Find Your Favorite Fallacy

I suck at logic. I realize that logic is the cornerstone of philosophy, but I'm really bad at it. Really bad. Funny thing is I don't feel all that bad about it. A few days ago, I looked at a sample problem from one of my old logic texts, and I didn't even know how to begin to solve the derivation. It felt wonderful. This fact, however, doesn't stop me from being interested in fallacies and when one's logic and reasoning goes dreadfully, horribly wrong. A fallacy, plainly put, is an error in one's reasoning. There are many reasons why one's reasoning goes awry, including errors in deduction, ambiguity, irrelevant data, vagueness, etc... The funny thing about fallacious arguments is that they always sound so good, so reasonable -- but they're always wrong. The thing about fallacies that irks so many philosophers is that the sweet sounds of a horribly reasoned argument always sound so good that people are all-too-often swayed by bad arguments rather than by a logically sound argument. The reason is, I think, has to do with the fact that straight logic is boring. It's hard, and it sucks, and not everyone can do it. Fallacies are fun. More importantly, everyone can do it. Unfortunately for fans of logic, fallacious arguments are far too common in the public sphere. A particular breeding ground for fallacious thinking is conspiracy theories. Here are a few of my favorites: I used to take a lot of this 9/11 stuff seriously (I still think a proper investigation is needed) until I heard professional famous people Heidi and Spencer Pratt (collectively known as "Speidi") on a radio show chanting for the downfall of the New World Order. Now, I'm not saying that they can't express their opinions, they are American citizens and well within their rights to express whatever nutty (or perfectly sane) ideas that they want. But really, listening to these two people who, so far as I'm aware of, have no discernable reason to be famous, ended my taking 9/11 truthers seriously right at that moment. Hearing those two was like seeing your grandmother naked. Once you've seen it all the magic of nana is gone. What I was thinking, while listening to "Speidi" was that I was hearing a fallacy at work. The fallacy was this: ARGUMENTUM AD VERECUNDIAM. It wasn't that we're supposed to believe that the GOVERNMENT pulled off a false flag operation against its own people because a legitimate source laid out compelling arguments for believing that 9/11 was an inside job. Nope. The argument laid out on this show was nothing more than a celebrity endorsement. "Speidi" might have a level of expertise when dealing with the ins and outs of show business, but their authority to speak on matters concerning politics and the inner working of the Tri-Lateral Commission might be lacking. They were speaking outside of their area of authority, yet made an appeal for something they lacked the authority to speak (about). That's what argumentum ad verecundium is. The funny thing about conspiracies is that they're usually not limited to just one form of bad argument. Most are a cornucopia of bad reasoning and awful arguments. Sure, it's great that Fear Factor host Joe Rogan knows that the GOVERNMENT attacked itself for the purposes of interning all Americans into FEMA camps, and that I should trust what he says, because he knows that everything we've been told about the Illuminati is true, but there's a more important reason why I should believe what he says-- if I don't I will die. This fallacy is ARGUMENTUM AD BACULUM. This particular kind of bad argument says, if you don't believe my argument, bad things will happen to you. If I continue to be one of the sheeple and refuse to believe that the Globalists have a plan to exterminate 80% of the world's population, I will end up pumped full of contaminated water, high fructose corn syrup, aspertame, flouride, and contaminated vaccines that will render me doscile and compliant (it also doesn't hurt to buy a copy of Loose Change). Speaking of high fructose corn syrup and vaccines being used to create passivity, apathy, and global pandemics, I come to my favorite fallacy and a conspiracy favorite: POST HOC, ERGO PROPTER HOC. Translated, post hoc, ergo propter hoc means "after this, therefore because of this". The reasoning goes, because A preceeds B, A caused B. Here's an example: I consumed three Hostess Snowalls right before slaughtering my family. Therefore, the Snowballs caused me to kill my family. Well, as you can see, that's wrong. The fact that I ate a snack just before committing murder doesn't necessarily mean that the two events are connected, despite the close proximity of the two events. Here's another common one, my child is a genius. I played Mozart while I was pregnant. Therefore, Mozart made my baby a genius. The fact is, is that even though it sounds nice to say that playing classical music to fetuses sounds nice (should be an indicator here), there is no causal connection between a child's IQ and what kind of music is played while its mother is pregnant. At best, the realationship is correlational. I know that the last paragraph might have upset a few people, especially those who believe that there is a causal relation between certain substances (like vaccines) and decreased health. I'm not saying that people who believe that substances like MSG are bad for your health are wrong. There might be a connection between environmental toxins and lower IQs and other ailments. What I'm saying is that the arguments that are used by proponents of conspiracy theories are often problematic because so many are so poorly argued. Of course, someone who thinks as I do might end up on the recieving end of another fallacy: ARGUMENTUM AD HOMINEM. The tactic of this fallacious argument is tried and true, and unfortunately it has a stunning level of success. Argumentum ad hominem is simply making the other guy look bad. This one you hear on both sides of the conspiracy issue; proponents and naysayers alike. It's making your argument look good by making the other guy's argument look bad. Conspiracy theorists call non-believers "sheeple" and shills for the New World Order. Conspiracy theorists are "nuts" and paranoids who listen to Art Bell while wearing their tin-foil hats. What I mean by writing this isn't to pick on conspiracy theorists. There are many legitimate reasons to believe that things are not always as they seem to be, and there should be at least a few people who are looking out to see if our government remains the free and open institution that it was designed to be. It's good to ask questions and look for answers -- that's the essence of philosophy. In his search for truth, Socrates questioned his interlocutors, forcing them to ask questions through dialogue. They rarely arrived at answers -- just more questions. Some people don't really like the idea of not having answers, so they look for answers, even when the connections they draw between events aren't reasonable or when there is no good reason to believe a particular line of reasoning. Then again, if everybody specialized in logically correct arguments, late night radio would be so uninteresting.

You Never Forget Your First Time

I remember that, during my childhood, I spent alot of time alone. Perhaps too much time alone. My mom worked evenings, and my older brothers weren't interested in hanging out with a kid in elementary school, so needless to say, I had plenty of time to enjoy my own thoughts. My most amusing friend for most of my childhood was the TV. All I can say about all of that now, is thank the heavens we had cable! Which is where I found the first TV show that I can say, most truly, that I fell in love with. I was a teen and tired of the crap that was called "entertainment" on the networks ( this was before Fox came along), and so I was eager for new visual stimuli. My ritual, at that time, was coming home, dropping my backpack at the door, jotting down to the living room, and popping on the TV. It was important that the TV went on before I had even relieved myself after a full day's schooling, or even stopping by the fridge to get a snack because the TV had to be on MTV as quickly as possible. (I could lay into some derisive commentary about how I remember when MTV used to show music videos, but that rant has been overdone. Besides, Tila Tequila is by far more entertaining than any Adam Ant video ever was or could hope to be). I had to see the newest Bell Biv Devoe video or see what new catch-phrase "Downtown" Julie Brown had for us to imulate. Now, I'm old enough to remember when MTV was a 24-hour video network, but I'm young enough to remember when the network started moving non-video content into its programming. One day, after setting down my bag, and turning on the TV, I saw something that I had never seen before: a 1970 sketch comedy show imported from England was on my TV srceen. It was called Monty Python's Flying Circus. There are plenty of firsts that we all remember: first kiss, first you-know-what, first love, first DUI arrest... those firsts that we say shaped who we are now -- the ones that, even when we're in the old folks home, we'll never forget. I can recall exactly which episode aired that day when I was converted ( I use the word "converted" because that's exactly how becoming a Monty Python fan becomes a part of who you are and takes over your soul). It was episode 33 "Salad Days". What I remember most about that episond is my alternating amusement and horror at the close of the title sketch. I'll say nothing more about it here other than to say that its ending is "Peckinpah-esque". The next day, I asked my school chums if they had seen what I saw the day before. None had. And this was to be a frequent experience I would find in my conversion. I've come to realize that Monty Python is the least popular popular thing I've ever encountered. Most people either say that they've never heard of it, or (and unfortunately the more frequent response) say that it's "British" humor and (as is the case with alot of British humor) not very funny. Unfortunately, a side of effect of conversion is the need to tell others what one has experinced. I felt like a Christian trying to convince the pagans that they should accept Christ. Ok, that's a little much. But at the very least I could sympathize with the various Andy Kaufman and Frank Zappa fans who had tried in vain to convince me that Kaufman and Zappa were entertaining. Andy Kaufman is not funny. But, I had experienced the miracle of Python. I needed to share it with others. I would randomly break into "The Lumberjack Song", recite lines from classic sketches like "Dead Parrot" or try to explain why "Fish Slapping Dance" was so funny. I found myself yelling "Dimmesdale" "Semprini" and "Albatross" in public places. Nobody understood me. Nobody wanted to understand me. I felt alone. I had this wonderful thing and the jr. high scum that I hung out with didn't appreciate what true comedy was. The funny thing is, is that unlike much of the things that I liked when I was younger ( take Knight Rider, for instance), I haven't outgrown my love of Monty Python. When I was younger I didn't understand all the philosophy-oriented humor in the sketches. All these years later, I understand why the Wittgenstein jokes are funny (and what a Wittgenstein is in the first place). I still appreciate the poop humor and the showing of the naughty bits, and the John-Cleese-shouting-at-the-top-of-his-lungs sketches, but there's so much more that I get now that I appreciate the show on an entirely different level. I can say about Monty Python's Flying Circus what I can't say about too many other shows -- watching it makes me realize that I've actually learned a few things in my lifetime. This October marks the 40th anniversary of the debut of the Fying Circus, and I'm certain that in those forty years, there were many latchkeys like me that were converted then and are still true believers now. I know that somewhere out there, some kid who spends too much time alone will see "argument clinic", or blancmanges playing tennis and experience a conversion just as I did. We'll all embrace our inner village idiots (or upper-class twits, if one prefers), always look on the bright side of life (which is my ringtone, I'll add), and learn to appreciate our philosophy without so much rat in it. Which is more than I can say watching the A-Team did for me. FIN

Deep Philosophy

I like porn. No, really I do. I know, that as a chick and a philospher, I shouldn't. And I'm not just saying it because it sounds cool. I like nasty movies. Of people doing it. I could try to make this seem all highbrow and say that I appreciate (i.e. I only watch) "classic" adult cinema, when pornographers were still trying to make "art" films, or that I only watch smut that's shot on film, or that what I watch isn't porn at all, but "erotica". But if I did say all of that I'd be lying. Just short of poop porn, with me, pretty much anything goes. Hey, has anyone else out there noticed that the music in porn flicks sounds alot like the music in exercise videos? weird. Given the ultimate purpose (or telos, if you are so inclined), of the whole dog and pony show (I'm not into that kind either), I'd much rather drop the pretense and admit that I'd watch Deep Inside Ginger Lynn, The Osporns, or Ben Dover's Booty Duty before picking up the Bertrand Russell companion for a mid-afternoon's lay about. Some may say that the genre is nothing more than exploitation of the worse degree, but I say -- well, first off, yes it is. But secondly, it's the perfect way to unwind after spending too many hours reading and thinking about Frege. Although I find Girls Gone Wild offensive. again, weird. That said, the pornographic cinema isn't exactly the genre that lends itself to philosophic inquiry (I hear a resounding that's not true. I say that porn tends to be the topic of much more philosophic criticism than it does to actual debate. For some strange reason people tend to shy away from the pro-porn position in deep philosophical discussion. Go figure. Or better yet, they say that pornography as a medium is subject to philosophical scrutiny, but the films themselves are not worthy of philosophical examination. This is said only so that those philosophers who watch porn can hide the fact that they enjoy watching two or more of their fellow homo sapiens copulating). But, that claim, porn isn't philosophic -- especially that the movies themselves are not philosophic-- is exactly what you would hear from someone who doesn't watch porn! Nudie movies are a virtual treasure trail of philosophic questions (and answers!). Ask yourself these questions: does a man who is banging his sister and his mother really "have it all"? if you win the lottery, would it change what you consider to be important in life? what would happen if every hot chick suddenly found herself in a "no man's land"? Despite what may seem to be mere crappy plots to excuse various acts of sexual congress, there are genuine questions about life, sexuality, and morality (among other topics) to be found in adult films. I know when I think Sasha Grey, I think of Randian Objectivism and the possibility that Ms. Grey may in fact be living as a real-life, female embodiment of Rand's Howard Roark. We all know that pornography, by definition, appeals to the "prurient interests of the viewer and that there is a line of thought that goes, any sick and twisted thing you can think of, somebody's already done it. And filmed it. And posted it online. Former adult star Sharon Mitchell has noticed this as well. There is no situation that anyone can think of that someone hasn't done before. It's kind of like thinking up perversions is like trying to be more original than the Simpsons. You can think of a plot that you think is totally original and has never been done before, just to realize that the Simpsons already did it in season five. Porn is kind of like The Simpsons. If you can think of it and it involves people humping, you're bound to find that someone has filmed it and is selling it out there, somewhere. Well, the idea of any imaginable situation should sound familiar to philosophers. Philosophers make it their business to think of situations where any number of events or worlds are possible. We call them "thought experiments". The purpose of the thought experiment, according to the philosopher, is to mimic the methods of scientific experiments to test philosophic theories. Given a set of factors and a given situation, we can see what will happen. However, unlike the scientist, the philosophical thought experiment takes place within the confines of the mind. A famous thought experiment was created by Hillary Putnam called "twin earth". According to the experiment, we are supposed to imagine that we have been transported to a planet where, instead of calling what we call "water" H2OP, they call it 'xyz'. The question that we are to ponder is, " are xyz and H2O the same thing?" ( I swear I will learn how to do subscript on this laptop!). Whether we say that they are or are not the same thing depends on our theory. (There's alot to go into to answer the question. I will not go into any of that other than to say that our answer is "no"). Thought experiments are like philosophic porn. Not convinced? Think about it this way: porn has it's own kind of thought experiments (usually found venues like Penthouse Forum, usually starting with the phrase "I never thought this would happen to me..." ) Or better yet, think of this one: extremely horny hot chick pleasures herself near open window, hot chick sees peeping Tom and decides -- instead of calling the cops -- to invite him in for some unlawful carnal knowledge. For a moment, we don't know why she does. We may speculate as to why she would invite some dude that's been whacking it while leering at her through her window into her apartment. We might even say something like, "if I were that shick, I would beat that guy's ass so hard" -- and then procede to explain exactly what moral rules the peeping Tom broke that would merit a beat-down. We can apply pornography to real-life situations. Likewise, philosophers use thought experiments to do the same thing -- to create situations where we can apply philosophical theories to see how the theory might be applied (or misapplied) in the real world. Porn and philosophical thought experiments are alike in that each deals with a given situation where there are possibly any number of possible outcomes. In the situation where our hot chick finds a peeping Tom, she may have invited him in, or brought in an even hotter roomate for a threesome, or she may have simply called him a pervert and closed her window. (NOTE: the "rules", if you will, of porn are not as clear-cut as those in philosophy. if we are dealing with a thought experiment that involves some moral dilemma, our "rules" may be any number of ethical systems-- Kantian, utilitarian, egoism, relativism, etc. Oftentimes, our "rules" in pornography are determined by sub-genre -- fetish flicks, S&M, German poop flicks, and the like. To determine how we would apply porn plots to real-life events, we use the sub-genre as a guide, or rulebook). The real difference is that pornography deals with fucking of the corporeal variety, whereas with philosophy, the fuck is of a different sort -- the mind fuck. But as fanciful as the circumstances of our thought experiments may be, unlike your basic porn plot, philosophic thought experiments have to make sense. We are bound by rules (logic, theories, etc.). If I create a possible world it can't be a world where people are both alive and dead, or where there exists round squares. Pornography, on the other hand, seems to have no rules whatsoever. For instance, women, despite what the real world may tell you, actually enjoy having sex with any quantity or quality of men. This does not make sense. Between the two, you would think that porn is the more demented medium. Amazingly enough, the more demented is the thought experiment! With your garden variety porn flick, you get a formula guy/girl, some chick-on-chick action, denouement, roll credits. In mainstream (and I do emphasize mainstream) porn usually isn't violent. But that's all that thought experiments seem to come down to -- excuses to fuck other people up. Violently. If you spend any time reading philosophy, you'd notice that much of it is pretty devoid of sex (although I heard that Bertrand Russell was a bit of a playa). But, thought experiments are littered with all sorts of ending-with-violence scenerios. Philosophers are obsessed with killing people! You know, FBI profilers say that some serial killers use murder to substitute for something else. This isn't so far-fetched since the roots of philosophy valued reason over the passions. The philosophic life is one where the desires are ruled by the rational mind. We can be reasonable killers, that bis, we can always find some rational excuse for killing someone. Aside from it's mere biological usage, sex is always a matter of the senses (and therefore a bit difficult to control). I have noticed, however, that in plenty of thought experiments, people seem to get killed. For instance: 1) some fat bastard has managed to get his gianormity wedged in the only exit of a cave that is filling up with xyz (I mean water). Ten people will drown if we do not find a way to move the fat guy from the cave's entrance. Our only solution (or maybe the best solution, if you're a utilitarian) is to blast that fat ass dude to kingdom come, thus clearing the hole where the ten can escape from the rising water (why we can't use the explosives to blast another hole that we can escape through, I don't know). The point here seems to be it that someone has to die. And that is so, why not the fattest guy in the cave? He's probably the reason why everybody's insurance premiums went up, eh? 2) I'm on vacation in some unnnamed South American country. I am visiting a quaint and primative jungle village ( that is miles away from any legitimate authorities). For reasons resembling a 70s exploitation flick, I find myself in a situation wherein some sadistic general demands that I kill some villagers to save myself and the rest of the villagers. Besides this one being a total wtf, I'm thinking that if this were a movie, the general would be played by David Hess ( if you don't know who he is, and I hope you do, see the original Last House On the Left or House On the Edge of the Park. They're pretty much the same movie so it really doesn't matter which one you see, except the acting in Last House On the Left is slighly better. Slightly). 3) some dude has the unfortunate fate of being suspected of murder. the problem is is that he's innocent. but there is a growing mob outside and they're reving for blood. if we let the crowd have him, it will settle them down. Do we throw the innocent to the bloddthirsty crowd? If we do, letting him die might actually calm things down. 4) some minority group really pisses off some majority group. it's not because of anything that they do, it's because they exist. since the minority is so small and since they're causing some distress to the larger group (by taking up valuable land, resources, etc.), it would be better if we let the larger group eliminate the smaller group. according to this feel-good scenerio, my utilitarian calculus suggests that killing the minority is not just morally permissible, but morally obligatory. 5) i see some dude drowning. I can: a) save him, or b) let him drown. if i save him, i have just saved Hitler and I will be, in some round-about way, responsible for the deaths of over 50 million of my fellow human beings. if i let him drown, i'm more directly responsible for neglecting my duty to help others in need. which act do I perform? either way, people die, right? Talking about appealing to morbid interests! I can't think of any thought experiment where someone doesn't end up dead! Thought experiments ain't just "to mimic the method of scientific experiments". It's philosophical snuff porn!

Philosophic Conundrums

What's the concept of concept? Why isn't funny a funny word?

OMG! I'm White!

I've held, until this point, the idea that my blog posts would not become some sort of online diary. I didn't want my posts to end up sounding like Go Ask Alice. It is. The very nature of a blog makes it so. The fact that I choose to write about stuff that, in reality, matters to no one but me makes it the kind of self-indulgence that people like me complain about whenever we (I) look at other people's blogs. There's something a little funny about self-indulgence. The funny thing is, is that those who are prone to doing it often think that they're not self-indulgent at all. We tend to say that we're "reflective", or dare I say, "philosophic". Claptrap. Since I think I'm the only person that I know that will openly admit that some steroetypes are true, I was looking some time ago at the blog "Stuff White People Like". I realized, while I was looking (and laughing quite loudly, or LOLling), that alot of the stuff on the blog described me perfectly. I came to the horrific realization -- OH MY GOD, I'M WHITE! The fact that I am here, writing this blog post only serves to confirm the fact that I am indeed a white person ( #149 self-importance, which is just the same as self-indulgence). The problem is, though -- I'm not white. I had a conversation with a professor (who, if this list is anywhere near correct, may be the whitest person that I've ever met) about a year ago about "stuff white people like", and he maintained that the blog is more indicative of class than of race. Meaning, that if a person makes a certain amount of money and has a particular level of education, they are more likely to be a certain way, no matter the race. I actually expected him to answer the way that he did. You see, as the list suggests, white people like diversity. They also like the idea (and they will tell you at the drop of a hat) that all humans belong to the same race (i.e. the "human" race), so I expected that he would say that the list was about something other than race. Of course, given the fact that I was talking to a professor, if not race, then class. (What that meant is, that there is, as I see, an unwilingness among the "educated" to not tie any social problem to economy. This is a result of listening to too much Pacifica, I think). But, really, I am white. I mean, I like tea, I sport a "save Darfur" bracelet and a bracelet of coffee beans supporting free-trade coffee, I own 4 David Sedaris books, I like The Daily Show and The Colbert Report (and yes, in some strange way, Stephen Colbert is my ideal man), I listen to public radio and love "This American Life" (for the record, "Wiretap" is pretty good, too). I have a Liberal Arts degree (political science) and I have a degree in that Liberal Arts degree in disguise, philosophy. I'm crazy about recycling (I rinse, too). The only reason why I want to move to Canada is for the universal health care. Most disturbing is that I know who Noam Chomsky is. I've heard that there is something out there called gender dysmorphic disorder. If I'm not wrong on the name, as I am often wrong about a great many things --I know it's when a person feels that they were born the wrong gender. It's the classis Glenn or Glenda -- a man trapped in a woman's body (or as we've seen recently, a Chaz Bono trapped in a Chastity Bono's body). I wonder, could it be that it's possible for someone to be a white person trapped in a black person's body? I don't mean those kids who hang out at the mall with the sagging pants listening to Asher Roth. I'm talking about something that, if race is more than a social construct, and is (at least to some degree) biologically rooted, is it possible that nature, as in the case of gender, got something wrong? I was really trying not to bring Michael Jackson into this, but maybe instead of jesting at his becomming white, we should have recognized that he may have been sufferring from a real disorder. It may be possible that he was merely correcting a mistake -- he really was white. Maybe. I don't know. Maybe I should send a letter to David Duke and ask him what he thinks about it. LOL.

The Art Of Not Paying Attention

I was reading through an issue of Entertainment Weekly, when I read that The Seventh Seal was being released as part of the Criterion Collection. I know that the movie is supposed to be about life and death, and God and all that, and that it's one of those movies that I must see before I die -- and I have seen it -- it's just that I don't remember a damn thing of what I saw. What makes matters worse, is that I watched it in a philosophy class. You see, since I was in a philosophy class, I was supposed to be paying attention. And I thought that I was. Well, truth be told, I payed attention long enough to remember that there was some dude who played chess with Death (who, by the way, looked a little like Observer from Mystery Science Theater 3000. Maybe that was no accident.), and that they're all dead at the end. It's not that the movie ended on a sour note that did it, either. Hell, I like bummer movies. And It's not because it was in black and white. A few of my favorite movies were shot in black and white including Night of the Living Dead and The Bad Seed, both of which end with the deaths of the primary characters. And it wasn't because the movie was long and boring either. I made it through taking philosophy classes -- the realm of the tedious, sleep-inducing lecture. But a strange thing happened while I was watching this movie. It's like I was never there to see it. Physically I was there, but my mind decided to take the day off (or my experience machine had powered down for repairs or whatever), because anything that happened between the opening credits and when the screen went dark at the end is a blur. (Which, consequently, is kind of the same thing that happened to me when I saw Donnie Darko. The opening credits started, and then everything went black.) Even now when I try to think about what I saw, all I can remember is how much a young Max von Sydow doesn't look at all like Stellan Skarsgard, who played a younger Father Merin in the prequel(s) to The Exorcist. I remember more about those anal rapes they call the prequels to The Exorcist than I remember anything about an important film of philosophical significance. I know that this movie has lots of philosophical significance and that it is one of those movies that I'm supposed to see before I die, but I don't really feel that bad for having missed it. I feel bad for lots of things (some of which I'm sure to tell in detail in future posts), but I don't feel even the slightest bit of guilt for publically saying that I don't remember anything about this movie. Which makes me think of something that a psych 101 professor said. He said that, for most people, childhood, when they think back on their own, is filled with many memories. They remember trips to the Grand Canyon with the folks, or fishing Lake Erie with granddad (wait, would that be safe?), or having their cheeks pinched past the point of human endurance by grandma's knitting club (those women could have been guards at Gitmo). The point is, is that for most people, their childhood supplies them with many memories. Many memories of childhood, my psych prof said, is a pretty good indicator that a person had a fairly good childhood. But, for some people, he said, when asked about what they remember about being a kid, they usually say, "nothing". My professor said that people who truly had a bad childhood don't remember much, or what they do remember is sketchy at best. The point is, is that there was nothing that happened (while they were kids) that was worth remembering. That's why they draw a blank when they thing back to when they were young. (And until then, I thought that everyone's minds suddenly went blank after they reached four.) Anyway, I think that the same thing happened when I saw The Seventh Seal. I really didn't see anything worth remembering. I'm not saying that the movie sucked (after all, it's foreign -- and that means that it has to be good), but what I am saying is that I already saw Bill and Ted play Twister with Death much more entertainingly. Once you've seen the knock-offs, it's a little hard to appreciate the original. Like when you hear Beatles covers, and then hear the originals... kind of like that. So maybe what I am is a little jaded. Or maybe a little stupid.

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.

Conversation Enders # 1: Useless Topics For the Philosophically-Oriented Individual

I've been watching that series that my local PBS station has been airing lately, called Closer to Truth. It's about philosophy and all that stuff that shut-ins and insomniacs like to watch at god-awful hours of the night. Needless to say, I've been watching faithfully. There's alot about the show that deals with philosophy in general, about existence and minds and souls... but alot of it revolves around questions about God. If there is a God, how powerful is God, and so forth. I think that for many people, the subject of God isn't one that they sit and muse about -- at least not to the extent that philosophers do. For most people, I think, they don't need alot of the ultimately useless arguments that philosophers drag out and debate without ever solving or answering anything. Religious arguments are filled with all sorts of meaningless debates: how many angels can dance on the head of a pin? how powerful is God? is it possible that God can create a rock so heavy that he can't lift it? There aren't answers to these questions because the questions themselves are unanswerable. or more to the point, pointless. The point of asking, I think, is purely for entertainment. I think that it's a distraction. If we spend so much of our time arguing about angels on pins and whether God can do a Sisyphus impersonation, we aren't spending our time coveting our neighbor's wife, resenting and hating our parents for our messed-up childhoods, or masturbating. So taking up so much time, I suppose, is pleasing to God. Unfortunately, taking up so much time on these questions is not so entertaining for us, as I'm sure that the guy who takes these debates way too seriously will inevitably ruin the collective fun to be had by anyone else within their vicinity. However, if we look at the "debate" philosophically, we'd see that it is fun (for awhile, anyway) to play around with genuine philosophically debatable topics such as the nature of existence -- our own and God's. But, sometimes we find that throwing out one of those useless questions actually helps us to thnk about the legitimate questions. Some time ago, I had a rather spirited discussion with a classmate about the question whether God can create a rock so heavy that he is unable to lift it. We both understood that the question itself is pointless, and more to the point, it is unanswerable. But, despite my objections to the question itself, I held that the answer is yes. God can indeed create a rock so heavy that he can't lift it. The point of asking, for those who aren't familiar with this supposed biblical conundrum, is to get to God's omnipotence. How powerful is God is the question. Uh oh. There's trouble. The immediate objection is supposed to be how can a being that is all-powerful create an object that he cannot lift? If there is at least one object that an all-powerful being cannot lift, then he is not all-powerful. If he is not all-powerful, then he is not God (since God is supposed to be so). This is supposed to be a smackdown. But I say, as Hamlet told Horatio, "there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of by mere humans". (I think that's what he said). I say that the God that I used to believe in is exactly that -- all-powerful, which means that there is no thing that he cannot do. This no thing includes creating contradictions. I know, red flag right there. The philosopher is screaming that we cannot create contradictions. That's right. We can't. We cannot be alive and dead. We cannot be in two places at once. God can. (If you beileve the Trinity, the idea of God being alive and dead simultaneously becomes apparent when you thinbk about the crucifixion of Christ. At least for 3 days, God was alive and dead). God can be everywhere and nowhere (kind of like the internet) in space. God is everywhere but nowhere in time. I can't be anywhere but at this one place at a particular point in time, but that's because I am human, and I am bound by laws that God put in place for humans to follow. Unless I am illiterate, nowhere in any religious text includes the expressed words that God is also bound by his own laws. The fact that I see the world in a certain way leads me to assume that the way I see things is the way that it must be for everything else. There's no reason why I should assume that my limited capacities should also apply to God. (Especially given the fact that God is not human). The fact that we cannot understand God's power does not give us reason to doubt that God possesses capabilities to do things that we cannot. (We readily accept other things that we cannot do that God can like creating the universe and all that dwell within it). Wr mistakenly assume that God we can comprehend the power of God. That assumption is more than a little arrogant. The fact that God can do things that we cannot do or comprehend ( as in how a contradiction can be actualized) goes to prove that God is more powerful than we can possibly imagine. If it seems counterintuitive or just plain wrong that God can create something like a rock so heavy that he cannot lift it -- congradulations! Your puny human mind can't comprehend the awsome, unlimited power of the Creator! And that's just my point. When I say that I believe that God is all powerful, I am asserting that he is all-powerful. There is not a believer or philosopher that will deny all-powerfulness to God's attributes. But, they will simultaneously assert that God cannot do something like create contradictions. I wonder then, if they are saying that God's powers are qualified? That is, God is something like 99.9% omnipotent? God can do everything, except he won't do that ( and yes, I realize that I just took a line from a Meatloaf song). Is this what they're saying? I suspect that, when a philosopher says that God cannot create too heavy rocks or any other contradictions (because for instance, he is bound by the laws of physics), he is saying that God's power is limited. If you want to say that this universe is governed by a not-quite God (that is, he's the 99.9% powerful God), then so be it.I'll still maintain that the God I'd like to believe exists is one that, at any moment, could reverse gravity and turn humanity into living dead things. It's just that he chooses to keep things the way that they are. But then, that's another matter for another day. See how much time I wasted talking about all that just now?

The Great Personality Test

I think I'm fairly smart. Someone once told me that I "look smart". This is not a compliment. I also had a friend that told me that I have a way about me that puts other people at ease. In short, I have a "Great Personality". ... and we all know what that means. Earlier this year, First Lady, Michelle Obama, made Maxim magazine's hot chicks list. Ok, she was in the 90s, but, hey she made the list. Former supermodel and wife of David Bowie, Iman said the she was going to be honest about the whole Michelle Obama thing. She said, and I'm taking some liberties in recalling this, that the First Lady is not all that, and that she is an "interesting" looking woman. Iman polished the insult by adding that, more importantly, Michelle Obama is very intelligent -- and that, in the long run, that's what's important. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out what Iman meant. If you have a list of hot chicks, Michelle Obama does not belong on that list -- even if her guns are spectacular. Hot chick lists, let's face it, are basically a list of chicks that a guy (and I guess some ladies, if they are so inclined) whack it to. A really tall black chick with big biceps and an underbite I would guess wouldn't pop up in a list that includes the likes of Scarlet Johansson and Megan Fox. What we're talking about, whether we say someone is hot, smokin', fine, tight, the bees knees or the cat's pajamas, or just plain "f"-able, is beautiful. And as usual, philosophers will stick their noses into any subject on which one can form an opinion. The science of beauty is no exception. The arena of philosophy that deals with beauty and what is beautiful is called aesthetics. When philosophers speak about beauty it's usually in discussions about art, music, or nature, or (even) the sciences or the beauty in a theory. When Bertrand Russell wrote about mathematics, he wrote mathematics, "rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty -- a beauty cold an austere... without appeal to any part of our weaker nature, without the gorgeous trappings of painting or music..." . The beauty of mathematics, for Russell, is found in the symmetry and consistency of things like a math equation. Now, I realize that I have stepped into the glass house and locking the door behind me, but if one looked at Mr. Russell, one would not wonder why he felt as such. I suppose that many a philosophy professor has, on the first day of class, surveyed his class, knowing which students are destined to become philosophy majors. I would guess that it's safe to assume that the good looking students are there for the credits. And that we are truly flabbergasted when they are not. Which, may in my case, explain why not one, but three of my philosophy professors recommended that I become a philosophy major (winking emoticon). There is all sorts of philosophy talk about beauty when it comes to art, or music, or even the beauty of math or science. But what about people? ...Which makes me think of our latest pop cultural encounter with Britain's Got Talent second runner-up and recent freak-out participant, Susan Boyle. Unfortunate Sue has been described as "unique", "talented", "special", "endearing", and so on. The thing is, is that people are attempting to find something complimentary to say about a woman in a culture where most of any compliments payed to anyone is focused primarily on one's looks. Since she's not ... we must find something nice to say. Hence, Susan Boyle is "great", or the half-assed insult a "plain jane". In a Star Magazine article from May 4, 2009, the article was entitled "What A Voice!". The article even featured a digitized "make-over" of Susan Boyle if she decides (oh, please do!) to change her image. But, the emphasis on her voice made me think of what Iman said. We can say to Susan Boyle, "At least you have your voice, because in the long run, that's what's important". (What's funny is that in that same issue, there was an article about IndyCar racer, Danica Patrick, who was featured in a bikini. I don't think that the article contained anything about her racig record or anything about IndyCar racing in general. The point of the feature is that Danica Patrick is hot.)If one is so inclined, pay attention to how the entertainment press speaks about Susan Boyle. Her looks become the 500 lb. gorilla in the room. At times, they speak of her appearance as one would speak of someone with a handicap or birth defect. (Susan "overcomes" the odds and "triumphs". What odds, I wonder?) They show digitized "before and after" photos like the before and after photographs are displayed on informercials about little kids in Central America after they get surgery on their cleft palates. It's kind of sickening. But strangely, alot of philosophy is mum on the matter. That doesn't mean that it's not discussed. There is plenty of talk about what or who we consider beautiful. But it seems that the old pros to whom we often refer are strangely silent about beauty and people. Maybe it's because, unlike our thoughts on the nature of reality or whether utlitarianism or Kantianism are viable moral theories, judging how we look, whether we are considered "beautiful" or not, is kind of personal. That is, beauty, unlike the way we'd like to think of our philosophy, is a matter of taste. It's what you think that matters -- but not in the quatifiable, logically sound, way that philosophers like their theories -- it's gut reactions, it's... what or who you like, and there's absolutely no logic to be found in that. We can't say with certainty that our belief that such and such or whoever is beautiful is true. Enevitably, someone will disagree with our choice. When we talk about beauty, it affects us in a way that our beliefs do not. You can be the smartest, most talented guy in the world (and you've figured out how to get around Hume's problem of induction), voted five times-- in a row-- the funniest fellow on earth, but if you look like Joseph Merrick, chances are you won't be dating much (especially if you happen to be of the female persuasion). When it comes to the perceptions and judgments of others, we can obscure our beliefs in ways that we cannot when it comes to our appearance. We can hide our atheism in a crowd of Christians, but hiding your face, unless one has religious reasons for doing so, is slightly more difficult. Beauty, being a matter of taste and as we all know, is a matter of contrasts. That is, things tend to be judged in accordance to something else. Something that is beautiful is more pleasing than some other thing. So, if Bertrand Russell were to look at any standard derivation next to my own theory of inconsistentism, it's fairly obvious which one would be more pleasing to his eye. But, when we say something is more pleasing, what we may be suggesting that something is better than something else. When we say something is better, we imply that something is good (one thing is gooder than another thing). Good, according to the philosopher, is something that is not merely physical, but is something that is transcendent. The mere pleasures associated with the corporeal are often favored less than those goods that go beyond the transitory physical world. Aristotle famously wrote that a life devoted exclusively to physical pleasure is the life of beasts. (it's worth noting that Aristotle wrote "exclusively" devoted to pleasure). We know that, by reading Plato, Kant, Mill, and the like, that what is good is not always what is pleasurable. This suggests that, if beauty is associated with some good (I really should be using a capital G when writing good), that what is beautiful may not always be what is pleasing to the eye. If anyone remembers high school algebra ( I do, I took it twice), quadratic equations are most displeasing to the eye. If we were to ask Russell, we could bet that he would see nothing but pure beauty. Good, as it is thought of philosophically, involves some sort of ultimate end, purpose or function. It's easy to see this when we think of art. Although we may disagree what is art, or which art is beautiful, we can agree that when we look at a piece of art, we have in our minds some list of qualities that we use to judge the merits of a particular piece of work. We may look for symmetry or overall composition. We look at color, or how closely the piece reflects reality. If I say that I judge the artistic merit of a particular piece of art on how it represents reality, I am saying that I am judging how closely the piece comes to showing the world as it really is. What I am looking for is how accurately the piece tells the truth. And we know, of course, that Truth is Good. Truth is an element of the Good. And good art,if it is Good then, it must be truthful. Any truth contributes to the overall, collective good (oops, Good). Plato's Republic, bk. III has Socrates explaining how the arts must be taught to bring about the ideal society. Socrates says that art, music, poetry, education, exercise (among other things) must be taught correctly if society is to foster the right characteristics in its citizens. (These characteristics include moderation, courage, and truthfulness). On the topic of music, Socrates states that is important to teach the right kind of music, "Because rhythm and harmony most of all insinuate themselves into the inmost part of the soul... and they make a man graceful in he is correctly reared, if not, the opposite... the man properly raised on rhythm and harmony would have the sharpest sense for what's been left out and what isn't a fine product or craft or what isn't a fine product of nature..." According Plato (or Socrates, whichever one you believed actually existed), a man who is raised on the right art is a better perciever of what is Good. This ability contributes to the soul. A good judge of what is Good has an enhanced soul, a Good soul. This, of course, allows us to infer that a person who lives life philosophically is, in the Platonic sense, a beautiful person, even if, according to our standards, they are not. Other philosophers, such as Nietzsche, made a similar connection between art and the soul. Art, says Fred, binds the emotion and rational spirits within man (oops, Man) together. From Plato to Marx, art serves a social/political function. "Beautiful" art enhances the individual. But what about people? Beauty in art, from the artist's perspective, is meant to illicit an response. Most likely, the desires response is emotional. (I really can't imagine any artist who wanted exclusively physical repsonses from his audience. Oh, wait. I may have thought of one. One may be the late Bob Flannigan. There's no way you can look at what he did and not react physically). Anyway, where was I? Was I anywhere? If an artist wants to cull an emotional response from his audience, he knows that the reaction will enevitably be varied and relative. "One man's junk is another man's treasure", they say. But, that's what we want to avoid in philosophy -- Relativity. Relativity negates the notion of innate goodness (or truth), which is exactly what we are speaking of when we look for the Good. What the philosopher looks for is some quality that is universally applicable (transcendental ideals or forms, if you prefer), or at least something near consistent. But art or whatever we're looking at that can, in one man stir his emotions while leaving another man stoically unaffected is not what we want. It doesn't help us to answer the question. If we regard beauty in the way that the artist takes his art, then what we deal with is mere felt responses, we get good, but only in the material sense -- not the higher, transcendent, capital G good that we're looking for! Maybe that's the problem. If we look at the biological function of beauty, we see that beauty or appealingness serves the purposes of reproduction. I heard on the news that there is a greenery that houses a flower called a "corpse flower". It is set to bloom sometime this week. The smell of the flower, they say, is akin to the smell of rotting flesh. That smell, although cringe inducing to us, is the sweet smell of honey to the various incects that catch a whiff of the aroma and are drawn to it. The smell is how the flower attracts bugs that will aid in its reproduction. We don't like the smell (and anyone who does seriously needs to get checked out). But the smell is not for us. It's to get a response out of another animal. The smell's please-a-bility is relative to what kind of species you are. The same may be for beauty. That is, it isn't a matter of goodness (unless you consider reproduction a Good), but a matter of taste. Perhaps the intrinsic goodness of beauty is that it facilitates a greater goodness, namely that finding Angelina Jolie smokin' hot contributes to the propagation of the human species. I know that this is something of a look to the biology (i.e. reductionist) answer. And I know that reductionist answers (or explanations, as I say), do little if anything to satisfy the philosophic heart of the questions we are attempting to answer. But, really, it's the best I can do. If it's any consolation, as someone who sports one of those terrific personalities, I'd personally like to think that there is something that is intrinsic to beauty that is beyond one's mere physical appearance. That there is indeed, such a thing as a beautiful soul.

Metacognition

I sat in on a friend's epistemology class a few days ago. Sitting there, being DREADFULLY quiet, reminded me of a few things. Foremost, it reminded me how much I desire a sort-of laymen's philosophy, or a philosophy lite (it's less filling, but it still tastes great). I'm not saying that what's needed is something that should be dumbed down (strange that so many people seem to believe that if you attempt to simplify things that you automatically dumb it down. This is not so), but we need something that is accessible. Something that is something that people want to learn. And sitting there in that classroom reminded me of why there are so many people out there who badmouth academia in general and philosophy in particular. It wasn't fun! I've heard all throughout my academic "career" that learning isn't always supposed to be fun. That sometimes things had to be slogged through and endured. But why? Why should somethng that is, at it's core, supposed to be about the whole of humankind so repellent to nearly everyone who encounters it? Is that the way that is't really supposed to be? I was listening to Bill Nye (the science guy) talking to George Norry explaining how teachers should teach science to kids (screw kids, they should be teaching this way to adults!). He said learning about science should be fun. That's what makes people want to learn more. People want to remember what they learned from an enjoyable experience and tend to want to forget what happened during crappy events. I heard a biologist say that, despite the fact that the human brain has receptors for pain and none for pleasure, sexual intercourse feels good because it's supposed to be done. You'll be more likely to keep doing it (and thus, keep procreating) if what you're doing feels more pleasurable as opposed to having the sensation that you've been jabbed through the eye with a hot poker... repeatedly. The human race would not have come (no pun intended) far if every time one had sex, you did something unpleasant like vomiting uncontrolably. Well, philosophy ain't sex, but there's really no justification (to use a philosophy word, here) as to why learning all this philosophy stuff has to feel like the hot poker instead of poking the hot chick. I heard a fellow student lament that we were spending so much time plowing away at theories that we weren't doing much philosophizing. He said we were spending too much time reading and not enough time talking (but then, he did say that he's a postmodernist). The professional philosophers are too wrapped up in being purists about what they do to see that what they're doing is supposed to be ... well, like life. and so far as I've been able to see, life ain't pure. it's kind of messy and hopelessly prone to inconsistency. But that's exactly my point. I sat in a really quiet classroom that day, and quite frankly, I worried that no one in that classroom would remember anything that they had heard the professor say that morning once the class had ended. When I talked to my friend after her class, I told her that one problem with philosophy is that there is so much heavy lifting involved with learning anything (most people have neither the time nor the inclination to dredge through learning the intricacies of Kant's Transendental Idealism or Rusellian definite descriptions), that people get turned off to the whole project. They shouldn't. I told her that, and I wholeheartedly believe this, nearly any philosophic theory can be distilled to a core set of ideas that can be expressed in five sentences or less. I said that I am an existentialist, but that existentialism can be reduced (another philosophic term) to a handful of core ideas. As long as you get those, you qualify. All that other stuff -- the heavy lifting -- is good to know, but not absolutely necessary for solving life's little dilemmas or figuring out which space to park at Target. I think that, if someone said that if you never learned how to read, and you were a Christian, all you really need to know are the Ten Commandments and "The Golden Rule", and if you obey those two main guidelines you'd be a fairly successful Christian, that no one would object. It's good to read Jude, but not totally necessary if you want to live according to the life of Christ. The same goes for philosophy. Quite frankly, I think that sometimes reading it is what causes the problem. Besides, Sartre is beyond boring. Like living as a Christian, the emphasis of philosophy should be as living life as a philosopher. Living, at least the last time I checked, has to do with occasionally having some fun. The essence of life is not only to learn as much as you can but to enjoy the moments that you have. We have a limited time here (in this life or this incarnation or whatever), and should be room for us to not only read what others have to say about what all this is and means, but to occasionally try it out for ourselves. You might not get it exactly right, but at least we know how it works in the real world. The object here isn't just to think and think about what we are thinking (about), but to do. Speaking of do... I had debated for a long time whether I should eventually get around to admitting to myself why I started all this philosophy business in the first place. My question was never regarding whether I was going to admit it (since I already have to several people), but whether putting it in a blog would scoot my semi-serious philosophical explorations from legit to Go Ask Alice. I think that the last thing that anyone would or should masquerade as philosophy is a bunch of diary entries -- though I suspect this is exactly what Rene Descartes did in his Meditations. I tend to think that, in the realm of philosophy, that ethics is really the only philosophy that matters. That's because no matter how much we may argue for a particular epistemic or ontological postition or view, we'll never know if what we say or believe is "truth" or not. With ethics, we can pick a theory, put it into practice, and get results. We can see where utlitarianism goes awry, we can see the benefits of egoism, or determine that Kant's ethics are the best set ot moral principles after all. We can do ethics. So much of ethics, and I think that this is true, even for the utilitarian, deals with motivation. We don't only ask what we should do, but also why we should or shuld not engage in a particular act. Asking ourselves these questions usually helps most of us to act in a reasonably morally correct manner. Unfortunately, some of us ask ourselves this question -- in particular the why part-- a little late. Like, three quarters before we graduate with a degree in philosophy kind of late. Sitting in my friend's epistemology class reminded me that, had I properly evaluated my intentions, I should have not pursued a philosophy degree. So, what's my reason? Why did I decide to take up philosophy? The short answer is: cute guy. If there is anything that would make philosophy unfun (besides reading Kant), it's taking up a major for the sole purpose of staring at the professor. It's typical, it's lame, and it never comes of anything... but that's my reason. I'm not embarassed about many things (things I should be embarassed about), but that's definitely one of them. Now, if you're sharp, you've already connected why I mentioned that epistemology class. Have Fun!

Everything I Needed To Know, I Sure As Hell Didn't Learn It In School

You ever look back on what you thought you knew when you were younger, and feel totally embassesed about all the stuff that you thought you knew but really didn't know? I was thinking, a few days ago, about which of my high school classes I felt that I had actually learned anything that I consider of any lasting value. I think that, of all of the classes I took, my English classes were the ones that I did any actual learning in. That totally sucks, beacuse it's now that I realize how much all that math was actually going to be used in the "real" world. I so suck at math. I decided to revisit some of my high school reading, since I still have some of the books that I was assigned to read way back then. I had King Lear in my hand when I happened upon my copy of Franz Kafka's The Metamorphoses. I read it when I was in the 12th grade. I guess that reading something like Kafka was suppsoed to be something that the "smart" kids were supposed to do, since it was one of those "thinkin' people's" books. It had philosophical subtext. I've read The Metamorphoses since leaving high school, but until I held it in my hand at that point, I hadn't realized how dumb I was when I read it. Let me explain: For those who are unfamiliar with the basic plot of the story, there's this guy, Gregor Samsa (one of the coolest character names in literary history), who wakes up one morning to find himself turned into a giant cockroach. His family is horrified by what he has become, and he spends the rest of the novel closed up in his bedroom. There's som hijinks with some lodgers, Gregor gets pelted with apples, and eventually he dies. The story ends with his family going out on a picnic, and a strange description of Gregor's nubile teenaged sister stretching her body out in the sun (that part always made me a little fearful for any sisters that Kafka might have had. It's creepy). Anyway, when we read the book in class, our English teacher asked the class if we thought that Gregor Samsa had literally turned into a bug? After all, the text clearly says that when Gregor awoke form unsettling dreams, he found that he had been turned into a giant beetle. Being that we were, for the most part, all of 17 to 18 years old, and that most, if not all of us were totally unaware of what Existentialism was, much less had read any, most of us said yes, we believed that Gregor Samsa had indeed inexplicably turned from man to insect. I don't want to boast, because I was and remain an incredibly stupid person, but I disagreed. It seemed kind of fishy to me that he would change from a human to a bug, and that his family didn't react the way that one might expect that one would act if a family member had been suddenly replaced by a roach. What's funny is that my teacher seemed more willing to entertain the opinions of those who believed that Gregor Samsa had shapeshifted and became vermin (oh, wait, vermin is rodents). When I took logic, I had a hard time trying to figure out why I had to learn this stuff, other than to keep a professor employed. (If someone had told me that was the reason, I would have probably done better in the class... nah!) The same thing happened again when I took philosophy of language ( that time, I actually registered my protest with the professor, which is not a very smart thing to do). But, when I think about the use of philosophy, it rings loud and clear when I think about reading The Metamorphosis -- it's useful to save yourself from embarassment! I can't possibly imagine the absolute embarassment when one of my former, fellow students, standing at a cocktail party, says when asked about the meaning of Kafka's masterpiece, "It was really gross when he turned into a bug!" I can imagine the looks of their learned companions, reeling back in disgust at the fact that someone missed the point of the book entirely. What we had missed, in that 12th grade English class, was the underlying philosophical context of the story. Well, it wasn't that it was missed, so much as it wasn't taught. We didn't get the Existentialist point of view that Kafka was using to tell us what was going on in Gregor Samsa's mind. If we had had that bit of useful information, we would have never wasted valuable class time trying to figure out if Gregor Samsa had actually turned into a bug! By engaging in a meaningless distraction, we missed the point of the book. We read it, but we didn't understand it. Which is how I pretty much feel whenever I open up a logic text. But at least I know that Gregor Samsa didn't turn into a bug!

What Makes A Philopsopher?

I was reading the latest issue of Rolling Stone magazine a couple of days ago. There was an article inside about Cornell West. The author of the article called West a "philosopher". I was thrown off a little bit by the designation. Here was a nationally, if not internationally known magazine, and on the cover, it identified Cornell West as a philosopher. Now, I know that professionally speaking, he is a professor of religion at Princeton. And I know that, in that case, there is a tremendous amount of philosophy to be had. But, somehow, despite this fact, he doesn't fit into what I had been taught what a philosopher is. And yes, despite it's unhipness, I still read Rolling Stone magazine. Although I enjoy Blender much more. By his own description, Cornell West fancies himself a jazzman and a bluesman. He speaks in the language that is understood by all feeling people -- much like everybody, no matter what race, gender, or social status, sometimes feels the blues. This made me think about what I'm doing, or at least attempting to do. My project, this blog, is meant to help me (and hopefully others eventually) to undestand philosophy through the medium of popular culture. Like Cornell West's view on the universality of the blues, I feel that the universality of popular culture is the best medium to use to communicate the themes that affect all of us. We all live in a world affected by television, motion pictures, music, the internet, and plain human interaction. Everyting is influenced by something, and those somethings are the ideas, some of which were thought up by some people called philosophers. As Cornell West calls himself a jazzman, I call my philosophy "zeitgeistology" (or philosogeistology). It's seeing how the "spirit" of our times affects the old ideas and principles that we hold and have influenced how we think and live. When I hear West or read about him, he suggests that our world, though shaped by ideas, is a world of humans of all stripes, who have to communicate and interact with each other. We can't divorce ourselves from our views of the world no matter how hard we may try. There are no impartial observers. And that's just the thing. I ask, when I write, when I think philosophically, how much of myself should I bring into what I think and say? Should all of my term papers be expressed from the point of view of "I"? Is it possible to look at life as an impartial observer? Should I look at life from that point of view? If I should be personal, where do I cross the line from personal to diary entry? And if I do, does that mean I've stopped thinking philosophically? I've been writing this blog (and my soon to be uncompleted book) for some time now, and time and again I feel that I'm missing something. I feel that there is something that I am not covering. Should I be saying something profound and important? Or should I say something about what is important? It's difficult, especially in light of the fact that "philosophers" aren't the most revered people in society to maintain that any of this philosophic thinking matters. There are plenty of accusations of overthinking (something I admit that I do anyway, and started long before I ever stepped foot in a philosophy class), or not being productive -- which means, in short, it's great to do all that thinking, but being a philosopher don't pay the bills. Unless you're Oprah, people don't pay you for your opinions. Maybe it's a matter of what you call it, but when I tell people that I have a philosophy degree, I get lots of rolled eyes and "boy, that's a useless degree!". But here's the funny thing about all of it. The same people that will tell you that you wasted the state's money getting a useless degree (and I've been told exactly that), will occasionally say a bit of philosophy. The thing is, is that they don't know that even though they'll say that all that opinionizing is stupid, in the same conversation, they might say, "what does not kill me makes me stronger", or explain the drawbacks of inductive reasoning without ever realizing that they just quoted Nietzsche or paraphrased Hume. Even though they won't admit it (and I'm saying "they" to mean professional philosophers and laymen alike), everyone is a philosopher. It would be difficult for me to make a strong claim that I am a surgeon, despite the fact that I have no medical degree, but I can sure as hell say that I am a philosopher. If I've ever sat and thought for more than five minutes on any given topic (helps if they are the "big" topics), I am a philosopher. No degree is necessary. I was listening to a lecture given by the late Alan Watts last week. He was talking about what's wrong with Western philosophy. He said that the problem with philosophy in the West is that it got away from it's point, its mission. Philosophy in the West became so theory laden and bogged down in terminology that it forgot its purpose. It forgot the questions that it was meant to solve. Worse yet, Watts claimed, it forgot about the people involved in it. Philosophy had committed a mortal sin -- it had become disconnective. It's that same feeling of disconnectivity that had always bothered me while I was earning my degree. I thought, if I couldn't connect to it -- and I was studying philosophy -- how in the hell was any of this was supposed to connect to any of the naysayers out there? We can't just ignore them. But that's just what I saw was going on. I kept asking who are we doing this for? What purpose do we, philosophers serve if no one is interested in hearing us speak? If the only people who are interested in philosophy are other philosophers, then we are committing the worst kind of intellectual crime. What we are doing isn't the pursuit of knowledge, it's masturbation. It's alot of workin' and jerkin' but ultimately you're only with yourself. You can't say that you scored last night if your hot date was your own hand. Likewise, you can't say that you did anything useful for humanity and the pursuit of knowledge if the only people who see it are just like you. This stuff that we were doing and thinking about was meant to help. The professors kept insisting that learning how to do derivations and stuff ws supposed to make us sharper thinkers. But what good is sharper thinking when everyone wlse out there looks at you and shrugs? The world has neglected the philosopher, and people seem to be getting along just fine. I think that what Alan Watts said is still true. There is something wrong with the entire project. Having recently left the halls of academia, I will tell you that the problem starts there. Allow me to relay a personal story: I had a classmate, who for personal reasons, could not attend class. Since I like to write, I tend to take rather detailed notes ( for which I pat myself on the back). I made arrangements with this student that I would take notes and then hand copies over to that student. I hadn't spoken to the student in a while so, and maybe this is where I made a mistake, asked the professor if there was any complaint about the quality of my notes ( I would hate it if someone was giving me shitty notes so I asked to see if my notes were ok). The professor did answer my question, that is, there was no complaint, but then added a bit of well... TMI. The professor said that they were disappointed that that student had come along that far without anyone telling them that that should have taken another (different) major. The student wasn't cut out for philosophy, and should have been persuaded to do something else. Now, my first inclination was to say that it seemed that the professor was suggesting that that student was stupid. And the fact is, is that that student was not. I had had plenty of discussions with that person where we did some pretty heaving thinking -- some of it beyond what we were learning -- meaning sometimes we were ahead of the lesson. But what really got to me was the idea that anyone would say that you're not good at thinking. That's a pretty big statement to make. I thought to myself, who on God's green earth made it so that a person needed to have a degree to qualify us to be or not to be something?!? Especially in light of the fact that life is something that we all experience. We've all asked, in one form or another, 'why am I here?' or 'why do I believe the way that I do?'. When I spoke to my classmate, there was no indication that this person operated subpar. The problem was, they often said, is that the lessons weren't connecting to anything. There was all that talk, but there was no life in it. I would say to my classmate, I'm sure if you asked my logic professor if I was worthy of being a philosopher, the professor would most assuredly say no. To be honest, I flunked my first logic class, and the last one I took, I barely passed with a D- (yep. No joke. The lowest passing grade above an F). I remember sitting in that first go-around at logic 200, wondering how this connected to anything. I knew that it mattered abstractly and that I should take it seriously, but there was nothing that made me want to study it. It just wasn't concrete to me. Which brings me to another point. There's a reason why, if one would listen, as to why people on the outside have a particular disdain for philosophers. There are some people who seem to delight in knowing some things that other people don't know, or that people don't understand. There is way too much of this going on in philosophy. Announcing to your class that most people won't pass the class on the first day of class becomes self-fufilling. I know that it's meant to weed out the chaff, but it also says to people who may be genuinely interested, 'Go away. You can't cut it'. More importantly, it re-inforces the idea that I-know-something-you-don't-know attitude that people claim that philosophers have. That kind of undermines the whole idea of doing it, doesn't it? I had asked a professor, once if philosophers were going the way of the alchemist? I said that, in a world of psychologists, anthropologists, linguists, sociologists, doctors of medicine, physicists, and neuroscientists, things that were once speculated upon are now being explained and demonstrated. The terminology has been made readily accessible and easy to understand. It's put into the common vernacular. No one looks to the philosopher for answers much anymore (there's an argument to be made that ethics is still a thriving field, but that's about it. And really, why go to an ethicist when you can call Dr.Laura?). When we want answers about the workings of the human body, we don't read Descartes, we turn to Dr.Oz, or if we want to know what makes people tick, we watch Dr. Phil, or Dr. Laura, or if we need a professional to tell us why our girlfriend is a total whack-job, we'll ask Dr. Drew Pinsky. Nobody out there reads Aristotle or Bentham (for answers, anyway). For most folks, so far as philosophy goes, I said, it's nice to know, but it can't give you the gold you're looking for. And I think that's why Cornell West appeals to people. He's learned, but he understands that this -- all this thinking about life and our place in it -- has to appeal to the common folk. Life doesn't just affect philosophers or the well-educated. He doesn't hold back because this has to do with all of us. We can't afford to leave anyone behind. You can't keep knowledge and truth away from people. It's immoral to do so. In the Rolling Stone article, the author said that everyday people rallied around West in the street, carrying copies of his book. Now, I'm sure that some of those people wouldn't be philosophy student material. But, they wanted to know -- they wanted to learn. When someone expresses an interest in learning, if they are filled with a curiosity about life, if they want to understand the why we do and think, even if they don't get all of the heavy lifting (which may, in the long run, be more extraneous than useful) -- if they want to learn, you teach them. You don't lament that no one flushed that student out. Because as Cornell West will tell you, everyone gets the blues. And there is no one who is not entitled to the title philosopher.

On A Tangentally Philosophic Topic

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