Most every philosophy student knows the cultural differences argument, and knows that it is untenable. For the fact that something immoral is a cultural practice does not make it right. In certain Muslim communities female circumcision is a cultural practice. It is brutal, degrading and reinforces whatever female stereotypes were not already embedded in the minds of every Muslim male in the world. Mainly that women are second class citizens, lesser people, and unable to control their sexual urges, and therefore need this sort of brutal genital mutilation performed on them so that sex will not be as pleasurable.
Nevertheless, there are some cultural differences we just have to live with. Americans prefer the right to buy assault rifles so much that they would increase the chance of their children being shot and killed by them just to hold onto that right; and that's fine.
Americans would rather have more gun shops, liquor stores, and advertising in their cowboy style, free market (and altogether tyrannical and utterly brutal and cold) capitalistic system than a well-funded education system, restrictions on manipulative ads - especially those targeted at children - and a good public transport system. That's okay too.
They're Americans. That's just who they are. The words Benjamin Franklin muttered to his dog are more important that the critical words against a military industrial complex, some fairly recent - and therefore not as good (in their minds) - president spoke against an expensive and not to mention Empire-like ("like" used for sake of generosity) foreign policy.
But, this is an instance when they're no longer confined to their own borders and their idiocy effects other people's lives. But forget about that. Even if the American people don't like it, Halloburton and other private contractors are making too much for that ever to stop.
What about health care? I think health care is a right. If someone is bleeding (possibly to death) I think it is a moral imperative to take every effort to stop their bleeding and heal their wounds. Is this imperative balancing on an ultimate principle or a great foundational premise which existed before the dawn of time and will go on existing ad infinitum? No; I just think that a country as rich as the US should do the very least, and insure that every one of their citizens is sure that as long as they can call for an ambulance or otherwise get themselves to a hospital, they will not be turned away for not having the right insurance plan or enough money.
I know that doctors help people even if they don't have insurance and good for them. Like police officers, fire-fighters and other such civil servants, they put their own well-being (financial or otherwise) on the line for others. But wait a minute... Doctors aren't civil servants. They can act as if money is not their only and sole objective in the practice of their craft, bur for too many of them it is.
Paying certain people - who hold vocational jobs - less, so as to encourage, only the pure of heart (those truly devoted to helping and healing others in this case) to take it up is not so bad.
Anyways, whether or not it will drive up overall costs, or take away some of your disposable income but providing health care for all people must be done. It is a moral imperative, if there ever was one.
Obama has got to stop fumbling around with this public-option plan and just shove universal health care down America's throat.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Freedoms Clash
I would just like to clarify something. Conservatives and libertarians (American libertarians) shout freedom as if it is one singular thing; it is not:
If I want to give individuals the economic freedom to work a job they like or pays well enough to make it worth it or even organize a union to make their job worth the pay, that freedom conflicts directly with the freedom of the market.
Unless you really are a fascist, no sensible person is against freedom, they're just for the ones they think are more important.
Stop telling people they're against freedom or democracy when they are simply against your interpretation and your desired implementation of the two and argue why their democracy harbours less of what is truly important and significant about democracy and why their freedoms are arbitrary and have no precedence over the freedoms you support.
If I want to give individuals the economic freedom to work a job they like or pays well enough to make it worth it or even organize a union to make their job worth the pay, that freedom conflicts directly with the freedom of the market.
Unless you really are a fascist, no sensible person is against freedom, they're just for the ones they think are more important.
Stop telling people they're against freedom or democracy when they are simply against your interpretation and your desired implementation of the two and argue why their democracy harbours less of what is truly important and significant about democracy and why their freedoms are arbitrary and have no precedence over the freedoms you support.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Linguistic Determinism
Are the limits of your language also the limits of your world? (Wittgenstein, roughly.)
The affirmation of the above statement would mean that when you can't put your thought into word, not only can't you express them, but neither can be even think them. I would have to agree with the empiricists rejection of this principle: knowledge arises from experience. (if not only from experience than also from experience.) I may be a compatibalist in the sense that I think its plausible that language and the acquisition of language broadens your intellectual or more correctly, conceptual horizons, but I do not think that if someone does not know the word 5, they do not "know" in some primitive way when they see 5 of something and the difference between 5 of something and 4 or 6 of something.
Linguistic determinism was an appealing idea to me at first. It really meant that the more words you know the more you know - exactly in proportion to how many words you know is how much you know. I can't accept it anymore though. The empiricist criticism I explained (roughly) above is sufficient, but there is still more...
Haven't you ever been slumped over the computer typing something, not knowing how to express a thought or an idea you have? Surely, it can't always be because you've forgotten a word or two, but some of the time it must be that you have the thought (concept) and yet are unable to express it.
Linguistic determinism was an attractive proposition to me for another reason as well, and this may be another reason I did not criticize it at first. Mainly, that it is pragmatically true. If you can't express your thought through language, a picture or something like that, you may as well not be thinking it at all. And in a certain sense, once you're able to find the words to express it and convey it to other people, it becomes crisper and clearer in your own mind as well.
I had the thought of this post, but now that I'm writing it, the main thought has become clearer, even to myself. So, I do think there is the possibility of compatibalism. Language might not determine thought, but it certainly can make it clearer.
The affirmation of the above statement would mean that when you can't put your thought into word, not only can't you express them, but neither can be even think them. I would have to agree with the empiricists rejection of this principle: knowledge arises from experience. (if not only from experience than also from experience.) I may be a compatibalist in the sense that I think its plausible that language and the acquisition of language broadens your intellectual or more correctly, conceptual horizons, but I do not think that if someone does not know the word 5, they do not "know" in some primitive way when they see 5 of something and the difference between 5 of something and 4 or 6 of something.
Linguistic determinism was an appealing idea to me at first. It really meant that the more words you know the more you know - exactly in proportion to how many words you know is how much you know. I can't accept it anymore though. The empiricist criticism I explained (roughly) above is sufficient, but there is still more...
Haven't you ever been slumped over the computer typing something, not knowing how to express a thought or an idea you have? Surely, it can't always be because you've forgotten a word or two, but some of the time it must be that you have the thought (concept) and yet are unable to express it.
Linguistic determinism was an attractive proposition to me for another reason as well, and this may be another reason I did not criticize it at first. Mainly, that it is pragmatically true. If you can't express your thought through language, a picture or something like that, you may as well not be thinking it at all. And in a certain sense, once you're able to find the words to express it and convey it to other people, it becomes crisper and clearer in your own mind as well.
I had the thought of this post, but now that I'm writing it, the main thought has become clearer, even to myself. So, I do think there is the possibility of compatibalism. Language might not determine thought, but it certainly can make it clearer.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Brad Pitt is an Atheist
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7uhKLUTGqA&annotation_id=annotation_635271&feature=iv
Friday, August 7, 2009
Schopenhauer's "Essay on the Freedom of the Will"
This was the book I read about on Amazon. It didn’t have many reviews, but the ones it had all scored it 5/5. I was introduced to Schopenhauer, early on by Nietzsche, although of course, Nietzsche all but abandons Schopenhauer and his buddhistic, spiritual philosophy or resignation, compassion and art after his first few books, really. Anyways, I thought he would be a good guy to read on free will. The word “free will” is thrown around a lot. The best way to explain its very strict analytic-philosophy definition is by putting it against a wall of what it is not. It is not physical freedom. I might be confined to a cell, my arms and legs shackled together and let out, and be “free”, but my will, will remain as restricted in the shackles as out of them. It is nothing to do with mental or psychological freedom. I could fall out of dementia and still not be free and I could open my mind, or free myself from my “self-incurred tutelage” as Kant might say and still not be a single ounce freer.
The common misconception is “to ask whether the will is in accordance with itself” and think that you are arriving at the heart of the issue. Of course you can do as you will. The question which we ask when we say, “is the will free”? is whether that will-that striving or that volition-is itself independent and uncaused. Is there an absence of necessity (6)? Some will say that although everything else in the physical world is necessary, human actions derive (or at least can potentially derive) from a self-conscious thought. That is true. Unlike other animals, humans can reflect upon past actions, and thus change the course of their future and the future of all those around them. Unfortunately self-consciousness does not escape Blatchford’s “nature and experience.” For if all we are is a composite of our nature (biological make-up) and the environment or experiences which act upon it, where is the room for a free agent? This agent which is a composite of nature and experience (intertwined) and nothing else has his or her actions decided based solely upon their biological make-up and their experiences.
Self-consciousness: the imaginative ability to see what you could do in the future and choose differently, does not escape from this dual physical make-up of a person. For, what is self-consciousness before experience? It is non-existent, or if it does exist in some elementary capacity, it is triggered and grown by experience. Therefore, it is a biological capacity humans have which experience brings into fruition. If you take away either nature or nurture, there is no self-consciosness either.
Daniel Dennet has argued that our definition of free will has to evolve to being what seperates our sorts of actions from animal actions. There is a great deal. Our actions are thought-out for one thing. When I take the sock out of my dogs mouth it doesn’t think, “well, I’ll lie down for a bit, wait for him to put the sock back on the floor and then get it again.” The dog is uniquely and solely focused on getting the sock and will try no matter what barriers you put into its way until it gets tired or has its attention taken elsewhere. It is ultimately dependent on its environment in a way humans are not. We could grow up in bad neighbourhoods and make our way out of them. Dogs don’t think, “if I play nice and be really affectionate with the neighbor across the street, maybe he’ll take me in.” So, in this sense, if you redefine free will as our imaginative of self-conscious capacity which seperates us from all other animals, then sure, we have free will.
I just don’t think most people are happy with this. They want that they write the chapters of their own story. They don’t want to just read a story if it has already been written. They don’t want to act out actions which were set in stone since the conception of the universe. They will say “I can do what I will at any moment.” Sure… “but at any given moment of your life you can will one definite thing and absolutely nothing other than that one thing” (Schopenhauer, 24). Animals live in the present. Whichever stimulus is strongest as motive determines their will immediately. We can take a bit longer, but no more can we escape the definitiveness of each and every one of our actions. Man “is free of the immediate compulsion of the perceptually present objects which act as motives on his will… by means of which he thinks and reflects, man has an indefinitely larger field of vision, which includes the absent, the past, and the future” (35-36).
Now, there are people who look at quarks which are little “things” that move in indeterminable ways. They’re not determined. I don’t know how this means that at some level we too are indetermined, but even if it does, I don’t see the big victory being indeterminate garners. This means that you could and do, do anything. It doesn’t mean you’re free to do anything, but only that you do anything, and no one can predict your next action. If you think this opens the door for freedom, you’ll have to explain it better to me. As far as I can tell it’s jut really weird. What is a “quark” anyways? I thought we had settled at atoms as being the smallest thing.
I don’t know what else to say about the naturalist conception of free will, but there is something left to be said about the super-naturalist conception. If you believe that the laws of nature can be suspended or that anything is possible by the grace of God, then sure free will is possible. God would have to suspend certain physical laws every time you take a sip out of your coffee mugs, but it is possible with this supernatural conception of reality that we do have free will. This isn’t saying much because anything is possible through this perspective. Every truth could be false and every falsity could be true.
What’s more interesting to me is Schopenhauer’s historical approach at looking what some of the greatest mind of the past had to say about this subject and on how so many believed in free will early on and later recanted. I won’t cite all of them, but here is a theological one:
“Therefore we find it written in all hearts equally that free will is nothing; even though this conviction is obscured by so many assertions to the contrary and by various authorities.-Here I should like to ask the defenders of free will to bear in mind that with their free will they are denying Christianity.-All testimonies (of the Scripture) which deal with Christ oppose the freedom of the will. These are innumerable, indeed the whole of Scripture deal with Him. Hence, if we take Scripture to be the judge in this case, then I shall be entirely vindicated in my view that there remains not a single iota or dash which does not condemn the doctrine of free will” (Jeremiah, 10:23.-Tr.).
The consequences of us not having the sort of free will we all seem to want is that we can not be held responsible for our actions in any ultimate sense. We are what we are and that is all we shall ever be.
The common misconception is “to ask whether the will is in accordance with itself” and think that you are arriving at the heart of the issue. Of course you can do as you will. The question which we ask when we say, “is the will free”? is whether that will-that striving or that volition-is itself independent and uncaused. Is there an absence of necessity (6)? Some will say that although everything else in the physical world is necessary, human actions derive (or at least can potentially derive) from a self-conscious thought. That is true. Unlike other animals, humans can reflect upon past actions, and thus change the course of their future and the future of all those around them. Unfortunately self-consciousness does not escape Blatchford’s “nature and experience.” For if all we are is a composite of our nature (biological make-up) and the environment or experiences which act upon it, where is the room for a free agent? This agent which is a composite of nature and experience (intertwined) and nothing else has his or her actions decided based solely upon their biological make-up and their experiences.
Self-consciousness: the imaginative ability to see what you could do in the future and choose differently, does not escape from this dual physical make-up of a person. For, what is self-consciousness before experience? It is non-existent, or if it does exist in some elementary capacity, it is triggered and grown by experience. Therefore, it is a biological capacity humans have which experience brings into fruition. If you take away either nature or nurture, there is no self-consciosness either.
Daniel Dennet has argued that our definition of free will has to evolve to being what seperates our sorts of actions from animal actions. There is a great deal. Our actions are thought-out for one thing. When I take the sock out of my dogs mouth it doesn’t think, “well, I’ll lie down for a bit, wait for him to put the sock back on the floor and then get it again.” The dog is uniquely and solely focused on getting the sock and will try no matter what barriers you put into its way until it gets tired or has its attention taken elsewhere. It is ultimately dependent on its environment in a way humans are not. We could grow up in bad neighbourhoods and make our way out of them. Dogs don’t think, “if I play nice and be really affectionate with the neighbor across the street, maybe he’ll take me in.” So, in this sense, if you redefine free will as our imaginative of self-conscious capacity which seperates us from all other animals, then sure, we have free will.
I just don’t think most people are happy with this. They want that they write the chapters of their own story. They don’t want to just read a story if it has already been written. They don’t want to act out actions which were set in stone since the conception of the universe. They will say “I can do what I will at any moment.” Sure… “but at any given moment of your life you can will one definite thing and absolutely nothing other than that one thing” (Schopenhauer, 24). Animals live in the present. Whichever stimulus is strongest as motive determines their will immediately. We can take a bit longer, but no more can we escape the definitiveness of each and every one of our actions. Man “is free of the immediate compulsion of the perceptually present objects which act as motives on his will… by means of which he thinks and reflects, man has an indefinitely larger field of vision, which includes the absent, the past, and the future” (35-36).
Now, there are people who look at quarks which are little “things” that move in indeterminable ways. They’re not determined. I don’t know how this means that at some level we too are indetermined, but even if it does, I don’t see the big victory being indeterminate garners. This means that you could and do, do anything. It doesn’t mean you’re free to do anything, but only that you do anything, and no one can predict your next action. If you think this opens the door for freedom, you’ll have to explain it better to me. As far as I can tell it’s jut really weird. What is a “quark” anyways? I thought we had settled at atoms as being the smallest thing.
I don’t know what else to say about the naturalist conception of free will, but there is something left to be said about the super-naturalist conception. If you believe that the laws of nature can be suspended or that anything is possible by the grace of God, then sure free will is possible. God would have to suspend certain physical laws every time you take a sip out of your coffee mugs, but it is possible with this supernatural conception of reality that we do have free will. This isn’t saying much because anything is possible through this perspective. Every truth could be false and every falsity could be true.
What’s more interesting to me is Schopenhauer’s historical approach at looking what some of the greatest mind of the past had to say about this subject and on how so many believed in free will early on and later recanted. I won’t cite all of them, but here is a theological one:
“Therefore we find it written in all hearts equally that free will is nothing; even though this conviction is obscured by so many assertions to the contrary and by various authorities.-Here I should like to ask the defenders of free will to bear in mind that with their free will they are denying Christianity.-All testimonies (of the Scripture) which deal with Christ oppose the freedom of the will. These are innumerable, indeed the whole of Scripture deal with Him. Hence, if we take Scripture to be the judge in this case, then I shall be entirely vindicated in my view that there remains not a single iota or dash which does not condemn the doctrine of free will” (Jeremiah, 10:23.-Tr.).
The consequences of us not having the sort of free will we all seem to want is that we can not be held responsible for our actions in any ultimate sense. We are what we are and that is all we shall ever be.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Politics: Iran, and other political things
I have not liked politics for the longest while now because I find that people writing or speaking about politics are often disingenuous and that there is most often an obvious solution, but a lack of political will. For instance in Iran the obvious solution is to help the Iranian people bring down the government they appear so desperately to want to take down - whether we're talking about Iranians in or even out of Iran mind you. Why does this not happen? I have no idea. Hussein may very well have been more of a threat to the West (specifically, but not only America) and the Iraqi people may deserve it more (to be freed, not to have war brought to them, obviously). Of course I'm not that nieve. I know the reasons were more selfish, like national security, creating jobs for private military organizations and maybe even controlling the oil reserves still left in Iraq which got America (thankfully, not Canada) in there.
So, why won't they do a very small favour for the Iranian people, without the need for large amounts of civilian casualties or a sustained military presence? Again, I have no idea. I guess until either America or any of the other NATO countries can afford it, they're not going to take on any military endevours, which, since even before Eisenhower were known to also be economic endevours (maybe evenly primarily economic). It's sort of like investing in an Empire.
I'm going to touch on the disingenousness of political commentator and especially politicians in a little bit, but this inability to "do" rather than to figure out that you probably should "do" is what is unattractive to a philosophically minded person like myself. I've been more worried about "should," "ought," and at the very least "why" (if I do agree with Quine's critic of normative ethics) and figuring those out than "how".
Now that I consider myself a pragmatist I will have to start worrying about finding solutions which are practicle and possible rather than those which are merely high political hopes with little to no connection to real world problems. You would think I would be a conservative and in a certain sense I am. That is, in the most traditional sense. Security is important to me and keeping expectations low is also important to me (never mind keeping policy in tune with academic research). But in a more important sense I am a liberal. I don't want people to suffer or die needlessly. Of course I hope people can do more than just avoid suffering and death, but this is a bare minimum which I believe is worth defending. Afterall, you're not going to realize your authentic self if you're dead.
So, I do have a political opinion and even a point of view. How can I be relevant to politics and how can politics be relevant to me with all the bull-shit? Well, I think a lot of the job of philosophers is to be the guards against bull-shit. I think that even if they can't solve the questions pertinent to our time, they can at least frame them correctly (or at least better than they had been framed before). For instance, with climate change, they can totally disregard the question of whether or not it is man-made. Scientists will more than often argue that it is, and some will argue that it is not, but few will argue that it is not relevant.
Aside from those, rather elementary tasks, which require media exposure more so than profound thought, philosophers can also pursue other purposes. As long as people respect philosophers (despite not knowing exactly what they do), philosophers can provide intellectual support and credence to certain political movements. Take Heidegger as the antithetical example. He provided philosophical credence to the Nazi movement in early 20th century Germany. Well, if there were more vocal (and unfortunately due to circumstance also non-jewish) philosophers who would argue against Heidegger passionately and vehemently, maybe it would have still happened, but at least there would have been more of an intellectual fight.
One of the reasons Heidegger was so influential was because he was a great public speaker. If political philosophers focused less on long political treatise and more on their 30 second appearances on CNN, maybe they could be more influential nowadays. This would require even the most meager requirments of what it means to be a philosopher to be dropped, but at least those philosophers (or hardly-philosophers) would be influential.
I would even argue that if bull-shit is necessary, using some old sophistic tricks and other such gimmicks to persuade people would not be so horrible. You've just got to be sure you're on the right side of things.
How do you know that? -- There is no way to assure you are right, but I think good people like me and you can be sure enough that we're not going to support the next Hitlers rise to power.
If you think we can know with any degree of certainty that we are right, and good, you're a analytic philsopher. Be gone!
So, why won't they do a very small favour for the Iranian people, without the need for large amounts of civilian casualties or a sustained military presence? Again, I have no idea. I guess until either America or any of the other NATO countries can afford it, they're not going to take on any military endevours, which, since even before Eisenhower were known to also be economic endevours (maybe evenly primarily economic). It's sort of like investing in an Empire.
I'm going to touch on the disingenousness of political commentator and especially politicians in a little bit, but this inability to "do" rather than to figure out that you probably should "do" is what is unattractive to a philosophically minded person like myself. I've been more worried about "should," "ought," and at the very least "why" (if I do agree with Quine's critic of normative ethics) and figuring those out than "how".
Now that I consider myself a pragmatist I will have to start worrying about finding solutions which are practicle and possible rather than those which are merely high political hopes with little to no connection to real world problems. You would think I would be a conservative and in a certain sense I am. That is, in the most traditional sense. Security is important to me and keeping expectations low is also important to me (never mind keeping policy in tune with academic research). But in a more important sense I am a liberal. I don't want people to suffer or die needlessly. Of course I hope people can do more than just avoid suffering and death, but this is a bare minimum which I believe is worth defending. Afterall, you're not going to realize your authentic self if you're dead.
So, I do have a political opinion and even a point of view. How can I be relevant to politics and how can politics be relevant to me with all the bull-shit? Well, I think a lot of the job of philosophers is to be the guards against bull-shit. I think that even if they can't solve the questions pertinent to our time, they can at least frame them correctly (or at least better than they had been framed before). For instance, with climate change, they can totally disregard the question of whether or not it is man-made. Scientists will more than often argue that it is, and some will argue that it is not, but few will argue that it is not relevant.
Aside from those, rather elementary tasks, which require media exposure more so than profound thought, philosophers can also pursue other purposes. As long as people respect philosophers (despite not knowing exactly what they do), philosophers can provide intellectual support and credence to certain political movements. Take Heidegger as the antithetical example. He provided philosophical credence to the Nazi movement in early 20th century Germany. Well, if there were more vocal (and unfortunately due to circumstance also non-jewish) philosophers who would argue against Heidegger passionately and vehemently, maybe it would have still happened, but at least there would have been more of an intellectual fight.
One of the reasons Heidegger was so influential was because he was a great public speaker. If political philosophers focused less on long political treatise and more on their 30 second appearances on CNN, maybe they could be more influential nowadays. This would require even the most meager requirments of what it means to be a philosopher to be dropped, but at least those philosophers (or hardly-philosophers) would be influential.
I would even argue that if bull-shit is necessary, using some old sophistic tricks and other such gimmicks to persuade people would not be so horrible. You've just got to be sure you're on the right side of things.
How do you know that? -- There is no way to assure you are right, but I think good people like me and you can be sure enough that we're not going to support the next Hitlers rise to power.
If you think we can know with any degree of certainty that we are right, and good, you're a analytic philsopher. Be gone!
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Rorty on Posner and Dewey
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nfQ2mWEEMw&feature=related
I don't like to do this but this is a lecture I just came across and it is well worth listening to.
I don't like to do this but this is a lecture I just came across and it is well worth listening to.
Friday, July 31, 2009
9/11 "Truth"
9/11 was an inside job?
Is there such a thing as too much skepticism? I don’t mean to sound trite, but honestly, is there a point at which doubt and skepticism get tiring and all but superfluous? I would always ask people to question their beliefs, even (and especially) their most basic and taken for granted ones, but to question whether two planes hitting two building actually caused them to collapse or whether there were bombs secretly implanted in the bottom floors which actually brought them down is just absurd.
As if the damage the planes would inflict – if they had not brought the buildings down would be so meager that the buildings had to actually come down to really scare Americans. It’s just ridiculous. People will say “building 7, you forgot about building 7!” No I haven’t. It was hit with so much debris and fire from the other buildings, having been an old building anyways, it did eventually collapse. Why did the owner say “pull it?” He meant to pull the fire-fighters and have them focus on more important things. He wasn’t worried about the old printers and fax machines in the building. It was old and would have come down sooner or later anyways, and like any good person, he would feel better if the fire-fighters didn’t risk their lives on an old building on the day of the tragedy of September 11th, 2001. Are there 100 more parts to the conspiracy theory I have not addressed? Of course there are. They’ve all been debunked by “Popular Mechanics” and you can view how on YouTube.
Now, what’s more interesting to me is why and how people become conspiracy theorists. Is it just because they lack critical thinking skills and like most people would rather believe what is amazing and fantastical than what is “true” - or at least what everyone else agrees they believe happened? That’s certainly part of it but I think there is more to it.
It’s the sensation I had in a Catholic High School of having access to secrets which no one else knew. When you see people doing such crazy things, like the Patriot Act or the invasion of Iraq caused mainly by their beliefs in something you believe to be mythical, you can’t help but protest. I hated having to go along with the motions of belief during the mass we had every month in our gym. In the same way, “9/11 truthers” just can’t stand what is happening all because of something they believe did not happen, or at least did not happen the way it has been purported to have happened.
I would like to end by saying that while they may be as sincere in their belief as I was, I was right and they are wrong; unfortunately I can’t do that. Kierkegaard was right. There is a certain thing called subjective truth. If there is no clear winner on either side of an issue you can choose which side to take as right and which to take as wrong. With God, this is the case. We don’t know with any certainly either way, and for that reason the beliefs of others should be respected when it come to God and even religion (so long as they are sincere of course). The problem with 9/11 truth is that there are no two ways about it. Something happened, the orchestrator (Bin Laden) put out a video admitting he was behind it… What more could they want? It’s not like it was just reported to have happenedand all you saw next was a pile of rubble. There were cameras which captured the moments of impact.
While I love that people are skeptical, there is a certain point when enough is enough. These “9/11 truthers” - as well intentioned as they may be – have to go back to their parent’s basements and leave Bill Maher and others who refuse to discuss this ridiculous issue alone.
Is there such a thing as too much skepticism? I don’t mean to sound trite, but honestly, is there a point at which doubt and skepticism get tiring and all but superfluous? I would always ask people to question their beliefs, even (and especially) their most basic and taken for granted ones, but to question whether two planes hitting two building actually caused them to collapse or whether there were bombs secretly implanted in the bottom floors which actually brought them down is just absurd.
As if the damage the planes would inflict – if they had not brought the buildings down would be so meager that the buildings had to actually come down to really scare Americans. It’s just ridiculous. People will say “building 7, you forgot about building 7!” No I haven’t. It was hit with so much debris and fire from the other buildings, having been an old building anyways, it did eventually collapse. Why did the owner say “pull it?” He meant to pull the fire-fighters and have them focus on more important things. He wasn’t worried about the old printers and fax machines in the building. It was old and would have come down sooner or later anyways, and like any good person, he would feel better if the fire-fighters didn’t risk their lives on an old building on the day of the tragedy of September 11th, 2001. Are there 100 more parts to the conspiracy theory I have not addressed? Of course there are. They’ve all been debunked by “Popular Mechanics” and you can view how on YouTube.
Now, what’s more interesting to me is why and how people become conspiracy theorists. Is it just because they lack critical thinking skills and like most people would rather believe what is amazing and fantastical than what is “true” - or at least what everyone else agrees they believe happened? That’s certainly part of it but I think there is more to it.
It’s the sensation I had in a Catholic High School of having access to secrets which no one else knew. When you see people doing such crazy things, like the Patriot Act or the invasion of Iraq caused mainly by their beliefs in something you believe to be mythical, you can’t help but protest. I hated having to go along with the motions of belief during the mass we had every month in our gym. In the same way, “9/11 truthers” just can’t stand what is happening all because of something they believe did not happen, or at least did not happen the way it has been purported to have happened.
I would like to end by saying that while they may be as sincere in their belief as I was, I was right and they are wrong; unfortunately I can’t do that. Kierkegaard was right. There is a certain thing called subjective truth. If there is no clear winner on either side of an issue you can choose which side to take as right and which to take as wrong. With God, this is the case. We don’t know with any certainly either way, and for that reason the beliefs of others should be respected when it come to God and even religion (so long as they are sincere of course). The problem with 9/11 truth is that there are no two ways about it. Something happened, the orchestrator (Bin Laden) put out a video admitting he was behind it… What more could they want? It’s not like it was just reported to have happenedand all you saw next was a pile of rubble. There were cameras which captured the moments of impact.
While I love that people are skeptical, there is a certain point when enough is enough. These “9/11 truthers” - as well intentioned as they may be – have to go back to their parent’s basements and leave Bill Maher and others who refuse to discuss this ridiculous issue alone.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Analysis Belaboured
I thought I would start by getting a thought I had earlier today about analysis-or more correctly-over analysis off my chest:
The same way an inauthentic, unoriginal poet tries to copy the style of another poet or comes up with metaphors so forced that they seem as if they had just glimmered of the poets fucking eye, so to do I believe that analysis can be superfluous, belaboured and exaggerated - or at least that's what I'm about to write an essay contending.
To explain my thought I'll thrown out the analogy that comes closest to it:
Have you ever been out at a pub or just joking around at school or work and somebody just goes a bit too far? There is that moment when everyone feels slightly uncomfortable, and usually the jokester him or herself realizes they went too far.
My question is, why is this not possible for analysis to go too far? If a hole can be dug too far and a joke can be taken too far, why can't an idea be taken too far? Let’s look at art especially, where I think there are instances of clear over-analysis. For instance, when you're looking at a work of art which has truly got to you and you're sort of lost from time and space, captured by the composition, does it really help that someone is there to explain why it is such a great work of art?
It would seem to me that if the work does its job there is no need for an explanation to accompany it. Some might say, "well how is the average person to understand avant-garde, really trendy, suttle art?" Well, if they don't understand it they should move on to work they do understand. Once they've acquired the refined palette and the proper tools to understand the more sophisticated works they can come back.
I didn’t understand Nietzsche at first but thought he was just really great. I started listening to Robert Solomon’s lectures and I read Kaufmann and Nehamas’ interpretations of him and slowly I began to really appreciate the content of what he wrote. This doesn’t seem belaboured or superfluous. It just seems like now it is my turn to interpret Nietzsche the way I see fit. Is there more to read on Nietzsche? of course. But as with all truly profound and remarkable philosophy, Nietzsche is like a work of art unto himself. At some point I have to sit back and appreciate him based on my own understanding of his work. Soon my thoughts on him could be so flooded with other people’s ideas I would have only a vague conception of “my” Nietzsche bombarded by thoughts of the Nietzsche of others.
In the same way, if philosophy is not math (and I believe it is not) than why do people seem to be trying to get the solution or get to the bottom of it (or a part of it) through analysis and inquiry? Like any good painting, doesn’t there come a point where splashing more paint on the canvas would really just muddy up the composition and not add anything more sustentative to it? I would think so. And why don’t philosophers meet a philosopher, analyze him and just before they empty their minds of any idea about his/her work or any argument for or against it, or even go back and look at it for the last time, just stop? Stop once you’ve reached a certain point and move on. Maybe come back later.
This is the genius of aphorism. Each is a work of art unto itself. It is enough but not too much, profound, and at the same time lacking profundity. Why this sort of writing has not caught on is beyond me. Maybe my next paper I will go far enough for a B-, but no further and then I’ll explain what I have done to my professor. I’m quite the little sphinx; I might do it.
The same way an inauthentic, unoriginal poet tries to copy the style of another poet or comes up with metaphors so forced that they seem as if they had just glimmered of the poets fucking eye, so to do I believe that analysis can be superfluous, belaboured and exaggerated - or at least that's what I'm about to write an essay contending.
To explain my thought I'll thrown out the analogy that comes closest to it:
Have you ever been out at a pub or just joking around at school or work and somebody just goes a bit too far? There is that moment when everyone feels slightly uncomfortable, and usually the jokester him or herself realizes they went too far.
My question is, why is this not possible for analysis to go too far? If a hole can be dug too far and a joke can be taken too far, why can't an idea be taken too far? Let’s look at art especially, where I think there are instances of clear over-analysis. For instance, when you're looking at a work of art which has truly got to you and you're sort of lost from time and space, captured by the composition, does it really help that someone is there to explain why it is such a great work of art?
It would seem to me that if the work does its job there is no need for an explanation to accompany it. Some might say, "well how is the average person to understand avant-garde, really trendy, suttle art?" Well, if they don't understand it they should move on to work they do understand. Once they've acquired the refined palette and the proper tools to understand the more sophisticated works they can come back.
I didn’t understand Nietzsche at first but thought he was just really great. I started listening to Robert Solomon’s lectures and I read Kaufmann and Nehamas’ interpretations of him and slowly I began to really appreciate the content of what he wrote. This doesn’t seem belaboured or superfluous. It just seems like now it is my turn to interpret Nietzsche the way I see fit. Is there more to read on Nietzsche? of course. But as with all truly profound and remarkable philosophy, Nietzsche is like a work of art unto himself. At some point I have to sit back and appreciate him based on my own understanding of his work. Soon my thoughts on him could be so flooded with other people’s ideas I would have only a vague conception of “my” Nietzsche bombarded by thoughts of the Nietzsche of others.
In the same way, if philosophy is not math (and I believe it is not) than why do people seem to be trying to get the solution or get to the bottom of it (or a part of it) through analysis and inquiry? Like any good painting, doesn’t there come a point where splashing more paint on the canvas would really just muddy up the composition and not add anything more sustentative to it? I would think so. And why don’t philosophers meet a philosopher, analyze him and just before they empty their minds of any idea about his/her work or any argument for or against it, or even go back and look at it for the last time, just stop? Stop once you’ve reached a certain point and move on. Maybe come back later.
This is the genius of aphorism. Each is a work of art unto itself. It is enough but not too much, profound, and at the same time lacking profundity. Why this sort of writing has not caught on is beyond me. Maybe my next paper I will go far enough for a B-, but no further and then I’ll explain what I have done to my professor. I’m quite the little sphinx; I might do it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
