Academician Krymsky’s Encyclopedia of Humor

In the second part of our libationary interview with philosopher Serhiy Krymsky, in addition to such topics as drinking and humor, being of vital importance to the human race, we broached an even more global subject: love and friendship.

CONTACTS WITH WOMEN BROKE MY RATIONALISM

The Day: Do you know the joke about a man and a computer?

S. K.: Of course. A supercomputer was developed, storing all human memory. It could solve any problem. An academic commission was set up to pass judgment on that miraculous invention. The first question they asked it was, “Is there God?” The computer replied, “There is now.” The second question was, “What is the square root of negative one?” The computer thought for a long time and then let out a small robot and commanded it give the one who asked that question a square wallop on the jaw! And the third question was “When will we have communism?” (remember, this was back in the 1960s). The reply was “Every 15th kilometer sign is a step toward communism.”

No one understood and they started studying the intermediate steps. It transpired that the computer had used Brezhnev’s phrase “Every five-year plan is a step toward communism” as its basis of calculation.

The Day: How do women influence mankind’s world views through philosophers ?

S. K.: Take French postmodernism today. They think that political rhetoric is born of contacts with women (seduction) and is then extradited to big-time politics.

The Day: Suppose we make a general question specific: What role have women played in your life? Have they in any way influenced your world view

?

S. K.: They certainly have. I graduated from the university a rationalist. But subsequent contacts with women broke and melted my rationalism away. I understood Dostoyevsky who said that the brain is a bastard because it hesitates. And the amplitude of such hesitation increases, thus creating a certain hesitant practice, if you will pardon my equivocation.

The Day: Considering your experience, do you think that a man can act “correctly” with regard to women? Or maybe correctly does not apply in this sense ?

S. K. : The thing is that a man must not be afraid to make mistakes. Only a fool has such a fear. And the difference between a foolish and clever man is that the fool watches his step too carefully. He may spend the evening telling you about the length of the crocodile tail and such. In other words, he will feed you generally known facts, lest you think he is not well educated. A clever man behaves naturally.

Some men are afraid of betrayal [by women]. I thing that such cheating is the cost of pleasure. Why should I fear being cheated on? It’s like good verse. You know how good verse is written? Norm, deviation from norm, then getting back to norm. Of course, one must not forget about form.

The Day: Form and substance, a pet philosophical subject.

S. K.: Let me tell you an anecdote based on historical truth. Stendhal frequented a salon where an affair was quickly heating up between a young man and a girl. As always in such cases, society was a serious obstacle, as it never forgave genuine passion; adultery, flirting, a quick affair, all this was generally accepted and easily forgiven. But once true love flared up, all friends became enemies. Anyway, the man was slandered, the girl believed it and threw him out: the greatest scandal possible in aristocratic society. Stendhal, however, was amazed by the young man’s parting remark (a perfect unity of style and content): “Until now, mademoiselle, I loved you as a woman whose intellect competed with her beauty. Now, mademoiselle, I think that you are beautiful indeed.” How well said and what a brilliant understatement!

WE HAVE FURNISHED THIS WORLD WELL

The Day: In The Summing Up, Somerset Maugham dedicates a whole chapter to philosophers. He believes that a man who can’t answer the question of the meaning of life is no philosopher at all. Would you briefly describe your understanding of the sense of life?

S. K.: You know, life has sense if only because we pose this question. Seriously, the meaning of life is in accomplishing that which cannot be accomplished naturally, as well as in developing one’s own personality.

The Day: Have there been any miraculous occurrences on your road to such development ?

S. K.: I am sure there have been, but I will answer this one philosophically. Here is a thesis which has been accepted at all times, by all philosophers: this world as an inexhaustible source of knowledge, and the process of cognition is endless. If so (and everybody agrees that it is), the absolute majority of phenomena in this world are still to be perceived by man. If so, again, miracles are bound happen in this world. And the greatest wonder is the complete absence of such miracles. It means that we have created our own comfortable but artificial world, building a wall between us and all that which is confusing and enigmatic. We have furnished this world well.

The Day: To paraphrase Mayakovsky, “This earth isn’t well equipped for merrymaking.”

S. K.: That’s right. In case you’re interested, on old charts the boundary line between the explored part of the world, the Oecumene, and that still to be explored was determined as being inhabited by dragons. Myths were born on that boundary line, ideas of miracles or wonders. There are, of course, wonders in this world: that which is not prepared by preceding circumstances and which always takes us unawares. It is always paradoxical. Of course, it is tough luck if one has never experienced a single miraculous occurrence during his lifetime.

The Day: Great! Here’s to miraculous occurrences !

S. K.: There is a classic British toast. This here lord says, “Women are strange creatures. This is what happened to me recently. I went out to take a stroll in the park before going to bed. In one of the alleys I noticed a frog and decided to pick it up and toss it in a ditch, but it spoke to me, imagine! ‘Sir,’ the frog said, ‘do not toss me in the ditch, better put me in your pocket. You will not regret it.’ Well, I did and went on. Before stepping into the house I thought I should throw the frog out. And it spoke again, ‘Please bring me inside, you will not regret it.’ I did, I walked into the bedroom and put the frog on the dressing table. ‘Sir, please put me in your bed, you won’t regret it,’ said the frog. Again I obliged, and the frog turned into a young beautiful woman — and at that very moment my wife stepped into the bedroom. Try as I did to state my case, she wouldn’t believe me. Like I said, women are strange creatures.”

The Day: What do you think of those dry pedantic philosophers that never make concessions for emotions like you do? Maybe they think that by doing so you transgress the laws of logic ?

S. K.: Strange as it may seem, I am a mathematical logician by training. The mathematical aspect is explained by political considerations years ago (it was the only way I could work without interference). I have since drifted away from mathematical logic. I have had constant confrontations with people without a sense of humor. They could not understand that real thought always calls for doubt. It’s a game and the only way to understand most serious things. In this context I am very fond of anecdotes composed by Georgian logicians in the Caucasus.

A school teacher addresses her class: “Children, we will now proceed to study conditional sentences. Give me a situation using the expression ‘just in case.’ All right, Tania, we are listening.

‘Mom went to the street market and took a shopping bag, just in case.’

“No, that won’t do. People going to the market always take a shopping bag with them. You, Petr?

‘Dad went to work and took his briefcase, just in case.’

“Well, that’s more like it; one may or may not take a briefcase going to work. However, we need a characteristic situation. Will you try, Solomon?

‘The Roman Pope has no right to get married, but he is a man, just in case.’

The Day: Does philosophy make a strong impact on literature or vice versa ?

S. K.: Philosophy does. The thing is that literary criticism is close to exhausting its characteristic plots; the comparative method shows that world literature consists of a mere 12 such plots. At present, no literature can exist without a philosophical context. Both literary critics and writers feed mostly on philosophic juices.

The Day: Who do you think is the greatest literary philosopher ?

S. K.: Indeed, there is a new literary philosophic genre. I would name Camus and Sartre. Both were philosophers and writers in equal measure.

The Day: Camus wrote that the main issue of philosophy is whether life is worth the effort of living it. What do you say ?

S. K.: That’s paraphrasing Schopenhauer who wondered why an inmate in a death row should go insane. After all, are we not all sentenced to death? Yet we live normally. That’s the main philosophical issue; why should man live, knowing that he will die anyway, suffering all those troubles and disasters?

The Day: Perhaps because during his lifetime man experiences pleasure, now and then .

S. K.: There is a toast on the subject. Radio Yerevan asks, “How did the Old Slavs handle their women?” Answer: “With a great pleasure.”

Getting back to literary philosophers. Dostoyevsky should be mentioned, of course. He was a writer who became a noted philosopher, the author of existentialism. In Ukraine, it was Hryhory Skovoroda, although he did not develop a system of his own. Skovoroda is interesting to us and I will quote from him: “There are cracks in my soul letting in the wind from hell.” That wind carried him all over Ukraine like an autumnal leaf. During his life Skovoroda did not allow his books to be published. He thought that his lifetime was his most important book. He staged his lifetime a film director, playing different roles. His epitaph reads: “The world tried to catch me but never did.” He was right. His was the role of the biblical prophet Barsabas [i.e., St. Joseph “called Barsabas, who was surnamed Justus...” (Acts, 1:23) — Ed.]. He was a preacher, itinerant poet, musician, and enlightener. Take his statue in the Podil. Clad in bast shoes and with an ancient version of the knapsack. What was inside? The Bible in Hebrew and an ivory gold-plated flute. He was one of the most learned men of the time. And traveler was another role he played. Yet we consider that countryside educator was his key role. We never fully understood him.

The Day: Perhaps his statue should have several faces ?

S. K.: Precisely. He wrote in a letter: “Talking to that man bores me; he doesn’t know Ancient Greek.” Yet we made him a rustic figure.

The Day: How do philosophers treat fashion ?

S. K.: There is a saying that a medicine is curative while it is fashionable. In other words, fashion should be treated very seriously.

Intellectuals and cultured people regard fashion as a mask to protect them against the surrounding world, lest they be crushed. This mask is very familiar to the general public. Yet to be genuinely fashionable one has always to keep half a step behind fashion. Those in the front lines are always cut down, in politics, life, and in a revolution. You keep a little behind and you are sure to hit the mark.

The Day: We have discussed love at length. How about friendship ?

S. K.: There is a toast. Aleksandr Pushkin was a very serious critic. He founded The Literary Gazette where he lashed out at everything and everybody, with much wit yet keeping dead serious and far-reaching. And he would always praise Anton Delwig, a markedly mediocre poet. Some would reproach him: you are a ruthless critic, why do you always praise him? To which Pushkin replied, “We write verse ourselves, but we are given friends by the Lord.” So here is to that which we are given by the Lord!

(At the end of our meeting Serhiy Krymsky let off a string of toasts and anecdotes. Naturally, we did not interrupt the flow of such marvelous eloquence.)

A friend of mine was skiing in March and fell, scratching his face on the snow. The next day he had to go to work. Being a clever man, he realized that he would be exposed to gibes (Hey man, what is it? A scratchy date?). So he waited for a chance to say for all to hear at the office, “I had a little argument with my wife, she got angry and hit me with the grater.” Everybody fell silent sympathetically.

A man is on board a plane. A stewardess enters and says that the plane is in distress and offers him a parachute. He puts it on and jumps out of the plane. The parachute refuses to open, so he is plummeting like a stone. Suddenly he notices someone whistling past him into the sky. “Hey, what’s going on down there?” he shouts at him. “I don’t know, I’m fresh from a powder magazine.” So here is to their rendezvous!

A Frenchman fell out of a window on the 20th floor and is falling, yelling “Ah- h-h!”. Flying past a window on the fifth floor, he glimpses a beautiful woman and shouts “Oo-la-la!” Here is to one’s ability to say Oo-la-la!! in the most critical circumstances!

At a party a woman rises and toasts the men, because a woman without a man is like fish without water. Another woman refuses to drink the toast, so the first woman says, “I meant fresh fish!” Now that’s a purely feminine gibe, one that only a woman could have conceived.

An ant marries a she-elephant. On their first night she died, and the ant says to himself, “Well, five minutes of pleasure and digging her grave the rest of my life.” * * *

Alas, we ran out of food and drink and our tipplers’ evening reached its natural denouement. We parted company feeling sure we would meet again with Academician Krymsky, an exceptionally interesting conversation partner, on the pages of The Day.