Connection and Reflection (7)

      This is my last one I have to do for this class YAY!!! Besides my outburst of glee, I still have to type this out. So my connection for this lovely morning is from Disney's Hercules. When little baby Herc got kidnapped by the little demon guys, he was supposed to drink all of a poison type potion thing that would turn him into a mortal. He was just about to drink the last little bit, when his new parents called out at exactly the right moment and he didn't turn fully mortal, earning him his future entitlement to a movie about him.
Yep, this blog is about fate. Of course, Hercules is an exaggerated vesion because it is Disney and they will make improbable situations like that. Regaurdless of that, what would have happend if the parents hadn't called out when they did, of Hades' little henchmen weren't so clumsy? Before that scene, Hades was talking to the Muses and they said that if he didn't do anything about Hercules, then he would foil Hades plans of world domination. In the movie, its obviously saying that you can't escape fate no matter what you do, Hercules would still save the day in the long run. But does that apply to real life? It's pretty hard to tell, since we don't have time machines. I personally beleive that there ae an infinite amount of parallel universes, whether or they they are accesable is irrelevant to this blog. So I believe that we have choices, and we can presume to choose them, but each choice forks off into a new situation or experience than the next. There's also the thought that our genes are preset so that our reactions and choices are pre determined. I don't really agree and I think this is long enough so I'm going on to my reflection.

        In the last part of the book, Hilde and her father talk about the big bang. It makes you sort of look at things and realize how vast the universe is and how little we actually know. There could be book characters who have escaped their stories and are walking around right now hitting us in the head with wrenches to get our attention, and we wouldn't even know it. There are as many possibilities about the universe as people can imagine, and although we can assume they aren't true, there is absolutely no prof against it. So while we might think that we're dust mites of a strand of rabbit fur trying to climb to the top, that "hair" could be a peice of intricate bacteria we haven't dicsovered yet and this bacteria is searching for higher meaning by climbing deeper into a wormhole. We can say it's impossible, but Luna Lovegood said something along the lines of "it exists until proven non existy". And it's pretty hard to actually disprove that the tooth fairy doesn't just inspire the parents to deal in terms of teeth. So this book gave me the perspective that Socrates was right. "All I know is that I know nothing". That basically describes what I'm feeling right now, especially seeing as I have this final next hour and I know absolutely nothing. Anyways, thank you for reading this blog if you happen to stumble upon it. Maybe I'll taike up a legit one that I'm not forced to do for a class and be able to write about more interesting stuff.

- Sassafras

Connection and Reflection (6)

         My connection for today comes from a book that I read last year called "Something Wicked this way Comes". In all honesty, I thought it sucked. It gave a very 1 dimensional view of good and evil, so much in fact that I thought the book was almost a satire and would end with the "evil" turning out to be nothing more than paranoia. Sadly, it didn't end this way and I was quite confused. The book made it blatantly clear that there was a definite line between good and evil, but I don't agree. The people modern society considers evil never think of what their doing as wrong. In "Something Wicked this way Comes", they didn't really add any character development to the bad guys, so that doesn't really count. But all real people who have committed crimes that seem inhuman do it either because of a mental state or for some sort of greater good cause. Sure, people can be greedy and selfish, but those qualities in and of itself are not all bad. They are survival traits. When you see on the animal channel about how different animals fight to get mates and the ones that don't just end up dying, we don't look at those winners as evil. Technically they just killed another of their kind to get a mate. Plus, there are so many cultures and so many definitions of what's evil that finding an absolute evil that biology determines for everyone is impossible. There are immoral decisions, don't get me wrong, but I believe that no act nor person can be completely and purely evil. Even in the worst torture I've learned about, WW2. The Nazis weren't "evil". They thought that they were doing the world a favor and starting a new super-civilization. They certainly weren't being moral in my mindset, but it was all caused by ignorance, greed, cowardliness, and a whole lot of other crap. But note how these acts in and of themselves are not evil, it's only when you take them to ridiculous extremes that they become harmful. Onwards...

           This weeks edition of reflecting upon Sophie's World is going to be centered around Romanticism. I have some more background information on Romanticism than the book explains, so I'm sorry if I sound too much like a genius...Oh wait, I always do that. Anyways, I think that a healthy does of Romanticism is important. Freedom of expression seems to be flourishing with Lady Gaga but not so much in daily social life. My dad and I actually had an argument over the way I held a fork. I said that it was my individual choice and style to hold a fork so brashly, as it is more comfortable for me to stab my food like I'm holding a sword. Dad said that I was making him look bad in public, and I asked why he should care what people judge of him, you should be confident enough in your parenting abilities that other people's glances shouldn't bother you. He said it was selfish for me to make him look bad; I said it was selfish for him to depend on me to make him look good. This was a very casual argument by the way, no chairs were thrown in the restaurant. I think I ended up losing just because my brothers agreed with my dad like a bunch of suck-ups but that's off topic, and I would just hate to be off-topic. So having a sense of your true self is important, and if everyone acknowledged their feelings that everyone has but still feel shameful of like jealousy or just plain out wanting something, instead of pretending we're all little angels, maybe we could realize that humans did not evolve to be perfect and I think if we faced that fact, we might be able to get a lot more accomplished and live more fulfilling lives. But that's incredibly idealistic, which is another thing the Romantics liked. Idealism is good in doses, but refusing to face the reality of situations can lead to some serious consequences.  So, I believe that a balance is important; you can take a lot of good things away from the Romantics, but we also must keep in mind that we are living in reality.

Connection and Reflection (5)

          My connection this week comes from a series of books that I haven't read in a while but still love. They are called Pendragon and the story line is pretty complicated so let me just get to the philosophy. In the fourth book, Bobby Pendragon goes to a "parallel universe" type thing called Veelox. Veelox is a broken territory (meaning parallel universe in book terms) and is under many problems. In Veelox everyone is hooked to a machine that makes all of their fantasies and whatever they can imagine become true. The ultimate happiness. There are only a few people who actually work and feed the people in the machines. They are on a food shortage, and basically no one is taking responsibility. Familiar? I hereby connect this to what we have learned. That one guy who said if there was a machine that was just for pleasure, we would face that instead of reality. In the end of the book, Bobby shuts the thing down and people wake up and see the mess going on. The bad guy transforms into a woman secretary of something or other and tells everyone that there was a technical difficulty and that the machines are back and running again. No one stayed to even ponder what the right thing to do was, they just hooked up to their machines again and began to let the world rot around them. I have to sadly agree with this statement. Only extremely strong people would be get out of it and face reality. It sounds pessimistic about the human race, but we've seen stuff to not as much extent still have an impact. Our attention spans are shrinking because of the speed of the internet. Would you rather be on Facebook or doing APUSH? Or I could use the example that kids are pending very little time outside by their own choice because watching t.v and playing video games is much more appealing than reality.

          I've sort of given up on trying to figure out what the heck is going on, so I'll discuss Kant. He isn't exactly easy to understand either, but I just Kant deal with the plot line right now (be prepared from more Kant puns, its the reason I'm writing about him). After looking at a simplified version of Kant's ideas, he miraculously makes sense. I actually really like this guy. I Kant say that I agree with everything that comes out of his intellectual mouth, but the jist of it makes sense. He has the idea that rational idea come from a process in order. First you have senses. You can sense anything and everything that's around you, but add more focus to a specific sense and it become perception. Example: I don't usually notice gravity pushing down on me, that would make it a sense, but when I pretend that I'm Super Man and jump off something, expecting to soar through the skies, gravity suddenly becomes my perception as I realize that the power of flight is not in my reach...yet. See what I did there? From my perception of gravity, I was able to make a conception or an idea. This is only one aspect of Kant's many complex theories that take quite a bit of perception to figure out. Kant also really liked mathematics and thought that science and math were things that were set in place and couldn't change no matter what experiences happen. 3+3=6 no matter what. Yet, as Socrates said, "The only thing I really know is that I know nothing." Kant has a the same sort of theory for religion, but I'll always wonder about everything else. Our senses can deceive us and do we truly ever know if what we're in is the reality we think we are? Probably not, but that's why we've got philosophy.

Connection and Reflection (4)

       My connection to the universe this fine Tuesday evening comes from my favorite animated series ever to exist. Avatar the Last Airbender is FYI: the best thing ever!!! My love for its amazingness is, alas, not quite so philosophical (well now that I think about it, I suppose I could write a blog on it, but I need to go deeper) but the content is. There are many philosophical references in the show, many from Uncle Iroh, but one specific episode caught my attention. It's called "The Swamp" and its in the second book. The basic plot goes that the crew is flying over a swamp when they get sucked in by a random tornado. This could actually be seen as another fate v.s free will thing, but hold up. So basically the crew gets separated and they are left of explore the swamp with their own wits, all of them have visions. Katara and Sokka saw people who they lost while Aang saw someone he never met before. They all chase their visions and end up in the center in the swamp where they get attacked by a giant seaweed monster who happens to be a hippie type philosopher.Once they clear up the whole attacking bit, the kids meet Huu (the guy inside the seaweed who was bending the water in the plants) who tells them some interesting things. Here's a quote: 

       ":Huu: See, this whole swamp is actually just one tree spread out over miles. Branches spread, then sink and take root, and then spread some more. One big living organism; just like the entire world.                             Aang: I get how the tree is one big thing, but the whole world?                                                                     Huu: Sure. You think you're any different from me or your friends or this tree? If you listen hard enough, you can hear every living thing breathing together. You can feel everything growing. We're all living together, even if most folks don't act like it. We all have the same roots and we are all branches of the same tree."                                                      So this is quite an interesting philosophy. Everything is one and together. From a social science standpoint, we were all raised diffently, and therefore, are quite different people because our environment and culture has effected us differently. But thinking about how we evolved, the tree is a perfect metaphor because even though we are different from a cultural perspective, we do have the same roots. The episode also explained the reason for their visions was that "time is an illusion, and so is death." This is a very hard one to wrap your mind around. In an era that looks at things chronologically, this is strange to think about. Huu cuts things down to its absolute basic substance. Spending an hour in APUSH sure takes longer than only a mere hour at Ceder Point or something. Humans all come from the same roots, and maybe so does time.

       

       In Sophie's World, everything is getting trippy.I'm going to get straight to what I want to write about, the fact that Alberto said that Alberto was writing a story about them for his daughter's amusement. There are a few reason why this can't be true, first off: cop-out! Secondly, why would Alberto call Sophie Hilde, and also,  what a ridiculous story to read to your daughter! But after thinking about it, its like a never-ending extension. So Hilde is reading a story on Alberto and Sopie, and we are then reading a story about a girl named Hilde who is reading a story about Alberto and Sophie, but maybe we're just a marble like in Men in Black and someone's reading a book about us reading a book about Hilde reading a book about Sophie and Alberto who are reading about philosophy. Oh goodness. What a mind boggling theory, the idea that everything is infinity bigger. I wonder if it has any actual limits. Like being small has an eventual limit, but I don't think the same restraint applies to being bigger, sense there's always that +1 you can add to a number. Going back to Descartes, there will always be doubt, and I guess we can never know for sure, but goodness, I really hope the ending changes from his theory because it seems like such a cop-out and they never predict the right theory in books, well besides Harry Potter 7. That concludes my fourth bloggy type thing.

Connection and Reflection (3)

         My philosophical connection for today comes from my favorite comic books, Calvin and Hobbes. Throughout the series, the author puts in thoughtful insights, but I'm going to have to make my main focus the overview because the book is all the way across the room and I am not getting out of bed. When his parents are around, Hobbes is just a regular stuffed tiger, but when he's with Calvin, he becomes an actual tiger who can walk, talk, and eat tuna fish sandwiches. The logical and realistic way to look at this would be to say that Calvin has a lot of imagination. Someone could argue that Calvin just carries Hobbes around all day, and makes up a personality for him. Another option is that Calvin's parents have outgrown their childhood, and can't see Hobbes because they refuse to. Since their adult minds are so boring, they can't see Hobbes because they are so used to the normalicy (I'm so making that a word) of their lives.The other option is a combination of both. This one is a little tricky, but last year during APUSH there was always some weird philosophical stuff on the board, and one time it asked if there could be more than 1 Truth. I don't know the exact meaning of Truth, but I can guesstimate. Maybe the two options both exist, they may be paradoxes, but there could be more than one Truth in this situation (I really don't know if I'm using it in the right way at all. My refusal to look it up probably isn't helping this blog's accuracy). Since its in a comic book, I agree with the third choice, I don't believe it can all be apart of his imagination, and, even though I favor this explanation more than simply imagination, I don't think you necessarily have to become dull when you become an adult. More so, I think Calvin and Hobbes doesn't focus on the existence of Hobbes. I think whatever the reader chooses to think while reading, is the right answer to them.   

        At the time I had hypothesized this theory, I hadn't actually read the chapters I was supposed to, but now I have and I want to explain what I think about Sophie and Hilde. Sophie's World has become extremely janky and not gonna lie, I'm a little confused. Anyways, my best guess at the moment is that Sophie is Hilde when she is being philosophical and enlightened. I want to say sort of  Jesus thing, that Sophie represents Jesus before he knew he was the Christian's savior, while Hilde is the awakened and fully aware that he is supposed to do...Jesus stuff? FYI: I am completely and utterly clueless about Christianity and Jesus in general, so please excuse me if I give the wrong information but I'll try not to go too in depth with the facts. Also, Sophie sees Hilde sort of looking back at her when she look at her reflection on her I.D card and in the mirror. That just seems so obvious, she can only see Hilde when she's looking at herself. Too obvious maybe? I feel like this is one of those books that is going to have an unpredictable and random ending that you couldn't have guessed in a million years, so I don't think I'm right, but its my best guess so far. The way Sophie is finding some objects Hilde is losing, could be that Sophie is becoming more and more Hilde, that is to say that she is climbing higher and higher on that little rabbit hair. So then who is Hilde's father? Well, according to my Jesus guess, Hilde's father must be God, but Alberto said he wasn't. Why is Alberto so mad and continuously ripping up the postcards anyways? My best guess right now would be that Alberto had a Hilde of his own, and something bad happened, but he needs to teach Sophie philosophy, but at the same time he doesn't want her becoming Hilde like he did. Maybe it led to some bad stuff, I don't know I feel like this argument has nothing even close to validity at the moment. Anyways, that's my recent reflection and connection for 6:23 in the morning :)

Connection and Reflection (2)

                   Since today used to be a Tuesday night, my head is full of that wonderful show Glee. In the latest episode (aired on the 27th) Kurt wanted the part of Tony for West Side Story but Blaine was also thinking of auditioning for that role. Kurt realizes that Blaine would make a perfect Tony and he wouldn't get the part, so Blaine offers to try out for a smaller role. Sacrifice has had conflicting views in the history of philosophy. On one hand, the basic argument appears that you should live for yourself, life is too short to live it for others. The other side has the argument about conscience, and sacrifice may be hard, but its the right thing to do. I don't prefer one argument over the other, for me it depends completely on the circumstance. Should Blaine accept the role of Tony? On one hand, he's still a junior and this would be an amazing thing to give Kurt, as it would make him happy and help him get into the college of his dreams. On the other hand, while accepting the role would be letting Kurt down, he would be enhancing the show so it would make it more pleasing for the audience. Also, why should Blaine let Kurt determine what he can and can't do? Blaine does have his own life, and he should be able to live it to its fullest extent. My personal philosophical conclusion is that, although it would be an act of altruistic kindness, Blaine has every right to take the role. While he may be disappointing Kurt, he would be helping the arts program and all the people at the school by making the show suermegafoxyawesomehot because he's Darren Criss.

         My reflection for Sophie's World is going to be not very informative about what I read, but on page 122 there are some questions that Sophie had to answer, and I'm going to compare mine with her's.

Make a list of things we can know. Then make a list of things we can only believe: The basic differences between these lists are that the knowing list is stuff that can be experienced with your senses, or is technical in some term like that. The other list takes a large proportion of what we think we know. Maybe everything is history is just a setup by aliens and BAM! APUSH is irrelevant. In hindsight I didn't actually make a list at all.

Indicate some factors contributing to a person's philosophy in life: A lot of us are influenced by society, the people around us (if you grew up with people who locked you in a cupboard under the stairs, an average person might have a sour view on the goodness of mankind), how we're treated, our culture, icons (a lot of times people will agree with powerful people with powerful arguments. Or we can agree with idiotic people with power *cough*GeorgeBush*cough*), historic moments (my generation's philosophy about freedom of privacy on an airplane, or for that matter, anywhere, may be different because of 9/11).

What is meant by conscience? Is conscience the same for everyone? It is most definitely not the same for everyone. In some cultures, Blaine would be expected to give up his role, because self sacrifice is valued higher than personal freedom. I believe there are some basic values everyone has, but even those are in different priorities. The question above this one that I'm answering has things that can affect what our conscience is. I that aspect, I agree with Sophie.

What is meant by priority of values: Sophie used an example for a personal dilemma. I would almost agree with her that driving a car is less important than saving the environment, but lets say you live way far away from your school. I think it would take me over 2 hours to ride my bike to school, plus my backpack, so that's probably even more time. I do see the environment as a high priority, but I also enjoy sleep, convenience, and heated cars. Again, these priorities cannot be set in stone one way or another, they are circumstantial, just like Blaine and his priorities. This concludes my second reflection and connection. Now for something completely unexpected :) 

Connection and Reflection (1)

      Good morning universe! It's 4:52 am and I am currently typing words into my computer. I could go on for a while describing exactly everything I'm doing, but that's only amusing to the person who's typing about the wonders of their nose itching. So I will save anyone reading this from such writings, and without further distractions, may I present to you my first blog post that counts for a grade.

       My connection to philosophy in modern media lies in a movie that has caused me much disappointment when I go to the zoo and the lion cub isn't singing. Yes, The Lion King is quite philosophical. Most of the philosophy I find in this movie comes from Simba's decision to return to Pride Rock. It holds a few questions we should all look at a little closer. First, the statement about responsibility. The jungle he finds represents a carefree paradise, and after thinking he killed his dad, he was "turning his back on the world" by chilling in the woods. The motto there was Hakuna Mattata (no worries) which is a philosophy in and of itself. Yet Simba still has worries and returns to Pride Rock to fix them. Should he have done it? Was it actually his responsibility to become king? Then you have to ask why can't Simba choose to live for himself? Disney obviously wants to put in the message that you should take on leadership and take the responsible route, but is Simba responsible for anyone else than himself? A few questions to mull over as I get into the next theme. 

       Socrates asked the question "Who are you when no ones looking?" It seemed that the reason Simba returned was because he found Nala. Since Timone and Pumba didn't know Simba was king, he didn't act like he was anything special. When Nala came he suddenly has eyes on him that knows who he is, and he decides to return. Maybe Nala did convince him, but when no ones looking, Simba might just be a carefree lion, sure he had regrets, but I don't think he would have taken action if no one came to him or started "looking". 

       Alright, my final philosophical connection is that there are undertones of fate vs. free will. Was Simba fated to be king? He tried to back out of it, but Disney portrays fate having the upper hand and overcoming free will. Or it could just be a coincidence that Nala finds Simba in a jungle in the middle of nowhere. Either way, it poses some interesting questions and topics.

       My reflection on Sophie's World comes from early in our reading about the analogy of pulling a rabbit out of a hat. To be excited about everything and how awesometastic the world is is something I take with me. For example, right now I'm pretty excited because in like 2000 years some aliens will see this and be like woah! So I'm making my own mark on history as I speak. Even if some random person in Alaska sees this, I am impacting some random person in Alaska's life! Even if it was for a second when they realized it was made yesterday. Most of the world has this mature type of mindset. But I don't think maturity has to be that way at all. Instead of going down on the rabbit hair, maybe becoming truly mature is not letting the world become a habit and climbing the hair. I know a lot of things I do are habitual, some are my fault, some aren't. But either way, I think that even though Sophie's over there going all out on her mom, she does have a point. When I read her reaction about how she felt awakened, I sort of felt like that too. I didn't want to go flaunting it, but after reading about how people slip down into habits, I realized that I did not want to be like that at all and I was going to have to do something to change it. Yet, like the Lion King, there is a level of responsibility that plays into becoming awakened. I could be truly outgoing and do whatever the heck I want in class (the random comments and connections to Flobots, Pokemon, Harry Potter ect... would increase quite a bit) saying that I was shaking up the norm, but for those people who just want to learn, I would be disruptive and the teacher wouldn't be too pleased. I think this maturity is finding that balance between those extremes. I ended up agreeing with someone, I just don't know who. Despite my constant off topicness, this is my reflection on Sophie's World.