When Britain’s Prince of Wales shows clear signs of agitation at world leaders’ curious paralysis in the face of the rapid deterioration of planetary ecological conditions, it should send a message to everyone concerned. And that means every human being on the planet, where humans are (supposedly) the custodians of planetary “health” but have been […]
Bert Olivier
As an undergraduate student, Bert Olivier discovered Philosophy more or less by accident, but has never regretted it. Because Bert knew very little, Philosophy turned out to be right up his alley, as it were, because of Socrates's teaching, that the only thing we know with certainty, is how little we know. Armed with this 'docta ignorantia', Bert set out to teach students the value of questioning, and even found out that one could write cogently about it, which he did during the 1980s and '90s on a variety of subjects, including an opposition to apartheid. In addition to Philosophy, he has been teaching and writing on his other great loves, namely, nature, culture, the arts, architecture and literature. In the face of the many irrational actions on the part of people, and wanting to understand these, later on he branched out into Psychoanalysis and Social Theory as well, and because Philosophy cultivates in one a strong sense of justice, he has more recently been harnessing what little knowledge he has in intellectual opposition to the injustices brought about by the dominant economic system today, to wit, neoliberal capitalism. His motto is taken from Immanuel Kant's work: 'Sapere aude!' ('Dare to think for yourself!') In 2012 Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University conferred a Distinguished Professorship on him. Bert is attached to the University of the Free State as Honorary Professor of Philosophy.
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In praise of animals – our fellow creatures
Animals – and not just pets, all kinds of animals – do not enjoy the care and acknowledgement of being our veritable brothers and sisters, as living beings, that they should by right receive. This much is beyond debate. The obscene practice of killing rhino for the supposedly medicinal and/or aphrodisiac properties of their horns, […]
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What about the dignity of other South Africans then?
The debate surrounding The Spear has, on occasion, been framed in terms of the concept of ‘dignity’, specifically that of the State President. And to be sure, one should grant the persons who occupy that position of responsibility from time-to-time the dignity they deserve. One could also take the argument further by claiming that every […]
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On the interpretation of a painting
I did not really want to write this piece, knowing full well that it would be greeted by howls of derision and by vituperative incomprehension in many quarters. But as events unfolded in the wake of the public display, at the Goodman Gallery in Johannesburg, of the Brett Murray painting metaphorically titled The Spear, reaching […]
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9/11 – When will the ‘truth’ finally emerge?
In the aftermath of 9/11 signs soon started appearing, first sporadically and later in a more concerted fashion, that all was not what it seemed, and not even what the official commission of inquiry into the circumstances and ‘causes’ of the event said in its report was able to put an end to the questions […]
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Turkish delight too
It was like entering a futuristic cave, where a culture’s history washes over visitors in a ceremony of initiation, making it a pleasurable sensation of assimilating its distinctive perspective on the world. It was dark when we entered, but only momentarily, before a feast of colours cascaded, as if from nowhere, dappling faces and surfaces […]
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The (ir-)rational market versus democracy
The e-tolling debacle concentrates, in microcosmic format, the tension — if not the opposition — between the market and democracy, even if many regard the “free market” as the zenith of democracy. Or, to put it differently, this tension — which is always there — establishes the economic domain and the political in a specific […]
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Disenchanted youth of the world: Tomorrow’s hope
The youth of the world are disenchanted — disenchanted by the older generation’s politics as well as their economics, by their ideologies and their religions and by their inability to halt ecological destruction. And they are the ones who will replace the current leaders of the world. What are the chances that they might just […]
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How humans ‘produce’ space
Space is one of the most intimately experienced, and probably least reflected-on phenomena of the human life-world. Like time, it is presupposed in everything we do, although – living, as we do, in an era of what Lyotard and others call “accelerated” time, and therefore constantly being aware of time – we are probably less […]
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Is cinema fundamentally conceptual or perceptual?
Looking for different ways in which the human body has been thematised in film makes for interesting research. I was reminded of this recently when acting as examiner for a dissertation written by a master’s student, Martin Rossouw of UFS, in which (among other films) he analysed Charles Chaplin’s 1936 classic, Modern Times. Rossouw demonstrated […]
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Economic injustice against the people
The growing divide between rich and poor in South Africa reveals the fault lines of a much broader divide – in fact, a global divide – between what one may describe as “the people” and the anonymous world of money (even if this world is often hidden behind identifiable agents, such as politicians). This was […]
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Going after ‘extreme oil’ is extremely irresponsible
The emerging information on the quest for what is referred to as “extreme oil” is worrying in the extreme. And it is very bad news for other creatures on the planet, especially those who live in the oceans, judging by the information clip sent to me by the Care2 petition site, to which I subscribe […]