paper proposal deadine

the proposal for a paper should be written this week and handed to me next monday (or tuesday for TR classes).

It consists of one or two paragraphs describing:

1. tentative title and topic (remember you have three topics to pic from),
2. your position (pro or con),
3. a tentative bibliography, sources, etc.

at the top of the proposal, write down your name & class/time.

thought experiment

some of you have brought the issue of thought experiment in class.

why do we need them?

1- to challenge the prevailing status quo (which includes activities such as correcting misinformation (or misapprehension), 
2- to identify flaws in argument(s) presented, 
3- to preserve (for the long-term) objectively established fact, and 
4- to refute specific assertions that some particular thing is permissible, forbidden, known, believed, possible, or necessary); 
5- to extrapolate beyond (or interpolate within) the boundaries of already established fact; 
6- to predict and forecast the (otherwise) indefinite and unknowable future; explain the past; the retrodiction, postdiction and hind-casting of the (otherwise) indefinite and unknowable past; 
7- to facilitate decision making, choice and strategy selection; solve problems, and generate ideas; 
8- to move current (often insoluble) problems into another, more helpful and more productive problem space (e.g., see functional fixedness); 
9- to attribute causation, preventability, blame and responsibility for specific outcomes; 
10- to assess culpability and compensatory damages in social and legal contexts; 
11- to ensure the repeat of past success; 
12- to examine the extent to which past events might have occurred differently. 
13- to ensure the (future) avoidance of past failures.

string theory

a great site discussing string theory.

the brain

check out this site explaining how the brain works.

T,R 9:50am class

T 5:40pm class

MWF, 11am class

is atheism a religion? (first post for comment)

take a look at this interesting discussion from the n y times debate section.

the news is that atheists now have a church (figure, if theists have then, why not the other side?).

let's frame the issue: atheists are on the rise (theists too, but that has always been the norm through the ages). also, we shouldn't presuppose that philosophers are atheists.

here is gary gutting writes from the philosopher's agnostic corner:

On the one hand, religions express perennial human impulses and aspirations that cannot plausibly be rejected out of hand as foolish or delusional.  The idea that there is simply nothing worthwhile in religion is as unlikely as the idea that there is nothing worthwhile in poetry, art, philosophy or science.  On the other hand, taken at their literal word, many religious claims are at best unjustified and at worst absurd or repugnant.  There may be deep truths in religions, but these may well not be the truths that the religions themselves officially proclaim.

to problematize the issue, then he adds:

Atheism may be intellectually viable, but it requires its own arguments and can’t merely cite the lack of decisive evidence for religion.  Further, unless atheists themselves have a clearly superior case for their denial of theistic religion, then agnosticism (doubting both religion and atheism) remains a viable alternative.  The no-arguments argument for atheism fails.

this moving paragraph comes from an atheist:

The atheist is free to concentrate on the fate of this world — whether that means visiting a friend in a hospital or advocating for tougher gun control laws — without trying to square things with an unseen overlord in the next. Atheists do not want to deny religious believers the comfort of their faith. We do want our fellow citizens to respect our deeply held conviction that the absence of an afterlife lends a greater, not a lesser, moral importance to our actions on earth.

assignment: read the nytimes discussion (there are 6 different takes).

what is your idea? elaborate a minimum 150-word comment and post it with your name at the bottom. this is the first post/comment assignment of the semester. the deadline for posting your comment is friday february 1 @ 11pm.   

debate, part 2

take a look at this new york times editorial. 

it has 6 responses to the issue of the gun controversy. read the synopsis. the issue here is not prohibition. this discussion is more nuanced.

i advance some points:

1- second amendment to the constitution and its history.
2- the downside (social price) to pay. 
3- there are approximate 300 million guns in circulation in the US alone.
4- take a look at the so called scholarly commentaries to the discussion (click here and scroll down). this is the discussion judges have when they read and write opinions. (by the way take a look at the difference between majority opinion and dissenting opinion). 

as you can see this discussion boils down to how we discuss personal freedoms (civil liberties). what are the limits of personal freedom?

_____________

we could try a debate in class. some student volunteers to read the different takes & pick one he/she feels comfortable with. this is the position he/she will defend.

i'd like to be able to do this as an exercise in class next wednesday, depending. it would be good to have at least three or four different points of view.

of course, i'll moderate the debate. 

how to win a point

we need to learn how to discuss and win a point.

T is a topic,
our opponent makes a point P to defend T.

try to establish that P is not relevant for T.

* is P contradictory? if P is contradictory it cannot be relevant. P is contradictory when affirms what it denies. sometimes this is not obvious.

ex. "killing is wrong," but "killing is self defense is not wrong."
if killing is wrong, then killing in self defense is wrong, since killing in self-defense is an example of killing. 

finding contradictions is the best way to defeat your opponent and with a little training it can be done easily.   

* is P necessary? if it's not, you're already proving lack of relevance. we already talked about this.

* is P circular? P being circular means that P is redundant. for example, a text being "true" because it's "sacred." something being true "because one is sure of it".

* is P fallacious? there are many fallacies.   if one can establish that P is fallacious one has shown that P is irrelevant to T.

infinite universe?

today we talked about the possibility of an infinite universe @ T,R 9:50am class.

my tentative response was perlmutter and schmidt's hypothesis: the universe is expanding at an accelerating rate.

is the universe "infinite?" not in time. U has a beginning, it's ± 13.7 billions years old.

do you mean infinite in the amount of matter? if U has "Z" particles they then each particle can be counted (provided one has enough time to do it). 

next, infinite spatially?

if it keeps expanding you would think that it keeps reaching "more of" something. 

space has to be defined as a distance between 2 points. without points "to breach" there is no space.

*but this widening of U is measured in time.
*if U reaches X a limit "L" then it stops expanding. there is always a ∆L of expansion.
*but then U is the container of space, which is... space! that is to say, U is being defined as the expanding of space then it's the expanding of itself, which is kind of circular. 

if U has a L, then presumably, U cannot be infinite. some hypotheses point in this direction (even a quadrillion, 10¹⁵ years, is a small infinitesimal of "evermore").

we need a phi 2010 club

there is always a place for philosophers to chill. this is the philosophy club. it's yours, but you have to create it.

submit your name here if you think you are philosophy material.

1- you love disagreeing with your parents and friends about politics and religion. you are basically a curious animal.
2- your boyfriend/girlfriend is in awe of your verbal skills (perhaps the relationship hinges on this point).
3- you don't hate math (or any science for that matter). you're careful characterizing people and situations.
4- your power of abstraction is patent (as you often find yourself lost in public places -or aimlessly driving for no reason).
4- you either wear glasses or are attracted by people who wear them.
5- 1-4 doesn't make you any nerdier or weirder. in any case, don't mind people calling you names (they wished they had your skills).

by the way, 1-5 is in jest.

if you're interested. write down your name here. we'll pick president, vice, treasurer and secretary. 

what's philosophy? (for now)

welcome all.

my classes are a bit unorthodox.

for example, the class rudiments: homework revision, strict. "home," not 10 minute-before-triff-class. "work," give it time. be patient.
 
class participartion: mandatory. talk or die. you're never wrong, students are young by definition (a 60 y old student is young in my book). let's put it this way. you're lucky: if there is a time to be wrong this is the time. i'm with you.

from the git-go you need to learn to build arguments and debate them.
why? beliefs work in synch with structural propositions. you do what you think. we have to get into the thinking to modify the doing.

what's an argument? a nugget, a treasure. you have to learn how to build it.

in class we analyze arguments and proceed to take them apart. this is what i call problematizing.

philosophy is a problematizing activity.

this is the phi 2010 blog for all my classes, please follow it

thanks for the company

phi 2070 was nice. lots of things said, broody exchanges, passionate discussions, foolish moments, possible future friendships,

thanks.

peace & love. keep in touch

art by nychos

you all have happy holidays. it's been a real pleasure!

atRifF
ps: keep in touch through mbourbaki.

Topics for the final exam

The topics for the final (tuesday, december 18 @ 12:40pm) are:

Zen techniques
Wu wei
Confucianism
Taoism

the exam will have the same format than last test. i.e., fill in the blanks for main terms or concepts. the essay question for the final will be to write a page about your favorite theme from within taoism and zen. 

how to present the final paper

the final paper must be presented on the day of the final exam.1,200 words, doubled spaced, stapled.

*no binders
*no cover page

ryokan and the art of poetry

Chinese poems

Walking beside a clear running river, I come to a farmhouse.
The evening chill has given way to the warmth of the
morning sun.
Sparrows gather in a bamboo grove, voices fluttering
here and there.
I meet the old farmer returning to his home;
He greets me like a long-lost friend.
At his cottage, the farmer's wife heats sakè
While we eat freshly picked vegetables and chat.
Together, gloriously drunk, we no longer know
The meaning of unhappiness.

Yesterday I went to town begging food from east to west.
My shoulders are getting thinner and I cannot recall the
last time I had a heavy rice sack.
The thick frost is a continual reminder of my thin robe.
My old friends, where have they gone?
Even new faces are few.
As I walk toward the deserted summer pavilion,
Nothing but the wind of late autumn blowing through
the pines and oaks.

Autum night -- unable to sleep, I leave my tiny cottage.
Fall insects cry under the rocks, and
The cold branches are sparsely covered.
Far away, from deep in the valley, the sound of water.
The moon rises slowly over the highest peak;
I stand there quietly for a long time and
My robe becomes moist with dew.

Returning to my hermitage after filling my rice bowl,
Now only the gentle glow of twilight.
Surrounded by mountain peaks and thinly scattered leaves;
In the forest a winter crow flies.

My life may appear melancholy,
But traveling through this world
I have entrusted myself to Heaven.
In my sack, three sho of rice;
By the hearth, a bundle of firewood.
If someone asks what is the mark of enlightenment
or illusion,

I cannot say -- wealth and honor are nothing but dust.
As the evening rain falls I sit in my hermitage
And stretch out both feet in answer.

The Long Winter Night: 3 poems 

The long winter night! The long winter night seems endless;
When will it be day?
No flame in the lamp nor charcoal in the fireplace;
Lying in bed, listening to the sound of freezing rain.

To an old man, dreams come easy;
I let my thoughts drift.
The room is empty and both the sakè and the oil are used up --
The long winter night.

When I was a boy studying in an empty hall,
Over and over I had to fill the lamp with oil.
Even now, that task is disagreeable --
The long winter night.

Green mountains front and back,
White clouds east and west.
Even if I met a fellow traveler,
No news could I give him.

Deep in the mountains at night, alone in my hermitage,
I listen to the plaintive sound of rain and snow.
A monkey cries on top of a mountain;
The sound of the valley river has faded away.
A light flickers in front of the window;
On the desk, the water in the inkstone has dried.
Unable to sleep all night,
I prepare ink and brush, and write this poem.

Winter -- in the eleventh month
Snow falls thick and fast.
A thousand mountains, one color.
Men of the world passing this way are few.
Dense grass conceals the door.
All night in silence, a few woodchips burn slowly
As I read the poems of the ancients.

Loneliness: spring has already passed.
Silence: I close the gate.
From heaven, darkness; the wisteria arbor is no longer
visible. The stairway is overgrown with herbs
And the rice bag hangs from the fence.
Deep stillness, long isolated from the world.
All night the hototogisu cries.

phallocentrism as a history of the world

atRifF

yesterday, after briefly introducing immanuel kant (MWF class 11am) i said that kant was a "phallocentric" philosopher.* i didn't mean that as an insult. had i been born in 1724, i would not have been that different, if not probably worse, than herr kant. then i said that "the history of the world is a history of phallocentrism" (also meant androcentrism and patriarchy).

i'm aware generalizations of this sort are problematic. but i stand behind them. mind you, i don't owe to this realization to self-discovery. i have learned these ideas from the courageous work of many feminist women. they finally made their plight known. all the while, men were -for the most part- silent. and when the time came to harken women's claims of servitude and exploitation, men felt, well, threatened. & they fought back. why? what was a stake was -men thought- too dear & significant to loose: political power. 

to realize that patriarchy & phallocentrism characterize the history of the world just follow the smell. for centuries upon centuries, who enjoyed absolute political power?* men (east & west). who exercised it? men. who owned the sources of wealth, means of production, capital, etc? men. who were the prophets, scribes and priests? mostly men. who enjoyed the kingdoms and fiefdoms? men. who had best access to schools and universities? men. who are the great artists and poets of antiquity & the great scientists of the ages? men. until the 20th century women were non-political entities!

(what's the role of women in world politics today? roughly a 20%. what progress!

which brings us to philosophy & the importance to question our received assumptions. the mysterious alliance between history and phallocentrism becomes an imperative: why?

from the patriarchal & androcentric POV men enjoyed more opportunities by keeping women exploited. they were taken care of, made wives & had offspring because of women. kant can lend us a hand here. his second formulation counsels: treat people as ends and never as means to an end. the male philosopher makes a fabulous argument in favor of a symmetry that he didn't really practice. men enjoyed centuries of, how to put it? uncontested impunity.

men are smart enough to come up with all sorts of justifications for their historic mess: 1- it's the woman's biology!  women bearing children and being less fit to take the early tough tasks of hunting and fighting for survival. 2- the sociological hypothesis of patriarchy claims that fathers (paterfamilias) assume an important "roles". some of these roles seem structural, as in the case of  maurice godelier's hypothesis that paterfamilias as provider of  financial support and making critical decisions, some of which must be obeyed without question by the rest of the family members. but following godelier's marxist argument, there must be economic conditions of production that perpetuate this sort of system. what's first, the chicken or the egg? 3- freudian psychoanalysis elaborataes the "penis envy" & "hysteria" hypotheses. did freud ever think that his sexual perceptions of what it is like to be a woman begged the question of his own gender? not that i know.  yet in honor to freud, he was able to observe that, as feminist naomi goldenberg puts it, "God the Father was responsible for keeping huge portions of the human community stupid" (goldenberg, p. 27).

it's at this point that i sensed a resistance from young, smart, males in the class. jeremy objected: "what is the problem of god being male (or father)?" none whatsoever. but remember that a woman may equally retort, "why not a female god?"

ideas come from language and language comes from practice & habits. women feminists have thought us how phallocentric language works. words carry a memory. they express cultural conventions & habits: "all men are created equal," words like "actor," "firemen," "chairman", "freshman," "salesman," "man-made," and so on, (these words in fact show who were in charge of these professions) "mankind," "fatherland." in spanish "patria" sounds feminine but it's masculine as in french "la patrie", german "vaterland." is this use of language not androcentric?

at some point aslan interjected that the east had a different history than the west. he mentioned a few islamic scholars, philosophers, scribes, etc. well, the west has them too. that doesn't change history's history because these examples constitute a negligible minority. in fact, defending this negligible minority only corroborates my point of male resistance to phallocentrism's alliance with history. 

of course, this discussion of whether god is male or female happens because we as humans need to  anthropomorphize theology's huge abstractions (god is the best example that comes to mind). ok, let's agree that the god of monotheism doesn't have gender. if god has the attributes that theology endows (which gender you prefer now? him, her, IT?) with, god has to be genderless.

yet, phallocentic language stubbornly re-appears. in the bible: "Not that any man has seen the Father, except the One who is from God; He has seen the Father." (john 6:46). in the Qur'an 112:3–4: "He begets not, nor is He begotten. And none is like Him [It]."

theologians (christian, islamic) retort that "he" really means "it", but the problem is that humans are gender-centric. Hu or Huwa are commonly translated as he. ** check out this video. an islamic scholar is presented with the same question: is allah a he or she? he tries really hard to explain that though referred to as he, allah is really genderless. but his explanation is totally circular. why? it begs the question on the use of language! which is precisely the feminist point: allah is genderless! yet, it's presented as he. why? oh, because of the conventions of the arabic language. and what are language conventions if not practices and habits translated into language?

the question persists, why? 
_________________________

feminist and scholar amina wadud in her excellent Quran and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text from a Woman's Perspective explains:

 (...) The established order within the Arabian peninsula at the time of the revelation was patriarchal: a 'culture built on a structure of domination and subordination ...' which 'demands hierarchy'. It was a culture with an androcentric bias, one where the male and the male experience are looked upon as the norm. (wadud, p. 79)

let's give the male species the benefit of the doubt. when they handle & own theology, (philosophy, science, etc) they forget they become androcentric. this is what wadud calls "male authority": 

Although the basis of Qur'anic discussion on society was particular to the existing system, it also gives general principles from which to derive solutions to social problems in other contexts. With regard to authority, the prevailing attitudes were patriarchal. As with other matters in society, the Qur'anic solutions to social problems reflect the prevailing attitudes in ancient Arabia. The general principle for leadership in the Qur'an is similar to the rule for fulfilling any task, that it should be filled by the one 'best suited'. That person is the one best suited on the basis of whatever qualifications or characteristics are necessary to fulfil that task: biology, psychology, education, finance, experience, etc. This principle works in a number of complex social arrangements: the family, society at large and leadership. (wadud, p. 88)

 wadud cites islamic scholar Al-Zamakhshari, who stated:

(...) that men are 'preferred' by Allah over women in terms of 'intelligence, physical constitution, determination and physical strength', although he cites no place in the text which states this. Such an assertion cannot be erased by saying that 'men have no right to overcome women by coercion, or display arrogant behaviour towards them'. Al-'Aqqad says that men deserve preference over women. (wadud, p. 35)

a note: when i said to aslan "i am arab" (which frankly doesn't add anything to the argument), my intention was merely to show you that i also feel invested and not just being flippant about these important issues. this is a minor point. 

____________________
* kant, listing all those unfit to vote because of their dependence and subordination, remarked that they (women) had "no civil personality and their existence is, so to speak, purely inherent." He included in this group "women in general" (anne phillips, p. 108). after the enlightenment, men's "sexual contract" was essentially an agreement among men on sexual hierarchy based on sexual difference. & this difference would be used to exclude women from citizenship and keep them subordinate within families. ** so, as it were, androcentrism enters through the back door of theology. i'd like to share with you some feminist views from the middle east:

the well-known declaration of women in islamic societies of 1997 (signed by a distinguished group of middle eastern scholars and muslim feminists, amongst them: mahnaz afkhami, seema kazi, mervat tallawy, etc).

egyptian author mona eltahawy on aljezeera.

repressive policies against women in iran.

fatema mernessi, a well-known arab feminist presents the problem as such:

in western culture, sexual inequality is based in the biological inferiority of the woman. in islam is the contrary, the system is based on the assumption that the woman is powerful and dangerous. all sexual institutions (polygamy, repudiation, sexual segregation) cab be perceived as a strategy for containing her power. 

it needs to be said that feminism in islam is a variegated phenomena. there is islamic feminism (with proponents like ziba mir-hosseini, mai yamani & nilufer gole, they deal with the issues of equality from within islam). for many of them the issue of discrimination and exploitation of women comes not from the teachings of the quran, but instead from prevalent androcentric attitudes of men's interpretations and fabrication of theological systems within islam. islamic feminists work within the traditions to preserve and change them. some are conciliatory, some are more radical. malika hamidi, french, of algerian origin, points to the needs of muslim women:

"victims of domestic violence, polygamy, those threatened with honor killings, circumcision, discrimination of all sorts, forced marriages, with little Turkish and Moroccan girls in Brussels just disappearing to be married. Muslim women are not involved enough in these debates, but we have to denounce that these are traditional and cultural practices - it has nothing to do with Islam."

let's come back to our initial question. if none of this has to do with islam (christianity, judaism, hinduism, you name it), why does it happen? 

Immediateness

According to Zen intellectualizations, concepts, even language itself are inadequate for expressing our experience as it is experienced.

We go through life thinking that our words and ideas mirror what we experience, but repeatedly we discover that the distinctions taken to be true are mental constructs. In verbalizing something, we may have a lingering sense of having compromised part of our experience, but we continue to devise new categories, new names for new things, more distinctions when a moment before there were no distinctions.

The goal of Zen training is to break down our dependence on categories that interfere with the directness and immediacy of experience, but this does not mean that thought stops altogether.

The Zen student is interested in preserving immediacy, but the myriad forms of life situations present a baffling assortment of possibilities to which one must respond.

Thought is effective only when it arises spontaneously out of a problematic situation.

which war? mine!

atRifF

what is war? "a condition of active antagonism."

antagonism? the "condition of being an opposing principle, force, or factor."

as opposed to what? which force? to be is to continually wage a battle with opposing instincts within oneself. a dynamic conflict of domination and subordination. to be means taking sides against oneself.

with this premise of "internal opposition" i'd like to probe an ancient taoist text, the art of war.
let's backtrack to philosopher f. nietzsche, who speaks a constant "wrestling of opposite forces." reality for nietzsche, is a flux of contradictions. an authentic individual must not only acknowledge this fact, but seek to promote similar oppositions within himself:

(...) a given quality contends against itself and separates into opposites; everlastingly these opposites seek to reunite. odinary people fancy they see something rigid, complete and permanent. in truth, however, light and dark, bitter and sweet are attached to each other and interlocked at any given moment like wrestlers of whom sometimes the one, sometimes the other is on top. (PTAG, 5)

a wrestling act. here's another one: "one is fruitful only at the cost of being rich in contradictions; one remains young only on condition the soul does not relax, does not long for peace." (TI, morality as antinature, 3)

this nietszchean auto-poesis (the making of oneself) is fundamental to overcome the stagnation posed by self-satisfaction, which paradoxically is something we all seek.  change means (inner) conflict engendered by opposites (friend, enemy, self). authentic self is he/she who is determined by this intensity of self-oppositions.

let's not beat around the bush. we can now entertain the opening words in the art of war:

1. military action is important. it's the ground of death and life... so it is imperative to examine it.

how can there be a "military" of oneself?

military relates to armed forces. soldiers! what's a soldier? one who actively serves a cause. which?

one, any, whether event or condition in which one is responsible for an action or result. 

i can see myself as a soldier on my way to battle with myself in an unforeseen event. any situation is in principle a pure beginning. here we must accept the uncertainty principle: everything begins in confusion and obscurity. the emergence of clarity is the result of this internal wrestling which leads to never-ending clarification. am i not responsible for this most significant cause? is is not mine? is it not my duty to fight? (think of the literal? non- literal? meaning of the b. gita).  

is this the end?

(...) he who has overcome his passions has entered into possession of the most fertile ground … to sow the seeds of good spiritual works in the soil of the subdued passions is then the immediate urgent task. the overcoming itself is only a means, not a goal; if it is not so viewed, all kinds of weeds and devilish nonsense will quickly spring up in this rich soil now unoccupied, and soon there will be more rank confusion than there ever was before. (WS, 53)

a new battle will have to be fought. and why not? 

enough said.

i'm closing this post next wednesday at 11pm.   

The Chuang Tzu

Excerpts from The Chuang Tzu.

until we have an answer

we had a discussion last class (11am, MWF). rather it was a moment in the discussion when imane made a point about trying to understand that some good can come out of history's horrors, i.e., this grasping can make us understand & build character, that besides the absurd horror, there's something redeemable.

i can see imane's point & agree with her up to a point, but i need to make very clear why i still have a problem with this argument.

this is not just suffering we're talking about, but unnecessary, undeserved, unfair, suffering that for ever destroys a life. worst yet, nonredeemable in the sense that it is anonymous & forgotten. we feel for those that we have loved and pass on. they are gone but are part of our memories. how about this interminable legion of nobodies throughout history? women, children, young men, elderly: talented, hopeful, bright, with full lives ahead of them. sentenced by being-there, in the wrong time & place. victims of ignorance, backwardness, hatred, hypocrisy, victims no one ever cared for. an interminable choir of ghosts with no past to claim for justice. where are they? can we see their faces, can we fathom their harrowing fate?

until we have an answer, it's better to just be quiet and silent. to keep silence, deliberately, not to try anything other than to honor their forgotten memory.

red meat, cancer, heart disease

heed the advice while there's time:

People who ate more red meat were less physically active and more likely to smoke and had a higher body mass index, researchers found. Still, after controlling for those and other variables, they found that each daily increase of three ounces of red meat was associated with a 12 percent greater risk of dying over all, including a 16 percent greater risk of cardiovascular death and a 10 percent greater risk of cancer death.

Tao Te Ching

for the sake of simplicity, i found this translation by s mitchell.

phallocentric power twice

this late 19th century poster illustrates phallocentric power @ the height of the struggle for women's suffrage in the U.S. take a look at the role of "men." a policeman hold the woman down, he reddish nose a sign of having been "attacked" by a "masculine woman" (epithet used against the suffragettes at the time).

 
a dapper mustached man vexingly steps on the woman's chest while force-feeding her through a funnel. "men" resent women's claim for political equality (in so doing, they are betrayed by their own representation). the "victims" are now the torturers who deprive  women of their freedom to go on a huger strike for being arbitrarily detained (for protesting men's political inequality?) this is how men protect their right not to be infringed upon by women.

and why not -all the while- have a little fun?

but meanings multiply with contexts: a little more than a century later water-boarding becomes a policy of state. the phallocentric method remains, now with different subjects. instead of women, now we got terrorists. both suffrage and terror are subversive acts.

who is the well-dressed man?

Confucius' Analects

The Analects.

length of our final paper

our final paper should be around 1,200 words. that's about 4 pages, double spaced.

i want to see some paper outlines!

don't forget to vote!

i don't think there's a more important ritual right now.