Ego, self-overcoming & "I will not serve"

[Svein Olav Nyberg]

As a mathematician, I can't help thinking of the simple similarity to 
functions. Do only the constant functions like f(x)==5 have a 
"nature"? Does "having a nature" mean "to be constant"? Or does it 
even mean that the differential has to be constant, allowing at worst 
for functions like f(x)==5+1.2x?

There is -for people as well as for functions- no contradiction 
between having a nature ("being an ego") and changing ("being dynamic 
and growing").

Sure, psychologically, it may be harder to see this, and it may also 
be harder to see that you are indeed acting as if you were a constant 
even after you have intellectually fathomed that functions can vary 
in all sorts of ways. But philosophically and intellectually, I think 
the route to enlightenment in this matter is short.

Re your references to Buddhism, I think that they also too often 
insist that only the constant may constitute a "nature", "self" or 
"ego". Only that they offer the flip-side of the usual view: they 
offer liberation from it. But there are different interpretations, 
and you don't need to become a non-function just to avoid being a 
constant function.


>And this is why the maxim "I will not serve" seems limited and
>one-dimensional to me: It seems to speak to and prioritize the
>static self at the expense of the growing and dynamic (and
>currently non-)self, which requires self-overcoming, which is a
>species of serving -- a species of commitment to serving something
>outside the ego.

This is true only if you view the ego as a constant function. But in 
another sense you may be right, in that people often project a static 
future ego that they serve at the cost of their current man. But then 
that is the same false dichotomy. It's like the function f(x)==x+1 
saying at a time when x=3 that f's TRUE value will be realized only 
in the future, and that this true value is 112, and not the current 
measly 4 (e.g. 3+1).


>And it might be argued that self-overcoming must be perpetual --
>Nietzsche for one argues that at great length and eloquence.

Maybe what needs ("needs"?) to be overcome is not the ego or self, 
but rather a rather restricted view of yourself. Just like Stirner 
saw that those who identified with labels of who they were (like 
"Christian", or "German" - or even "human") were just scared out of - 
themselves - and into spooks and concepts.


>To overcome the ego is to commit to and serve something outside
>its boundaries. How then can one say "I will not serve"?

Maybe by understanding who you are in a different sense than that of 
being a fixed thing or concept
-- 

Svein Olav Nyberg
http://www.nonserviam.com/solan/

   "Did you ever contribute anything to the
    happiness of Mankind?"

   "Yes, I myself have been happy!"

                 - John Henry Mackay