The Lying Carpet – A contemporary philosophical fable that questions reality

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Those are some nice illustrations, they remind me of Gorey. But could you be any more vague about the point of the book?

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It’s apparently a philosophical book. As such, having a point tends to be non-mandatory.

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It seems to be questioning the foundations of reality in a nice, gentle fashion.

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Sounds a little like Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities, which is a remarkable book that manages to be a philosophical treatise on epistemology entirely through poetic prose.

I was having a discussion with some friends who have been reading some heavier philosophy, and their argument was that it doesn’t need to have a “point”, as it just feels good to read such works. Fair enough, but doesn’t pleasure itself have a point? For me, something that does some real work is preferable. I like practical applications of ideas… probably why I’m a historian instead of a pure philosopher.

I irked my philosophy teacher (with whom I had a heavy high school feud, he was dumb and authoritarian and unlike my ex-real-world-engineer teachers thought he has to be always right because he is in the position of authority, and wanted me to memorize things, long story) by claiming that the beauty of philosophy is that whatever opinion you have, some Big Name is out there to bolster you up.

I understand that so very much that I ended in engineering. :smiley: :smiley: :smiley:

You can double-dip - things can at the same time both give pleasure and do real work. :smiley:

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Agreed… I’m afraid far too many people imagine that the production of knowledge isn’t real work…

I like how “hope” is apparently represented by a monolith.

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