Philosophy and Phylogeny

In my somethety-something years on this planet, I've read exactly zero books of philosophy. Somehow that seems both odd and correctable. Or as Wittgenstein would say...well, I don't know what Wittgenstein would say and that's the point. I bet he would say something about truth tables if we're talking young, calculating, I-see-the-world-with-more-clarity-than-anyone-else Wittgenstein or maybe something about how my use of "philosophy books" determines the meaning of philosophy as that which I haven't read and precludes every book I HAVE read from being considered philosophy, if we're talking to older, more world-weary and world-wise Wittgenstein.




And so that preceding paragraph is an example of how I've gone through most of my life. I recognize my lack of philosophical erudition and can compensate for it with soundbites and off-hand examples that hint that I DO know what the hell I'm talking about. As long as my conversation partner doesn't know any more than I do, or at least isn't confident that they do, I win! The key is to make sure you gauge, before you bust out with some jargon that may or may not be correct, the other person's knowledge. The last thing you want is to have someone correct you. You want to leave other people with the impression that you sure know what you're talking about, throwing Sartre and Kant into random conversations in applicable ways. Oh, I forgot, that's the other key. Just memorize a few exemplars of Kantian or Cartesian thinking and wait for a time in the conversation where you can say "well, as Kant would probably say..." That way you don't have to really worry about it derailing into a true discussion of philosophy while still getting across the point that you know a lot about Kant even when you don't.

Now, don't go thinking that this is easy. It takes a lot of work trying to predict where conversations are going to go before you actually get in the same room as the people you are going to be conversing with. Organized gatherings (church, book clubs, business functions) make it a lot easier, but know that there's a good chance you won't be able to use your pithy little insight if the right topic doesn't come up. The absolute last thing you want to do is use it in an inappropriate place and look like a fool.

So, I don't know how we got here but anyway, what I wanted to say when I started out was that I think I'll get around to reading some major works of philosophy this year. I've had Being and Nothingness on my shelf for more than two years now, so I guess I should finally read it. Of course, if I can pull it off right, I can get you to THINK I read it even when I didn't.

List Tuesday: Peri-haptic Haploid Edition

Words I Would Like To Someday Use In Context Correctly

1. Absquatulate *
2. brimborion*
3. claviger*
4. dipnoous*
5. enchorial
6. facinorous*
7. gledge*
8. holmgang*
9. irremeable*
10. jactancy*
11. kilderkin*
12. littoral
13. muricate*
14. nidorous*
15. ochlesis*
16. palilogy*
17. quadrennial
18. recumbentibus*
19. sardanapalian*
20. tripsis*
21. urgrund*
22. vigesimation*
23. wittol**
24. xertz*
25. yare
26. zocle*

*Not an actual word cccording to The Word (MS)
**I do not want to this to be used in context of me

Gratuitous Baby Picture

Just for the heck of it.





Also, I don't know if you noticed (I didn't until after her name was official), but my new daughter is apparently named after two computer programming languages: Ada, and Pascal. To be fair, we did add an extra letter to each name, so we've got that going for us.



If we end up having another son, I'm thinking about naming him Cobol Fortran. Or maybe Assembly C++.

The Miracle of Flight

The other day I was just doing my usual thing, you know, driving home from work when I saw something that literally made me fall out my chair. Well, not literally, but figuratively literally. I couldn't literally fall out of my chair because there was a door to my left and a stick shifter control knob thingy to my right. But anyway, I figuratively literally fell out of my chair because I saw this dude just walking along on the side of the road! By the Buffalo Wild Wings at 26 and the Van Dyke Expressway! Who does that??? I almost rolled down my window and asked him if he needed a ride. I didn't though, because it was pretty cold out there and nice and warm inside my car. I didn't want to let the warm out. Global warming is bad enough as it is.

This is Where The Party Ends

I'm sorry. I haven't been blogging regularly. I looked. There's no blog equivalent of Metamucil. And eating more fiber doesn't help. Trust me.

Just so you know, like most things in the world, my life since my last post can be summed up succinctly with to TFD comics. They are eerily accurate. F'n Drew, man.

List Tuesday: I Just Stood There Whistling

Reasons Why I Didn't Write A List Today

1. Myu fiungfersa are frpozrebn toghethert

Why Do I Even Bother?

So, we've got family visiting this week. Five of them. Five is a big number. It's more than the number of quarters in a dollar. It's more than the number of quarts in a gallon. Basically, it's more than almost anything with "quart" in the word. Okay, okay, only three of them are staying with us in our 1 bedroom apartment, but still.

Anyway, our guests have been using our upstairs "guest" bathroom for all bathroom-related activities. We use that bathroom primarily for numbers 1 and 2 and not for tooth brushing or hair drying. Our guests, however, do use it for those purposes. Combine that with a shoddy wiring job on the outlet and what do you get? Flames shooting out of the outlet, that's what. Apparently my last attempt to fix the problem (solution = cover everything with electrical tape and hope that fixes the short) didn't take and apparently electrical tape is inflammable.

So yesterday afternoon I decided I should probably try another fix. First, I removed all the old tape and found a loose wire sticking out of the "hot" terminal. So, I removed the whole outlet mechanism to work on it. Of course, the whole time I'm working on it, my son is in there with me watching me. Here are a few things he said that make me remember that I'm utterly hopeless.

"What are you fixing, Daddy?"

"Daddy said "GRRRRRRR"

"Daddy are you fustyrated?"

"No, Mommy is supposed to do it." In response to me saying I was trying to fix the outlet.

Maybe next time I should just accept my lack of any practical knowledge and hire a dang electrician. Or have Mommy do it.

Well, one outta five ain't bad...

So the fifth and final Worship for Justice meeting took place today over by the White House. We missed it. And this time we didn't even have a good excuse, but I'll give a few anyway.

We didn't leave Vienna until after the meeting had started.

We couldn't find a parking spot near Lafayette Park.

Brickbaby fell asleep on the way and he looked too cute to wake up.

It was hot.

Hey, we went last week, what more can we do?.

Unfortunately, none of those excuses make me feel any better. I mean, people are suffering and dying and I can't even make it to a "rally" to support them and un-support their tormenters? Ahhhhh, America. The land freedom not to give rip if you don't feel like sitting outside in the heat.

Even though I didn't make it today (sorry guys!) I'm still a firm believer in the cause. I hope that Dubya listened today, and I hope there's something that can be done. By the way, World Leaders (that means you UN, and EU and USA), now that this series of five gatherings is finished, I expect Justice (with a capital J) to be delivered ASAP. Ideally by the end of next week, though this isn't a firm deadline. And if I don't see it, I'm going to ask to speak to a manager. So you all better shape-up, ya hear?