What were they thinking: Arcadia

The chaos theory states that in the complete disorder of the world there is order as described through fractals within Arcadia. The name chaos though implies complete catastrophe and strife rarely do I personally think of chaos as a good thing, which brings me to my point. Why name it that to me it compares to renaming the death penalty "killing people," or Chinese capitalistic politics "baby labor." This is a distinct language issue that they should really clear up

Automatons

So, in Arcadia it is said by Chloe that "Sex is the attraction newton left out."
Imagine a very very complicated machine. Complicated to the point it seems as magic to us. Could that robot ever actually feel sexual attraction? of would the attractions it felt be governed by it's programming? if the latter, wouldn't it still (more or less) follow Newton?

the end

How can you tell it's the end of the school year?

Okay, pretend that you're an observer rather a participant of high school. If you ignored the summer component, and you knew that the school year cycled, how could you track the beginning and end of each school year? How do you know? What is the chain of events? How would your conclusions be limited by the fact that you're an observer, not a participant?

Huh.

"All truth is profound."



True (no pun intended) or false?

TOK Blog Survey

Help Me Out...

Soon, I'll be giving a survey to all of the TOK students to help me evaluate the blog this year. Overall, I've been happy with what I've seen but considering the blog is still in its infancy, I'm looking to get feedback as to what has worked and what hasn't so that I can figure out what I want the survey to look like.

My goal is for it to be a forum for discussion between classes as well as schools in the future. I love the idea but it isn't there yet. It's been great at times, inconsistent others. It's provided a place to discuss but hasn't generated the discussion that it could. So what I would like from you, at least those of you that still surf occasionally...

What has worked? What hasn't?
How could it be improved?
How could we build a stronger online community?
How could it be better utilized?
Any other suggestions?

Thank you in advance.

NYC Condom Campaign

So, we had a presentation in our class on Thursday for the IA about the NYC condom campain. After seeing the presentation or looking into the topic, I was wondering what everyone thought about this campain and then why do you think this?

Time-Why and How?

So, I have recently been pondering the element of time. How it impacts our lives and why man felt the need to develop this concept. But is that a truth for man-does time actually exist or is this something which is subject to change for any of us? What has society done to make it either acceptable or not to feel the need for this idea of time itself?

If you would like a little distraction, check out this link:
http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/

Wikipedia.com - Ethics

Skim the BBC article about Wikipedia.com.

From the information, Ryan Jordan seems to have committed an unethical action by creating a false identity. His made up PhD allowed him to edit articles more freely and gave him the authority to “arbitrate disputes between authors.” But what if his motive was to educate? BBC mentions he researched what he posted (I.E. Catholicism for Dummies – though this was actually meant to undermine his authority). Would this assumed ‘educational’ motive justify his actions?

OR

Can forging an identity ever be justified? Recall the ethics presentation we had a while back, where a police officer impersonated an attorney in order to capture a murderer.

Emotion/Ethics in Awakenings

Since we all watched the movie Awakenings in our TOK class, I have a question regarding ethics and emotion in the movie. So, to what extent does Dr. Sayer use emotion in justifying what he believed was an ethical decision to give Leonard an overdosage of the revival medication? Also, why would one think that he was so deeply committed to the one patient, Leonard?

Science and Philosophy

In modern physics, much of the research being done is on extreme conditions. The result is more and more strange and hard to believe theories. One of the hardest to understand is the theory of Quantum Mechanics. What is the role of the scientist to look into the implications of science? My question is does a scientific theory need a philosophy explaining the science, or should science be seperate from philosophy. Mainly the idea of the quantum wave function, since the wave function has to be collapsed but currently there is no theory of why quantum wave functions are collapsed.

Ethics in Awakenings

Hey all! So in a last ditch effort to post on ethics, I decided to talk about ethics in the movie Awakenings, which we're currently watching in class. I thought the conversation between Dr. Sayer and the previous neuropsychologist who had worked with these patients was really interesting, especially when the first psychologist said that they cannot be thinking, because that would destroy his sense of morality *ie, he wouldn't be able to live with that knowledge, which then informed his ethics in how he treated those patients; he made it ethically permissable to avoid treating them at all. Another ethical dilemma raised is the dosage of l-dopa that he gave to the patient; this far exceeded what his supervising doctor allowed, and what he legally had permission from the mother to give, but because he morally felt compelled, thinking it would help, he administered it anways. It will be interesting to see how this plays out through the film, and what further ethical issues are raised, along with seeing how others will treat him *ie- will he be punished?* when he acts on morality, rather than ethics.

Fermat's Last Problem

Hey, this is actually Michael. I can’t post on my own account, so I am posting on Kyle's.
I don’t know how many classes other than Malone’s watched the movie about the proving of Fermat’s Last Problem, but I wanted to post on it anyways. I just thought it was interesting that the people in the movie were just so much more immersed and knowledgeable in mathematics, that it went over all of our heads, and the we thought it was funny the way they talked about and interacted with math. We had no idea what they were talking about for most of the time, and the mathematicians talked about the math as simple and elegant, when the class had no idea what was going on. So this leads me to my question: How does each area of knowledge create its own culture?

Ethikos

Should the data gathered from the Nazi Death Camp Experiments be allowed to be used?

I say yes.
1. Data has no ethics in and of itself. Apples are red has no moral implications, no matter how many apples you threw at people to convice them that they are red. The data gathered from the experiments, although from undeniably evil means, are amoral and cannot be held to any moral standards as it is just a peice of information.
2. Although some of the data may be skewed, there is no way we can get other data to prove that it is skewed. This is the basis of all scientific theories. They can never be true, they can only be disproven. As soon as the data from the experiments is disproven then it can be discounted. Currently it is the best data we have, so we need to deal with it.
3. It does not set a precedent. All that we say by using the data is that we need data. There is no condoning of the Nazis in using their data anymore than touring their death camps is equivalent to reopening them.
4. The data has already saved lives.

Argue away!

South African Plays

In theatre class lately, we have been talking about African theatre, and one of our units was on South Africa. I found it interesting that after apartheid was ended, there was a dryspell of theatric material. It seems as though every playwright in South Africa had been writing out against apartheid, and now that it was over, they had a lack of material to write with. I guess my question is this: How much can an piece of art: be it a painting, a book, or a play, affect a culture's ideas and understandings?

Censorship

So in the "Censorship and its Progeny" packet we just read it talked about a controversial art show in Anchorage Alaska. It focused on Dread Scott's piece "What is the Proper Way to Display a U.S. Flag?". In this piece there is a U.S. flag lying on the floor and a comment book on the shelf above it. But to leave a comment as to What is the proper way to display a U.S. flag? a person must step on the flag. My question to you is would you walk on the flag, and what comment would you write in the comment book? I know what I would write.
I would say: To me the flag symbolizes the United States (that part is obvious). But to me it is the 50 stars in the corner of blue that truly represent the concept. By having the stars close like that it represents the closeness of the United States. However, because of this I have preminitions about having the flag high on a mast. Although I understand that this is displaying the symbol of America proudly for everyone to see, to me it makes the united states seem unattainable. Like it is something we strive for but never quite reach. As if it is in our dreams, but can never quite come true. One example for this view is the division between red and blue states. It is always a contest to see how many red and blue. Thus we are never fully united. By putting the flag on the ground it brings the dream of being fully united much closer to me, and everyone. For that reason as I write this comment I am standing right on the stars so that I can feel connected to everyone in every state through the stars.
So although this is a really long entry I would love to hear what everyone else would do and say.

Is there a fundamental difference between the male and female brain?

Can we claim that, in general, men are inherently better at math and science, or is the disparity between numbers of men and women in scientific fields due only to cultural bias?
If it's only because of cultural bias, then why did that bias develop in the first place?

______________________________________________

I think this issue is interesting, and I can think of several good arguments for both sides. However, I've noticed that those arguments are based mostly on emotion-- the main premise behind most of the points is that the arguer wants their point of persuasion to be true. For example, I would really like to think that men and women are intellectually equal in all areas. I based my decision on what I wanted to be true, and only found supporting evidence afterwards. When responding, try to see if you're doing the same thing.

A story with a moral

There were once two islands separated by a body of water. There was a ferry boat that traveled between the two islands once a week. On one island lived "A", on the other island lived "B". One week "A" and "B" met on the ferry boat and instantly fell in love. Neither of them had any other means of transportation, so they met eachother eery week on the ferry boat.
Until one day "B" said, "this long distance relationship is just too hard. I can't handle it, it's over." Well, "A" was devasted, got off the boad, sat on the dock and cried.
Along came "C" who asked what was wrong. "A" retold the story and "C" said ,"No problem! I have a canoe; I'll take you across to the other island. But there is one condition. You have to spend the evening with me." "A" thought about it and agreed.
The next day "A" and "C" set off for the other island. But news travels faster than "C's" canoe, and "B" had heard about "A's" decision before they arricev. "B" was waiting on teh shoe when the canoe docked. "B" said, "'A', you have been unfaithful. Leave!" Again "A" was devasted, sat on the shore, and cried.
Along came "D" who asked what was wrong. "A" retold the entire story, "D" became very angry, stormed off, and beat up "B".

Rank the four characters fromt the best to the worst where 1 is the best and 4 is the worst
We're mostly talking Moral/Ethical grounds here - How did you make your choice?

"We'll Pay You Not to Have Kids"

The following is a brief summary of an article found in the CNN archives (June 28, 1999), concerning ethics. It says: A California-based private group called Children Requiring A Caring Community has reportedly been succeeding in its goal of preventing drug-addicted women from having unwanted children. The program offers cash payments of $200 to men or women who undergo long-term birth control (like Norplant, or an IUD) or permanent sterilization (such as tubal ligation or vasectomy). And now the organization has begun exporting its program to other states. This approach pits the goals of protecting children from harm against reproductive liberty, and we need to ask how far we should go in favor of each.

In my opinion if a woman does not want a child, she does not have to procreate. And if a woman wants contraception she may be able to recieve free pills from clinics such as Planned Parenthood, etc. The problem in my opinion, is that recovering addicts are already concerned about recieving money and using it for drugs...paying a recovering addict money is not a good idea, and it is not necessary. The article has its opinions but what are yours? Is this practice ethical?

Murder and Morals: the Mystery

This is essentially a post to create discussion about the topic in my previous post (the long one), since I doubt many people are going to read it. You can try to prove the following statement untrue, and I'll respond to defend it as true. It should be interesting...

Killing other humans is not wrong, morally or ethically - it just happens to be a mostly convenient guideline.

(Oh, and please don't take this to mean that I would go out and kill people for fun. I wouldn't. Really. It's just to generate discussion on an idea I find intriguing)

Forgot one

I forgot a very important issue that has yet to be brought up as well.

Is the War in Iraq ethical?

See previous post for my whole long spiel about the sanctity of BLOG. Please respect all guidelines and opinions here as well, as people may not share your own.

I say nay. The War in Iraq is not ethical. This is because the true reasons that we are there have been hidden under red tape, and have, even currently, been hidden from the public. The government's job is for the people, and when the people are not being told what the government is doing then there is a breach of etiquette. This breach or etiquette is what makes this unethical. I agree with what I see as the reasons for us going to Iraq are, but that is irrelevant. I oppose it all the same because it isn't ethical for the Govt to hide facts from the public, any more than it is ethical to impersonate a lawyer to capture a psychopath. What we need to understand is that there is a difference between morals and ethics. Morally both are acceptable (to me at least), but ethically they break the code of honor (the Constitution and Laws) that this country is based on, and indeed the citizens gain power from. Therefore: The War in Iraq is not ethical.

The Big Guns

We have started to discuss ethics, in case you didn't notice for whatever reason, and so I decided to bring out the two biggest ethics arguments i could think of!
Abortion -- this is the (controversial) removal of fetuses. This often (at least 90% of the time) results in the death of the fetus. My question is: Is abortion ethical.

The Death Penalty -- This is the (controversial) removal of criminals. This often (at least 90% of the time) results in the death of the criminal. My question is: Is the death penalty ethical.

Just as a reminder I feel that I should remind everyone that this will get people very, very tense and angry, so please be careful with words. No ad hominim. This is supposed to be a discussion board, not a flame board, and please respect that. I am saying this again because I am very selfish and don't want to get hurt because I brought this up.
Thank you.

Wisdom

What is "wisdom" as far as TOK is concerned. We know have the ability to determine what knowledge, and how we reach the conclusion that we actually have some so called "knowledge." But does wisdom come into play ever? No.
So my questions are:
1.) What is Wisdom, a definiton.
2.) How do you get any wisdom? 7-11? Walmart (unlikely)?
3.) What is the cost of wisdom? (there may not be any)
4.) Do you have wisdom?
5.) Can wisdom every be something that you have a PJTB about? (Can you be sure you have wisidom)

So, for once I will actually answer my own questions, in an organized manner even.
1.) Wisdom is the ability to use knowledge. Very broad, but as far as anyone ever seems to be concerned, this seems to be the one real requirement to have wisdom, to have knowledge and understand how to act on it. Wisdom includes, by my definition: Knowing when to ask someone out, going into battle (physically, or even in a game), and even knowing what to order for lunch.

2.) Wisdom is no more aquired from age than knowledge from class. As Abigail Van Buren put it, "Wisdom doesn't automatically come with old age. Nothing does - except wrinkles. It's true, some wines improve with age. But only if the grapes were good in the first place." (Thank you quotationspage.com) Wisdom comes from experience, which is dependant on how willing you are to experience. A man who is 80 and lives in a cave is far less wise than a 20 year old who has traveled the world. As van Buren put it, if the grapes are good, it will be a good vintage. You need an inherant want for wisdom in order to be able to aquire it, and a hermit doesn't have that.
PS I apologize to all of the hermits I am putting out of business with this blog post, but they shouldn't be able to read it if they are really hermits.

3.) The cost of wisdom is that of living, perhaps a bit higher. In order to gain wisdom you have to put yourself in a certain amount of controlled danger, so there is always the possibilty that you may suffer higher because you fail to forsee some accident that happens, no matter how small the probability. However, in all likelyhood, there is no more cost of wisdom then that of life. And despite the raise in the cost of living we can all see how popular it remains. (That was a joke btw)

4.) I have some wisdom, but there is always someone who has experienced more, and so I am definately not the wisest, but merely one of those common wise people; like peers, and parents all are.

5.) You never can truly know that you, yourself, have wisdom. Other people may recognize it in you, and you may understand that you have some shred of wisdom, but it can never be actually properly justified to yourself. "If I really had been wise, then I wouldn't have..." But that is just semantics really. However, to other people it can be properly justified, "He's so wise, he did..." The wisest (and perhaps most foolish) would say "Of course I am wise, I always did the right thing."

If you find any falacies in my arguement, notify me, and I will try to rectify them, also please poke at my ideas, and create your own. Yours is as good as mine.

Mysteries of Choco Canyon

While watching the movie, and seeing the logical steps the archeologists took to make their conclusions, a thought came to me. Why is it that we assume that the most logical answer is the correct one? Simply because it makes sense to our minds does not guarantee that it is truly what happened. Yet, so often with theories it seems we try to justify the current theory when new information pops up by either adding to it or creating exceptions to the rule. We seem to refuse to question accepted ideas until it becomes conclusive that the accepted ideas cannot coexist with the new findings. Any thoughts on this, or examples of this in other aspects of society?

Jabberwacky

This is an interesting website where you can have a conversation with a computer.
What do you think?

The Duck Theory of Logic

What do you guys think of this idea of logic?
For those of you who are inable to read Wikipedia here is the basic duck test: If a bird looks like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, then you can infer that it is indeed a duck, even if it is not wearing a label that explicitly states its identity.

1. What if it isn't a duck?
2. How does this fit in with TOK?
3. Did Kyle steal the car?

On a lighter but much stranger note....

And here's a shorter post for those who don't really want to read the previous one. I'm pretty sure this man is insane, but it's interesting looking at the language he uses and how he tries to debunk the use of "word" and "singularity" by using pretty obscure and hard to follow terminology. It's interesting, but also more than a little frightening. I'm not sure how to connect this to TOK besides through his language usage, but discuss away.
Here's the site: www.timecube.com

Ethics?

This could be an incredibly controversial post, and if you're incredibly touchy about things such as ethics and morals then please don't take offense. And it's a long one, and if you don't want to read it all (it is interesting, though) please don't post a response. It's a big and messy topic.

"Ethics" don't exist.

Wait....what? The ideas and values that we base our lives around are pointless, meaningless, and paradoxical? Yup.

I'll begin with the simplest argument against this: It is wrong to kill another person. It is a basic fundamental belief in every major religion. It is hammered into our minds from the time we are born. Killing people is bad.
But then comes that little loophole that exists within every possible moral: ...except when...
Examples: war, self-defense, religious right, defending your "property", police action, etc., etc.
But wait...just because it's not wrong for some people doesn't make it any less wrong for me. Killing people is still wrong.
But it's also right. This is the contradiction - this is why, really, none of our beliefs mean anything. Something that is wrong can't also be right and vice-versa. Killing terrorists is a good thing for us to be doing right now - it is the right thing to do. But look at it from the point-of-view of the people who agree with the terrorists and you see family members and innocent people who believe in a cause that is not accepted being slaughtered by a nation with more power and wealth then their insurgency could ever dream of having.
People will say that this relativistic nature of each and every moral "law" doesn't mean that the morals are pointless. Just because someone thinks what we're doing is wrong doesn't make it wrong. But yes, yes it does. Just think about it: that notion itself, "killing people is wrong", is a universal notion. We automatically apply it to the rest of the world, every other human being, and make judgment calls based on that application. But when that notion fails, when that ideal doesn't serve our purposes, we toss it aside. It stops affecting us, we stop adhering to it. It loses its meaning.
For example, if someone with a gun pointed at your head backs you into a corner, and your hand finds a pistol on the counter or ground behind you, what would you do? Fight or flight. The cornerstone of our psyche. If there is no other option, then our morals disintegrate in front of the prolonging of our little lives. I know that if I were in this position I would take my chances and shoot the "someone" first. If I ran, I would die, so I choose to forsake my morals for an instant and kill this person standing in front of me. Doing so is neither right nor wrong to me at the time, because "(s)he started it", but (s)he is now just as dead as I would've been. One life gone, one still living. The fact that it was in self-defense doesn't fully apply. The moral "law" that had been followed throughout my entire life is now shown to be devoid of right or wrong sides, and as such, doesn't exist. That moral loses the pretense of meaning when faced with the truth of the action.

Now, the security provided us by our nice little things called "societies" or "governments" and by the "social contract" wouldn't be very effective if people were to go around killing each other, would it? Not really, no. In fact, anarchy would become the most popular government if people started acting out the ideas explored in the above section, and that wouldn't exactly be good for politicians. Or economists, or used car salesmen, or the IRS. If people didn't live by a code of some sort that delineates between "right" and "wrong", then the world would devolve into chaos. Yup. It would mean a resurrection of the notion of "survival of the fittest" that we as a species have slipped away from just like we have become immune to practically everything else this lovely but frustrated planet of ours has thrown at us. The people who can survive have the right to survive and will survive, until they let down their guard and someone removes them. They lost their right and gave it to someone else. It would be brutal, messy, and not much fun. But, I think we have to acknowledge the fact that our existence as it is now is based entirely off of lies: lies the government tells us, lies we tell ourselves, and lies we tell other people. If even a little of the truth were to seep in, the truth of life would be revealed through anarchy. Anyway, that's a tangent you can talk about if you want. Back to my earlier statement.

So, killing people as a moral doesn't really mean anything since it is relativistic. But what about the others? Is every moral negated because they're relative? Yup. Exactly. I'm going to stress this again: the argument "this moral is right for me and therefore, to me, it is right, signifying its existence." doesn't hold up. The whole point of having a moral is it's universal nature - the fact that it applies to everyone else in the world in your mind, not just you. If someone else believes your ideal to be wrong, then they throw a wrench into the whole thing. A moral cannot be right AND wrong and still be a moral, still be a guiding force in our lives. If it is both, then it is not universal, and therefore not a moral. Look at another example - stealing. If I walked up behind someone and stole their wallet, that wouldn't be wrong - I took advantage of said person's lack of attention in that particular moment for my own gain. Survival of the fittest. But it wouldn't be right, either: because I stole their wallet, I would have deprived them of money, identification, and practically everything that holds a life in this civilization together. The society we live in frowns upon that sort of thing. People living within a certain socity have to be productive to further that society's goals or aims. These two opinions clash and that is where the "meaning" of the moral disintegrates.
However, before I continue on that topic, another question has to be answered if it isn't clear enough already: "Why do we have morals, if they are negated because of their relativity?". The answer is rather simple - because the society we live in demands that we have them. As discussed earlier, societies would break down without a moral code, and no one would be happy about that who happened to have power in the society. So, they created a set of guidelines so that the workers wouldn't go about killing each other over silverware sets: our modern "Ethics". These are not a part of our psyche, as some would have you believe - if you can kill someone and you have the right to kill someone and you would stand to personally gain from killing this someone, you would. We are not inherently afraid of transgressing our morals, we just don't because we believe we shouldn't. Nothing directly relating to the action the moral deals with. The "moral" means nothing to us except that someone somewhere says it's bad. There is no more essence to a moral than that. And does "someone somewhere says it's bad" sound like a good enough reason to not do something? Not really. So then why do we continue to pretend, and go about our daily lives living with these restrictions (that's all they really are)? Because if we didn't, there would be chaos. And although chaos is interesting and alluring, it usually doesn't foster a long life. Look at teens today, for an example.

I am not saying that morals are bad. I am merely saying that they are lies. They are lies that make our lives a little bit more plush and extravagant, but they are lies nonetheless. I am also not saying that we should dismiss them all together. I'm saying that we should acknowledge that our existence as we know revolves around lying to ourselves constantly.

Whew....I think I'm done, but I probably didn't say everything. Anyway, thanks for reading the whole thing, but I do have one little request: don't post a simplistic, short, and false response to my statement here such as "Since this is right for me, it is right, and that signifies that moral's existence.". I think I already covered that. More than once. It's complicated material, so don't take it lightly.

How do we measure pain or suffering?

How do we measure pain or suffering?

This is not a question of emotion like "happiness" or "sadness" but rather how one weighs the impact of positive and negative experiences.
For example, (you don't have to use this particular one) lets say that a malnourished refugee has been isolated from his 3rd-World society and is on his own. How would he measure future experiences in terms of suffering and pleasure? Do you believe it to be mostly determined by:

1) A personal and relative experience: any event that occurs to an individual is measured in comparison to their most positive and negative frames of reference. In other words, a spectrum of their best and worst previous experiences determines how they scale or judge future ones. With the given example of the refugee, he would judge another day of starvation to be commonplace and would not feel any negative reactions because of prior personal experience.

2) Societally relative: The "feeling" of an experience is judged by how it compares to what society deems as the consensual standard. As with the example above, if a refugee starves one more day, he will not see it as negative if his society did not. His standards for well being are mostly dependent on prior societal norms, even when isolated.

3) Create your own.

In reality and most "normal" situations, both 1 and 2 would applicable to some degree. One might in fact influence the other.

Consider:
-Are times where one can take precedence over the other?
-If suffering is relative, personally and/or societally, can you compare levels of feeling between different people? For example, is a middle class depressed teenager's level of suffering comparable to someone who has experienced starvation and physical pain?

Jesus Camp

This is based upon the documentary, not my own personal opinions.
I am sorry to those of you who will have trouble viewing this clip.
Any way. I just thought I'd bring this back up because Evan had brought it up a long while ago, and nearly noone had any idea what he was saying.
So basically what are your reactions to this?
Especially to the kid saying, "We're being trained to be God's army."

IM in school

I know we've talked about this but I found this article and thought it was interesting. It's about how IM speak is now infiltrating student work and even standardized tests. Another example of the evolution of language...

Is this becoming a problem with any of you?

Happy Holidays.

"stay the course" and snow

Ok so first I just want you to know that I LOVE SNOW!!!!!!!!!!!!! Half day snowday today= amazing, full day snowday tomorrow= even more amazing, I'm going sleding, and making a snowman, and everything! but this was not really the point of my post, well it was half the point, just so I could share my love. but seriously, ok this article talks about how Bush and his administration being forced to change the language they are using about the iraq war. Tell me what you think, about both subjects!

The Truman Show

How do you know that you're not the main character in your own "Truman Show"? If you haven't seen the movie, here's a summary:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120382/plotsummary

Knowledge and Wisdom

In Malone's class, we've been really trying to delve into the knowledge issues of Lanuage. I think that a huge part of Language is all of the different connotations that are attached with each word. In past week, I've been rereading The Giver, and a passage that really stood out to me was when the characters were talking about the "acquisition of wisdom." Meanwhile, in TOKland, Mr. Malone has been asking us to look at Language as an "acquisition of knowledge". Then I was thikning about why are these two words, knowledge and wisdom, have such different connotations? What do you think of when you hear or read the word knowledge, and likewise with wisdom? While these two words share a close meaning, what are the differing perceptions that you have for these two words? What can we learn about Language from these different connotations?

Piss Christ

Ok, so the title is already controversial. Anyway, last year in my art class, Mrs. Lynam showed me this work called Piss Christ. Basically what it was was this guy, Andres Serrano, put a little crusifix in a jar, and filled it with his own urine... and some of his own blood. Then he took pictures and published it as art. Now I'm sure it had some artistic merit... mostly it was just controversial. But I have some questions for y'all. What is the difference between art and... well, self torture? Where do we draw the line with art? What can fly and what can't?
The main question I want to ask is... what counts as art?

Sense Perception in Literature

Hello.
How's everyone doing?
Good.
So a thing that I have wanted to talk about for quite some time is the concept of sense perception in Literature. I know that this was a subject discussed a very long time ago, but I would like to explore the concept of "Sense Perception" by analyzing how it is talked about in reference to Literature.

Here’s my take on the concept of Sensory Perception in Literature. Good literature (especially poetry, but prose as well) has the ability to make you feel whatever it is trying to portray to you. Your inner eye (as well as inner nose and inner fingers and inner everything else) becomes stimulated by words on a page and the experience of reading becomes much more than just staring at glyphs on a sheet of paper (or computer screen).

The last statement can be disputed on this thread. Indeed, additions (or subtractions) to that statement are welcomed.
However, if we accept that SP in literature includes appeal to the inner senses then what exactly is Sense Perception? If we accept that sense perception is also the concept of the inner self, then what is the difference between sense perception and plain old perception?

Consider the poem below.

Prelude
I

The winter's evening settles down
With smells of steaks in passageways.
Six o'clock.
The burnt-out ends of smoky days.
And now a gusty shower wraps
The grimy scraps
Of withered leaves across your feet
And newpapers from vacant lots;
The showers beat
On empty blinds and chimney-pots,
And at the corner of the street
A lonely cab-horse steams and stamps.
And then the lighting of the lamps.
-T.S. Elliot
Isn’t it pretty? I think so…

Individual Thought??

So it's my week to track the blog and that means I get to come up with a creative idea to stimulate thought and discussion. My friend Jenny and I were talking a couple of weeks back and she brought up the idea that no one could ever have any original thoughts because someone, at some point in time, at some location in the world has already had that thought or something that could resemble it. At first I disagreed, but her argument became more and more convincing so I want to know what you think. Can a person truly have original thought, something that no one else has thought before? Can those thoughts become knowledge? If so, how? Is this a comforting or disturbing concept? Think about it, write about it, I want to know what you think.....and are those thoughts original?

Internet Slang

Ok so it's my week to "host" and I was trying to come up with a topic and when I typed some letters into the title thing sometimes there would be a suggestion, I typed jk since I was going through the alphabet and got to thinking about internet slang (achronyms specifically) so I decided to post about that. Specifically I thought I'd ask you wonderful people (out there in cyberland) how(or to what extent) internet slang has impacted/changed the level on which people interact and/or converse today.

Here's some achronyms if you're curious http://www.netlingo.com/emailsh.cfm

ethics

This is a link to the bbc ethics site that is really interesting. The whole sight is cool but here is just a little piece on what a just cause for war is, out of the whole war section. Look at the justification they use. If you have a chance look at the rest of the sight, it's really interesting.

Little Green Men

We send/sent space probes to float around in the Milky Way with pictorial messages attached to them. For example, the 1977 Voyager probes had golden records, with inscribed diagrams depicting the human form and our location. The records were made based on the fact that little green men can understand basic math and geometry. Why is it that math and science are used to communicate with aliens? Wouldn't they have other ways of knowing?

Intelligence

I was searching around and I found a phychologist named Howard Gardner who says that there are seven different types of intelligence.
1. Linguistic
2. Logical-Mathematical
3. Bodily-Kinesthetic
4. Spatial
5. Musical
6. Interpersonal
7. Intrapersonal
How do you think these relate/compare to the four ways of knowing that we learn in TOK?
Can both models be right or are they in conflict with each other?

I am GOD

Prove me wrong.

Language Poem

A while ago in class we read a poem called "Nothingness" by Ahron Amir about the absence of language. (If you haven't read it yet you probably will sometime this week, so you should wait and respond after looking at it in class.)

We didn't really have a chance to freely discuss it in class, so I wanted to do that here. I thought the poem raised a lot of interesting questions. First of all, what do you think about the fact that it was translated? How does that impact what it says about language?

Another thing-- most of the images it offers "Of a man flung from a treetop far above the ground", a "pilot whose parachute would not open", a stone falling to a bottomless pit, are about falling. Nearly everyone has dreams about falling, or the sensation of falling in their sleep. Could this almost instinctual, basic image be something that you can connect to without language? Is that why it's offered in this poem? I realize that the fact that it is a poem makes it hard to convey the sensation of the absence of language, but go with me here. What do you think?

One last point-- The speaker describes them self as a "non-I" in the absence of language. Do we define ourselves through language? Can a sense of identity exist without it?

What do you think? Any other things you want to discuss with this poem? Please respond! :)

Knowledge isn't Justified True Belief

Hmm... I'm not sure what this does... never was really a blogger... testing testing... 1,2,3
Let's see, so Knowledge supposedly "Justified True Belief"

Consider this situation: Bob and Jim apply for the same job.
Bob thinks Jim will get the job because Jim seems more qualified.
Jim has 10 coins in his pocket. (bob saw)
Bob concludes through his reason, logic, and emotions the knowledge claim that 'the person who will get the job has 10 coins in his pocket.'
Unbeknownst to Bob, he will actually get the job. And, though he hasn't checked his pockets, in reality, he also has 10 coins in his pocket.
Thusly, the knowledge claim was true, however,
Bob's justifications were invalid.
His belief was an incorrect "map of reality."
But he still came to the right conclusion.

Uh oh spaghetti-ohs.

Slang

So what I want to start a conversation about is the slang of "our generation." What I mean by that is right now in 2006 at Poudre High School what is the slang that we have developed and what do they mean? Looking at the 70s myself in our assignment I am wondering why it seems like alot of the things we say are just taken from other generations. Are we the generations of no new language? What will that become in the future?

Heil!

Read the title, respond.

Communism is good.. Yes?

If Communism is all for one and one for all, then how come people think of it as evil. And how does north korea work with Kim Jung il runnin the show?

P.S. all hail red china

- laughingcorpse


Teachers Note: Due to the way this question is worded, some of you may not initially see the relevancy. I ask those of you responding to put the TOK twist on this... How do people use the WoKs to come to personal conclusions about Communism and its role as a political system? -- Mr. Malone

Language, how much does it cause one to stereotype?

Hi all,
as one of the people hosting the blog this week I wanted to ask, in relation to the unit of Language as a WOK, how much do you think language effects how you judge others? And is that judgment at all based off of the politics surrounding the region the language is from? How do people stereotype just based on the way one speaks or communicates (disregard race for the time being and please just focus on language even though the two are more often than not related)?

Language in Psychology

In psychology we recently studied how language influenced culture, and vice versa. We found examples on how it did work, and how it didn't. In some examples, we could even see how language is a manifestation of culture, and how one can see aspects of a culture through the language associated with that culture (for example, in Japanese they have multiple ways of saying "I", whereas we really only have one. That could show how it is important to identify status and relationships in Japan when speaking, but maybe not so much in the U.S.). We are just starting to look at language as a WoK in TOK. Does TOK look at language the same way as psychology?

THE Answer

As has already been established by a very "reputable" source, the answer to life, the universe, and everything is....
42

Now, based on what you have experienced and what you know (and your interpretation of the answer), what is the question?

The Power of Slang

As we begin our look at Language as a WoK, we are going to consider how a specific language can define a culture, and in this instance, a generation. As part of the Slang Assignment (if you haven't been introduced to it, you will), we want you to consider and use the following slang from the decades listed below. Also provided is an on-line slang dictionary that will help you find any words that you are having a hard time finding.

1920's
1930's
1940's
1950's
1960's
1970's
1980's

Slang Dictionary

If you wish to print these lists for your use, please do so at home. They are long and would be a huge waste of paper. Have Fun...