I like being resurrected, I feel much less dead

Sometimes I wonder if it's possible to characterize the experience of living. If someone were to ask you: "How does it feel to be alive?" What could you say?

Whean?

There is a shortage of good question words. Who, what, where, when, why and how, are limiting and often require additional words to formulate a precise question. So I try to come up with my own. One of my recent favorites is "Whean"? As in "What do you mean?" which comes in handy when you ask for clarification as often as I do. Does anyone know of any question words in other langauges that are not synonymous with the English ones mentioned above?

Writing and Society

I've noticed as I've started to read more blogs and read more nonfiction, that our collective writing style in America seems to be much less formal (and becoming even less formal). I think that people are writing how they speak and arranging information more from the reader's perspective. My sense is that this is a result of the sheer quantity of information available. We don't want to read fluffy writing (unless that is our explicit purpose) to get at what we need. We want the info. Now. I find that this seems to run in parallel with broader social trends on dress and behavior, i.e. more casual. This makes me wonder: If you dislike fanfare in the public arena, do you dislike flowery langauge? And on the social level, if a society values merit and productivity, does it value this kind of economy in its writing? I wonder if there has been research done on this, or if it is a relationship that only exists in my mind.

Visual language

What we have done is developed an alphabet of sounds that we use to codify spoken language, i.e. written language. Basically, we write down what we say. Why do we think that the same langauge that we use for our ears will work equally well for our eyes? We know that the cognitive processes are different and yet we treat them as if they were the same.

Thought Transactions

As I sit here and write this, I know that my reader (if there happens to be one), is going to read the words in a linear fashion and then tie together the meaning at the end of the sentence. I think we all know this is how language "works." Because that is the way we read, it is simple to take advantage of this and write sentences that have virtually no meaning. Like this one. (That sentence didn't even have a verb.) But my point in writing this is not to make a joke on you, the reader, or show how clever I am. My point is to pique, and the pique in this piece is to look at the langauge itself. We use language all the time but how often do we really ask ourselves (or others) what it is. What is it that happens in this funny little transaction that we call communicating? How is it equally possible to write sentences that mean something as well as sentences that say virtually nothing? How often does communication actually occur?

Cow Brains

My friend Raj and I were walking around the Stamford Nature Center on Sunday, and decided to check out the petting zoo. We saw one strange animal (looked like a cross between a shaggy dog and a horse) that we had never seen before, and a young - dare I say - friendly-looking cow. Rather than brave the horse-dog, we walked over to the cow, and it met us right at the fence. It was looking right at us and seemed to be wondering if we had any food. Raj and I spent the next few minutes trying to discern what - if anything - was going on its mind. Raj said (and I'm paraphrasing quite a bit): "there is nothing happening in there. Think about what a cow does all day - nothing. Therefore, it has nothing to think about." The problem for me is that I both agree and disagree with this sentiment. I believe that cows - and other animals - do not think in the way that we normally use the word. What would prove to me that they were "thinking" was if they did something that was outside the bounds of their generally observed behaviors. (I'm not sure if there are documented cases of this, or what exactly a clear example would be.) But this is belief-only material too. Because I have no good way to imagine the state of mind of another organism, it is very difficult to suggest what is "going on in there." And without knowing what's "in there", I can't say much about it at all.

Poor motivation as blocked action

A lack of motivation is more often derived from confusion and fear than it is from laziness. In my experience, very few people are lazy (which I would define as knowing what you want, how to get it, being unafraid to act and simply not acting.) In general, motivation suffers because we don't know what we want. Or, we know what we want, but we don't know how to get it. Or we know how to get it, but we are afraid to talk to a specific person or make a certain kind of presentation. Any inkling of uncertainty anywhere in the process could block action. The difficult part is that, in general, we don't recognize in ourselves or others where the blockage is!

Ordering by type

One of the main elements of critical thinking is to divide something into types or parts. Why do we do this? What does it gain for us to say that there are 4 types of personalities, 6 types of langauges, 3 types of sport, 5 types of fruits? It seems to me that we order things by how we should act in response to them. Are there other reasons to organize by type?

An "I" for a "We"

I object to the usage of "we" in philosophical questions, e.g. "Why are we here?" etc. Here's why: the use of "we" as a reference to all people assumes a common answer to the question (an unwarranted and likely harmful assumption); and, it distances the questioner from what he or she is questioning. In other words, it makes the question general rather than specific to him or her. So, if you find yourself asking yourself this age-old question, or if you find "we's" popping up in your other philosophical concerns, please, do me a favor, and substitute and "I" for a "we". Ask yourself: "Why am I here?" and restrict this answer to you. This simple substitution will result in a more active existential justification. (Plus, who are you to answer this for all people if you cannot answer it for yourself?) Then, once you've got it and you think it's appropriate, you can generalize your Answer (because it does deserve a capital "A" at that point) from yourself to others. And you can include me in your "we", because I personally enjoy people with Answers.

Double Sense

Try a simple experiment. Touch something (e.g. your desk, your keyboard). Concentrate on how that thing feels. Really feel it. As you're doing that, pay attention to what you are looking at (e.g. your monitor, a blank wall). Really see it.

Now, while you're seeing and feeling, observe your thoughts.

Can you pay attention to both at the same time? Are you sure that you are sensing touch and sight simultaneously?

If you were successful, tell me how you did it and how you knew you did it.