CHREMOLATRY: a new word for an old disease
Every December I spent in Western Europe or North America I was trying to find a diagnostic word that would describe the epidemic disease that befalls the inhabitants of these regions. They start buying things in unimaginably enormous quantities, wrap them up and give them each other, or keep them for themselves. Things they do not need. The average West European owns 10 000 things, the average North American even 20 000 things. They don’t know how many of these things they really need. But they keep on multiplying them.
What are we experiencing each December? A wild rush fore more things. Back in 1998 I was almost crushed by the shopping multitudes in the center of the Westphalian city of Münster. The next advent Sunday the crowd managed to really stomp a person to death there. Here in the US I saw the same stampede for more things on TV as ‘Black Friday’.
I remember Georges Perec’s first novel, ‘Les Choses’ that describes how a young couple explores “happiness” in a consumer society by surrounding and burying themselves under an increasing number of objects. The English title ‘Things: A Story of the Sixties’ pretends the phenomenon was limited to the Sixties of the previous century.
“Entia non sunt multiplicanda sine necesitate” is a statement known as Occam’s razor, or Ockham’s razor, and word for word it means that “entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity.” It is sometimes expressed in Latin as ‘lex parsimoniae’ (the law of parsimony, economy or succinctness. It is a principle that generally recommends from among competing hypotheses selecting the one that makes the fewest new assumptions.
If we were to translate this recommendation from the realm of epistemology into the realm of everyday life we might say: do not multiply things beyond necessity. I could also say: ‘stop reifying!’ (from Latin ‘res’ thing + ‘facere’to make, reification can be loosely translated as thing-making; ) or ‘stop making more things than needed!’
Today the legendary light bulb went up in my head and I found the diagnostic name of the disease that takes epidemic proportions every year in December:
CHREMOLATRY. I made it up from the Greek words
chrema = a thing,(also: business, spec. money, riches)
+ -latry = worship
I waive the copyright on it and send it out to my friends and acquaintances as a diagnostic name they can also use as a diagnostic tool by asking themselves the question:
“How deep am I affected by CHREMOLATRY? How deep am I worshipping things and how much do I contribute to their multiplication beyond necessity?”
Would our merry race go on multiplying the things on the face of the earth, polluting also the air, the water, even our brains if we asked us this question? Would the cult of multiplying things beyond necessity reach its paroxysm at the end of each year?
I doubt it. No appeal to reason has led to more reasonable conduct of life on a mass level in the long run.
On an individual level, however, the question might lead to the question “what are the things that I really need?” and might even mark the starting point of a wonderful journey of self-knowledge, purification, simplification, stress elimination. Or even peace of mind that is happiness.
misquoting Aristotle
No Epicurean is, should, or can be a great fan of Aristotle but we all are in the habit of quoting him. For instance on what he said about habit: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then is not an act but a habit.”
I am sorry to admit that I am no exception in my Epicurean happiness guide “From Pain to Pleasure: The Proven Pathway to Happiness” , in the just published paperback edition, too…
Because it is a misquote. I have just found it out from Jules Evans in an article entitled Fake quotes he published on Sunday, 18 December 2011 in his blog.
I also found out from Jules’ blog entry that I am not alone with this misquote. Others widely misquote, too, and not only Aristotle but also John Stuart Mill, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Gandhi.
Commenting on Jules’ article Greg Linser refers us to ‘Falser Words Were Never Spoken’ by Brian Morton, published in the New York Times who mentions Henry James, George Eliot, Picasso “all of them are being kept alive in popular culture through pithy, cheery sayings they never actually said.”
From now on I guess I’d better stick to quoting people I know firsthand, like myself:
“Check the source before you quote, or you risk to misquote and be exposed.”
Jules Evans, Aristotle, John Stuart Mill, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Gandhi, Greg Linser, Brian Morton, New York Times, , From Pain to Pleasure: The Proven Pathway to Happiness, Henry James, George Eliot, Picasso
“From Pain to Pleasure: The Proven Pathway to Happiness” now as paperback, too
Finally, I can accommodate the wish of those friends of mine who demanded a paperback book they can lay back with on the sofa and read leisurely, instead of having to sit in front of their computer, or to print out the eBook.
My friends can buy the little funny Epicurean happiness guidance “From Pain to Pleasure: The Proven Pathway to Happiness” I wrote with my wife as a paperback either form Amazon or directly from my own eStore, also powered by Amazon through CreateSpace.
I encourage my friends to buy from my eStore, as the royalties paid by Amazon are less than one dollar per sold copy and will not contribute substantially toward paying my huge hospital bills.
I have also reminded my friends that life is too short to spend any minute of it worrying or stressing out ourselves and others and that stress can be deadly. (If they want to have the facts, they can read my stress report – downloadable for free here.)
The one question most people stress out over every year in December is “What presents to make whom?” Those of my friends who have not made a decision yet should seriously consider buying my little funny Epicurean happiness guidance “From Pain to Pleasure: The Proven Pathway to Happiness” as it it is the ideal present they can give anybody you love and care for, including their precious selves.
If they are on a lower budget this year, they can still get the downloadable eBook version for half of the price of the paperback here
In addition, they can still download the first chapter for free here
The most precious present I received came from my oncologist: as per last medical checkup: I am still cancer-FREE, no recurrence so far.
I gave a talk on Epicurus’s life, teachings, and influence in August this year in Madison, Wisconsin. The professional young man who made the video recording lost most of it. My son edited the footage I recorded myself from a silly angle and he uploaded the first two parts – Epicurus’s life and teachings – to his ownYouTube channel as it is 34 minutes long and I cannot upload to my own channel anything longer than 15 minutes.
As for the third part, Epicurus’s influence, I still have the slides and the sound recording and I plan to make more slides and record a presentation at home.
My recommendation to my friends was this year to enjoy every single day of their remaining lives in leisurely stress-FREEDOM, quoting Epicurus: “We have been born once and cannot be born a second time; for all eternity we shall no longer exist. But you, although you are not in control of tomorrow, are postponing your happiness. Life is wasted by delaying, and each one of us dies without enjoying leisure.”
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