why you should read Twilight of the Idols

[EXCERPT]

The church fights passion with excision in every sense: its practice, its "cure," is castratism. It never asks: "How can one spiritualize, beautify, deify a craving?" It has at all times laid the stress of discipline on extirpation (of sensuality, of pride, of the lust to rule, of avarice, of vengefulness). But an attack on the roots of passion means an attack on the roots of life: the practice of the church is hostile to life.

The same means in the fight against a craving — castration, extirpation — is instinctively chosen by those who are too weak-willed, too degenerate, to be able to impose moderation on themselves […] Radical means are indispensable only for the degenerate; the weakness of the will — or, to speak more definitely, the inability not to respond to a stimulus — is itself merely another form of degeneration.

discovery

It is never the idea alone that inspires. Have you ever run up against some one idea throughout your life, only to throw it out as trivial the first 50 times you hit upon it and be completely changed by it on the 51st encounter? The idea hasn't changed - so what accounts for the difference?

In reading other people and developing dialogue we expose ourselves to new ways of seeing. With new eyes comes the ability to see everything again for the first time. To reinterpret the world. "The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." (Proust) Books and dialogue are not the only way to take on new eyes, but they help, particularly when the people you're reading and talking with are brilliant. "The dwarf sees farther than the giant, when he has the giant's shoulder to mount on." (Coleridge/Newton/etc.) Running one's head into the ground is the result of approaching a thing in the same way over and over again. One rarely gets very far that way. There are lots of reasons people argue and debate. One reason is discovery. Another is fame. Two people might seem to be doing the same thing in all outward appearance, but I suggest that you can usually tell who is looking to discover and who is looking to be looked at.

what you are

...a convoluted mess of projected personality?

. . .

Some have learned to think that who they are is nothing more than their outward appearance. They value only how they appear to other people. They can't feel worth unless they are selling themselves in some way or another. They have no sense of intrinsic worth; worth for them is a function of how well they've approximated an idea in someone else's mind. For many, they value appearing some way or another because

. . .

Man no longer dares to appear what he is. What he is is nothing, what he appears is everything for him. ~Rousseau

Man has acquired an artificial self and become alienated from his inner being. The general effect of this concealment and distortion of human nature is to deprive people of individuality. ~book about Rousseau

top down

first, i don't mean to offend anyone. second, i mean to offend everyone. the language is not professional. but neither is life.


I think:
my shadow is more me than me.
and I wonder,
does the outside reflect the inside?
no,
the one prostituted, the other true.
but you can't prostitute your outward self and not have it affect the inner self.
collateral damage.
the outside infects the inside, and pretty soon
we become what we spend so much time trying to appear
(what at first we were only trying to appear)
because the two are inseparable.
::
two lives conjoined,
like the two sides of a sheet of paper:
an impression on one side
appears inversely on the other
and vice-versa.
::
but the realization comes too late.
and by the time you have any sense of all this you've wasted so much fucking time.
why do we aspire to be cardboard and paper dolls?
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3phsIEmKWbw)
we are self-censoring, image projecting cover-ups.


money and all this shit we do for it.
it makes things so...unreal.
we have to pretend in order to live.
it's so top down.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top-down_a ... ganization)
::
and yeah, I feel entitled to complain,
precisely because I do not feel it needs any special entitlement.
what if I don't like "the way things work"?
I don't want to go through some bullshit process of petitioning
for change that'll take years to actually happen
and many more months for some ineffective law to be effected - if at all.
my right to petition. great.
::
it's a machine.
we feed it so that it can feed us.
and we're all just feeding each other most of the time.
it's mostly an act to get fed.
to get fucked.
to get satiated. to get satisfied.
it's ugly.
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQntzqyde-w)
and I don't want it. but i'm in it. up to my neck and can hardly breathe.


i'm trying to be real.
of course, everything is "real."
but that's not what I mean.
i'm trying not to allow myself to be molded so completely by society.
society is a powerful force-
it's a jet-stream that pulls you along
and before you realize it you are playing the game
and can no longer remember creativity...inspiration...wonder.


the game.
some people call it "growing up."
false.
there is no reason growing up has to also suck the fucking life out of you.
maybe some people manage to retain themselves.
maybe this is what we're alluding to when we talk about keeping one's inner child,
i.e. remaining a child-at-heart.
as for me,
I've almost totally lost that part of me and I am - obviously - very bitter.
at who, at what, I don't know.
but this feeling is the only real thing I have right now.
(how dramatic!)

on emotions

Yes, we can now take anti-depressants, mood stabilizers, what have you to block a good amount of the pain of feeling, at the expense of doing just that, severing yourself from your own emotions. People on meds do commonly report feeling numb and emotionless. "Chemical imbalance." What they're really saying is that you have a disposition, the tendency, to predominant unhappiness. Detrimental to yourself and others. So you must artificially check your emotional lows (and highs) and re-condition yourself to manageable (acceptable) levels. But you can never "re-condition" it away.

"My point is that beauty, passion, creativity, love, would cease to exist if we all allowed ourselves to become devoid of emotion, and that is much more sad to me than feeling crappy about my life (even if I feel that way most of the time)." I believe in paying attention to all of my feelings, even and most especially the ones I would try to hide from myself. I used to go to great lengths to avoid uncomfortable social situations and certain emotions; I had conditioned myself to intellectualize, rationalize, and feign competency. I was in denial about a whole range of my own emotions. I couldn't bring myself to validate my feelings and convinced myself otherwise. So I did not learn. So I did not grow.

We are fated to go through the most unpleasant emotions. This may never change about us in general; but, if we have the honesty and courage to accept our condition, we can at least then begin to understand ourselves better.

Is this Moral Failure?

Introduction
(selling out)

"I think the term "product" has a bad rap. I blame Wal-Mart."
"I think Wal-Mart is evil enough to dwarf the combined sin of the rest of mankind to nothing (in comparison)."
"Wal-Mart is 'selling out' incarnate. Sold out and morally bankrupt."

Yay for shopping at Wal-Mart...
...because the ethical implications of doing so just don't weigh heavily enough on the average middle-class American conscience (conscience? what conscience? that would involve some mechanism of internal reflection. we are too approval-seeking to have developed anything like a conscience.).

The Good Samaritan Experiment
"In the Good Samaritan experiment, even seminary students could not be counted on to stop and help a stranger in need. In the experiment, Princeton seminarians were asked to prepare a report on the parable of the Good Samaritan in one building and report to another building to discuss the parable. The seminarians were randomly assigned to one of three groups, those told that they were running late, right on time, and a little early. While making their way to the other building, each of the seminarians encountered a man slumped on the sidewalk in obvious distress. Of the seminarians told they were early, 63% stopped to help; those on time stopped 45% of the time; and 10% of those running late helped. The researchers found that, "Ironically, a person in a hurry is less likely to help people, even if he is going to speak on the parable of the Good Samaritan. (Some literally stepped over the victim on their way to the next building!) The results seem to show that thinking about norms does not imply that one will act on them.'"
(http://www.experiment-resources.com/hel ... avior.html)
(http://faculty.babson.edu/krollag/org_s ... marit.html)

Moral Care
Why don't we care?
...about large scale exploitation,
starving children in other countries,
foreign wars...
..when none of it affects our immediate interests and well-being?
Why isn't it of interest to us!?
Sometimes we feel somewhat guilty about it, but not enough to move us to action.

Only small minority of us are in the humanitarian "business." Why?
We could all contribute something, and, likely, more than we are.

Moral Obligation
Why don't I look into everything I buy so as to boycott goods from exploitative companies? Why do I eat meat? (Because it's customary and I'm used to it and it would be inconvenient to do otherwise?) Why don't I give money to every television add for charity? Why am I not devoting my life humanitarian causes?

Is this moral failure?
Or is all of the above supererogatory!?
Certainly I am concerned about all of these things, but why haven't I really tackled any of them with more...gusto?
Am I alone in feeling this way?
I keep settling on the idea that I should concentrate moral efforts locally. I should do good where I am.
But then in today's world is there really any excuse for not thinking globally?

It feels like such a battle. I'm one of those people who, when he becomes really passionate about something, devotes all his energy to a single thing. So how do you juggle these global issues with personal life goals. How can anyone have the energy for all of this in life? I guess one ought to find some way to compromise?

Two things:
(1) What moral obligations do you think we have?
(2) Any of the issues I mentioned are up for discussion as well.

religion

No one is born religious; this has to be taught.

just found some things I wrote at 17

Me at 17, summer before college, on an internet discussion board, in response to thread topic "If you dont believe in God than why are you kind to people?"...with every pre-college educated word and misspelled atrocity in all its glory absolutely unchanged.

My response to discussion topic:
I used to believe that the only motive for action is ultimately a selfish motive. Everything we do, we do because we want to survive the best way we can. We learn how our actions affect the world around us, some learn better than others, and we constantly manipulate the world around us to achieve the results we want. For example, why would I obey the laws and follow rules, well...even as young babies we discover that there are norms and rules, and the consequences that follow. You can even think of gravity as a rule, a rule that has no moral attachment. "If I drop my toy it will fall to the floor." Then there are rules like "mommy will be angry if I make a mess." As we grow and learn more about the world and the other people in it we discover more rules and how to live with them succesfully.

So why are there philanthropists and acts of charity? Well, most of us know that when we are kind to others it makes us feel good, either about ourselves, or about the world. We also want to construct an image for others to see, we have a reputation to uphold. Why uphold a reputation? Because a reputation proves very useful in relationships.

What about love? If I give my unconditional love to another person it may seem like altruism, but really I know that it's always mutual. If I respect this person and care for them and meet their emotional needs I can expect to recieve their love and affection in return, that makes me feel good.

And when great sacrifices are made? When a person values someone to such an extent that he/she will sacrifice his/her life for that person, maybe this indicates that if he/she were to continue living without the other person he/she would be miserable.

Sometimes I think of it as a more complicated strategy for survival.

Another person in the same discussion thread wrote:

Compassion is an emotion--that's not up for debate, right? It responds too automatically to just be us thinking that, "well, if I help them, they'll help me later, plus that chick'll think I'm deep..."; it doesn't always go like that, so it's got to be built in. We thus associate it with selflessness in general, even though we aren't always selfless for the sake of compassion.

My response:
I'm not sure if I can agree yet, maybe because I see so much less compassion in the world sometimes than you're giving credit, but I would like to think that we all have a deeper instinctive care for the human race, and hopefully we do realize that we won't get anywhere if we have to kill off half the world to get there.

But, I don't think we're giving the selfish emotion enough credit. Being selfish, especially as a tool for survival, isn't shallow at all. I'm thinking for a way to illustrate this...

Before you bring a child into the world, why do you decide you are going to? I have not yet had this experience, so I tread cautiously, but is it because you have compassion for this unborn child, or because you feel somwhere inside you an obligation to keep the human race going?
I would think that this is a more selfish than selfless decision. If I am going to put my "self" in something more wholly than I have ever dedicated myself to anything else before, I am doing it for me, me and my partner. I would not do it for any other reason.

Besides, doesn't love for anything stem from selfish desire? I love a great many things, for me those things seem to affirm who I am, my existence, if you will.

And actually, now that I'm thinking on this I'm a bit confused by what you wrote Alun. How can we associate compassion with selflessness? Wherever passion is exerted there are always reasons of pure selfishness behind it.

Me ruminating, still in the same discussion thread:
I don't care if you live your life being the kindest person on the earth, I would agree with your behavior, and I would love to be your friend, but I can't quite have all the respect for you in the world if you're making choices because someone else told you to.

Now, I believe people do what they believe to be right, but then that means that theists believe that religion is good and truthfull, not on account of their own moral values, but because they believe in God's.

If this is true, it's not a very stable grounding for morality. It becomes a source for theists to justify their actions, and it's just plain...plain something...not good.

How can we learn to be better, more moral species if we are limited to following directions? (Isn't it obvious that God's directions have always been confusing and even misleading at times?)

/end 17 year old me.

God, I haven't changed very much at all. In fact my 17 year old self just persuaded me again to believing that "the only motive for action is ultimately a selfish motive."

On the one hand, this makes me proud of where I was at 17.
On the other hand, it scares me that I am not really much more advanced in my thinking than I was at 17. Makes me question the value of all my classes at university. Have they really helped me advance intellectually?

fantasy

"If you travel to Japan you might see an interesting cultural phenomenon: middle-age well-to-do business men spending a inordinate (in my opinion) amount time and money buying anime comics and toys (which are everywhere). To a Western mind this seems very unusual and at times when considering all the peculiar idiosyncrasies of this culture I even wonder if modern Japanese culture is in the middle of mass psychosis. I am not saying that you cannot find such escapism in the West, there is plenty of it here, as well, from Wiccan godessess who talk to the trees in their backyard, to hardcore Trekkies, to religious head-laying tongue-speaking fanatics, to sugarcoated reality everyone sees on tv everyday. But how important is fantasy to psychological well-being? Or should I say, just how damaging is reality to a mind?
They teach prisoners of war and those who are subjected to sensory deprivation, for example, to "find their happy place" in order, I assume, to forestall or prevent a complete nervous breakdown of the mind. All over the world children are told fairy tales, either in the form of books, stories, or Disney cartoons, or are told fictinal explanations to natural phenomena.

Does this then imply that reality is a stressful thing for a child and can damage its psyche if not buffered against with make-believe stories? And what of adults? Or should I say, and what of adults under normal, everyday circumstances?
It is clear to me that fantasy world provides a buffer against reality that might be otherwise psychologically damaging to the psyche. What is not clear to me is when the use of fantasy is overused, or is unwarranted. In the case of the Japanese businessman: is his reality so harsh as to warrant such flights of fantasy to preserve his psychological well-being? An even better question, is the harshness(or stressfullness) of his reality equivalent to the degree of his fantasy? And on the flipside, can the degree of fantasy tell us about the harshness (whether real or perceived) of the reality of the individual?

What I am getting at is: can we simply live and work and think in reality? Wouldn't a world be a better place if all people actually functioned in reality? Should we make more effort in bridging the gap between the inner world and the outer world? Because I see that this gap getting bigger and bigger, as if people are pushing away against reality.
And for those with "creativity"argument , can't we be creative and real at the same time?"

I don't think it's the case that reality is too harsh for the Japanese businessman, but that reality, with all it's social conventions, restrictions, and mindless routines--real or percieved--seems rather dull and monotonous for the middle-aged well-to-do Japanese businessman. Escaping into a thrilling anime story is a way to feel, if only superficially, the emotion and excitement deficient in one's day-to-day life.

I think this is a symptom of modern day alienation, which is, in turn, the effect that modern societies and their political economies have on individuals. For so many, the goal is to get the credentials to get a good-paying job to afford to have a life of plenty. The problem is plenty of what?

"...modern man lives his life according to what others expect him to be rather than on what he really is"
"...the mask of uniformity merely disguises real feelings"
modern man is "taken away from [his] true self by his subservience to artificial needs"
~The Philosophy of Rousseau, Ronald Grimsley

why you should read The Value of Philosophy

This-

[EXCERPT]

The value of philosophy is, in fact, to be sought largely in its very uncertainty. The man who has no tincture of philosophy goes through life imprisoned in the prejudices derived from common sense, from the habitual beliefs of his age or his nation, and from convictions which have grown up in his mind without the co-operation or consent of his deliberate reason. To such a man the world tends to become definite, finite, obvious; common objects rouse no questions, and unfamiliar possibilities are contemptuously rejected. As soon as we begin to philosophize, on the contrary, we find, as we saw in our opening chapters, that even the most everyday things lead to problems to which only very incomplete answers can be given. Philosophy, though unable to tell us with certainty what is the true answer to the doubts which it raises, is able to suggest many possibilities which enlarge our thoughts and free them from the tyranny of custom. Thus, while diminishing our feeling of certainty as to what things are, it greatly increases our knowledge as to what they may be; it removes the somewhat arrogant dogmatism of those who have never travelled into the region of liberating doubt, and it keeps alive our sense of wonder by showing familiar things in an unfamiliar aspect.

...sounds familiar.

life?

By all means, be grounded. Be grounded in whatever it is you hold sacred, whatever you hold dear to your heart, whatever you rely on for foundation. But sometimes do not be afraid to balance on one foot. You may discover that there is more to life.

By all means, question everything. Question God, question authority, question your self. But sometimes do not be afraid to get messy. The journey of life is better forged with energy, creativity, and living, than by hacking away at all things with the tools of logical necessity.

vile music

Dr. Brian Russell says:

I wrote about a case back on May 26, 2009 involving the vile music of “artist” Marilyn Manson, and since it’s been a few months, I think my bottom line bears repeating: A person who enjoys graphically, grotesquely-violent music and imagery is, in my opinion, psychologically-bizarre at best and downright dangerous at worst, and I think it’s reasonable for a parent to worry that a person (whether it’s his or her own child or someone with whom his or her child associates) who not only enjoys but creates such imagery is at the dangerous end of that spectrum.
(http://girlpundit.com/2009/09/study-this-with-dr-brian-horrorcore-killer/)

But, concerning music/entertainment influence on young people, I think the issue is not as black and white as the above.

I listen to Marilyn Manson’s music now, but I used to think he was just some kind of freak whose songs I didn’t understand. He dressed strange, seemed weirdly sexual, was the center of lots of terrible rumors, etc. My opinion was that he was, as Dr. Russell put it, “psychologically-bizarre at best and downright dangerous at worst.” My opinion has changed. My earlier opinion of him was based on rumor. I had know idea who he was or what he sang about. So, I was curious and looked into it one day. I started listening to some of his songs — tried to make out what they might mean. It’s important to me that the music I listen to isn’t senseless noise and actually has a point. I cannot like music if I judge it to be morally flawed. It's true, Marilyn Manson is often graphically grotesque and sometimes sings about "violent" subject matter. But that’s not enough to dismiss the music as “bad.” You must look into the meaning of music and image. There is both great beauty (good) and great ugliness (bad) in the world and an entire range in between; should it be surprising that this is reflected in art? Secondly, if you don’t understand the meaning of a song or picture (or what the intended meaning is), then on what basis do you judge it good or bad?

If you’re following me, here’s the big point I’m trying to make: If something is to be deemed bad, there should be a good reason why. I honestly see merit in Marilyn Manson and meaning in a lot of his work (some things I still don’t understand). To some extent I have to interpret what I know and hear of him, but I’ve gathered a good perspective of him now from sources like his music, his interviews, and his writing. It’s often hard to tell who someone is at first glimpse. So, figuratively speaking, I’ve done some intense observation.

I would recommend you do the same. There are plenty of youtube videos of him in interviews. Watch them — I think it’s important to understand people who are different from ourselves.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkxomNoPN-Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY1×7o7WjB4
This is a pretty great interview of "early" Marilyn Manson:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPfWnMXGmhE

Now an even bigger point to all of this is that if we were more willing to make an effort at understanding each other (and things that are strange to us) instead of being dismissive, I think our society, our culture, would be a healthier one. We wouldn't have so much to repress if we more communicative and understanding. Some people don’t feel like they fit into society, and at the same time can’t leave society. We’ve all felt this way in a small scale situation, e.g. at school or in a new place. If you ignore and distance yourself from “mis-fits” and make no effort to understand...what else is there for a “mis-fit” but to spiral further and further into deviancy (being different). Why would a social deviant try to become part of a society that ignores, looks down on, makes fun of, pre-judges, and cares nothing to understand him/her? If people communicate and try to understand each other I believe we would see less violently extreme behavior. That’s my theory anyway. And that’s why it’s important not to throw all weird, mysterious, shocking things into one category: BAD. A more sophisticated approach is necessary.

ideology = fate

You know your ideology is kind of like your fate. It's shapes your character. I think it's uncommon for people to actively shape their own ideology--to be aware of how they see the world and go through a process of molding a new view. If you control your ideology, I see it as controlling your fate. Really controlling your fate. (control fate? -- I'm not even sure I understand what I'm trying to mean by this.)

"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." Proust

But how much control over ideology can a person have? I don't know. I was trying to point out that this realist, individualistic, classically liberal ideology (I don't know what else to call it), i.e. looking with this pair of eyes, overemphasizes an empty idea of freedom that is at the same time a trap.

tragedy

(loosely connected thoughts)

To be frustrated, angry, confused, this is nothing new in life. Yet these emotions continue to surprise us. And the potency of pain never wears away. It bites just as hard or harder each time. Thinking "Oh, I've felt this before..." does nothing to lessen the hit. Familiarity with feeling does not diminish its impact.

Yes, we can now take anti-depressants, mood stabilizers, what have you to block a good amount of the pain of feeling, at the expense of doing just that, severing yourself from your own emotions. People on meds do commonly report feeling numb and emotionless. "Chemical imbalance." What they're really saying is that you have a disposition, the tendency, to predominant unhappiness. Detrimental to yourself and others. So you must artificially check your emotional lows (and highs) and re-condition yourself to manageable (acceptable) levels. But you can never "re-condition" it away.

Of course, I'm aware that life can be overwhelmingly good, too. But my point is about fate. Necessity. Somehow, I think, we have to come to terms with the fact that we are all fated to go through pain, anger, confusion, frustration, sadness, i.e. formidable unpleasantness, over and over, again and again, that we do not have the control our realist, individualistic, classically liberal ideology says we have. In America, in general, we strongly recognize in ourselves, through the cultural mirror of ideology, the rational subject, unbridled autonomy ("Be anything you want to be!" / "Land of opportunity!" / "You have the power to change anything!"), individuality, independence, and unique identity. But this is a mis-recognition of what we really are, and of the real conditions of life and living. A set-up for disappointment and an impediment to understanding.

We cannot simply free ourselves of the bad, i.e. ugly emotions and life's tragedies. We cannot simply change our mind or alter our perceptions about life's tragedies. We cannot be consoled by reason either. In fact, we know that it is often useless to say/think "Well, if I had only done such and such, this wouldn't have happened. Next time, I'll avoid it all." It can frustrate us forever. We must often just accept it. And simply making ourselves feel better (or, not as bad) about tragedy through perceptual reconditioning only ever works, in my experience, to avoid bad feelings and never really helps one reach a better understanding. But the bad--pain and suffering--are just as much a part of living as the good, and will always be. Of necessity. Did you forget? We are all fated to die. And we must live with this knowledge, or be lucky enough not to think about it, or perhaps have the good fortune to understand something of death (though nothing of the power to change it). And so it's all very tragic, isn't it?

But tragedy, since the Ancient Greeks (see: Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, etc.), has also been a major source of enlightenment, wisdom, and meaning, in addition to distress.

There is something to the study of tragedy that I think can help me reach a meaningful understanding of the human condition and cope with life in a way that is not mere avoidance or false hope or quick and easy rationalization of life's tragedies, but an honest appraisal of them.

In my view, there is a challenge to not become so hardened and bitter towards life that you resign from creativity, and wonder, and from putting yourself out there to confront the world.

To live.

But this is all kind of bullshit isn't it? It's all just varying levels of sophisticated rationalization. What is not--poorly constructed or otherwise--a rationalization?

Tragic.

choosing a career

From "The Point of Departure, Chapter 5: The Long Walk"

I needed to free my mind to do what I had never done before—figure out what I really wanted from my career—but I had spent too long concentrating on projects that required intensive analytical thinking without any personal involvement. I found that I couldn’t just shut down the logic and dream for a while.

Our society just isn't built so that we can all take the time to figure out what we really want in life. It is so essential we maintain some expected level of productivity. Sometimes I get the feeling that I am a package moving through a production line. Especially in college I've made myself so busy with chasing "success" that to stop and rethink the idea of success is to lose ground in getting it. The day-to-day is a constant barrage of email, schoolwork, DEADLINES. One random obligation after the next is how life feels sometimes. Like you said, sometimes you have to reclaim your life because we often revert to autopilot in the face of routine expectations. We live in a system that aims to maximize time, output, profit. We are trained to quantify, calculate, reason. We are told that we must be productive.

What it all comes down to IMO is the "for the sake of..." What is all this productivity for the sake of?

Calculated optimization doesn't exactly leave a lot of room for people to reflect, to dwell, to think slowly. In fact, we often retreat into our busy lives to avoid thinking about something or other that bothers us. Our lives hum at a pace that makes it difficult to dwell and spend a lot of time thinking deeply about ourselves and the world. I resent that. Especially now that I am scrambling to complete law school applications, hoping that, since I have no idea what I want, a law degree will afford me more time and more options.

pessimism / optimism

Is the world a good place? Does it want us to be happy? Or is it a horrible place where we can only do our best to battle or avoid its "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune"?

People don't really have any business thinking that the world thinks, much less that it thinks about them. I try not to moralize the world.

Somehow we have the (mis)fortune of being materially configured such that we (1) have minds and (2) experience suffering, elation, hate, and desire in a world that is utterly unaware of itself and lacks all capacity to feel.

It's just a category error to ascribe any kind of mind or morality to the world. If you expect the world to be nice, you will die thinking it hates you -- or else you will develop rationalizations for why you must be "tested" in such horrible ways. But, having lost all expectation that the world regards you at all in any manner, the issue becomes a non-issue and you are free to get on with things, or do whatever it is you do to cope.

Even if hell exists and we're in it, hell itself does not punish. It can be punishment, but cannot punish. Punishment is deliberate -- only by conscious design or purpose. The world is indifferent. It doesn't have a mind to mind us -- much less punish us.

The world is a giant operant conditioning chamber complete with random reinforcement and certain death, and as a species we face extinction or evolution, a fate that is, I'd say, largely out of our control. That much is certain.

Bottom line is: A bit of pessimism might be a call to action, but too much is completely disabling.

"Antonio Gramsci famously called for 'pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will': the one the spur to action, the other the resilience to believe that such action will result in meaningful change even in the face of adversity."

poem

In a picturesque park down a scenic path,
One shoe follows the other
Treading the cobblestone
Passing pairs of feet walking the opposite direction.
All are determined to get where they are going.

Sun pierces through a web of branches;
Moon casts an eerie glow.
Flower to flower a butterfly dances;
Blanket upon blanket falls the snow.

Feet march on
To the café,
To the library,
To the playing fields,
Where whole bodies wait to greet them.

better left to the experts: a rather critical look at myself

It's usually extremely difficult for me to describe my self, but I felt rather lucid just now-

One thing about me: I used to be terribly critical of other people in that I had/have a hard time listening to anybody without an intense questioning of a person's motivations. I never decided to be critical, it was automatic. And let me tell you, I used to find pure motivation (my own made up standard for acceptable motivation) to be virtually nonexistent. ...either that or I used to just project my own impure motivations onto everyone else. At any rate, I was also big into seeking approval from....everyone, so even while I was hugely critical of character I would still try to be universally well-liked. I used to be so worried about what other people thought of me that if I couldn't say something perfect I'd say nothing at all. And so, I was pretty much set up for social disappointment. I was your model "nice-guy." Well, to an extent, I still am. These are terrible habits that were formed in me (no doubt the result of some childhood trauma...just kidding) and, combined with what used to be my basically virginal and prude-ish personality, I tended towards social gawkiness and, sometimes, self-isolation. We can call this one of my "hang-ups."

Well, I grew a bit between middle and high school and a lot between high school and university. But growth hasn't been automatic. For me, this growth is born (with great pain, as is customary of birth) out of conscious every day determinations to mold my self into something I can respect. Nearing who I want to be has been a painfully slow process. I often battle regression. And I'm afraid I will never be satisfied. Maybe I can at least keep dissatisfaction in check. But my hope will continue to be that I will one day feel like I am completely who I want to be and only ever have to work on maintaining that.

My work is before me. My work is my life, and vice-versa.
I am my work.

I am art and artist. Life is creativity with limits.

This theme has been echoing around in my head for awhile. Case in point, something I wrote in January of this year:

for knowing so clearly what i think will raise the quality of my life, i am terrible at getting what i want. felt like i was getting somewhere for a while there, but then my momentum petered out. still going, but slowly. which might as well be not-at-all, 'cause life seems like it's going to be short. i don't generally regret things because i don't generally have any cause to regret them. but if my present were my past, i think i'd regret it right now. yet i feel attached to this situation, to "my life." not sentimentally attached, but tied down. i don't want to be a "product" of my life. i don't want to do the same things over and over and i don't want to just react. i think this is what disillusioned middle-age must be like. wanting other things in life, yet feeling resigned to your current family, job, friends, lifestyle -- things that pull from you your energy to create and leave you feeling tired and reluctant about life.

i've read it in books and even in song lyrics the idea that a person is an artist and a work of art. you are your medium. make of it what you will. when i think about things this way i feel like i get why some people dress differently, absurdly, or wear ridiculous make-up or get tattoos and piercings or walk with character or do those creative things that no one appreciates in the same way that they themselves do. they are artists. and they are performance art.

i don't think everyone is an artist.

At least my preoccupation with my own self-development is consistent. However, I reject the idea that I am running around in circles and that, as the popular saying goes, I have "come full circle." I patently reject the idea.

I may approach this same idea any number of times, but never do I close a circle in my thinking. Each time, my "angle of approach" is different, if only slightly. So my thinking travels in spirals, not circles. And this is important because I do not believe that all this reflection is worthless. I am going somewhere, if slowly. Spiraling upwards.

I am art and artist. Life is creativity with limits.

"A man’s character is his fate."
~Heraclitus

"In the end, we get what we are."

challenge

I want to challenge and not avoid. Avoidance is a sign of weakness and confrontation is a sign of strength. To abstain does not mean to avoid. It can also be a kind of confrontation.

What I am is a large, but finite, range of possibilities. I can strive to be anything within that range. ...

Questions

Am I going to see daily events as obstacles or opportunities? Life as tedious or creative? Am I stunted when things go wrong or do I grow? Do I have choice in any of this or not?

Cost-Benefit Analysis Please!
Should I lose sleep to finish assignments to keep up the grades OR get rest and suffer academically? (Short-term...? Long-term...?)

I am so used to the game and my role in it. If you master your role then you always know what to expect. Why should I be trying so hard to master this role? Am I not brave enough to be just what I am?

"Man no longer dares to appear what he is. What he is is nothing, what he appears is everything for him." (Rousseau)

Role breaking is harder than rule breaking.

Strange Days anyone?

deconstruction

I'm reading about deconstruction in ENGL 401: Methods of Literary Interpretation:

This is how deconstruction works: by showing that what was prior and privileged in the old hierarchy (for instance, between creative writing and literary criticism) can just as easily seem secondary, the deconstructor causes the formerly privileged term (creative writing) to exchange properties with the formerly devalued one (literary criticism). Would we write if there were not critics -- intelligent readers motivated and able to make sense of what is written? Who, then, depends on whom?

Not everyone, however, has so readily seen the attractions of deconstruction. Two eminent critics, M.H. Abrams and Wayne Booth have observed that a deconstructive reading "is plainly and simply parasitical" on what Abrams calls "the obvious or univocal meaning" (Abrams 457-58). In other words, there would be no deconstructors if critics did not already exist who can see and show central and definite meanings in texts. Miller responded in an essay titled "The Critic as Host," in which he not only deconstructed the oppositional hierarchy (host/parasite), but also the two terms themselves, showing that each derives from two definitions meaning nearly opposite things.

From "Deconstruction and The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man"

listening to your parents II

I've been feeling slightly weird about how I criticized my parents for justifying themselves/their advice poorly when I was younger. I just stumbled across a possible counterpoint which has helped me gain some perspective:

But you don't give a kid the entire picture right away. First, you make damn sure he doesn't fall off the cliff. As he or she gets older, you can tell her more about mountain climbing.

Look - there's no such thing as "the entire picture". You could go on forever about the "entire picture". And I think the gun thing is a good example. You don't teach safe gun handling to a toddler. You scare the living shit out of him about even going near one first. Later, you explain how to handle one. He may feel burned that he was first taught to fear them at all costs. If he tells you of this trauma, you slap him in the head and tell him not to be such a wuss.

No, I am not entirely serious. I am burlesquing my point in order to more clearly make it.

I get this. I guess what you say to your kids really depends on what issue you're instructing them and how capable they are of understanding more complicated reasons.

Hey

I feel that there's some profound sadness in this song.

listening to your parents

I seriously think the reason I didn't listen to my parents a lot was because they gave oversimplified justifications for a lot of their decisions and expected me to do what I was told based on the fact that they were my parents.

I like how the command "Listen to your parents." literally means *hear what your parents have to say*, but is universally taken as "Do what your parents say." Maybe it's because we used to think that if you actually listen to what your parents have to say you'll end up doing what they say. I don't know if we think this anymore. It certainly isn't true.

Even if my parents made good decisions, they gave me bogus justifications. And my parents are very good parents.

I think as a parent you know what works and what doesn't, what's good and what's not (or some approximation of it), but you don't necessarily remember why it works or why it's good -- things just become habit. So when it comes to bringing up children, it's convenient for parents to supply simple, easy to remember reasons for their kids to understand and accept or to avoid justification at all with the perennial "You'll understand when you're older./You'll thank me when you're older./Trust me./It's for your own good."

Some of my favorite justifications for things:

Don't Lie. You'll get in twice as much trouble if you do something wrong and lie about it.

Don't steal. We will find out.

Wear nice clothes. They look better./People will like you more.

Keep your mouth closed and lips together when you chew. "Smacking" is rude.

None of these reasons were ever compelling to me on a moral level.
Sorry Mom, Sorry Dad. Much love!

emotional overflow and misdirection

I have this feeling that I've got something really wonderful to say to somebody, but I don't know who and I don't know what.

Back

Well, I'm back home (but you probably already knew that). I actually got back June 29th (started off from Canberra airport on what was June 28 there, then Sydney/jet engine problems/3 hour flight delay/arrival in LA/9 hour layover at LAX/caught the 11PM flight to Marlyand/arrived 7AM on Monday June 29), but I was only home for a few days before heading off to Maine with my mom, dad, and Kate. Now I'm home again.

Australia. I feel, and I'm sure some expect, that I should have some culminating words to say about my experience abroad. At some point or other, I think I will, but I'm not ready to say those words yet.

Australia. What immediately come to mind are memories. I look back at my experiences in Australia with overwhelming positivity. I enjoyed living/studying/playing in Australia, sometimes immensely.

I won't forget

AustraLearn's killer orientation program in Cairns,
scuba diving on the Great Barrier Reef,
ANZAC Day:
(especially the Dawn Service,
freezing cold weather,
and inadequate clothes),
IB!!,
training for IB,
my Div 4 teammates and finishing,
inter-hall field hockey,
watching Bruce basketball,
ANU campus and classes (my introduction to continental philosophy),
Jean-Luc Nancy and The Experience of Freedom,
getting my first HD on an assignment!,
Mooseheads (and the crazy nights that started, or ended, there),
my time spent in Melbourne
(which includes Cirque du Soleil,
Crown Casino,
a real barbecue,
AFL,
but more importantly the top-notch people I spent my time with),
playing soccer with fellow Brucies,
the unofficial weekly soccer sign-up sheet :),
Big Night Out! (Band Night hosted by Bruce!),
learning all sorts of things from my fellow Brucies, like:
the philosophy and practice of NLP;
tips on running, soccer, field hockey, cricket, etc.;
heaps of stuff about nutrition;
the value of a Rolex;
Slagsmålsklubben = popular Swedish "8-bit" pop;
a good (or cheap) bottle of Port can go a long way;
the Dragon Ball series are (secretly) universally enjoyed;
how to say "Come to Fenner!" in a really funny high-pitched voice;
and loads more!
the craziness of ANU semester 1 exam period,
things we said often:
"chin, ciao",
"we are not the (blank) Malaysians",
"are you serious?",
"goodonya!",
"shitonya!",
"tha-ha-ha-hat's right!" (superb!),
"are you a firshyear? or a lashyear?",
"no means no!",
"Americaaaa!",
"H-o-pe!",
"Cha---nge!",
being "Charlie Brown"
as well as Mr. (Bedroom) Philosopher
as well as Mr. just-in-case Paczynski,
whole-foods Bolay,
these-days Hasan,
much of my second-to-last night at Bruce,
and the next day (my last) at Bruce,
Tim Horton's and laughing fits,
that there were some really eye-opening political-
and philosophical discussions,
a great time in Sydney,
my travel buddy from Chicago,
and most especially I will not forget a truly awesome and creative bunch of people with whom I had an uber-great time. Many of you made big impressions on me. Most of all I am glad that I met each and every one of you. For those of you I was able to get to know well, I feel lucky. The best to all of you.

So this is my official "I'm back from Australia and here's a little bit of what Australia was like for me."

I kept thinking, while I was at ANU, that my time in Australia would probably seem like a dream to me when I got back to the States. This is because back home there is no one who shares any common experience with me of Australia, and all I have is memory (oh, and Facebook) to prove what happened to myself. Kind of a weird thought, yeah, but not that weird. Well, now that I'm back I do feel somewhat alienated from "my life" (which isn't so unusual for me). But in this case I am split between feeling, on the one hand, like Australia was an episode of my life that never happened, that I'm picking my real life back up after escaping for a brief while into some weird movie, and, on the other hand, like I am somehow altered, and that the present follows naturally from my time in Australia.

Facebook definitely helps in providing the illusion of continuity. I can look at my pictures and keep in contact with friends, but, in an important way, I am also cut-off from things that happened and friends I had (have) in Australia. I am amazed at how much impact physical closeness can have on psychological closeness. I feel very far away from Australia now, in both senses. Maybe I need to think of the world more as my neighborhood.

In any case, I believe that I am not yet done interpreting my Australian experiences. I can already see how I have changed in 5 months, and, in time, I think I will discover that studying in Australia has impacted me in no small way.

I remember stumbling across an intriguing website on "dialectics" while writing my final paper for Adv Continental Philosophy. (http://home.igc.org/~venceremos/whatheck.htm)

So, if dialectics is "a tool to understand the way things are and the way things change," and, if I truly have changed, then I'm not really "back," I'm somewhere new. To say something is back is to say that it has returned, i.e. "come full circle." But change moves in spirals, not circles. Even for cyclical processes (day/night, breathing in/breathing out, one opposite/then another), "dialectics argues that these cycles do not come back exactly to where they started; they don't make a perfect circle. Instead, change is evolutionary, moving in a spiral." I've spiraled, not circled.

So I'm here but I'm not back. Got it?

paths

A: Trust me; this is the path to salvation.

B: It's not my path - not if you're leading the way.

tonight

Sick of politics, for now. Feeling inspired.

Obama and National Security

Even though Obama just spoke this past Thursday in Cairo about relations with people of the Middle East, what I have to say here pertains mostly to Obama's previous speech about U.S. National Security and is a response to the following article from the Washington Times:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jun/06/obama-derangement-syndrome/

From the article: What might have been a serious debate over interrogation techniques has been mishandled. Instead of trying to balance the need for intelligence on terrorist operations with the desire to respect civil liberties even in the most extreme cases, an attempt has been made to criminalize past policy decisions and demonize those who made them.

This is the rhetoric of Dick Cheney – in fact, what is said here closely mirrors Cheney’s May 22, 2009 response to Obama’s National Security speech of the same day. Obama has, in my opinion, rightfully taken a firm stance against water-boarding and other interrogation techniques that are, without doubt, forms of torture. Cheney apparently felt that it was important to point out that water-boarding was only ever used on a small number of prisoners at Guantanamo. But if water-boarding is torture (and I assume you oppose the use of torture), then the number of instances of U.S. government application of water-boarding becomes irrelevant; the torture of human beings, in all its forms, wherever it is used, and whoever uses it, is wrong. Obama was right to criticize former policy. We must recognize past mistakes. Obama demonized no one. To see Obama’s condemnation of torture as a demonization of past policy makers is to expose one’s own unwillingness to admit to past mistakes. This kind of outlook seems like nothing more than defensive quibbling to me. As a general rule, however difficult it is for each of us to accept our own errors, it is the only way we will learn to do better.

From the article: Meanwhile, al Qaeda operatives now sleep more soundly, secure in the knowledge that, if captured, the worst that will happen is that some CIA agent of Satan will attempt to establish a "trusting" relationship with them.

This is more borrowed rhetoric. Cheney said the exact same thing in his speech. The fact that the U.S. government makes an official pronouncement against the use of torture is not likely to embolden Radical Islam. Those who do violence in the name of Radical Islam are already unafraid of the consequences of their actions because they are emotionally charged and believe that their actions are justified. And it only fuels their hatred, strengthens their convictions and, in their eyes, further justifies their violence if the U.S. uses or supports the use of torture. There is a common but mistaken response to this point that goes: “If one criticizes the U.S. in any way regarding terrorism, then one is blaming the U.S. for the terrorist atrocities committed against the U.S.” No. Violent attacks on innocent people are wrong. The wrongs done by the U.S. government under no circumstances justify such attacks, but our wrongs are still wrong, and we ought to learn from and correct our own mistakes.

From the article: Finally, it is becoming apparent that Mr. Obama's diplomatic ‘surge’ to stop the nuclear weapons and missile development programs of Iran and North Korea is proving unproductive. Still, Mr. Obama is not yet pressing Congress to give him the tools he would need to squeeze Iran's rulers by cutting off their gasoline supplies - the most promising of possible economic sanctions.

Maybe, and I am skeptical about this one in light of the U.S. government’s recent history, just maybe the U.S. will step back from or even reverse its practice of using military force and coercion to stop nuclear weapon proliferation. The U.S. ought to lead by example, not by force and coercion. Hopefully Obama was thinking along similar lines when he quoted Thomas Jefferson in his speech in Cairo: "I hope that our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us that the less we use our power the greater it will be."

Concert!

I can't contain my excitement in anticipation of U2 and MUSE together in concert this September.

Observe:


Epic:

people and places

t: what do you like best about Australia and being abroad? tell me, I need to day dream about far away places.

p: what I like best about Australia isn't anything exotic. it's the people. auzzies as well as internationals. getting past the exterior and pushing the limits of casual conversation. really getting to know people. you can go many places in people.

I reckon

that things are more complicated than you [can] think. It's hard to accept uncertainty, and in the course of daily life I suppose we have to act certain about some things. But I think we often run into problems thinking things to be so clear-cut. We like to simplify. We have to simplify. It's evolutionarily advantageous for our survival (like a local optimum). It's efficient. Conserves energy. Human understanding has its limits, so we have to bend the world to fit within the boundaries of our understanding. That's the only way it all makes sense. I'm suspicious when things make too much sense. Something's bent.

None of this is remotely practical, but I'm through with practicality. If I were a machine, I'd be doing economics instead of philosophy.

Everything I know or think I know is used to configure a framework for "seeing" the world. If I take the things I know to be less clear-cut, more uncertain, less stable, I get a more "open" view of the world (as contrasted with the popular phrase "narrow-minded"). The world opens up, if you like. It's easier to slide my knowledge around and reconfigure new and more sophisticated frameworks for thinking and perceiving the world. I don't know what truth we can aspire to. We have to realize that we can't help but bend things to make sense. Human understanding covers a fairly wide range (to what do I compare it to?), but a finite range none the less. All we have are interpretations. Interpretations are never "wrong." It's not wrong that we bend things, and I don't see it as a condition to be overcome. That I see it, however, is important.

Things that do make "perfect" sense to us most likely only do so because they are parts of a system, a worldview, that we invented -- that we've bent into shape because we find it meaningful. Myths. Sometimes myths we live by.

So I'm building up a tolerance for uncertainty. You may not be thick if you don't understand the world; you may not be thick if it doesn't make sense. Don't always let yourself bend it, whatever it is you're trying to comprehend. Sometimes allow things to seem unstable.

Your brain may fall out; I don't know. I think it'll be okay if you're open-minded but pay attention to your feelings.

I really like when something prompts a radical alteration in my perspective of things. My experience from then on is deepened and more attuned. Each time I am repeatedly aware of many more uncertainties as well. My worldview has to be ever reconfigured to make meaning of particular uncertainties, and each time inevitably reconfigured in such a way that a different set of uncertainties crop up (sometimes "tainting" ideas and views which used to stand firm and unchallenged).

That's what I reckon.

INWARD BOUND IS A DANGEROUS ACTIVITY

...is the sub-heading on the Indemnity Form. Further:

As a participant of Inward Bound I understand I will be exposed to SIGNIFICANT RISKS OF PERSONAL INJURY, and possibly, death.

Some risks include:

• unmarked hazards (eg. cliffs, rivers, creeks, fences, low-lying trees)
• rugged terrain and unpredictable conditions
• bad weather
• darkness and poor light
• plants and animals
• contaminated water
• dehydration
• getting lost
• contact with vehicles on roads
• heat temperature exposure
  
• cold temperature exposure (eg. possible risk of hypothermia)
• fatigue and personal bodily injuries due to long-term exercise
• disparity in experience or condition of participants
• disparity in maturity or competitiveness of participants

I release the ANU Interhall Sports Club Incorporated, its members, employees, volunteers and agents from any liability for any negligence.

I have read this indemnity form, understand its contents and agree that its terms and conditions bind me and my heirs and successors.

--I take it seriously but, at the same time, it's a bit humorous.

it's official

...I've been placed in the fourth of 7 divisions, where the lower one's division the more kilometers one will race. I'm set to run somewhere between 50 - 60 km (31-37 miles) with my three teammates, one of whom is our navigator and another our assistant nav. Each residence hall will send a team to compete in each division. And the hall whose teams accumulate the most points across divisions will essentially "win" IB. We'll be blindfolded, transported, and dropped-off on April 3rd at around 10 or 11PM somewhere 50 kilometers from campus (on a mountain or in the bush) and will navigate back to campus with our head torches, maps, compasses, and other supplies. Our packs will weigh about 8 kilograms (18 Llbs) each. We won't reach campus and the finish line until sometime the next morning, April 4. This will be the most I will have ever put my body through.

weird

on making the most of my experience

I had been feeling this great pressure to do a lot of traveling to really take advantage of my experience in Australia. I'm realizing now that I don't need to see it all to make this experience great.

So I think that I will not worry about traveling to as many places as possible while I'm at ANU (which is totally an awesome university for an international student to study at!). I hope to hit Sydney and Melbourne and I will not be unhappy if I don't have the time or money to travel to other major locations.

The way I see it, I'm getting so much out of just being here, meeting new people, and learning new things in a new setting. I couldn't take full advantage of all the opportunities here at ANU even if I dropped all my classes. I'm getting involved and it's really great. With all that's going on, I'm only worried about focusing on my classes when there are so many other worthwhile ways to spend my time.

I committed to doing the IB run today. We went out shopping this morning for gear and supplies and I got a running/travel hiking backpack, a water bladder, thermal under-wear, and a head torch -- all required for the competition (which is sometime around April 3 or 4th). I'm seriously excited about this. Everyone is, it's contagious.

I've also been very keen about finding time to practice field hockey. About a week ago I would not have been at all interested in playing field hockey because I still had it in my head that it was a girl's sport (as for the most part it is where I live in the U.S.). But it's a very intense game, and parallels well to soccer, actually.

Weekly PhilSoc (ANU Philosophy Society) talks/lectures/debates are part of my schedule as well. I listened to a heated argument about human rights at the last meeting I attended. The two arguing were doing so quite vigorously, if that helps paint the scene. I almost wanted to chip in at one point, but then I wasn't sure if what I was going to say was on mark, and I certainly did not want to step into such a vehement exchange without being sure.

I'm having a lot of trouble making sense of my text for Adv Continental Phil, The Experience of Freedom by Jean-Luc Nancy, partly, I think, because of the syle of the writing and partly because the ideas presented are completely foreign to me and I'm not yet in the habit of thinking from a "continental" (for lack of a better phrase) perspective. My Adv Analytic Phil text is closer to the philosophy I've done at UMBC, but still difficult.

I don't really know how to close this entry, but I also don't have anything more to say right now.

general remarks on various topics

>Topic: Truth and Critical Thinking

Guaranteeing truth is very difficult, if at all possible. Our physical and conceptual "tools" for discovering truths about the world are poor (they MUST be poor because we have no way of confirming anything we “know” to be absolutely true, and can usually assume that what we know about the world is NOT absolutely true), and human sensation and perception are not at all well-suited for recognizing "truth." But, if you are a fan of science, empiricism, and the like, there is hope that through these and similar methods we can know what about the world is likely to be as well as what is not likely to be. Additionally, there are scientific standards that, if you take them to be competent standards, can help us to decide what things we have good/sufficient reason to believe and what things we do not have reason to believe (regardless of one’s preconceptions). This is one way of seeking knowledge. There are other ways of seeking knowledge, but most aren’t as widely accepted as scientific investigation.

You don’t want to be “blown this way and that by the wind.” I think that’s smart, and I’m the same way. I take a lot for granted, and I’m probably not even aware of most of it. I hope that my experiences and course of study have trained me to think more critically, especially when making a decision or solving a problem (though I did not necessarily choose to study philosophy for this "benefit").

I also take a lot of things to be true that I have done no work whatsoever towards confirming that they are actually true. It just doesn’t seem possible / or practical to worry about whether a man named Abraham Lincoln really did exist, serve as 16th president of the U.S., and succumb to assassination on April 15, 1865. Such worrying would have to consume all of my waking life if I became skeptical of everything I “knew.” It would be a hellish preoccupation.

I am more likely to turn a critical eye to knowledge that concerns my sense of “right” and “wrong,” or topics and questions that are already hotly contested, in the first case because ethical matters are more gripping than ordinary matters and in the latter because controversy seems to be reason enough to become critical.

>New Topic: The tension between Evolution and Irreducible Complexity

I don’t think the complexity of the human organism as a product of evolution is nearly as miraculous as the fact that there is anything at all instead of nothing (which by-the-way is one of the very few indubitable truths we know about the world). (Am I sounding like a twip yet?)

I think that as human beings we may just be too full of ourselves to believe that we evolved from insignificantly simple microscopic organisms via a series of (in our opinion) small changes over a (in our opinion) long period of time. Why is this so miraculous? We are here. Rocks are here. We are just doing what we do. What of it?

I suppose I’m glad I exist, but, as far as I know, I did not have any desire to be conceived or exist at all – I simply was and do. Why do we prefer to think that we are any more miraculous than rocks? After all, a rock, to exist as it does today, probably came about through a process just as precise and remarkable as the supposed evolution of species. Which is more remarkable? Does it matter?

A thing’s remarkable-ness doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the explanation underlying its existence, probably because thinking something “remarkable” is a subjective judgment, while descriptive explanations consist of facts which are either true or false.

So if I put aside my wonder at my own existence or the existence of my species, then I can properly consider whether or not the theory of evolution works or does not work.

From the 2 minutes of research I just conducted…the notion of “irreducible complexity” seems, at best, highly controversial (among the general public) and (as regarded by “the scientific community”) probably not a valid challenge to evolutionary theory.

However, even if irreducible complexity happened to gain widespread support (as a cripple for the theory of evolution), I do not think it would tempt me to “put God in the gap.” That seems to be arguing from ignorance. Should evolution come to be seen as improbable because of disconfirmatory evidence, that would not make the idea of divine intervention (as it pertains to the existence of different forms of life) more possible.

>New Topic: Linguistic Confusions

The world we live in is not “post-modern,” and the world during the 18th and 19th centuries was never “modern,” though we might say so in casual conversation. These are only names that relate specifically to unique periods of human enterprise and their products. We tend to (over)use them a lot and they have become “buzzwords” by our constant bending and blurring of their original uses. See here.

But I'm going to have to undermine myself. Maybe the world we live in today IS a product of human enterprise. Do we live in a postmodern world? What does that mean?

I feel like all I'm doing is creating linguistic confusions. Wittgenstein thought (as have many others) that philosophy isn't really about answering the "big questions" or making genuine discoveries (those are for science), but that philosophy is "the untangling of linguistic confusions achieved by examining our words as they are ordinarily used, and contrasting that use with how the words are misused in philosophical theories and explanations" (Soames, The Age of Meaning).

"The results of philosophy are the uncovering of one or another piece of plain nonsense and of bumps that the understanding has got by running its head up against the limits of language. These bumps make us see the value of the discovery." (Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations)

Here's an unrelated Wittgenstein quotation that I want to remember:
"Uttering a word is like striking a note on the keyboard of the imagination." (Philosophical Investigations)

first day of classes tomorrow

Tentative course list:

PHIL2074 - Modern Theories of Knowledge
PHIL2082 - Sex and Death: Philosophy of Biology
ENGL2056 - Renaissance and England
PHIL3071 - Adv Continental Philosophy

I may be dropping Mod Theories of Knowledge (PHIL2074) for the course Adv Analytic Philosophy (PHIL3072) since I've gotten permission to take it. I should be up to my ears in reading regardless.

Oh right, and the standard undergraduate degree takes 3 years to complete in Australia -- then some go on to a 4th year for Honors but you have to maintain I think at least a Distinction level ("D") across all of your classes to be an Honors student. If you're in your first year at university, you're a "first year," and likewise for second, third, fourth year, etc. I kept calling people sophomores and juniors and I was getting funny looks until someone kind of mentioned "I've always thought it was cool that you guys have a name for each year." Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, and Senior were so foreign to most people that they didn't even know the order. I kept getting "so 'junior' -- that's like your second year?" or "'sophomore' isn't that your first year?" It was amusing to me to have to constantly explain that.

The university grading system is different, too. At the ANU they have High Distinction (HD) which is 80-100%, Distinction (D) 70-79%, Credit (C) 60-69%, Pass (P) 50-59%, and Fail (F) below 50%. I've heard different things about how difficult the grading system is. Someone told me that it's pretty tough to get all High Distinctions and that it can even be difficult to get a Distinction in a class. I guess that's as it should be.

I practiced cricket for the first time today. I can pitch the ball pretty well, but I still haven't gotten the hang of batting, nor gotten used to the idea that you don't (can't) strike out in cricket.

They do a lot of competitive inter/intra-college (college = residence hall) sport here. There's a huge running event called "Inward Bound," or usually just "IB," where participants get blindfolded and taken out to some unrecognizeable destination at 9 in the evening (so it's dark) at which point they then take off their blindfolds and compete in groups of 4 to make it back to campus before all the other groups. This event comes in a few different levels or distances. There's a 20K, 100K (!), and a few intermediate distances. But the distances listed are decieving because you also have to "find" your way back and are likely to run more kilometers than are listed. Right now I'm training for the 20K -- we'll see...

I'm going to give Rugby and Australian rules football a go as well. I'll let you know how that goes.

So there was an Eastern Bloc Bar Night in the Buttery the other evening, then we had a huge campus wide toga party two nights ago (complete with an eating-of-strange-things competition, a cardboard tube javelin throw event, and interpretive dancing), there's a masquerade ball tonight, and more to come. All the events are probably going to slow down a bit since classes start tomorrow, but other things like sports are going to be picking up.

Huge Nine Inch Nails concert in Sydney tonight. Didn't get tickets in time and would have had to miss classes tomorrow. I'm still planning on going to a few concerts while I'm here, though. Definitely want to visit Sydney and Melbourne, and I'm starting to think it would be pretty easy to catch a cheap (so I'm told) ferry to Tasmania while I'm in Melbourne. I'm still working out dates and times. It's going to be good though. That's basically my feeling right now.

Life at the ANU and in Australia

~You can see students playing rugby and Australian rules football all the time throughout campus.
~There’s a licensed student-run bar in my residence hall.
~Single rooms are surprisingly spacious!
~Students wear gowns fairly frequently for special occasions (I’ll get my own soon).
~Internet is a pay as you go service. We pay a rate of $1 per 100 megabytes of information. This means that streaming/downloading music and video make internet use very expensive. For instance, I’m going to avoid using youtube if I can help it.
~Electronics seem to be cheaper here than in the U.S., but other conventional things are more expensive.
~Most stores, restaurants, and shopping centers close around 4 or 5PM. I was walking around Canberra’s central mall/shopping center around 5PM and all the shops and dept. stores were closed.

the expectations of others

a lot of the time I feel this great pull to care about the same things that other people care about. other people seem to expect it and want it from me. i was pretty unhappy for a while because i didn't want to fake anything and yet i felt compelled to meet the expectations of others. now i'm more and more accepting the consequences (whatever those may be) of being more genuinely *me*. a lot of times this has the affect of making me feel at odds with other people in general, but now i have a greater appreciation for people who are engaged in this struggle to be genuinely themselves.

in the process of redefining my values, it has been most difficult to figure out how i want to live. for a long time the only options i thought i had were the options people told me i had -- and they seemed abundant enough when i was younger. but now i reject the idea that other people have any say in what *my* options are. now i'm searching for a way to retain some kind of integrity of the self and at the same time afford the costs of society.

begin Australia

So this is my sixth day in Australia, third day in Canberra at the ANU. It has been 6 flights, 30hrs in the air, and many more hours in airports getting here. I spent my first 3 days in Cairns ("Cans") at AustraLearn's "program orientation."

Cairns was a great time. About 30 of us AustraLearn students shacked up in a hostel called Serpents. This was the *dodgiest-place-ever.* I roomed with seven other guys (four of them frat brothers from a Connecticut university) in this rectangular space with bunk beds. Our room was basically wrank, the carpet was stained all over from god knows what, and the communal bathroom down the hall was a sauna in itself because if there was any ventilation, it wasn't working. There's a hostel for you. Right, and it was so humid in Cairns that whatever swimsuits or towels we used never fully dried. The climate in that part of Australia (Queensland) is best explained by the term "wet tropics" (as opposed to dry tropics) because it's tropical (rainforesty is the official term, I think) and super wet. So lots of rain and humidity is pretty standard there. It was also very sunny and hot. Something like 30+ degrees Celsius every day, which is like upwards of 86 degrees Fahrenheit. Also, Cairns had been and still is on alert for dengue fever which is a tropical disease carried by mosquitoes and your friends. You get aches, fever, weakness, and sometimes a rash. It really sucks.

But like I said, Cairns was actually a great time.

Day 1 (on arrival in Cairns):
~At the airport we met up as a group and with our 4 AustraLearn coordinator dudes/dudettes, who were all pretty cool. The AustraLearn reps were all fairly young. Two were Americans who had been living in Australia/NZ for a while and two were native Aussies. They were in truth pretty cool people and ridiculously fun guides. After traveling on planes for more than a day without showering, we were all pretty grimy, so the guys in my room and I dropped our stuff and went straight to the hostel pool. Then we played volleyball a bit and finally took showers. Later that evening I went to the hostel pub with some new friends, had a few drinks, went up to bed around 10-ish, opened up a book to read, and promptly fell asleep.

Day 2 (Cairns):
~This was RainForeStation day. We went on a bus up a mountain that had undergone a rock/mudslide earlier that morning. On the way up this thing we were looking out the bus windows and saw a car that had fallen off the edge of the mountain road and down onto the side of the mountain in the bushes. Good stuff. Anyhow, when we got to the Rainforestation Nature Park we learned about the rainforest there, held snakes, koalas, learned about cane toads (Australia's national pest), and hung out with kangaroos whom we were able to feed, pet, and just chill around with. Kangaroos seem like the furry, mellow, marsupial versions of velocirators. At the park we also watched an indigenous Australian dance, threw boomerangs, played the didge, and had a good time.
~then volleyball and swimming back at the hostel
~Later that night... most of us when to this pub/restaurant and we all sat at these long rectangular tables and drank and ate and yelled back and forth just to talk to each other. Well, it was a good time.

Day 3 (Cairns):
~Scuba diving and snorkeling out in the Great Barrier Reef. Scuba diving was amazing. I'd say it's something you should try before you die.
~found out that the father of one of the 4 fraternity students from Connecticut was in the mafia. That bit of information helped me put in perspective the gold chain he wore, why the other frat guys constantly surrounded him like groupies, and his indifference to the nice crack in the screen of his new apple laptop which fell from the top of a bunk bed.
~In the evening the AustraLearn reps did a final information session for us about Australia and dispersing to our unis, which included an orientation wrap-up complete with pictures and memories from our 3 days in Cairns. Being in a completely different part of the world for the first time for even just 3 days is enough time for you to form an incredible number of new memories and a huge impression of the place. Really, our 3 days in Cairns for the AustraLearn orientation was almost in miniature a smaller but similar arc to what will be my entire time here. I arrived, met 30 other students who were going to various other universities in Brisbane, Perth, Canberra, etc., learned a lot about Australia and had a lot of experiences with other students, then exchanged goodbyes and flew off. I had only just met the other AustraLearn students a couple of days before and I was sorta sad that we were all splitting up already. We all shared what was for most of us our first intense experiences in Australia. So when I left Cairns (with 3 other ANU students) to fly to Canberra, I was sort of wishing we had had more time. I can only imagine what it will be like to leave Canberra to fly back home in 5 or so months.

Note: AustraLearn gets my approval. The reps were wicked nice, knowledgeable, and helpful. Made for a great first 3 days in Australia.

Day 4 (CANBERRA):
~Arrived in Canberra at the ANU after a couple of flights and a bus ride. Explored the city a bit. Met heaps of new people (veteran ANU students as well as newbies and internationals like me).
/day 4

This is what I have been telling everyone about my first impressions of Canberra -- Canberra reminds me a lot of Wachington D.C. (which isn't surprising, I'll explain in a second) and New Mexico. Imagine Washington D.C. in the middle of New Mexico surrounded by bush and mountains and nothing else for miles. That's what Canberra's like. ANU is located on the outskirts of the city, and within 15 minutes you can walk to a large mall and shopping centre (one which rivals some of the big malls back in the U.S.). Pubs, restaurants, and grocery stores are pretty abundant too.

Canberra sits inland between Sydney and Melbourne (two of Australia's most happening cities) on the east coast of Australia. For the longest time, before Canberra existed, both Sydney and Melbourne fought it out to be Australia's capital city. Soooo...they planned out and built a third city in between the two and called it Canberra. Canberra was in fact modeled after the U.S. capital D.C. So it's a bit odd when I walk through the city that it reminds of being back in D.C. Except Canberra seems to be on the whole a lot cleaner and less confusing to wander around in. More on the city when I've done more exploring.

So there are major fires tearing apart Australia's southern territory Victoria. In fact, I met a 5th year ANU law student from Victoria yesterday and he was asking me if I knew where Victoria was, and I was like "of course, that's where the fires are" and I guess he wasn't prepared for me to bring that up because he grew quiet for a few seconds and explained that just thinking about it made him feel pretty emotional. The point is, the fires are a huge deal here. I opened a national newspaper the other day and stories about people who had died in the fire or whose houses and belongings had been destroyed filled every page. At least a few of the fires are known to have been arson. It's pretty crazy.

Also, really quickly let me just tell you how weird the idea of unisex communal bathrooms/showers in the dorm seemed to me at first. My first thought: "really!?" But after a few days of bumping into girls pretty regularly in the restroom or showers, well, it's pretty standard and not all that odd now. The bathrooms in my dorm are the only ones I know of to be unisex here. All other restrooms around campus and in the city have been "men" or "women." I think it would be a good debate about whether restrooms and showers should or should not be unisex.

a thought

the ubermensch -- man as art and artist -- the artist as ultimately (essentially?) alone in his (her) pushing through boundaries

what an awesome paper topic this would be.
or maybe it's the force behind a future novel in the same way that objectivism was for the fountainhead and atlas shrugged.

fateproject.org

"The moment we try to apply our will to make ours something that is not ours, we are lying, stealing, failing the truth, failing diligence, and serving hubris."

"As Heraclitus tells us, 'A man’s character is his fate.'"

"In the end, we get what we are."

"There’s a great story about the philosopher William James (some say Bertrand Russell), who once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the Earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits the center of a vast body of stars called our galaxy. At the end of the lecture, a diminutive old woman at the back of the room got up and said: 'Sir, what you have told us is rubbish. The world is really flat and supported on the back of a giant turtle.' James grinned knowingly, then replied, 'And on what is the tortoise standing, madam?' 'You’re a very clever, young man, very clever,' said the old lady. 'But your question is no good. It’s turtles all the way down!'"

"Look death in the face with joyful hope, and consider this a lasting truth: the righteous man has nothing to fear, neither in life, nor in death, and the gods will not forsake him." (Socrates)

---------------------------------
W. Somerset Maugham's, The Appointment in Samarra (1933), a modern recounting of an ancient tale:

There was a merchant in Bagdad who sent his servant to market to buy provisions and in a little while the servant came back, white and trembling, and said, "Master, just now when I was in the marketplace I was jostled by a woman in the crowd and when I turned I saw it was Death that jostled me. She looked at me and made a threatening gesture. Now, lend me your horse, and I will ride away from this city and avoid my fate. I will go to Samarra and there Death will not find me." The merchant lent him his horse, and the servant mounted it, and he dug his spurs in its flanks and as fast as the horse could gallop he went. Then the merchant went down to the marketplace and he saw Death standing in the crowd and he said, "Why did you make a threating gesture to my servant when you saw him this morning?" "That was not a threatening gesture, said Death, "it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Bagdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra."
---------------------------------

"The one choice we have in any situation—and this choice determines whether the outcome is favorable or not—is self-knowledge and humility or presumption and hubris."

"According to fate theory, however, free will and fate—and this means fate as a deterministic principle—are not mutually exclusive. The seeming contradiction between them is resolved when we recognize that our free will is itself the deciding factor in determining our fate, though only generally."

----------------------------------
fate first-aid:

1. Is there an important truth I haven't been willing to tell?
2. Did I tell an untruth that hasn't been put right?
3. Is there something I need to say to someone else?
4. Is there something I haven't been willing to hear from someone else?
5. Have I been living in fear of the worst?
6. Have I been pretending to know more than I really know?
7. Is there something I should have done that I've left undone?
8. Having done all I can do, have I been unwilling to let go of the outcome?
9. Have I been waiting for someone or something else to rescue me?
10. Have I been hiding who I really am?

A "yes" answer to any of the above questions indicates hubris and a need for mid-course correction. If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, take immediate steps to apply the principles of practice so that the truthful answer becomes "no," which will return you to friendly terms with fate. You should experience immediate relief. Further, the situation then should improve without your having to do anything else about it.
-------------------------

relief, catharsis, vitality

...interlude...

for knowing so clearly what i think will raise the quality of my life, i am terrible at getting what i want. felt like i was getting somewhere for a while there, but then my momentum petered out. still going, but slowly. which might as well be not-at-all, 'cause life seems like it's going to be short. i don't generally regret things because i don't generally have any cause to regret them. but if my present were my past, i think i'd regret it right now. yet i feel attached to this situation, to "my life." not sentimentally attached, but tied down. i don't want to be a "product" of my life. i don't want to do the same things over and over and i don't want to just react. i think this is what disillusioned middle-age must be like. wanting other things in life, yet feeling resigned to your current family, job, friends, lifestyle -- things that pull from you your energy to create and leave you feeling tired and reluctant about life.

i've read it in writing and even in song lyrics the idea that a person is an artist and a work of art. you are your medium. make of it what you will. when i think about things this way i feel like i get why some people dress differently, absurdly, or wear ridiculous make-up or get tattoos and piercings or walk with character or do those creative things that no one appreciates in the same way that they themselves do. they are artists. and they are performance art. i don't think everyone is an artist.

someone recently told me about a theory of aesthetics which claims that art is necessarily "framed," if not by the dimensions of a page or a gilded rectangle, then by the dimensions of human perception.

when the sun descends beyond the horizon in a captivating sunset, it's the ephemeral nature of the moment that makes it art for many people. art can be framed in space or, as in this case, time. sometimes a piece's spatial or temporal framing has everything to do with everything. the dimensions of the frame don't have to be rigid and are often, in fact, blurred or faded or uncertain. art prevails nonetheless. haha.

forget about it

I'm boycotting dwelling.

2 0 0 8

>>Things that were significant to me in 2008:

Some things are significant because they remind me of other things.

Things I did

started a blog
CTY
lost my voice as a teacher
learned how to play songs on the piano
hiking / rafting
ice skating
energy drinks
kissed, hugged, and danced with a dolphin in the Bahamas
new years in WVA

Ideas

Modernism
Existentialism
civilized machine / people as cogs, "fitting in," and measured by the social function they serve
Nihilism
psychoanalysis
social acceptance / seeking to please
Evolution
teleology/deontology
deconstruction
Continental /Analytic Philosophy
my identity
fear and motivation
aggression

Books

Watchmen - Alan Moore
Emotional Intelligence - Daniel Goleman
Irrational Man - William Barrett
What is an Emotion? - William James

Writers / People

Henry James
William Carlos Williams
Friedrich Nietzsche
Marilyn Manson

Film and Television

Juno
Cloverfield
Lost in Translation
Mad Men
The Sopranos
The Bucket List

Games

Hearts
Rock Band

Music

Bands
Tryad
Panic! at the Disco
Nine Inch Nails
Stabbing Westward
Avril Lavigne
Poe
Marilyn Manson
Depeche Mode

Songs
You Oughta Know - Alanis Morissette
Hello* - Poe
The Perfect Drug - Nine Inch Nails
Enjoy the Silence (and the reinterpretation) - Depeche Mode
Little Bird - Annie Lennox
The Beginning is the End is the Beginning** - Smashing Pumpkins
The Take Over, The Breaks Over - Fall Out Boy
Like New*** - Deerhunter
Reflection - Tool
Xerces - Deftones
Coma White - Marilyn Manson
Great Big White World - Marilyn Manson
Running Wild**** (Extended Instrumental) - Tindersticks
Beauty Never Fades - Junkie XL feat. Saffron
Succexy - Metric
Dead Disco - Metric
Another Way to Die***** - Jack White & Alicia Keys

*from the end credits of Stir of Echoes
**from the 2008 preview trailer to the 2009 movie Watchmen
***from a compilation album promoting the NIN "Lights in the Sky Tour" and supporting bands
****from the credits of the penultimate episode of The Sopranos, "Blue Comet"
[only place I have ever been able to find it: http://hypem.com/track/315949]
*****from the title sequence to Quantum of Solace