The Newtown Pentacle

Maritime Sunday drifts into port again.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Recently spotted while onboard a Working Harbor Committee trip, the tug Ireland entering the Kill Van Kull on a misty evening.

Ireland has been mentioned before, in this Maritime Sunday post from January of 2013.

That’s all the truth.

from wikipedia

A central proposition of existentialism is that existence precedes essence, which means that the most important consideration for the individual is the fact that he or she is an individual—an independently acting and responsible conscious being (“existence”)—rather than what labels, roles, stereotypes, definitions, or other preconceived categories the individual fits (“essence”). The actual life of the individual is what constitutes what could be called his or her “true essence” instead of there being an arbitrarily attributed essence used by others to define him or her. Thus, human beings, through their own consciousness, create their own values and determine a meaning to their life. Although it was Sartre who explicitly coined the phrase, similar notions can be found in the thought of existentialist philosophers such as Heidegger, and Kierkegaard.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Ireland was towing a work barge which was carrying a materials handler as it entered the Kill. Notice the bars sticking up out of the barge, they would be driven down into the soft bottom of the waterway before any work started, and act as stabilizing stilts- or so I’ve been told.

People lie to me all the time, and I pretend that I don’t realize it.

from wikipedia

Deception includes several types of communications or omissions that serve to distort or omit the complete truth. Deception itself is intentionally managing verbal and/or nonverbal messages so that the message receiver will believe in a way that the message sender knows is false. Intent is critical with regard to deception. Intent differentiates between deception and an honest mistake. The Interpersonal Deception Theory explores the interrelation between communicative context and sender and receiver cognitions and behaviors in deceptive exchanges.

The five primary forms of deception are:

1. Lies: making up information or giving information that is the opposite or very different from the truth.
2. Equivocations: making an indirect, ambiguous, or contradictory statement.
3. Concealments: omitting information that is important or relevant to the given context, or engaging in behavior that helps hide relevant information.
4. Exaggerations: overstatement or stretching the truth to a degree.
5. Understatements: minimization or downplaying aspects of the truth.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Ireland was heading toward the New Jersey side of the Kill, where the petrochemical industry looms large. This shoreline infrastructure is an essential component of the mechanism which is New York City. We are, all of us, components of this machine in some way or another.

This, lords and ladies, is no lie. I think.

from wikipedia

Egocentric predicament, a term coined by Ralph Barton Perry in an article (Journal of Philosophy 1910), is the problem of not being able to view reality outside of our own perceptions. All worldly knowledge takes the form of mental representations that our mind examines in different ways. Direct contact with reality cannot be made outside of our own minds; therefore, we cannot be sure reality even exists. This means that we are each limited to our own perceptual world and views.