Micah & Lillers Sittin’ In A Tree…
July 26, 2007 | Filed Under Micah, Pictures | 2 Comments
… K - Eye - Es - Es - Eye - En - Gee
… First comes the lick, then comes the slobber, then comes the pouty face that makes me sing….
Buckaddee, buckaddee, buckaddee buck. Why do you always have to spread that yuck? First on my toes, and then on my face….oh my God what a nasty taste.
Fallacies of Eastern Thought
July 23, 2007 | Filed Under Small Talk | 1 Comment
I’ve long been enamored with Eastern Thought. I know that there are many varieties of Eastern philosophies and ways of life, so I apologize from the very beginning for lumping them into a single category. But communication requires simplification.
The most appealing aspect of Eastern Thought, to me, has been the idea that almost all negative emotion is derived from the illusion that the individual has more control over his or her circumstance than he or she really does. In other words, “if only I had done X” or “I can’t believe she did Y” - these thoughts can often make a person angry, bitter, etc. And the fact is that one cannot change what happened in the past. Nor does one have much if any control over the decisions of others.
The truth of the matter is that often times we do self-indulge in counterfactual emotions for far too long, and the only effect that they have is usually self-destructive (this is one of the reasons that forgiveness is so powerful).
So Eastern Thought, on the whole, I think, has much wisdom to offer, especially in regards to seeking peace in one’s life. But I also think that it is fundamentally flawed, keeps people from living full human lives, and brings people who take it far enough to disregard the intrinsic value of interpersonal relations. In other words, I think Eastern Thought is not flawed just for the realist, but for anyone who thinks that persons and individuals are fundamental to the Universe, as opposed to illusory.
Talk to anyone who’s enamored with Eastern Thought and the first thing they will probably say to you to convince you of the truth of their views goes something like this: “Take a deep breath. Now breathe out. Notice that you and the Universe are one. That there is no fundamental boundary between you and the universe. As you breathe in, you breathe in the Universe, you are the Universe and the Universe is you.” The key idea is that the perceived separation between you and the Universe as well as you and Others, is an illusion. To achieve enlightenment and wisdom, one really spends the rest of one’s life overcoming this illusion and recognizing the true nature of the Universe.
In fact, a fundamental piece of knowledge in Eastern traditions is to recognize that the processes going on inside your body are exemplary of the processes going on in the Universe. That you become one with the Universe by knowing it through your own body.
What I’m offering here is not an argument, but a reason for rejecting the full blown doctrines of Eastern Thought while appreciating the truths that it speaks of.
The gist of my reason is this: that individuals are fundamental, basic constructs of reality, that living a full, fulfilling life requires an appreciation of relations between individuals, respect and love for the other, and that the thought experiments designed to convince you otherwise are logically flawed.
It is my view that a rejection of the fundamental existence of individuals in one’s ontology is, at its core, selfish and individualistic. Now, those attributes aren’t seen as negative attributes to everyone. If you see selfishness and individualism as positive attributes, then this article is not meant to convince you.
But what I do want to suggest is that Eastern Philosophies ultimately deny the individual, and in doing so deny the relata of the relations between individuals.
Ok, so why does this matter? Well, it matters because in most of the Eastern systems that I’ve explored, the general tendency is to focus on the well-being of one’s own body, of one’s own thoughts, of one’s self. The other tendency is to reject the existence of moral consequences, to detach one self and one’s actions from considerations of their consequences, and from their implications.
It is my view that while Eastern thought is certainly capable of producing a sense of peace and serenity in one’s being, and to improve the well-being of the individual in certain respects (i.e. low stress, low anxiety, quiet mind, etc). Eastern thought can be fundamentally destructive to relationships and to the full range of human living. In other words, I believe that when taken seriously, Eastern thought leads to a rejection of the highest goods that so many people naturally value in life.
It might be argued that maybe these “highest goods” aren’t really good at all. That enlightenment will show one that the joy of family, of sport, of trust, of long term committment, of interpersonal relations are illusory. My response to this suggestive line of thought is simply that the burden of proof is on the person who has already assented to Eastern Thought to convince the rest of us. And further, it is my view that the person who has already assented to Eastern Thought must first convince the rest of us that the notion of the individual is illusory.
So basically Eastern Thought moves from gaining your assent that the notion of the individual is illusory, to the view that many of the things that the ordinary man values are built upon this illusion. Dedication to moral goods is one example. The value of commitment, a relational notion that requires individuals as relata, is undermined. The value of family and friends, again, which require individuals as relata, is undermined.
What you are left with is a selfish individual who identifies himself with the Universe and proceeds to act from a position of serene drifting between states, flutterings of fascination and utter disregard for the Other.
20 Dolphins Catch a Wave
July 11, 2007 | Filed Under Pictures | Leave a Comment
I couldn’t resist posting this beautiful shot from the UKs Daily Mail.
Reason and Reasons
July 10, 2007 | Filed Under Small Talk | Leave a Comment
I like thinking about how language affects the way we think.
I was in the shower this morning, where I do pretty much all my thinking for the day, and it occurred to me that some reasons are not based in reason. Ok, so what’s the big deal?
Well, most people will agree that when you think deeply enough about the world, things don’t just happen, they happen because of something else that happened. Beliefs are one such thing that we think come into existence because of something else (the reason). In other words, you believe what you believe not *just* because you believe it, but because something happened to bring you to that belief.
Most of the beliefs that you have now, you did not have when you were born. So at some point in time, you acquired most of the beliefs that you have. But why?
Well, for reasons. Ah, but not all reasons are based in reason! In other words, many people have beliefs for reasons that we might describe as “just intuition” or “it’s obvious” or “that’s the way I see the world” or “that’s how I experienced it” - many of the reasons for our beliefs are attitudinal - based in feeling or brute preference.
Ok. Again…so what.
Well, many people, rightly, think that beliefs should be had for reasons. But, for whatever reason, the same people often make the mistake of thinking that such reasons should all be based in reason. In other words, many thoughtful people take the absurd view that the only good reason is a reason based in reason. But that would make most of our beliefs bad beliefs.
Does this mean that I’m anti-reason? Absolutely not. What it does mean is that I’m not so naive as to expect that all my beliefs be based in reason, and I’m also very comfortable holding beliefs that “seem” right even if I can’t demonstrate (using reason) the reason for the belief.
“So you’re one of those people who blindly believes in God, eh?” - No, I didn’t say that. But I do think that one can have reasons for believing in God which are not based in reason (though I suspect there are well-formed reasons that are based in reason too).
A Frozen Delaware River
June 25, 2007 | Filed Under Pictures | 3 Comments
I live two blocks from the Delaware River. This winter one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen happened… the Delaware River froze over.
On Watching Sports
June 21, 2007 | Filed Under Small Talk | 1 Comment
I’m a sports fan. I’m also acutely aware of the fact that the emotions of sport are built upon an illusion. Despite this, I allow myself the joy of sport as well as the depression of sport.
When I was teaching philosophy, I used sports to highlight the way our emotions can deceive us. I mean, let’s be serious. A grown man shouldn’t get depressed for a whole day, not to mention a whole week, because of a game.
But somehow, it happens. It seems that to achieve the full joy of sport, one must be willing to experience at least a little of the sorrow of sport. As a matter of fact, you just can’t experience the ecstasy of routing for a team unless you take the sport more seriously than, in reality, it deserves to be taken. But in taking it more seriously than it deserves to be taken, it’s easy to carry a disruptive depression back into the real world (which makes it quite different than a piece of fiction or film).
One of those queer little oddities of life.
The Phils
June 21, 2007 | Filed Under Pictures | Leave a Comment
They’re my team. They aren’t consistent. Which makes for a bad relationship. But I still love them.
Corduroy and Abby
June 17, 2007 | Filed Under Pictures, Small Talk | 2 Comments
These are my two cats, Corduroy and Abby. I can count on them both to provide remembrances of order and structure every day. Kittyroy gets upset if we’re not up in bed by 9pm. Abby comes to sit in my lap around 3pm everyday;-) Very reliable animals. I could learn a thing or two from them.
Chicagoland
June 17, 2007 | Filed Under Pictures, Trips | Leave a Comment
Stephanie and I spent a few days out in Chicago. It was nice. We really liked the waterways that went through town (though it was easy to tell which direction the water was traveling because it entered very clean and exited very dirty!) We also got stuck walking through some sketchy neighborhoods, largely due to my poor map reading!
Perceiving God
June 17, 2007 | Filed Under Small Talk | 2 Comments
I’m not trying to make an argument here. I’m not trying to say why other people should believe that God exists. But as of late, many people on the internet have been accusing people of faith of being irrational, delusional, and many other derogatory descriptions.
What I want to make clear is that many people who believe in God do so because they perceive the world as being a God-world. Just like many people perceive a red book as being red, many people perceive this world as being a world that has a God. And just as many “people of reason” will insist that the book *really* isn’t red, many “people of reason” will insist that the world *really* isn’t a God-world. That’s fine. But it’s not delusional to believe the contrary in either case.
That’s not an argument for why *you* should believe in God. But if you are genuinely interested in why *I* believe in God, it is because the predicate in the following sentence is apparent to me: This world has a God. In other words, when I perceive this world, I perceive it as having a God. And this despite my encountering pain, suffering, disappointment, the imperfection of the body and my reading so many of the very good arguments for not believing in the existence of God.
Why do you believe the book is red? Because I perceive it as red. Why do you believe the universe has a god? Because I perceive it as having a god. Again, not an argument. Just a reason for my belief.