Fear and Trembling
I had my first secondary tutorial on Friday, and it was intense. My tutor is one of the foremost scholars in his field; if you want to verify this statement, go to a decent bookstore and look for books by C.F. Robinson in the Middle Eastern History section. Our interaction was a little one sided. He obviously knew far more than I would ever on the subject. I was under prepared, having concentrated more towards the end of the time period I was assigned to write an essay on, where he was more concerned with the origin of the situation. It was early in the morning, and I was only half awake and sometimes trembling because my muscles didn't like being used at the ungodly hour of 9 a.m. Further, I was distracted by all of his books, especially the ones in Arabic. (Why do professors have to tease me so?) I came away thinking, but with some difficulty; having had to come up with answers on the spot for an hour, I had a somewhat severe headache.
Still, I could walk out of his office with a smile. I knew that I would learn more from this approach in the course of four tutorials than I would in a traditional class, even one that was every day. Merely being prepared to take the onslaught of brilliance is preparation; fear of being caught in a wrong answer and wanting his approval as a carrot-and-stick approach to studying seems to work for me.
The way my mind works, I was tempted to then think about the nature of fear, how fear on the one hand kept me frozen while I was in the arena, but when it comes as a goad it can be helpful and a prompt for work. Instead, I sat back and tried to relax by reading Sartre and Heidegger.
Today, I got word of the deadline for Reflection, the literary magazine at Gonzaga. I had already been told about the deadline for Charter, the academic literary magazine. (The difference is that Reflection leans towards poetry and fiction, Charter essays and non-fiction) Both are in early February, which doesn't give me very much time to write for them. Now, I submitted to Charter last term, but I wasn't particularly pleased with what I sent them. As it is, I don't even know if it got in. As for Reflection, well, I've been writing a little poetry here, but I haven't had much time to revise them, and it takes a long time for me to be satisfied with my poems. I could write a quick short story, I suppose, but the thing is, I want to be able to submit things to both that I'm happy with. At the same time, I'm here in Oxford and I have one or two prior commitments to keep, as well as books I want to read. Oh, and I'm still trying to learn Greek, as well.
All of a sudden, I wish some of that fear that inspired me on Friday to go and get reading done on Saturday could come and hit me over these new assignments. Once, I would have jumped on them immediately. Now, I think work is catching up to me at last, and I can't produce on the same broad range that I used to. It's not that I'm really complaining; it's just I've fallen into the state which I hate the worst when I see it in other people; I want things both ways. It goes along with change, I expect.
Soon, I know I'll get over this slightly self-pitying moment and get to work. I can cut back on my outside reading, and some of the sillier things I spend time on. I'll get to writing, which always helps me write more. Once I get on a roll, I'm sure I'll come up with something half-way decent. And if someone lets me know how things go in February, I'll pass it along here.
On Inspiration
Yesterday the study abroad program with which I participate sponsored a trip into London. As I had little need or desire to go on the tours that were planned, I treated the trip as merely a free bus ride into the city. The last times I have gone into London I have not had very much time, and I've found myself doing some of the same things more than once, something that I think is a shame in what might be the world's most diverse city. So, though I did go with some of my new friends into the National Gallery, when they left to go with the rest of the group to another museum, I headed off on my own and made my way on the tube to the British Library.
I've seen the British Library once before, but I did not remember very much of it, merely that it contained a section of George III's library and a collection of some old manuscripts and such like. On this trip, having experienced the Bodleian library here in Oxford, I think I could appreciate the British library more. They are built in the same regard; by built I mean the system is developed in the same manner. Entrance for actual reading is controlled carefully, but anyone can come in and read essentially anything. Like the Bodleian, there is very little that you cannot find in the British Library.
Unlike the Bodleian, the British Library keeps a display of some of their more precious possessions. These include original Gutenberg bibles, the common indicator of a worthwhile collection. But there are things on display that are literally unique to the world's historical collection. They have, for example, the second oldest record of the book of Hebrews. Next to that, they have a codex of the New Testament from a century later. The distinction is obvious, and connects the museum visitor to the past: "see how Christianity began to flourish between the third and fourth centuries A.D.?" These records had a profound effect on me, something I've mentioned before. But this was a double jolt. On the one hand, reading the Latin in the original hand made me feel a connection to this otherwise anonymous monk copying out the codex. But then the two of us are connected in a different way when I think about the theological nature of the bible, and wondering how they play out with a different emphasis in a different tongue. The two of us are then looking back even further together, connected in purpose.
One part of me wants to shrug this off as nonsense. I've put a lot of thought into arguments to the effect that such a work is not attached to its author. But the idea is still seductive, that we can live on in our works. The idea was further enhanced by the handwritten notes of more modern authors kept by the Library; notes written by Austen, Auden, handwritten compositions by Britten, Vaughn Williams, and even Handel. The thing that struck me is how ordinary they looked. You couldn't tell at a glance the difference between genius and scribbles. To me, this was the most inspiring thing of all. Seeing these things connected me to their authors; they showed me that I could be like them.
England, in this respect, is a little different than America or France. In those two countries, the original copies are usually not given to museums, but to colleges and family. This is, in my way of thinking, a mistake, but I won't go into that here. The landscape here is inspiration. In earlier times, biographies of great men were inspirational to generations of artists and thinkers. Plutarch's Lives inspired people all the way to Napoleon. I can understand why such things are not quite as effective as they used to be, but what I presumed was that the nature of inspiration was the same. Having these things on display would seem to me to be inspirational for people in the classical way.
It seems to me that either people are not rising to the occasion of being great thinkers on the model of the past, the model has changed, or they are rising to the occasion and I'm just not aware of them. I can't say which one is more likely. But if it's the first, I think that we have reason to be worried.
An Example Needs to be Made
One of the questions I am generally asked, especially once people know that I'm studying in Oxford, is "what are you studying?" I've come to dread that question. If I reply that I'm studying philosophy and history, about half the time the immediate response is something along the line of "well, what do you plan on doing with that?" The best response, I've found, is to shrug it off, and say something along the lines of "get used to being poor." But if I gave in to my emotions more, if I told the truth more, what I would honestly have to say is: "be a philosopher, one that has strong ties to history." It wouldn't go over well. No one is a philosopher. Even back in the days when people were philosophers, that wasn't their profession. They were either independently wealthy, teachers, or part of a religious order. The first being already somewhat out, I've not quite decided yet between the other two. But such would be only something to make sure that I stayed fed and clothed. What I would be is a philosopher.
It still sounds presumptuous. It sounds like I would sit around all day thinking about things and coming up with abstract and useless descriptions of how the world works, without managing to do anything actually useful. To a large part that might be true, as a caricature of a philosopher. Most of our lot have been known to be fairly eccentric. Immanuel Kant, for example, would take walks around his hometown of Koningsburg with such regularity that the local housewives were known to set their clocks by him. And everyone knows about Aquinas and his job with the firebrand and the woman for hire his brothers had sent up to him. They're not exactly the sort of people you might first think of consulting when you want help with your everyday life. That's fair enough, actually. Everyday life is not the sort of thing philosophers are generally good at. But then neither are a lot of people, so that's not too much of a problem.
One of the real problems most people have with philosophers is an assumed sense of snobbery. Philosophers are seen as thinking of themselves as smarter than everyone else. Again, there are examples to back this up. Hegel believed he was being very clever when he said that 19th century Prussia was the heyday of civilization, that it was, in fact, the end of history. There are accusations of dogmatism; the British have a joke wherein a British physicist is explaining to a French philosopher about how the latest scientific equipment was proving such and such, and that so much progress was being made about the state of the world. The Frenchman replies, "well, that's wonderful, but how's the theory?" Philosophers are seen as not particularly caring about the state of most people, and of sitting in an ivory tower while they go about counting the number of angels on the head of a pin. How they paid for the ivory, I have no idea.
I can't really defend the historical philosophers against these attacks. What I can do is outline my own idea for what history should be and hope that it is an improvement: something that comes out of empirical knowledge, rather than trying to force the phenomena into rigid theories; and paying more attention to the outside world rather than what is traditionally considered "high culture." Studying in Oxford doesn't seem like the first way to encounter this 'outside world,' but I like to think I'm doing my part by slumming around Paris on the cheap with more such adventures on the way.
What I can defend against is the idea that philosophy is useless to the workings of the world. There are very clear instances when philosophy could be very useful. Philosophy is, after all, a certain method for putting forth, exploring, and analyzing arguments. Any time there is an argument (even in the vernacular sense) where one side is trying to persuade the other, philosophy would be useful. For the most part, though, this seems to be ignored. Let me give a good example where philosophy can help. Chris has recently posted on his blog about the neo-atheists - thanks for giving me this idea, by the way. While it might be, and often is, fun for me to check out and analyze their arguments, I'm not going to go that far right now. What I'm going to analyze is a selection of some comments made at a site which has links to a rather important debate between three major neo-atheists and three people defending religion on the question, "are we better off without religion?"
Many of the comments, of course, dealt with the believability of the debaters.
"[Theologian 1]'s answers were very straight-forward, but his answer assumes that hte (sic) listener is able to think logically and has some background knowledge about teh general area. [Neo-Atheist 1] answers were full of handwaving -- oh scientists are working on it. Trust us."
And,
"it was left to the stammering [Theologian 2] to predictably add a hackneyed, Daily Mail-style cod philosophy to justify religion. He wound up tying himself in knots .....On the other hand [Neo-Atheist 2] was his usual persuasive self, forensic, emotive and potent as ever. [Neo-Atheist 1] was devastating in taking [Theologian 3] apart..."
the result of this being a mere commentary on the debate. Nothing is decided this way; it is genetic fallacy to say "A had a better argument than B, therefore A is true." Supposing that people wanted to actually find an answer to such a question (and I don't think that they do, more on which later) what you would have to do is first find some common ground to define the playing field by, something that is hard to do on such an open ended question. But the people commenting make it worse:
"Those who choose to believe in one or more of the diverse gods that human mythology offers, have thus stepped outside the possibility of discourse"
Also,
"What a ridiculous claim! Do you honestly think you can disprove the Bible? Every argument... has been countered. And if you really read the Bible, and understand it, it will save your life."
Both of these examples, in different ways, puts forth their own opinion by completely denying the possibility of the other position. Since the other position in fact exists, and has some fairly intelligent proponents with good reasons for believing such things, I would say that such arguments are weak at best and vacuous at worst.
In general, and in a very oversimplified way, the problem with this debate is over the ambiguous nature of the word "faith." Used negatively by one side, it means the impossible picture of a man with a beard in the sky, which seems just as possible as a flying spaghetti monster. Used by the other side, it means a justification for knowledge which is beyond empirical data, which can also be applied to the presuppositions of the neo-atheists. Finding one singular definition is of course, impossible. What you could try to do, though, is to explain, far before the question "are we better off without religion?" comes up, exactly what one means by religion, what one means by knowledge, what one means by supernatural, and what one means by faith. Only then could such a debate occur. Otherwise, it is simply glorified opinion stating, with neither side actually considering the other's arguments.
Of course, most people don't actually care about other people's arguments. Most people are generally satisfied that they are in the right, and that anyone who disagrees with them is simply ignorant. For the most part this tendency is kept under the table. This is why we don't talk about religion, politics, or recent events at a fancy dinner. Today, the situation is somewhat worse. Most people, when confronted with an argument (even poorly conceived) against their position can revert to the line: "well, we should agree to disagree." This is where the philosopher is needed, and desperately. Knowledge, truth does not mean anything any more if people can't tell when something is proved and when something isn't. At this point, it's not so much the job of the philosopher to explain why the argument is right or wrong, it's simply to try to let people realize that arguments matter. Why do you believe what you believe? What's your justification for it? What are the holes in its conception? What are the advantages of thinking in a slightly different way?
One person commented, "The problem of the BELIEVER is: s/he believes they know the truth (and, therefore, can never come to the truth)." This, of course, is something I believe to be slightly more universal, and it is in solving that problem that the philosopher can be of help to the world.
And I was doing so well, too...
Christmas break always is a bad time for me when it comes to keeping in touch with people. First of all, I'm usually going back to a place where my laptop doesn't have the constant access to the internet that I've become used to in college. That keeps me from checking and sending e-mail, and of course updating my blog. This Christmas I went to visit some old friends of mine in England, and they don't have internet at all, which in some ways was actually a nice break, but it also meant I was essentially cut off from a lot of the things I pay attention to. I mean, what if I needed to find out some useless information? I couldn't just go and check it out on wikipedia. I honestly don't know what I did with all my time without youtube, either.
I have noticed, however, that it is not just the access or lack of access to the internet that makes me more or less likely to post. I've been back from Suffolk for a pretty good amount of time now. I did have a friend of mine visit from Germany, but I could still have posted while he was here, though not when I took him to London. The fact is, I've noticed, that I really need to have a set schedule before I can get to posting. At Gonzaga, this isn't really a problem. I have my schedule all set up for me. In England, we're pretty much on our own for most days of the week. We have a couple of hours in a week that we need to be at a certain place; other than that, it's all on us. Besides that, this is the first time I've lived in a house rather than in the dorms. This means I have more stuff to keep track of: food, laundry, keeping the bathrooms clean. Strangely enough, this situation seems to motivate me to get all of my work done. I am more disciplined here than I have been at Gonzaga. Sometimes, I think this is just because the work here is harder, but I think a lot of it is just because I have more freedom regarding my choices.
On the other hand, this all falls apart when classes are over and I don't have anything to do anymore. My natural instinct is to be lazy. I have a very hard time getting anything done when the basic goals of the week that I become used to disappear. This break, I've read maybe half the books I wanted to. I haven't cleaned my room, even though every time I walk in I am reminded how much I should. I procrastinate in buying food, to the point where I often wonder what is the better choice - going out at 8 p.m. to buy groceries or to just eat cereal with no milk. I haven't written much. While I was at my friends' house for Christmas, I spent a couple of hours every night before I went to sleep writing a story that I've been working on for a long time. I could do that because I kept a rhythm, but now that I'm back here, but without anything specific to do, all of my energies just dissipate.
I'm not particularly worried about this phenomenon. Next week I start my tutorials, and I'll get back into a rhythm, even if that means I won't be able to have as much time to get "outside" reading done. I simply find it interesting how much easier it is for some people, at least, to pay attention to things when they can block out everything else. "This is something I need to do, this is something I would like to do. I better do the former before I get to the latter." I suppose not all people need be like this. I'm sure there are people one could put into a room with no particular instructions, and they would figure out something to do without any other prompting. I'm sure there are also people that need every hour of their life scheduled out by other people before they can get to work and actually be useful. But in any case, there is a discrete influence by our sensibilities that affect our attitude and attention. I suppose it is possible that I could just gird myself and change my attitude, without having outside influences change. But it seems like a major part of human existence to have one's attitude reflect one's situation, as strange as that may sound. Philosophers and psychologists have wondered for years why people obey orders that they personally disapprove of, just because it is given by a superior. They ask why people in a mock up prison acting like prisoners start being more docile, while the guards become more sadistic. Nothing fundamental or essential has changed: these are the same people, except with the perception of a change of sensibilities.
My introspection is obviously not a contribution in any real way to the solution of these problems, but it seems clear to me that there is a three way connection between one's actual situation, one's attitude, and one's response that is far more complicated and intricate than most people think about.
Anyway, all that to say that I'll be updating more frequently starting next week; also, a peephole into the way my mind works. Hope you came out this side unscathed.
