, right? Because wisdom is the highest perfection of reason, right? And therefore, we've looked, I think, at that text from Thomas there, the proemium to the Nicomachean Ethics, where he refers back to what Aristotle says here that it belongs to the wise man to order things. And he says the reason for this is because it's proper to reason to know order, right?

[1:42] Well, we know it from Shakespeare's definition too of reason as the ability for a large discourse, looking before and after, right, which is a definition of order. But I think this gives a little hint, you know, that what is most magnificent in the way of the knowledge of reason, right, is characterized by what is characteristic of what reason. I always take the example. I say, you know, what woman stands out most of all?

[2:10] Who is the most excellent woman? Well, it's it's Mary, right? And you see in the prayer there, Hail, Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy, right? Well, why should call the Mother of Mercy, but not the Mother of Justice, right? Well, she's a woman, right? She is the woman, right, antonomasia and and the woman is characterized more by mercy than by what justice, yeah, yeah, and a more just, you know,

[2:41] not as merciful, right? So there is all kinds of examples of that, right? So what is in the definition of reason should help us to understand wisdom because that's the highest perfection of reason. But what we see as characterizing wisdom should. And so we reflect back upon the nature of that, right?

[3:02] Okay. Now, who is the first guy in the history of philosophy to really talk about something like the divine mind, a mind that is? One of those pre-Socratics, one of the ones begins with an A.

[3:23] Yeah, yeah. Anaxagoras, right? Comes fairly late among the early philosophers. And Anaxagoras said, you know, that matter is all a mix-up, you know. And then this greater mind began to what separate things, right? That's the first thing that we say about the mind, huh? Separates things. And then it began to what order these things, right? And so I was thinking about that, and I went back in my text there and see what the Greek text was, right, huh?

[3:51] And the Greek word for order, there, of course, is the one as something is taken from the same word as as cosmos, right, which means order in Greek, right? And so he's seeing reason is characterized by distinguishing and then seeing the order of what it's distinguished or making the order of what's distinguished. And that's said what?

[4:17] That's a good confirmation of what Shakespeare said in his definition. Well, I have a bad habit of hanging around used bookshops, you know, and picking up odd editions of Shakespeare, right, huh? And these go back years and things. This is a Shakespeare's Hamlet, right? And it's edited by William J. Rolfe, you know, who does very thorough things. This one here, it actually sometimes you find a little bit of writing, you know, whoever owned the book in the past.

[4:52] And this guy, Mister Woodward, huh? Shakespeare class, February nineteenth, eighteen ninety-six. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So he has very good notes, you know. So I find out odd facts I didn't know, you know. Act four, scene four, right? Where the the definition. We got to go to the notes here, there. See what he has in the notes.

[5:31] Hmm. Note thirty-six here, huh? Such large discourse, etc. Now he quotes two things, right? One from Samuel Johnson, who edited one of the famous editions of Shakespeare, right? And one from what Theobald, right? One from Theobald is the one that I really find interesting. Theobald, you know, was another editor of Shakespeare, right? He didn't like Alexander Pope's edition, and so he sat down to set it right.

[6:08] And Theobald, you know, is famous for the most famous emendation of Shakespeare, and one that's been universally adopted. Everybody's come after, you know. So, really interesting from what a few of you write. But this is a different one now from Theobald, right? But I just give you what he says here. Johnson talking about large discourse, right?

[6:36] Such latitude of comprehension, such power reviewing the past and anticipating the future, right? But that does touch upon the first sense of what looking before and after, yeah, yeah.

[6:54] Now the second one is the one I find really interesting. Theobald remarks that looking before and after is quote an expression purely Homeric. He refers to the Iliad, Book three, one o nine, eighteen, two fifty. Okay, now if you know Homer, this is a Homeric phrase, right? Not quite as good as Shakespeare's, but it's the phrase "look before and behind yourself," right? Okay. Like in the Middle Ages, they had the man of prudence, you know, with an eye here and an eye here, look before and behind him.

[7:33] And the men who are wisest, right, in the Iliad, right, they look before and behind, right. So the famous example, what about my Homer Iliad in was too much, it's already weighed down.

[7:49] When Achilles is coming back into battle, right, and he decides to come back after his best friend has been killed and so on, and it's almost like nighttime, and he just comes to the edge of the battle, and roars, you know. And of course, up to this time, the Trojans getting pretty confident that they could, you know, set the fire of the ships and the Achaeans and so on.

[8:16] But one guy who alone could look before and behind, him says, right? He says, "Let's get back into the walls, you know, before tomorrow." And and you know, you know, the great warriors, you know, say, "You coward, you! You like to take?" And of course, the next day he just mows him down, you know. See, that's kind of stock phrase, right? That's interesting, huh? Because by antonomasia, right, you know what antonomasia means.

[8:49] That's kind of a horrible word. It comes from the Greek rhetoricians, right? But Antonomasia is a figure of speech, where the name that is common to many is given to one in particular. He's said to be the, right? Okay. Now the Bible is very fond of antonomasia, so the Bible is named by what? antonomasia. The Bible means what? The book, right? Well, there's many other books, I wouldn't, but among all books, this is the book, because it's the Word of God that said it, right?

[9:26] The Gospels are named by antonomasia Good news if we got a new child, a new grandchild. But this is, you know, by antonomasia, the good news of our salvation, so on, God becoming man to save us, and so on. So this is by antonomasia, good news, right? Okay.

[9:54] Christ Himself is named by antonomasia, because Christ means what? Well, all these kings and priests, you know, prophets are anointed, right? You know, but he is the anointed one, right? Okay, so that's a very important figure of speech, right? And so Thomas, in the text, you'll see sometimes instead of saying Aristotle says, you'll say the philosopher says, right? But Aristotle himself had called Homer what? The poet, right?

[10:27] And so by antonomasia, Homer is called sometimes the poet instead of well, he's the greatest poet, okay? Sophocles is pretty good too. Well, now when I was reading the Federalist Papers, huh, they were talking about you know arguing for the union of the colonies and so on. If they don't do this, you know, in the words of the poet, they say, a long farewell to all my greatness.

[11:01] Well, they didn't say who the poet is. They said the poet, and as the poet says, any dummy should know that the poet is for us Shakespeare, yeah, yeah. Well, it's interesting to see that the poet in ancient times and the poet of modern times, right? Both have a similar phrase, right? And it's magnificent that Theobald points that out, right? He's good, right? And someday I'll bring in that happy emendation, but it's not freaking necessary for our purposes here today, you know.

[11:33] But it's a magnificent one. I mean, it's just so good that it's been universally adopted. There's no question that this is, you know, I mean, there are certain defects in Shakespeare's thing that they see. There's obviously something wrong here with the text, right? You know, and people try to amend these things, and sometimes they're more happy than other ones. But this is known as the happiest emendation that's ever been of a line of Shakespeare.

[11:54] So I mean, he's really something to behold, you know, in some ways. And so that's a very beautiful text there, right? But notice, huh, when Shakespeare, when Aristotle is praising the great Homer, right? One thing that Aristotle says is that plot, right, is the soul of tragedy.

[12:21] It's not like the moderns think, you know, sometimes the plot is there to reveal the characters. What does reveal something about them, right? But Aristotle sees that the characters are there for the sake of the what action, right? So the plot is the very soul of tragedy and even of epic. And Aristotle praises Homer for teaching all the Greek poets how to make a good plot. What Homer saw was that a good plot was not about what happens to the main hero, but that it's about a course of action that has a beginning.

[13:00] A middle and an end. That's the most highest praise that the the poet gets, right from Aristotle. He taught all the Greeks that this is what a plot has to be. It has to be a course of action as a beginning, middle, and end. Well, then Aristotle goes to define beginning, middle, and end. And what does he say? Beginning is before something, but not after something. And end is after something, but not before something.

[13:29] And a middle is before something and after something. Now, there's no part that is either before or after anything because it wouldn't fit in. But notice, huh?

[13:41] A phrase purely Homeric, as as he says. And then the praise that Aristotle gives of the what what a plot should be, right? It's in terms of before and after, right?

[13:56] And this is similar to before and after. Look before and behind yourself, right? Okay. So it satisfies reason. Yeah, yeah. So it's beautiful to see these these harmonies, right? Okay.

[14:11] Now, I don't just read Shakespeare. I mean, some people think I just read Shakespeare. Yeah, you read Shakespeare, so yeah. I come out to the bookstore. and my wife says, "No, no, not another edition of Shakespeare." It was, I had an uncle that died, and he had some, you know, a lot of gift editions, you know, huh? Well, because people kind of pick it out these ones, so I get the Shakespeare gift.

[14:46] Well, what is the most famous biography in English language? Yeah, yeah, yeah. In fact, it's so good that some people claim it's the greatest biography ever written. Okay, there's something very vivid about this biography because he's giving the actual conversations of him. I mean, people read Boswell's life. You have. Yeah, yeah, it's in the Great Books, right? You have the Great Books edition around here somewhere. You probably have a book I don't think we have it though Boswell.

[15:21] Yeah. Yeah. We have a lot of partial, let's say, hit and miss of the series, and I think. we have one in the whole series Yeah. Anyway, it's it's right in the Great Books, right? And some people claim it's the greatest biography ever, you know. But anyway,

[15:43] now what's that got to do with the definition of reason, right? Well, I had to escape from Aristotle, so I said, "I'll read. " Boswell's Life of Johnson, right? And this is the abbreviated one, but anyway, it goes through his whole life. Finally, the last days and the death of Johnson, so on. And so, at the very end of the Boswell's Life of Johnson, you have

[16:17] he feels he should kind of sum up the character of Johnson, right? And it goes on for a couple of pages here, but just read you part of it, huh? Okay.

[16:32] He was steady and inflexible in maintaining the obligations of religion and morality. But that's the next sentence now, both from a regard for the order of society, right?

[16:52] And from a veneration for the great source, and great and source are capitalized, and from a veneration for the great source of all order. What's that referring to? My mind. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just like with Anaxagoras, right?

[17:15] And then Mars, he sees that right? So I enjoyed reading the life of Samuel Johnson. So then I decided I'd go get Boswell's, you know, the Journey of the Tour, the Hebrides Islands. Did you ever read that? I'm sorry. Hebrides journey, Journey to the Hebrides. No, but I read some biographical information about Boswell. He was quite the live wire and quite. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And he became a better man.

[17:44] Became a better man, right? I just reading in the Journal the Hebrides. They got into a bad storm, right? You know, traveling one island to the other one. He said, "If I got out of this, you know, I'm going to be much better. Very good, you know. " But anyway,

[18:04] in the beginning of the journey to the Hebrides, right? He he brings in the character, yeah, and again he sums up, right? He's that same thing there again. Great source of what? All order, right? You know. Well, remember how Shakespeare says, you know, Godlike reason, right? Huh? What's Godlike about reason? Well, many ways, or something Godlike about reason, right? But if God is the source of all order, and order means it before and after, right?

[18:36] And reason looks before and after. There's something what? Godlike about reason. That's one way of seeing it being Godlike, huh? Now you see Thomas is always quoting a passage from Saint Paul, and if I remember rightly, it's the Epistle to the Romans. But anyway, it's in the epistles, and I've seen it quoted so many times. I can't remember the Latin, you know. Quae a Deo sunt. ordinata sunt

[19:07] I mean, it's many times you remember the Latin, you know. The things which are from God are ordered. Quae a Deo sunt, ordinata sunt

[19:20] But I mean nice little witness here, huh? He sees that, huh? Boswell. He's not that great a guy, as you said, some ways. But he sees that, right? Even Boswell, right? And that's the most famous biography in the, you know, English language, right? Okay.

[19:40] So let's turn here now to Aristotle's Proemium*. Now, when Thomas has a commentary in the Book of Aristotle, or an exposition, as, they call it, right? Which means a laying out. Thomas lays out the book and. Invariably, he makes the first division of the whole work of Aristotle. I used to tell my students in class, it's dividing like Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. And of course, if you're trying to divide Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet as a whole, what would be the first division of Romeo and Juliet?

[20:29] Prologue and the play. Yeah. Now the prologue is very short compared to the play, right? But it's like the division that Thomas gives of Aristotle, the proemium is the word they use, and the what, tractatus, right? Which means the drawing out. And the way we used to translate proemium is paving the way, right?

[20:54] So the main thing in the proemium is to say what you're aiming at, right? The desirability of what you're aiming at, right? And in the first two readings here in the proemium, he's going to talk about what wisdom is about, right? And then in the second part, the third reading, he's going to talk about the kind of knowledge wisdom is, right? Okay.

[21:21] So it's dividing in a way like Romeo and Juliet, right? Okay. You have the main play itself, but then you have this prologue. I take Romeo and Juliet because most of Shakespeare's plays don't have a prologue, right? Some of them have an epilogue. It's kind of a prologue to Henry VIII, right? But the prologue to Romeo and Juliet is marvelous, huh? And the prologue is written in the form of a what?

[21:52] Same form as the sonnets. It's got 14 lines, right? And it's divided into three quatrains and a couplet, and the you know, iambic pentameter and so on, right? Okay. Now what does the prologue do to Romeo and Juliet? Do you remember the prologue at all?

[22:16] The first quatrain, if I remember right, he says, "Two households, both alike in dignity, In fair Verona where we lay our scene, From ancient grudge break to new mutiny, Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean." Now if you know what Aristotle teaches in the book on the poetic art about tragedy, right? Tragedy is about men, women, I guess sometimes, who are in a state of what society above most of us, right?

[22:53] Okay. Nobility, that sort of thing, right? Two households, both alike in dignity. And fear of her own, that way they are seen, being the place where civil blood makes the lions unclean, and so on, huh? From fourth, okay. He's talking about two noble families here, right? Raised above, common thing, and what they're in feuding, right? Okay. Now, in the second quatrain, he says, "From forth the fatal loins of these two foes, a pair of star-crossed lovers take their lives, whose misadventured, piteous overthrows do with their death bury their parents' strife."

[23:44] Well, now you get more idea what the play is going to be about, right? Out of these two feuding families, strange as it may sound, right? A man and a woman, right? One the son, one the daughter. I guess the only son, right? The only daughter, right? In these cases, they're going to fall in love, and it's going to be what? Piteous, right? Well, now Aristotle talks about tragedy.

[24:11] He says that it moves us to what? Pity and fear. So, in the second quatrain, you expect something tragic, huh? You're being prepared for a tragedy, whose misadventured, piteous overthrows do with their death, right? It's going to be pitiful, misadventures, right? The message doesn't get to Romeo, right? That she's not really dead. Oh, that's just terrible. Okay. Now, what's the third quatrain? Well, the other emotion, the fearful passage of their death-marked love, continuous in their parents' rage, which, but their children's end, not remove.

[24:54] Now the two hours' traffic of our stage, right? And I got the whole thing prepared, right? Okay. Aristotle compares a proemium to a to a prologue, right? And even to an overture, right? You listen to the overture of Mozart's Don Giovanni and the overture of Cosi fan tutte, and you're being prepared for an entirely different thing, right? Huh?

[25:25] Which, if you with patient ear attend, but here shall this sorrow shall strive to mend, right? Pay attention, and we'll do even better next time. Okay. So it's preparing the way, right? Huh? So the proemium is like a prologue, right? Huh? The proemia Aristotle are magnificent, huh? Now, the greatest teacher I had was Monsignor Dionne, right?

[25:51] And I know when my friend Warren Marie went up to Laval to study with Charles De Koninck who was a Nature's man up there, much more famous than Dionne, Because Warren had a background in natural science, right, and so on, and De Koninck taught natural philosophy and so on. But he made perfectly clear to Uncle Warren, as we call, in the family, that the greatest mind up here is Dionne.

[26:25] And I know when I was writing my doctoral thesis under Monsignor Dionne, and there was some big thing on my thesis there, and I'd go and talk to De Koninck and see what he thought about it, you know. So when I asked him the question, he says, "Why are you asking me? when you've got Dionne? I wonder what you have to think too." So I said, "I said, okay."

[26:43] So he told me what he thought. It was kind of interesting, right? That humility, right? Why bother asking me? You know, why bother asking Berquist? You can ask Tom's Aquinas, right?

[26:56] Hmm. Now, why do I mention that, right? Well, because Monsignor Dionne, among other courses he gave, he gave a whole course on what a proemium is. It was on this premium in particular, but in general about a proemium and how important they are.

[27:16] So they expect a lot from a proemium, not from the preface of a modern author in this book. No, no, but Aristotle proemium huh? Or Thomas's premium, something. Okay,

[27:34] that's enough to arouse your attention. I mean, just got to be something very, very significant, right? Sometimes Dion takes like a proemium there in logic, and oh my goodness, he's got another lecture on that same proemium

[27:59] Okay, so let's look at the beginning of the proemium here. Now, Thomas, when he begins his commentary exposition of the proemium, he says it's divided into two parts, right? Now let's cheat. Let's cheat, huh? And you know how you turn to the last part of the book and see what happens. Yeah. Well, sometimes Aristotle, at the end of a proemium, he has an epilogue, right, where he recalls in the reverse order that he did it what is in the proemium right?

[28:41] And so look at the last paragraph there on page five. Aristotle's an epilogue here, right? What is the nature of the knowledge sought? Then has been said, Aristotle says, right? That's the second thing he does. That's what he does in the third what reading, right? And what is the goal of the investigation, right?

[29:15] And the whole knowledge overabroad must reach. That's the first thing he does in the first two what readings, right? Okay. Now, when Thomas, you know, says the proemium is divided into parts, first he shows what the goal is, right, of wisdom, and then secondly, the kind of knowledge it is. Aristotle recalls those two things, but in the what reverse order, the thing he just finished last, and then goes back to the thing he did before.

[29:49] He does the same thing in the great proemium to the Nicomachean Ethics. That is three parts, right? And he he recalls the three things he's done, right, in the reverse order that he did them. Right. Okay.

[30:08] So that's look now, but this is, you know, many other things are being done. Aristotle kills many birds with one stone now. All men by nature desire to know. That's the way it's usually translated, right? I put in in brackets there to understand because it's not the common word for knowledge. He uses the word eidenai, right? Which usually is translated by intelligere, you know, to understand, right?

[30:40] In English, but either way makes sense. Okay. But why do you think he wants to begin with that statement? That it's by nature that they desire to know. What is that going to say about the kind of good that knowledge is? Right. The good is what all desire. The good is what all want. Right. But if all men not only desire to know, but they desire to know by nature, what does that tell you about this good?

[31:13] It's universal. It's natural good. It's a real good, right? It's the very nature of man to want to know, right? Aristotle gives a sign from the senses, right? Okay. But to understand is something that belongs to what reason, right? And it's interesting that he goes to the sign from the eyes, right? Now when I was a little boy, my mother used to say, "I see," said the blind man, but he couldn't see at all.

[31:51] Did your mother ever say that to you? I think she thought it was very clever. My mother never went to college or anything like that. It's a secretarial school, right? And so I got into being right because she applied for a job. My father's doing the hiring. It was all for the knowledge. Yeah. Yeah.

[32:13] Yeah. And a fateful day. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And they started to go out. I guess he had he had to had to keep it secret because the other secretaries would be, you know, furious. You know, jealous.

[32:33] Anyway, I see," said the blind man, but he couldn't see at all. It's kind of a little pun on the word to what see. But why do we take the word to see more for understanding, right? Than to what hear, maybe or smell or taste, right? From our sense, yeah. It's more spiritual sense, right? More perfect, right? And so on. That's kind of interesting, right? He takes the example from the eye.

[33:03] Though you can take it from other senses to some extent too, right? Yeah, yeah. But now he says a sign that men by nature desire to know is the love of the what senses, huh? Now he's going to point out, touch upon the fact that we use our senses to do all kinds of things, right? To make things and so on, right? But do we use our senses sometimes just to know and not to do anything?

[33:34] Yeah. So he says, and that's what's important, what he's talking about here, right? Because wisdom is going to be a knowledge that is sought right? For its own sake right. You know, we're Christians, and and our goal is to see God as He is, right? Saint John says, "We know when He appears, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is," right? Okay.

[33:59] Now, why do you want to see God as He is? Are you going to make something out of Him? Are you going to do something with Him?

[34:07] Make some money, dude. Sell tickets. It's just to know, right? Not to make or do anything, right? Making and doing is over, right? Mary has chosen the better part and shall not be taken away from her, right? She should have a job, yeah. I used to tell students this, and he said, "Well, then you got to be practical in this life because you don't want anything from the next life."

[34:40] So he says, apart from the usefulness, they are love for themselves, and especially, right, among the others, that through the eyes, huh? For we choose to see, he says, before all the others, not only in order that we might do something, but also not aim to do anything, right? Look at that beautiful sunset tonight, right, huh? You know, or somebody you know had bought a house, you know, and I went to visit him, you know.

[35:10] Look at that view. He was really impressed. He had bought a house at this beautiful view, right? Now, I was on the internet the other day there, and they had something you know about the the most expensive houses in the in the in the country, right? And the most expensive house, he goes state by state, you know. They started out there like three million, they went up to five million.

[35:31] Say they're doing the high things, end up with some hundred fifty million dollar house in California, but they just you know, you just think the outside the house, I know what they got inside, you know, but something really had magnificent views, right? I mean, say yeah, just beautiful, right? I remember my my wife and I were down in Virginia one time, and and we having dinner there, kind of an outdoor.

[35:57] Places you know and so on, and look up at the sky. I've never seen a sky like that. I think southern sunsets are more what impressive than the ones up north. I think you know, but it's like they're folds and folds of red. I was amazed. I said, "secretary I mean the waitress, you know. " And she's like, "Like, what's wrong with you? "

[36:20] You know. I said, "I just don't think like that, " you know, huh? You know. Where were you? Down Virginia. Virginia, yeah, Virginia. And the sunsets I ever saw in front of was. Yeah. Yeah. The old movie, The Spanish Man, you had these glorious things. Gets expands. It's broader. It's wider. It's deeper at the equator, and then things gets narrower. I guess if that's the right way to describe it.

[36:47] In the Caribbean, the the sunsets, the the skies are. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But even you know, I got reading the Hebrides, you know, journey to the Hebrides and so on. Look what Hebrides on the on the internet, right? New computer. And they had a you know slide thing. You know, you can you press the thing. You know, this is something. You know.

[37:11] And but why I'm looking at these things, right? I'm gonna. I'm probably not going to go to the Hebrides. I probably won't get a chance to go there. But I mean, just to see the thing, right? Huh? You know. And

[37:24] when I was in Quebec, we used to have a little ferry that went across the Saint Lawrence, and you see all the beautiful hills around there, mountains and so on. You know, and why are you going across there? You're not going to do anything, just just to see it. You'll go out there, you know, Sunday afternoon, see the things, right?

[37:43] He says they are loved for themselves, and especially among the others, that through the eyes, right? For we choose to see before all the others. Now, one time I was talking about this in a little class there, and this one young lady, there, she said she'd rather. I took as a sign people would rather be deaf than what blind. You wouldn't want to be either one, of course.

[38:05] And she said she'd rather be deaf, blind than deaf. course she has a love of music, She played Bach on the organ, and she she plays it in the churches around here, you know, even today, you know. But she was the exception. The rule. But I mean, you know, I listen to Mozart just about every day, and why do I do that? Does it help me? You know, to make something or to do something or.

[38:31] Better tea. How do you make tea? Just for its own sake, right? Huh? So we do have a desire to know, apart from making or doing, right? That's seen in especially those higher senses, huh? It's one of the two dimensions of man, they say. The personal dimensions, mostly physical. For we choose to see before all the others, not only in order that we may do something, but also in not aiming at doing anything.

[39:02] Right? The cause is that this sense, this one among the senses, especially makes us know something and shows many what differences. Now, when I was in the sixth grade, I got a great interest in astronomy. Right? And the library was really in one room in nativity Grade School there. And but in the back of the of the room, there was a place you could go up on the ramp, kind of, you know, up the place, and there was a thing there, and we got to explore around a little bit.

[39:41] And that's where the astronomy books were. He says, "Let's take a book out and go to the library." I started taking astronomy books out, and I got very interested in them. Right? But notice, I didn't have the eye; I just had hearing. I can't hear the stars or the planets or Orion, you know. Can't hear the sun I was looking at when the family albums. There are pictures there, and there's you know some articles of my father there.

[40:13] You know, they've been the Western newspaper, the Saint Paul, Minnesota newspaper, and so they're describing my father and his company and so on. Things and talking about. And he shares a with his youngest son. That was me. He says it has got to be right. Well, you know the the Orion is is the planet. I mean, a constellation. It's easy to to identify. You know, at that time I forgot about the belt, I knew the names of the three stars that make up the belt.

[40:44] So my father learned them right. He went out to lunch with one of his business friends, and his son had come with the other businessman. and his son was a pilot, right? They were talking about you know they do use these stars even now for some navigation, right? And they were talking about Orion, and my father named the the stars of the belt. It was kind of funny, you know.

[41:09] But I often thought of this in terms of this, right? I couldn't look at the stars and the moon. I remember another friend of my father's. He had a son who was interested in astronomy. He had made one of these telescopes, right? Big ones. My father's company made the stand for it, you know, and so on. And so we were invited out one night to the observatory, right?

[41:33] And we were going to look at the moon. That was the plan, you know. And the the clouds had covered up the moon, right? So he directed the telescope towards Saturn, right? And I had seen pictures of Saturn with the rings, you know, in books, but I'd never seen it in the in the flesh. Those big ones. It is so impressive when you see those. Have you ever seen them

[41:57] through telescope? Yeah, I mean, a big one. I've seen them, but only in a telescope that wasn't very powerful. Yeah, well, this this is a pretty powerful telescope, I mean, Gibson, right? But all that would be what lost as well as the the sunset that I was talking about, right? Huh? You know, paintings and so on, right? Somebody told me recently that Proxima Centauri, a very close star to us, they think that there's a habitable planet or a planet within a habitable zone.

[42:23] Did you hear about that Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I heard about that. Yeah. Well, it takes too long to get there. Sorry, sorry, the Western. Telling you about this new propulsion system which doesn't need a mass, you know,

[42:41] boost mass, so it's super economical. Get up to velocities that would make it a pretty short trip, you know, four or five years. So that's pretty short. But more likely, since the price of gas is going down and getting better, the Milky Way is actually very cheap.