Pegasus’ Gun

…..PEGASUS GUNS …I did notice the headlines of the newspaper and had an awe-inspiring mixed feeling of being sad and rejoice together. I was weighing down to learn that Pegasus, who was flying through heaven with his great big wings, landed down on the earth … All of a sudden, I was taken away from newspaper headlines to my M.Phil. Classes, where I used to spare handsome time over the ontological and epistemological status of the Pegasus and like terms. And lo!! Lots of tiny Pegasus were flying around me and were claiming their legitimacy in the domain of our linguistic real world. Pegasus, our imaginary Greek hero (?), unexpectedly becomes the real protagonist of the newspaper. Ah! I jumped to my jumbo toes!! I had a ride on Pegasus that flew me, to a place full of fancy dreams that even the theory of error was put into the trashcan. But the logical problem was constantly infringing me from behind.

My friends!! Perhaps all of you know Pegasus is now in the middle of a massive international crisis…some unidentified agency targeting leaders, journalists, lawyers, and important persons for surveillance and snooping operation is conducted against them … but they allege that…. Pegasus is spyware for preventing crime and terror! …. … …What treachery!

Pegasus, the mythical winged divine horse, and one of the most recognized creatures in Greek mythology refuses to fade away!! It is back again with a whopping human leap. It is here with his Off-springs – a whole new generation of winged horses. It has the ability to invade one’s phone without a click from the targeted user. Once a vulnerability is found Pegasus can infiltrate a device using the protocol of the app., it hooks into most messaging systems. It installs the necessary modules to read the users’ messages, capture screenshots, log pressed keys, and whatnot! It could listen to encrypted audio clips too. So our Pegasus has secured many items in its fold in the new avatar.

Usually depicted as pure white, it has changed its colour to black with some suspicious element in its belly. Classically, Pegasus is said to be the offspring of the Olympian god Poseidon, and I was stunned to learn that it has cut off its parental bond from Gorgon Medusa to the digital world. Traditionally, it is said that Pegasus was caught by the Greek hero Bellerophon and allowed to ride him in order to defeat the monstrous Chimera, who was an evil creature. Pegasus kept riding to the heavens, Mount Olympus, where he took his place among the stars. Afterward, Zeus transformed Pegasus into the eponymous constellation and placed him in the sky for his loyalty and bravery. Gradually, Pegasus lost his tough image of bucking and throwing the hero Bellerophon from his back, so he is now transformed into digital software. My goodness!! he has acquired a new soft skill. That is good!

See! the wondrous character of the divine horse, his iron hooves, has struck the ground and his marks caused springs to turn into fountains of inspiration, creating waves of earthquakes among the important global personalities. His wings are beating the air, coming down upon the earth. His feathered legs paw the ground and the river of news and information flows every day. His sniff, and haze threads through the mountains to the earthly pages. At the heart of snooping and cutting-edge software tools, Pegasus is now throwing divine lightning bolts of Zeus. People say it is nasty software but I suppose, since it has no visibility of data, it will provide you a safeguard of power against your enemy. I have heard that people are getting psycho nowadays. No friends !! if these things are playing in your mind, keep them aside because our divine horse Pegasus has come to rescue you. I have read that Pegasus is a responsible creature, sometimes called ‘Thundering Horse of Jove’ because he passed the hurling thunder everywhere. In the long span of his thousands of years of career Pegasus’s story was the favourite theme in Greek art and literature. But after coming to the earth it is recognized as the corporate logo or emblem of weather satellite of Ecuador, named Pegaso, Pegasus Airlines Istanbul, Mobil Oil Petroleum Company, Pegasus marble company. In late antiquity Pegasus’s soaring flight was interpreted as an allegory of the soul’s immortality; in modern times it has been regarded as a symbol of spying inspiration—a new incarnation –suggesting immortality of the divine creature. Its wings are fluttering all over the world.

Our classroom discussion is alive once again and the point is whether the proper name "Pegasus” is an empty term, as we used to say, since there was no such horse, the name has no referent. The meaning of the proper name is said to be the identity of its bearer which is it referent. It may be a disguised definite description that signifies some unique characteristic of that person or object. For example, Pegasus is understood as the “divine horse” or "the winged horse of Bellerophon". But where is the referent corresponding to the description? Thus, if someone shouts Pegasus does not exist, since the description does not apply to any horse, what is wrong there? Moreover, the obvious denial of its existence presupposes its existence, which further initiates the contradiction of asserting that something does not exist.

Nevertheless, I agree that Pegasus is an object of the imagination, it is an abstraction, it is a literary concept, a fictional character, but so is the mathematical and geometrical concepts. Let me ask: Who first decided to call a triangle “a triangle” and not a circle? Who invented that the number 2 will come after number 1 and come before number 3? Closely related are intentional objects, which enhance the theory that whatever our thoughts and feelings are about, even if they are not about anything real, however, they intend something, coincide with real objects, somehow. if not an existent then at least a nonexistent object is there.

It is also observed that the objects of the mind are frequently involved in the roles that people play in the acting profession. Charades is a game people play by guessing imaginary objects from short play-acts….Science fiction has plenty of collision with future times, alternate times, and past times that are objects of the mind. In The Transformers: The Movie, which was released in 1986, the narration opens with the statement, "It is the year 2005." In 1986, that statement was futuristic. In the year 2005, the number 2005 did not change, but the object of the mind that it represents did change. Now, The Transformers: The Movie is retro-futuristic. In metaphysics and the philosophy of language, nonexistent objects such as the round square, golden mountain, centaur will muddle the definition of objects as well as will produces an air of paradox if the dual copula strategy is not applied. The strategy is to analyze it using two copula-s –– it is round and it is square.

Assuming that there exists infinite possible and impossible worlds, objects are freed from the adjective of “necessarily existing” in our actual worlds, instead may exist in impossible worlds, where the law of contradiction does not apply. In answer to the question, “What is there?” what comes out is: “Everything”, both possible and impossible. The so-called impossible objects like a round square, which is both round and square even if it cannot exist in our actual world in the same sense as a table, somehow “are” or “subsist”… which provides sound ontology to fictional entities. The verb "to be" (exist) have two such distinct senses of “there are" –– so-called "wide sense", including Pegasus, the golden mountain, the round square, and so on and the so-called "narrow sense", encompassing only things that are real or existent in the present tense. Mind my friends!! history subject will be eliminated from our syllabus if Pegasus will have to exist in the real present tense only.

Again, let us suppose that Pegasus does not exist. Then tell me, my friends! what exactly is the thing that does not exist? The “Riddle of Non-being” is as: “Non-being must in some sense be, otherwise what is it that there is not?” The problematic coin has two sides. First, it suggests that talking about Pegasus will force to assert that something corresponds to the name of Pegasus exists which is the conglomeration of the alphabets like P..E..G..A..S..U..S. This is the semantic side of existence: If Pegasus is not there, in any sense of the word, what would we be talking about? For example, if one says Pegasus flies, then one is committed to the claim that something, that flies, exists.

The mythological horse had to use magic propulsive force beams to propel itself through the air to fly because an anti-gravity field, the total body weight, the dense and heavy bones of the large body of the horse cannot be lifted by the size of wings as typically depicted for a Pegasus. The sentence, “the cat is on the mat” still floats in the outer space, if there is no gravitational field present. But our mythical divine horse uses extra-power to defy the earthly role of the gravitational field and refers to an intentional object, even if there is no available visible data.

The fictional objects issue a challenge to our ontological categories since to provide an account of them also means to deal with their strange function. Typical examples of fictional objects are a centaur, Pegasus, Sherlock Holmes. For example, when one says: “Hamlet is the most complex character in the history of literature”, one is dealing with a fictional object attributing him an extra-fictional property such as complexity.

Fictional objects appear to be the borderline cases situated on the confines between ontology, epistemology, psychology, and philosophy of language. I would like to share an interesting story of the Royal dynasty of Krishnanagar back in the 17th century, when the king was instructed in a dream to worship Goddess Jagatdhatri, riding a Lion. The next day, he ordered an artist to prepare an image of the Goddess Jagatdhatri, as mentioned in the mantra he recited before him. But when the artist finished the image, the vehicle (Vahan) of Goddess looked neither like a lion nor like a horse. It was the mixture of two, which exemplifies how the inner idea of the artist dominated while executing the plan, although he was unaware of the idea of a unicorn at that time. Since then it has become a tradition of Royals to worship Jagatdhatri in that mode always. The reality of a lion crossing its boundary and accommodating the reality of a horse is the typical example of how an artist can take the liberty of using the given material, according to his choice. Nevertheless, it emphasizes the notion that we have to redefine our concept of object, being, and non-being.

We might reformulate our initial problem in the following way: why should we be interested in non-being, only because some of the assertions about it are not trivial. Coming back to our point, it seems that when we judge something we always have to admit its existence. A person who judges believes something to be judged. A person who knows understands that knowledge is impossible without something being known. So, conviction is the first thing that anyone will grant as being present in judgements. It must occupy a definite position within the antithesis of ‘yes’ and ‘no’. Our thought is actually unlimited in its free assumption of objects-- the thesis of unrestricted freedom. The ontological status of such imaginary objects is not in question and they are free from any existential commitment. The whole realm of non-entities, such as “the round square”, “Apollo”, “Hamlet” etc., can now be satisfactorily dealt with. All these are denoting phrases that do not denote anything. A proposition about Apollo means what we get by substituting dictionary meaning of Apollo, say “the sun-god”. The fictional objects exist like any other object in the world: they are said to be the social products, created by the author’s imagination.

Eventually, Pegasus is standing on the junction: either he should tackle his dilemma in meta-ontological manner or in a pragmatic way. The option is open and choice is his. But I can remind him of his past –

Oh! The great Pegasus!!! The earth is a stage of unintended magic. You have tender yourself for sale and you have seen the consequence of the uproars! Your strength is maligned to the core. Let not the wrestling Chimera of this mundane earth stop your majestic flight…I plead ….fly high and high to the kiss of the beyond!! March back to your divine abode! Please go back to the sunshine of your divine abode. You were wondering in the summer wind and amidst heavy rain-fall, you were starving, yet you were peddled everywhere. The rowdy bargaining has denigrated your heavenly dignity. You have lowered your soul for the earthly creatures. But no more!! No more to the ditch side now. No more horse-trading with the world. There is a ray of grazing sunshine on Mount Olympus. Go back to your birthplace! If you can fathom it!!!