Theos-Talk Archives (May 1996 Message tl00590)

>
>  Dear Spirit Folks,
>
>         In the event you thought there were no humor possibilities nor
> educational benefits for spiritual well being at work in reworking the
> eternal "Why did the chicken cross the road?" query, check this item which
> polymath Richard S. Russell" (RSRMadison@AOL.COM) discovered and shared on
> the Secular Humanist Discussion Group.  He is not the author, however.  I
> think it was pulled from the internet.
>
> WHY DID THE CHICKEN CROSS THE ROAD? A Survey of the Philosophical History
>
> Plato -- For the greater good.
>
> Karl Marx -- It was a historical inevitability.
>
> Machiavelli -- So that its subjects will view it with admiration, as a
> chicken which has the daring and courage to boldly cross the road, but also
> with fear, for who among them has the strength to contend with such a paragon
> of avian virtue? In such a manner is the princely chicken's dominion
> maintained.
>
> Hippocrates -- Because of an excess of light pink gooey stuff in its
> pancreas.
>
> Jacques Derrida -- Any number of contending discourses may be discovered
> within the act of the chicken crossing the road, and each interpretation is
> equally valid, as the authorial intent can never be discerned, because
> structuralism is dead.
>
> Noam Chomsky -- The chicken didn't exactly cross the road. As of 1994,
> something like 99.8% of all US chickens reaching maturity that year had spent
> 82% of their lives in confinement. The living conditions in most chicken
> coops break every international law ever written, and some, particularly the
> ones for chickens bound for slaughter, border on inhumane. My point is, they
> had no chance to cross the road (unless you count the ride to the
> supermarket). Even if one or two have crossed roads for whatever reason, most
> never get a chance. Of course, this is not what we are told. Instead, we see
> chickens happily dancing around on Sesame Street and Foster Farms commercials
> where chickens are not only crossing roads, but driving trucks.
> (Incidentally, Foster Farms is owned by the same people who own the Foster
> Freeze chain, a subsidiary of the dairy industry.) Anyway, ... [Chomsky
> continues for 32 pages. For the full text of his answer, contact Onanian
> Press.]
>
> Thomas de Torquemada -- Give me 10 minutes with the chicken and I'll find
> out.
>
> Timothy Leary -- Because that's the only kind of trip the Establishment would
> let it take.
>
> Douglas Adams -- 42.
>
> Nietzsche -- Because if you gaze too long across the road, the road gazes
> also across you.
>
> Oliver North -- National Security was at stake.
>
> B. F. Skinner -- Because the external influences which had pervaded its
> sensorium from birth had caused it to develop in such a fashion that it would
> tend to cross roads, even while believing these actions to be of its own free
> will.
>
> Richard Nixon -- Edgar will find out! Or, uh, we could put, uh, Liddy on it.
> Liddy. I worry about Liddy sometimes. Remember when we assigned him to figure
> out which 1 of those [expletive deleted] passenger pigeons had been leaking
> campaign secrets?
>
> Carl Jung -- The confluence of events in the cultural gestalt necessitated
> that individual chickens cross roads at this historical juncture, and
> therefore synchronicitously brought such occurrences into being.
>
> Jean-Paul Sartre -- In order to act in good faith and be true to itself, the
> chicken found it necessary to cross the road.
>
> Ludwig Wittgenstein -- The possibility of crossing was encoded into the
> objects chicken and road, and circumstances came into being which caused the
> actualization of this potential occurrence.
>
> Albert Einstein -- Whether the chicken crossed the road or the road crossed
> the chicken depends upon your frame of reference.
>
> Aristotle -- To actualize its potential.
>
> Buddha -- If you ask this question, you deny your own chicken-nature.
>
> Howard Cosell -- It may very well have been one of the most astonishing
> events to grace the annals of history. An historic, unprecedented avian biped
> with the temerity to attempt such an herculean achievement formerly relegated
> to Homo sapiens pedestrians is truly a remarkable occurence.
>
> Salvador Dali -- The Fish.
>
> Darwin -- It was the logical next step after coming down from the trees.
>
> Emily Dickinson -- Because it could not stop for death.
>
> Epicurus -- For fun.
>
> Ralph Waldo Emerson -- It didn't cross the road; it transcended it.
>
> Johann Friedrich von Goethe -- The eternal hen-principle made it do it.
>
> Ernest Hemingway -- To die. In the rain.
>
> Werner Heisenberg -- We are not sure which side of the road the chicken was
> on, but it was moving very fast.
>
> David Hume -- Out of custom and habit.
>
> Saddam Hussein -- This was an unprovoked act of rebellion and we were quite
> justified in dropping 50 tons of nerve gas on it.
>
> Jack Nicholson -- 'Cause it (censored) wanted to. That's the (censored)
> reason.
>
> Pyrrho the Skeptic -- What road?
>
> Ronald Reagan -- I forget.
>
> John Sununu -- The Air Force was only too happy to provide the
> transportation, so quite understandably the chicken availed himself of the
> opportunity.
>
> The Sphinx -- You tell me.
>
> Adolf Hitler -- If it was a white, Aryan chicken, it was because it was its
> destiny to seek lebensraum in the historical vaterland. If it was 1 of those
> Rhode Island Communists, it was a cowardly act of betrayal of der volk, for
> which it will be made to pay.
>
> Henry David Thoreau -- To live deliberately ... and suck all the marrow out
> of life.
>
> Mark Twain -- The news of its crossing has been greatly exaggerated.
>
> Catherine Mackinnon -- Because, in this patriarchial state, for the last 4
> centuries, men have applied their principles of justice in determining how
> chickens should be cared for, their language has demeaned the identity of the
> chicken, their technonogy and trucks have decided how and where chickens will
> be distributed, their science has become the basis for what chickens eat,
> their sense of humor has provided the framework for this joke, their art and
> film have given us our perception of chicken life, their lust for flesh has
> has made the chicken the most consumed animal in the US, and their legal
> system has left the chicken with no other recourse.
>
> Ludwig van Beethoven -- Eh?
>
> Stephen Jay Gould -- It is possible that there is a sociobiological
> explanation for it, but we have been deluged in recent years with
> sociobiological stories despite the fact that we have little direct evidence
> about the genetics of behavior, and we do not know how to obtain it for the
> specific behaviors that figure most prominently in sociobiological
> speculation.
>
> Josef Stalin -- I don't care. Catch it. I need its eggs to make my omelet.
>
> Malcolm X -- It was coming home to roost.
>
> Don Glass -- To show the possum it could be done.
>
> Don King -- Fosure not because Mike had no sexual assault on his mind. Our
> bro done learned his lesson from the last time. Besides, Allah don't hold
> with no chicken-[bleep]in'.
>
> Bill Clinton -- It is one of the challenging problems of our time, isn't it?
> And, altho we have known of this problem for many years, nobody has ever
> taken it seriously enuf to really feel the chicken's pain. Clearly we need to
> move forward on this issue in a measured, humane way, bearing in mind that
> the federal government can't be all things to all creatures, but that, in the
> final analysis, it is the Constitution of this great land of ours which
> guarantees freedom of action, within prudent limits, for all of us. God bless
> you, and thanks for asking.
>
> Bob Dole -- How should I know? Get that microphone out of my face!
>
> Jerry Garcia -- And what a long, strange trip it's been, man!
>
> ----------- (add your own and pass along)
>
> Donald B. Ardell -- Because wellness is too important to be presented or
> lived grimly, as chickens had a tendency to do on the side it was already
> on.
>
> Bill Hettler --  Why to attend the National Wellness Conference in
> Stevens Point in July, of course.
>
> Spirit at Work Subscribers -- To learn how to redirect hurricanes and, if
> not satisfied with extant realities, create some new ones.
>
> Millennium Matters Subscribers--Because the new "I AM AMERICA" map
> coincided with Gordon Michael Scallions map and numerous other predictions.
> It was concluded that "the other side of the road" was a safe place.
>
> Susan Renuka Dubin--for the greater experience, and besides, the Chi Chi
> Rodriquez Chichilean Race Reunion was being held there.
>
> _________________________________
>
> .....add yours and pass it on!
> Peace,
> Renuka

--



   Bee Brown
   Member TSNZ,Wanganui Branch.
   Theos Int & L