I am finally back on my schedule of seeing a relatively new silver screen production every Friday. Today I viewed Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Now, after the debacle of Semi-Pro I was not sure if I could trust Judd Apatow's latest film; however, after being reassured by Mr. Roeper I decided to give it a look. I give Forgetting Sarah Marshall four stars. I highly recommend it. Not only is it a hilarious comedy but it is also a better love story than most romantic comedies for its surprisingly Objectivist take.
Through Peter Bretter's (Jason Segel) relationship with Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell) and Rachel Jansen (Mila Kunis) bad and good, meaning untrustworthy and trustworthy, relationships are explored. However, Bretter's good relationship with Jansen also emphasizes other important Objectivist themes which surprised me. Honesty is always important in a relationship, but Jansen also emphasized that Bretter needed to act, to produce, and to be happy. She explained that if he did not like his job, he should quit. She also prodded him to complete his rock opera. The importance of production is also emphasized when Marshall finally explains to Bretter that his inaction was why she left him. Of course, she never told him that why they were in a relationship, and she violated the relationship before she called it off; thus, making her point valid, but far from being the hero. Furthermore, the fact that the film is about Forgetting Sarah Marshall points out the huge problem with staying friends after a romantic relationship is over. A romantic relationship, especially this one, is put to an end because the individuals involved do not live up to each other's standards. Marshall found Bretter to be too lazy, and later Bretter found Marshall to be a liar. It all becomes very clear how important it is to forget an ex, identify one's own problems, when Bretter finally labels the flip-flopping leeching Marshall as the devil.
Also, Aldous Snow (Russel Brand) was an awesome depiction of the modern promiscuous and ignorant new age, free loving, multi-culturalist. While in a relationship with Marshall he explains that he has no qualms about sleeping with other women while they are together. Thus, the viciousness of promiscuity is briefly explored, something that is not given enough secular attention since the 1960's. Additionally, a hilarious and completely honest moment is when Marshall points to Snow's tattoos, one Buddhist, one Nordic, one Chinese, all of conflicting ideologies, not making him a citizen of the world but an idiot.
However, I was not sure about Bretter and Marshall's five minute reconstructed relationship. In the beginning Bretter refuses, but he eventually gives in. Ultimately, after about 15 seconds, Bretter realizes it is a mistake and leaves. I would have preferred him realizing this before hand; however, this scene did allow for the ending to work out, so it has its merits.
I also like the fact that the movie begins with Bretter naked (for split second he is absolutely naked; all the meat is in the window) and then ends with him completely naked. A full circle story, where at the beginning one completely sees Bretter for who he is (not much) and then in the end completely sees who he has become (a reasonable proud producer).
Friday, April 25, 2008
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Exploit-the-Earth Day
Tuesday, April 22, was Earth Day, an utterly unhappy affair. Therefore, I celebrate Exploit-the-Earth Day instead. It occurs on the same day; however, it is not concerned with the hatred of man as Earth Day is. Exploit-the-Earth Day celebrates man's greatness and superiority over the environment, while Earth Day degrades man and identifies him as a vicious plague upon the invaluable earth.
There are three major problems I have with Earth Day, and they all concern hating man as previously stated. Earth Day celebrates the lowest form of altruism, inherent value, and inside-the-box thinking.
As I have stated in previous posts, altruism is a vice. Altruism teaches that one's life is worthless and in order to give it any value one must live his life, sacrifice his life, destroy his life, for the sake of others, complete strangers. I can think of nothing more vicious, except choosing to be ignorant. However, Earth Day adopts altruism in a whole new way; subsequently, making it more vicious than its original meaning. The original meaning of altruism is solely concerned with man. A man must sacrifice his life to other men. Still vicious, but completely on the human tier. Earth Day lowers altruism to a new disgusting form because it argues that man's life is of no value unless he lives it to preserve the earth as it would exist without him. Therefore, Earth Day celebrates the destruction of man's life for the sake of the environment. This is completely twisted and utterly stomach churning. I have addressed this briefly in previous posts particularly when I spoke about the crow video, but I am going to address it again and more in depth here. It is completely irrational to assume that the environment, trees and animals, things completely devoid of all reason are more valuable than man, a being who's reason is inherent. This is a completely warped sense of morality that the utterly irrational should be preserved by destroying the inherently rational. Some will argue that Earth Day does not celebrate this, but a cooperative existence with the environment. Man should not be cooperatively living with the environment. To cooperatively live with the environment is to give the environment respect, which assumes that the environment is equally valuable to that of man. The environment is inferior to man. Therefore, man should be concerned with living without regard to the environment. If a man owns large tracts of land and wants to build condominiums and sky scrappers on that land, the man should have no qualms about bulldozing each tract. Of course, I would recommend he sell the trees and the animals to make some profit before hand and offset the cost of his building. However, this idea that the trees, animals, condominiums, and sky scrappers should be able to exist to their fullest at the same time is wrong. Of course, some will argue that the environment is inherently valuable, and it would be vicious to destroy what is valuable. I agree to some extent, but this leads me to my next point.
Before I continue, I would like to point out that I was a Boy Scout and I earned the rank of Eagle Scout. Currently, I am also advising a Venture Crew. I have other problems with these organizations, but overall I find them beneficial. Of course, the wider scope of this is for a later post. I am just trying to point out I have had my fair share interacting with the environment, and I admit I enjoy it. The past summer I went hiking with some friends through the White Mountains, I have hiked in the Catskills, and I have been camping several times. I enjoyed everyone of those experiences. I like looking at the mountains and seeing the wide valleys and forests from the tops. I like the way the woods look in the early morning. However, I will not admit the environment has inherent value. That is a lie. The truth is the environment only has value because man exists. If man was extinct, which would mean all reason was dead, then the mountains would not be beautiful. There would be nothing attractive about valleys, forests, early mornings, or starry nights. Furthermore, none of nature would be important. Mountains, forests, valleys, deserts, trees, animals, etc. would all be worthless. This is because there would be no reason to value them; there would be no men to value it. Environmentalists forget that value presumes a valuer. Something cannot have value unless it is valued by someone. Some will argue that the animals and the plants value the environment. This is not true. Animals and trees are devoid of reason, and reason is necessary to value. Reason means one has the ability to determine virtue and vice, which means he also has the ability to identify good and bad in the sense of more valuable versus less valuable, or likeable versus dislikeable. Plants certainly cannot do this. Animals cannot do this either because they are shackled by instinct. Foxes do not live in dens because they like dens. Foxes live in dens because instinct tells them to live in dens so they will not die and they can reproduce. Koala's do not like eucalyptus leaves. Koala's are just ordered by their instinct to eat eucalyptus leaves. Therefore, the environment has no value without man, yet environmentalists want man to lower their impact on the environment or destroy themselves so that in both cases the environment can sustain its inherent value. Earth Day celebrates the environment's alleged inherent value, and since the environment has no inherent value Earth Day celebrates a falsehood; consequently, Earth Day is irrational.
However, other environmentalists, the more logical of the sort, will argue that the environment must be preserved for man's sake. These environmentalists argue that if man harms the environment too much the earth will not be able to sustain man's life. In turn, man will become extinct, which is certainly no good. This is selfish environmentalism, which is far more rational and respectable than the other environmentalists; however, these environmentalists are not completely rational. Their stance inherently restricts reason; thus, promoting a certain level of ignorance. This stance supports inside-the-box thinking. The best way to depict this problem with through an a story I constantly heard in elementary school. My elementary school science teachers always told the class that one day the sun would implode or explode, something to the effect that the sun would go out. The class would then respond with the general idea that, "Oh, well, by the time that happens we will all be dead, so it won't kill us." I always thought to myself and I continue to think that by the time that happens man will have found a substitute; man will no longer need the sun because he will provide it for himself in some way. Environmentalism has a similar stance. In analyzing global warming environmentalists will argue that if carbon emissions are not lowered and other regulations are not followed then the environment will descend into chaos. I do not really understand all that science stuff, but apparently hurricane Katrina is a sign of that. Therefore, the environment must be preserved, man must slow his development, so the environment will not descend into chaos and kill off the human race. I offer an outside-of-the-box solution. Instead, how about scientists focus on ways to create environment instead of preserving environment. Find ways to create a sun, atmosphere, air, plants, and animals. Find a new energy and more efficient energy source for when oil runs out. Create the environment man needs to survive do not preserve it. Once man create the necessary environment to sustain human life, then man can manipulate it from its immediate construction so that it will not be destroyed as man continues to industrialize, become more technological, and creates more machines. Earth Day does not celebrate this progressive thinking. Earth Day celebrates the present, the natural state of things, stagnation. Earth Day celebrates the limiting of man. I have proposed the exact opposite. I have proposed that man move forward to by creating his own living condition. Man does not need the environment; man has reason.
Therefore, since Earth Celebrates the irrational devaluing and limitation of man I propose a new day of celebration. Actually, I am not really proposing it. Exploit-the-Earth Day has been proposed by The Objective Standard, and Objectivist journal. I am supporting The Objective Standard's proposal. Thus, on the next April 22 celebrate Exploit-the-Earth Day. Celebrate man's greatness, his reason, his egoism, and his independence. On Exploit-the-Earth Day do not limit one's actions, do not preserve the environment as is, control the environment. Cut down a tree, have a pork roast, run one's factory for an extra hour, celebrate productivity. Celebrate the fact that man does not look at the environment and see what is but what can be. On Exploit-the-Earth celebrate the fact that man is supreme and not of the ignorant earth.
There are three major problems I have with Earth Day, and they all concern hating man as previously stated. Earth Day celebrates the lowest form of altruism, inherent value, and inside-the-box thinking.
As I have stated in previous posts, altruism is a vice. Altruism teaches that one's life is worthless and in order to give it any value one must live his life, sacrifice his life, destroy his life, for the sake of others, complete strangers. I can think of nothing more vicious, except choosing to be ignorant. However, Earth Day adopts altruism in a whole new way; subsequently, making it more vicious than its original meaning. The original meaning of altruism is solely concerned with man. A man must sacrifice his life to other men. Still vicious, but completely on the human tier. Earth Day lowers altruism to a new disgusting form because it argues that man's life is of no value unless he lives it to preserve the earth as it would exist without him. Therefore, Earth Day celebrates the destruction of man's life for the sake of the environment. This is completely twisted and utterly stomach churning. I have addressed this briefly in previous posts particularly when I spoke about the crow video, but I am going to address it again and more in depth here. It is completely irrational to assume that the environment, trees and animals, things completely devoid of all reason are more valuable than man, a being who's reason is inherent. This is a completely warped sense of morality that the utterly irrational should be preserved by destroying the inherently rational. Some will argue that Earth Day does not celebrate this, but a cooperative existence with the environment. Man should not be cooperatively living with the environment. To cooperatively live with the environment is to give the environment respect, which assumes that the environment is equally valuable to that of man. The environment is inferior to man. Therefore, man should be concerned with living without regard to the environment. If a man owns large tracts of land and wants to build condominiums and sky scrappers on that land, the man should have no qualms about bulldozing each tract. Of course, I would recommend he sell the trees and the animals to make some profit before hand and offset the cost of his building. However, this idea that the trees, animals, condominiums, and sky scrappers should be able to exist to their fullest at the same time is wrong. Of course, some will argue that the environment is inherently valuable, and it would be vicious to destroy what is valuable. I agree to some extent, but this leads me to my next point.
Before I continue, I would like to point out that I was a Boy Scout and I earned the rank of Eagle Scout. Currently, I am also advising a Venture Crew. I have other problems with these organizations, but overall I find them beneficial. Of course, the wider scope of this is for a later post. I am just trying to point out I have had my fair share interacting with the environment, and I admit I enjoy it. The past summer I went hiking with some friends through the White Mountains, I have hiked in the Catskills, and I have been camping several times. I enjoyed everyone of those experiences. I like looking at the mountains and seeing the wide valleys and forests from the tops. I like the way the woods look in the early morning. However, I will not admit the environment has inherent value. That is a lie. The truth is the environment only has value because man exists. If man was extinct, which would mean all reason was dead, then the mountains would not be beautiful. There would be nothing attractive about valleys, forests, early mornings, or starry nights. Furthermore, none of nature would be important. Mountains, forests, valleys, deserts, trees, animals, etc. would all be worthless. This is because there would be no reason to value them; there would be no men to value it. Environmentalists forget that value presumes a valuer. Something cannot have value unless it is valued by someone. Some will argue that the animals and the plants value the environment. This is not true. Animals and trees are devoid of reason, and reason is necessary to value. Reason means one has the ability to determine virtue and vice, which means he also has the ability to identify good and bad in the sense of more valuable versus less valuable, or likeable versus dislikeable. Plants certainly cannot do this. Animals cannot do this either because they are shackled by instinct. Foxes do not live in dens because they like dens. Foxes live in dens because instinct tells them to live in dens so they will not die and they can reproduce. Koala's do not like eucalyptus leaves. Koala's are just ordered by their instinct to eat eucalyptus leaves. Therefore, the environment has no value without man, yet environmentalists want man to lower their impact on the environment or destroy themselves so that in both cases the environment can sustain its inherent value. Earth Day celebrates the environment's alleged inherent value, and since the environment has no inherent value Earth Day celebrates a falsehood; consequently, Earth Day is irrational.
However, other environmentalists, the more logical of the sort, will argue that the environment must be preserved for man's sake. These environmentalists argue that if man harms the environment too much the earth will not be able to sustain man's life. In turn, man will become extinct, which is certainly no good. This is selfish environmentalism, which is far more rational and respectable than the other environmentalists; however, these environmentalists are not completely rational. Their stance inherently restricts reason; thus, promoting a certain level of ignorance. This stance supports inside-the-box thinking. The best way to depict this problem with through an a story I constantly heard in elementary school. My elementary school science teachers always told the class that one day the sun would implode or explode, something to the effect that the sun would go out. The class would then respond with the general idea that, "Oh, well, by the time that happens we will all be dead, so it won't kill us." I always thought to myself and I continue to think that by the time that happens man will have found a substitute; man will no longer need the sun because he will provide it for himself in some way. Environmentalism has a similar stance. In analyzing global warming environmentalists will argue that if carbon emissions are not lowered and other regulations are not followed then the environment will descend into chaos. I do not really understand all that science stuff, but apparently hurricane Katrina is a sign of that. Therefore, the environment must be preserved, man must slow his development, so the environment will not descend into chaos and kill off the human race. I offer an outside-of-the-box solution. Instead, how about scientists focus on ways to create environment instead of preserving environment. Find ways to create a sun, atmosphere, air, plants, and animals. Find a new energy and more efficient energy source for when oil runs out. Create the environment man needs to survive do not preserve it. Once man create the necessary environment to sustain human life, then man can manipulate it from its immediate construction so that it will not be destroyed as man continues to industrialize, become more technological, and creates more machines. Earth Day does not celebrate this progressive thinking. Earth Day celebrates the present, the natural state of things, stagnation. Earth Day celebrates the limiting of man. I have proposed the exact opposite. I have proposed that man move forward to by creating his own living condition. Man does not need the environment; man has reason.
Therefore, since Earth Celebrates the irrational devaluing and limitation of man I propose a new day of celebration. Actually, I am not really proposing it. Exploit-the-Earth Day has been proposed by The Objective Standard, and Objectivist journal. I am supporting The Objective Standard's proposal. Thus, on the next April 22 celebrate Exploit-the-Earth Day. Celebrate man's greatness, his reason, his egoism, and his independence. On Exploit-the-Earth Day do not limit one's actions, do not preserve the environment as is, control the environment. Cut down a tree, have a pork roast, run one's factory for an extra hour, celebrate productivity. Celebrate the fact that man does not look at the environment and see what is but what can be. On Exploit-the-Earth celebrate the fact that man is supreme and not of the ignorant earth.
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Ben Stein and Intelligent Design
For once these two topics are actually related. This past Friday Ben Stein's documentary entitled Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed was released. First, let me state for the record that I have not seen this movie yet. I was busy this past Friday, the only day I ever see movies, and my local silver screen has a very limited number of new releases usually consisting of the next installments from the creators of Scary Movie 4, Meet the Spartans, and Superhero Movie. However, if this was available to me I would see it, even though I know it is going to be horrible.
From as far as I can tell from the trailer on the movie's website, this documentary is a defense of intelligent design as a viable alternative to the theory of evolution. For anyone who does not know the term "intelligent design" is a euphemism for "creationism." Intelligent design does not necessarily believe in Adam and Eve and that they were made of clay and God blew his breath in them and that Eve was actually created from one of Adam's ribs that God stole when he slipped Adam some rohypnol. However, intelligent design does argue that God is the force and being behind the creation of life. Basically, science has a problem. Well, I would not really consider it a problem as in like a contradiction or conflict or falsehood. I mean problem as in an obstacle or hurdle. Like 2+2 is a problem. One must understand the logic involved in 2+2 to get over the hurdle and come to the conclusion that it equals 4. The problem science has is that there is this theory of evolution, and a scientific theory is not like an opinion. The theory of evolution is not comparable to, "Which do you prefer, apples or oranges?" It does not depend on the person and his own beliefs. It is true that evolution is not a proven fact, much like how gravity is not a proven fact. However, there is some evidence to support that something close the theory of evolution is actually at work. The current problem with the theory of evolution is that no one really knows how life actually started. That is, of course, a problem that continued scientific study will answer. Basically, Ben Stein's movie and other creationists, or intelligent desiginists, say "No God damn it, we want the answer now. If you scientists don't know, we sure as hell know. God." As I see it, and as I have explained before, and Stefan Molyneux agrees, that is like saying, "Well I have no damn idea and I do not intend to find out." Just great. Halting the search for truth. Always a sound strategy.
Of course, there are several other problems with the intelligent design theory, I mean opinion, in that it completely relies on the existence of a supernatural being, which really does not exist. Intelligent design should not be acknowledged as a viable alternative to the theory of evolution because the existence of a supernatural being should be acknowledged as a possibility. This is where I distinct myself from agnostics, who argue they really do not know. My response is, "Well, if you do not know, then it does not exist." No supernatural being exists, and I will provide a brief proof of it based on a podcast from Stefan Molyneux's Freedomain Radio. However, I do not believe that I should have to provide any proof. I am the skeptic. The skeptic never proves his skepticism like the accused never proves his innocence. It is the believer who proves his belief like the prosecutor proves the accused's guilt.
If one is interested in hearing Stefan Molyneux provide this proof it is podcast 1040 of Freedomain Radio. I listened to the podcast a few days ago so I am going to try and recall as much of it from memory.
Let me start with an interesting point. There are millions of people of several different faiths who believe a God, a supernatural being exists, and no one thinks these people are crazy. If I went around saying I believed in Keebler Elves, Vampires, Werewolves, fairies, goblins, zombies, etc. I would be sent to Arkham Asylum. But the believers in God get a free pass.
The problem of a belief in God is that it evades all criteria of proof. When someone says he believes in God he is stating that God truly exists. He is stating the existence of God as a truth. He is not saying that he had a dream that he met God. That takes place in his own mind, and currently that cannot be proven. However, if God exists in reality his existence can be objectively proven. Therefore, there are certain scientific tests that can be conducted. I will use an analogy much like Molyneux to get the point across.
There is a man who comes to me and says that he has an invisible pink unicorn in his living. Obviously, I think this is amazing and want to see it; however, the man reminds me that the unicorn is invisible. I respond by pointing out that just cause the unicorn is invisible does not mean I cannot feel it, smell it, hear it, and taste it. Of course, the last of those would be really gross unless I killed it, cooked it, then tasted the invisible meat. The man, however, informs me that the unicorn cannot be felt, smelt, heard, or tasted. I encounter another problem, yet I have the use of modern science. There are infrared waves, heat waves, etc. that modern science allows me to measure with new technological equipment. Thus, the invisible pink unicorn cannot hide, and I will also be able to determine if it is pink even though I cannot see it because different colors produce different wave lengths. Of course, the man tells me known of these things can detect it either. This posses a problem because all the methods for proving the existence of the invisible pink unicorn have been exhausted. In asking the man how he knows it exists he says it told him, but he said it could not be heard. He then corrects himself saying it told him in his mind. Once again the existence of the invisible pink unicorn cannot be measured. Therefore, if it cannot be measured, it does not exist. That is the definition of existence.
Above I used an invisible pink unicorn and people will undoubtedly say well an invisible pink unicorn is not God. This is, however, a lie. God cannot be seen, felt, heard (unless in one's own mind), smelled, or tasted. Also, no instrument that measures energy, waves, or rays can detect him. Therefore, there is no proof of his existence. God is exactly like the invisible pink unicorn.
However, the believers will raise another point. They will say man's current technology cannot prove his existence, but at a later date it might be able to. Therefore, man must be open to the possibility that God exists until the technology can detect him. This is a huge problem for two reasons. Firstly, the believers are unwilling to accept that God may not exist. There is no place for the technology to spit back results that say, "No God." Technology will always eventually uncover God for them. I am an atheist, and I am the exact opposite. I do not believe in God. There is no evidence to prove his existence. God does not exist. However, if science says, "Hey, you were wrong. He is real. He has been detected." I will admit that I am wrong. The believers refuse to subject their beliefs to reality. They refuse to subject their beliefs to questioning, testing, evidence, and truth. I, however, am willing to do so. I am the definition of the open mind. The open mind is not one that accepts everything. The open mind is the one that subjects one's own beliefs to reality. The believers in God are closed minded, without reason. For example I am closed minded on the belief that killing innocent men is a vice. That is a solid case, a solid truth. God is not, but believers remain closed minded on it. The second problem with this position is that if they argue that one must accept the idea and science will eventually prove the existence of God, then everything must be accepted. The existence of Keebler elves must be accepted. The same goes for vampires, werewolves, smurfs, etc. Also, whiwhnondsohfusd must exist. I have no idea what whiwhnondsohfusd is or are, but I said it, I say they exist; therefore, they must be accepted science will eventually prove its existence. On a more serious level, however. This would be like if a man in the 1500's said that x-rays exist. X-rays did indeed exist in the 1500's but there was no way to measure it at all. Therefore, none of them should have believed in x-rays. If they believed in x-rays they were ignorant. In that time period the term x-ray also did not mean anything. X-ray meant as much as whiwhnondsohfusd it was of absolute no value.
The final problem with the existence of God is that he is a contradiction. Believers say God is all knowing and all powerful; however, God cannot be both. He can be one, or the other, or neither; however, if he were neither then he would not really be a God. If God is all knowing, then he knows everything that will happen until the end of time. Therefore, he cannot be all powerful. If he is all powerful then he can change anything. If God knows everything that will happen then he cannot change anything because then he will not know what will happen after he changes something. For example, God knows everything will happen on earth at any given moment. At a particular moment it will rain on me and God knows this, but God does not want it to rain on me. Consequently, he moves the clouds somewhere else. Well, he knew I was going to be rained on, but now I am not going to be; therefore, God did not. Also, he moved the clouds to Las Vegas where there were no clouds before. I knew it was not going to rain on Las Vegas, but now it is; therefore, he did not know.
Once again this is almost completely from Stefan Molyneux. It is certainly incredibly interesting. It is not something skeptics should have to prove, but it certainly helps when combating things like Ben Stein's Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. That title also bothers me because it argues that a belief in God is intelligence. It is the exact opposite it is irrational. Through the trailer one will see that several scientists who believed in God were fired from their jobs. I would certainly consider firing them from their jobs. Irrational rationalists, that is a contradiction. Of course, if they produced results I would consider keeping them. In the trailer Stein also says that people plan on keeping science in this tight little box where it can never touch God. Yes, absolutely. Science should be in the box of reason and never be allowed to touch the ignorant.
From as far as I can tell from the trailer on the movie's website, this documentary is a defense of intelligent design as a viable alternative to the theory of evolution. For anyone who does not know the term "intelligent design" is a euphemism for "creationism." Intelligent design does not necessarily believe in Adam and Eve and that they were made of clay and God blew his breath in them and that Eve was actually created from one of Adam's ribs that God stole when he slipped Adam some rohypnol. However, intelligent design does argue that God is the force and being behind the creation of life. Basically, science has a problem. Well, I would not really consider it a problem as in like a contradiction or conflict or falsehood. I mean problem as in an obstacle or hurdle. Like 2+2 is a problem. One must understand the logic involved in 2+2 to get over the hurdle and come to the conclusion that it equals 4. The problem science has is that there is this theory of evolution, and a scientific theory is not like an opinion. The theory of evolution is not comparable to, "Which do you prefer, apples or oranges?" It does not depend on the person and his own beliefs. It is true that evolution is not a proven fact, much like how gravity is not a proven fact. However, there is some evidence to support that something close the theory of evolution is actually at work. The current problem with the theory of evolution is that no one really knows how life actually started. That is, of course, a problem that continued scientific study will answer. Basically, Ben Stein's movie and other creationists, or intelligent desiginists, say "No God damn it, we want the answer now. If you scientists don't know, we sure as hell know. God." As I see it, and as I have explained before, and Stefan Molyneux agrees, that is like saying, "Well I have no damn idea and I do not intend to find out." Just great. Halting the search for truth. Always a sound strategy.
Of course, there are several other problems with the intelligent design theory, I mean opinion, in that it completely relies on the existence of a supernatural being, which really does not exist. Intelligent design should not be acknowledged as a viable alternative to the theory of evolution because the existence of a supernatural being should be acknowledged as a possibility. This is where I distinct myself from agnostics, who argue they really do not know. My response is, "Well, if you do not know, then it does not exist." No supernatural being exists, and I will provide a brief proof of it based on a podcast from Stefan Molyneux's Freedomain Radio. However, I do not believe that I should have to provide any proof. I am the skeptic. The skeptic never proves his skepticism like the accused never proves his innocence. It is the believer who proves his belief like the prosecutor proves the accused's guilt.
If one is interested in hearing Stefan Molyneux provide this proof it is podcast 1040 of Freedomain Radio. I listened to the podcast a few days ago so I am going to try and recall as much of it from memory.
Let me start with an interesting point. There are millions of people of several different faiths who believe a God, a supernatural being exists, and no one thinks these people are crazy. If I went around saying I believed in Keebler Elves, Vampires, Werewolves, fairies, goblins, zombies, etc. I would be sent to Arkham Asylum. But the believers in God get a free pass.
The problem of a belief in God is that it evades all criteria of proof. When someone says he believes in God he is stating that God truly exists. He is stating the existence of God as a truth. He is not saying that he had a dream that he met God. That takes place in his own mind, and currently that cannot be proven. However, if God exists in reality his existence can be objectively proven. Therefore, there are certain scientific tests that can be conducted. I will use an analogy much like Molyneux to get the point across.
There is a man who comes to me and says that he has an invisible pink unicorn in his living. Obviously, I think this is amazing and want to see it; however, the man reminds me that the unicorn is invisible. I respond by pointing out that just cause the unicorn is invisible does not mean I cannot feel it, smell it, hear it, and taste it. Of course, the last of those would be really gross unless I killed it, cooked it, then tasted the invisible meat. The man, however, informs me that the unicorn cannot be felt, smelt, heard, or tasted. I encounter another problem, yet I have the use of modern science. There are infrared waves, heat waves, etc. that modern science allows me to measure with new technological equipment. Thus, the invisible pink unicorn cannot hide, and I will also be able to determine if it is pink even though I cannot see it because different colors produce different wave lengths. Of course, the man tells me known of these things can detect it either. This posses a problem because all the methods for proving the existence of the invisible pink unicorn have been exhausted. In asking the man how he knows it exists he says it told him, but he said it could not be heard. He then corrects himself saying it told him in his mind. Once again the existence of the invisible pink unicorn cannot be measured. Therefore, if it cannot be measured, it does not exist. That is the definition of existence.
Above I used an invisible pink unicorn and people will undoubtedly say well an invisible pink unicorn is not God. This is, however, a lie. God cannot be seen, felt, heard (unless in one's own mind), smelled, or tasted. Also, no instrument that measures energy, waves, or rays can detect him. Therefore, there is no proof of his existence. God is exactly like the invisible pink unicorn.
However, the believers will raise another point. They will say man's current technology cannot prove his existence, but at a later date it might be able to. Therefore, man must be open to the possibility that God exists until the technology can detect him. This is a huge problem for two reasons. Firstly, the believers are unwilling to accept that God may not exist. There is no place for the technology to spit back results that say, "No God." Technology will always eventually uncover God for them. I am an atheist, and I am the exact opposite. I do not believe in God. There is no evidence to prove his existence. God does not exist. However, if science says, "Hey, you were wrong. He is real. He has been detected." I will admit that I am wrong. The believers refuse to subject their beliefs to reality. They refuse to subject their beliefs to questioning, testing, evidence, and truth. I, however, am willing to do so. I am the definition of the open mind. The open mind is not one that accepts everything. The open mind is the one that subjects one's own beliefs to reality. The believers in God are closed minded, without reason. For example I am closed minded on the belief that killing innocent men is a vice. That is a solid case, a solid truth. God is not, but believers remain closed minded on it. The second problem with this position is that if they argue that one must accept the idea and science will eventually prove the existence of God, then everything must be accepted. The existence of Keebler elves must be accepted. The same goes for vampires, werewolves, smurfs, etc. Also, whiwhnondsohfusd must exist. I have no idea what whiwhnondsohfusd is or are, but I said it, I say they exist; therefore, they must be accepted science will eventually prove its existence. On a more serious level, however. This would be like if a man in the 1500's said that x-rays exist. X-rays did indeed exist in the 1500's but there was no way to measure it at all. Therefore, none of them should have believed in x-rays. If they believed in x-rays they were ignorant. In that time period the term x-ray also did not mean anything. X-ray meant as much as whiwhnondsohfusd it was of absolute no value.
The final problem with the existence of God is that he is a contradiction. Believers say God is all knowing and all powerful; however, God cannot be both. He can be one, or the other, or neither; however, if he were neither then he would not really be a God. If God is all knowing, then he knows everything that will happen until the end of time. Therefore, he cannot be all powerful. If he is all powerful then he can change anything. If God knows everything that will happen then he cannot change anything because then he will not know what will happen after he changes something. For example, God knows everything will happen on earth at any given moment. At a particular moment it will rain on me and God knows this, but God does not want it to rain on me. Consequently, he moves the clouds somewhere else. Well, he knew I was going to be rained on, but now I am not going to be; therefore, God did not. Also, he moved the clouds to Las Vegas where there were no clouds before. I knew it was not going to rain on Las Vegas, but now it is; therefore, he did not know.
Once again this is almost completely from Stefan Molyneux. It is certainly incredibly interesting. It is not something skeptics should have to prove, but it certainly helps when combating things like Ben Stein's Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. That title also bothers me because it argues that a belief in God is intelligence. It is the exact opposite it is irrational. Through the trailer one will see that several scientists who believed in God were fired from their jobs. I would certainly consider firing them from their jobs. Irrational rationalists, that is a contradiction. Of course, if they produced results I would consider keeping them. In the trailer Stein also says that people plan on keeping science in this tight little box where it can never touch God. Yes, absolutely. Science should be in the box of reason and never be allowed to touch the ignorant.
Friday, April 18, 2008
Racism
Yesterday I watched an episode of Penn Jillette's show Penn Says on Crackle. The episode was in response to a viewer comment from Cifier. I have to say it was phenomenal to hear both of them. First I listed to Penn's episode, then I located the Cifier response. Both were excellent. Like Penn I always thought there was something wrong with the term "African American." I much prefer using the term "black" when I need to, but I am always nervous that I will be attacked for using the term "black." Now, I actually think I should explain why I have to use the term "black," and that does not really make any sense. As I understand it the term "black" is equatable to the term "blond." I never use "black" in a derogatory tone, and I really do not see how the term by itself is derogatory. I use the term "black" only to describe and identify a person. For example, if I am with a friend in a large crowd and I see someone in the crowd doing something hilarious, not embarrassing or humiliating hilarious, just entertaining hilarious. However, as I am pointing to the hilarious man for my friend to watch and laugh with me my friend cannot find him. If the man is black I will then say something like, "The black guy, over there." The same exact thing would occur is the situation were identical except for the fact that the black man was a blond woman. In that case I would say, "The blond girl, over there." I really do not see how "black" is a racist term. Penn briefly addresses this point, Cifier really does not, but the point they do address, especially Cifier, is how the term "African American" is racist.
Briefly, I will explain what racism is. At its very core racism is collective judgment. Collective judgment can take many forms. One great example of a collective judgment is, "Blonds are stupid." In reality, it is not that blonds are stupid, this collective judgment is stupid. It is irrational to judge every individual in the same way based solely on a physical feature. What makes it even more irrational is that the physical feature used to judge has no affect on intelligence. So the ignorance of collective judgment is two fold. Furthermore, it is vicious because it is devoid of reason. What is even worse than collective judgment is acting on that collective judgment. As an extreme, if a blond kills someone it would be completely irrational and completely vicious to then kill all blonds because they are all stupid so they are predisposed to killing. Not only is this now a collective judgment it is a collective punishment. Individuals are different, that is why they are called individuals and not something else like units or cogs. Therefore, and individual's physical similarity to a guilty individual is not reason to punish him. This violates the individual's natural rights. To me, this just seems so simple, but it escapes so many people.
Racism, is the collective judgment I described except it is not based on hair color but skin color. Just replace the previous statements of blonds with blacks and you have yourself several racist statements. Now, if racism is collective judgment, then saying African American is certainly racist. Cifier explains it perfectly. I highly recommend listening to his comment, but I will briefly summarize what he said. Cifier is black, but he states that he has never been to Africa. He states that he has lived in America his whole life, he celebrates American holidays, he has an American culture based on these holidays, he loves America, he has no love for Africa, he does not speak any African languages, he does not know of any African tribes, he does not celebrate any African holidays, and he does not practice any African cultures. So a black man with complete connection to America and absolutely no connection to Africa is then labeled as an African America. He argues this is racism because he is labeled as African simply because he is black. Cifier is absolutely correct. The term "African American" is racist. It is a collective judgment based on skin color. Solely because of an uncontrollable physical feature, skin color in this case, it is collectively judged that all black people have a connection to Africa. Cifier has clearly shown this to be false. Cifier then goes on to explain how insulting the term "African American" is. Cifier states that for his whole life he has been American; however, no one will let him be America. Cifier just wants to be American, but no one will acknowledge that. People say he is African American. He is African first, American second. This, as Cifier sees it, and I would completely agree, is insulting.
Penn's response to Cifier's comments is also perfect. Penn does not correct anything Cifier said, or disagree with anything he said; Penn cannot, what Cifier said was true. Penn only goes a step further by saying that racism goes both ways, meaning collective judgment goes both ways. Penn states that no one should hate himself based on his ancestry, and no one should be proud because of his ancestry. Penn is correct, it does not make sense, it is completely irrational. Negative collective judgment based on ancestry would be hating all individuals of African descent. That is irrational because present individuals are not connected to individuals of past generations. Sure blood lines, genes, may be related, but the actions and motives of past individuals do not control present individuals. Therefore, if someone's grandfather was a Nazi, that is no reason to hate his grandson. The grandfather's actions and motives do not control the grandson. Positive collective judgment based on ancestry is exactly the same. If someone's grandfather was a Nazi hunter that is no reason to praise his grandson. One may hate the Nazi grandfather and like the Nazi hunting grandfather, but one may not like or dislike their grandsons based on their actions and motives. Negative and Positive collective judgment even not based on ancestry is just as irrational, and therefore vicious. A black man who grew up in America should not have pride in being black because of the Haitian Revolution or slave rebellions. It does not make sense, the past individuals do not control or speak for the present individuals.
Briefly, I will explain what racism is. At its very core racism is collective judgment. Collective judgment can take many forms. One great example of a collective judgment is, "Blonds are stupid." In reality, it is not that blonds are stupid, this collective judgment is stupid. It is irrational to judge every individual in the same way based solely on a physical feature. What makes it even more irrational is that the physical feature used to judge has no affect on intelligence. So the ignorance of collective judgment is two fold. Furthermore, it is vicious because it is devoid of reason. What is even worse than collective judgment is acting on that collective judgment. As an extreme, if a blond kills someone it would be completely irrational and completely vicious to then kill all blonds because they are all stupid so they are predisposed to killing. Not only is this now a collective judgment it is a collective punishment. Individuals are different, that is why they are called individuals and not something else like units or cogs. Therefore, and individual's physical similarity to a guilty individual is not reason to punish him. This violates the individual's natural rights. To me, this just seems so simple, but it escapes so many people.
Racism, is the collective judgment I described except it is not based on hair color but skin color. Just replace the previous statements of blonds with blacks and you have yourself several racist statements. Now, if racism is collective judgment, then saying African American is certainly racist. Cifier explains it perfectly. I highly recommend listening to his comment, but I will briefly summarize what he said. Cifier is black, but he states that he has never been to Africa. He states that he has lived in America his whole life, he celebrates American holidays, he has an American culture based on these holidays, he loves America, he has no love for Africa, he does not speak any African languages, he does not know of any African tribes, he does not celebrate any African holidays, and he does not practice any African cultures. So a black man with complete connection to America and absolutely no connection to Africa is then labeled as an African America. He argues this is racism because he is labeled as African simply because he is black. Cifier is absolutely correct. The term "African American" is racist. It is a collective judgment based on skin color. Solely because of an uncontrollable physical feature, skin color in this case, it is collectively judged that all black people have a connection to Africa. Cifier has clearly shown this to be false. Cifier then goes on to explain how insulting the term "African American" is. Cifier states that for his whole life he has been American; however, no one will let him be America. Cifier just wants to be American, but no one will acknowledge that. People say he is African American. He is African first, American second. This, as Cifier sees it, and I would completely agree, is insulting.
Penn's response to Cifier's comments is also perfect. Penn does not correct anything Cifier said, or disagree with anything he said; Penn cannot, what Cifier said was true. Penn only goes a step further by saying that racism goes both ways, meaning collective judgment goes both ways. Penn states that no one should hate himself based on his ancestry, and no one should be proud because of his ancestry. Penn is correct, it does not make sense, it is completely irrational. Negative collective judgment based on ancestry would be hating all individuals of African descent. That is irrational because present individuals are not connected to individuals of past generations. Sure blood lines, genes, may be related, but the actions and motives of past individuals do not control present individuals. Therefore, if someone's grandfather was a Nazi, that is no reason to hate his grandson. The grandfather's actions and motives do not control the grandson. Positive collective judgment based on ancestry is exactly the same. If someone's grandfather was a Nazi hunter that is no reason to praise his grandson. One may hate the Nazi grandfather and like the Nazi hunting grandfather, but one may not like or dislike their grandsons based on their actions and motives. Negative and Positive collective judgment even not based on ancestry is just as irrational, and therefore vicious. A black man who grew up in America should not have pride in being black because of the Haitian Revolution or slave rebellions. It does not make sense, the past individuals do not control or speak for the present individuals.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Novelty and Art
Over the past week my Political Theory has been reading an essay by Alan Bloom entitled Our Listless Universities and two essays by Leo Strauss entitled What is Liberal Education? and Liberal Education and Responsibility. I do not completely agree with either Bloom or Strauss; however, I do agree with about 90% of what they say in regards to Liberal education, or college and university education. The 10% I do not agree with is what they argue are the causes of the decrepit state of liberal education, greed, selfishness, self-interest, etc. As I see it, the exact opposite philosophy has created liberal education. However, I do agree with what they identify as the problems of liberal education and my generation as a whole. In past posts I have actually addressed the issue and I seem to have been addressing it more repetitively in the past few posts, so I will not completely restate my argument. In summary multi-culturalism and free love have caused people to dump reason, reality, and logic to adopt moral relativism; thus, enters the destruction of civilization. Obviously, it is not an immediate destruction, it is a slow process, and Bloom would actually agree with me. He sees these movements as enormous problems, and that current colleges and universities just reinforce those movements. So, instead of teaching about truth, reality, and reason as they should, colleges and universities are creating collectives, no-judgment zones, and anti-reality. They have established the absolute of no absolutes, which in itself is a contradiction; thus, negating the whole philosophy. Before moving on to some of the specific points of Bloom's and Strauss' arguments I have not addressed before I would like to dispute one stance Bloom and Strauss have. As they see it colleges and universities used to be concerned with truth and reality, but in recent years, specifically around the 60's, have turned away from that. I originally agreed with this position. Strauss argues that liberal education is supposed to be a check on mass culture. Mass culture is basically the collective of irrationality, the mob of fashion, fads, and pop culture. Strauss states this culture is dangerous because it is concerned with novelty, which I will address later. As he sees it the colleges and the universities have surrendered or been hijacked by the mass culture. However, after I thought about this for awhile I realized this could not be the case. Currently, I am reading Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand and she makes the exact same arguments against liberal education. This is exhibited in John Galt's, Ragnar Danneskjold's, and Francisco D'anconia's relationship with philosophy professor Hugh Akston and physics professor Robert Stadler. Akston is the professor concerned with truth and reality while Stadler is misguided. Akston is also portrayed as somewhat of a mis-fit at the Patrick Henry University and eventually anti-reality thinkers such as Simon Pritchett. The point is Ayn Ran wrote Atlas Shrugged in the 40's before the multi-cutluralist and free love boom of the 60's. The same problems also occur early in her previous novel The Fountainhead. I realize that Atlas Shrugged is based on a future dystopia, but Rand may have based her university portrayal on reality. This would indicate that colleges and universities never really had a "hay day" where truth and reality were top priorities. Therefore, it is the status of education that perpetuates moral relativism. Of course, the individual students lack responsibility because they do not have to listen to their professors, they can just educate themselves. However, if a student pays $40,000 a year to be educated, teaching the absolute of no absolutes does not count as education. Colleges and universities have not been hijacked, they have been causing the problem from the start. As I see it Bloom states it perfectly, "[A] young person does not generally go off to the university with the expectation of having an intellectual adventure, of discovering strange new worlds, or finding out what the comprehensive truth about man is. Instead, the primary concern of our best universities is to indoctrinate social attitudes, to 'socialize,' rather than to educate."
The first new topic I would like to address is novelty from Strauss essay. As I stated before Strauss argues that liberal education is supposed to a check on mass culture, the culture of fads, fashions, and popularity. According to Strauss this culture is obsessed with novelty, they are always seeking the newest thing. This is inherently dangerous to education and more importantly morality, reason, all the stuff I have talked about before. If someone is obsessed with novelty he believes that new is inherently good. This is similarly related to multi-culturalism where differences in cultures, the differences themselves, are assumed to be inherently good. Consequently, novelty, new qualities, are not subjecting to reason. Since new is assumed to be good or virtuous, all the time, then no one needs to approach the novelty, apply reason, and discover if it is actually virtuous. Furthermore, worshiping novelty completely disregards the concept of truth. Truth is reality, it is whatever is real, and it is not affected by the desires or actions of man. I am speaking about moral truth right now. For example, the simplest example, the initiation of force is always vicious. That is the truth. Regardless of what men want or what men do that will always be the truth. Novelty is constantly changing; therefore, if novelty is always good then truth does not exist because truth is then affected by man's wants and actions.
I understand all this to be very obvious, of course, other people do not. In fact other people do not even realize that they worship novelty. My Political Theory class began discussing these three essays on Monday, and the class started with Bloom's essay. Everyone, except myself, disagreed with Bloom. They said his essay was offensive, which it was not he was just saying all the students were wrong. They also said he was too distanced from the student population even though he was a professor at a college, and that he had no evidence to prove his thesis. I laughed a little inside at this because it was the first time I heard these students demand evidence. They are of course right Bloom did not have an conclusive scientific evidence. He even admitted this in his essay by stating that it was purely based on his observations. The novelty worshiping arrives on Wednesday when the class begins discussing Strauss' first essay. Both Strauss' and Bloom's essays are quite similar. They basically have the same thesis and almost similar proof, but Strauss has a more professional writing style than Bloom. That is really the only difference. However, people latched onto Strauss' essay. People who disagreed with Bloom the day before were now hailing Strauss. One student even did it in the same class. He said he thought that Bloom had no idea what he was talking about at the beginning of class, then mid-way through class he said he agreed with Strauss and found that Bloom may have some merit. Of course, this student may have genuinely begun to understand what Bloom and Strauss were arguing, for he used some examples in his own life at college. He also said that he was sick of all the professors and students denouncing reality. He may have come to a revelation; however, I am not entirely convinced, and the rest of the class has not remotely convinced me. I would like for the class to actually and truthfully agree with Strauss and Bloom, but want and desire do not alter reality. I believe I have witnessed this same phenomena before and actually in the same class. Every time the class discusses the reading whether it is by Machiavelli, Locke, "The Clown Prince of Philosophy" Rousseau, Marx, Plato, etc. the class always agree with what these people say. Granted, I agree with bits and pieces of these philosophers arguments, but I always make that clear. I state that this makes sense, but there is a severe problem with this part of the theory. Actually, in most cases I just attack the philosophy. People have been agreeing with these chumps for years, it is about time someone says, "Hey hasn't anyone noticed the ridiculous shit over here." Anyway, my class just agrees with whoever they are reading, and obviously they cannot agree with everyone. One cannot agree with both Locke and Marx, they are practically polar opposites, but the class does. One cannot agree with Machiavelli and "Philosophy's Court Jester" Rousseau, but they do. The problem is exactly what Strauss was talking about, an obsession with novelty. The students just like whatever is new. However, the most dangerous element here is that these students do not even realize it. They do not realize they are contradicting themselves from week to week. They do not realize they are agreeing with Strauss' argument against novelty on the basis that it is a novelty. They do not realize they are the mass culture that Strauss is attacking.
I would also like to point out that the student who may have had an epiphany argued that he was tired of professors and students not making judgments. He pointed out a historian asked him if it was his place as a historian to make judgments on history. The student said that was the entire purpose behind a historian. He said if one does make judgments on history, then there is no point studying it. The point in studying history is to identify past mistakes in order to to repeat them in the future. However, as the student said, everyone now argues that people are just a product of their time and environment, people have no control over what they do, so no one can judge other humans. This is how he saw reality being denounced. He then pointed out that while history tries to avoid judgments, tries to tell everyone to just accept things as they are and do nothing, that other departments such as philosophy tell people to challenge the status quo and be individuals. In class I pointed out that I agreed with most of what this student said except the last part. I see the philosophy department as a department for worshiping novelty. Philosophy is supposed to be concerned with discovering truth, but just read Michel Foucault, read Giorgio Agamben's essay Beyond Human Rights. These people are not concerned with truth or reality. They are just trying to come up with the most creative, the most novel idea possible. These people are slaves to novelty, and exhibit just how dangerous and pervasive novelty worshiping is; it infiltrated the last front against it.
Next I will discuss art, which is addressed in both Bloom's and Strauss' essays, but I really thought of addressing this idea while walking around campus today. Since the weather is starting to get nicer and it is towards the end of the year students began working on projects. This is especially true for the photography students, and by God they were photographing shit. On my way to class I noticed a student with a camera walking around the outdoor covered walkway outside of my dorm. He was photographing the grout where the wall and the floor meet. He was photographing a disgusting muck filled crack. Now, I have no idea what this student's assignment is. Maybe it was an assignment to take pictures of really small things, like the smelly grains of mud in the crack. However, he was listening to music while he was taking pictures, and I assumed this was for inspiration. He could also just be using the music to pass the time for a boring assignment, but I really doubt it. My college has some of the most ridiculous "art" I have ever seen. In fact I will not even call it art. I refuse to devalue the word art. My school has some of the most ridiculous decorations, and I believe this student was just making another decoration. I also saw another student from my window take a picture of someone who worked in the Kosher dinning hall. The back of the Kosher kitchen faces my dorm window and sometimes I woman who works there steps outside to take a break, have a cigarette, drink some water, sit for awhile. While this woman was sitting there a student approached and asked if she could take a picture of her. The woman's response was, "Why do you want a picture of an exhausted woman." I believe this sets me on the perfect track to my point. Granted, there are some excellent photographs of people working and resting that can be taken. Men working on construction sites, men in a foundry, cooks, etc. One can also photograph these men relaxing and exhausted, once they have finished observing their creations with pride. Obviously, this woman was not doing that. This argument should not be construed as an attack on this woman. I am just saying this woman was absolutely exhausted, she was not at her highest point, it appeared she would rather be at home than outside of a Kosher kitchen on a cigarette break without an ounce of energy left. This woman was exactly right. Why would anyone want a picture of that? The student wanted that picture because the student like many other people have grown up with the idea that man is small, weak, and absolutely worthless. Therefore, man should feel not pride, he should suffer, he should sacrifice his body and life to others, man should be miserable. A photograph of that woman captures this philosophy. That philosophy is completely wrong, and art was not made for that philosophy. Art was made to depict man in his best form, proud, satisfied, strong, individual, and independent.
Bloom and Strauss do not exactly say this much, but they do attack art. Bloom attacks modern music. He claims that it has the beat of sex, and that it pounds to the irrational core of man that is ripe in teenagers. He argues that it is like gas on a fire; it only provides an ephemeral burst of flames. Now, I do like The Rolling Stones, The Who, Queen, The Arctic Monkeys, The White Strips, Wolfmother, etc. but I also know they are not the best. I know they are no where near ideal music. I listened to them much in the past, but recently I downloaded some classical music. Two weeks ago I thought The Beatles and The Rolling Stones were the best, but orchestra music really captures the essence of art. The Rolling Stones are like decorations. They are entertaining, interesting, novel, and ephemeral. Orchestra music, the clashing and pounding of several instruments echoes to man's self, appeals to his mind and independence. The Rolling Stones makes one feel he is at a concert in a mosh pit of sorts, but orchestra music unlocks the strength in man to conquer nature, climb to the top of a mountain alone and stand against the blazing orange sun and whipping winds. Orchestra music requires more thought, calculation, reason, intelligence, and logic than rock and roll. Orchestra appeals to the truth and reality, and rock and roll does not. I believe Bloom has it right, and I believe Strauss stated it perfectly when he said, "Liberal education supplies us with the experience in thing beautiful." This is to say not everything is beautiful. Not everything can be accepted. Therefore, not everything is art. Strauss also states here that beauty is not felt, it is not intuitive, beauty is learned. Thus, there is reason to art. In other words, art is objective. One walk around my college and one will understand most students here do not understand that. They believe anything is art; consequently, they have not been educated on what is beautiful.
The first new topic I would like to address is novelty from Strauss essay. As I stated before Strauss argues that liberal education is supposed to a check on mass culture, the culture of fads, fashions, and popularity. According to Strauss this culture is obsessed with novelty, they are always seeking the newest thing. This is inherently dangerous to education and more importantly morality, reason, all the stuff I have talked about before. If someone is obsessed with novelty he believes that new is inherently good. This is similarly related to multi-culturalism where differences in cultures, the differences themselves, are assumed to be inherently good. Consequently, novelty, new qualities, are not subjecting to reason. Since new is assumed to be good or virtuous, all the time, then no one needs to approach the novelty, apply reason, and discover if it is actually virtuous. Furthermore, worshiping novelty completely disregards the concept of truth. Truth is reality, it is whatever is real, and it is not affected by the desires or actions of man. I am speaking about moral truth right now. For example, the simplest example, the initiation of force is always vicious. That is the truth. Regardless of what men want or what men do that will always be the truth. Novelty is constantly changing; therefore, if novelty is always good then truth does not exist because truth is then affected by man's wants and actions.
I understand all this to be very obvious, of course, other people do not. In fact other people do not even realize that they worship novelty. My Political Theory class began discussing these three essays on Monday, and the class started with Bloom's essay. Everyone, except myself, disagreed with Bloom. They said his essay was offensive, which it was not he was just saying all the students were wrong. They also said he was too distanced from the student population even though he was a professor at a college, and that he had no evidence to prove his thesis. I laughed a little inside at this because it was the first time I heard these students demand evidence. They are of course right Bloom did not have an conclusive scientific evidence. He even admitted this in his essay by stating that it was purely based on his observations. The novelty worshiping arrives on Wednesday when the class begins discussing Strauss' first essay. Both Strauss' and Bloom's essays are quite similar. They basically have the same thesis and almost similar proof, but Strauss has a more professional writing style than Bloom. That is really the only difference. However, people latched onto Strauss' essay. People who disagreed with Bloom the day before were now hailing Strauss. One student even did it in the same class. He said he thought that Bloom had no idea what he was talking about at the beginning of class, then mid-way through class he said he agreed with Strauss and found that Bloom may have some merit. Of course, this student may have genuinely begun to understand what Bloom and Strauss were arguing, for he used some examples in his own life at college. He also said that he was sick of all the professors and students denouncing reality. He may have come to a revelation; however, I am not entirely convinced, and the rest of the class has not remotely convinced me. I would like for the class to actually and truthfully agree with Strauss and Bloom, but want and desire do not alter reality. I believe I have witnessed this same phenomena before and actually in the same class. Every time the class discusses the reading whether it is by Machiavelli, Locke, "The Clown Prince of Philosophy" Rousseau, Marx, Plato, etc. the class always agree with what these people say. Granted, I agree with bits and pieces of these philosophers arguments, but I always make that clear. I state that this makes sense, but there is a severe problem with this part of the theory. Actually, in most cases I just attack the philosophy. People have been agreeing with these chumps for years, it is about time someone says, "Hey hasn't anyone noticed the ridiculous shit over here." Anyway, my class just agrees with whoever they are reading, and obviously they cannot agree with everyone. One cannot agree with both Locke and Marx, they are practically polar opposites, but the class does. One cannot agree with Machiavelli and "Philosophy's Court Jester" Rousseau, but they do. The problem is exactly what Strauss was talking about, an obsession with novelty. The students just like whatever is new. However, the most dangerous element here is that these students do not even realize it. They do not realize they are contradicting themselves from week to week. They do not realize they are agreeing with Strauss' argument against novelty on the basis that it is a novelty. They do not realize they are the mass culture that Strauss is attacking.
I would also like to point out that the student who may have had an epiphany argued that he was tired of professors and students not making judgments. He pointed out a historian asked him if it was his place as a historian to make judgments on history. The student said that was the entire purpose behind a historian. He said if one does make judgments on history, then there is no point studying it. The point in studying history is to identify past mistakes in order to to repeat them in the future. However, as the student said, everyone now argues that people are just a product of their time and environment, people have no control over what they do, so no one can judge other humans. This is how he saw reality being denounced. He then pointed out that while history tries to avoid judgments, tries to tell everyone to just accept things as they are and do nothing, that other departments such as philosophy tell people to challenge the status quo and be individuals. In class I pointed out that I agreed with most of what this student said except the last part. I see the philosophy department as a department for worshiping novelty. Philosophy is supposed to be concerned with discovering truth, but just read Michel Foucault, read Giorgio Agamben's essay Beyond Human Rights. These people are not concerned with truth or reality. They are just trying to come up with the most creative, the most novel idea possible. These people are slaves to novelty, and exhibit just how dangerous and pervasive novelty worshiping is; it infiltrated the last front against it.
Next I will discuss art, which is addressed in both Bloom's and Strauss' essays, but I really thought of addressing this idea while walking around campus today. Since the weather is starting to get nicer and it is towards the end of the year students began working on projects. This is especially true for the photography students, and by God they were photographing shit. On my way to class I noticed a student with a camera walking around the outdoor covered walkway outside of my dorm. He was photographing the grout where the wall and the floor meet. He was photographing a disgusting muck filled crack. Now, I have no idea what this student's assignment is. Maybe it was an assignment to take pictures of really small things, like the smelly grains of mud in the crack. However, he was listening to music while he was taking pictures, and I assumed this was for inspiration. He could also just be using the music to pass the time for a boring assignment, but I really doubt it. My college has some of the most ridiculous "art" I have ever seen. In fact I will not even call it art. I refuse to devalue the word art. My school has some of the most ridiculous decorations, and I believe this student was just making another decoration. I also saw another student from my window take a picture of someone who worked in the Kosher dinning hall. The back of the Kosher kitchen faces my dorm window and sometimes I woman who works there steps outside to take a break, have a cigarette, drink some water, sit for awhile. While this woman was sitting there a student approached and asked if she could take a picture of her. The woman's response was, "Why do you want a picture of an exhausted woman." I believe this sets me on the perfect track to my point. Granted, there are some excellent photographs of people working and resting that can be taken. Men working on construction sites, men in a foundry, cooks, etc. One can also photograph these men relaxing and exhausted, once they have finished observing their creations with pride. Obviously, this woman was not doing that. This argument should not be construed as an attack on this woman. I am just saying this woman was absolutely exhausted, she was not at her highest point, it appeared she would rather be at home than outside of a Kosher kitchen on a cigarette break without an ounce of energy left. This woman was exactly right. Why would anyone want a picture of that? The student wanted that picture because the student like many other people have grown up with the idea that man is small, weak, and absolutely worthless. Therefore, man should feel not pride, he should suffer, he should sacrifice his body and life to others, man should be miserable. A photograph of that woman captures this philosophy. That philosophy is completely wrong, and art was not made for that philosophy. Art was made to depict man in his best form, proud, satisfied, strong, individual, and independent.
Bloom and Strauss do not exactly say this much, but they do attack art. Bloom attacks modern music. He claims that it has the beat of sex, and that it pounds to the irrational core of man that is ripe in teenagers. He argues that it is like gas on a fire; it only provides an ephemeral burst of flames. Now, I do like The Rolling Stones, The Who, Queen, The Arctic Monkeys, The White Strips, Wolfmother, etc. but I also know they are not the best. I know they are no where near ideal music. I listened to them much in the past, but recently I downloaded some classical music. Two weeks ago I thought The Beatles and The Rolling Stones were the best, but orchestra music really captures the essence of art. The Rolling Stones are like decorations. They are entertaining, interesting, novel, and ephemeral. Orchestra music, the clashing and pounding of several instruments echoes to man's self, appeals to his mind and independence. The Rolling Stones makes one feel he is at a concert in a mosh pit of sorts, but orchestra music unlocks the strength in man to conquer nature, climb to the top of a mountain alone and stand against the blazing orange sun and whipping winds. Orchestra music requires more thought, calculation, reason, intelligence, and logic than rock and roll. Orchestra appeals to the truth and reality, and rock and roll does not. I believe Bloom has it right, and I believe Strauss stated it perfectly when he said, "Liberal education supplies us with the experience in thing beautiful." This is to say not everything is beautiful. Not everything can be accepted. Therefore, not everything is art. Strauss also states here that beauty is not felt, it is not intuitive, beauty is learned. Thus, there is reason to art. In other words, art is objective. One walk around my college and one will understand most students here do not understand that. They believe anything is art; consequently, they have not been educated on what is beautiful.
Friday, April 11, 2008
Application Response
Currently, I am looking for either a summer internship or job, so over the past few weeks I have been emailing my resume, cover letter, writing sample, references, etc. to a variety of different organizations and businesses. I originally wanted to intern with the federal government, but that never really panned out. I realize I am presently at a disadvantage because I am a college freshman and internships, especially with the federal government which are probably in high demand, go to graduating seniors, juniors, sophomores, and finally freshman. After, the federal government internships never really panned out I began applying for internships in office work, administrative work, public relations, and lobbying just to get any basic office experience. Yesterday, I applied with one of the following organizations, and today I received an interesting response. I was rejected like with all of my past attempts; however, this individual had something additionally negative to say. The name of the organization and the individual will remain nameless. The email read as follows:
Hello Steven:
Thank you for your application. I read your blog and
your resume. We are seeking candidates who have a
background in advertising, public relations, graphic
design, video, or web design. Those candidates would
have prior course work, experience (paid or unpaid),
internships, and memberships in professional
associations. For this reason, I don't have a
position here for you.
I do have some advice. When you begin to set a career
direction for yourself -- and it is early, yet, to do
so -- you will want to package yourself for the job.
Many employers would find your aspects and topics of
your blog offensive. So I don't recommend, in the
future, that you send potential employers a link to
your blog, because of its controversial content.
It's great that you are writing and practice will
definitely improve your writing and critical thinking
skills. Even for a blog that is personal in nature,
you should start thinking about your audience and how
to make your writing more understandable. Think: what
do I want them to think or do after reading this post?
Am I trying to persuade them? Entertain them? Why
should they bother reading my posts? These kinds of
questions will lend purpose to your content.
Breaking your blog into shorter topics and applying
simple formatting (using headings, bullets, and links)
would go a long way to making your writing more
user-friendly. Try and keep your posts to 450 words
or less, and think about making one main point,
supporting it well with about three supporting points,
and calling it a day for that post. You may want to
watch the tone of your writing, if you want to
increase your audience. I know this is not a business
blog, but if you are submitting it to a business as a
writing sample, you should know that the essence of
business writing for online purposes is creating
concise, purposeful, and memorable content (people can
remember about three supporting points before you lose
them).
I definitely recommend that you make an appointment
with a career counselor to discuss your options and to
learn about ways to strengthen your resume and present
yourself to potential employers. Good luck.
The first paragraph is perfectly fine. That is exactly how organizations should select employees, in a rationally selfish way. If the applicant does not have the merits or abilities to produce profits for the business then the applicant should not be hired. An email that stated that would be perfectly fine. However, this individual goes into the problem area once he starts addressing this blog.
When applying for this internship one of the questions was whether or not I have a blog. Of course, I do. I am writing on it right now. Since I had a blog the organization would like to know the web address so they could read it. Obviously, that did not go over very well. However, I want to address that there is a perfectly logical way this organization could have responded. If they read the blog, and realized I did not hold the same beliefs as them, then they could have responded by saying, "You will not be hired because you do not follow the same philosophy as the organization." This would make perfect sense. It is just like an organization not hiring someone for a lack of merit or abilities. If my philosophy runs contrary to the organization's philosophy then the organization should not hire me because not only would that be immoral on their part for compromising their values, but it may also be difficult for them to generate profits on hiring me. However, this is not at all what this individual says. This individual says I should deny the truth.
This individual basically argues that it is moral for me to lie. Within the second paragraph he says it was a poor decision to send my blog to them. At first I thought that maybe this individual were right, but then I realized he was absolutely wrong. Firstly, they asked if I had a blog and if I would give them the web address; therefore, if I did not send the web address then I would be lying. There are certain occasions when lying is acceptable. For example, if lying will preserve one's natural right from being violated, or if lying will protect one's privacy, what one holds to be personally sacred. Of course, neither of these are long term solution. They are short term, escapes from the current situation. If someone puts a gun to my head, asks if I am a Christian, and I know if I say I am a Christian I will not be killed, then I will certainly lie and tell the gunman I am a Christian. However, then I will leave that place as quickly as possible. Primarily, so the chance of my natural right to life being violated decreases, but also so I can live in a place where I can be myself without lying. In this application, however, lying is not acceptable. It is not acceptable to deny the truth in order to get a job. The second problem with this individual's argument is that in order for me to lie about the existence of this blog I would have to be ashamed of it. In turn, I would also be ashamed of my philosophy, and ultimately I would loathe myself. None of this is true; therefore, I have not reason to hide my blog. In fact, my blog is open to the public. I do not have to give anyone a web address. People can just search for my blog on blogspot. The final problem with this individual's argument is that he is basically saying his organization condones lying, the denial of truth, the denial of one's self, and in turn self-loathing. He says it would have been better for me not to submit the blog, to lie, in order to appear better to my employers. In other words, lying would make me appear better to my employers, acting viciously would make me appear virtuous. I would not want to be part of such an organization.
The second part I would like to address is that the individual claims my blog is offensive and controversial. Controversial? - yes. Offensive? - no. Granted, I have called Rousseau a clown, attacked religion, and attacked altruistic morality, but those are all really just controversial. Well, except for the Rousseau part. Offensive would be more like if this was a Nazi blog and in every post I argued that all the Jews should be killed. In fact, my blog is the exact opposite. My blog argues for the absolute protection of natural individual rights. This cannot be offensive. Of course, this individual just points out a current ill. In addition to Nazi-esque positions being offensive, the term "offensive" has also come to include saying people are wrong. In the current multi-culturalist, free loving, accepting society, it is offensive to say other people are wrong. I have addressed this issue to a much larger extent in previous posts, but once again it makes itself clear.
Another problem is when the individual begins addressing my writing. Obviously, the writing in this blog is not the acme of literary work. I am sure there are plenty of spelling errors and certainly plenty of grammatical errors. However, this blog really is not made for that purpose. The purpose of this blog is to provide immediate Objectivist commentary on the events in my life. Therefore, much of the work in this blog will be simply first draft. Now, I can understand if this blog was the only example of my writing I sent with my application; however, this is not the case. In addition to sending my blog I sent a writing sample. I sent an essay from my Foreign Policy class last semester concerning Islamic fundamentalism in the year 1979. Thus, in addition to my blog they had a pristine, clean, polished, clear, and concise piece of academic writing. Therefore, they are able to establish a difference. They can see this is clearly first draft immediate writing, while I can achieve good clear and concise writing. However, this individual responds like this blog is the only evidence of my writing they have. Also, the individual actually acknowledges this is a more personal casual blog not meant to reach academic professional standards.
Additionally, the individual then goes on to tell me how to write. Now, I agree writing classes are important in order to understand how to structure different kinds of written works. What this individual recommends, however, does not assist me in structuring my work. I hear his advice all the time. The advice that my writing needs to be more accessible to the masses in order to achieve its goal of convincing people. This is where people are always wrong. I do not write for anyone, and as I understand it no one should be writing or working for anyone else. I write, and people should work, for themselves. I write so that I am personally satisfied with what I produce. I am not concerned with what people think after reading my work, what they do, how they change, or even if they read my blog. There are very few people who read this blog but I continue writing. The reason is because I like to Objectively comment on my life, not because I want to serve the people.
Finally, the individual appears to present a contradiction in the last paragraph. He recommends I make an appointment with a career counselor so I know what to put in my resume and how to present myself with employers. This appears to contradict what he said in the first paragraph. He said I was completely based on my merits and abilities, which did not meet the organizations desires. He obviously says this in order to make it appear like my blog had no affect on the decision making process; however, the last paragraph makes it appear otherwise. If I was completely based on my merits and abilities then there is nothing a career counselor can do. A career counselor cannot provide me with a better background in marketing, advertising, and public relations. I can only do that myself. Honestly, I am not really interested in that. I am actually studying International Relations; however, as I stated earlier I wanted office experience. Of course, this is beside the point. The point is the career counselor can help me if I have no idea what I want to do with my life, or if I do not know what to put in a resume. He can also teach me how to behave around an employer. The email I sent, of course, did not contain any material that is in my blog. I did not attack the organization for being altruistic or religious. I simply said I am interested in a summer internship with you organization, attached is the required information, and if any more information is required please contact me. Therefore, the career counselor cannot help me improve upon what I presented. The individual, however, acts as if I was misguided, anti-social, a problem child because I did not lie and sent them my blog like they asked. He appears to think a career counselor can guide me in lying about my philosophy to my employers. Since the career counselor cannot improve my abilities, my blog must be what the individual is referring to; however, he said in the first paragraph the blog had no impact on whether or not I was hired. This is the contradiction the individual offers.
As I concluding note I would like to make it clear that I have not responded to this individual's "help" as he calls it. It sounds like he just uses altruism as a guise to attack my philosophy. This also presents lots of other moral problems such as lying again and self-loathing; he does not believe he can argue against my philosophy so he pretends like he is offering me advice. This is, however, another digression. I am saying that I do not desire to "prove these people wrong," or "show them." There was a time, back in high school, a time when I was more misguided than today that I had the mentality that I would show all the people who did not believe in me by becoming rich and famous. In the past year I realized this is not a reason to desire success. If I desired success for that reason I would really just be seeking power, which is just dependency. I would be admitting that I do not have control over my own happiness. I would be admitting that I am weak. I would need other people to suffer in order for me to feel happy. This is vicious because it is a product of self-loathing and is dependence. Therefore, I have not responded to this individual. His response shows me he has a weak morality; thus, his opinion of me hold no value to me. I do not need to make them suffer now or later because I can make myself happy, their suffering cannot. However, some may argue that by addressing the email in my blog I am trying to achieve the same as if I were to respond to the email. I do not believe this to be the case. I used the email because I believe it offered good issues to address with Objectivism. Also, as I stated before this blog is for myself. I do not expect that organization to read this, nor do I care if they do.
Hello Steven:
Thank you for your application. I read your blog and
your resume. We are seeking candidates who have a
background in advertising, public relations, graphic
design, video, or web design. Those candidates would
have prior course work, experience (paid or unpaid),
internships, and memberships in professional
associations. For this reason, I don't have a
position here for you.
I do have some advice. When you begin to set a career
direction for yourself -- and it is early, yet, to do
so -- you will want to package yourself for the job.
Many employers would find your aspects and topics of
your blog offensive. So I don't recommend, in the
future, that you send potential employers a link to
your blog, because of its controversial content.
It's great that you are writing and practice will
definitely improve your writing and critical thinking
skills. Even for a blog that is personal in nature,
you should start thinking about your audience and how
to make your writing more understandable. Think: what
do I want them to think or do after reading this post?
Am I trying to persuade them? Entertain them? Why
should they bother reading my posts? These kinds of
questions will lend purpose to your content.
Breaking your blog into shorter topics and applying
simple formatting (using headings, bullets, and links)
would go a long way to making your writing more
user-friendly. Try and keep your posts to 450 words
or less, and think about making one main point,
supporting it well with about three supporting points,
and calling it a day for that post. You may want to
watch the tone of your writing, if you want to
increase your audience. I know this is not a business
blog, but if you are submitting it to a business as a
writing sample, you should know that the essence of
business writing for online purposes is creating
concise, purposeful, and memorable content (people can
remember about three supporting points before you lose
them).
I definitely recommend that you make an appointment
with a career counselor to discuss your options and to
learn about ways to strengthen your resume and present
yourself to potential employers. Good luck.
The first paragraph is perfectly fine. That is exactly how organizations should select employees, in a rationally selfish way. If the applicant does not have the merits or abilities to produce profits for the business then the applicant should not be hired. An email that stated that would be perfectly fine. However, this individual goes into the problem area once he starts addressing this blog.
When applying for this internship one of the questions was whether or not I have a blog. Of course, I do. I am writing on it right now. Since I had a blog the organization would like to know the web address so they could read it. Obviously, that did not go over very well. However, I want to address that there is a perfectly logical way this organization could have responded. If they read the blog, and realized I did not hold the same beliefs as them, then they could have responded by saying, "You will not be hired because you do not follow the same philosophy as the organization." This would make perfect sense. It is just like an organization not hiring someone for a lack of merit or abilities. If my philosophy runs contrary to the organization's philosophy then the organization should not hire me because not only would that be immoral on their part for compromising their values, but it may also be difficult for them to generate profits on hiring me. However, this is not at all what this individual says. This individual says I should deny the truth.
This individual basically argues that it is moral for me to lie. Within the second paragraph he says it was a poor decision to send my blog to them. At first I thought that maybe this individual were right, but then I realized he was absolutely wrong. Firstly, they asked if I had a blog and if I would give them the web address; therefore, if I did not send the web address then I would be lying. There are certain occasions when lying is acceptable. For example, if lying will preserve one's natural right from being violated, or if lying will protect one's privacy, what one holds to be personally sacred. Of course, neither of these are long term solution. They are short term, escapes from the current situation. If someone puts a gun to my head, asks if I am a Christian, and I know if I say I am a Christian I will not be killed, then I will certainly lie and tell the gunman I am a Christian. However, then I will leave that place as quickly as possible. Primarily, so the chance of my natural right to life being violated decreases, but also so I can live in a place where I can be myself without lying. In this application, however, lying is not acceptable. It is not acceptable to deny the truth in order to get a job. The second problem with this individual's argument is that in order for me to lie about the existence of this blog I would have to be ashamed of it. In turn, I would also be ashamed of my philosophy, and ultimately I would loathe myself. None of this is true; therefore, I have not reason to hide my blog. In fact, my blog is open to the public. I do not have to give anyone a web address. People can just search for my blog on blogspot. The final problem with this individual's argument is that he is basically saying his organization condones lying, the denial of truth, the denial of one's self, and in turn self-loathing. He says it would have been better for me not to submit the blog, to lie, in order to appear better to my employers. In other words, lying would make me appear better to my employers, acting viciously would make me appear virtuous. I would not want to be part of such an organization.
The second part I would like to address is that the individual claims my blog is offensive and controversial. Controversial? - yes. Offensive? - no. Granted, I have called Rousseau a clown, attacked religion, and attacked altruistic morality, but those are all really just controversial. Well, except for the Rousseau part. Offensive would be more like if this was a Nazi blog and in every post I argued that all the Jews should be killed. In fact, my blog is the exact opposite. My blog argues for the absolute protection of natural individual rights. This cannot be offensive. Of course, this individual just points out a current ill. In addition to Nazi-esque positions being offensive, the term "offensive" has also come to include saying people are wrong. In the current multi-culturalist, free loving, accepting society, it is offensive to say other people are wrong. I have addressed this issue to a much larger extent in previous posts, but once again it makes itself clear.
Another problem is when the individual begins addressing my writing. Obviously, the writing in this blog is not the acme of literary work. I am sure there are plenty of spelling errors and certainly plenty of grammatical errors. However, this blog really is not made for that purpose. The purpose of this blog is to provide immediate Objectivist commentary on the events in my life. Therefore, much of the work in this blog will be simply first draft. Now, I can understand if this blog was the only example of my writing I sent with my application; however, this is not the case. In addition to sending my blog I sent a writing sample. I sent an essay from my Foreign Policy class last semester concerning Islamic fundamentalism in the year 1979. Thus, in addition to my blog they had a pristine, clean, polished, clear, and concise piece of academic writing. Therefore, they are able to establish a difference. They can see this is clearly first draft immediate writing, while I can achieve good clear and concise writing. However, this individual responds like this blog is the only evidence of my writing they have. Also, the individual actually acknowledges this is a more personal casual blog not meant to reach academic professional standards.
Additionally, the individual then goes on to tell me how to write. Now, I agree writing classes are important in order to understand how to structure different kinds of written works. What this individual recommends, however, does not assist me in structuring my work. I hear his advice all the time. The advice that my writing needs to be more accessible to the masses in order to achieve its goal of convincing people. This is where people are always wrong. I do not write for anyone, and as I understand it no one should be writing or working for anyone else. I write, and people should work, for themselves. I write so that I am personally satisfied with what I produce. I am not concerned with what people think after reading my work, what they do, how they change, or even if they read my blog. There are very few people who read this blog but I continue writing. The reason is because I like to Objectively comment on my life, not because I want to serve the people.
Finally, the individual appears to present a contradiction in the last paragraph. He recommends I make an appointment with a career counselor so I know what to put in my resume and how to present myself with employers. This appears to contradict what he said in the first paragraph. He said I was completely based on my merits and abilities, which did not meet the organizations desires. He obviously says this in order to make it appear like my blog had no affect on the decision making process; however, the last paragraph makes it appear otherwise. If I was completely based on my merits and abilities then there is nothing a career counselor can do. A career counselor cannot provide me with a better background in marketing, advertising, and public relations. I can only do that myself. Honestly, I am not really interested in that. I am actually studying International Relations; however, as I stated earlier I wanted office experience. Of course, this is beside the point. The point is the career counselor can help me if I have no idea what I want to do with my life, or if I do not know what to put in a resume. He can also teach me how to behave around an employer. The email I sent, of course, did not contain any material that is in my blog. I did not attack the organization for being altruistic or religious. I simply said I am interested in a summer internship with you organization, attached is the required information, and if any more information is required please contact me. Therefore, the career counselor cannot help me improve upon what I presented. The individual, however, acts as if I was misguided, anti-social, a problem child because I did not lie and sent them my blog like they asked. He appears to think a career counselor can guide me in lying about my philosophy to my employers. Since the career counselor cannot improve my abilities, my blog must be what the individual is referring to; however, he said in the first paragraph the blog had no impact on whether or not I was hired. This is the contradiction the individual offers.
As I concluding note I would like to make it clear that I have not responded to this individual's "help" as he calls it. It sounds like he just uses altruism as a guise to attack my philosophy. This also presents lots of other moral problems such as lying again and self-loathing; he does not believe he can argue against my philosophy so he pretends like he is offering me advice. This is, however, another digression. I am saying that I do not desire to "prove these people wrong," or "show them." There was a time, back in high school, a time when I was more misguided than today that I had the mentality that I would show all the people who did not believe in me by becoming rich and famous. In the past year I realized this is not a reason to desire success. If I desired success for that reason I would really just be seeking power, which is just dependency. I would be admitting that I do not have control over my own happiness. I would be admitting that I am weak. I would need other people to suffer in order for me to feel happy. This is vicious because it is a product of self-loathing and is dependence. Therefore, I have not responded to this individual. His response shows me he has a weak morality; thus, his opinion of me hold no value to me. I do not need to make them suffer now or later because I can make myself happy, their suffering cannot. However, some may argue that by addressing the email in my blog I am trying to achieve the same as if I were to respond to the email. I do not believe this to be the case. I used the email because I believe it offered good issues to address with Objectivism. Also, as I stated before this blog is for myself. I do not expect that organization to read this, nor do I care if they do.
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
No Human Rights
Obviously, the term "human rights" is a new fangled modern way of recognizing that natural rights are inherent in everyone. Of course, the term natural rights already accomplishes that, even the term "rights" already accomplishes that. However, the United Nations had to go about and adopt a declaration of human rights, and the multi-culturalists and free lovers latched on to the novelty of human rights instead of its sufficient predecessor natural rights like it was some new fad or style unique to their free loving accepting generation. Ironically, as I have stated before, that generation, and the current generation of carbon copies, has only produced one thing, amorality, which presented itself in my Political Philosophy class today.
Today my Political Philosophy class began discussing "human rights" hence forth to be simply and properly called natural rights. It started by discussing a particular essay the class was assigned to read entitled Beyond Human Rights by Giorgio Agamben. His argument is that the boom if refugee populations of the 20th century exposed a disconnect between state and nation. State identifies a government, while nation identifies a group of people with a cultural similarity. Usually, states and nations are one in the same. For example, Germany, which is a state for the nation of Germanic peoples. Of course, Germany also provides an excellent example as to how nations are disconnected from states. During the reign of Nazi Germany the Jewish nation found itself outlawed by the German state, even though the sect of the Jewish nation had lived in Germany for years. According to Agamben, this leads to certain peoples, the outlawed nations, having their rights violated under the guise of justice. Clearly, a sinister system. However, Agamben points out something more interesting. Usually outlawed nations, refugee populations, immigrate to other states; however, those states do not protect all their natural rights. Agamben's essay basically asks whether or not natural rights are a fiction because of this?
The answer is a resounding no. Natural rights are a truth. Just because certain states violate natural rights does not mean that the natural rights, the same rights for all men, do not exist. However, this is the exact argument most of my class made. They said, and I am paraphrasing but any word I bold I am positive they said, "I feel that since natural rights are violated all the time that natural rights cannot really exist. Natural rights cannot exist unless a state protects them." The "I feel" is extraordinarily annoying because that is probably why they do not think natural rights exist. Since they are not thinking, they are feeling, they cannot draw a logical conclusion. Briefly, let me set the record straight. I am not against emotions. However, I am against blindly following emotions like my class mates apparently due. Emotions are not to be blindly followed and they are certainly not to be repressed. There are reasons why men have emotions; therefore, in order to understand what the emotion is conveying or why one has an emotion one must approach it with reason, not ignore it. Now, back to my classmates and their disbelief in natural rights.
In their argument there is a direct contradiction. "Natural rights cannot exist unless a state protects them." Well... a state can only protect something if it exists, so if protecting brings something into existence, yet one cannot protect something that does not previously exist, then natural rights cannot exist. That is like saying, "There cannot be a banana unless I have eaten it." The banana has to exist before one eats it; the banana cannot be brought into existence by eating it. That statement is just rife with irrationality. I mean it reeks more than a sewage treatment plant, but my class mates could not see it. Even my professor was somewhat slow to catching on. He only brought up this point at the end of class. Of course, I brought it up much earlier. In response to such a statement I said, "Well, that's like the state is lying. See, natural rights, like truth, exists outside of man's control. Just because I tell a lie does not mean truth does not exist. Just because the state violates natural rights does not mean they do not exist." Still, this made no sense to them.
To give someone a little more credit, very minute, he stated that cultures have different concepts of rights. This is true. So far so good. He then said that like in Muslim cultures women have to wear veils. In our culture we identify that as a violation of rights, but in their culture it is not. Clearly, everything these students are arguing, especially this comment, is just a product of the multi-culturalists, free loving, acceptance movement. True Western cultures, in this case I will say specifically America, and Muslim cultures have different concepts of rights. Therefore, if two people disagree in a point then at least one of them has to be wrong. They could actually both be wrong. However, what is not a possibility is that the Muslim conception of rights and the American conception of rights are both correct. This is a denial of the truth. Of course, the students have already denied the truth. Natural rights are at the very base of the truth, they are almost the foundation, and they claim they do not exist. In this case they have claimed that there is no truth. One could argue that they have only argued that natural rights are not the truth; they have not said that the truth did not exist. This is incorrect.
If these students believed in a supernatural being, then they would not be denying the existence of truth. However, I am sure they are all atheists, and if they are not I will just pretend they are for this argument; to show that atheists who deny the existence of natural rights deny the existence of the truth. There is no supernatural being to tell them what to do. There are no natural rights to establish moral boundaries. Therefore, there is no right and wrong. What a supernatural being told someone to do would be correct, possibly. The full extent of this topic is for another post. The natural rights establish moral boundaries, such as, the most simple, do not kill do not steal. Thus, if there are no natural rights. If no one has the natural right to life, liberty, property, or pursuit of happiness there is nothing wrong with killing an innocent man. However, these are the same students who despise the Nazis, and rightfully so, they despise slavery, and rightfully so. Slavery and the holocaust cannot be despised if man does not have the natural right to life. Of course, they do not see these problems. They do not understand that they have fallen off the edge into the void of nihilism and amorality. If they did, they would feel nauseous. I am not even sure why they would live, why wake up, why go to college to learn. The ultimate end of this line of thinking is looking about the universe and just seeing different meaningless objects bumping into one another.
Another disturbing element of their argument, however, was that the state basically creates natural rights. They did not word it that way, they worded it in a contradictory fashion; however, that is what they believe. Natural rights are decided by the state. Then they are not natural and they are not rights. They are nothing more than limitations the state puts on itself, and can remove whenever it pleases. It was a that moment I realized how I was different from most of the other students. I do not need the state. I understand their is a truth, I seek it, and I abide by it. These students need the state. However, they do not need the state for protection. I myself like to have a state for that reason. The state's purpose is to protect man's natural rights. If there was no state I would hire a security firm to do the same job. This is not what these students need the state for. The students depend on the state do identify them. If the state did not exist, then they would have no self. To say the state decides what natural rights are is to say decides who an individual is. These individuals truly believe that to. They see no potential in the human mind. These are the same individuals who would say that man is merely a product of his environment; a man does not choose who he is. If the state was gone these people would be lost. These people are not individuals they are voluntary dependents. What is interesting is that they are dependents who do not love the state. They are not nationalistic or patriotic. They do not stand behind the American President or support the war. I am not classifying these as virtuous or vicious things I am just pointing out that they depend on the state but they also hate the state. It is like the opposite of Rousseau's individual. Rousseau's individual only existed if he was a citizen. For Rousseau an individual was defined by his state, by how he supported the state, and how he participated in the state. These students are defined by the state by how they hate the state. They are just reverse-conformist, reverse-nationalists, which is just as irrational as conformists and nationalists. If the state where to disappear, they would have nothing to hate nothing to complain about. I am probably overestimating too much. I mean, these people would not be completely mindless; however, a large part of their lives would be gone.
Today my Political Philosophy class began discussing "human rights" hence forth to be simply and properly called natural rights. It started by discussing a particular essay the class was assigned to read entitled Beyond Human Rights by Giorgio Agamben. His argument is that the boom if refugee populations of the 20th century exposed a disconnect between state and nation. State identifies a government, while nation identifies a group of people with a cultural similarity. Usually, states and nations are one in the same. For example, Germany, which is a state for the nation of Germanic peoples. Of course, Germany also provides an excellent example as to how nations are disconnected from states. During the reign of Nazi Germany the Jewish nation found itself outlawed by the German state, even though the sect of the Jewish nation had lived in Germany for years. According to Agamben, this leads to certain peoples, the outlawed nations, having their rights violated under the guise of justice. Clearly, a sinister system. However, Agamben points out something more interesting. Usually outlawed nations, refugee populations, immigrate to other states; however, those states do not protect all their natural rights. Agamben's essay basically asks whether or not natural rights are a fiction because of this?
The answer is a resounding no. Natural rights are a truth. Just because certain states violate natural rights does not mean that the natural rights, the same rights for all men, do not exist. However, this is the exact argument most of my class made. They said, and I am paraphrasing but any word I bold I am positive they said, "I feel that since natural rights are violated all the time that natural rights cannot really exist. Natural rights cannot exist unless a state protects them." The "I feel" is extraordinarily annoying because that is probably why they do not think natural rights exist. Since they are not thinking, they are feeling, they cannot draw a logical conclusion. Briefly, let me set the record straight. I am not against emotions. However, I am against blindly following emotions like my class mates apparently due. Emotions are not to be blindly followed and they are certainly not to be repressed. There are reasons why men have emotions; therefore, in order to understand what the emotion is conveying or why one has an emotion one must approach it with reason, not ignore it. Now, back to my classmates and their disbelief in natural rights.
In their argument there is a direct contradiction. "Natural rights cannot exist unless a state protects them." Well... a state can only protect something if it exists, so if protecting brings something into existence, yet one cannot protect something that does not previously exist, then natural rights cannot exist. That is like saying, "There cannot be a banana unless I have eaten it." The banana has to exist before one eats it; the banana cannot be brought into existence by eating it. That statement is just rife with irrationality. I mean it reeks more than a sewage treatment plant, but my class mates could not see it. Even my professor was somewhat slow to catching on. He only brought up this point at the end of class. Of course, I brought it up much earlier. In response to such a statement I said, "Well, that's like the state is lying. See, natural rights, like truth, exists outside of man's control. Just because I tell a lie does not mean truth does not exist. Just because the state violates natural rights does not mean they do not exist." Still, this made no sense to them.
To give someone a little more credit, very minute, he stated that cultures have different concepts of rights. This is true. So far so good. He then said that like in Muslim cultures women have to wear veils. In our culture we identify that as a violation of rights, but in their culture it is not. Clearly, everything these students are arguing, especially this comment, is just a product of the multi-culturalists, free loving, acceptance movement. True Western cultures, in this case I will say specifically America, and Muslim cultures have different concepts of rights. Therefore, if two people disagree in a point then at least one of them has to be wrong. They could actually both be wrong. However, what is not a possibility is that the Muslim conception of rights and the American conception of rights are both correct. This is a denial of the truth. Of course, the students have already denied the truth. Natural rights are at the very base of the truth, they are almost the foundation, and they claim they do not exist. In this case they have claimed that there is no truth. One could argue that they have only argued that natural rights are not the truth; they have not said that the truth did not exist. This is incorrect.
If these students believed in a supernatural being, then they would not be denying the existence of truth. However, I am sure they are all atheists, and if they are not I will just pretend they are for this argument; to show that atheists who deny the existence of natural rights deny the existence of the truth. There is no supernatural being to tell them what to do. There are no natural rights to establish moral boundaries. Therefore, there is no right and wrong. What a supernatural being told someone to do would be correct, possibly. The full extent of this topic is for another post. The natural rights establish moral boundaries, such as, the most simple, do not kill do not steal. Thus, if there are no natural rights. If no one has the natural right to life, liberty, property, or pursuit of happiness there is nothing wrong with killing an innocent man. However, these are the same students who despise the Nazis, and rightfully so, they despise slavery, and rightfully so. Slavery and the holocaust cannot be despised if man does not have the natural right to life. Of course, they do not see these problems. They do not understand that they have fallen off the edge into the void of nihilism and amorality. If they did, they would feel nauseous. I am not even sure why they would live, why wake up, why go to college to learn. The ultimate end of this line of thinking is looking about the universe and just seeing different meaningless objects bumping into one another.
Another disturbing element of their argument, however, was that the state basically creates natural rights. They did not word it that way, they worded it in a contradictory fashion; however, that is what they believe. Natural rights are decided by the state. Then they are not natural and they are not rights. They are nothing more than limitations the state puts on itself, and can remove whenever it pleases. It was a that moment I realized how I was different from most of the other students. I do not need the state. I understand their is a truth, I seek it, and I abide by it. These students need the state. However, they do not need the state for protection. I myself like to have a state for that reason. The state's purpose is to protect man's natural rights. If there was no state I would hire a security firm to do the same job. This is not what these students need the state for. The students depend on the state do identify them. If the state did not exist, then they would have no self. To say the state decides what natural rights are is to say decides who an individual is. These individuals truly believe that to. They see no potential in the human mind. These are the same individuals who would say that man is merely a product of his environment; a man does not choose who he is. If the state was gone these people would be lost. These people are not individuals they are voluntary dependents. What is interesting is that they are dependents who do not love the state. They are not nationalistic or patriotic. They do not stand behind the American President or support the war. I am not classifying these as virtuous or vicious things I am just pointing out that they depend on the state but they also hate the state. It is like the opposite of Rousseau's individual. Rousseau's individual only existed if he was a citizen. For Rousseau an individual was defined by his state, by how he supported the state, and how he participated in the state. These students are defined by the state by how they hate the state. They are just reverse-conformist, reverse-nationalists, which is just as irrational as conformists and nationalists. If the state where to disappear, they would have nothing to hate nothing to complain about. I am probably overestimating too much. I mean, these people would not be completely mindless; however, a large part of their lives would be gone.
Monday, April 7, 2008
Another Discussion with My Professor
I just had another discussion with my professor of both my Political Theory and Political Literature classes. On this occasion we discussed topics surrounding my latest paper for Political Theory about Machiavelli's Mandragola. In the essay I argue that Machiavelli does not promote absolute selfishness in Mandragola. Absolute selfishness is acting selfishly by initiating force. This is, of course, different from what people usually associate with Machiavelli. Usually, Machiavelli is associated with promoting absolute selfishness, or opportunistic nihilism, which has also become to be known as acting Machiavellian due to its relation to Machiavelli's other book The Prince. I did not agree with everything Machiavelli promotes in Mandragola but I do believe he is on the right track. I would not say the purpose of life is fore pleasure, which seems to be the theme of Mandragola, but the purpose of life is to be happy, and pleasure is certainly closer to being happy then what religion suggests or the state suggests.
However, the discussion with my professor became interesting when he explained just how influential Machiavelli was. I remember he explained in class that Machiavelli is the father of modern political thought, and I understood that as meaning he was the first to provide a secular system for the state. This is of course true, but my professor said the real influence Machiavelli has is that he redefines the purpose of the state. Prior to Machiavelli the state was concerned with governing souls, or making virtuous people; however, Machiavelli changed the state's concern to the governing of bodies. This has had a dramatic impact on man.
In looking at history one can see that since the Renaissance, religious authority has been declining and continues to decline. However, thinkers and scientists like Machiavelli, Bacon, Locke, Newton, etc. did not directly attack religion, or the church, in order to achieve this. Instead they basically set up another camp. This camp was obviously far more rational than the religious camp because it was concerned with this world. If this world is so important, and it is, than the purpose of life cannot be to please a supernatural being so one can enjoy eternal paradise. If this world is so important then the purpose of life is to be happy in this life. Therefore, if happiness is the purpose to life, then the state can no longer be concerned with governing souls, creating virtuous men. The state must allow man to have the freedom to pursue his happiness. Thus, the state must govern bodies; the state must ensure that no individual violates any other individual's natural rights, so that individuals can pursue happiness. I agree with everything thus far and I have addressed most of this in previous posts.
The interesting problem that my professor pointed out that from this switch, governing souls to governing bodies, eternal paradise to worldly happiness, man has changed profoundly because man has forgot his soul. Now, I do not believe in souls, they have some type of religious spiritual connotation that just reeks of irrationality; however, I do believe man has a self, which is composed of an individual's personality, behavior, but most importantly, his philosophy. I not a historian and I did not live in the pre-Renaissance world, so I have no idea whether men were more or less concerned with governing their souls, or selves, before the Renaissance, but before the Renaissance men's selves were being governed. Granted, how they were being governed was vicious in two ways. First, when the state assumes the authority to govern selves then the state must violate individuals' natural rights; thus, it acts viciously. Second, the state was governing selves with religious morality, specifically altruistic Christian morality. The state was using an irrational system that told individuals not to live their own lives but to live for a supernatural being's life. This is obviously vicious. However, when Machiavelli changed the state's purpose it appears as though man did not follow the change. The state went from governing selves to governing bodies, but man did not start governing his self. Instead man just followed the state and governed his body even more. The best example I can provide for this is one my professor used. He said presently people are less concerned about pornography and more concerned about smoking. I originally said I agreed with him and did not understand why people were so obsessed with smoking, but later I understood everything he was saying. Smoking harms the physical body, while pornography harms the self. Whether both halves of this statement is true or not is beside the point. There are plenty of other examples to show man is more concerned with governing his body than his self. For another example, many of my acquaintances were obsessed with going to the gym; however, few of them have thought twice about drinking. Now, let me set the record straight, I am completely against neither pornography nor drinking; however, I do see moral problems with both. The moral problems with drinking are actually addressed in my spring break post. As for smoking, I almost have no problem with smoking. I would actually sooner smoke a cigarette than drink alcohol.
The problem I am trying to point out is that when government switched from governing selves to governing bodies, and man decided to govern his body instead of his self, man's self was forgotten, man's self is decaying. There are a variety of moral problems man faces. He praises altruism, protects religion, protects the state, lies excessively, traumatizes children, praises the initiation of force, etc. These are products of the fact that man's self is ungoverned. Of course, I am not arguing that the state should start governing selves again. As I stated before, that is vicious. I am also not saying man should leave his body to the way side, for a man's physical body constitutes a part of his self. I am just arguing man needs to begin governing his self. He needs to practice philosophy, true philosophy. Not the bull shit philosophy of Michel Foucault. Philosophy meaning the search for truth. He must be concerned with his reason, his motives. He must understand what he believes. Man must become concerned with morality.
However, the discussion with my professor became interesting when he explained just how influential Machiavelli was. I remember he explained in class that Machiavelli is the father of modern political thought, and I understood that as meaning he was the first to provide a secular system for the state. This is of course true, but my professor said the real influence Machiavelli has is that he redefines the purpose of the state. Prior to Machiavelli the state was concerned with governing souls, or making virtuous people; however, Machiavelli changed the state's concern to the governing of bodies. This has had a dramatic impact on man.
In looking at history one can see that since the Renaissance, religious authority has been declining and continues to decline. However, thinkers and scientists like Machiavelli, Bacon, Locke, Newton, etc. did not directly attack religion, or the church, in order to achieve this. Instead they basically set up another camp. This camp was obviously far more rational than the religious camp because it was concerned with this world. If this world is so important, and it is, than the purpose of life cannot be to please a supernatural being so one can enjoy eternal paradise. If this world is so important then the purpose of life is to be happy in this life. Therefore, if happiness is the purpose to life, then the state can no longer be concerned with governing souls, creating virtuous men. The state must allow man to have the freedom to pursue his happiness. Thus, the state must govern bodies; the state must ensure that no individual violates any other individual's natural rights, so that individuals can pursue happiness. I agree with everything thus far and I have addressed most of this in previous posts.
The interesting problem that my professor pointed out that from this switch, governing souls to governing bodies, eternal paradise to worldly happiness, man has changed profoundly because man has forgot his soul. Now, I do not believe in souls, they have some type of religious spiritual connotation that just reeks of irrationality; however, I do believe man has a self, which is composed of an individual's personality, behavior, but most importantly, his philosophy. I not a historian and I did not live in the pre-Renaissance world, so I have no idea whether men were more or less concerned with governing their souls, or selves, before the Renaissance, but before the Renaissance men's selves were being governed. Granted, how they were being governed was vicious in two ways. First, when the state assumes the authority to govern selves then the state must violate individuals' natural rights; thus, it acts viciously. Second, the state was governing selves with religious morality, specifically altruistic Christian morality. The state was using an irrational system that told individuals not to live their own lives but to live for a supernatural being's life. This is obviously vicious. However, when Machiavelli changed the state's purpose it appears as though man did not follow the change. The state went from governing selves to governing bodies, but man did not start governing his self. Instead man just followed the state and governed his body even more. The best example I can provide for this is one my professor used. He said presently people are less concerned about pornography and more concerned about smoking. I originally said I agreed with him and did not understand why people were so obsessed with smoking, but later I understood everything he was saying. Smoking harms the physical body, while pornography harms the self. Whether both halves of this statement is true or not is beside the point. There are plenty of other examples to show man is more concerned with governing his body than his self. For another example, many of my acquaintances were obsessed with going to the gym; however, few of them have thought twice about drinking. Now, let me set the record straight, I am completely against neither pornography nor drinking; however, I do see moral problems with both. The moral problems with drinking are actually addressed in my spring break post. As for smoking, I almost have no problem with smoking. I would actually sooner smoke a cigarette than drink alcohol.
The problem I am trying to point out is that when government switched from governing selves to governing bodies, and man decided to govern his body instead of his self, man's self was forgotten, man's self is decaying. There are a variety of moral problems man faces. He praises altruism, protects religion, protects the state, lies excessively, traumatizes children, praises the initiation of force, etc. These are products of the fact that man's self is ungoverned. Of course, I am not arguing that the state should start governing selves again. As I stated before, that is vicious. I am also not saying man should leave his body to the way side, for a man's physical body constitutes a part of his self. I am just arguing man needs to begin governing his self. He needs to practice philosophy, true philosophy. Not the bull shit philosophy of Michel Foucault. Philosophy meaning the search for truth. He must be concerned with his reason, his motives. He must understand what he believes. Man must become concerned with morality.
Friday, April 4, 2008
Two Film Reviews and The Blame Game
The first film, which I saw today, is 21 and I give it a whopping two stars. If I did not find Vegas personally appealing with the desert, casinos, gambling, smoking, drinking, stripping, lights, nocturnal life etc. I would have give 21 one star. The film is moderately entertaining with night shots of Vegas lights and gambling accompanied by an electronic soundtrack, but the film is overwhelmingly boring with its simplistic generic plot. Basically, guy has good friends but needs money, guy dumps friends to get money, man he works for dumps him leaving him with nothing, guy tries to get money one more time and gets revenge, gets his friends back, and no longer needs money. I would think a story about card counting, beating the casino system, would be a little more thrilling, apparently I was wrong. Actually, this film is not a good test of that plot because the movie does not follow the book. This not only makes the film boring, but also inaccurate. For example, the book explains that Vegas casinos can throw people out for card counting; however, though the card counters did get thrown out they were never beat up for counting. The only time one of the counters was beat up for counting was when he went to a casino in the Bahamas. Apparently, he had been thrown out of all the Vegas casinos and thought he would try the Bahamas. Unfortunately, the casinos in the Bahamas recognized him as an infamous counter, so they beat him up. None of this is in the silver screen production; however, what is more annoying is that the film shows casino security guards beating up some of the counters. The film creators obviously needed to work it into the story and decided to throw the truth out the window, or they thought Vegas was still the good old Vegas of the 60's and 70's before it sold out to be Disney-esque. Obviously, this creates an unrealistically bad depiction of modern Vegas; consequently, making a theme hard to discern. It appears everyone was just a little bad in the movie, the casinos are bad for beating and exploiting people, and the counters are bad for gambling. Great, more incorrect stereotypical morals. This, however, is not to say the film actually presented this theme well, but that is all I could discern from this boring monstrosity. A far better theme would be: there is nothing wrong with casinos, people voluntarily go to gamble, gamblers consent to the casinos' rules tilted in the casinos favor; however, casinos are private property and though counting is not illegal casinos certainly have the right to throw someone out for counting.
The second film, The Bank Job, I saw a few weeks ago, and I give it three stars. is kind of a good movie because it is about a heist, and all heist films are kind of good because they are all kind of the same. However, there is one distinguishing factor of The Bank Job, which was not embraced. The film is based on the true story of a bank robbery in London. Apparently, MI5 wanted photographs of a certain princess doing a certain scandalous something in Bermuda. Consequently, MI5 decided to secretly convince some criminals to rob the safety deposit boxes of the bank where these photographs were kept. The rules MI5 gave were, steal everything from this particular box and give it to us, everything else in the vault it yours. There are some huge themes here the film could have embraced, but the film largely focused on the bank robbery. The film should have offered perspectives on: Is preventing sex scandals in the royal family from reaching the people a reason to violate individual's natural rights? Should the government be allowed to hire out villains in extenuating circumstances? Should the bank robbers be punished, or is it completely the government's fault? Basically, The Bank Job was a wasted opportunity.
Now, the final point I must address is the blame game that has been going around in my Political Theory class. As I mentioned in a previous post I have been reading Rousseau's Politics and the Arts in the class. As I stated before I hate Rousseau. I think he is clown. However, the rest of the class does not think so. In the past two days the professor has been asking the class if Hollywood does harm to society? Of course, the entire class jumps on board with Rousseau and says, "Hollywood sets a bad example. Hollywood sets societal standards. Celebrities get paid too much. Movie stars should take on more responsibility." My response: "No, how about you take on more responsibility." Hollywood, or any group of people, only has an affect on individuals if individuals allow that group to have an affect. Hollywood is not responsible for any of the "banes of society" such as scandalous clothing, promiscuity, greed. I, of course, do not really have a problem with any of those. Rational selfishness is a virtue, so greed is not a problem. As for scandalous clothing and promiscuity, I personally see no gains in either of those but if someone else wants to do it fine. However, the more important point is individuals choose to follow what Hollywood does. Hollywood does not put a gun to anyone's head. Hollywood does not order people to look and behave like celebrities. It is individuals' own choices that cause that. However, my class refuses to accept responsibility for their actions and blames it all on Hollywood. More examples of laziness, ignorance, self-loathing. I personally do not believe in any thing as societal value. My class does, however. They gauge everything by how much value it brings to society. The group is not important. If one lives for the group he does not live for himself. His actions show that he loathes himself, that he believes himself to be unworthy of a life. In reality Hollywood is not damaging society, it is the emphasis of society damaging society. It is a vicious cycle. Society cannot sustain itself because it preaches laziness, ignorance, self-loathing, but those are what actually harm individuals, and if individuals are harmed then society cannot exist. People must forget about society. People must begin to act rationally selfish. At that point individuals will be healthier. The blame game will not be practiced. And the scourge of society will be dead.
The second film, The Bank Job, I saw a few weeks ago, and I give it three stars. is kind of a good movie because it is about a heist, and all heist films are kind of good because they are all kind of the same. However, there is one distinguishing factor of The Bank Job, which was not embraced. The film is based on the true story of a bank robbery in London. Apparently, MI5 wanted photographs of a certain princess doing a certain scandalous something in Bermuda. Consequently, MI5 decided to secretly convince some criminals to rob the safety deposit boxes of the bank where these photographs were kept. The rules MI5 gave were, steal everything from this particular box and give it to us, everything else in the vault it yours. There are some huge themes here the film could have embraced, but the film largely focused on the bank robbery. The film should have offered perspectives on: Is preventing sex scandals in the royal family from reaching the people a reason to violate individual's natural rights? Should the government be allowed to hire out villains in extenuating circumstances? Should the bank robbers be punished, or is it completely the government's fault? Basically, The Bank Job was a wasted opportunity.
Now, the final point I must address is the blame game that has been going around in my Political Theory class. As I mentioned in a previous post I have been reading Rousseau's Politics and the Arts in the class. As I stated before I hate Rousseau. I think he is clown. However, the rest of the class does not think so. In the past two days the professor has been asking the class if Hollywood does harm to society? Of course, the entire class jumps on board with Rousseau and says, "Hollywood sets a bad example. Hollywood sets societal standards. Celebrities get paid too much. Movie stars should take on more responsibility." My response: "No, how about you take on more responsibility." Hollywood, or any group of people, only has an affect on individuals if individuals allow that group to have an affect. Hollywood is not responsible for any of the "banes of society" such as scandalous clothing, promiscuity, greed. I, of course, do not really have a problem with any of those. Rational selfishness is a virtue, so greed is not a problem. As for scandalous clothing and promiscuity, I personally see no gains in either of those but if someone else wants to do it fine. However, the more important point is individuals choose to follow what Hollywood does. Hollywood does not put a gun to anyone's head. Hollywood does not order people to look and behave like celebrities. It is individuals' own choices that cause that. However, my class refuses to accept responsibility for their actions and blames it all on Hollywood. More examples of laziness, ignorance, self-loathing. I personally do not believe in any thing as societal value. My class does, however. They gauge everything by how much value it brings to society. The group is not important. If one lives for the group he does not live for himself. His actions show that he loathes himself, that he believes himself to be unworthy of a life. In reality Hollywood is not damaging society, it is the emphasis of society damaging society. It is a vicious cycle. Society cannot sustain itself because it preaches laziness, ignorance, self-loathing, but those are what actually harm individuals, and if individuals are harmed then society cannot exist. People must forget about society. People must begin to act rationally selfish. At that point individuals will be healthier. The blame game will not be practiced. And the scourge of society will be dead.
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Rousseau and Animals
For the past three weeks, for homework, I have been reading works by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who is regarded as one of the three great political philosophers. In my opinion this clown is worse than Hobbes, meaning he is far inferior to that of Locke. The three works of Rousseau's I have had to read are On the Social Contract, The Government of Poland, and Politics and the Arts. These three works actually only represent two problems I have with Rousseau: his theory of government, and his theory of individuality.
Rousseau's basic theory of government is that the majority, or what he calls the general will, decides all the policies of the government. That is all fine and dandy except for the fact that he also states anyone who agrees with the social contract must always adhere to the majority. Of course, that would be fine if the general will decides to create a constitution to limit its own actions, a constitution that would outlaw violating individuals natural rights. However, Rousseau does not speak of this, which I have a huge problem with. Without demanding that this general will have limitation on its power so as to preserve individuals' natural rights, the general will can decide whatever the hell it wants to decide. The general will becomes nothing more than a tyrant. Basically, what Rousseau creates is democratic despotism. However, I have an ever bigger problem with this joker. He argues that once an individual agrees to enter this social contract he cannot leave, he cannot act as an innocent minority, the majority must force him to assimilate. This is absolutely ridiculous. This is not the purpose of government. Rousseau even acknowledges that this general will is tyrannical, but he admits that he believes the purpose of government is not to protect natural rights but to make people virtuous. Obviously, liberty does not ultimately yield virtue, for individuals, whose liberty has not been stripped from them, have the freedom to make some vicious decisions. However, there are two conflicts Rousseau creates with this little theory of his. Firstly, he is putting a lot of faith in man. Now personally, I do have great faith in man. Man has reason; therefore, he has the ability to achieve and accomplish greatness. However, I also acknowledge that the majority of people for some reason choose to be lazy; thus, they choose to be ignorant. Using one's reason requires work, and apparently people would rather just not work. This, of course, is a much larger topic for another post. The point I am making is that since people do not utilize their reason they cannot determine what is virtuous. This is the problem with Rousseau's general will that is more concerned with creating virtuous citizens than protecting natural rights. In the end Rousseau's general will yields a horde of vicious fools. The second problem with this position is that Rousseau contradicts himself. Rousseau is concerned with virtue; therefore, he creates a government that does not protect natural rights, so that it can create virtuous citizens. This, itself, is vicious. Rousseau creates a vicious system to create virtue. Contradictions like this do not work. A government that viciously violates natural rights in order to create virtuous citizens is not a virtuous system. A system like this will inevitably initiate force, and the initiation of force is always a vice. Also, Rousseau's theory is somewhat communistic, which might explain this warped general will concept. Apparently, in his book before On the Social Contract Rousseau argued that people desire to be loved by others and that power is attractive and power becomes equated with wealth, and therefore the wealthy are raised up while the poor fall. Eventually, these poor people become pissed because the wealthy own the land and the tools the poor need in order to labor; therefore, the poor steal the wealthy individuals' property. Consequently, the wealthy strike a bargain that says the wealthy and poor will get together to create a system to protect property rights. Sounds like a damn good idea to me. Unfortunately, Rousseau does not think so because the poor have no property to be secured; therefore, the wealthy just enforce the system that is already in place. Apparently, Rousseau's system of government, the general will, is supposed to correct that problem. Personally, I see no problem with the previous system. It is rational, it is virtuous, while Rousseau's is obviously irrational and vicious.
The second major problem I have with Rousseau is captured in his works The Government of Poland and Politics and the Arts. The problem here is the way Rousseau warps the definition of liberty and in turn enslaves the individual. As one can see from the previous summary I gave Rousseau loves the state. Rousseau sees the state as a great savior. Personally, I see the state as a good idea that is constantly raped by harlequins like Rousseau. Anyway, according to Rousseau, the state is the true path to liberty. As Rousseau sees, it the previous government established by the wealthy is completely determined by man's passion to be selfish. Also, not much of a bad idea, of course, Rousseau does not distinguish between absolute selfishness and rational selfishness, so maybe it is a bad idea, but from his description it does not sound so bad. In any event, Rousseau finds passions to be bad. In his eyes passions produced a bad state. His state, however, is devoid of all passions; therefore, it is good. I would argue otherwise, not only is it bad but it is filled with passions, and I am not a man against passions and emotions, but I just call contradictions as I see them. Any way if his state devoid of all passions is good, and the previous state possessed by passions is bad, then the way to virtue is to follow Rousseau's state. Basically, Rousseau changes the definition of liberty from freedom to do what one wants without violating the natural rights of others, to freedom from one's passions. However, here is another Rousseaun contradiction. In order to be free from one's passions the individual must become a citizen, the individual must devote his life to the state. Of course, he changes the definition of liberty for this to work, but Rousseau's path for freedom from passions, from vice, the path to virtue, is inherently tyrannical. The individual never exercises his liberty he only does what the state wants him to do. For example, in Politics and the Arts Rousseau argues that it is a bad idea to have a theater in Geneva because people will be wasting their time entertaining themselves when they should be educating themselves about government and participating in government. Rousseau argues that the theater only reinforces passions, vices, thus enslaving men again. As I understand it liberty is the right to choose whether one wants to go to the theater, educate himself about government, or participate in government. Of course, Rousseau only sees liberty in the state. Bringing it to its simplest form, Rousseau believes that the individual is born for the state, that a good individual is not an individual at all but a citizen.
Now I am going to briefly speak about animals because there was an extensive debate in my Political Literature class as to whether or not man was an animal. The debate was basically between the professor and one student. The professor took up the side that man is distinctly different from animals, while the student's argument was man is largely an animal, the only distinguishing characteristic was that man understood evolution and other animals did not. In order to make his argument the student showed the class a video of a crow trying to pull something out of a tube. In the video the crow has a metal wire and attempts to stab the object at the bottom of the tube. Eventually, the crow gives up on this method, but then takes the wire, applies leverage, which bend the wire and creates a hook. The crow the uses the hook to pull the object out of the tube. I admit this is fascinating. The student also brought up lots of other amazing information. I believe he is a philosophy major, but he talks a lot about recent finds in genetics and biology. Another example he used to equate man to animals, or nature in general, was that scientists have found that corn has evolved over the years. Apparently, corn has become more palatable to humans. Now, I am not sure if I will give corn the credit and not man. I mean man is only selecting the best tasting corn. The one's that were gross may have been left to die, so once those less tasty genes of corn are dead the better tasting ones take over. However, I see the point this student was making. Genes have a large impact on what kind of human beings are produced. Even human personalities are somewhat determined by genes. So not only did he argue that humans are almost completely created by genes like animals, but also that animals posses some limited forms of intelligence previously assumed to be a human monopoly. Once again I will point out that genetics and animal behavior is all very fascinating, and I do not doubt most of what this student argued, but I do not see these similarities as enough evidence to equate man to animals. I agree much of a human is determined by his genes, but man is not enslaved by his genes. The main distinction between man and animal is reason. Man has the ability to reason, to determine what is right and wrong. Animals have no reason. Animals are completely enslaved by instinct. Animals are completely unaware that there is even a concept called morality and truth. They know nothing beyond their lives. Of course, some individuals will have difficulty accepting this argument because they may be moral relativists, they may be completely amoral. However, amorality is a falsehood, so therefore these people are wrong. I will not get into explaining an objective morality here. I need a separate post to discuss that. Returning to the point, since man has reason, can determine right and wrong, man can also choose to be virtuous or vicious. Animals have very little choice. They have almost no free will, no liberty. They are completely commanded by instinct. This in turn points out a larger distinction between man and animals. Since man has reason, and consequently liberty, in turn all other natural rights will follow. Animals do not have natural rights. Since they have no reason, and consequently no liberty, they have no natural rights. That is why it is perfectly fine for a man to cage an animal, but it is vicious for a man to cage another man without consent. In order to illustrate the difference between man and animals more clearly I will use the crow video as an example; however, I am changing some of the facts of the video to get my point across. The fact that the crow can make a hook is of no importance as to whether he is closer to animal or man. Let us say the crow is trying to get a worm with this hook. The crow is being commanded by his instinct to get the worm so he can eat it, so he will not die, and so he can spread more offspring. A man trying to get food may very well be eating so as not to die, but is he really concerned about creating offspring. No. If the man is in a situation where he is starving he probably wants to eat so he can continue living his life an be happy. The man wants to continue to live to continue being happy. Happiness is not even a part of the crow's consciousness. However, I admit this is a weak argument, and the second half is more convincing. Let us say the crow does eventually get the worm out with his hook; however, another crow comes along, grabs the worm, and flies away. At this point the crow, who had his worm stolen from him, is commanded by instinct to find another worm so he can eat, not die, and spread off spring. If a man is trying to get food on a deserted island let us say. He climbs to the top of a tree and grabs a fruit. He brings the fruit back to the ground and just as he is about to eat it, another man, also abandoned on this island, runs past the man with the fruit, grabs the fruit, and runs away. At this point the man thinks, "Hey! What the hell! That is my fruit." Since the man has reason, he has natural rights; therefore, he has property, and he recognizes he has property. The crow has no understanding of this concept of property; furthermore, the crow has no right to property. Additionally, the man, whose fruit was stolen, is able to recognize the taking of his fruit as a vice because his natural right to property was violated. There is no virtue or vice in the crows world, and the crow does not even acknowledge so. Remember the crow is just commanded to get another worm, eat it, not die, spread offspring. The crow does not believe the stealing crow is bad. The crow also does not believe the stealing crow is bad. This captures the separation between man and animal. I am not denying that man is completely different from animal. There are similarities, man after all did evolve from animal; however, there was a point where man broke the barrier, discovered reason, and exited the animal life. Man now exists on a tier superior to that of animal.
Rousseau's basic theory of government is that the majority, or what he calls the general will, decides all the policies of the government. That is all fine and dandy except for the fact that he also states anyone who agrees with the social contract must always adhere to the majority. Of course, that would be fine if the general will decides to create a constitution to limit its own actions, a constitution that would outlaw violating individuals natural rights. However, Rousseau does not speak of this, which I have a huge problem with. Without demanding that this general will have limitation on its power so as to preserve individuals' natural rights, the general will can decide whatever the hell it wants to decide. The general will becomes nothing more than a tyrant. Basically, what Rousseau creates is democratic despotism. However, I have an ever bigger problem with this joker. He argues that once an individual agrees to enter this social contract he cannot leave, he cannot act as an innocent minority, the majority must force him to assimilate. This is absolutely ridiculous. This is not the purpose of government. Rousseau even acknowledges that this general will is tyrannical, but he admits that he believes the purpose of government is not to protect natural rights but to make people virtuous. Obviously, liberty does not ultimately yield virtue, for individuals, whose liberty has not been stripped from them, have the freedom to make some vicious decisions. However, there are two conflicts Rousseau creates with this little theory of his. Firstly, he is putting a lot of faith in man. Now personally, I do have great faith in man. Man has reason; therefore, he has the ability to achieve and accomplish greatness. However, I also acknowledge that the majority of people for some reason choose to be lazy; thus, they choose to be ignorant. Using one's reason requires work, and apparently people would rather just not work. This, of course, is a much larger topic for another post. The point I am making is that since people do not utilize their reason they cannot determine what is virtuous. This is the problem with Rousseau's general will that is more concerned with creating virtuous citizens than protecting natural rights. In the end Rousseau's general will yields a horde of vicious fools. The second problem with this position is that Rousseau contradicts himself. Rousseau is concerned with virtue; therefore, he creates a government that does not protect natural rights, so that it can create virtuous citizens. This, itself, is vicious. Rousseau creates a vicious system to create virtue. Contradictions like this do not work. A government that viciously violates natural rights in order to create virtuous citizens is not a virtuous system. A system like this will inevitably initiate force, and the initiation of force is always a vice. Also, Rousseau's theory is somewhat communistic, which might explain this warped general will concept. Apparently, in his book before On the Social Contract Rousseau argued that people desire to be loved by others and that power is attractive and power becomes equated with wealth, and therefore the wealthy are raised up while the poor fall. Eventually, these poor people become pissed because the wealthy own the land and the tools the poor need in order to labor; therefore, the poor steal the wealthy individuals' property. Consequently, the wealthy strike a bargain that says the wealthy and poor will get together to create a system to protect property rights. Sounds like a damn good idea to me. Unfortunately, Rousseau does not think so because the poor have no property to be secured; therefore, the wealthy just enforce the system that is already in place. Apparently, Rousseau's system of government, the general will, is supposed to correct that problem. Personally, I see no problem with the previous system. It is rational, it is virtuous, while Rousseau's is obviously irrational and vicious.
The second major problem I have with Rousseau is captured in his works The Government of Poland and Politics and the Arts. The problem here is the way Rousseau warps the definition of liberty and in turn enslaves the individual. As one can see from the previous summary I gave Rousseau loves the state. Rousseau sees the state as a great savior. Personally, I see the state as a good idea that is constantly raped by harlequins like Rousseau. Anyway, according to Rousseau, the state is the true path to liberty. As Rousseau sees, it the previous government established by the wealthy is completely determined by man's passion to be selfish. Also, not much of a bad idea, of course, Rousseau does not distinguish between absolute selfishness and rational selfishness, so maybe it is a bad idea, but from his description it does not sound so bad. In any event, Rousseau finds passions to be bad. In his eyes passions produced a bad state. His state, however, is devoid of all passions; therefore, it is good. I would argue otherwise, not only is it bad but it is filled with passions, and I am not a man against passions and emotions, but I just call contradictions as I see them. Any way if his state devoid of all passions is good, and the previous state possessed by passions is bad, then the way to virtue is to follow Rousseau's state. Basically, Rousseau changes the definition of liberty from freedom to do what one wants without violating the natural rights of others, to freedom from one's passions. However, here is another Rousseaun contradiction. In order to be free from one's passions the individual must become a citizen, the individual must devote his life to the state. Of course, he changes the definition of liberty for this to work, but Rousseau's path for freedom from passions, from vice, the path to virtue, is inherently tyrannical. The individual never exercises his liberty he only does what the state wants him to do. For example, in Politics and the Arts Rousseau argues that it is a bad idea to have a theater in Geneva because people will be wasting their time entertaining themselves when they should be educating themselves about government and participating in government. Rousseau argues that the theater only reinforces passions, vices, thus enslaving men again. As I understand it liberty is the right to choose whether one wants to go to the theater, educate himself about government, or participate in government. Of course, Rousseau only sees liberty in the state. Bringing it to its simplest form, Rousseau believes that the individual is born for the state, that a good individual is not an individual at all but a citizen.
Now I am going to briefly speak about animals because there was an extensive debate in my Political Literature class as to whether or not man was an animal. The debate was basically between the professor and one student. The professor took up the side that man is distinctly different from animals, while the student's argument was man is largely an animal, the only distinguishing characteristic was that man understood evolution and other animals did not. In order to make his argument the student showed the class a video of a crow trying to pull something out of a tube. In the video the crow has a metal wire and attempts to stab the object at the bottom of the tube. Eventually, the crow gives up on this method, but then takes the wire, applies leverage, which bend the wire and creates a hook. The crow the uses the hook to pull the object out of the tube. I admit this is fascinating. The student also brought up lots of other amazing information. I believe he is a philosophy major, but he talks a lot about recent finds in genetics and biology. Another example he used to equate man to animals, or nature in general, was that scientists have found that corn has evolved over the years. Apparently, corn has become more palatable to humans. Now, I am not sure if I will give corn the credit and not man. I mean man is only selecting the best tasting corn. The one's that were gross may have been left to die, so once those less tasty genes of corn are dead the better tasting ones take over. However, I see the point this student was making. Genes have a large impact on what kind of human beings are produced. Even human personalities are somewhat determined by genes. So not only did he argue that humans are almost completely created by genes like animals, but also that animals posses some limited forms of intelligence previously assumed to be a human monopoly. Once again I will point out that genetics and animal behavior is all very fascinating, and I do not doubt most of what this student argued, but I do not see these similarities as enough evidence to equate man to animals. I agree much of a human is determined by his genes, but man is not enslaved by his genes. The main distinction between man and animal is reason. Man has the ability to reason, to determine what is right and wrong. Animals have no reason. Animals are completely enslaved by instinct. Animals are completely unaware that there is even a concept called morality and truth. They know nothing beyond their lives. Of course, some individuals will have difficulty accepting this argument because they may be moral relativists, they may be completely amoral. However, amorality is a falsehood, so therefore these people are wrong. I will not get into explaining an objective morality here. I need a separate post to discuss that. Returning to the point, since man has reason, can determine right and wrong, man can also choose to be virtuous or vicious. Animals have very little choice. They have almost no free will, no liberty. They are completely commanded by instinct. This in turn points out a larger distinction between man and animals. Since man has reason, and consequently liberty, in turn all other natural rights will follow. Animals do not have natural rights. Since they have no reason, and consequently no liberty, they have no natural rights. That is why it is perfectly fine for a man to cage an animal, but it is vicious for a man to cage another man without consent. In order to illustrate the difference between man and animals more clearly I will use the crow video as an example; however, I am changing some of the facts of the video to get my point across. The fact that the crow can make a hook is of no importance as to whether he is closer to animal or man. Let us say the crow is trying to get a worm with this hook. The crow is being commanded by his instinct to get the worm so he can eat it, so he will not die, and so he can spread more offspring. A man trying to get food may very well be eating so as not to die, but is he really concerned about creating offspring. No. If the man is in a situation where he is starving he probably wants to eat so he can continue living his life an be happy. The man wants to continue to live to continue being happy. Happiness is not even a part of the crow's consciousness. However, I admit this is a weak argument, and the second half is more convincing. Let us say the crow does eventually get the worm out with his hook; however, another crow comes along, grabs the worm, and flies away. At this point the crow, who had his worm stolen from him, is commanded by instinct to find another worm so he can eat, not die, and spread off spring. If a man is trying to get food on a deserted island let us say. He climbs to the top of a tree and grabs a fruit. He brings the fruit back to the ground and just as he is about to eat it, another man, also abandoned on this island, runs past the man with the fruit, grabs the fruit, and runs away. At this point the man thinks, "Hey! What the hell! That is my fruit." Since the man has reason, he has natural rights; therefore, he has property, and he recognizes he has property. The crow has no understanding of this concept of property; furthermore, the crow has no right to property. Additionally, the man, whose fruit was stolen, is able to recognize the taking of his fruit as a vice because his natural right to property was violated. There is no virtue or vice in the crows world, and the crow does not even acknowledge so. Remember the crow is just commanded to get another worm, eat it, not die, spread offspring. The crow does not believe the stealing crow is bad. The crow also does not believe the stealing crow is bad. This captures the separation between man and animal. I am not denying that man is completely different from animal. There are similarities, man after all did evolve from animal; however, there was a point where man broke the barrier, discovered reason, and exited the animal life. Man now exists on a tier superior to that of animal.
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