While On A Walk

I heard that Nietzsche said that most (good) philosophy is done while one is walking. That is to say, that getting out into the world does more to stir one's mind than does sitting in a university, speaking to other people who do no more than echo exactly what you already think or say. I think that's true. Sometimes, however, going out for a walk only results in experiences that only confirm why so many people out there, myself unexcluded, claim that they hate humanity. I thought that I would try, for god knows how many umpteeth time, to rid myself of the practice of seeing things so negatively. I thought that I would try to see the bright side of life, as suggested by the Monty Python song. I think that there must be some higher force at work somewhere in the galaxy, because every time I attempt to see the worthiness of humanity as a whole, my hopes are dashed and I only end up confirming that people, as the Slipknot song says, equals shit. Why the bad attitude today? To get back to Nietzsche, I was out for a walk. Nothing monumental, just a short jot before it really got (gets?) hot outside. You see, here in SoCal, there is no such thing as a gradual climb in the temperature. It's cool one day, and 101 out the next. Go figure. But anyway, I was out for a walk. Which kond of started off nice because I hadn't literallly been out of the house all week. I was thinking of what I had read the night before (which would be last night) in Kurt Vonnegut's book, Man Without A Country. He said that He likes talking to people. I don't. But I, having newly committed myself to sunnying up my personality, decided that I would at least try to enjoy the company of others. So I was walking. Well, I wasn't enjoying anyone else's company at that time, since I was walking alone. But that's kind of besides the point. Now, I know that there are people who, for reasons that only they and their god know, decide that they should shout out things to people walking on the sidewalk or along the road. I've personally never understood this phenomenon. Well, that's precisely what hapened while I was walking. Usually it's something incoherent. It's like the person decided to shout something, but then decides to back down -- but only after the words have already left his mouth. By the way, it's almost always a he who does it. Usually, the words they say aren't so clear. But his time, it was a loud and clear "fuck you!". This really left me confused. Not to mention that it broke my chain of thought. Now, really. It's not that the words themselves offended me. They didn't. I've said that particular phrase to other people on more occasions than I care to remind myself that I have. But, usually, at least in the case that I've used that phrase, the person to whom the comment was directed deserved to have it said to them. I was just walking. And when I looked to see who said it, the guy seemed pretty angry, too. He looked really pissed off. How can I explain that? I thought, for a moment, that I might have done something to offend the guy. I thought about what I was wearing -- just a pair of blue jeans and a black t-shirt. That usually doesn't get people that worked up. I was wearing a backpack, but there's nothing on that that I think would upset anyone. I took all of my anti-Bush patches off after the election. Besides, I don't think by the looks of this guy that he would have noticed if they were still there. For a few moments, I really thought about why that guy would have said, no, shouted it. Seeing that I've been programmed to think that there is a philosophical angle to be had in everything, I actually attempted to flip through the (limited) list of philosophers in my head to see if any of them ever addressed why people feel the need to shout things to people who aren't doing anything to them. I couldn't think of any. The more I thought about it, the more I thought that there must be some explanation for why this is. There is, but I guess that, in the long run, the answer is psychological rather than philosophical. There is some not-so-deep seeded need in some people to yell at people -- the more shocking the statement the better. And since you're in a car, and your intended shockee is walking, you're long gone before the person ever gets his bearings straight enough for a proper response, whatever that would be. (What would be the proper response? An "ok, thanks buddy" or a "well, good day to you, too"?) I'm guessing that, on this subject at least, philosophers may be mum on exactly why this is so, that is, why people feel compelled to shout things at people walking down the street. (Which would mean that at last there is something that philosophers don't have an opinion about!) So, I guess my queries on the subject are better directed to the headshrinker than to the guy in the front of the class boring his class to death with examples of Gettier problems. I don't see how anyone would find a way to worm the need to shout "fuck you!" to passersby into some epistemic debate or metaphysical claim about the existence of monads. But I'm certain that some philosopher has some opinion about why people do. They can't leave any subject untarnished by their (expert) thoughts about everything. Whatever.

Conversation Enders # 15: How To Appear Smart While Convincing Others How Stupid You Really Are Or, A Short Treatise On Pretentiousness and Choplogic

When I was in elementary school (5th grade to be precise), my 5th grade teacher, who shall remain nameless (not so much to protect his identity, but to avoid being sued), initiated a lesson that proved that "gifted and talented" kids may not be so. Some teachers did and still operate under the impression that so-called topnotch children should develop their critical thinking skills. This idea is obviously a big mistake. Try to see where this idea goes wrong. My 5th grade teacher attempted to introduce a classroom full of eleven year-olds to the philosophic enterprise of logical thinking. Yeah, right. Dude, we were eleven year olds! It's difficult enough to get a classroom full of well over twenty one year-olds to sit down and shut up during an actual college level philosophy class, let alone attempting to reason with a group of hyperactive and disinterested kids (and we really were disinterested in learning any of that crap) that reading philosophy was going to make us into better people. The only thing that I remember about the whole ordeal is that the focus of all that crap he had us reading about was some dude named Harry Stottlemeyer. Needless to say, the attempt did not go over -- at all. It was a lead zeppelin in the truest sense of the phrase. Unfortunately, my teacher's failed attempt was just the first of many attempts by subsequent teachers to nurture one of education's worst side effects -- thinking too much. This overthinking is a problem to say the least. It affects both the educated and the uneducated alike. Unfortunately, it's found among the educated in greater frequency than any other segment of society. This overthinking silll leads to another affliction among the over-educated set: the need to convince others how smart we are. If you've spent too much time around these over-educated types, you mave have noticed that they tend to manifest their need to impress with their brainpower in one of two ways: 1) impressing others with their extensive book knowledge. This is usually examplified by the incessant need to add more detail or backstory to information that other people already know. For example, a group of people are discussing the evils of slavery in the Americas. There is no real need to add detail to the horrors of slavery more than the fact that human beings were bought and sold as property. But the individual who needs to impress others with his smarts will inevitably add such factoids as the fact that the first recorded slaves came to the Americas in 1620, and that, throughout the slave-holding states, it was illegal for a slave to own a comb, or that, because of the prevalence of rape of female slaves, as high as 70% of the U.S. black population has European ancestry. It's not that these facts aren't entertaining or interesting. But the plain truth is, is that no one asked to hear what the guy had to say. His point was that he had to prove that he knew more about the subject than anyone else in the room. The second type of overthinker is the worst of the two: he is the person who finds the hidden significance and deep meaning in damn-near everything he sees -- no matter how trivial or insignificant the thing is. We've all seen this jerk. Let's say that there is a group of people reminiscing about the incredibly stupid TV shows that aired during their collective adolescence. The show that they are discussing is the incredibly, mind-numbingly awful saturday morning classic, Saved By the Bell. Without ever being invited into the discussion, Mr. Smarter-than-you decides that he is going to learn everyone about how Screetch reflects Hegelian alienation, or what Slater's physique can teach us about Platonic forms. He decides to wow us all by explaining in painstaking detail, how Zach is really Nietzsche's ubermensche. Whichever one we encounter, conversations tend to drift into the realm of the academic -- where words like "pedantic", "didactic", and "soporific" come to mind ( I did a little wowing myself just there. I pulled out three 50 cent words!) All this overthinking (bombastic overthnking at that) tends to result in the exact opposite effect that it is intended to have. Amazingly, overthinking deralis thought. It creates a type of disposition in those who are prone to overthinking that we should only think about those things that are "important". Inevitably, this line of thinking itself tends to cast the net of subject mater very narrowly. Conversations tend to be small and for the most part, uninteresting. I say, if you want to try this out, try talking to an academic about any subject other than their subject of choice or expertise. Good luck. The unfortunate result of this mindset is that those who think too much are often accused of snobbery. This, I think, has to do with why so many Americans are so dismissive of education. It's esay to see that we have a real disdain for bookworms, smarty-pants, know-it-all's. We hated Al Gore in part because he came off like he was smarter than everyone else (and worse yet, knew that he was). The allegation, however, isn't entirely untrue. People who overthink are sometimes arrogant jerks who do feel that they are the smartest people in the room. The unfortunate side effect for those who overthink is that many of them become so wrapped up in being dismissive of anything that does not warrant intellectual merit, that they often miss the point of thinking entirely. The key is that we must remind ourselves that it's not that nothing trivial has significance to it. Eric Draven (aka, "The Crow") said that nothing is trivial. Unfortunately for Mr. Draven, he realized that fact after he was stabbed a few times and chucked out of a 4th story window. For the majority of us, our lesson need not be so extreme. Now, it may be true that there are really trivial things that lack any significance whatsoever (for instance, it is a waste of time to contemplate the philosophic significance of my big toe), but it is easy to understand Draven's sentiment. When it comes to overthinking, we have a problem. But, our solution is not dismissing all as insignificant, either. During the last KPFK fund drive (wait, that might still be going on now), a host lamented the fact that there are a bunch of movies at the cineplexes that don't teach anything. That statement, and I think that she might take offense to my supposition, is exactly what is wrong with overthinking. It is possible to find, if one looks hard enough, significance or a lesson in nearly anything. I'd say that her problem is, is that she was being intellectually lazy and dismissing anything that set out to entertain as its first priority as non-instructive. There is as much to learn from Madea as we can learn from a documentary about detainees at Gitmo. (Really, this is true). That's the trap. There is a possibility that, with all of our looking, that we run the possibility of looking too deep. The key is finding what the Buddha called the "middle way". That is, when we look for significance, we must be careful not to overthink, but we must also watch that we do not underthink, either. Take what you watch or read or hear with caution. I was listening to "Fresh Air" a couple of nights ago while I was washing dishes. Terry Gross was talking to Woody Allen. I've been around philosophy types long enough to know that this guy is the total package so far as filmmakers go. Ask any philosopher which Woody Allen film he digs and you'll be sure to hear Annie Hall, or Crimes and Misdemeanors sure as I can crack my knuckles. Personally, I'm a fan of What's Up, Tiger Lily?. But that's just me. I was amazed to hear Woody Allen say (alright, I already kind of knew this) that he isn't a deep thinker. He says that people look all over his movies, looking for clues for life's hidden meanings. But to him it seems, his movies are merely the product of his or his partner's imagination. There is nothing more than what makes for a good story. He says that he's more likely to be the guy wearing a T-shirt drinking a beer than he'd be the guy knee-deep in some philosophic roundtable discussing the merits of some deep and complex philsophical theory. I know that many philosophers hail Woody Allen as some sort of movie god, and often rank him among those who are "philosophers" in the academic sense. I learned some time ago that Woody Allen, unlike say, Lakers (Go Lakers!) coach Phil Jackson, Harrison Ford or Steve Martin, wasn't a philosophy major in college. He studied film... and flunked out. But you see, that's where overthinking gets the best of people. Not only do they see deep thinking where it isn't, but they also created a persona for a filmmaker to match their own tendency to overthink. I think that the king of (cinematic) pop, George Lucas, said it best when he said that there are people who dismiss films like Star Wars as fluff, but on the flipside, there are people who look way too deep. They're so busy looking that they miss the point. I'd like to end on this note. I think that it applies: Back in the mid-90s, there was this Tom Petty video for the song "You Don't Know How It Feels". The viedo had all sorts of flashy images in it, and plenty of people started asking,"what does all of this mean?" (I guess it's worth noting that this is the era when video directors like Mark Romanek and Mark Pellingham were churning out videos that had "meaning"). I remember watching VH-1 one afternoon when the subject of Tom Petty's video came up. The second most frequently asked question about the video (right behind "Is that a man?") was what did the video mean? Tom Petty's answer was that the video meant nothing. There was no point other than to throw alot of cool stuff together in a video (although I suspect that there was some deconstructivist that said that there was meaning, and of course, Tom Petty didn't see it). That's so cool! And it's especially cool for this point: you can dig too deep and shoot right past the answer. You can dig enough and find meaning that was lurking in a Romero zombie flick, or finding the Jungian archetypes in Lucas' Star Wars. But you can also not look at all and still get it. The point in all of this is that, despite my early trauma with the likes of that Stottlemeyer bastard, and my excursion into the academic world of overthinking (something I have not completely shed from my soul yet), I am aware of, and seeking that happy balance between the two extremes.

Half-assed Apologies

While I'm on the subject of negativity, I'd like to acknowldge that, from time to time, I can go a bit too far. I was looking at a previous post I'd written called "I truly hate the well-intentioned". I was shocked by the level of vitriol that I had expressed in that post. I don't think I was being so much negative as I was being mean. I must have been really pissed off about someting or on my period to write so meanspiritedly about people who mean well (and the Pacifica listening audience). Sorry to those who were the targets of my meanspirited commentary (and there were particular people that I had in mind writing it). Though I'm apologizing for the level of meanness, I'm not, however, taking abck the sentiment that I had expressed in that post. I still think that people who say that the solution for racism is race-mixing are more than a little misguided in their "solution" for the problem. If you think about it, their solution may be worse than the cure. But I don't want to open up that can of worms today.

A Frown Turned Upside Down

I have a problem with negativity. Really, I do. I've always had it. I can't remember a time when I wasn't pissed off about something. Nope. I can't. There are people that say that our dispositions are evident in the womb. That is, we are born who we are. And there's always somebody's mother blathering on about how such and such was fidgity in the womb, and went on to be a fidgity kid who grew up to be a fidgity adult. "He was always like that" she says, shaking her head. Our personalities are as fixed as the stars in the sky. Unfortunately, some of us have what might be called "problem" personalities. We're the ones who are sure fire to bring down anyone's good time. The Eeyores and Oscar the Grouches who seem to get off pissing all over everybody's parade. The honest fact of the matter is that we do. Or at least I do. Sometimes, you're lucky enough to find another group of misanthropes who share your disdain for all things happy. In high school, I was lucky enough to find a couple of kids who shared my pessimistic outlook. Back in high school, I was partial to the "gothic" lifestyle. The funny (Iguess slightly ironic) thing is, is that there are plenty of self-professed goths who are, when the world is not looking, fairly upbeat and optimistic people. And this is exactly the situation that I found myself in. I had hooked up with happy-go-lucky goths. My worst nightmare. I was too dour for the downtrodden. All these years later, I find that I haven't lightened up a single bit. I'm just as bitter as ever. Perhaps even more so. (the past eight years of the Bush administration really put me in a foul mood). I'm so negative, that I've caused more than a few of the people that I know to say that i should stop being so negative. I've tried. I really did. I tried to do that "the Secret" crap, where you put out positive thoughts to attract positivity to you. Well, it didn't work. I tried to be positive. Does anyone out there know how hard that truly is -- being positive? I guess that experts on happiness (although I believe that being negative does not exclude one from being happy) will tell me that I didn't work hard enough at changing myself. They'll tell me that I was trying to take the shortcut, and that I wasn't being positive so much as I was wishful thinking. Either way, failing to attract the positivity that I deserve in the ling run, gave me one more thing to be negative about. This attitude is quite detrimental to long-lasting relationships. I had thought that I was doomed. No one, it seems, likes a perpetual grouch. I thought that i would spend the rest of my life faking optimism for everyone else while secretly harboring my little, black stormclouds. That is, until I realized that my problem wasn't that I'm a negative person. My problem was that I was trying to not be a negative person. My efforts to throw off my cloak of despair had led my to a place where I shouldn't have gone in the first place. I was trying to be so pleasant for everyone, that I wasn't being who I was. the reason why I was repelling people wasn't because I was a grouch, it was because I was a faker. I wasn't a genuine person to anyone, least of all I wasn't being genuine with myself. That was my problem. So, I've embraced my inner crabby person, and agreed with myself that, no matter what, i will not give over who I am to entertain the needs of other people. If other folks can't handle a little bad mood, then so be it. We'll part on good terms. I think that's what I'm going to do. At least until I meet some incredibly hot and painfully optimistic guy. In that case, I will immediately throw out everything about being an incurable pessimist and begin sunning it up immediately. After all, I'm only a girl.

Waterboarding

In light of this BS with Sean Hannity, I have one question: If torture isn't painful (meaning it's something that one would do to another of one's fraternity -- I didn't call it a "frat" because, no I don't call my country a ...) then why do it?

The Monster Is Your Personality Type!

I've been seeing way too much of these Twilight people. Especially that dude that they keep trying to tell me is hot. He's all over TMZ. They show him with his shirt off, they show him with that chick from the movie that he may or may not be dating... I'm just waiting for the point when this dude pops out of my sock drawer. I see the guy. I don't get it. Anyway, it's not that I have a problem with the type of movie this dude is in -- I like vampire movies. I'm just a little disappointed in myself for suddenly getting all purist over how a bloodsucker movie is supposed to be. That's strange, because I'm no fan of Anne Rice, either; which is supposed to be what those Twilight movies are -- they're the new Anne Rice or whatever. Whatever. Personally, I'm a fan of the old Hammer flicks. Nobody does the Count quite like Christopher Lee. Which brings me to an old question that gets bounced around from time to time during sometimes sprited conversations between genre fans. The question being, which movie monster would you want to be? The choices are usually limited to the three primary movie monsters -- the wolfman, Dracula (or a vampire generally construed), or Frankenstein's monster (I say Frankenstein's monster as opposed to "Frankenstein" because as the purists will tell you, "Frankenstein" is the name of the doctor, not the monster). I guess with the growing populariy of the undead flick, that we'll soon be adding zombies to the mix. Although I suspect that I'm the only person that I know that would pick the zombie as the movie monster that I'd most like to be. My sister says that she dislikes zombies, not for the fact that they eat the flesh of the living ( although that has something to do with why she does), but for the fact that, according to her, zombies are jsut plain rude. They pounce on you and tear you to pieces without even asking! At least some vampires get you to cooperate by seducing you to give up your blood. But not the zombie. The hoarde sees you, and then they strike. And, what makes things worse is that, thanks to Zach Snyder, zombies aren't the shambling, you can outwalk them types, oh no. They run. Fast. So, the name of the game is pick a monster. It seems pretty easy. People usually go for the vamp, not because he drinks blood, but because he's suave, he's usually pretty well-off, and her gets all the chicks. And if the vampire in question looks anything like Asia Argento looked in Love Bites, you can see why. Werewolves, although it's admittedly cool to go around snarling and howling at the moon, are kind of hit and miss. If you're stuck being the Lon Cheney, jr. sort of wolfman, you'll look like some dude who went to the dog groomers and glued a bunch of shavings to his face. That look may have scared the pants off of people back in the day, but now it just screams "LAME". If you're lucky enough to look like David Naughton in An American Werewolf In London (probably still the best werewolf flick ever made), or the Lycans of Underworld (although the vampires looked cooler), then you're better off. I thought that it was pretty amazing that the same guy who played Lucien in Underworld is the same guy who played David Frost in Nixon/Frost. But I guess that's why they call it "acting". Unfortunately for Frankenstein's monster, aside from the occasional "ugh!" or "ummm!", he isn't that exciting. Nobody ever picks him. Even if you say that the monster (as played by Peter Boyle) in Young Frankenstein is an option. Wait. I think that I read once that Marilyn Manson said in an interview that if he had to choose, that he'd choose Frankenstein's monster. He said that everyone picks Dracula because he's a badass who gets the chicks. But the monster, Manson said, is a deeper character. He's a monster, for goodness sakes! He's already an outcast. He's got a heart, and feelings, and a (abby normal) mind, just like the rest of us, but people run from him. They reject him at first sight because he's an abomination. They try to destroy him. Even his own creator rejects him. Manson said that Frankenstein's monster was a character that is closer to who he was and how society was treating him. (this was when Marilyn Manson was the musical "boogeyman" being blamed for every malcontented white teenager's shooting spree. Remember back then?) But that's the idea. Manson saw what the monster symbolized and applied it to who he saw himself as a person. The monster represented a being, who through no fault of his own, (he was after all, only what his maker had made him), was rejected and shunned by society. He was a monster who embodied all that was unnatural and sinful within man's soul and desires. Desire is what the choice is supposed to reveal about ourselves when we pick which movie monster we'd like to be. The vampire is, according to those who read too many meanings into things, a vision of a rape fantasy. He comes to you (and it is usually a he) in the middle of the night under coat of darkness. He takes your blood without your consent. His teeth, of course, are merely metaphor. They are his sharp penises that penetrate you. You catch his disease by sucking from him (and there is absolutely no need to say what that means). It's also worth noting that the type of vampire is revelatory as well. Do you want to look like Brad Pitt in Interview With the Vampire? or do you want to look like Max Schrek's Nosferatu? The elegant, erudite ladies man (wait, Anne Rice's characters were kind of gay, so I guess you'd be an elegant, erudite man's man. Which is absolutely ok by me), or do you favor the bestial nightcrawler (who, on an episode of Spongebob Squarepants had a thing for playing with lightswitches)? Says a bit about who you thing you are. Primarily that at some point in your life (sooner rather than later) you'll end up on a sex offender registry. If you say the wolfman, that's supposed to be nothing but uncontrolled id. It is man's inner beasts literally ripping through him and taking control. He turns from man to beast. Into the flesh-ripping wolf. Wolves have totally creepy eyes. Does anyone else think that? The wolfman doesn't think he's all instinct. Of course, like the vampire, there's the enevitable sexual component to the monster. Of course, I could get crude, and suggest that you avoid bending over in front of the wolfman, lest you wnat to be had that-way-style, but since this is supposed to be somewhat academic, I won't. Werewolf people are underhanded and seriously not to be trusted. How much can you trust someone who literally turns into a dog? Lastly, if you choose doc Vic's monster. Well, you're a sorry sack of crap that probably listens to too much of the Cure, and thinks that the world just doesn't undestand his poetry. You hate people, but what you really want most of all is a girlfriend -- which would require you to like people. Until then, you'll just lock your bedroom door and sulk to Dead Can Dance.

I Used To Think I Should Put On A Laser Light Show

Sometimes, one can benefit from looking around at the people around you. I started this whole blog thing with the intention that this thing would help me to focus my thoughts enough to write a book. I would, I thought, write the book that I wanted to read when I was trudging through my philosophy classes -- you know, that book written by some smartass who would say all sorts of stuff like "It's not that important that you learn what Kant has to say about anything", or "Philosophy is in the mind of the beholder"... Yeah. I stroked the 'I'm going to write a book' fantasy for quite a while. So far, no book. I haven't even started. This would not be a problem, if not for the fact that I started to feel like I was doing something wrong. I have this blog, and I write about what I wanted to write about -- the intersection between popular culture and philosophy -- but I felt like I wasn't doing things right. Like I wasn't saying something important. Maybe it's has to do with President Obama and the fact that we're all supposed to be changing things. I wasn't feeling like what I was doing was contributing to the change that we're all supposed to be believing in. Who cares about how we can learn Kant's metaphysics from an episode of The Brady Bunch? Will that create green jobs? Will knowing Popperian analysis of scientific theory create peace between the Palestinians and Israel? will it fix California's budget problems? No, it won't. But, then, I did something. I started to look around at what other people are blogging about. There's the serious, 'we're telling you what's the news' folks at The Huffington Post, but mostly, there's people who ar just like me, who just can't keep their ideas to themselves. And that gave me comfort... for awhile. I wasn't so bothered about having my blog anymore so much as I was troubled by the fact that my blog is just so boring! I mean, I think that I can write entertainingly. And occasionally, i can rip of a funny line or two. But the cold, harsh reality is that I write like a person who does philosophy. I mean, yeah, that's what I'm writing about, but it's what I sound like that really makes me want to stick my head out of the window while speeding past the mailbox, you know. I'm thinking now that I should have pictures pasted all over my blog. I should have pics of Kant and Hume, and a little area devoted to Wittgenstein, or links to Monty Python sketches. But, there's something that tells me that it should the content that I should focus on -- the flashing lights and go-go dancers are just too postmodernist. Maybe. Then again, would putting pictures of Kant up really make things more exciting?

Fight Riff

I thought that I wouldn't put anything up today, but this is like an addiction that I cannot shake. Now that I'm writing I seem to have lost all of my thoughts. Unfortunately, this happens way more often than I'd like. What I've been thinking about is the fact ...

On A Tangentally Philosophic Topic

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Conversation Enders #9: The Not-So Magical Misery Tour

They say that you can tell a person's personality by what kind of music they listen to. In reality, telling a person's personality by way of their musical preferences is intended to be one of those "tests" that people think up to screen out people that they think are beneath them. To give an example, if you're into Phillip Glass and the Kronos Quartet and someone you meet at a gathering of mutual friends gushes on and on about how cool Toby Keith is -- well, you get the idea. I had heard of this so-called personality test during a conversation with a "baby boomer", that is those individuals born roughly between 1945 and 1964. The people who turned on, tuned in, and dropped out, and are still convinced that everything they said and did was pop cultural gold. I think what he really was trying to do was convince me that any music that he liked was cool, therefore suggesting his superiority, and that my liking the FooFighters was somehow akin to primitiveness. I was a knuckledragger. Although I recall he liked the song with the video that's like those Mentos commercials. It was "inventive" he said, kind of like A Hard Day's Night. I remember, before I completely lost interest in his going on about how cool the 60s was, ( although I swear he was a teenager in the 70s), he was yammering about how bands today had lost their sense of humor, and how the art was missing from modern music, and that it's all about making money nowadays... He was suggesting that the music of the 60s, with its emphasis on art and making the listener feel something, not only provided the soundtrack by which to pick up chicks to, but also influenced the way that people thought about life and themselves -- how we interact with the world and how we feel connected to everyone around us. This was something, he said, that today's music simply does not do. You could tell a man by his music, he claimed. If the baby boomers are right, and no good music was made after 1969 ( which may be true in the case of Wham!), and if there is a definitive link between personality and music preference,then there is no better personality test than the question which Beatles do you like? For those who would answer the question, " I like all of the Beatles music", shame on you. Liking the Beatles is not merely a matter of liking their music generally, it is a gauge on how you see the world. Which era you like tells the world what kind of person you are. There a two basic ways of gauging personality type according to the Beatles: 1) early vs. late Beatles 2) Lennon or Mc Cartney If you say that you prefer to listen to "early" Beatles, roughly covering the years from 1962 to 1966 (when they stopped performing in public, unless you discount their "rooftop" performance), then your personality is described as follows: you're conventional. You like things to be clear, simple and easy to understand (like many early Beatles lyrics). You're likely conservative, and most importantly, you don't readily accept change. You like the Beatles who wore the matching suits and didn't sing about revolutions and posed naked on album covers with their girlfriends -- and you like the world to be that way, too. If, by chance, you dig the late Beatles, then you're open and progressive. You may be slightly militant, or at least you talk as if you are (but more than likely you're "out, in"). You've probably referred to authority on at least one occasion as "the Man". You like confusion, chaos, and of course, smoking weed. Your mind is a changing place, and according to you, like your mind, that's the way the world is. The test is similar with whether you prefer the lyrics of John Lennon or Paul Mc Cartney. If you like Paul, then you're a romantic. You like silly little love songs, and there's absolutely no problem with that according to your world view. Love for you is between you and the gender of your choice. And, you don't have a problem with making money. If you prefer Lennon, you're the edgy rebel. You speak your mind and you're not afraid of pissing people off. Love isn't just between you and your girfriend that nobody else seems to like, but is something that involves the whole world. And not just love, but peace, too. You have a seious problem with those people who sold out ( but we all know that you've got a little tucked away in your pocket as well). Funny, no one ever says what kind of personality you have if you like George. The idea is, is that this "test" isn't supposed to be just an icebreaker or a topic of conversation that is meant to take up time but not teach us anything. It's supposed to be a way to gain insight into who we are -- as any music that we listen to is supposed to reflect who we are. Sometimes this assumption is right. For instance, I know that gloomy people tend to listen to gloomy music. Usually someone who describes themself as a philistine wouldn't listen to Mozart or something supposedly "refined" or high class. Yeah, I get that but, if you ask me, this question -- and I mean this question gauging a personality (and by extension a worldview) by what "era" of Beatles a person likes -- is a prime example of philosophic overthinking. Now that I'm writing this, I don't not suspect that some philosophy student thought up this question. It reeks of philosophy. And leave it to a philosopher to overthink a preference. If you don't believe that this actually happens, overthinking preferences that is, there is a book currently on the shelves of any number of local bookstores called The Beatles and Philosophy. It sets itself apart from all of the other (hundreds) of books about the Beatles, in that its authors have somehow found a way to overthink meaning into the Beatles' (generally thought of as ) pop songs. The book, in all of it's philosophic significantness is not so much a homage to a seminal pop band as it is a monument to the power of overthinking. I would give an example or two, but since I endowed my own The Beatles and Philosophy book to the logic lab (big clue) and since I am way too lazy to google anything, I can't give you an idea of how philosophic overthinking goes hideously wrong. But, let me preempt myself here -- I'm not saying that the Beatles weren't saying anything, sure they did! Afterall, that's what the 60s was about (so they say anyway). And I am not, repeat, NOT trying to say that philosophers shouldn't look for the deeper or hidden meanings behind otherwise seemingly unphilosophic things. But I really don't think that they were going for something that deep. I think that what they were trying to do is make money and, eventually, get high. Paul Mc Cartney said that what drove he and John Lennon to songwriting is their mutual desire to write tunes for Frank Sinatra. Sometimes, even with things that have meaning, we read more into it than there is. I recall hearing that Freud said that sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Well, sometimes a song is just a song. I think that when you've taken to finding the Leibnizian view of God and the universe as articulated by George Harrison's "Within You, Without You" or the Humean subtext of "Hello, Goodbye", you're going a little too far ( I don't know if there are Humean subtexts to any of the songs on Magical Mystery Tour or if there is any Leibniz to be found on Sgt. Pepper. I made those examples up). What's funny about finding the deeper philosophy in Beatles lyrics is that it ignores the fact that there are even funnier "meanings" to be found in the songs without consulting Spinoza or Nietzsche. Ask yourself these questions: Are they really singing "everybody smoke pot" during the coda of "I am the Walrus"? or, how was everybody snowed by John Lennon's obvious lie about what "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" was really about (which is kind of like how people back in the 70s had no clue that the Village People were gay. They sang songs about macho men and hanging at the Y! Hello?!?), or how is it that Charles Manson really did get what the song "Blackbird" was about? It's these questions that remain unanswered and need to be. By the way, if no one has noticed that the tenor of this post has drifedway into the hypocritical, I'm more clever than I thought. So clever, in fact that ... And for the record, I prefer late Beatles (White Album specifically) to early and I'm a fan of the songs of George Harrison, especially "Only a Northern Song" from Yellow Submarine. The movie sucked eggs, but the song is cool.

Post-twenty, Teenage Poetry

I used to write really atrocious poetry when I was in high school. I mean, really bad. I think it's a phase that every teenager who takes himself way too seroiusly goes through. You know, to seem deep or something to that effect. Navel gazing as a sign of wisdom and maturity...To be called an "old soul". The problem is, though, is that even though I understand that, when I was 18 I was angry for absolutely no reason at all, I'm still holding on to a fair amount of cynicism. To be honest, I'm holding on to alot more than a fair amount of cynicism. Last night, I was thumbing through some of my old philosophy term papers, looking for something to write about. I was thumbing through a epistemology term paper when I noticed a single page of looseleaf notebook paper sandwiched between a couple of pages of my term paper. It was the last poem that I wrote. I wrote it while that whole unpleasantness about hurricane Katrina was going on. And, typical to form, it was atrocious. But, I thought that I'd put it here. So, in lieu of an actual blog entry, I present crappy poetry: "if you can't, don't" i'm not gonna talk politics. I'm not gonna protest, or walk out, or demonstrate I'm not gonna sit-in And I'm not gonna write a letter, or send an e-mail, or make a phone call. I'm not going to do anything. I'm going to sit here in my comfy chair Look at my unused Ab-Rocker, and Be utterly, entirely AMERICAN. I'm gonna overeat and not get sleep And watch too much TV. And not give a good goddamn about anyone who hasn't been On Extra! or on Entertainment Tonight Or seen on YouTube. It's an E! Entertainment Television world out there And it don't matter If it ain't beautiful. therefore, I'm not going to do a damn thing. NOT ONE GODDAMN THING I'm not gonna care while the war is raging I'm not gonna care while children are starving Or when women are being gang-raped in Bosnia Or mutilated in Sudan, or while people are being Ethnically cleansed, bunker bombed, collaterally damaged, Or shocked or awed or otherwise wiped off the face of this earth. 'Cause it just don't matter to me anymore. Or just that it never did. I can watch floods in New Orleans And pretend to pity the so poor and the so black. I can watch genocide in Darfur And not even offer a piss-poor prayer to GOD in hopes that Maybe he'll watch over them... Ican stare at the TV for hours And turn it off and still Have a nice day. I can do this because an American can do this. And besides, I live in a pretty good neighborhood.