Tuesday, March 15, 2005
Sunday, March 13, 2005
Hiking on the Santa Rosa Plateau was a lot of fun. We hiked over 10 and a half miles, and saw the majority of the accessible reserve.
The park surprised me in the variety of wildlands that it possesses in a small area. Depending on the steepness and size of the hills, as well as what side of the hill you're walking on, the dominant vegetations vary wildly. There's prairie-land, chaparral, oak woodland, and coastal sage scrub, all within what seems a rediculously small area. Each of these biomes contains unique wildlife, too.
We definitely liked the prairie the most. It feels so wide open and free. I just get the feeling that the earth is friendly in a place like that. Tall grass, low hills, it's the most beautiful kind of carpeting possible. Areas like that are really special, and I'm glad we got to spend the day there out-of-doors.
The park surprised me in the variety of wildlands that it possesses in a small area. Depending on the steepness and size of the hills, as well as what side of the hill you're walking on, the dominant vegetations vary wildly. There's prairie-land, chaparral, oak woodland, and coastal sage scrub, all within what seems a rediculously small area. Each of these biomes contains unique wildlife, too.
We definitely liked the prairie the most. It feels so wide open and free. I just get the feeling that the earth is friendly in a place like that. Tall grass, low hills, it's the most beautiful kind of carpeting possible. Areas like that are really special, and I'm glad we got to spend the day there out-of-doors.
Jonathan and I went hiking at the Santa Rosa Plateau Ecological Reserve yesterday. Here's a picture:
Wednesday, March 09, 2005
Guys, this is great. I had no idea there were such specific names for groups of animals. Some of my favorites:
-A prickle of Porcupines
-A crash of Rhinoceroses
-An exaltation of Larks
-A gulp of Cormorants (that's a great one! very fitting--they'll just swallow fish whole)
-A parliament of Owls
-An unkindness of Ravens (can you imagine? "Woah, did you see that huge unkindness of Ravens fly overhead?!")
Who knew?!
-A prickle of Porcupines
-A crash of Rhinoceroses
-An exaltation of Larks
-A gulp of Cormorants (that's a great one! very fitting--they'll just swallow fish whole)
-A parliament of Owls
-An unkindness of Ravens (can you imagine? "Woah, did you see that huge unkindness of Ravens fly overhead?!")
Who knew?!
Monday, March 07, 2005
Shakespeare and the Dialectic
Shakespeare's style of writing is the most conducive to creating a dialectic that I think I've found. This stems from the complexity of his plays, and their power in drawing people into them.
Shakespeare has broad appeal, and he was so intelligent that he wrote characters that people would identify with because of the kind of people that they are. For example, Richard II is an idealist in Shakespeare's play (by the same name). His opponent, Henry Bolingbroke, is not. He is a pragmatist. Now, when I read Richard I thought, "This guy is so smart!" but people that I've been dialoguing with have the opposite reaction. "Richard is insane!"
If I try to convince someone that Richard is not insane, that will have to be done in a conversation, because there is no other way to effectively change their stirred intuitions. In fact, if I were to really want to convince them to believe me, I'd have to convince them that there is a deeper reality than we can see on the surface, and we'd start talking metaphysics. Shakespeare's text has created a dialect-pregnant situation.
I really appreciate the genius of a man who is able to do this, and, though I have never been taught this aspect of Shakespeare before, I think it may be his greatest accomplishment.
Shakespeare's style of writing is the most conducive to creating a dialectic that I think I've found. This stems from the complexity of his plays, and their power in drawing people into them.
Shakespeare has broad appeal, and he was so intelligent that he wrote characters that people would identify with because of the kind of people that they are. For example, Richard II is an idealist in Shakespeare's play (by the same name). His opponent, Henry Bolingbroke, is not. He is a pragmatist. Now, when I read Richard I thought, "This guy is so smart!" but people that I've been dialoguing with have the opposite reaction. "Richard is insane!"
If I try to convince someone that Richard is not insane, that will have to be done in a conversation, because there is no other way to effectively change their stirred intuitions. In fact, if I were to really want to convince them to believe me, I'd have to convince them that there is a deeper reality than we can see on the surface, and we'd start talking metaphysics. Shakespeare's text has created a dialect-pregnant situation.
I really appreciate the genius of a man who is able to do this, and, though I have never been taught this aspect of Shakespeare before, I think it may be his greatest accomplishment.
Saturday, March 05, 2005
I just started a new job a few days ago. I'm a marketing assistant for The Academy. I call high school students, who have been recommended by Biola, to see if they're interested in coming to our summer leadership conference. Basically, I'm a telemarketer. I try not to call during dinner time, but sometimes it can't be helped.
I made calls for about an hour and a half this afternoon and I think I got three people to apply. At least, these three students were very interested in it. So that's good. It's easier to keep making calls if it feels productive.
Most people are willing to hear about The Academy, especially since we only call students with a strong academic record. But I talked to one father who was pretty annoyed at my calling. I called him first a few days ago to talk to his daughter. I told him a little about it and asked if he thought that would be something his daughter would be interestd in. He was kind of short with me and said, "Well, I guess you'll have to call back and ask her." So, I called back today and he answered again. I asked to speak with his daughter, and he said she wasn't at home. Before I could ask what a better time to call would be, he said, "Oh-I-have-to-go. Bye" *click* Something tells me it won't do any good to call them back.
I suppose I deserve a little bit of that for some stuff I did to a telemarketer who kept calling my home a couple of years ago. Story time: During the interterm of sophomore year (January 2003), my parents were gone for several days; so Gabe and I were holding down the fort and making sure Phillip and Abbey didn't burn it down. Anyway, during this time, we started getting calls from some telemarketer guy. At first we would just tell him that our parents weren't available to come to the phone. But he kept calling back every day. Often twice a day. I mean, it got to the point where we recognized his voice as soon as he said, "Hello." So the four of us had a meeting. And we talked about some ideas of things to say when he called. Creative things. I don't remember all the stuff we came up with, but here are a couple that we actually went through with. All four of us contributed to these ideas, but I was the one who ended up talking with him...
Conversation 7(or so):
Telemarketer: Hello, may I speak with Thomas Moothart, please?
Me: He's grounded. He isn't allowed to talk on the phone.
T: Uh, I'd like to speak with Mr. Moothart. Is he your father?
Me: Yes, he's my father. He likes to set a good example for us kids, so when he does something wrong, he grounds himself. He can't watch TV; and he can't come to the phone. I'm sorry.
T: Wow. Ok, I'll try back later.
Conversation 8 (or so):
Telemarketer: Hello, may I speak with Thomas Moothart, please?
Me: (not disguising my voice at all) This is Thomas.
T: Uh, may I speak with Mr. Moothart, please?
Me: I'm Mr. Moothart.
T: Well, um...
Me: It's the voice, isn't it? I'm sick of it! Nobody ever believes that I'm a man over the phone! *click*
Yeah. I'm pretty sure I deserve anything I get during this new job.
I made calls for about an hour and a half this afternoon and I think I got three people to apply. At least, these three students were very interested in it. So that's good. It's easier to keep making calls if it feels productive.
Most people are willing to hear about The Academy, especially since we only call students with a strong academic record. But I talked to one father who was pretty annoyed at my calling. I called him first a few days ago to talk to his daughter. I told him a little about it and asked if he thought that would be something his daughter would be interestd in. He was kind of short with me and said, "Well, I guess you'll have to call back and ask her." So, I called back today and he answered again. I asked to speak with his daughter, and he said she wasn't at home. Before I could ask what a better time to call would be, he said, "Oh-I-have-to-go. Bye" *click* Something tells me it won't do any good to call them back.
I suppose I deserve a little bit of that for some stuff I did to a telemarketer who kept calling my home a couple of years ago. Story time: During the interterm of sophomore year (January 2003), my parents were gone for several days; so Gabe and I were holding down the fort and making sure Phillip and Abbey didn't burn it down. Anyway, during this time, we started getting calls from some telemarketer guy. At first we would just tell him that our parents weren't available to come to the phone. But he kept calling back every day. Often twice a day. I mean, it got to the point where we recognized his voice as soon as he said, "Hello." So the four of us had a meeting. And we talked about some ideas of things to say when he called. Creative things. I don't remember all the stuff we came up with, but here are a couple that we actually went through with. All four of us contributed to these ideas, but I was the one who ended up talking with him...
Conversation 7(or so):
Telemarketer: Hello, may I speak with Thomas Moothart, please?
Me: He's grounded. He isn't allowed to talk on the phone.
T: Uh, I'd like to speak with Mr. Moothart. Is he your father?
Me: Yes, he's my father. He likes to set a good example for us kids, so when he does something wrong, he grounds himself. He can't watch TV; and he can't come to the phone. I'm sorry.
T: Wow. Ok, I'll try back later.
Conversation 8 (or so):
Telemarketer: Hello, may I speak with Thomas Moothart, please?
Me: (not disguising my voice at all) This is Thomas.
T: Uh, may I speak with Mr. Moothart, please?
Me: I'm Mr. Moothart.
T: Well, um...
Me: It's the voice, isn't it? I'm sick of it! Nobody ever believes that I'm a man over the phone! *click*
Yeah. I'm pretty sure I deserve anything I get during this new job.
Tuesday, March 01, 2005
Hello, all.
I just wrote a little ditty on Augustine's disproof of astrology. I'd say it's a pretty clear cut argument.
Basically, there are cases where two people are born at the same time. This means that, if their lives are determined by the position of the stars at their birth, then they will have the same kind of life. In these cases, they didn't. So, astrology isn't true.
Another version of this argument that he puts forth is that of twins. Twins are born of the same mother, in some cases at almost exactly the same time (like Jacob and Esau). Yet they live very different lives! (like Jacob and Esau)
I am actually curious what the justification is for people who do ascribe to horoscopes. I can sort of understand the ancients believing in it, because they thought stars were self-moving movers. In other words, they thought they had souls. I think they thought this becuase there was no apparent cause for the regular motion of the heavens. This is because they thought the cause had to be present to the caused at all times. Anyway, if stars had souls I'd be more willing to believe they could influence things because soulish things have greater capacities for activity than non-soulish things. I hear tell some people still think stars have souls, but I haven't heard the arguments to support it, and obviously we can't accept the account that they demonstrate regular motion in the same way the ancients did, since the galaxy isn't earth-centered.
The other neat argument I read today in Augustine is about Genesis.
Basically, the argument is that for God to have created everything from nothing, it must not have been with a voice like the voice He spoke in the gospel "This is my son with whom I am well pleased" or with the voice like the one with which He spoke to Moses. Because, for His voice to be heard, it would have to be temporal, and time didn't exist until after He had spoken.
Which means that those Words must have been eternal in Him. And this corroborates John 1, in which it says about Jesus, "And the world was made through Him." Awesome, huh? The other thing he argues is that, in this read of Genesis, Beginning means the Word, which is nice because it seems to free us from temporal confusion, "What does in the beginning mean?, etc". So you could read Genesis this way:
"In the Word, God created the Heavens and the Earth."
It makes sense to me.
I just wrote a little ditty on Augustine's disproof of astrology. I'd say it's a pretty clear cut argument.
Basically, there are cases where two people are born at the same time. This means that, if their lives are determined by the position of the stars at their birth, then they will have the same kind of life. In these cases, they didn't. So, astrology isn't true.
Another version of this argument that he puts forth is that of twins. Twins are born of the same mother, in some cases at almost exactly the same time (like Jacob and Esau). Yet they live very different lives! (like Jacob and Esau)
I am actually curious what the justification is for people who do ascribe to horoscopes. I can sort of understand the ancients believing in it, because they thought stars were self-moving movers. In other words, they thought they had souls. I think they thought this becuase there was no apparent cause for the regular motion of the heavens. This is because they thought the cause had to be present to the caused at all times. Anyway, if stars had souls I'd be more willing to believe they could influence things because soulish things have greater capacities for activity than non-soulish things. I hear tell some people still think stars have souls, but I haven't heard the arguments to support it, and obviously we can't accept the account that they demonstrate regular motion in the same way the ancients did, since the galaxy isn't earth-centered.
The other neat argument I read today in Augustine is about Genesis.
Basically, the argument is that for God to have created everything from nothing, it must not have been with a voice like the voice He spoke in the gospel "This is my son with whom I am well pleased" or with the voice like the one with which He spoke to Moses. Because, for His voice to be heard, it would have to be temporal, and time didn't exist until after He had spoken.
Which means that those Words must have been eternal in Him. And this corroborates John 1, in which it says about Jesus, "And the world was made through Him." Awesome, huh? The other thing he argues is that, in this read of Genesis, Beginning means the Word, which is nice because it seems to free us from temporal confusion, "What does in the beginning mean?, etc". So you could read Genesis this way:
"In the Word, God created the Heavens and the Earth."
It makes sense to me.
Saturday, February 26, 2005
Friday, February 25, 2005
I just finished watching The Sound of Music. What a classic. That is a great movie. It's got humor; it's got drama; it's got romance;... it's got...nuns. And Julie Andrews is my hero! She's so cool. Oh, here's a funny line from the movie: "I like rich people. I like the way they live....I like the way I live when I'm with them."
I watched it with my roommate, Bethany, and her boyfriend, Wade. Wade told us that there's a scene where the real Maria makes a cameo appearance! But he didn't tell us until after the movie was over, so we didn't notice her. Maybe next time...
I watched it with my roommate, Bethany, and her boyfriend, Wade. Wade told us that there's a scene where the real Maria makes a cameo appearance! But he didn't tell us until after the movie was over, so we didn't notice her. Maybe next time...
I'm off to work. This weekend's going to be non-stop activity for me, and the sleep probability rating is showing a strong negative on 8 hours a night, and indicating possible all-nighters in the three day forecast.
Here's a really beautiful picture I found on weather.com.
Lighthouses are cool. This one is the Portland Head Lighthouse, in Cape Elizabeth, Main. The picture was taken on the first of this month!
The Lighthouse picture from submitted Weather.com photos
Here's a really beautiful picture I found on weather.com.
Lighthouses are cool. This one is the Portland Head Lighthouse, in Cape Elizabeth, Main. The picture was taken on the first of this month!
The Lighthouse picture from submitted Weather.com photos
Wednesday, February 23, 2005
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
Jonathan and I are taking a tennis class for P.E. We have homework due every Wednesday. For homework, we can do pretty much anything we want, (just so long as it has something to do with tennis) and we write down what it is we did on a 3x5 card. This week, we're learning how to serve. So, for homework, he and I watched this cool video about correct form in serving. You should watch it too. It'll make you a better tennis player. And a better person. Maybe; I'm actually not sure about that last part.
Sunday, February 20, 2005
Since we're posting about homework, I guess I'll share what I've been working on today. It's got nothing to do with Nietzche or Orientalism.
I have an assignment for my Curriculum class to design a Thematic Unit (actually, just part of one...most Thematic Units are much longer and could take a couple of months to complete), a week's worth of lesson plans (20 in all: 1 each day for math, science, language arts and social studies), all centered around a theme. I've chosen to do Pioneer American Life, and to use Little House on the Prairie as the basis for my lessons. Jonathan and I have been reading this book together lately. He helps me with my homework. Anyway, today I created a sort of skeleton for the Thematic Unit. I don't have any of the actual lessons written yet, but I've got a good start. This is what it looks like:
Pioneer American Life
Grade 3
Language Arts (Little House on the Prairie)
1. Ch. 1-3; Pretend you're the Ingalls' dog, Jack: write the story of crossing the creek from your perspective.
2. Ch. 4-6; Venn Diagram: Compare/Contrast life then with life now.
3. Ch. 7-8; Word Choice Activity
4. Ch. 9-11; Write an alternative ending to chapter 11. What would have happened if...
5. Ch. 12-14; Class discussion: Compare Mary/Laura, Pa/Mr. Edwards
Social Studies
1. Review map skills and geographical terms
2. Geography of the states that the Ingalls travelled through
3. Discuss the meaning of the term "Indian Territory"
4. Introduce the various North American Indian tribes
5. Have students choose a tribe that they'll write a one-page report on
Math (measurement)
1. Instruments of measurement
2. Measuring to build (a log cabin)
3. Measuring distance (of travel, for example)
4. Measuring to cook
5. Measuring to dig (a well)
Science
1. What is a prairie?
2. Variety of life on the prairie (begin putting things in broad categories)
3. Birds on the prairie
4. Small mammals on the prairie
5. Large mammals on the prairie
So, that's it! I'm having fun designing it, and I think it'll be fun to dig deeper into each lesson as well.
I have an assignment for my Curriculum class to design a Thematic Unit (actually, just part of one...most Thematic Units are much longer and could take a couple of months to complete), a week's worth of lesson plans (20 in all: 1 each day for math, science, language arts and social studies), all centered around a theme. I've chosen to do Pioneer American Life, and to use Little House on the Prairie as the basis for my lessons. Jonathan and I have been reading this book together lately. He helps me with my homework. Anyway, today I created a sort of skeleton for the Thematic Unit. I don't have any of the actual lessons written yet, but I've got a good start. This is what it looks like:
Pioneer American Life
Grade 3
Language Arts (Little House on the Prairie)
1. Ch. 1-3; Pretend you're the Ingalls' dog, Jack: write the story of crossing the creek from your perspective.
2. Ch. 4-6; Venn Diagram: Compare/Contrast life then with life now.
3. Ch. 7-8; Word Choice Activity
4. Ch. 9-11; Write an alternative ending to chapter 11. What would have happened if...
5. Ch. 12-14; Class discussion: Compare Mary/Laura, Pa/Mr. Edwards
Social Studies
1. Review map skills and geographical terms
2. Geography of the states that the Ingalls travelled through
3. Discuss the meaning of the term "Indian Territory"
4. Introduce the various North American Indian tribes
5. Have students choose a tribe that they'll write a one-page report on
Math (measurement)
1. Instruments of measurement
2. Measuring to build (a log cabin)
3. Measuring distance (of travel, for example)
4. Measuring to cook
5. Measuring to dig (a well)
Science
1. What is a prairie?
2. Variety of life on the prairie (begin putting things in broad categories)
3. Birds on the prairie
4. Small mammals on the prairie
5. Large mammals on the prairie
So, that's it! I'm having fun designing it, and I think it'll be fun to dig deeper into each lesson as well.
I have a lot of reading to do at the moment. I'm putting a lot of effort into this Senior Thesis of mine, and so I am reading a lot about it. This means that I need to take periodic short breaks or I just about go nuts becuase of the sheer quantity of reading I've been doing on one subject this weekend.
But, to take a break, I'll post about Nietzche, and tie it into some of the reading I've been doing for my thesis, which allows me to constructively work on two homework assignments at the same time, while on my blog, which provides for me a change of environment (to liven up the night!). This is: a pull question on Nietzche, which will be due at Mid Rags (I suppose that's coming closer and closer) and to process Edward Said, whose book, Orientalism, revolutionized the discussion of Orientalism. Orientalism is the study of the East, by the Westerners, and since my thesis has to do with Byron's mission to the Greeks (a Westerner going East) it's relevant to understanding how people might think of him thinking. The sum of what this paragraph is expressing for you, the reader, is that this is going to be a very long post and most of you will not read it. But, I've also supplied (in this paragraph) justification for writing it independent of your readership and that means you dont need to read it for me to write it! Gosh, what a great paragraph!
PQ: What is the appropriate Christian response to Nietzsche? Academically? Interpersonally?
Nietzche is fundamentally opposed to the Christian religion, reviling it continuously and explicitly with his pseudo-philosophical expressions of genius and angst. Therefore it is meet for Christians to develop a response for ministering to the minds of those people who hold to ideas put forth by Nietzche (whether or not they came to believe them through him or through modern post-modern movements) and to defend Christianity against his attacks, which means, at least for Biola students, holding up at least a foundationalist evangelical form of orthodox Christianity to be more than what he says it is.
The most fundamental assault by Nietzche on Christianity in The Genealogy of Morals is not his explicit textual criticisms based through strange philology on a contrived history. Although he says that he views Christianity as a kind of Jewish revolt by an impotent priestly class against those that are weaker, his arguments do not hold up against careful scrutiny. This was adequately established several times during my class when we set out to understand his use of philology. For example, his appeal to philology to disprove the idea that guilt comes will-freedom intuitions. “Have these genealogists of morals had even the remotest suspicion that, for example, the major moral concept Schuld [guilt] has its origin in the very material concept Schulden [debts]?” (Genealogy of Morals, Second Essay, Section 4) This argument is not intended, according to the translator and editor Kaufmann, a famous Nietzche scholar who has worked to redeem Nietzche for academic study after his famous use in Hitler’s problems, to pull weight. But the truth is that it is the only referral to a potential concrete fact in the whole section, and philology is the only substantial evidence for his history offered. So, Kaufmann is probably incorrect in that assessment and we are free to move forward with our critique. But there is not far to go, the argument is easily refuted by examining English or any other language that does not have this philogical relationship to debt. Also, with the amount of information he gave us here, we cannot accept what he said because it appears equally plausible that schulden is the longer form of schuld, and the idea of debt came from an idea of responsibility stemming from moral intuitions that actually do come from our conceptions of freedom.
So, what is this genius, as he likes to consistently point out, doing? He must know this argument is invalid. This is the real puzzle in dealing with Nietzche, but it may amount to this: because power is the sum of existence, as explained in Essay 1, Section 13, with an example where he says all actions are merely actions, and do not stem from a doer, there are no ideals. Or perhaps because there are no ideals there is only material, but the point is: any ideal is not believable. Yet, remember, Nietzche is a genius. Therefore he realizes the obvious truth that “any ideal is not believable,” as I stated it above, is also an ideal! And so, he is forced also to condemn living this way. What this leaves is a totally consistent nihilist approach, expressed basically poetically throughout this work.
Here lies the challenge for Christianity, for Christianity is unavoidably an ideal. If ideals chain men, Christianity is a great means of enslaving and turning us into our own self-destroyers through an ascetic ideal.
Responding to this question is exceptionally difficult, because Nietzche leaves no common ground through which to dialogue. It demands a dishonest intellectual attitude, an accusation Nietzche himself has leveled at all idealists, in which he denies the existence of a priori propositions that he must hold. Thus, interpersonally, the only way of expressing Christianity to a Nietzchean must be by demonstrating the fruits of Christianity. There are also, I feel, still a priori conceptions buried in the consciousness of these people, placed there by God, that might be appealed to in earnest and honest friendly discussions. If consistent, they will deny these intuitive inward pulls, but perhaps it is impossible for anything less the genius of Nietzche to hold to such a powerful belief system.
Academically, which removes the intimacy of friendship from scholarly debate, strikes a more difficult solution. There is no way, operating within a Nietzchean system, to argue against Nietzche. The only plausible solution I can see is to stand humbly on the outside and express honest incredulity. An example of a very important scholar who expresses ideas (via Foucalt) held by Nietzche was Edward Said. His book Orientalism attacked the idea of learning about the Orient as an academic discipline because it was a form of mental imperialism, and the source of political imperialism. Now, the form of Said’s argument is such that it assumes that ideas enslave (familiarly Nietzchean) those that they study. This is the bomb-blast of Said’s book, and is found in the introduction of a 200-page book. The response of intellectuals to Said was mixed. Bernard Lewis, the foremost American Orientalist, attacked it viciously four years after it was published. He claimed it was absurd, viewed common sensically, and this seems proper. But it required him standing outside of the philosophical system of Said and appealing to others’ common sense. The thrust of this defense is to prevent others from holding to Said’s belief system. It’s an unfortunately rear-guard stand, and in this way has its shortcomings. At this point, however, it seems the best response.
Said does not go so far as Nietzche, and so there is another root of criticism. It is this: his analysis of Orientalists seems as morally improper, by his own criteria, as the Orientalists' studies of the Orient.
But, to take a break, I'll post about Nietzche, and tie it into some of the reading I've been doing for my thesis, which allows me to constructively work on two homework assignments at the same time, while on my blog, which provides for me a change of environment (to liven up the night!). This is: a pull question on Nietzche, which will be due at Mid Rags (I suppose that's coming closer and closer) and to process Edward Said, whose book, Orientalism, revolutionized the discussion of Orientalism. Orientalism is the study of the East, by the Westerners, and since my thesis has to do with Byron's mission to the Greeks (a Westerner going East) it's relevant to understanding how people might think of him thinking. The sum of what this paragraph is expressing for you, the reader, is that this is going to be a very long post and most of you will not read it. But, I've also supplied (in this paragraph) justification for writing it independent of your readership and that means you dont need to read it for me to write it! Gosh, what a great paragraph!
PQ: What is the appropriate Christian response to Nietzsche? Academically? Interpersonally?
Nietzche is fundamentally opposed to the Christian religion, reviling it continuously and explicitly with his pseudo-philosophical expressions of genius and angst. Therefore it is meet for Christians to develop a response for ministering to the minds of those people who hold to ideas put forth by Nietzche (whether or not they came to believe them through him or through modern post-modern movements) and to defend Christianity against his attacks, which means, at least for Biola students, holding up at least a foundationalist evangelical form of orthodox Christianity to be more than what he says it is.
The most fundamental assault by Nietzche on Christianity in The Genealogy of Morals is not his explicit textual criticisms based through strange philology on a contrived history. Although he says that he views Christianity as a kind of Jewish revolt by an impotent priestly class against those that are weaker, his arguments do not hold up against careful scrutiny. This was adequately established several times during my class when we set out to understand his use of philology. For example, his appeal to philology to disprove the idea that guilt comes will-freedom intuitions. “Have these genealogists of morals had even the remotest suspicion that, for example, the major moral concept Schuld [guilt] has its origin in the very material concept Schulden [debts]?” (Genealogy of Morals, Second Essay, Section 4) This argument is not intended, according to the translator and editor Kaufmann, a famous Nietzche scholar who has worked to redeem Nietzche for academic study after his famous use in Hitler’s problems, to pull weight. But the truth is that it is the only referral to a potential concrete fact in the whole section, and philology is the only substantial evidence for his history offered. So, Kaufmann is probably incorrect in that assessment and we are free to move forward with our critique. But there is not far to go, the argument is easily refuted by examining English or any other language that does not have this philogical relationship to debt. Also, with the amount of information he gave us here, we cannot accept what he said because it appears equally plausible that schulden is the longer form of schuld, and the idea of debt came from an idea of responsibility stemming from moral intuitions that actually do come from our conceptions of freedom.
So, what is this genius, as he likes to consistently point out, doing? He must know this argument is invalid. This is the real puzzle in dealing with Nietzche, but it may amount to this: because power is the sum of existence, as explained in Essay 1, Section 13, with an example where he says all actions are merely actions, and do not stem from a doer, there are no ideals. Or perhaps because there are no ideals there is only material, but the point is: any ideal is not believable. Yet, remember, Nietzche is a genius. Therefore he realizes the obvious truth that “any ideal is not believable,” as I stated it above, is also an ideal! And so, he is forced also to condemn living this way. What this leaves is a totally consistent nihilist approach, expressed basically poetically throughout this work.
Here lies the challenge for Christianity, for Christianity is unavoidably an ideal. If ideals chain men, Christianity is a great means of enslaving and turning us into our own self-destroyers through an ascetic ideal.
Responding to this question is exceptionally difficult, because Nietzche leaves no common ground through which to dialogue. It demands a dishonest intellectual attitude, an accusation Nietzche himself has leveled at all idealists, in which he denies the existence of a priori propositions that he must hold. Thus, interpersonally, the only way of expressing Christianity to a Nietzchean must be by demonstrating the fruits of Christianity. There are also, I feel, still a priori conceptions buried in the consciousness of these people, placed there by God, that might be appealed to in earnest and honest friendly discussions. If consistent, they will deny these intuitive inward pulls, but perhaps it is impossible for anything less the genius of Nietzche to hold to such a powerful belief system.
Academically, which removes the intimacy of friendship from scholarly debate, strikes a more difficult solution. There is no way, operating within a Nietzchean system, to argue against Nietzche. The only plausible solution I can see is to stand humbly on the outside and express honest incredulity. An example of a very important scholar who expresses ideas (via Foucalt) held by Nietzche was Edward Said. His book Orientalism attacked the idea of learning about the Orient as an academic discipline because it was a form of mental imperialism, and the source of political imperialism. Now, the form of Said’s argument is such that it assumes that ideas enslave (familiarly Nietzchean) those that they study. This is the bomb-blast of Said’s book, and is found in the introduction of a 200-page book. The response of intellectuals to Said was mixed. Bernard Lewis, the foremost American Orientalist, attacked it viciously four years after it was published. He claimed it was absurd, viewed common sensically, and this seems proper. But it required him standing outside of the philosophical system of Said and appealing to others’ common sense. The thrust of this defense is to prevent others from holding to Said’s belief system. It’s an unfortunately rear-guard stand, and in this way has its shortcomings. At this point, however, it seems the best response.
Said does not go so far as Nietzche, and so there is another root of criticism. It is this: his analysis of Orientalists seems as morally improper, by his own criteria, as the Orientalists' studies of the Orient.
Friday, February 18, 2005
Last night four of us stayed up very late discussing this particularly puzzling question:
Can we know that something tastes good?
My opinion is yes.
We most certainly can know that some things taste good to us. As long as the sense of taste is reliable, then there's a correspondence between the flavor and me, and from this point of view it seems like knowledge.
The crux of the debate hinged on what knowledge is, and whether or not taste is proper justification.
My view of the issue is that we know things according to certain modes proper to those things. Therefore the justification of our knowledge should be according to the mode that we know it. And taste is known through our tongue's tasting (and smell, actually). Therefore we can know whether or not something tastes good.
I dunno, it all seems clear to me. Dustin, you can post your position on your blog or in my comments, so that people can understand your view.
This objection seems the most cogent: taste is not true or false. Therefore taste is not a matter of knowledge. But the proposition, "this tastes good" can be a matter of knowledge (as it's propositional) therefore I am not persuaded by this objection.
A silly discussion, I know, but the real issue was epistemology and, at least to some degree, the necessary conditions of justification. At one point I found myself defending the law of non-contradiction, which was disturbingly self-contradictory.
Another issue was whether or not certainty is a condition of knowledge. I'd say no, because inductive reasoning seems to bring things probabalistically to light in such a way that I still am able to claim to know them. In other words, it's the most likely truth, but I'm still justified in believing it through my inductive argument because there's not sufficeint contrary justification. And so it would be irresponsible not to believe it.
I think the most interesting part of the discussion was on the nature of beauty. We examined, at one point, whether or not taste could be beautiful. It fit one of the signs of a beautiful thing: it inspires desire. However, considering this definition, we had to ask, "Is beauty present to every sense?" And it seems a strange thing to say "This feels beautiful." It occured to me that I'm most comfortable saying "beauty" when I'm talking about sight and hearing. Then someone asked a great question: what about brail? So deaf people can experience beauty through words, like us, but they do it with their fingers. This showed conclusively that ideas, primarily, are beautiful.
Now, ideas are immaterial realities. This seems indisputable. Ideas are most definitely not matter. You can never touch an idea or test one with an instrument. So, if beauty deals mainly with ideas, then beauty itself must be immaterial. And so Plato is right. (For an Aristotelian, beauty is immaterial but always bound in matter. If you're a Thomist, you have a hybrid of these two views, because you see beauty as existing eternally in the mind of God as the exemplar cause of beautiful things on earth: in this way Thomas obviously doesn't seem very Aristotelian, and I'm not sure he isn't a Platonist here.)
Bum bum bum!
I've been becoming a more confirmed in a more Platonic metaphysics lately, even though I've been spending a lot of time in St. Thomas Aquinas.
*later update*
I added a bit about brail because I remembered it and it's insightful and important.
Can we know that something tastes good?
My opinion is yes.
We most certainly can know that some things taste good to us. As long as the sense of taste is reliable, then there's a correspondence between the flavor and me, and from this point of view it seems like knowledge.
The crux of the debate hinged on what knowledge is, and whether or not taste is proper justification.
My view of the issue is that we know things according to certain modes proper to those things. Therefore the justification of our knowledge should be according to the mode that we know it. And taste is known through our tongue's tasting (and smell, actually). Therefore we can know whether or not something tastes good.
I dunno, it all seems clear to me. Dustin, you can post your position on your blog or in my comments, so that people can understand your view.
This objection seems the most cogent: taste is not true or false. Therefore taste is not a matter of knowledge. But the proposition, "this tastes good" can be a matter of knowledge (as it's propositional) therefore I am not persuaded by this objection.
A silly discussion, I know, but the real issue was epistemology and, at least to some degree, the necessary conditions of justification. At one point I found myself defending the law of non-contradiction, which was disturbingly self-contradictory.
Another issue was whether or not certainty is a condition of knowledge. I'd say no, because inductive reasoning seems to bring things probabalistically to light in such a way that I still am able to claim to know them. In other words, it's the most likely truth, but I'm still justified in believing it through my inductive argument because there's not sufficeint contrary justification. And so it would be irresponsible not to believe it.
I think the most interesting part of the discussion was on the nature of beauty. We examined, at one point, whether or not taste could be beautiful. It fit one of the signs of a beautiful thing: it inspires desire. However, considering this definition, we had to ask, "Is beauty present to every sense?" And it seems a strange thing to say "This feels beautiful." It occured to me that I'm most comfortable saying "beauty" when I'm talking about sight and hearing. Then someone asked a great question: what about brail? So deaf people can experience beauty through words, like us, but they do it with their fingers. This showed conclusively that ideas, primarily, are beautiful.
Now, ideas are immaterial realities. This seems indisputable. Ideas are most definitely not matter. You can never touch an idea or test one with an instrument. So, if beauty deals mainly with ideas, then beauty itself must be immaterial. And so Plato is right. (For an Aristotelian, beauty is immaterial but always bound in matter. If you're a Thomist, you have a hybrid of these two views, because you see beauty as existing eternally in the mind of God as the exemplar cause of beautiful things on earth: in this way Thomas obviously doesn't seem very Aristotelian, and I'm not sure he isn't a Platonist here.)
Bum bum bum!
I've been becoming a more confirmed in a more Platonic metaphysics lately, even though I've been spending a lot of time in St. Thomas Aquinas.
*later update*
I added a bit about brail because I remembered it and it's insightful and important.
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
I added a couple of links: one to Jeff Y's site, who's an old good friend of Libby. And one to Gabe Moothart's site, who's Libby's brother. Gabe's is always a good read, and Jeff's looks interesting, too.
Also, I fixed the link to Luke's site! Now it doesn't direct you to Microsoft.com anymore. Why on earth was it doing that? Luke's site is cool, but he should post more.
Just to make it completely clear, however, on the coolness front here is the order of the world's coolest people.
1. Libby
2. Jon
3. Our families
4. Our friends
5. Everyone else
6. Lem (he's the least coolest)
Also, I fixed the link to Luke's site! Now it doesn't direct you to Microsoft.com anymore. Why on earth was it doing that? Luke's site is cool, but he should post more.
Just to make it completely clear, however, on the coolness front here is the order of the world's coolest people.
1. Libby
2. Jon
3. Our families
4. Our friends
5. Everyone else
6. Lem (he's the least coolest)
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