1. Double-ness is Western-ness: --i.e. the mark of our Civilisation
Athenean philosophy: Plato & Artistotle circa 500 C. BC. —
The World of Appearance is supported by a (non-appearing) World of Reality: “the Forms”
Permanence & Change
E.g. A river looks permanently the same, but it is every moment a different river.
Roman Empire: philosophy of Stoicism
Emotion & Reason: balance & control
The Will must agree with Nature
Christianity: City of God and City of Man
St. Augustine: Civitas Dei
Interpenetration, co-existence, difference

2. Doppelgänger: ‘double-goer’
A ghostly double of oneself
Prefiguration of impending evil, misfortune or death
Mary Shelley’s husband famously saw his before death
Transmigration of soul

3. Non-Western: unitary Japanese: single-ness; One-ness;
difference is dissolved:
e.g. suffering is maya=illusion
Islamic Civilisation: Allah is One, therefore all is one.
politics, economics, family, education, clothing
Doubleness suggests ‘other-than-Allah’, therefore blasphemous.
Idolatry is capital crime; Ikon is capital crime (Islam is iconoclastic); even representation is a capital crime.

4. Double-ness in the West: note how doubles support each other
External (General)
Chaos & Order
Governed & Governors
Church & State
Bourgeoisie & Proletariat (Marx)
Savagery & Civilisation /Death and Survival (Darwin)
Internal:
Body and Soul
Private and Public
Vice and Virtue
Desire and Self-Control
Conscious and Subconscious
Success & Failure (an individual standard)

5. Doubleness complements & co-exists: Contrasts to BINARY which is annihilating
Double: example
BINARY: DESTRUCTIVE
Literature (Art) as a mirror
Reflects back what the reader—or the reader’s times—shows to the mirror.
Reveals what the subject presents to its objects, but can’t see for him or her self.
Like a familiar room becomes unfamiliar is seen through a large wall mirror
Right vs Wrong
Human vs Inhuman
Light vs Dark
Saved vs Damned
Hired vs Fired
Life vs Death
Us vs Them

6. A reason for Victorian “doubles”
“Amputation” (Marshall McLuhan, )
Technology:
the extentions of man
Technology is the amputation, by science, of human attributes into external devices and creations
We then confront our second-selves
Stages of Amputation
Literacy
speech & memory
Industrialisation
Hands, arms, legs
Computerisation
Nervous system
Science is ‘amputator’
Dr. Frankenstein
Dr. Jekyll
Confronts us with ‘evil’ doubles / creations

7. Douglas Coupland: Duality
An icon of surrender and prayer: Coupland saw this icon on the wall of a non-denominational chapel in an American airport
A sign of
Faith
Surrender

8. Coupland wrote this novel to show how Faith and Doubt exist as Double: two co-existing sides of one concept
“Faith” implies doubt by definition,
Doubt looks naturally to Faith