On Pain

On Pain

                 Ernest Junger a German writer in his essay “On Pain” which was written in 1934 after Hitler take power in 1993 shows that pain is the main experience in human life and behavior. Individual as society all deal with pain. He points that being submissive to totalitarian tends to be the best way to avoid pain. His essay analyzes “worker type” and specialized liberal education system. He as discuss the impact of technology in human life as he relate to the aspect of the Nazi regime. He uses metaphor to describe the negative perception of situation in Hitler Germany.

“The profussion of violent imagery, and the fast pace and constant danger of modern life forces people to become more tolerant of pain and death: The human will disciplines and outfits this flesh with such painstaking care that it now seems more indifferent to injury. Today, we again are able to bear the sight of death with greater indifference, since we no longer feel at home in our body as we did before. It no longer accords with our style to stop a flying show or a car race simply because of a deadly accident. Such accidents lie not outside but inside the zone of a new kind of security”(p. 43).  

In this passage he is referring to advancing technology and how people are reacting. He discusses that through photography one could see the violent imagery and how regular hazard force people become accustom to pain.  This is interesting because people who suffer constant pain after a while the body get use to the pain and it become as if a normal part of life. Junger argues that to overcome pain is through detachment. Most of us do not seek suffering, but it comes to us as inevitable out of the way in which we find happiness. The kind of detachment that brings freedom all desire and attachment is to be desire less. It is securely base on the knowledge that all thing of the world are momentary  and passing and that clinging to them will eventual be a source of pain.

                                             

Questions

(1)          Ernest Junger’s thesis that pain is the central experience of life can be judge as the truth. Nothing in this life time is achieved without pain. Pain helps to realizes that there is a problem. Mixed emotions and behavior are often counterproductive of with coping with problems.

(2)          Post-liberal refers to the nihilistic view of Nietzsche,that there is no freedom; it relates to ti the idea of progress in terms of material well-being  an the reduce that to a series of empirical indices, such as income level, education life and life expectancy.

(3)          Photography refers to as “Evil Eye” because photographs reflect the truth an expose the harm just as it has occurs. It is a weapon that can expose precise and objective depictions. For Junger seeing is an act of assault. Photo graph is an expression of peculiarly way of seeing; it demonstrates qualities, impressive displays that attract attentions. Politicians today use television to reveal their purpose or to point out their opponent.

(4)          The relationship between specialized education and the “worker type” is that the both require training, obedience and discipline.  There is also limitation to both areas of human life. Like “worker type”, specialized education experienced assault on liberal education; in which people liberty was in question. As they have been denied the right of free inquiry

(5)          Submission to totalitarian authorities protects individuals from pain; a totalitarian is a system maintain by threat and force; instruction and rule are given to mold in to the shape desired by the authority.  Submission to impose duty may spare one from aggressive action of save life.     Self preservation by adapt and be