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THE DISCORDIAN SOCIETY SYMBOL
This magnificent emblem pictorally symbolizes The Working
of the Forces of the Universe and What Those Forces Are.
It is called THE SACRED CHAO.
Utilizing the symbolism of the Taoist "Ying & Yang", we
have The Sacred Chao divided into The Hodge and The Podge; only
instead of a Podge spot in the Hodge side there is a PENTAGON,
to represent The Eristesque Principle; and instead of a Hodge
spot in the Podge side, there is The Golden Apple of Discord,
to represent The Eristic Principle.
These two Principles--in eternal strife against each other--
bring forth Life.
The Eristesque Principle: is, essentially, that everything
that claims to be ordered is in fact only superficially ordered,
and imperfectly at that. In other words, even the greatest
orderers of all humanity, The Scientists, find that every time
they get some kind of good scheme going some damn thing or another
doesn't fit and every word of the "knowledge" of science must be
prefaced with the understanding that it might all be scrapped if
the wrong evidence pops up tomorrow. Furthermore, every scientist
today (using "scientist" narrowly) is spending the bulk of his
time trying to figure out just what to do with all the bits of
inforation that he already has that even now don't fit the scheme.
Anyway, it is all well and good because the order is not really
there in the first place--only primal chaos; it is we that give
birth to order, imposed on chaos, so that we may utilize our
environment and Lead A Good Life. That is, ordering is [essentially]
a Human thing and also in fact, is essential to humans.
But what most people do not realize is that there is another
Principle at work also.
The Eristic Principle: is, essentially, pure bald discord,
the antithesis of order, in its unadulterated state.
This Principle, too, is necessary for Life--for without it,
something or another would happen that must be terrible, but we
poor humans lack the Understanding (so far) to appreciate what [that]
might be. But if you don't believe that this Principle exists:
LOOK ABOUT YOU! Oh, yess, Discord is an inherrent Principle of
The Universe. Really, it is.
For a more complete dissertation on The Principles, see
"The Cosmology" in the incompleted Holy Work of Malaclypse (The
Younger), H.C., Summa Universalia ("A Summation of the Universe)
which is probably not yet available. Also, for a more complete
rendition of The Eristesque Principle in particular, read his
"Myth of Ichabod", included in the same Holy Work but also
distributed alone on occassion.
The Pentagon and The Apple of Discord were chosen to represent
these principles for the following reason:
We have found that one of the finest examples of Superficial
Order resting on a solid foundation of Chaos is the United States
Military Headquarters, The Pentagon Bldg. Furthermore, the
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