Through a Glass Darkly

Tried absinthe for the first time this weekend. I remember reading Hemingway: The Sun also Rises and The Garden of Edan, I remember Monet's and Picasso's absinthe drinkers and all the stories about the post-impresionists. I wasn't sure what to expect maybe some sort of different experience. It tasted like herbal tea, especially since i heated the glass up. I did not have a proper spoon or cared to light my room on fire, so the absinth wasn't served as it is traditionally meant to be served. All that aside, I felt nothing, or I did I didn't realize it. Doctors have a hard time distinguishing between s. and dug users, S. do not know as they are slipping into delusions, they only realize that in retrospect. It would seem you would only be able to know if you had felt something different in retrospect. The only thing I remember feeling is slightly awake... and hungry for some odd reason hmm. I was thinking about writing something just to see if I would be more creative, but I ended up going out that night. I saw Hairspry which was fabulous...

It seems that the people here are nicer to drunk kids. I went to the movie theater when I was sober and the cashier was down right rude, but the one last night was very nice. As was the bartender in the pub where I waited. I love walking the streets smoking here. I remember when I was younger and walking through Venice how I felt that each stone was filled with history. I have the same feeling here. I just imagine all the brilliant people that walked these very same streets as me. It is a very humbling feeling to know your place in life. Yet, I don't think you should ever accept that place when you are young, youth should be the fight against the monotony of old age. That that older people are necessarily boring. In fact the ones I have talked were quite interesting. Perhaps their life just seems monotonous, at least when we think about it at this age. I don't know, I don't think I am coming off to well in this discussion. In the I think you should be aware of your limits as a person and try to push beyond them to see if you think correctly, but not by making great strides but by little steps. Everything in moderation. But that seems to imply that I am afraid of changes... which would seem fair.

Cooked for the symposium today, actually spend most of the day cooing, a little bit of reading about the definition of art. The symposium was a little disappointing, few people showed up and the discussion didn't last very long, but it was fun if nothing else. Everybody loved my food which is nice to hear but never worth believing. In a world where compliments are dashed out for everything the not only lose their force but seem almost required when one works for something. I think hard work is over rated. Passion is as well, just because you want something doesn't mean you deserve it.

There is a film society that runs films every sunday night. There are several film societies but this one has the most interesting films, and the documentary film society never emailed me. I saw Bergman's Through a Glass Darkly, for the second time. I enjoyed it much better this time around a quote from the movie really struck me and I think I will use it in a paper I have to write. There of the characters are in a play and this quote is part of the play: "[A] thoroughbred artist: a poet with no poems, a painter with no pictures, a musician with no music. I despise ready... made art, the banal result of vulgar effort. My life is my work..." Art isn't about the products it is about the individual we value these individuals because they color our lives differently. We care that works are authentic because they are a tie to a person with a certain way of viewing the world. Forgers may duplicate artworks but as long as they do not capture the concepts behind the pieces they remain merely craftsman. I have always appreciated artists almost as much as I hate how they do not fit into my neat logical system. Emotions and the subjective aren't very parsimonious.

I went to a lecture friday after my tutor pointed out not so kindly that I should consider taking more. The lecture was whether there was a problem in taking a mixed view of the existence of time and modality. For example if you thought that all things exist you should probably think that everything exists presently. The discussion was very surreal it was as if some people took *real* concepts and reduced them to logical terms and started playing games with them. The paper presented didn't advance some philosophic thought, but tried to reconcile certain positions held by famous philosophers. One of those philosophers was there, and was able to holds the room's attention by merely describing the position he now holds. No justification was needed, he was one of the high priests of the field. Everyone was merely sucking his toes. I don't want to do that, doing things like that is the reason why I am so hesitant to go into academia. It is a world in itself with no relation to anything. It is like a beautiful chess match that only few are privileged to see. I like playing chess as much as the next eastern european, but I can't see myself living in a world so oblivious to everything else. There are practical applications to philosophy but they are rather worthless. Oh well, que sera sera... I have that Doris Day song stuck in my head my head. I went too a play about Sylvia Plath and that song was in it.

For anyone with an hour to waste this is worth seeing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HqdnjgkExY.

different night same place

I am less tired tonight than I was last night but I am still here scrambling to write a paper before my eyes glue themselves shut. My tutor forget we had an appointment which will force me to do more work.. Now I am comparing Kant's concept of freedom in the Metaphysics of Morals against Hegel's concept in the Elements of the Philosophy of Right.
Kant likes to think that there are two worlds the world of appearances, everything that as human beings we have access to; the other world is the world of noumena of things in-them-selves. We cannot know anything about this world it is beyond our ability to know (how can make such a claim is a problem). We are not free in the world of the appearances we act according to the causal laws of nature, but we are free in the world of the noumena and thus we can think of ourselves as free even when others see us as determined. Kant likes to have his cake an eat it too.
Hegel on the other had believes in only one world in which there is no divide between our thoughts and objects. We come to have freedom from indeterminesse, from the empty abyss of nothing, the ummmm, the universal. This universal is absolute possibility, freedom. Once a certain thing is willed there is a unity between the particular (that which wills a certain individual thing) and the universal because the particular is contained in the universal and the universal only finds determinacy in the particular, this union is the will which is simultaneously free and constrained. Hegel read too much eastern philosophy, he deals in contradiction much too often...
I prefer Kant to Hegel, but what he describes is not really freedom, it is the hope that we are free, maybe it is even what happens when we act. I read a bout a psychological studied that a certain area of the brain is activated before we choose something to give us the illusion that we have free will.
These are the things that I like the most in philosophy the self, freedom of the will (or lack thereof), and morality. I guess I don't really mind staying up with these friends.... so long

I think I would like to live here

For whatever reason I am unbearably tired right now. I have to finish two papers rather quickly and have to get a move on there. I enjoyed Sunday and it made me think that Oxford is the type of city I would like to inhabit in the near future. In the morning I red some philosophy, in the evening I cooked a meal, my roommate bought some read wine, and we with some friends had a "symposium." We discussed what the definition of normal. Most of their definitions gravitated towards a concept which involved a statistical norm. That is obviously wrongs, the concept of normal that our culture espouses is different from the statistical normal. And even if they coincided that definition of normal would lack any power as a relative term. Unless normal is grounded on some objective criteria it cannot be burdened with value judgments. Anyway...
After dinner I saw If... at a film society. Shitty screen and sound projection, but it was an interesting experience. THere was a social gathering after the film which I skipped because of all the work I ended up not doing. But just walking in the cold dark air I thought to myself, I would not mind doing this in the future; I would like to live in a place like this.

Settling in

So now that I have settled in it would seem the perfect time to reflect on what has thus happened.

I left from Newark airport. My parents drove me, my sister was away at some camp peer leadership event. My mother took the wrong turn and we ended up in Orange or Newark, not the most welcoming of neighborhoods, or so I thought. We got in time at the airport and sat with my parents talking about all the little things you do before you don't seem your parents for about 9 months. Told them that I am considering law school that I think the philosophy department at my school likes me etc. My dad was rather happy with the last part, not quite sure why... that's a lie.

I bought a cartoon of cigarets and a bottle of Scotch at the Duty-Free. Tried reading for a while, but never really managed, something about my nerves, I don't like having to deal with authority even in the form of airport security. Had a pint at a bar in the terminal, a Sam Adam's Octoberfest. It was a decent beer. This guy Paul disagreed. Paul was american of polish decent and he was going to Poland to mary his girlfriend which had lived in the States for three years but got tired of waiting for Paul to marry her, so she returned to Poland. If you aren't able to give a reason to stay they take flight, or so I am told...

The plane was rather uneventful, but its strange how all the flight attendants are pretty like polished silicone. I went to the UK through a program by the name of Butler, so they put us up in a hotel and oriented us on how to make the most of the little time we are studying here, so as to make the most of our time here. We they also mentioned how cold the and unfriendly the English are. Lies, all lies. I also liked the assumption that we were her for the culture. Maybe some are, I am here for the education.

Classes started off as soon as we got to the college. I am stuck in the least physically attractive college. It reminds me so much of my home institution that it almost feels like I never left. I am also stuck with a roommate, I say stuck lightly because I actually like my roommate. He is from Jersey like me, goes to Bates. Nice kid we aren't very similar in a lot of things, but I am happy to have know him. I just don't like the idea of spending so much time with someone, I would end up hating anyone after a month or two of their exclusive company.

The fist tutorial I have is currently on Hegel, it is an overview of his philosophical system. I like my tutor but there is a certain strangeness in him, he is slightly eccentric but in a reserved way. He wears strange socks. Hegel's system can be described briefly as an attempt to escape the problems of a foundational philosophy by not having any foundations to his philosophy. the philosophy comes about naturally fro indeterminacy and nothing providing us with the four categories of Kant and Aristotle. I am now suppose to be studding how Hegel establishes free will.

My other tutorial is on aesthetics in which I am reading about Kant my favorite philosopher. Hard to read though very hard to read.

All the architecture over here is beautiful in an overwhelming way (besides my college). It is everything I imagined it would be. I like walking around at night smoking, pr during the day just taking everything in. I am really happy that I am here. There is so much to do that at times it is overwhelming. I will only be at Oxford for a little over 25 weeks, time is so very short.

There are two term breaks In which I will be traveling through out Europe, I want to spend some time in France and Spain. I will be spending Christmas in either Austria or Romania. My tutor also recommended that I travel through out Britain and I think I will next week, go somewhere there is green and hike, by a bottle of some red wine and walk around a bit.

I do most of my own cooking which is somewhat cheaper. I make a lot of indian food because it is easy to make, a lot of spices and a lot of boiling. Made beef tikki masala last night, making hummus tonight which isn't really indian... I enjoy cooking it is relaxing. I found a lot of interesting shops with more exotic food, I have to ask my Pakistani friend what it all means. But I have discovered garlic and ginger paste which is nothing short of marvelous.

I bought a bottle of absinth... we'll see how that goes.

I'm here

Spent almost a week in Felton outside of Heathrow and London so that the program sponsoring me could orient us. The night I have spent with some British students has generally undid all of that orientation.

Oxford is the largest town in which i can remember living. It is not a huge town but it is your stereotypical college, british town. The little I have seen is amazing and I feel very lucky to be here. I have some work to do so I won't spend too much time on this blog.