Serge is in his seventies, a lawyer, and taught philosophy in college for three decades. And he’s a thoroughgoing nihilist. Naturally he wouldn’t admit to that, and in fact in conversation he won’t admit to anything, but that is what he is. To me he is Stepan Verkhovensky, the ineffectual Westernized word-corroder in Dostoyevsky’s The Possessed (The Devils) who infects youth with his empty hyperrationality. 

  Say something is up and Serge ‘playing the devil’s advocate’ will object and argue ‘down.’ Say something is white and he ‘playfully’ takes the opposite view. Every observation or statement made at the table over coffee can and will be subverted by Serge until the only thing left standing is his hallowed ‘philosophy,’ which in the end is nothing more than time wasting word play. 

  Did I say he taught philosophy in college to young men and women for three decades? 

  Needless to say I avoid Serge like the plague. That’s because to me he is the plague, the plague of groundless, heartless, Godless (mytho-poetically speaking) inorganic reason that has spread across the globe these last two centuries and now threatens our very existence through environmental degradation and catastrophic internecine conflict. 

  And it goes without saying that in Dostoyevsky’s classic The Possessed Stepan Verkhovensky’s influence over the younger generation is nothing short of disastrous. 

Got a question? Puzzled with Life? Let’s have some fun with it! Email me at omphaloscafe@gmail.com