"Is a banana considered a snack?" is an "absolutely contradictory self-identity"

Even now, if there is a bump on the road while I am walking, I find myself wanting to climb it. Or, I might choose to walk only on colored blocks.
When I read while moving back and forth between Nishida's writing and my own heart, that is how it feels in terms of my mood.

Nishida's cascading words overwhelm my heart, which is full of gaps. Conversely, when I try to slip my own trivial ideas into the gaps of his seamless writing, I feel as if the Iwanami Bunko (blue) edition is breathing.

What Nishida calls an individual object is "something that limits itself while being limited by others". Something that can be self-reliant as a self-cause is not an individual object.
It is an individual object precisely because it depends on others and is depended upon by others. The contradiction of mutually negating each other is what makes an individual object an individual object.

The individual object and the whole are connected in a form where they mutually limit each other.
The individual object dies once at the extreme of self-limitation and is revived by reorganizing itself. Through this, the whole is constantly remade, and the individual object lives a new life moment by moment.

This is, for example, like the lyrics of Makoto Kawamoto's "10 Minutes Before":

Skipping steps on the subway stairs, all my senses are opening up
I'll shed this body and become someone new
Not wearing a seatbelt on the roller coaster, with that feeling that I might die
I might be kissing in 10 minutes
I was just born

That is the feeling of the lyrics.

During the 10 minutes of my dash to avoid being late, I am reborn over and over again.
The streets I run through, my tangled legs, I can't worry about my hair or anything like that. When I lunge forward with my whole body and the doors of the train I barely made it onto close, the world regains its silence.

I feel a bit out of place with my desperate expression. As the train slowly starts to move, the world's time begins to progress in a way different from just a moment ago.

It's good that my heavy breathing has calmed down, but what expression or posture the "I" will have in the next moment after I lift my head is the biggest and only problem next.

Without saying anything difficult, what Nishida calls "pure experience" or the "flow of life" is exactly that of a heart-pounding "excitement".

I previously used the expression "girlish explosive power" for Nishida, and I personally think that having one's heart race and saying "Lovely!" without a moment's hesitation at something that catches one's eye is (in terms of the soul's attitude) girl-like and wonderful. This includes the point that in the next moment, my heart is taken by something else, and I have zero interest in the original thing, as if it were a lie.

In such a succession of moments, because "I" am constantly being supplied with "me," and "I" am reorganizing the structure of "me," I am constantly producing soft skin, continuing to molt, never rusting, and remaining fresh.

When I spread my arms and dive in a beautiful direction, I become a completely new me.!

By the way, and this is sudden, there is a classic joke: "Is a banana considered a snack?" (This is too much of a "by the way," though...). It's the one where you confuse the teacher with a question that catches them off guard about whether a banana is allowed as a snack on a field trip.
Although it seems abrupt, I think this is a good example of what Nishida calls the generation of intension-extension through the mutual limitation of individual objects and the universal, and it is very suggestive when thinking about Nishida-esque creation.

In short, "Is a banana considered a snack?" is an "absolute contradictory self-identity". The individual object here is the "banana" and the general is the "snack." In essence, the "banana" is a
homogeneously detoxified "snack" that acts as a detonator that flips the "absolute <not a snack> type <snack>" from the bottom up and makes it bristle.

A "banana" signifies the exterior to the safe "snacks" that elementary school students are expected to bring on field trips, such as Pocky or gummy candies. Setting aside the judgment of whether a banana actually qualifies as a snack, I believe there is significance in the fact that by explicitly stating the question "Is a banana considered a snack?", one refreshes (or in Nishida's terminology, produces or poiesis) a clichéd category. Furthermore, regarding this kind of external movement, there is an image of
"the floorboards being pulled out" ("stepping off the Earth"). This is because I feel the key is the "!?" sensation when a stable footing is suddenly yanked away.

Moreover, this is not just about the intension of "snack" being conceptually transformed by the exceptional extension that is the "banana," but it is also important that the poiesis effect extends to the point where the intensions of the person asking the question "Is a banana considered a snack?", the teacher, and the surrounding students are also shifted from the inside.

The creation includes the stir it causes, such as "Is a banana a snack?", "No, nutritionally it's a staple food", "I never thought of using fruit as a snack", "It would be pretty pitiful during a snack exchange", "But that guy would totally do it...", and so on. Here, for example, if a classmate inspired by "Is a banana a snack?" suggests, We got a lot of excellent Delaware grapes as a mid-year gift, so let's bring those as snacks and share them with everyone on the bus, then the absolute contradictory self-identical production movement of "snack" will be further spurred on and can be expressed as follows.

"Snack" -!? Banana !?- "Absolute <not a snack> type <snack>" - "Snack'" -!? Delaware !?- "Absolute <not a snack> type <snack>" - "Snack''"...

Here, the "snack" with a prime (') is a "snack concept" that has been newly reorganized in the face of the heterogeneity of "banana" or "Delaware." Once the floorboards are pulled out, "snack" is "absolute <not a snack> type <snack>" downgraded (or upgraded?), but it is gradually integrated and internalized as a new "snack." I think of poiesis in the Nishidian sense as the repetition of such movements where contradictions bite into the inside, flip, overcome, and are then shaken by contradictions once again.

Nishida says,
"Life is always oscillatory; as long as it is oscillatory, there is such a thing as life." (from "Absolute Contradictory Self-Identity," *Nishida Kitaro Philosophy Collection III*, p. 50)

Also, while thinking about Nishida, the idea of Professor Gunji's "open limit" is simultaneously recalled.

"Open limit" is a focus that both limits (bounds) and opens the world. For example, the "vanishing point" used in perspective in painting brings about a difference in perspective on a plane by piercing a point "•" on the canvas, thereby opening (opening) a three-dimensional space there. However, by placing a "vanishing point," the pure appearance before the viewpoint is restricted to the figure, and the degree of freedom of the ground of the entire landscape is lost (limit). "
The limit is a point that negates the world and at the same time is the totality that grounds the world" (Yukio Pegio Gunji, *Science of Living*, Material of Life and Consciousness, p. 84), and it is something ambiguous.

The open limit creates a distinction between a concrete finite instance and the limit as an idealized conceptual totality. However, once this distinction is executed, another finite that was latent in the symbol of the limit gushes out" (ibid., p. 94). It is said that an open limit is like

"a thick line that can be written inside". Usually, the width, mass, and spatiality of a "line" that distinguishes something are ignored and treated as if they don't exist. However, once it is understood that an infinite number of lines can be written inside the distinguishing line, the nature of the intension called "line" itself is transformed.

Such open limits are numerous in the everyday world. According to Gunji, "Tsuyoshi Kusanagi's position in SMAP" is an open limit. To begin with, what is the condition for an idol to be established? It is differentiation from non-idols (according to Gunji,
"differentiation from pathetic guys like us" (p. 121)). In the rapidly changing entertainment world, how can one maintain idol popularity for a long time? One method is
to increase the possibility of the group becoming privileged by possessing diverse types of attributes
. In other words, by preparing characters within an idol group that emphasize various attributes, they respond to customer needs. However, this diversity is limited to the realm of possibility, and it is visible that it will be consumed one after another and eventually become boring (the "girl who is nowhere"
mentioned in a previous article is also this).

However, as for Tsuyoshi Kusanagi, it is said that he is assigned a different role. Since the text is interesting, I will quote it as is.

As an existence that is not one of the possible options as an idol, Kusanagi-kun has certainly pioneered his own path, succeeded as a character actor, and says things like 'Ippon Manzoku' with a goofy persona. Such things can be said to be generating various axes (inscribing lines within lines), and the embodiment of the situation where the extension (Kusanagi) changes the intension (idol) (Figure).

In short, Tsuyoshi Kusanagi is the banana of the idol world. Or perhaps, he is the mastermind and key player who activates an absolutely contradictory self-identity within the "idol".

Also, when you think about it, an open limit does not need to be a particularly deviant element at all, and honestly, it makes me think that anything can become an open limit depending on the context in which it is placed.

As an example, let's consider "○," whose meaning changes depending on the preceding and following context.

While the meaning of "○" itself is not fixed, if it is △ ○ □, then ○ is a "circle shape." If it is A ○ F, then ○ is the "alphabet letter O." If it is × ○ ◎, then ○ is a "passing grade."

You could even substitute a simple "I" for the "○" here. In other words,
depending on the situation placed at that time, the required role, appropriate behavior, and suitable title, the individual that is me is defined by the intensional world each time. For example, the "I" at school is a "student," at a part-time job becomes a "clerk," and when going to a convenience store, is a "customer."

"True individuals must be at the limit of both limiting and being limited," so in order for me to be myself there, it is important that "I" show a repulsive force that defines the whole while being defined. In short, I think it is important for "I" to be a moderately heterogeneous extension, that is, a moderate "banana," to be open while being at the limit. "Moderate" is the key; uprooting and dismantling the intension is something else entirely. Going out of one's way to create an open limit is, of course, for my own ease of living, and also for the freshness of the specific community I belong to as an intension. Building on the expression used when quoting Makoto Kawamoto's lyrics at the beginning,

constantly producing soft skin, continuing to molt, and staying fresh makes the "openness" of an "open limit" important. Conversely, a perfect and non-contradictory self will eventually "rust".

While I say "moderately heterogeneous extension," what is it specifically? As an easy-to-understand example, I think behavior like "a type of adult never seen before" that a child around elementary school age might think of is just the right balance. "The position of an uncle or aunt who tends to be treated as an eccentric among relatives" would be an outlier existence within the intension of "adults" as far as a child has encountered them. They can't be the parents, and they are completely different from teachers. They aren't preachy at all, but they answer what you ask without dodging. That kind of composure and airiness is cool. After all, they let me ride on the back of a moped, which is prohibited in the school district, the other day... They might not be looked upon favorably by relatives, but such adults appear very attractive to children. Also, making someone realize "Are there adults like this in the world? (It's not a lost cause after all)" is, however modest, a creation of the world.

What I want to say is that Kitaro Nishida is interesting when expanded into daily life, and absolutely contradictory self-identity is a word that only comes alive when lived by a living human being. At the time I started writing this, I think that's what I wanted to say, surely... It's vague, but I think that's fine.