Reflection and Connection 7

Reflection:

It's cool to see some modern philosophers because for a long time I thought philosophers were only historical figures that tackled challenging topics in history. People like Socrates, Cicero, Hegel, Kant, and more who challenged people's perception of what they knew and in some cases were punished for it. In some sense though I feel like today everyone's a philosopher since there isn't really a huge downside to be considered one. Back throughout history philosophers have had to contend with government and religion, heavyweights issuing knockout punches and punishment left and right from exile to execution. Being a philosopher meant traversing the minefield of everyday life and standing by the new and sometimes unpopular viewpoint you profess even in the face of giants. Nowadays it's easy to call yourself a philosopher. You see pictures all the time with hazy filters and sepia tones, a pseudo-philosophical phrase draped across in helvetica font. With such an over-saturation of "philosophy" I respect people who take it for more than face value and live up to the standards set by those who paved the road before them.

Connection:

While watching the documentary I was able to connect with the airport guy who talked about cosmopolitanism. I think it's important to learn from other cultures and backgrounds even if they do things differently. I also agree that you shouldn't forsake your own personal heritage for the sake of one united homogenous civilization because you should be proud of yourself and what you come from. Your background is special and deserves recognition. I'm optimistic about a world that can work together to further goals but I'm also proud of my Chinese background, my Irish background, my German background, my American background, etc. and I think that remembering what you come from is a good thing because it's part of what makes you who you are.

Reflection:

Learning about the Naturalists was pretty interesting. I liked how Marx, Darwin, and Freud were different in what ideas they had and talked about as opposed to the philosophers we learned about last that were pretty much the same every time. I like being able to learn about each philosopher and how they came to their conclusions instead of how 3 people had the same idea, hated each other for it, and tried to express how different the idea was even though it wasn't really changed. I think the most interesting of the naturalists was Darwin. His work was constantly being shadowed by the question of if it was right for him to publish it or research it, his wife was afraid he'd go to hell, and when his favorite daughter died, he became incredibly depressed. You have to feel for him if only a little bit.

Connection:

 The movie we watched about where God fits into science I thought was cool. It was a little hard to believe how ignorant some people could be though. The one guy who absolutely refuted evolution was really annoying. His lectures on how evolution is wrong reminds me of a little kid sticking his fingers into his ears and screaming when they don't want to hear something they don't like. The most interesting part to me was when the one senior ( I forget his name ) was having a barbeque with his family and he discussed his feelings on evolution and creationism with his dad. His dad was adamant about his belief in creationism, but there wasn't any belittling of ideas going down by either side, at least from what I remember. It was a very polite discussion on a topic that can be a sensitive issue.

Reflection:

I thought I was starting to get the book, but I’m not sure anymore. I kind of understand that Sophie and Alberto are trying to escape the book, but does that make them real in the book but not real in Hilde’s reality? And if they escape the book do they become real in the real world? It’s hard to wrap my head around sometimes. Alberto seems like he’s really upset with the Major all of a sudden too, which is making Hilde upset with her father, which I think is weird. Why does she care if the made up characters in the book her father wrote are feeling manipulated by him? And she’s thinking about running away because of the book which is pretty ridiculous. That leads back to the whole “are they real” question. Maybe the later chapters will make more sense, but that’s what I thought last time.

Connection:

The philosophers we’ve been learning about recently have really similar ideals. So similar that it’s a little hard to tell the difference between them. A lot of them hated the ideas of the others even though they were pretty much the same thing, and I thought that was pretty interesting. I can’t really say which one I agree with the most. I was never a fan of Locke or Rousseau, or Kierkegaard. I think I’d have to say Hegel makes the most sense, but Kierkegaard and Schopenhauer both hated him. I don’t know why, they all had pretty similar ideas. (Except Schopenhauer, he hated everything)

Reflection and Connection 4

Reflection:

Now that I know that Sophie's World is really about a book, it's not as confusing anymore. It makes more sense that Sophie and Alberto are part of a book that Hilde's father is writing, and it explains all the weird stuff happening to Sophie. That doesn't mean it makes sense though, Sophie and Alberto are apparently sentient beings inside the book Hilde has and they're trying to get out before Hilde's dad notices which I'm assuming means the end of the book? At least now I can write off all the weird stuff (like little red riding hood and the sea monster) as distractions to keep Alberto and Sophie from finishing their philosophy stuff and escaping the book, and it doesn't seem as weird when you look at the whole picture. It's cool to see how the philosophy lesson now has a reason in the story rather than just being Alberto taking Sophie in as his pupil for no reason.

Connection:

Recently we've been talking about Kant and his views on morals. To me, Kant and his philosophies are some of the easiest and most difficult to understand. His ideas on morality and how it's tied to your attitude makes sense to me. If you're doing something good to be rewarded, you're not doing it for moral reasons, even if your actions are good. Simple and to the point, it makes understanding his view a lot easier than if he had an abstract view on morality. But that's not to say he can't be complex. Kant's views on Law are just that. He thinks that everyone is bound to follow the same laws, but your following of those laws is only counted as moral if you choose a path that everyone else can also follow at the same time. To me this leaves a lot of questions, like if the law is unjust but everyone is following it because it's a law, is it moral to go against it? Since everyone else has the opportunity to, it should be a moral choice right? Also, who decides if the rules are right or not? People usually have the same consensus on what's right and wrong, but every once in a while ideas will clash. How do I know my decision is moral just because I think it's right?

Reflection and Connection 3

Reflection:

Sophie's World is starting to get really weird. It was never that normal to begin with, but now it’s just going nuts. Hilde’s father apparently knows everything that Sophie and Alberto are doing, and Alberto says Hilde’s father isn’t a good guy and that he’s toying with them, but he calls Sophie Hilde at least 3 times? The letters addressed to Hilde from her father are also getting co addressed Sophie, and the messages are starting to mention her more in detail. It’s starting to get really confusing and hard to follow. Not to mention Sophie’s starting to sass Alberto a lot. I find it interesting that Alberto’s using time as a way to explain what happened in which period to Sophie. At this point though, I’m more interested in the story than with the philosophers. I’m not a fan of Descartes, Spinoza, or Locke I guess.

Connections:

As we were learning about the Baroque era, I couldn’t help but think that there’s a little of that going on right now. It seems like there’s more and more “carpe diem” going on, not to mention the conflicts with religion. I’m sure it’s nothing close to the actual period but I feel like there’s a little hint of it going on. It’s interesting to see how the philosophers of this era and their theories are used in movies now. Chuang-Tsu’s butterfly idea is really close to the plot of Inception in my eyes, with him wondering if he’s Chuang-Tsu dreaming of butterflies, or a butterfly dreaming as a person. Descartes’s mind separate from body theory has been replicated throughout time, with Hillary Putnam’s ideas in 1987 and The Matrix where reality is a barren wasteland but people spend time in a simulation world separate from the outside.

Reflection:

Since the last post I've been able to think about philosophy a lot more. Learning about Aristotle and Plato and their ideas was interesting because I could see how their philosophies influenced other people and things. When we watched Source Code, I was able to see how it was an allegory to Plato's prisoner in the cave idea. When Captain Stevens was in the capsule, it was like the prisoner only seeing shadows in the cave. as he works Goodwin into finally telling him what's going on, it's like the prisoner walking out of the cave, being blinded by the sun but not completely out yet. Eventually when he finds out what's really happening to him, it's like the prisoner finally escaping the cave and being blinded by the truth. He didn't want to accept it at first, just like the prisoner was accustomed to seeing shadows and not things in such detail.

Connections:

When we talked about the Hellenic philosophers, it was cool to see what kind of philosophies you fell under and for what reason. I especially found it interesting how the meaning of cynicism changed from when it was thought up to now, from more of a monk point of view to a distrust of everything. Seeing how Cicero thought about the different Hellenic philosophies was a good way to dissect each one, such as how he thought skepticism was useless unless it was intellectual curiosity. I enjoyed talking about Saint Augustine's ideas and how they worked into weather or not we believed in a soul because it made me think about why I think we do instead of just we have one because we do. The more we get into philosophy the easier it is to understand how things in the world work with those ideas

Reflections and Connections

Reflection:

Sophie's world so far is a very interesting book. I like the way Sophie's encounters with the philosopher give information like a textbook would, but it makes it more interesting because you're thinking about the story at the same time you're getting the information. I feel like the philosopher is like Socrates in the way that he asks Sophie questions, and then questions her answers. I'm not really sure what Sophie is an allusion to, she might be like a sophist but I don't think she believes that she knows everything like they did. It's a little odd that the philosopher doesn't want Sophie to meet him unless it's on his terms, and he's using Hermes to transport the letters to her. It's pretty cool that the dog is named after the messenger god because he's the philosopher's messenger to Sophie. I think soon that Sophie will meet the philosopher, because he's shown her who he is in the video, so it seems like they might meet up in the near future.


Connection:

Philosophy can be applied in the real world in more ways than I had originally thought. Socrates's methods of Socratic irony are used in media a lot to express flaws in someone's arguments or ideas. Democritus and his ideas of atoms making up all living things are used every day in science. I like how if you know what to look for you can spot the ideas of philosophers a lot. Plato's ideas of forms are showcased in the example of beauty. Like he said, beauty has one form that can be interpreted many different ways. While the fashion industry might see one side of it, other people might see it in a different way. To each person, beauty is an individual idea, but it's all based off of the concept of the form of beauty that always stays the same.