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Index for this page...
All The Following Items Were Posted On February 1, 2009 Beauty: In everyday speech, when people use the noun "beauty" or the adjective "beautiful," they use it to mean something they think is fine or wonderful -- almost a synonym for the word "swell." They do not think of the sense that these words have in philosophical aesthetics. St. Thomas Aquinas' definition of beauty as that which pleases upon being seen tends to support subjectivism. For "being seen" read instead "being beheld," and then what Aquinas is saying is that which, when beheld, gives us pleasure, we call beautiful. Different persons get pleasure of this sort from different objects. They differ in their tastes. What one person finds enjoyable, another might behold with no pleasure at all. However, there is another aspect of beauty that most persons fail to consider. In addition to the enjoyable, there is the admirable. What makes one object more admirable than another is some excellence in the object itself. That which is more admirable may not also be more enjoyable. This brings us to the interesting question of whether human beings differ from one another in the matter of taste. Can we say that some persons have good taste or that some persons have better taste than others who have poor taste or no taste at all? Is it not true that the only way you can know whether a person has good taste or poor taste is by the fact that individuals who have the best taste are those who enjoy the most admirable objects? Is this not the only way you can judge a person's degree of taste? If you can rank objects in the degree to which they are admirable, then the individuals who find the more admirable also the more enjoyable will be persons of superior taste. If there are those who still doubt that there is an objective aspect of beauty as well as a subjective aspect, or who question the concurrence of the enjoyable and the admirable, let them be asked whether it is possible to spoil a work of art that many individuals find enjoyably beautiful. If they admit that the work of art can be spoiled -- that is, made less admirable -- then they are acknowledging that there are certain traits of the objects in question that can be altered or removed to make it less excellent, that is, less admirable. The traits in question are in the object, not in the senses of the beholder. That is what it means to say that admirable beauty is objectively present, but enjoyable beauty is in the eye of the beholder, who gets pleasure from beholding it. The three things that everyone should remember when they think about beauty are (1) the distinction between enjoyable and admirable beauty; (2) the scale that places individuals according to the degree to which they have good taste, enjoying most that which is most admirable; and (3) admirable works of art can be spoiled by removing from them those traits which, when present, make them objectively excellent and admirable. Source: Adler's Philosophical Dictionary: 125 Key Terms for the Philosopher's Lexicon. Have you a copy of this book in your personal library? If not, consider getting one. Read Max Weismann's review of this book by Clicking Here.
William James (1842-1910), American philosopher of Pragmatism James was both a philosopher and a psychologist. He studied in New York and in Europe and received a medical degree from Harvard in 1869. He began to teach anatomy and physiology at Harvard in 1873, and then began teaching philosophy in 1879. James helped found the American Society for Psychical Research and published numerous papers on the subject. In 1902, James delivered a series of Gifford lectures in Edinburgh, Scotland, on the general topic of The Varieties of Religious Experience, in which he surveyed the broad fields of religious attitudes from both the philosophical and the psychological standpoint. But the culmination of his thought, towards which he had been groping since youth, was his book on Pragmatism (1907) based on lectures delivered at Columbia University and built around the central idea that ideas have practical consequences and are to be tested by these consequences. In the resulting controversy his readers definitely split into two camps, that of ardent converts and that of critical opponents. His thoughts, clearly and beautifully expressed, will be long remembered. For example:
Read more about William James in The Radical Academy. See books by and about William James in the Academy Bookstore.
FOR THE RECORD 1. Bailout Figures Zoom Past "Insane," Take a Right Turn at "Monstrous," by James W. Harris We have reported that the federal government's bail-out figures had reached staggering proportions -- topping the two trillion dollar amount. That figure is almost inconceivable. So... how do we describe the more recent estimate by CNBC.com? The respected news source calculated on November 28 that the bailout total had reached... $7.36 trillion dollars. CNBC says that figure "is a combination of what's been committed (where it is defined) and what has actually been spent or lent (where a given program has started)." To put that in some kind of perspective, that is more than twice what was spent on World War II, adjusted for inflation. And nine times what the government has spent so far on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Or... half the U.S. annual gross national product. Or... enough to pay off half or more of the country's mortgages. Or... roughly $24,000 for every man, woman, and child in the U.S. Or... roughly $50,000 per taxpayer. "Not only is it an astronomical amount of money, it's a complicated cocktail of budgeted dollars, actual spending, guarantees, loans, swaps and other market mechanisms by the Federal Reserve, the Treasury and other offices of government..." notes CNBC. CNBC has a chart showing all the gory details of where the money is supposed to go, at the URL below. And of course, the bailout is, as some say about our Constitution, a "living document." It's still going on. Special interest groups are begging, or demanding, hundreds of billions more. (A similar story by Bloomberg News puts the government's promises at $7.7 trillion.) So tune in next time. These incomprehensibly large numbers above may be...incomprehensibly larger. Sources: CNBC.com; Liberator Online, "Brain-Boggling Bailout Boondoggle Numbers" James W. Harris is the editor of Liberator Online, a publication of Advocates for Self-Government. His articles have appeared in numerous magazines and newspapers, and he has been a Finalist for the Mencken Award, given by the Free Press Association for "Outstanding Journalism in Support of Liberty." 2. The Brain, Your Honor, Will Take The Witness Stand Every courtroom is a laboratory of human nature, where jurists clinically question our memory, behavior, sanity and sense of responsibility. Exploring the anatomy of justice, though, researchers have started taking testimony from the brain itself to better understand the origins of a fair verdict. No one really knows how millions of microscopic brain cells can weigh objective legal notions of right and wrong. But last month, researchers at Vanderbilt University for the first time identified distinctive strands of neural tissue active when, like a judge or juror, we think about crime and punishment. In an experiment at the frontier of law and philosophy, the researchers used a brain scanner to examine the impartial judgments at the heart of our legal system, recording how brain cells behave when assessing criminal responsibility and meting out sentences. "We take decision-making for granted, like breathing," says Vanderbilt law professor Owen Jones, who conducted the experiment with Vanderbilt neuroscientists Rene Marois and Joshua Buckholtz. "If you want a world in which judicial and jury decisions are fair, unbiased, sensible and reasonable, then we ought to understand a little bit about how it actually happens." Source: Wall Street Journal Charles Darwin was just 28 years old when, in 1837, he scribbled in a notebook "one species does change into another"--one of the first hints of his great theory. He'd recently returned to England after his five-year journey as a naturalist aboard the HMS Beagle. In South America, Oceania and most memorably the Galápagos Islands, he had seen signs that plant and animal species were not fixed and permanent, as had long been held true. ... For another 20 years he would amass data--20 years!--before having his idea presented publicly to a small audience of scientists and then, a year later, to a wide, astonished popular readership in his majestic On the Origin of Species, first published in 1859. ... But Darwin recognized that his work was just the beginning. "In the distant future I see open fields for far more important researches," he wrote in Origin. ... In the 150 years since Darwin published Origin, those "important researches" have produced results he could never have anticipated. Three fields in particular--geology, genetics and paleoanthropology--illustrate both the gaps in Darwin's own knowledge and the power of his ideas to make sense of what came after him. Source: Smithsonian Magazine 4. Single Cell 'Can Store Memories' Just one brain cell is capable of holding fleeting memories vital for our everyday life, according to US scientists. A study of mouse brain cells revealed how they could keep information stored for as long as a minute. A UK specialist said that understanding these short-term memories might help unlock the secrets of Alzheimer's Disease. The finding was reported in the journal Nature Neuroscience. The difference between the brain's long-term and short-term memory has been likened to the RAM of a computer and the hard-drive. To perform normal functions, we need the ability to store, quickly and reliably, large amounts of data, but only a small amount of this needs to be retained in the longer term. Source: BBC News Online 5. Quote For The Month: "Porn Industry Bailout" "Another major American industry is asking for assistance as the global financial crisis continues: Hustler publisher Larry Flynt and Girls Gone Wild CEO Joe Francis said Wednesday they will request that Congress allocate $5 billion for a bailout of the adult entertainment industry." -- Source: CNN news
COUNSELING CORNER: A Gun History Lesson . . . If I could wave a magic wand and all lethal weapons throughout the world would be immediately destroyed -- never to return -- I would do it without hesitation. However, that is impossible. While I do not want my next-door neighbor to have a nuclear bomb hidden away in his basement, I do not want him (with a few obvious exceptions) to be denied the possession of a gun for self-defense or other reasonable use. There is, I believe, truth in the statement "If guns are outlawed, only criminals will have guns." The following information was sent to me via e-mail. While many of the facts below were already known to me, some were not and I have not had time to verify each and every one. But I think the following information, taken as a whole, makes an important point and I pass it on to you for consideration. -- Dr. Dolhenty. In 1929, the Soviet Union established gun control. From 1929 to 1953, about 20 million dissidents, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated. In 1911, Turkey established gun control. From 1915 to 1917, 1.5 million Armenians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated. Germany established gun control in 1938. From 1939 to 1945, a total of 13 million Jews and others who were unable to defend themselves were rounded up and exterminated. China established gun control in 1935. From 1948 to 1952, 20 million political dissidents, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated. Guatemala established gun control in 1964. From 1964 to 1981, 100,000 Mayan Indians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated. Uganda established gun control in 1970. From 1971 to 1979, 300,000 Christians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated. Cambodia established gun control in 1956. From 1975 to 1977, one million 'educated' people, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated. Defenseless people rounded up and exterminated in the 20th Century because of gun control: 56 million. It has now been 12 months since gun owners in Australia were forced by new law to surrender 640,381 personal firearms to be destroyed by their own government, a program costing Australia taxpayers more than $500 million dollars. The first year results are now in:
Note that while the law-abiding citizens turned them in, the criminals did not, and criminals still possess their guns! It will never happen here? Probably the Aussies said that too! While figures over the previous 25 years showed a steady decrease in armed robbery with firearms in Australia, this has changed drastically upward in the past 12 months, since criminals now are guaranteed that their prey is unarmed. There has also been a dramatic increase in break-ins and assaults of the elderly. Australian politicians are at a loss to explain how public safety has decreased, after such monumental effort and expense was expended in successfully ridding Australian society of guns. The Australian experience and the other historical facts above prove it. You won't see this data on the U.S. evening news, or hear politicians disseminating this information. Guns in the hands of honest citizens save lives and property and, yes, gun-control laws adversely affect only the law-abiding citizens. During W.W. II the Japanese decided not to invade America because they knew most Americans were armed! Note: Admiral Yamamoto who crafted the attack on Pearl Harbor had attended Harvard University from 1919 to 1921 and was Naval Attaché to the U. S. from 1925 to 1928. Most of our Navy was destroyed at Pearl Harbor and our Army had been deprived of funding and was ill prepared to defend the country. It was reported that when asked why Japan did not follow up the Pearl Harbor attack with an invasion of the U. S. mainland, Admiral Yamamoto's reply was that he had lived in the U. S. and knew that almost all households had guns. If you value your freedom, consider using these facts when discussing gun control with your acquaintances.
A LITTLE OF THIS & A LITTLE OF THAT A Little Wisdom: Never trust the advice of a man in difficulties. -- Aesop (620-560 BC), Greek storyteller. A Little Advice: Stand up for what is right, even if you are standing alone. A Little Quip: There is no pleasure in having nothing to do; the fun is in having lots to do and not doing it. A Little Proverb: Friends may come and go, but enemies accumulate. A Little Question: Do Lipton employees take coffee breaks? A Little Reflection: Wise men learn by other men's mistakes, fools by their own. A Little Admission: Instead of getting married again, I'm going to find a woman I don't like and just give her a house. A Little Observation: The trouble with life is that you're half-way through it before you realize it's a do-it-yourself thing. A Little Warning: Accomplishing the impossible means only that the boss will add it to your regular duties. A Little Definition: RAISIN -- Grape with a sunburn. A Little Quote: "He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts... for support rather than illumination." -- Andrew Lang (1844-1912). A Little Put-Down: Tell a man that there are 400 billion stars and he'll believe you. Tell him a bench has wet paint and he has to touch it.
Some interesting & provocative articles on other websites: The Power of the Word, by Peter Kemp: Why did philosophers come together in a world congress for a whole week? What could we offer the world by our papers, symposia, lectures and discussions? Was all that nothing but sheer words, words and words? How can these words be important for the world today? Other researchers and scholars have special research fields, but we philosophers have no special discipline. We can have discussions with researchers from all fields, and not only with researchers but also with technicians, with artists, with moralists and so forth. We can enter their fields, but our activities do not belong to any of them. We are everywhere and nowhere. The Future of Man--How Will Evolution Change Humans?: When you ask for opinions about what future humans might look like, you typically get one of two answers. Some people trot out the old science-fiction vision of a big-brained human with a high forehead and higher intellect. Others say humans are no longer evolving physically--that technology has put an end to the brutal logic of natural selection and that evolution is now purely cultural. The big-brain vision has no real scientific basis. Learn Philosophy -- The classic discipline can help with contemporary dilemmas and modern careers, by Diane Cole: The questions are ripped from the daily head-lines: Should illegal immigrants be barred from enrolling in public universities? Should courts declare surreptitiously gathered DNA off limits as legal evidence? No, it's not another spinoff of Law & Order. It's Ethics Bowl, an increasingly popular intercollegiate tourna-ment where competing teams reason their way through thorny case histories. The winners are judged not on the sound and fury of their responses but on the thoroughness of their consideration and understanding of differing points of view. Rethinking science and religion, by Howard Smith: Politicians, and everyday Americans, too, are thinking about new approaches to national policy. One that is ripe for reassessment is the appropriate role of religion in matters of science. Religion provides us, as individuals, with its ethical and human perspectives on civic decisions, including judgments on issues prompted by scientific discoveries. But during the Bush years, religion was too narrowly defined by a small subset of opinions, and was used to constrain federal science programs rather than strengthen them.
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