The Rubinshteinic Philosophy On The Night

The Rubinshteinic Philosophy On The Night

The night is my favorite time of day. I feel more free at night than at any other time, as long as I don't break the noise laws.

For many, the night is a time for hanging out in nightclubs and other recreational places, for sleeping, or for sex. However, for me, it is a time when I can be left alone, undisturbed, and un-interfered with by the outside world. It is a time of blissful, temporary apocalypse in my local region of the world. As if everyone else vanished and I'm the only one alive.

No one will complain or invade my privacy as long as I don't break the law (which is applicable almost everywhere and anytime), and as long as I keep my mouth shut so as not to disturb everyone else who is sleeping.

Daylight is the atmospheric mask that the sun grants the world. The true colors of space and the appearance of stars only appear when the sun unmasks the world, one time zone at a time, revealing the true colors of the otherworldly reality: dark, empty, and distant from countless other planets by distances unrecognizable by many. Perhaps this reality could be a true analogy to some of our lives.

I don't like daytime. It is too bright, too warm, and too civilized. Just as the daytime is the mask of the sun, the External World wishes that you mask the space within you, either partially or completely. It doesn't like the public expression of disturbing truths, and it contains seas of people effortlessly arguing against each other, online or offline, on the untamed exclusivity of the public space; conflicts that are futile and energy-demanding in the long run.

But when it's night and most people go to sleep, there is much less conflict, much less pretentiousness, and much less stress. All of these were probably what led Sartre to believe that "Hell is other people," and to many others, such as myself, to either partially or entirely renounce the world in the name of attaining peace and other goals such as enlightenment and mastery of whatever art. For the External World, for many, is but a distraction, an obstacle, that is more in the way than it isn't.

The night is like a recurring "free trial" version of what a life of solitude could entail: what does it mean to be within the void while the rest are in another world? It is a presentation in many parts of the globe of silence's relief, with little to no chatter, arguing, or violence, physical or literal.

Many people at large contain a basic hypocrisy. They will try to limit others, but dislike being limited themselves by others. This is how unfortunately public spaces work today, under the false belief that many indeed have the legitimacy to limit others, whether they succeed in doing so or not. This is quite sad because much of the world can be more of a democracy, and less of a tyranny of the majority.

However, when night comes and you are alone, all of these problems become non-existent. This grants you the freedom, at least temporarily, to be yourself. You can enjoy the relieving silence that you have been expecting since the last time you woke up.

The only demand is that you be quiet vocally, just as others are when the law demands it. Finally, the law becomes not just a barrier, but a protector of an enabling deal: the honest social contract that Hobbes believed was the essential reason for the formation of civilization on the ashes of a former anarchy.

The contract of blissful solitude is only diminished by the mask-covering-body that is the sun, when it rises once more to commence the unfortunate, noisy necessity of having to live with one another for the sake of the economy and public discussion on things and beings. Many, by the way, are not worth the sacrifice of our serenity.

Hopefully, the task that is my life, that my life is for, will finally end, and then I will be able to rest for eternity and peacefully. I do not see that metaphorical rest as exclusively negative. No. I see it as a way to "live" the exact silence I experience when humanity's asleep around me. The freedom from lights, from noise. The freedom that simply allows me to rest, without anything else needed.

But until then... Hail Philosocom.