The Inferred Donkey

“there’s some bearin’, carryin’ and sufferin’ with that tham thar donkey” - Jehosaphat Jump of Leadville, Montana

Etymology of ‘to infer’

From Latin inferō, from Latin in- (“in, at, on; into”) + Latin ferō (“bear, carry; suffer”) (cognate to Old English beran, whence English bear), from Proto-Italic *ferō, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰéreti (“to bear, carry”), from the root *bʰer-. Literally “carry forward”, equivalent to “bear in”, as in concluding from a premise.                                                                                                                              https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/infer

Preface

Lesser mortals might infer facetiousness and condescension, while you, dear reader, and our self-selecting siblinghood, will happily consider with alacrity, the foregoing notions and allusions. You will see that I shall be exploring, discovering, and laughing ‘with’ you and not ‘at’ you. The astute will recognise this ploy to both dragoon and deter, ingratiate, and deflect. What a self-selecting crew we are? Indeed, I would like you to self-select immediately to reap the full benefits of the Donkey to which we allude.

The story so far… - prequels to follow, of course

Well, I have a donkey’s tail and a donkey’s tale to fix to the inferred donkey.

Ah! You have one of those inferred ones! I have been wanting one like that for a long time. I have noticed that they are like buses, even if you are next to the bus garage. They are held up (perhaps a coffee break) and then three roll out at once.

Here Come The Donkeys/Buses

I hesitate to state, not quite explain, that I have been developing a way of standing at the bus stop (donkey’s tail concealed) that appears to assist in the materialisation of a bus. In a specific sequence, I recently and quite unwittingly, coughed, raised my eyebrows, as if in agreement with someone across the road, and then scratched my right leg with the edge of my left shoe and the bus pulled out of South Croydon bus garage.

I naturally thought that this requires further investigation, however, I should endeavour to not use this newly discovered ritual willy-nilly. They say that transcendence is hidden in banality and the apparent is bridge to the real. It should only be a last resort when the time-space continuum as it relates to buses has been interrupted.

Donkeys later…

When and how would such a perturbation make itself known? When there are no buses, of course, you fool! Oh, great public transport meta-physician, surely all the possible moments of an absent bus would not be justification enough for your special sequence ritual? When would you decide that it is time for the cough-eyebrows-foot scratch-funny-stare procedure? Ah-ha! You’re right and already embarking on the path to bus-waiting enlightenment.

Confronted with this special combination of insightfulness, abstruseness and common sense from a would-be bus waiting guesser; then, and only then, do I bring to light my donkey’s tail and how this has guaranteed me a more than optimum experience with buses and their availability.

More Adventures with the Inferred Donkey

So now, the fun party game of attaching the donkey’s tail whilst blindfold, is a tired metaphor but - tiredness of metaphor is not redundancy or obsolescence. Tiredness sits neatly with Nelson Goodman’s taxonomy but critically sits (or stands casually) with donkey, the idea of donkey and donkey-ness as a platonic form. May I cross-refer you with the details of the leaning bicycle in Mr O’Brien’s The Third Policeman’. Abusing the footnote seemed inappropriate for our present ferocious intellectual progress in this matter.

The Donkey To Which We Allude

The donkey, or at least the main donkey, or the central coalesced idea of the multiplicity of donkeys we might hold on to as ‘donkey’, is something you would have guessed already and that I barely need to state, except for the formalities and courtesies of the situation, namely…

The donkey is the thing-in-itself, the Kantian Ding an sich. However, when can we truly say something has an essence independent of representation and observation? We imbue, compile, allocate, associate. How can anything be a thing in itself? It in turn vibrates its own phenomenological iterations, apparitions and presences. We have all that, don’t we? From the sub-atomic, wavelength and particle dichotomies and quantum yes, no, indifferent. Seemingly, this ‘exists’ subjectively separate from our objective observation over time, whether milliseconds or millennia. Well No and Yes and indifferent. But you knew that.

Digression 001

“The wind will change, and you’ll go like it!”

Love to know the history of this saying. Probably too prosaic and vernacular to have a historiography. Mum used to say it when we were pulling ridiculous facies (I am the eldest of five), but the possibility of becoming a strange version of myself, Kafka or Struwwelpeter? Fear of ‘going like it’ has come and gone in phases over the years, as there are a thousand versions of ‘going like it’. One hopes one has gone like everything one could have done, but perhaps I am only up to, say, 786 of the 1000 versions and further terrors await (a random allusion – 9 on a scale of 3-12). When I am in certain moods or indulging in certain behaviours that I find unacceptable in myself, I hear or generate Mum’s voice saying “Stop! Or you’ll go like it!” Yes Mum.

One Aspect of The Donkey

Historically, the donkey is a vehicle of utility and humility. Not least in the New Testament and Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem / Palm Sunday (which I may well return to). The beast of burden is known for passivity and docility, and yet has a reputation for unpredictable wilfulness and being annoyed or inflamed by small things such as an inquisitive bee. Perfectly reasonable if the donkey discusses this with you first, before kicking and neighing. I have found them to be both obtuse and defiant in this regard.

The Burden Itself

We come to the donkey’s status as the smuggler’s equine choice*. The most common burden being a human, whether Sancho Panza or a wandering dervish and, by subterfuge and stealth, I arrive at a particular crossroads for our donkey to take a rest.

* I know there is the pack horse, but they are serious. Attention is drawn to packhorses. They are the hook on which hangs a spaghetti western.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nasreddin_(17th-century_miniature).jpg

Nasrudin used to take his donkey across a frontier every day, with the panniers loaded with straw. Since he admitted to being a smuggler when he trudged home every night, the frontier guards searched him again and again. They searched his person, sifted the straw, steeped it in water, even burned it from time to time. Meanwhile he was becoming visibly more and more prosperous. Then he retired and went to live in another country. Here one of the customs offices met him, years later. “You can tell me now, Nasrudin,” he said.“Whatever was it that you were smuggling, when we could never catch you out?”

“Donkeys,” said Nasrudin.

Source | Idries Shah, The Sufis
(1971)

Digression 002

The Moral High Ground

From time to time (what’s that?) politicians and activists appeal for the re-establishment of the ‘moral high ground’. This marvellous rallying point, more constant aspiration than an actual state of mind or collective virtue, we seize upon it anyway, as something we think we all might know and agree the meaning of.  I notice as of Spring 2024, barely anyone dares mention it. As we see a collapse of international courage advocating universal values, no one has the temerity to raise the flag and shout ‘to me, to me!” to the dissolute moralists. That perhaps is Eurocentric as we see commitment to the international criminal court coming most strongly from the ‘emerging economies’. Domestic politics is deeply troubled by people speaking on behalf of ‘silent majorities’; those hordes of well-wishers unable to put pen to paper or sign a petition. No doubt such exist but who can claim to speak for them? Are these the ones that want to be part of the ‘moral high ground’ or the ones who believe such appeals only come from the cultural elites and would like them and their ‘moral high ground’ stamped into the mud of making (insert your word of choice here) great again.

Digression 03

“I Don’t Know What I Want But I Want It Now!”

Sir Henry at Rawlinson End announces this inimitable phrase.

Both an announcement and demand to his housekeeper Mrs E. Sir Henry has been used to getting what he wants all his life but still does not know what he wants or needs. Rather than say that is all of us in our consumer, ‘doom’ scrolling or ‘get’ scrolling condition. No that’s me… that’s me. If someone told me I have a fortnight to live would I:

a)     Get my photo archive in order?

b)     Get fit for the incineration?

c)     Phone everyone and say sorry for all the times I was an arse with them, actually being an arse and thanks for putting up with me, Mr Arse, all these years?

d)     Just thank everyone and say goodbye?

e)     Decide I might as well have a bungy jump after all?

f)      Read those 2 chapters of ‘Ulysses’ that I avoided? No, perhaps not!

But is that what I want or wanted?

The best I can come up with is real connection with people. On reflection, I have hardly put any effort into the thing I most want. Mmmm…let’s see where this goes.

Next time folks: More on the Lacuna

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