Wednesday, November 5, 2008
A New Nation
Alright, it may be a little different from a room full of old, upper-class, white men, but I don't think it is very different from the ideals they posited for the United States.
Throughout this entire day, I have felt a warm swell of pride for a country I had almost lost hope in. But, mixed with that pride, I feel a muddled skepticism--I keep asking myself: "can it really be true?" To be honest, as good as it feels, I'm a little scared of what this all means. I cannot anticipate with a calm assurance what the next era will be like, and that scares me a lot. I felt a similar wash of anticipation and fear right before going off to college . . . and for that matter, both times I graduated college.
But, just like in those instances, I know that it is time. Like a grad student that spends years to finish his thesis or dissertation, it is time for the United States to be true to the vision put forth by the founding fathers and allow the most qualified man to take one of the most powerful positions in the world, regardless of the color of his skin or the foreign timbre of his name.
I also know that a great majority of the world celebrated this epic event with us. The united voice of the American people may have restored our dignity in front of the rest of the world.
As a philosopher interested in social justice, I would like to add that I am glad that we have regained some consistency with our nation's ideals and founding documents. Now, we are a country that has proven that all men are indeed equal, though we may not treat them that way. There is still work ahead for Obama and the rest of us (God knows not all causes important to me were successful yesterday), but today let us all celebrate a victory and a step in the right direction.
It has been a hard, uphill climb, but a black man will now enter the White House, not begrudgingly, but carried in by an overwhelming majority of American voters.
Here is a link to the international celebrating:
Yahoo News!
And, just in case you haven't seen it, here is the first part of Obama's acceptance Speech:
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
That Time of Year
While looking for some organic tomatoes at Kroger, I found that they are selling my favorite seasonal fruit. In a slow movement towards locavorism, I'm trying to be a seasonal vegetarian. (Seasonal as in "using what is in season," not "only vegetarian in certain seasons.") I didn't find the tomatoes, which is sad; but, I forgot about pomegranates. I love pomegranates. I know they are not quite the same thing, but "Chop Wood, Carry Water" and all that jazz.
Here is a list of good reasons why pomegranates should be loved by all--or at least by me.
1. Mrs. Shanks, my 6th grade World Civilization teacher. She is responsible for my first utterance of the Greek language and my first taste of pomegranates. On that day, look ago, I remember wiping my stained hands onto the moon of my over-sized, printed tee . The howling wolf looked almost sad that the moon was bleeding above its head. I still have that t-shirt . . . okay, the shirt stuff is all elaboration. But, Mrs. Shanks still rocks!
2. Healthy, healthy, healthy. Pomegranates give you 40% of your daily amount of potassium, vitamin c, vitamin e, vitamin a, folic acid, and other goodies.
3. Antioxidants. Because cancer is kind of bad.
4. Three pomegranate seeds can keep you in Tartarus for a substantial portion of the year. Honestly. Ask Persephone, she still remembers. But maybe, while you are waiting for spring, you can become an important underworld deity. Think of the Power!
5. You can use the seeds in tandem with toilet paper to throw on people's houses this Halloween. Though, the custom may then be referred to as "tamponing," due to the stains. Finger licking good.
6. Scholars suspect that the "apple" that Adam and Eve ate from was actually a "pomegranate." So, that means that you can eat of the Tree of knowledge for months at a time. Just don't tease God by saying: "Nah nah nah na boo boo, what are you going to do about it now?" Smiting may be the answer.
7. It is called Jewel of the Winter. And jewels are a gay's best friend. Also, there is Pama liqueur, and liqueur is a gay's best friend.
8. Pomegranate lassi. Nuff said.
9. What's good enough for Needle, is good enough for me. And, if you don't know Conan the Barbarian Cartoon series . . . well, yeah.
10. There is no ten. Winter sucks, and we should all take time to remember that it sucks, and that its sucking doesn't stop until spring. So, eat a pomegranate next to your space heater and remember that some people are curling up inside a dumpster because it is the only way they can stay warm this winter.
Enjoy!
Links and Videos:
Homeless:
For the homeless, a quest to stay warm
Pama:
Pama Liqueur
Pomegranate Lassi:
Pomegranate Lassi
Conan:
Friday, October 24, 2008
Hell Hath No Fury--The Death of an Avatar
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Is Anything Green?
Monday, October 13, 2008
I assert the Affirmative
I was stoked, and it turned out to be well worth getting there by eight thirty in the frickin' morning on a Saturday. For the most part, most of the debaters I judged either argued for utilitarianism or deontology, citing Mills and Kant respectively. My joy, however, didn't come from hearing new arguments, so much as seeing high schoolers and their bright eyes, awkward hand gestures and earnest dispositions. Most of the young adults I judged were over-joyed by my elaborate praises and thorough critique of their work. They hurriedly jotted notes, and two of them thanked me profusely for the detail and attention. To be honest, it made me a little sad to walk back in to teach a required course this morning. The attitudes are very disparate.
Friday, October 3, 2008
The Food Industry Has It Out For Me
Looking over my options, I thought about a salad. Paying anyone six dollars to throw vegetables into a bowl and hand it to me seemed a little ridiculous. If times were really hard I could gather grass and leaves into a bowl myself. Ultimately, I opted for sushi. Since, I allow myself to eat fish every now and then, and I thought having protein rich meal would keep me focused and functioning for tomorrow, I choose what looked like Crab Philadelphia Roll (Phili rolls with the salmon are my favorite when in fish-meat mode). Half-way through the meal, however, my stomach cramped up like it does when I'm eating something it hate (i.e. gluten). I stopped my meal and checked the ingredients sticker attached to my plastic sushi box (that must be what I pay so much for!). Sure enough the answer became clear:
Imitation Crab has wheat in it.
They use wheat among several other ingredients so that the pollock paste (that is a type of fish they grind up) can hold its shape. I am astounded by my lack of knowledge of what goes into my food.
Locavorism is starting to look better everyday.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
“Flowers fall always amid our grudging, and weeds flourish in our chagrin.” ~Dogen
I am amazed, sometimes, at the synchronicity I notice in my life. The synchronicity may only be constructed by my mind’s organizing structure; but, the pattern lies there before me just the same. In particular, I mean that separate areas of my life (family, profession, etc.) demand from me similar lessons before I can move freely. Troubles stand like identical, yet prismatic gates that all require the same bloodstained key.
This post comes from several events that happened to me over the past week, including visiting my brother’s birthday and the beginning of fall teaching. The lesson has something to do with the intentions of nurturing and the ends of such actions. But to be honest, I don’t know if I’ve reached any conclusions, so far.
Dogen, the Zen master and philosopher, put forth the title quote of this post in his seminal work, Shobogenzo Genjokoan. Dogen left these writings as lectures and lessons to Zen monks, but the entire tradition holds up his words to a higher philosophical status. This specific quotation has a metaphysic dimension. Dogen could mean that there is a real disconnect between what happens and what we want to happen, but this is both too simplistic and inconsistent with his greater work. Zen Buddhist tradition holds that the world is interconnected, albeit illusory. Still, just as external events can cause ripples in internal states, the reverse can also be true.
Another interpretation of this quote is that it attacks the notion that our desires are important or influential. Just because I love flowers, I cannot stop them from withering away, and just because I detest weeds, I cannot stop them from growing. It is likely that Dogen is lecturing his monks here on the Stoic’s project—reigning in the mind and desires to gain better control of the self. But, for those of you who know Buddhist thought, there is not a self to pseak of, but instead, no-self (anatman in Sanskrit). Control is a skill taught and fostered in Zen, but it cannot be the ultimate goal. If control were the ultimate goal, then there probably exists a controller that desires control, since control is not a neutral display of power. That being said, control is contradictory to ideas of no-self. What Zen typically strives for (and not without its own paradoxes) is a cessation of control and a fostering of no-mind. You can understand this no-mind as a sort of living in the moment, similar to the Tao, but that simplifies the matter a bit.
Right now, I take up Dogen’s words as saying something cautionary about our passions, while at the same time, pointing in the direction of the best way to nurture.
First off, I believe that Dogen is warning against teleological thinking, which roughly means focusing on the end of action. One way that we engage in teleological th
inking is to see the end as the validation of the action, with which Zen Buddhism (not to mention Kant) would disagree. If the withering of the flower invalidates our affection for it, then it is the affection that is flawed. The same for the weed: if our affections are only positive in the absence of the weed, then it is the affection that is mistaken in the reality of the world, i.e. shit happens.
Teaching is a sort of nurturing. It requires the teacher to give to the students in hopes that the students will improve in general or gain a certain skill-set to put in her metaphoric tool kit. In philosophy, I hope to mostly give my students good training in analytical reasoning, but also general instruction on some of the great thinkers in our history. If I engaged in mostly teleological thinking, I would likely feel distraught or dissatisfied to learn that many students of intro level classes never read philosophy again, and may never pick up the analytical reasoning skill-set from her or his toolboxes after the semester ends.
Dogen’s answer would be that we must shift our thinking, but a full exploration that will have to wait until another day. Before I go, I will put forth a counter-argument prior to any paradigm shift.
Without abandoning teleological reasoning, I could argue that I at least left the student with the opportunity to pick up that skill set. Indeed, it would be a sadder affair if the student reached into the toolbox in her future and couldn’t pull that dusty reasoning when she wanted
and maybe needed it. However, if we are truly focused on the ends, we would have to consider the statistics (which may or may not be possible for predictions) and probably conclude that this explanation would not be strong enough. Would teachers still teach as fervently, if they not that it may avail nothing? If we are teleological, that seems unlikely. Do we pull weeds because we one day hope that they won’t return?
Not without being foolish.
And now a word from our humorous sponsors on the topic of "best intentions."
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