A real time live stream of all tweets directly mentioning the 45th President of the United States set to the music of Ligeti: Requiem II Kyrie.
Pessimism of the intellect does not mean always looking for the worst-case scenario, as many tend to do today. It means rather seeing the world as it is, rather than as we would like it to be or as others fantasise. It means accepting nothing at face value, doubting all that we are told, and questioning everything, not in the spirit of cynicism but of scepticism.
But always, pessimism of the intellect needs to be underpinned by optimism of the will. That means a belief in the human capacity to meet new challenges, overcome them and move society forward – not a naive Stalinist ‘Forward ever, backward never’ attitude, but a confidence that man can make his own history, even if not in circumstances of his own choosing.
