Learning
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Philosophy Module Week 3
A Whole Lot of Culture…and Lecturing 17 hours later and I’m DONE. I just finished Paul A. Cantor’s lecture series on Commerce and Culture. It was good but lengthy. From Shakespeare to video games to the Casablanca movie. Cantor spoke on how culture, art, economics and the market work together, and what viewpoints have produced the best results over time. A consistent theme was that art thrives in the free market. Another consistent idea presented was that art has changed over time, and it has almost always concerned people as it changes. Art created in a free, or commercial market means that artists have incentive to create art that people…
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Define Your Terms – Praxis Wednesday Response
Last night our module got to speak with James Walpole. Although it was really just a conversation between the four of us on the call I found a few notes to take away and appreciated the discussion overall. Something that stuck out to me was when James mentioned defining your terms. This further confirmed a debate/argument technique that I had actually heard before from some of my favorite political thinkers. It ensures you are speaking about the same things, and that you know what the other person is talking about and arguing for or against. Another favorite point from the conversation was that if you use a fallacy admit it…
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Art in Motion (Picture)
Throughout history, different art forms have been doubted, from the novel to the movie to the video game. Many in society saw movies s as being too different when they first came into existence to be seen as art, critics claim they were too complicated, commercialized, or counter-culture. When the movie came about many wanted to call it an art form but that was soon challenged as many people wanted to pin down a particular artist for each film. The problem was that even for the greatest motion picture works, this was and is largely impossible. Critics would judge that directors were writing what the audience wanted. Cantor points out…
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Philosophy Module Week 2
The second week of the module was really helpful. I learned about how to construct an argument from start to finish, and how to make all my points valid, and how to avoid invalid arguments, or fallacies, that is. Arguments can be good. We learn a lot more by discussing issues and claims and backing them up with arguments then we do by just spitting facts back and forth, or avoiding arguments as a whole. Fallacies are invalid arguments. I hadn’t really realized before what explicitly constituted an invalid argument, and how I may have been misled by them in the past. Now I know more about what to look,…
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Luxury Versus Necesity in Society
The first artist came to be because society could support them. In our latest Praxis lecture, the teacher talked about how there is an economic basis for culture; because artists do not create their own means and therefore reveal a relatively sophisticated society (paraphrased, Paul A. Cantor). This lecture acknowledged that commercialization is more often than not good for the creation of art, as is capitalism. Both these force an artist to perform well to create valuable work that others are willing to sacrifice a hard-earned dollar for. A lasting thought I had concerned Paul’s quote: “The line between artists and non-artists is increasingly blurred” (Cantor). That is, as our society…
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Try Something New, Even if it Seems Daunting
I’ve found myself with the opportunity to try new and unique things, as partially evidenced by my unicycling and swing dance articles. Trying new things often means going out on our own to experience something new. It often means a little investment, even if just buying a ticket to attend a unique event. It also usually means were putting ourselves in a circumstance that people in our normal circles may not know much about. Going outside of the “normal” can be truly freeing, and wonderful though, it means we feel so satisfied when we’ve followed through with our intentions because we took the step ourselves. Your parents didn’t sign you…
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The Truth of a Claim Doesn’t Depend on the Person Saying It.
Fallacies. Arguments tend to have at least one or two pop up, and who could blame someone if they don’t know better. It’s a fairly easy way to make it sound like you know more than you do or have more arguments for your claim than you do. From popularity claims to red herrings, and straw man arguments there’s a number of options out there as well. I thought that the concept of understanding that the truth of a claim doesn’t depend on whether or not someone lives it out or not, was a very helpful fact to learn it made me realize that my search for truth is ongoing…
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Why Good Salesmen are Not the Enemy
Ever since seeing people selling things at my door and my parent’s getting telemarketing calls on the land line ,and believe it or not, taking a sales class in college, I’ve had a sour taste in my mouth for sales, and although I don’t think I want it to be my job -because I love marketing- I think I now see the value in it, especially in business. Last night’s Praxis Wednesday was all about sales and we were joined by Jack Sayler he talked about the art and science behind the sales industry. We were encouraged to think about solutions ourselves before going to managers, this helps you be…
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Arguments Aren’t What You Think They Are
My latest Praxis lesson talked about the actual prerequisites required to develop an argument and what an argument actually is. An argument is the idea that backs up a claim which is a determined side of an issue, you need both an issue and a claim to have an arugment. I can sometimes be argumentative, and for a while I was led to believe that this was mostly bad. This isn’t true at all, in fact -one could argue- you are making a claim if you aren’t stating an explanation, question, command, phrase, or pronouncement; and if you are making a claim you should therefore have an argument to back…
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Consider the Unlikely, Sometimes.
Hypotheticals in philosophy are part of the reason I’ve been frustrated by philosophy in the past. My latest Praxis lesson was how to navigate hypotheticals, and appreciated that the article acknowledged that some hypotheticals are not helpful and do not need to be analyzed. Others, though, provide an opportunity for us as people to think about where our convictions and beliefs lie. Good hypotheticals are qualified by two very different functions. Either they devise practical contingency or the help to achieve intellectual clarity. The first helps us consider different options while the other clears up different points of view and what they might mean – in a nutshell. So now…
