I’m not yet sure how I feel about Christopher Alexander and his ideas about what has been wrong with Architechture over the past 100 years or so. I think as an exercise (more for my own mental stimulation than anything else), I’ll listen again to the programme recently broadcast on ABC Radio National (no Podcast, but I figured out a way to download rather than stream it…) and perhaps summarize and critique his ideas.
Of course, there’s always the chance I won’t finish doing that…
Thu 15th Dec 2005
Reading Maria Tumarkin’s review of Hazel Rowley’s book Tète-â-tète, a ‘biography’ of Philosopher Jean Paul Sartre and Feminist Simone de Beauvoir’s relationship, kept reminding me, on some level, of the relationship between the two step-sibling protagonists in the 1999 film Cruel Intentions. Fascinated more by the power inherent in a sexual relationship than the act itself - apparently Sartre wasn’t that into sex - both couples were often competing for the affections of an often younger, more vulnerable female.
The key thing that twigged me to this similarity was the fact that Sartre apparently couldn’t wait to finish the job, and get in touch with de Beauvoir and let her know he’d achieved a successful seduction, and de Beauvoir, in the relationships she initiated with other women saw her taking a much more aggressive rôle. Similar here to the extremely erotic “practice” kiss Kathryn (Sarah Michelle Gellar) helped the much younger target Cecile (Selma Blair) “learn”.
The ending wasn’t quite the same - Sartre and de Beauvoir seemed more than happy to continue their work indefinitely, wheras Sebastian (Ryan Phillipe) fall for one of his victims, Annette (Reese Witherspoon), and ultimately died as a good person, who had finally, genuinely felt true love. However, the feel of the relationship between them is similar - Sartre and de Beauvoir apparently stopped “sleeping together”, and their relationship was based purely on sharing partners, wheras Kathryn and Sebastian never slept together, and had a lot of sexual tension between them that was never consumated. Similar, but different.
The Conservative Philosopher: One Man, One Vote
I don’t normally read conservative websites, but I cam across this one as part of some fault-finding I was doing for another Blogsome user.
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Sun 14th Aug 2005
I found this on a site today.
It reminded me of the round of ads that are happening on Adelaide TV at the moment.
I’m not big on religion, but what Jesus said really makes sense.
I have a little joke I make when people ask me how work is. It goes a little like this:
Other Person: How is work going?
Me: Okay, I suppose. I mean, it’s not like work is supposed to be fun or anything. That’s why it’s called ‘Work’, and not ‘Fun’. Can you imagine what the world would be like? “Well, I’m off to Fun now, I want to pop in there and have a little fun for a couple of hours”.
[Other Person walks away...]
Me: Hey, where are you going. Come back…
However, I don’t really believe this. I want to be in a situation where I can do something I love as the main [source of income|thing I do each day]. I read an article which used to be at http://calacanis.weblogsinc.com/entry/1234000540052285/ about this. I guess I don’t necessarily want to be a ‘professional blogger’, although it seems like it might be a fun job. I’d just like to be doing something I like, for the significant portion of my time.
I already have a job where I do have a fair amount of time to ‘do my own thing’. If necessary (and meetings permit), I can leave work well before 3:30pm, and I get a fair chunk more holidays each year than the average worker. I don’t think I’d like to give up those aspects of the teacher lifestyle. But there are things about my job that I don’t really like.
I’m not going to be too specific, but I forsee myself in the not to distant future not working full time as a teacher. Whilst some people don’t like the idea, and the ‘randomness’ of being a relief teacher (Supply Teacher in the UK, Substitute in the US), I think it sounds better than the alternative. Not having to do a heap of marking and preparation. Not having to attend staff meetings. Not having to attend Parent-Teacher interviews. Not having an income during holidays.
Okay, at the moment that last one is a bit of a kicker.
My aim is to have some other sources of income, something that allows me to work ‘from home’, whether it’s building renovation and maintainence, coding or otherwise. I sometimes feel that my generation is the first one to decide that we don’t have to spend our whole lives working, to support our lifestyles. Our whole lives should be our lifestyles.
Life is short. Enjoy every day.
You wouldn’t steal someone’s car,
so don’t steal Music/Movies.
I heard an interesting thought on the similarities between piracy of copyright material and theft.
No, I wouldn’t steal some guy’s Ferrari if it were left on the street, but if I were able to make an exact duplicate, without doing any damage to it, then I would.
And what’s more, I was never going to buy a Ferrari in the first place. They haven’t lost a sale from me…
Tue 24th May 2005
This was written in response to a Year 12 Philosophy essay, title “The Probability of Existence”, early in 2004. I’m posting it here, as I thought I’d already sone so, but was unable to find it.
There seems to me to be little doubt that, in some sense, we exist. Since, as Descartes suggested, the fact we can think, we must exist. Cogito ergo sum.
But what of the idea of our type of existence? Is our perception of our environment real? Is our environment real? On first appearance, as Chas suggests, we observe reality, and there must be truth to it. Or, on closer examination, there must be some kind of existence. According to logic, something must either have a quality, or not have a quality. This seems reasonable, but in fact such a simple proposition can lead to a paradox.
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Mon 7th Feb 2005
I’d never really come across classical philosophy until partway through my Education degree. We did a philosophy of education subject, and around the same time I happened across Stephen Jay Gould’s books.
And I realised how some historical figures - most notably Freud & Aristotle have shaped our ideas of the world. And in some cases held back the progress of science by decades, or even centuries.
The most obvious examples are the elements, and the planets. Aristotle pushed for the acceptance of the 4 Elements theory - Earth / Air / Fire / Water, and it took centuries for more reasonable theories to take over.
Four of anything is usually pretty neat - especially if you can pair them up on axes at right angles to one another and have a continuum. And having four elements means you can associate them with your four humours. Now there’s a classical mistake that cost countless lives!
The furore over planetary gravitation is another cause of concern. The most worrying thing is that there were Classical Greek scholars who decided that the Earth orbited the Sun. But not Aristotle. Think of where we might be now if we’d figured this one out 2000 years ago.
Freud and his fixation on sex held back psychology decades. And his work was all based on half a dozen patients. Nothing like a small (non-random) sample size to skew results. I think I could formulate a coherent theory of mental illness related to facial hair with a dozen or less carefully chosen subjects.
And now I read (and realize) we have more than 5 senses. And the whole sight-sound-touch-taste-smell gimmick is down to the big A.
I mean, it’s obvious to anyone who’s had a cold that taste and smell aren’t independant. And you can ‘feel’ when you are in a changing gravitational field, like an accellerating elevator.
And there are others I hadn’t even thought of. We sense when we are hungry, or need to urinate. We know where our limbs are. NewScientist had an article naming 21. But my favourite is the Circadian Rhythm. Knowing when to get up. I think mine is broken.
Thu 15th Jan 1970
That’s purpose is just to trigger Wordpress to update the Post count of each Category.
I’ll leave it here incase I need to redo this operation. It took me ages to tick each category box…
