Tobacco and the Soul

Wow, that is some deep thinking. I especially enjoyed the part of the balance of the pipe having both male and female attributes. Being a long time wiccan, this makes my piping even more meaningful! Thanks for posting this!

Well, the author made a few interesting observations and shared some rather unflattering opinions.

Like June said to Ward, "aren't you being a little hard on the beaver?" (the 60's & herb)

Well, that's an interesting take. It indulges in the academic inclination to cubby-hole things, but that process is often informative if not revelatory. I wonder if Mike attained his Ph.D., what he's doing now, and what he's smoking now.
As a story-teller myself, I always thought it was an outlandish joke how Freud sold his century on one central myth as being key to human psychology, as if poor old Oedipus could contain the myriad of human passions and confusions. Playing on the incredible inhibitions of Victorian England and Europe, he sold the bill of goods and became a lynchpin of modern intellectual life. I roll my eyes. But I do have an enduring respect for his slender volume, "Group Psychology and an Analysis of the Ego," which has it that the larger the group that behaves in one way the more primitive their behavior. I can see that one. Just using Freud as an example of the academic mind at work here.

Since I consider myself an academic (and a rhetorician), I would like to weigh in.
What most people don't realize about Socrates, Plato, or Aristotle is that the majority of the texts that we attribute to either three were mostly passed down orally (and written down much later by someone) or were found in the notes of their students and later written down and translated, especially Aristotle. If we think about the notes of students today, we can only imagine what might have been jotted down or not jotted down. With that said, through these texts, we know that Plato was an interesting character. He distrusted rhetoric. He felt that rhetoric was evil and manipulative and thought it to be inferior to wisdom (whatever that means to a dead Greek philosopher over 2 1/2 centuries old). He also distrusted the act of writing. He felt that writing weakened one's intelligence. When it comes to Plato's notions of the body and soul explored in the article (although it might be Socrate's thoughts not Plato's), Plato's notions were connected to the state which corresponded to certain kinds of people. As a result, it established a hierarchy of who was fit to rule. While most of Western thought is grounded upon many of the notions of Plato, I would claim that Plato would not be very happy with the world we live in. I would also claim that Plato would not be very happy that individuals partake of any kind of drug because this would weaken one's constitution (citizenship) thus weakening the state or democracy. We are very far removed from Plato's time. Thus, I do find it a bit interesting that one would connect the practice of pipe smoking to classical thought that was very much engrossed in the policing and managing of individuals through the government. Not a bad thing, but I don't think it is convincing as it seems.
Second, it is not that women didn't smoke before. Women have always smoked.....all kinds of things. However, we do have this perspective in society that women do not smoke. Where does this come from? It comes from the fact that women have often been relegated to the private spheres (home), whereas men have often been connected to the public spheres (forums). For example, during the Victorian era, women smoking in public was frowned upon as well as them engaging in any kind social discourse, hence, "they should be seen and not heard." Therefore, most of them smoked in private, at home. If they smoked at home, how would anyone know if she smoked to begin with? However, we do know some well-known women who smoked, such as the suffragettes and Virginia Woolf with all of them smoking tobacco using pipes.

A pretty interesting read for sure. I will however need to read it once or twice more and give it some time to digest.

In the meantime I think I will light up my pipe and think about it. ::

Jim, I think you have that idea right...I just might do the same thing

An epic font of codswallop of the most basal order. It reads like the author stopped at cliffs notes for phil 101.

Chasingembers, a Wiccan? Burn the witch! :evil:

It wasn't completely awful right up until he started in on chewing being "subhuman". And when he started in on the "imposter weed" I snickered audibly. This guy may have made it through Philosophy 101, but his understanding of history is laughable - cannabis and opium were smoked in the "Old World" centuries before tobacco was imported.
And as for witch-burning, do please tread carefully. Some of us Heathens don't find the subject particularly amusing. :twisted:

I was being facetious, as I hope everyone realizes. Indeed, I took a grad class on the European Witch Craze of the Middle Ages, and meet Wiccans in person and read some Wiccan books, finding them a very civilized religion. Certainly more so than some denominations I could name.

Blessed be all. I got the humor in that one, as opposed to an unnamed individual making condescending remarks about witches a while back. Indeed quite civilized, and very simple to the point that it can be condensed into two words. Harm none.

It's more than obvious the writer? hasn't a clue in regards to cannabis and it's medicinal properties....and it's relationship to "soul." I guess the poor guy obtained all his misinformation from the old "Reefer Madness" propaganda movie.
I'll stop here as I wasted enough time reading his drivel.

"It is fitting that all three kinds of smoking tobacco involve the use of fire..."
Smoking is funny that way. I was predisposed to like the article, but...

I don't think cigarettes do much for the soul; pipes and cigars on the other hand can be smoked contemplatively; and even if that deeper level is not reached, to me puffing on a pipe is more satisfying than puffing on a cigarette.

There's a kind of "philosophy" (not of the analytical school) that engages in "cultural studies" and revels in interpretation through metaphor. That's what the writer was doing. He "valorizes" (a key word of the genre) the pipe smoker over other uses of smoking or of tobacco. He's concerned with the psychology of the tobacco (and cannabis) user. Not with the biological consequences of it.