from JUB 307-B. Remember, the nectar is in the journey. JPO
A collaborative search for wisdom, at Middle Tennessee State University and beyond... "The pluralistic form takes for me a stronger hold on reality than any other philosophy I know of, being essentially a social philosophy, a philosophy of 'co'"-William James
Monday, December 17, 2012
Thursday, December 13, 2012
A word to would-be wise students
Please heed my previous instructions and postpone all grade queries ’til Monday.
...Sitting in that waiting room yesterday, I was pleased to come across a very wise bit of teaching advice from a younger colleague in the Chronicle of Higher Education that I’ve been inching towards for some time, and am finally going to embrace on January 17: ditch the syllabus on the first day of class. Do something interesting and fun, and begin really getting to know your student collaborators from the get-go. Talk about due dates and such later. Ask ‘em all “Who are you?” and “Why are you here?” and write down what they say. Other smart tips abound in the article too (though nothing about how to make yourself love grading).
I’ve come up with another innovation as well: floaters. We’ll have a different representative of each of our four discussion groups floating from group to group at ten minute intervals during each class, helping me knit the separate strands of our larger conversation into a tighter weave. “Connecting the dots,” I call it...Up@dawn
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Psychilosophy [posted for John Donovan]
Psychilosophy [posted for John Donovan]
If you examine anything for a long
enough time you are guaranteed to find something philosophical about it, that
being said, sometimes the philosophical qualities of some things are a bit more
prominent than others. The television show Psych
is filled with many philosophical topics, themes, and even quirky one-liners.
Although the message that Psych sends sometimes may not be the
philosophy that most people agree with, the message is still there. Psych sends many messages, but one of
the more obvious ones is the message that if you are good enough at any certain
thing, such as observing every little detail, you can float your way through
life with not a problem in the world.
Psych is
a television show that first aired in 2006 on USA Network, the main characters
of the show are a man named Shawn Spenser who spends most of his time solving
murders under the guise of a psychic, when in reality he is just hyper
observant due to his father’s constant training when he was a child. Burton
Guster, or Gus for short, his black best friend who is a pharmaceutical
salesman and partner in solving crimes. Other important characters are Henry
Spenser, Shawn’s father, Juliet O’Hara, Shawn’s eventual girlfriend and
detective of the Santa Barbara Police Department, and Carlton Lassiter,
comically stoic head detective of the police department. Although the members
of the police department are initially suspicious of the authenticity of
Shawn’s claim of psychic ability, he consistently proves himself to them, so
they consistently believe in him and his ability to solve cases.
As far as philosophical occurrences
in the television show, the most obvious philosopher in the show is Henry
Spenser, Shawn’s father is always chiming in with little quips and quotes that
sometimes do not penetrate Shawn’s thick skull, however they usually do have
good meaning being as that Henry has Shawn’s best interests in mind, no matter
how ridiculous of things he says to his son sometimes. Henry does not
necessarily just spit out easily interpreted bits of information that every
viewer will understand, he usually just gives Shawn a good bit of relatively
normal advice that a father would give to a son, and due to this a majority of
the advice that Henry gives Shawn is somewhat situational and not applicable to
every person. That is what makes the show so constantly amusing though.
Throughout the show, Henry Spenser
is somewhat of an all-good type of character. He worked as a police officer for
a long time when Shawn was a child, and he was an always honest, good hearted
police officer, even when his partners did the exact opposite. For example, in
the last episode of the sixth season, Henry and Shawn find out that there was a
case that every one of his partners had done their part in covering up. Henry
of course is devastated because the police force was all he knew, and he found
out that everything it stood for was wrong. Henry’s constant goodness actually
causes a good deal of trouble for him in the end. At the end of the episode,
Henry goes to visit his fourth partner who he believes did not help cover up
the case that his other two partners had helped conceal, but once he gets there
and begins talking to him, he realizes that he was wrong, and that the last
remaining partner that could have been good was also paid off by the bad guys.
His partner then in a fit of depressed rage shoots Henry in the chest, leaving
the audience to wonder if Henry is dead or alive until the next season begins
in February. Unsurprisingly, many people are very excited for the season
premiere.
One of the more depressing
philosophers in the series is the head detective of the Santa Barbara Police
Department, stone cold hearted and comedically stoic, Carlton Lassiter.
Lassiter throughout the show showcases his absolute lack of feelings towards
any other human beings than himself. In a way he is a classic narcissist, but
it also sometimes appears as if he does not care about any others, but he also
does not necessarily care too much about himself either. Lassiter is one of the
more confusing characters in the show due to his constant indifference and
insensitivity towards those around him. For example, in the second episode of
the first season, the police are at a spelling bee investigating the mild
poisoning of a young boy’s inhaler in order to get him out of the contest, when
the older spell master in charge of the contest suddenly gets dizzy and falls
out of his perch in the box of the theatre. Most normal people in a situation
such as this would apologize to the audience in the auditorium and let the
family of the man that fell know that their prayers are with them, but Carlton
Lassiter simply lets the audience know that the building is completely safe and
that the fall to death the old man had was completely coincidentally. Maybe
Lassiter is not purposely insensitive, rather he is almost unacceptably
practical. This practicality is something that many sometimes mistake for
maliciousness, when in reality a person just does not know any other way to
approach a situation than head on in the most seemingly reasonable fashion
possible.
Throughout the span of the show,
Shawn Spenser and Juliet O’Hara eventually become lovers, and their
relationship itself has some philosophical qualities. Shawn had his eye on
Detective O’Hara almost from the start of her initiation onto the detective
agency, despite the fact that the two of them saw different people for the
first couple of seasons, as time progressed the two of them began to date and
eventually become a rather serious couple. The slow and patient nature of their
relationship shows the audience that sometimes the tortoise really does beat
the hare. This is important for many young people to know, because with
technology getting quicker and quicker and convenience becoming the American
dream, people are just getting progressively more and more impatient. If people
took as much time living as they do trying to live more conveniently then
people would probably be happier and relationships would probably last longer
then they do now.
One of the more humorous
philosophical attitudes that a character has is the attitude of the always
classic, Burton Guster. Gus’s attitude throughout the show is one of either
annoyance at Shawn’s ridiculously childish antics, or infatuation with a
certain hobby or woman. Gus shows the audience a person who wants to act as
mature as possible, but still gets distracted by everything that anyone throws
at him. In many ways it is funny, but in other ways it is a constant reminder
that you are not really allowed to act any way that you want to once you get
older. It is not that easy to keep acting like a child the older you get. And
for many this is a rather depressing fact, immaturity may be a bad vice, but it
is definitely soothing to the soul. One example of Gus’s constant distractions
are in the third episode of the sixth season. Shawn decides to go undercover at
an insane asylum, and Gus goes undercover to join him inside the asylum as a
cleanup boy. Once Gus gets inside he meets a very attractive patient and is
immediately worthless for the rest of the episode because he is always trying
to talk to the girl. Fortunately the girl is not actually as crazy as most of
the other patients; however, she does sometimes think that she is a middle aged
plumber named Frank, so there is that that Gus is forced to deal with.
Throughout the entire show each of
the characters progressively grows into their respective rolls within the show.
As the characters do this progressing they also develop their own personal
philosophies that become more and more prominent as time goes on. For example:
Henry Spenser being the classic good human character that many philosophers
would reference from time to time and never wanting to believe that anyone he
worked with could be payed off or turned into a “bad cop”, to always giving his
son any fatherly advice that he could because even though Shawn does not always
treat his father with the respect he deserves, Henry always loved him and had
his best interests in mind. Carlton Lassiter, the classic narcissist who has no
one in particular’s best interests in mind, and always approaches every
situation as unbiased as the next. Unless of course a situation includes
someone who does not like America or believes that Ronald Reagan did not have a
successful presidency. Or the relationship that Shawn Spenser and Juliet O’Hara
share, the patient but always progressing relationship that many young people
should probably be doing their best to model, due to the ridiculous amount of
people obsessed with convenience and accessibility and the opposite of
patience. Or Burton Guster’s constant
distractions from police cases and even his job as a pharmaceutical salesman,
Gus’s personal philosophy being that ‘if it catches your eye, go for it’, a
philosophy that many people tend to avoid as they get older so that they may
not appear as immature as they used to be.
As a whole, there are a number of
unique and personalized philosophies that each character believes in and
continues to grow into as the series progresses. Each one of the characters on
the show has a different set of ideals that can apply to different situations
in the real world with real people. Psych’s constant puns and clever one
liners are often times just corny jokes that one could probably go without
hearing, but every so often the one liners will carry a mountain of
philosophical advice that if taken the right way could be beneficial to anyone
and everyone. As for the puns, they usually are not very philosophical, but
they are pretty funny and definitely not to be ignored, solely because they are
humorous. Overall, just like anything else, the television series Psych does not have a substantial
amount of obvious philosophies just floating around openly in each episode;
however, once examined, a person can see that the philosophies are endless, you
just have to look closely enough.
Thursday, December 6, 2012
Exam #3 Review Questions
The exams in all sections will be based on these questions and topics. Again: study the relevant texts, don't just memorize Qs & As. There will again be a glossary of names, and an extra credit opportunity: "Who is your favorite philosopher? Why?" OR, "Write two paragraphs on your favorite final report presentation." You can prepare your extra credit answer in advance.
Who did Peter Medawar, Nobel Prize winner for Medicine, say "is incomparably the greatest philosopher of science there has ever been?"
A: Karl Popper
What two principles did Rawls base his theory of justice?
A. freedom and equality
A. freedom and equality
What Philosopher was called a Nazi for defending euthanasia?
A: Singer
Which philosopher said that the reason we find tragedy valuable as an art form is that we regard it as a form of insight?
A: Neill
A: Neill
The view that combines the accepting of modesty with the search for improvement is known as?
A: Stoic Pragmatism
Posted by Kendall Martin (14/3)
1) Turing helped to invent what piece of modern machinery for use in World War II?
THE COMPUTER
2) According to Cottingham, should faith or praxis come first in the cultivation of spirituality?
PRAXIS
3) Who said if we can't talk seriously about the most important questions of ethics and religion, we should just stay silent?
LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN
4) An imaginary situation designed to bring out our feelings, or intuitions, on a particular issue, is called a what?
THOUGHT EXPERIMENT
5) True or False: According to Stephen Law, architecture has a place in the realm of aesthetics.
FALSE (Alain de Botton claims this.)
Posted by Michael Sharber (19/1)
==
· What is the key to living well according to Lachs?
o control over yourself
· Stephen Law believes that suffering is a form of evil? T/F
· Who discussed the idea of good and evil in the world, in reference to the argument of God's existence?
-Stephen Law
-Stephen Law
· Which philosopher discussed the idea of computers thinking for themselves?
-Searle
· Judith Thomson came up with thought experiments to test the Law of Double Effect. T/F
· What term did Arendt use to describe ordinary people doing bad things?
-Banality of Evil
Posted by Matthew Anderson (19/2)
==
1. What condition does Matravers have to consider something art?
-Be connected to the art world.
2.What is the main principle Cupitt uses to defend his viewpoint on the existence of God?
-Non-realism
3.True/False Grayling supports the idea of Intelligent Design.
-False.
4.What is speciesism?
-bias towards your own species
5. True/False Someone who is unsure about the existence of an afterlife and a spiritual world is considered an atheist.
-False
Posted by Mary Johnson 19/4
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Philosophy of Metaphysics
Shawandra Jenkins
Prof. Oliver - #14 Group 4
December 4, 2012
Final Essay
Philosophy
of Metaphysics
Shawandra
D JenIn Western philosophy, metaphysics has become the study of the fundamental nature of all reality, what is it, why is it, and how are we can understand it. Some treat metaphysics as the study of “higher” reality or the“invisible” nature behind everything, but that isn’t true. It is, instead, the study of all of reality, visible and invisible; and what constitutes reality, natural and supernatural. Because most of the debates between atheists and theists involve disagreements over the nature of reality and the existence of anything supernatural, the debates are often disagreements over metaphysics
In Western
philosophy, metaphysics has become the study of the fundamental nature of all
reality — what is it, why is it, and how are we can understand it. Some treat
metaphysics as the study of “higher” reality or the “invisible” nature behinIn Western philosophy, metaphysics has become the study of the fundamental nature of all reality, what is it, why is it, and how are we can understand it. Some treat metaphysics as the study of “higher” reality or the“invisible” nature behind everything, but that isn’t true. It is, instead, the study of all of reality, visible and invisible; and what constitutes reality, natural and supernatural. Because most of the debates between atheists and theists involve disagreements over the nature of reality and the existence of anything supernatural, the debates are often disagreements over metaphysics
4
SSH
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In Western philosophy, metaphysics has become the study of the
fundamental nature of all reality, what is it, why is it, and how are we can
understand it. Some treat metaphysics as the study of “higher” reality or the
“invisible” nature behind everything, but that isn’t true. It is, instead, the
study of all of reality, visible and invisible; and what constitutes reality,
natural and supernatural. Because most of the debates between atheists and
theists involve disagreements over the nature of reality and the existence of
anything supernatural, the debates are often disagreements over metaphysics.
The term metaphysics means “the books after the books on nature.” When a librarian was cataloging Aristotle’s works, he did not have a title for the material he wanted to shelve after the material called “nature”, so he called it “after nature.” Originally, this wasn’t even a subject at all; it was a collection of notes on different topics, but specifically topics removed from normal sense perception and empirical observation.
People that study Metaphysics are
called Metaphysicians. A metaphysician is someone seeking to understand the
substance of reality: why things exist at all and what it means to exist in the
first place. Much of philosophy is an exercise in some form of metaphysics and
we all have a metaphysical perspective because we all have some opinion about the
nature of reality. Everything in metaphysics is more controversial than other
topics, there isn’t agreement among metaphysicians about what it is they are
doing and what they are investigating.
Some people tend to wonder why we study Metaphysics; they want to know if it is pointless or not. Some irreligious atheists, like logical positivists, have argued that the agenda of metaphysics is largely pointless and can’t accomplish anything. According to them, metaphysical statements cannot be either true or false; as a result, they don’t really carry any meaning and shouldn’t be given any serious consideration. There is some justification to this position, but it is unlikely to convince or impress religious theists for whom metaphysical claims constitute some of the most important parts of their lives. Thus the ability to address and critique such claims can be important.
There are a lot of questions that surround Metaphysics: What is out there? What is reality? Does Free Will exist? Is there such a process as cause and effect? Do abstract concepts (like numbers) really exist? All these questions can be answered. Not all of them will have the same answers. Everybody will have different perspectives on the questions that Metaphysics. These are true Philosophical questions in my opinion.
Inception and Phiosophy
Megan Covington
Sec. 13 part 2
One question that the viewers watching the movie, and also the people in the movie always asked was, how did they know if they were dreaming or not? How they declared that was with something called a totem. What that is, is a simple object that each person has that they can use to determine if they are dreaming or not. For example, in the movie, Cobb had a spinning top that he kept with him at all times. If he spun that top and it just kept going and going, then he knew that he was in a dream. But if he spun the top and it fell shortly after, then he knew that it was reality. This is a good concept to have because it was very easy to get confused as to what was real and what was a dream after they had been doing this for a certain amount of time. It was confusing for me at times when I was watching the movie to decifer what was a dream and what was real life.
Something in the movie that was interesting to me was what they described as limbo. Usually when a person dies in a dream, it causes them to just wake up from that dream. But when a person is heavily sedated and they are in a dream inside of a dream, and they die they go into a place called limbo. Limbo is kind of hard to describe to me, but what I believed it to be is a place that the person that enters Limbo makes up. There are no other people in limbo except for the people that enter it. When you are in limbo, it is very easy to forget that there is another reality. With that being said, a person can be in limbo for a very long time. A person can grow old in there and think that there life is fixing to end, but when they die they wake up in actual reality again. But while they are down there, that becomes their reality. When a person does wake up from limbo, sometimes it can be hard to realize that it is real life, since they were in a dream for so long. For example, Cobb and his wife grew old together in limbo. They were probably down there for 50 or more years. When they woke back up in real life, his wife could not accept the fact that it was real life. She thought that she was still in a dream, so in order for her to wake up she had to kill herself. When she did that she actually died. It is very sad that the people in this movie live their life like that. Going through each day trying to figure out if they are in a dream or if it is actually real life that they are seeing. But all this is their philosophy on life. Living in a dream has become better than actual reality to them, and after going through with inception, they could never forget. They needed more to life than actual reality.
One philosopher that I could kind of relate this story to is Plato, and his cave theory. His theory was that we are all in the dark in a cave and can only see what is in the shadows. He believed that we have no idea what real life is like outside of the cave, unless someone goes out and explores it. When that person comes back in the cave to explain to the rest of the people, they have no other choice than to believe that person because they have no clue. It is a very interesting theory that I believe to be true. I believe inception relates to this theory because these people that are performing inception are going way outside of the box. They are doing something that everyone else in the world would persume to be impossibe. When they bring outsiders into their world and tell them about what they are doing, they believe them because it is so out of the ordinary and they have no other choice, when they bring them under and actually show them their world and their hobby. Everyone else in the world is blind to the theory of inception because they have not experienced it, and their minds are not fit to to comprehend that it is even possible.
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
Garrett's final report blog post
Here is a link to the blog I created for my final project for Introduction to Philosophy 1030-014 at Middle Tennessee State University.
While I would like to have seen my original idea through to fruition (interviewing two contrasting personalities in regard to Don Cupitt's interview in Philosophy Bites), the stars did not align for me to do so...merely a figure of speech.
Thanks very much,
Garrett Milich
Sec19 Grp1: Exam #3 Questions
1) Turing helped to invent what piece of modern machinery for use in World War II?
THE COMPUTER
2) According to Cottingham, should faith or praxis come first in the cultivation of spirituality?
PRAXIS
3) Who said if we can't talk seriously about the most important questions of ethics and religion, we should just stay silent?
LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN
4) An imaginary situation designed to bring out our feelings, or intuitions, on a particular issue, is called a what?
THOUGHT EXPERIMENT
5) True or False: According to Stephen Law, architecture has a place in the realm of aesthetics.
FALSE (Alain de Botton claims this.)
THE COMPUTER
2) According to Cottingham, should faith or praxis come first in the cultivation of spirituality?
PRAXIS
3) Who said if we can't talk seriously about the most important questions of ethics and religion, we should just stay silent?
LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN
4) An imaginary situation designed to bring out our feelings, or intuitions, on a particular issue, is called a what?
THOUGHT EXPERIMENT
5) True or False: According to Stephen Law, architecture has a place in the realm of aesthetics.
FALSE (Alain de Botton claims this.)
Ashley Eppert Section 14
Post 2 of 2
Marriage involving Religion
Marriage and religion tends to be a pretty sticky topic. Depending on your belief, if you have one,
many of the beliefs that involve organized religion tend to come with a set of rules chained to the foot
of marriage. One of those rules being, no sex before marriage. The basic problem with this one is the
obvious one: suspense
This is why many Christian couples marry so young, because of the anticipation of sex and starting a
family (obviously not the only reason but a huge factor no doubt).
"Ring by Spring" - a 'cute' catchphrase at a few Christian colleges up in Michigan
Also the 'ol "God told me you were my wife"...gets me everytime.
Then there are those who go in the opposite direction, questioning the fundamentals of marriage as a
whole. If we're having sex before marriage and are now capable of having children on our own, then
do we necessarily need a significant other at all?
and not to mention the divorce rates as they are, and then factor
in the couples religious views, yadayada... Soon
popping the "big question" won't be the big question anymore,
but rather the "big question" will turn into a series of big questions
on womens Sperm Donor sheets.
Politics...Why?
Posted for Blake Taylor:
Some would ask why do we even have politics, which would in turn lead to what is politics. The military tends to hate it, the average Joe doesn't understand it, and the privileged seem to take advantage of the power of it. I would like to talk about why humans as a whole tend to lean towards needing politics (or government) to set the rules for them. I mean such examples, as “The Rent is Too Damn High” Party almost makes the whole thing a joke. I am an International Relations Major, which is essentially a Political Science degree, and I still don't understand how it all works but what I can say is that no matter where you look there is some form of government. If power is the allocation of resources when, where, and how; Then you could simply break down politics and government as the man with the bigger stick (metaphorically speaking). Country like Somalia are essentially without a form of government, but everyone knows that if you are there you must not do certain things (or you risk certain death), well if this is so then there is someone (or system) that is enforcing rules, just like any other government, it may not be fair, but it is working that way. So I will be trying to figure out why humans feel like they need politics, whether it is inherently in our DNA or maybe it is something we are taught, or maybe even something that we just don't need.
Lets start with the idea that it is in our DNA. So when we are formed in the womb like all other decisions based off of DNA, like our hair color or even (there is some debate) whether our DNA is structured to turn off and in turn kill us. This is an interesting point to be made, with the thought that our DNA teaches us to follow some sort of system without question, of course there is question of how the system operates but I am talking about there being a system. We don't hear politicians arguing over having a system in general, they just argue how the system works. Thus when we are born we feel that there is something in place and we must abide by it and follow it. With that thought comes a seemingly contradictory one, what about criminals that break from the system and do what they want? (maybe the Joker from Batman), are these people genetically mutated? This is an interesting debate because there is some detail relating to the fact that a lot of serial killers have extra chromosomes. Let me digress and begin whether or not it is something taught to us.
Imagine you are born and there is nothing but just the natural instinct to live (survival, if you will). You have a clean slate, a blank white board, or an empty glass. Next your mother/father teach you that you must eat a certain way, you must wear certain things, well now you are following someone who (carries the bigger stick) this is all you know and your government or political system is your authoritarian parents and your house is your nation-state. Many years later you grow up and you take with you into the world your knowledge of following your parent’s rule; know you follow the government’s rule (law). This point I believe is a little hard to critique because there not much information regarding how newborns operate and whether or not we have to teach them everything or they already know it. The only play off of the last argument is that if criminals don't have a DNA issue then is it how the parents raised them. Some would say, “yes” that is exactly right, a large group of criminals actually had terrible childhoods. Gangs gain members due to the fact that they want the brotherhood that they do not get from their families. So now let us divulge into the final question of not needing a system at all.
Maybe we don't need politics or government at all. Lets imagine a scene of anarchy. Women and children are hiding where they can, the man is scavenging the land for food, and they fight with other men who try to take their food. The world is trashed and decrepit, there are fires burning from the remnants of the dying past. Is this the picture I am just painting you or do you actually see a world that is happy where everyone could ban together and not need a system, they actually just do things out of the good of their hearts and never start problems because then you would need a system for punishing them. Would a group band together and start taking what they want from the weak, would a group or a leader of a group start a town and set order to a world without? Now the truly interesting question is, would we ourselves be our own government? Imagine a set of morals so strong that could not be broken by any man, would that not be a government. Is the pen mightier than the sword in this sense?
All the questions asked are questions that should be discussed at a level as low as middle school. I believe that it is too soon to tell if government is actually needed or not, but you never hear of a story that doesn't have order and a system in place to control the populace from tearing itself apart. As for the questions I proposed; why humans feel like they need politics, whether it is inherently in our DNA or maybe it is something we are taught, or maybe even something that we just don't need. I do not an answer I just have more questions when I try to think of an answer to the already proposed questions.
The Philosophy of Good and Evil
Matt Anderson
Philosophy of Good and Evil
Sec. 19 Group 2
The
idea of good and evil has been around for as long as man can remember, but how
did it come about? And why? It is the human tradition that good triumphs over
evil in almost every circumstance. But how did good and evil start? Some would
say that they are natural in the world. But one has to wonder, what is the
concept of good and evil, and how did it all come about?
To fully understand the idea of good
and evil in the world, one must know what good and evil are. Good is defined as
‘morally excellent, virtuous, and righteous’ by the dictionary. It is more
commonly known as all things innocent, someone or something that only ever does
the right thing (by moral standards). Someone that is good is a hero to those
around him, and whose actions are only to help and benefit people. The most
common figure associated with being good is God. The Lord Almighty is seen as a
purely benevolent being, who only wants the best for man. Even after Adam and
Eve disobeyed him and committed the first sin on Earth, he helped them and put
them in a position to survive and prosper. But that first act of sin also can
be where evil came from.
Evil is the complete opposite of
good. Anyone who does something bad, such as murder, theft, or lying, can be
considered evil. Evil beings all have the common intent of trying to harm or
destroy something or someone, either for their own benefit or just to watch
things fall apart. The dictionary definition is the exact opposite of good,
being morally wrong, wicked, and not virtuous.
Now when it comes to good and evil,
if you’re a Christian you could argue that evil began when Satan, in the form
of a snake, tempted Eve to bite into the fruit. Between that first act and
man’s free will, over time evil has developed into much more. Cain murdered
Abel, and there are countless other examples of evils in history starting from
that. Now a days, there are examples evil everywhere, from infamous events such
as Hitler’s Holocaust and the September 11 terrorist attack on the Twin Towers,
to less public instances of murder and theft that happen every couple of
seconds around the world. There are, however, many examples of good on Earth
too, whether it be the countless charities dedicated to helping those that are
diseased, starving, or living in overly harsh conditions, or down to small acts
of kindness such as giving some homeless person on the side of the street some
food or cash.
Despite all of that though, I still
believe that good and evil are just a concept fabricated by man to justify
their actions and belittle others. Good and evil are, when it comes down to it,
just a matter of perspective. Nearly everyone in our society can agree that
taking another person’s life is wrong and evil, but there are societies and
religions in other places that don’t. Some Muslims, for example, believe that
removing infidels (non-Muslims, and Jews in particular) from the Earth is the
will of Allah, their God, and that when they kill an infidel they are doing
right. Or even by our own beliefs, if someone is holding a loaded gun to your
head and is about to murder you and you get the opportunity to stop him but
only by taking his life, does taking that chance make you an evil person? On a
grander scale, what some situation were to arise and you were able to save
millions of lives simply by killing one person who plans to kill all of those
people. Would you be evil for killing that one person, even though you saved
millions as a result? Or you could flip the situation. What if you knew a
person who was completely brain dead and would never live a normal life and
they somehow managed to get a message to you saying that they wanted you to
pull the plug. Does it make you a good person that you are preserving that
life, despite the fact that they want it to end? Would you be evil if you did
what the person requested and did end their life? These are all hard questions
that could be argued forever, because everyone has a slightly different view on
the matter.
The whole concept of good and evil,
just like with the line between what is right and what is wrong, is just a
matter of perspective. What one person might find an act of good, someone else
may find it evil, such as with the case of the Twin Towers. And that goes both
ways. Everyone on Earth has different judgment, views, and perspectives, and
while people can come to a general consensus on what good and evil are, there
is always going to be someone else to refute it and think the opposite. Good
and evil are simply labels given to the actions and decisions of man, and even
though they have clear definitions, there will always be different views on
what they really are.
Sec. 19 Group 2 Final Review Questions
·
What
is the key to living well according to Lachs?
o
control
over yourself
·
Stephen
Law believes that suffering is a form of evil? T/F
·
Who
discussed the idea of good and evil in the world, in reference to the argument
of God's existence?
-Stephen Law
-Stephen Law
·
Which
philosopher discussed the idea of computers thinking for themselves?
-Searle
·
Judith
Thomson came up with thought experiments to test the Law of Double Effect. T/F
·
What
term did Arendt use to describe ordinary people doing bad things?
-Banality of Evil
Caleb Davenport section 13: Brains for Philosophy.
Caleb Davenport
Section 13 group 4
Final Report
Brains for Philosophy
Most people believe in a simple
philosophy of treating others fairly, not stealing, and not killing. We live by
these few moralities not only for the reason that two of them are laws, but
also because it is beneficial for everyone to follow them for a
well-functioning society. Is this our current way of
life, or is it something that has been programmed inside of us since the beginning
of civilization? If the world was in a zombie apocalypse where there was no
electricity, no easily accessible food, and no law, we could be sure that our
world would be completely different, but would our philosophical way of life
change?
First, treating others fairly will be
a very difficult thing to do in a zombie apocalypse considering it is already a
challenge in today’s society. A zombie apocalypse would put a great deal of
stress on those trying to survive, and the will to survive would haze one’s
mind and make people not think clearly. Humans handle stress differently. Some
people do nothing, some physically fight, and others are deceitful. Most people
are going to be wary when they come across another human because instead of it
being an everyday thing it is going to be a rarity. Also, the person(s) someone
comes across is probably going to need supplies or shelter to help them
survive. Basically it is survival of the fittest and not many people are going
to want to help anyone else unless it is beneficial for them. They want to live
more and take care of their own, and it is much harder to take care of someone
else outside of what a person has supplies for.
A shortage of supplies would also
cause stealing. It is normal to think of stealing as wrong in the way we live
now, but in a world with no jobs or running stores, we cannot really treat
stealing the same as we did before. Going into a store and raiding all of their
food during a zombie apocalypse cannot be considered stealing because the store
isn't in business anymore. This also stands when talking about stealing from
empty houses; there may be people living in them, but most likely the families
that used to live at the house are dead. These types of theft would no longer
be thought of as stealing but rather as a necessary act for survival. Although,
stealing from other groups of survivors will still probably be viewed by most
people as immoral, this does not mean that it will not happen. In fact, stealing from others will
become more common because most all of the supplies from the store will have
already been taken by other groups.
In our society it is generally
accepted that killing is wrong, but would killing be okay in a zombie apocalypse?
I cannot see how killing another human without a probable cause will ever really
be “okay”, but in a world that has been turned upside down where it is an
everyday struggle just to stay alive I believe there would be many more
justified and unjustified killings.
Some of the reasons for justified
slayings during a zombie apocalypse can be rooted to numerous things like
someone becoming infected or someone being a serious threat. There are also
circumstances that could be up for debate on what is considered justified and
unjustified such as killing because of competition for food, someone trying to
force themselves into a person’s group, or accidentally mistaking someone for a
zombie. Some examples of unjustified murders are killing off the weakest link,
murdering for supplies, and, just like the present, straight up murder.
Another conflict would be killing a
zombie. The dictionary states that a zombie is “the body of a dead person given
the semblance of life but mute and will-less, by a supernatural force, usually
for some evil purpose.” This definition dehumanizes zombies, but would it
really be that simple to kill a zombie? They were human so could it not still
have a trace of humanity left no matter how buried it is? I’m sure after a few
tried to bite your face off that killing would become easier, but would the
dreadful feeling of killing something that seems so human ever truly go away? People
would also have a major conflict if the zombie was their mother, father, sibling,
spouse, etc. Would killing one of them be justified if they were a zombie? If
the theoretical acceptance that zombies are only controlled by a small part of
their brain that makes them able to move and gives them the hunger to kill
holds true, then killing them would be perfectly acceptable. If there was a
slight chance of humanity, which some people would choose to hope for, that
would make the killings unjustified because there was a way to prevent their
deaths.
In conclusion, if the world was in a zombie
apocalypse then our philosophical ways of life would definitely change. People
would have to create and adapt to a new way of life because with so much
emotional wreckage and the constant fighting to survive, people will have a
hard time trying to save their humanity.
If you would like to know how to survive during a zombie apocalypse read this book: http://www.amazon.com/Zombie-Survival-Guide-Complete-Protection/dp/1400049628
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