The Christian Vanguard

When I was a Protestant, our college ministry would have these really early morning prayers where all the guys would go on top of Signal Hill and pray. We would gather in a circle and go around and do a little prayer. And by itself a 2 or three minute prayer isn't bad, but, when you have a couple of guys who are just trying to flex, a 3 minute prayers in a circle of about 15 guys can mean just standing in a circle for a solid 45 minutes, and I wasn't having it. So when it was my turn to pray, all I said was, "Dear God, please bless me with millions and millions of dollars. Amen." I was kinda making a point, and I was being a butthead about it. Afterwards, my friend Max came up to me, and he told me, "Dude, I looked up and Steve just gave you the maddest look. It was hilarious." Indeed, it was.  So, what exactly is wrong here? Maybe the execution of the prayer, in that context, but I want to look at the content. The content of the prayer did, at the time, see

The following is a draft of a final paper I had to turn in for my Analytic Philosophy paper. Enjoy.  Russell’s Structural Collapse In this paper, I critically examine Bertrand Russell’s theory on the relationship between our sense-data and physics. Russell aims to show that we construct about the world from our sense-data, we do not infer the world from our sense-data. He does this by arguing from analogy. Since we do away with hypothetical entities in math, then we should do it in physics. The relative property between math and physics in Russell’s view is that physics really is just reducible to math. However, I show that there are problems with the mathematical content of the analogy itself and Russell’s understanding between the relationship of math and physics which absurdly tells little to nothing than what we commonly understand physics tells us, thus making his argument by analogy a weak one.  Russell is out to set out a theory concerning the relationship between sense-data and

The following is an essay I had to turn in for my analytic philosophy class.  Analytic philosophy begins with Immanuel Kant and his distinction between analytic and synthetic propositions. Analytic propositions are those which express nothing in the predicate which is not already in the concept, whereas synthetic propositions are those which do predicate something to the subject, and thus amplifies our knowledge (“Prolegomena” p.10).1Because the predicate is already thought up in the concept, all analytic propositions have the property of being a priori in nature, whereas synthetic propositions can be either a priori or a posteriori (Ibid. p.10).2There is some contention about whether there really is synthetic a priori knowledge, however, since synthetic judgments are often thought to come from experience, which doesn’t seem to be part of what it means to be a priori.3Kant argues that mathematical judgements are synthetic a priori, since they do not directly rely on the principle of no

These last few weeks, my car has been making a really bad screeching noise. I kind of hoped it would go away, but it only got louder and louder as time went on. So I finally decided to drop it off at a mechanic. They told me they could find no noise. I went back, drove around with one of the mechanics in the passenger seat, and sure enough, my car made no noise. I'm sure this has happened to many of us before.  I'm going to force a metaphorical reading on this event, so I have something to write about. When we have issues, we tend to lash out. Sometimes it is a cry for help. And after a while, the screeching in our souls becomes so loud, we go see someone to help fix us, but really, we just need to vent and have someone hear us. We just need to release some things, just talk to someone, and then we're all good and dandy once again.  Some time ago, I wrote about feeling a need to cry, but being unable to do so. That it was building up pressure, and I didn't know when it

 Sir Roger Scruton presents an argument in his book Beauty: A Very Short Introduction against the transcendental nature of beauty. To be clear, he is only presenting it, not endorsing it. He writes, "Why believe p ? Because it it is true. Why want x ? Because it is good. Why look at y ? Because it is beautiful. In some way, philosophers have argued, those answers are on a par...Someone who asked 'why believe what is true' or 'why want what is good' has failed to understand the nature of reasoning...Does the same go for beauty?...To say as much is to overlook the subversive nature of beauty. Someone charmed by a myth may be tempted to believe it: and in this case beauty is the enemy of truth...A man attracted to a woman may be tempted to condone her vices: and in this case beauty is the enemy of goodness...Goodness and truth never compete...The pursuit of beauty, however, is far more questionable." The argument states that since transcendentals have this qualit

In rationality and decision theory, we have the Maximin principle, which states that we look at the worst possible outcomes of every act, and choose the act which produces the least worst outcome. So, if I have to choose between two investments, say Apple and Google, and if the worst case scenario for my Apple investment is I lose $100 and the worst case scenario for my Google investment is that I lose $200, then under the Maximin principle, I should choose to invest in Apple over Google. That is, if course, if I want to minimize my losses.  There is something pessimistic about the Maximin principle. If for example, the best case scenario for my Google investment is that I profit 1 million dollars and the best case scenario for my Apple investment is I profit 5 thousand dollars, then we may be rational to choose Google over Apple. But I want to focus on the pessimism because I get the sense that many people are pessimistic about politics and the election these days. So, can the pessimi

I had to give a 5 min presentation on Gottlob Frege for my Analytic Philosophy class. I had a powerpoint, but I wrote out the entirety of what I said. Here it is. Frege had several important ideas, and one of the more important ones was his championing of this view called “Logicism”. So what is Logicism? So Logicism is the view that math can be reduced to logical statements, thus making math a branch of logic. Just as there are branches in philosophy, like Ethics, Logic, Metaphysics, and those branches have sub branches, like in Ethics you can branch off into ethical theory, and applied ethics, so Frege wants to say that math is a branch of Logic. Which was a real trip at the time because it was something of a common opinion that math was a generalization of our experiences. And this view was held by philosophers like John Stuart Mill. So for example, when I have two dollars, and then I have another two dollars, I then learn that I have four dollars, and so I draw from my own personal

The following is an essay I turned in for my Aristotle class.  Explain Aristotle’s argument in Physics Book VIII, Chapter 4. Your explanation should make clear not just what problem Aristotle addresses but why it is a pressing problem for him. The problem that Aristotle wants to address is the origin of causes (256a). To flesh this out, he makes a few distinctions. The first distinction is between accidental and essential motion (254b10). Accidental motion would be things like a woman healing a patient. The woman heals a patient not because she is a woman, but because she has healing medical knowledge. That she is a woman is only an accident of the cause. Essential motion on the other hand is motion with appropriate links to causes, such as being healed by a doctor. It is essentially the doctor who heals me as a doctor, not for any other feature in addition to their doctor status. A second distinction he makes is between things which are moved by either something within itself or from

The following is an essay I turned in for class.  In On The Heavens Book II, Chapter 13 Aristotle states, “In general our quarrel with those who speak of the movements in this way cannot be confined to the parts, it concerns the whole universe.” (294b31 – 32) Explain what he means and how his criticism of his predecessors as well as his development of his own view illustrate what he means. (You will have to be selective in what you discuss here.) The context in which Aristotle says this in his discussion about the underlying cause for the rest of the earth, that is to say, why the earth itself is not moving. This begins with his discussion of his predecessor's arguments that the earth is still because of its shape. Anaxagoras and Democritus reasoned that the earth is still because it is flat (294b15). The flat side which presents to the air is so wide that it doesn’t allow air to move around it, like a lid (294b15). And since movement through air is possible because one cuts throug

The following is an essay I turned in for my British Empiricism class. It is on Hume's Problem of Induction.  Deductive and inductive reasoning are types of argument structures. In a deductive argument, the truth of the premises guarantees the truth of the conclusion. For example, if 1) All cats are mammals 2) Felix is a cat, then it would follow inescapably that 3) Felix is a mammal. If 1 and 2 are true, there is no possible or conceivable world in which 3 is not true. Inductive arguments do not provide this guarantee. A good inductive argument only makes the conclusion more probable or likely than not. For example, if 1) 90% of people can swim, and 2) Michael is a person, then 3) Michael can swim, though not guaranteed, is likely. It does not follow with logical necessity because Michael may just happen to be part of that 10% of the population that does not swim.  David Hume’s problem of induction states that inductive justifications that rely on past experiences will fa

No. The quotation some people have in mind when they think that he did is the following.  But in Europe, in the nineteenth century, the two models were joined by a third, socialism, which quickly split into two different branches, one totalitarian and the other democratic. Democratic socialism managed to fit within the two existing models as a welcome counterweight to the radical liberal positions, which it developed and corrected. It also managed to appeal to various denominations. In England it became the political party of the Catholics, who had never felt at home among either the Protestant conservatives or the liberals. In Wilhelmine Germany, too, Catholic groups felt closer to democratic socialism than to the rigidly Prussian and Protestant conservative forces. In many respects, democratic socialism was and is close to Catholic social doctrine and has in any case made a remarkable contribution to the formation of a social consciousness. The quotation from B16 is taken ou

The following is an essay I wrote for my British Empiricism class.  In order to understand Berkeley’s argument that sensible objects cannot exist unperceived, we first need to understand his ontology and how he understands “existence”. The objects of our knowledge, begins Berkeley, are either impressed upon the senses, or by perception of the passions or mind, or by memory and imagination. All these objects, no matter which mode they come by, will only be known to us by some kind of property, such as it is red, soft, and heavy. That is all that is known to us, and what is not known to us is the thing in themselves. When I describe my heavy red blanket, all I am really describing are my bundled perceptions of the thing, but there is a gap between my perceptions of the thing and the thing itself. So all I really have access to are perceptions. However, if there are no perceptions of a thing, then it cannot be said to exist. For Berkeley, to speak of something unperceived as existing

The following is an essay I turned in for my Aristotle class.  Teleology for Aristotle is an all permeating cause of prior causes. It is an end, termination, or consummation of previous acts. It is “that for the sake of which” a thing is done (194b30). So, suppose I want to be healthy, I will perform certain acts for the purpose of achieving health. I wake up early so that I may exercise so that I may be healthy. I put on my socks, so I can put on my shoes, so I can go on my run, so that I can be healthy. In this series of actions, the end goal of health sustains and motivates these actions, and these actions are complete and done well when health is achieved.  Teleology being an end should not be confused with the temporally last thing in a series, however. Even though my running causes my health may be the last in a series in a temporal sense, that’s only an accidental feature of the example. More fundamentally, Aristotle means that which is best for it (195a20). For health

The following is an essay I had to write for my Aristotle class. Aristotle’s discussion about the distinction between energeia and kinesis is an organic development of his previous discussion about the distinction between potencies (1048a25). He thinks that clearing up distinctions about actualility will also help us understand in a clearer way what we mean by our distinctions within potencies (1048a25). If there is a distinction like natural potencies and rational potencies (1047b-1047b30), then it stands to reason that there will be a correlating distinction within actualities. Aristotle also claims that actuality, or energeia, is an extension of the same movement, or kinesis (1047a30), which could be problematic since if they are essentially identical, then it shouldn’t be possible to have those correlating distinctions, as there can be no distinctions among identical things. So, energeia and kinesis would have to be distinct. This is what is motivating Aristotle. So what i

The Tome of Leo is a letter written in AD 449 by Pope St. Leo to St. Flavian, who was Bishop of Constantinople. Why was this letter sent? After the Council of Ephesus, there arose a new heresy spewed by a monk named Eutyches who taught that after the incarnation, Christ only had one nature, and not two natures (divine and human). Eutyches was condemned by the Bishop, but another "council" was held in defense of Eutyches' teaching and condemned Bishop St. Flavian. This council became known as the Robber Council, which is an invalid council . So, St. Flavian appealed to his brother bishop Pope St. Leo and the letter is the reply. You can read it here .  The letter is significant for a few reasons. First, it is significant because it is a defense of orthodox teaching on the two natures of Christ. It was so profound, that this letter was appealed to in the next Ecumenical Council, the Council of Chalcedon, which did finally and authoritatively lay to rest the teaching of

Few months ago, I bought some shoes. Nice shoes. Almost $300 dollars. Johnston and Murphy. Bought two shoe brushes with them, and some socks. Didn't think I'd need them, but I'm glad I bought them anyway. Nice lady who sold them to me, who could obviously tell I didn't have a pair like this before, showed me how to take care of them, polishing them for me, the movements to make, having me do it in front of her, what to do in cases of damage, all that. So now, I do that with some regularity. I don't always wear them, I might wear them for Mass or something, but I'll always clean them. And there's something very nice about it. There's something of a ritual to it that speaks to my inner man. I think many rituals are like this. For old school cholos, it was pressing ones pants to highlight the crease. For many boy growing up, it was seeing their dads shave and being taught how to shave. Learning how to tie a tie. How to start a fire. How to hunt. A passin

I have a friend who is mentally disabled. She is functional, socially at least, but is not one to securely hold a job. She has, in the past, made me very uncomfortable. Not for any inappropriate reason. So for example, we were at a mutual friends birthday party, doing karaoke, and I sat next to her after doing an awesome rendition of Johnny Cash's " Boy Named Sue " and she goes, "You're really cool." And I mean, I guess she didn't mind the silence in the room that followed that. I gave an awkward smile, said thank you, and avoided eye contact. On the ride home friends commented on my being uncomfortable . And I was like, yeah that's weird, she's weird, but she's slow, so I mean, I guess we have to put up with it. And she would contact me and my friends, asking when the next time we were all going to hang out, and we were always kind of evasive. Was it mean? If you had asked me at the time, I may have been evasive on that as well. I think I