Back To The Argument

(SP) "It may be getting old but it ain't over yet"

2006-11-11T13:35:00.000-08:00

The unexamined life is not worth living. And I've been feeling pretty worthless lately. But hopefully soon my struggle will pay off and I will have more time for all this shit. Until then, another quote, "life without music would be a mistake." (Immanuel Kant)

(AP) "And for your outstanding performance in a comedic role, I'd like to dedicate the findings of the jury to the dead."

2006-03-23T14:43:00.000-08:00

I am not usually a conspiracy theorist...no, really...stop laughing. But the increasing amount of what I can only describe as insurmountable evidence that fits into either one of two categories:
1) Scientific Fact or 2) Logical Deduction has raised serious questions (in my mind, at least) about the Official Account of the events of 9/11. For those who have always felt like there has been something fishy about the whole thing, I urge you to consult the website created and maintained by a group called Scholars for 9/11 Truth. As far as I understand it, this is a group of students, professors and professionals (in fields ranging from psychology to economics to engineering) whose aim it is to reopen the congressional investigation which, they believe, was prematurely closed primarily because, according to them, critical pieces of evidence were either discluded or ignored. The method this site employs consists of analyzing video, interviews and de-classified documents while subjecting all of these to modern physics, chemistry and structural engineering to test whether or not the Story (this is how I will, hereafter, refer to the Bush Administration account of the events) can accurately explain the phenomena witnessed, and if not, to make some suggestions about what may have been going on. I am not going to repeat all of the information from the site here (obviously), but I will mention 2 elements (one from science and one from western logic) which, I think, give cause in-and-of themselves to delve deeper.

The science (in two subparts - there is much more than this on the site)

1a. (Chemistry) It is a property of steel (the main structural component of the towers) that fire from any traditional source (there's no reason to think that anything untraditional was in these building) does not burn hot enough to weaken its structural integrity. A key element of the Story is that residual fires from the plane crashes caused the weakening of the building's structural integrity, leading to their eventual collapse.

1b. (Physics) These buildings were constructed in three vertical sections so that in the event of a major disaster, if there was damage to only one part of the building, the others would still maintain integrity. The planes hit in the upper-most section. Which does not explain, on it's own, why the lower sections were weakened. But in consideration of newtonian mechanics, it's even worse than that. Here's a crude analogy: imagine your body divided into three sections (head/neck, torso and legs). Imagine you sustain a rather serious blow to your head/neck which almost decapitates you. What would happen to your body parts in that case? If your head had, so to speak, suddenly lost anchoring to the rest of your body, it would topple off the body and land next to it. Notice, if you can remember the videos, what we saw when the buildings collapsed was not that (the top section falling off the rest of the building and onto the street) but more, to continue the analogy, like your legs had been taken out from under you. You will find on this site many interviews with not only pedestrians but firepeople and eplosives experts who say the collapse as seen can only be explained by a controlled implosion which destabilized the bottom 3rd and accounts for the physical way that the building collapsed. They make a much better case than I just did, but I thought it was worth pointing out, even here...

The Western Logic.

1. Download the following 3 minute clip from the site (right-click and save). It is an interview by the 911 Commission of Norman Mineta (transportation secretary). In this he recounts a situation that took place in the Pentagon that he witnessed between the vice-president and a soldier. It was aparently procedure (although Mineta had just found out about it that day) that F-18's be scrambeled in the event that terrorists take over a civilian aircraft (in order to shoot it down). Now, Mineta says that they kept getting updates from some guy on the distance between the plane and its percieved target (50 miles, 40 miles, etc...). And when it got to "10 miles," the guy turns to the vice-president and says, "do the orders still stand?" This aparently was visibly jarring to the vice-president but lets put that aside; let's just examine the claim. Consider the following argument:

1) The "orders" in question were either to have the F-18's intercept or they weren't.
2) If the orders had been to intercept then the F-18's would have intercepted
3) The F-18's did not intercept
4) Therefore the orders must not have been to intercept.

I don't think it really matters what the orders actually were (although it does make a difference, criminally speaking, if the order was e.g. "let them go") in the sense that this information alone (regardless of the actual orders) demands somebody give a reason why the supposedly intact policy was circumvented (or preempted), especially when it was easily foreseeable that these planes were going to cause damage to their targets, not to mention the loss of human life.

At this point I really don't know what to make of this. And I am, as always, surprised that the media (who, according to that douchebag Hannety, clearly are just out to hurt the president) have not picked up on this yet. But I think we are in for several very interesting months leading up to November '06. I certainly hope my suspicions are incorrect, because if not, things are a lot worse than I ever imagined.

(MP) Almost Every...Line Is Sung In-Time, And Almost Every Verse Ends In A Rhim (sic), The Only Problem We Had Was Writing Enough Words"

2006-03-13T13:48:00.000-08:00

To Whom It May Concern,

Things have been pretty slow with my life recently and so, consequently, things have been pretty slow here at Back To The Argument. But I finally have some good news to report. Setoff will have the Song Of The Day over at Garageband.com this Saturday. If you have a free moment cruise over and see what some people have said about our tunes since we put them up. The cool thing about this honor is that it basically comes from the fact that we have had some very positive reviews and also, in fact, some nominations in categories like Best Production, Best Male Vocal and Most Likely to Sell Out And Be Seen On MTV Next Month...well, we're not too proud of that last one, but, you know...it's not a real category anyway. In other band news, Setoff has basically been in hibernation since our last show writing new material because, among other things, we are planning to record a full-length CD in June back at the Art Of (F)Ears with Andy "Nobody Knows My Last Name Anyway" Ernst.
By way of preparation, we are hoping to play 4 new songs at our next show (a week from Friday) and that shit doesn't come easy. Hours upon hours are spent glaring at each other in our cramped practice space in the sketchy part of Oakland fighting the urge to break an instrument (or, you know, a limb) and dodging Eric's drumsticks. He has become particularly adept at "losing" a stick while we play which then flies off in a seemingly random direction but which ultimately (and 'miraculously') hits Nino or I (whomever has presumably offended him in some way) with pinpoint accuracy. I've been trying to figure out a way of getting back at him, but I can't really claim that it's an accident when he gets a concussion from an errant Les Paul Custom. But enough about that, if any of you who read this happen to be free on Friday, March 24th you should come out to the Balazo Gallery in San Francisco and watch us (delicately) tear it up with Second Shot and King City (members of Mad Caddies, RKL, Lagwagon, etc.). One of these days I really will get around to writing a more academic post. There are several topics that have been swirling around in my head for some time but all my free moments recently have been spent on band-related things. After we complete writing for the full length (probably in the next 3 weeks) I will have more time on my hands and then I would prepare yourselves for the deluge. Or don't...but don't say I didn't warn you.

-Whitney Baron
Executive Vice President In Charge Of Guitaring

(SP) "So Much For Saturdays And Other Days Where Lives Are At Stake, God Forgive Us For The Hatred, For The Risks That We Take."

2006-02-13T19:00:00.000-08:00

Gabba Gabba Hey Punk Rock Fans!
I hope this posting finds you...well, let's just hope it finds you, period. I was up in the Reno/Tahoe area this weekend with Setoff. We had a really great time; I especially enjoyed sharing our touring experience (such as it is) with my girlfriend Val (although I'm sure she could have done without the food poisoning she suffered at the hands of the veggie pizza at Fat City on Saturday night) and our new de facto "business manager" Ben Stein (even thought we didn't win his money, he was able to get us our money). Friday night we played in Reno at a really small club/bar called the Reno Jazz club. The ambience was pretty back-alley and both of the other bands weren't very good but the booker was nothing if not really generous to us (she gave us $30 of the $55 dollars she made at the door). Saturday night we played in South Lake Tahoe at a place called "Whiskey Dick's Saloon." The bands that night (one of them was the same as the night before) were also not that impressive and there was a problem with the set times which left a sour taste in the mouths of all the bands. We had made an arrangement with the booker (who happened not to be at the club the night that we were playing) to the effect that we wouldn't play first since we travelled for so long to be there. This caused a problem because one of the bands (obviously a local band) didn't want to play first and the other band that we had played with in Reno also didn't want to play first because they had travelled from San Francisco as well. So all the bands just sort of sat around until almost 10:30 (the music was supposed to start at 10p) when the bar manager stepped in and made the local band play first. Then, (I figure) just to spite us, they took 45 minutes to set up there equipment and start to play. On top of it they seemed to be total douchebags...pretty low class. I didn't have as much of a beef with the second band, although they never mentioned our name during their set even though they knew what it was (we had played with them the night before). So, as a result, we didn't get on stage until after 12:30a and thus played to a thinned out, largely uninterested audience. We also played sloppily; but drunkeness on the part of certain bandmembers was responsible for that, and said bandmembers have vowed not to do it (drink excessively before shows) again. Incidently, we got the whole trainwreck on DV tape (the soundguy records every set there) and if nothing else, if and when we actually put out a band DVD about our touring experiences, we will definitely include the part where I say (after a fuckup on Customer), "You're too drunk!" and he responds (without missing a beat), "I think you're not drunk enough!"...fun times. In any event, as per usual, even though the audience wasn't digging it, the soundguy (Allen) was heaping on the praise and he said that we must rebook (and tell the manager that he [Allen] had told us to rebook on a "better show")...I love that we get essentially the same comment at all the shows we play...well, impress enough soundpeople...The most unexpected and pleasant part of the evening however was that we made $100 even though not many people cared to listen to us and one person from the back of the bar even shouted, "I'd rather be asleep" during a pause. The money situation is funny to me because I'm sure that the reason we got the most money was that we were playing "nominal headliner" for the evening. And even though the Hyenas (the openers) probably had 30 people watching them play, I'm sure they didn't see even $50...there is some justice in this world...
Speaking of...it was our first show playing as a four piece after the departure of Jeremy and Jesse Korkki. A great big shout out to Matt Howell who learned all of our tunes on bass in 2 days and was able to fill in some of the gaps left by our departed string section. He is already adding flares to the songs to make them his own and I am looking forward to beggining to write with him in attendance as we attempt to compose a full-length's worth (12 songs) of material before a June recording session. We already have 4 songs completed musically and I already have parts written for 5 other songs - we are well on our way to meeting that goal. The new material is the best stuff I have ever written. It's inexplicable to me because when I was writing for Karaoke Outfit it would take me a long time to sit down and compose a song, and some days I would try and it would yield nothing. These days when I sit down to compose, ideas just flow out of me. And even though I haven't totally completed many of the songs that I've started, these recent tunes have so much more potential then any of my earlier tunes (even though I still have a soft spot in my heart for Suburban Legend and No Apology) that I can't help but be excited to see what I'm going to turn out in the next 4 months. I think a large part of it is that I have now internalized many more chord forms than the traditional power chords or barre chords and so, with these more melodically complex tools in the kit, it is far easier for me to be prolific than it was during my days with the Outfit. I will soon post some tabs of new material in the next couple of days for those of you muscially inclined ones to peruse.
Anyway, it's late and I want to get some of these ideas down before I go to sleep. Catch Y'all Later Eatin' The Puddin'.

(AP) "Snap out of it, you're not making any sense."

2006-01-17T22:53:00.002-08:00

This is going to be quick, but I just have to point this out. After I came home from practice I started reading an article on CNN.com about Clarence Ray Allen (an elderly death row inmate) who was just put to death. In the article it explains that Allen had had a heart attack in September and that he subsequently requested that if he were to go into cardiac arrest at any time before his exocution date, that he should be allowed to die (i.e. no attempt should be made to resuscitate him). And aparently a prison spokesperson (Vernell Crittendon) denied this request saying, "at no point are we not going to value the sanctity of life...we would resuscitate him." Does that not strike anybody else as at best rediculous and at worst illogical. Aparently demonstrating the sanctity of human life involves not allowing a man to die of natural causes but rather prolonging his life just so that *we* can be the ones who kill him. I do not necessarily believe that everyone's sentence on death row deserves to be commuted but let's please not pretend that prolonging the lives of these doomed men is a humanitarian gesture. Thank you and goodnight.

(SP) "And I'm leaning on this broken fence between past and present tense. And I'm losing all these stupid games that I swore I'd never play."

2006-01-08T17:29:00.000-08:00

Hello everybody.

What follows is another half assed attempt on my part to rouse myself from the posting coma into which I have settled which has made this place just about as interesting as watching that Lindsey Lohan movie with the talking car...you know which one I mean. Not much has changed in my life since the last time I posted here. I am still working for my dad, a job which is not as ass as it used to be, although the project is slowly winding down and I know I'm just going to screw myself in the end if I don't have something else lined up for once I finally finish there. But for now it's paying the bills (what little there are - thank god for living at home) and occupying my days which otherwise would no doubt be spent poking around on the same five sites on the internet that I poke around everyday and playing Half Life 2; which I maintain is the best video game released for xbox this year and rivals Halo (the game which will surely go down in the annals of history as the best game for the xbox platform) in terms of story and single player content. The visuals and physics engine are stunningly real.
In any event, the band is still going strong presently although some things have gotten better and some things have gotten worse in the last 2-3 months. On the upside, the band feels more cohesive to me these days. Practices are pleasant and productive experiences and I no longer feel the tension that was once there between certain members of the group. I think this has resulted in the other major positive which is that we're writing the best music yet and we have five or six songs at varying levels of completeness towards either are next recording endeavor or, should we choose, we can use some of them to complement our 8 song EP and actually have a 12 song record by the time we tour around this summer. That all said, there are two aspects of the band which are not as good as they used to be. First, money - the band as a whole doesn't have a lot of it. When we're planning to save money to tour (which requires some of the band members to save up an extra months rent while we'd be gone) and we still have the studio rent ($86 perpersonpermonth) and we're seriously considering going back into the studio to at least fix the small number of mistakes on the first EP if not record more material to add to the EP ($250-$700 perperson) depending what we do, and, assuming we get no help from a label on the post-production end (which has it's own benefits and drawbacks) ($300 perperson) that's really upwards of $1300 that I have to come up with in the next 6 months or so, and that's a lot. Not that I can't do it (the expenses would be stretched out over time) but some of the other band members aren't in the same financial situation as I with regard to either living situation or wage, and I hope we can come upon a solution together which minimizes strain on all the band members. The second shortcoming at this point is the difficulty of booking shows (let alone BIG shows). We got to play with Lagwagon in late November which was an awesome show (probably my best show ever), but since then we have played only a couple small shows and to relatively unappreciative audiences. Despite the fact that we have some bigger shows on the horizon (one in Arcata, of all places, and one in South Lake Tahoe) and that we will probably have a larger hometown show in February/April it feels like we've hit a lull. I'm not sure how fair that comment is because our first three shows were exciting for different reasons (Underground was our first, Pound was our first at a respectable club and the Mad I was our first HUGE show - and on the road) and I guess the nature of the beast, until we take off - so to speak, is that we're going to play a string of small shows with minimal audiences. It's just kinda frustrating because I thought I had put those days behind me when Karaoke Outfit desolved. I guess my expectation that we were going to become an instant hit locally was just unrealistic. What Eric and I have come to realize now is, as frustrating as it may seem, the next step (aside from finishing the record) is getting lucky. That means having a national touring band take us on tour with them. Now, this is not outside the realm of possibility for THIS summer (we're keeping our fingers crossed that one of our connections will come through for us) but the waiting game is particularly painful when I'm still not sure exactly what the shape of my next couple of years is going to be. The worst part about it is the unknown; that the call could come tomorrow or next January, but I suppose that's what makes it kind of exciting too. And in the meantime, we'll just plug on and try to make as much of a name for ourselves locally as we can so that when the big break does come (and I truly believe it will) we will already have the hometown shows taken care of.
In other news, SKI SEASON HAS BEGUN! Although I have not managed to get up to the mountains yet, Val, Cec, Jason and I are going to go up to Northstar for MLK weekend. I am really excited about this because I will get to ski Lookout Mountain for the first time, so pray for snow this week so that we can have fresh powder on what will probably become the new hotspot for advanced skiers in North Lake Tahoe.
I will be back around here sooner or later so leave a message or IM me @ Bond681@aol.com. And if you have some free time check out Setoff's myspace site www.myspace.com/setoffpunk or our website (which will be put up soon) @ www.setoffpunk.com. Later all.

-Whitney

(MP) "Like I don't know how to sing, I can barely play this thing"

2005-10-06T16:15:00.000-07:00

This is a little something I've been working on, I like it, I'm not sure if anybody reading this thing can play it but I'd love to get feedback:

Verse:
G1: (all power chords) A,B,D, Fm (high), E (high)
G2:
e -----------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------10---9--------------------
---6----------7------9---7---6-----9----9-----------------------------
---7----9-----5------7---7---7-----7-------------------------------------
--------7------------5---5---5-----9----7-----------------------------
E-- -5----5-----7-----------------------------------------------------

Chorus:

Chorus:
G1: (all power chords) F (low), D, A, E (low)
G2: --------------------------------------------------e
--------------------------------------------------
--9---9---7---6(bend)--9----11---9----------------
--7---7----------------------9---9------------------
--4---5---5---5--------7-----7---7---------------------
-----------------------5-------------------------------E

(MP) "We Are All We Have"

2005-09-02T12:16:00.000-07:00

An unlikely group of saviors...Propagandhi: Saving Punk Rock One Thinly Veiled, Politically Charged Progressive Thrash Song At A Time. (Check Out A Song Off The New Record, Download Die Jugend Marschiert)

2005-08-25T17:26:00.000-07:00

We have a room???

2005-08-25T17:04:00.000-07:00

Holy Shit, it's Fat Mike...oh, no...wait...

2005-08-25T16:59:00.000-07:00

Who needs a mic, anyway...?

2005-08-14T16:44:00.000-07:00

Nino (the lead singer) and I at our first show...after several drinks...

(SP) "You said, 'I gotta wake up so fucking early,' and I said, 'Maybe the director's turned on us.' "

2005-08-14T15:43:00.000-07:00

Hey Guys, (and here I'm making a big assumption that anybody actually reads this thing anymore)

This will be more or less of a life-update post which will chronicle the last couple months (briefly) since my last post. I've been readjusting to a new post-graduate life and I have been unforgivably neglecting this blog. I hope to be posting on a more regular basis these months, so you can move this page back to the top of your bookmark list (yeah, right). In any event, I think the reason I stopped posting was that I was working on a post one night (which still might make its way up here, in one form or another) about abortion. The problem that I found was this: it wouldn't end. It was just about the point that I reached 7 single spaced typed pages I decided to give it up and save it for another day. Well, that day has still not come. But I still have the document saved and maybe one lonely night when I've got nothing better to do (*cough*), I'll resurrect that particular monster. The main problem with it, aside from covering (in insufficient depth) a staggering amount of intellectual territory, was that I kept going back to passages and reordering arguments and sharpening points. The unfortunate side effect of which was that the piece as a whole lost rhythm and the flow of a coherent analytical piece. Rather, it began to seem more like a rambling high school op-ed piece (that happened to be a little long on vocabulary and a little short on clarity). I mean, the points are still there, but I sorta lost track of what was going on where, and when I can't even puzzle out my own train of thought I should not ask that anybody else do it. (even if it is just Evan, Val and Ryan)

Anyway, what the hell else have I been up to, you ask...I finally graduated college in June. I could not have asked for a better ceremony. Even if the keynote speach had not included a blues-based rock song (written for us grads) that the dean of the music deparment (who emceed the affair) had played on guitar, I would have still been very pleased with it. I was presented by the chair of the Philosophy Department who is probably the oddest-yet-coolest professor I have ever had. Suffice it to say he is the worlds foremost expert on midieval philosophy, he has a large elfish beard, an earing (because he loves pirates) and he lives in a trailer with his wife and two daughters. Also, there was often innuendo about illicit drug use, but none of that had ever been confirmed (or denied) by him.

After graduation I moved back home. The experience of living at home again has been unexpectedly pleasant. My parents are glad to have me home, I'm glad to not be paying rent, they're not kicking me out anytime soon, and they also have been very accepting of the fact that my life plan (by my own devices) has become blurrier since I left college. I'm no longer sure that I want to apply directly to law school (for september '06), and right now I'm having a fine time working for my dad and just relaxing. I'm in no rush, but I'm glad that no one else (yet) feels like they need to be in a rush for me.

The other rather major development in my life is that I have joined a new band. We are called Setoff (we agonized over this and decided better to stick with this name despite the fact that there is a japanese thrash band called, "Set Off" rather that name ourselves something we didn't like as much - some possible options were ZeroDecibel, The ZeroDecible, Make Amends and YesFX [well, the last one was a joke..but, you know...]) Right now we are playing the kind of music that I have wanted to play ever since I started playing guitar, and so I hope that recent drama issues (which might make it into another post one of these days) do not drive us apart before we garner the respect/fanbase that I think we deserve.

In any event, I will be going to Yosemite for the second time in as many months next weekend and I am really excited about it, not just because (this time) I will be going with friends, but because we are going to try to tackle Half Dome (which I have been wanting to do again since the first time I did it).

There's certainly plenty more to say. But honestly I'm not feeling like packing this post with any more detail, it's long enough as it is. I know that state-of-the-union e-mails/posts are never the most interresting to read anyway, but I just felt like I had to dispense with it before I could move to more engaging sorts of posts. Tune in next week (or whenever) kids for my review of both the Setoff show at the Pound (on 8/19) and the trip to Yosemite...for now...keep watching the skees...uh...skies.

(AP) "Dance and laugh and play, ignore the message we convey, it seems we're only here to entertain."

2005-05-04T03:56:00.000-07:00

(Since the song is so good, I just have to finish the quote)
"A rebellion cut-to-fit, I refuse to be the sountrack to it
Music saying we're still knee-deep in shit.
Well there's something wrong inside, we've played it safe, enjoyed the ride
You won't like this but I've got something to confide.
We stand for something more, than a faded sticker on a skateboard
Rain on your parade then we're out the door
And I don't even care any-fucking-more." (Still none of you...? That's what I thought...)

Anyhoo, now that my (somewhat extensive) title is out of the way, this is going to be my first Academic(ish) post. The impetus for this has come from conversations that we have had in my Hegel class. Or, rather, thoughts that have occured to me in consideration of comments that the professor made off the cuff a couple of weeks ago. The real reason that the topic has come up at all was the death of Pope John Paul II. Now, people obviously have some conflicting feelings about JPII (he was pro-life [& anti-euthanasia], anti-gay, anti-feminism [which *I* don't personally understand] and anti-stem cell research...but he was also anti-war, anti-death penalty, anti-imperial and anti-nazi...).

My aim here is not to pass judgement on him (and even if I did pass some sort of judgement on him as a person, I think it is generally agreed upon [by the world's catholic population at least] that he was a very good pope). In terms of trying to enfranchise (sic) the world's catholic populations, speaking (at least) 8 languages and travelling to 117 countries and every continent (excluding Antarctica) is totally unprecedented and (I think) amazing. I am not going to take away any of the (what I believe is) rightfully due respect owed him. Rather, my aim here is to adress part of his history which is suspiciously absent from the frenzy of news reporting which followed his death. Now, what I'm relatively sure a lot of you (except those of you who I told recently) don't know is that the pope had a PH.D in philosophy (yes, philosophy!) and he was a professor of philosophy at the University of Krakow for 20 years before becoming pope. In fact, up until close to the time of his death he was still a professor emeritus on the books there. Now, the suspicious part: Among all the accolades mentioned in the news media after his death (he was an avid athelete, a scholar, a poet, an actor and even a stonecutter [this information is readily available on the internet]) there was no mention of Karol Wjtyla's graduate degree nor his tenured position at U of K. Well, that's not precisely true. A classmate of mine brought in the special "Pope's Death" commemorative edition of Time magazine and in it you can find out that JPII had a PH.D (although it doesn't say in what) and you can also find out that he was a professor (but it doesn't list a subject).
This may be very surprising to you, but I guarantee that this is not the first time that the topic of philosophy has been willfully avoided in media. If nothing else, consider that "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" was called "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" when it was first released in hardback. Thanks to Val for pointing out that the "philosophers" in question were something more like what we would call "alchemists," but something tells me that a desire for factual consistency (and not wanting to trivialize philosophy by equating it with alchemy) is not what caused them to change the title. I can just hear Sally from marketing in my head, "but no kid will want to pick up a book with 'philosopher' (philosophy) in the title...it's BOOOORING." There are many other examples of this phenomenon. I do not want to go into any more depth about that here, but if you would like to know, you can always IM me and I'll be happy to clue you in.
The main bone that I have to pick with society-at-large regarding this phenomenon is that it is, I think, chiefly a misunderstanding about the aims and practices of philosophers which causes people to have this knee-jerk (or yawn-inducing - take your pick) negative reaction to it. For the rest of this post I will examine the entries for "philosophy" on YourDictionary (www.yourdictionary.com) and attempt to shed some light on what I think the real essence of philosophy is, and then make some closing reflections about philosophy in general. Here are the first four definitions provided by the above website. I will mention all of them and then I will pear them down to what I think is the best candidate for how philosophy ought to be viewed by the great unwashed:

1. Love and pursuit of wisdom by intellectual means and moral self-discipline.
2. Investigation of the nature, causes, or principles of reality, knowledge, or values based on logical reasoning rather than empirical methods.
3. A system of thought based on or envolving such inquiry: "The philosophy of Hume."
4. The critical analysis of fundamental assumptions or beliefs.

I will treat these all in turn:
1. This is mostly an etymological fleshing out of the word "philosophy," which contains the roots for "love" and "knowledge." I don't think it's innacurate to say that philosophers love knowledge, but this should, by no means, be assumed to be the sufficient condition for being a philosopher. I'm sure mathematicians, physicists and anthropologists alike all "love knowledge,"(if you didn't, why would you be in academia? It certainly isn't because of the money.) but none are philosophers. Now, how about this last part. That is, that we (philosophers) arrive at our knowedge through intellectual means and moral self-discipline. Now, it is certainly true that we arrive at knowledge by intellectual means, but again, this doesn't pick out philosophy and only philosophy. I think it would be an insult to all other academic disciplines to say that we are the only ones who exercise the intellect. Now, to the last bit...I actually have a funny story about that. My first upper division philosophy class was with Keith Kaiser and at one point during lecture, he cocked his head to the side inquisitively and asked, "Do any of you ever get the idea that philosophers are just more moral than your average person?" A bunch of us nodded (I mean, they spend a good deal of time developing what it means to act rightly. Wouldn't it be a huge waste of time to work to gain those realizations and then act in contravention of them?). Kaiser laughed, "No, philosophers are no more moral than anyone else...we are just very good at talking about what it would be to be moral." (God bless that man, he should have been given tenure, maybe the university will one day realize..) And that's all I have to say about *that* part.
2. This is interesting...philosophers do study all of those things: nature, causality, epistemology (the study of knowledge), ethics and value theory...and we do base our knowledge on logical reasoning, but I think it's patently false to say that philosophers do not rely on empirical methods. I mean, what good would philosophy be if it didn't reflect our reality? (imagine that certain philosophers of physics rejected general relativity...would anyone have any reason to listen to the conclusions they would draw). Philosophers certainly use empirical methods not only for the philosophy of science, but also for the philosophy of language and ethics. We examine human experience and behavior and then attempt to correctly describe it...just ask Wittgenstein...well, that might be a little hard at this point...
3. This is just a certain subset of usages, I think. I think they're just trying to describe what it means when someone says something like, "the philosophy of Hume." But I'm a little unclear as to the reference and scope of "such inquiry"...in any event, I don't think this is relevant to the essence of philosophy.
4. Surprise, Surprise - this may seem overly simplistic to some, but I think this is actually and precisely what real philosophers do. We examine assumptions or beliefs in a WIDE range of fields (just look at def. 6 on the website - and that's far from exhaustive) and we critically evaluate them (using logic, deduction and yes, even intuition...). Philosophers provide a certain kind of check on the rest of society. Namely, we consider the ways that people talk about things (from faith to free will, knowledge of numbers to knowledge of intentions) and we ask ourselves one simple question, "Does this make sense?" Philosophy is really just a reasoned questioning process. Sure, studying philosophy has given me a love of knowledge. But it has also provided me with a method, or rather, a standard for evaluating new information by providing me with techniques for questioning, consideration and invalidation that are not always present or encouraged in our culture.

Conversational aside --- At this point maybe I should mention that it is my silly, idealistic dream to teach high school kids to do philosophy. They're at a formative stage for their cognitive capacities and I know, having been one once (a LONG time ago), that many of them are skeptical. And I think being able to add philosophy's tricks of the trade (so to speak) to their intellectual arsenal would only help the post-adolescent transition from the safe, caring and (generally) accepting world of high school (and, to a lesser extent [location depending], college) to the often deceptive, manipulative and even irrational (in some respects) working world.---end conversational aside.

I think it is more or less true that the media and "society" see philosophy as boring, hokey and even (lock the doors and bar the windows) impractical. And people may actually believe this. But, you want to know my honest opinion? I think the reason there is an anti-philosophy bias in the western media is that people in the know realize that it is dangerous to many of the institutions that "we" prize over all else. And so the image these people endeavor to project to people with their finger far from the pulse (jammed straight up their asses - thanks, K.S.) is one which makes philosophy seem bland, irrelevant and uninteresting...but I will save that rant for another post.

In closing I would just like to say the following: Consider the major problems of the day: Terrorism, Foreign Policy (and how best to reengratiate ourselves with foreign nations with whom we have, among other things, idealogical differences), Terri Schiavo and the right to die, Michael Jackson and child/sexual abuse, Domestic policy (from gay marriage to the right to arm, [the bounds of] free speech to stem cell research)...By and large, I think you'll find, our (and here I mean, people in general) positions on these issues are inextricably intertwined with our core beliefs and our fundamental assumptions about the way that the world is (and should be). Taking all of this for granted, then, doesn't it seem like what is needed is precisely to have philosophical discussions about these things. My diagnosis: let's remove "philosophy" from the list of rhetorically employed "swear words" ("oh, that's JUST philosophy") and lets attack these issues as they deserve to be attacked.

---End Communication.

(SP) "The Counting Crows is playing 'Round Here,' and I'm not having fun, cause you're not here with me."

2005-04-26T23:59:00.000-07:00

Actually, I'm currently listening to "Raining in Baltimore,"(we miss you Evan :}) but you get the point...I'm still working out the kinks in how I'm going to do this posting business (i.e. how often, how long etc.). The only substantive thought I've had about it tonight has been that my posts will generally be of two types: academically substantive posts and socially substantive posts. I think I will somehow flag the posts (for the lazy reader) so that if you don't want to read about my personal exploits (hey - I wouldn't want to read about them) or you are particularly interested in reading my posts about philosophy etc. (heaven forefend), then you can plan accordingly, thereby conducting your blogging experience expeditiously with a minimum of ennui. For the sake of browsing ease, I think I will include an "SP" (as I have done in the title above) if the post is going to be a more social post, and "AP" if the post is going to be academic. You have now been warned.

I was actually all set for this to be my first "AP," but I don't really have the time or the inclination at this point to go to that effort. I was going to talk about the Hegelian notion that there are no truths independent of time. The main reason I didn't actually end up posting on this, though, is that I don't feel like I grasp it well enough myself to exposit...perhaps sometime soon, because it's interesting...but I still can't help feeling like there's something intellectually sinister going on just beneath the surface. I have to continue working with the material, which, incidently, is not much help (This is a gross understatement. Read: DO NOT ATTEMPT TO UNDERSTAND HEGEL'S "Phenomenology of the spirit." YOU'RE BETTER OFF NOT KNOWING). Separating out Hegel's prose in to serviceable chunks (because of excessive use of ambiguously referential indexicals) is akin to trying to separate a brick into american cheese-like slices with a kitchen knife. If you succeed at all the result will be very jagged and probably not usable for any practical purpose; not to mention that you're likely to ruin your knife in the processs <> Man holds up post-op kitchen knife - "This is your brain on Hegel." But I digress...

I have always wondered something about the people who flyer on Bruin Walk. I wonder about what causes them to select certain target individuals to recieve their "product." Now, there are certainly groups who target particular genders or ethnicities. I am not really concerned with why these groups target me specifically or ignore me specifically (isn't it obvious in each case?). What I am more interested in is why the volunteers who seem to be equal opportunity flyer-ers ignore me or single me out. Part of it can probably be chalked up to the fact that I'm always listening to music and mouthing along with it. And often, because of the nature of my music, I look angry and so I probably (and justifiably) weird some people out...but there are still people with whom I establish eye contact (and who seem to be giving flyers to everybody else) who either enthusiastically stuff their piece of paper in my hand, or just watch me pass by. I don't have an answer to my own question, but it's something I am going to pay closer attention to...One thing is for sure, it's not because these people are so perceptive that they can tell that I will be interested in what they're selling - The only flyer I got yesterday was from the Armenian Christian Outreach and it asks, "Which American organization recieves millions of your tax dollars and murder's people?"...give up?...Planned Parenthood. Boy are these people barking up the wrong tree, don't even get me started.

"At 1(AM), I was sitting and thinking of all the beautiful things I could have become."

2005-04-26T01:00:00.000-07:00

Well, that wasn't a totally unsuccessful first post. Although if you take into account the fact that my intention in posting it was to add that photo to my profile (which I eventually did anyway), and not to actually make a post with that picture (although I have to say I'm pretty pleased with the caption), perhaps you will consider it a greater failure than I do. In any event, this is a somewhat inauspicious start...things will get better, I promise...just bear with me...

(btw, yes, I am stealing Evan's idea of giving all my posts titles which are constitutive of lyrics from songs [although his are commonly {somewhat} bastardized] but he doesn't let many people see his livejournal anyway and so I don't really feel like I'm stealing his thunder...As a part of this structure, I will be giving prizes to the first person who can comment on each post and give me the author/song title/album title of the song which I quote...I dunno, maybe a couple quarters for laundry...it's really all I can spare at this point - Evan, Valerie and Ben are exempted due to prior (and comprehensive) knowledge...sorry.)

2005-04-26T00:46:00.000-07:00

I'm currently enrolled in "Remedial Posing for Rockstars"..as you can see, I'm getting the hang of the "action shot"...if only the camera had had a slower shutter speed.