I'm taking a course in Moral Philosophy right now. This is the second course in ethics I have taken, and I'm being exposed to the same quirky cast of characters, this time around, just a bit more in depth. Ethics is one of the more accessible areas of philosophical inquiry, and probably the most popular. Both classes have been filled to capacity with plenty of opinionated tweens, and I've spent most of my time in those classes listening and observing rather than speaking.

The first thing I observe is that on the first day, at least one student will make the point that morality is obviously relative and that we can't really say objectively what is right and what is wrong. They will usually offer an example about "a primitive tribe in [place where primitive tribes might live]" and how they hold something to be virtuous/vicious that our western minds don't. Philosophy classes are usually filled with pretentious snobs (including yours truly) who revel in the opportunity to knock down stupid arguments like that, but the comment usually gets to stand on its own uncontested. Why someone who doesn't believe in at least some moral objectivity would take a course on the ethical theory is beyond me, but I guess that's the price I pay for being born in the twentieth century.

The second (and most interesting) observation is watching how people react to the different systems. Generally speaking, there are four major figures in the history of moral philosophy. For background, here is a way over-simplified description of each thinker and his system (sorry, they're all men):

Aristotle - The ethical action is a mean between an excess and deficiency. For instance, courage is the mean between rashness and cowardice, or wittiness is the mean between buffoonery and boorishness. Eudaimonia (happiness/flourishing) is the chief end of virtue.

Immanuel Kant - Morality must be grounded in objective, a priori reality. A moral action is one that comes out of (not just in accordance with) duty to the moral law. The ends of an action don't matter. Duty commands us to do the moral thing without regard for the ends.

John Stuart Mill - The goal of morality is to secure the most happiness and least pain for the most people. Unlike Kant, the ends are everything to Mill. Rational beings must weigh the benefit of an action to determine its morality.

Friederich Nietzsche - Morality is grounded in the affirmation of life. Christian morality causes us to deny our true selves, and enslaves us. True morality sets us free.

Now, I over-simplified each of these to an incredible degree, but I believe I represented them fairly enough.

But to the point. The reaction to Aristotle is basically neutral. People like his ideas, his "practicality" (I personally found Aristotle to very impractical on his most vital points). They don't like how tedious he is, how long his book is, how emotionless he is. But overall, people react positively to Aristotle.

People love Mill. And what American wouldn't love him? He is, in so many ways, the great spokesman of classical liberalism. He writes well, makes good arguments, and really does think about morality in much the same way as most people do. Mills utilitarianism is a very western idea, and people react very positively to it, even to the point of giving his system passes when it most needs pushback.

Not very surprising, at all. What does surprise me is the reaction to Kant, and not only that, but the reaction to Kant in relation to the reaction to Nietzsche. People despise Kant. He upsets people, even infuriates them. Nietzsche gets some push back, but ultimately, people react rather well to him, especially given how much of a boogey man people have made him into.

This is at Baylor. Baylor is a Christian school in name only, but a high percentage are still evangelical. And, from what I can tell, a high percentage of students in these classes are Christians, or at least have a strong background in the Christian tradition. Nietzsche is the guy who said "God is dead"* and Kant is the guy who's ethical system most resembles the words of Christ. It doesn't help that Kant is a terrible writer and Nietzsche's prose is stunning, but come on!

Granted, there are problems with Kant's approach, and he isn't the most practical guy in the world, but I don't think he deserves the amount of abuse he takes.

Tomorrow, we're discussing the categorical imperative. Should be fun!

* In case any philosophy nerds are reading, I know that I just took Nietzsche out of context, and I know how dangerous that is. I believe that Christians can learn from Nietzsche, but I also think that if people don't want to scream and prove him wrong when they read him, then they have not understood Nietzsche.

Eliot, Kierkegaard, O'Connor, Dostoevsky, Percy, Lewis and Faulkner are the only authors I will read from here on out. I don't need anybody else.

This is, of course, untrue.

In order to avoid congratulating the Saints on their victory over my favorite quarterback, I figured I'd post a question.

Why do we never hear about steroid use in football? I believe I heard something about it a few years back, but it wasn't a big story, and I might be imagining it. I can't really say. But it's never talked about or even wondered about, as far as I know.

I suppose some of it has to do with the fact that steroids aren't all that helpful to the guys who get all the glory in football. Quarterbacks might get some extra arm strength out of it, but I've never seen a successful quarterback who looked like he was on steroids. Most of them are somewhat cut, but nothing beyond your average NBA small forward. Many are downright lanky. Receivers and defensive backs are mostly a skinny, swift bunch, and I just don't see steroids, as I understand them, being conducive to that particular skill set. Running backs, I suppose could probably benefit from Andro or HGH, and I guess of the skill positions, theirs is the most suspicious. But even then, so much of what makes a running back good has nothing to do with strength. Many of them aren't even that fast comparatively (Emmitt Smith, the all time leader in rushing yards and touchdowns, was notoriously slow for an NFL skill position). Steroids don't give you better vision or agility.

So, maybe we don't hear about it because the guys everyone pays attention to don't really have anything to gain from taking steroids. It isn't an issue for the same reason NBA point guards aren't constantly under suspicion for juicing.

But I look at linemen, particularly defensive linemen, and linebackers and think, some of them have got to be shooting up. These guys are freaking monsters. Guys who look like cattle are running forty yard dashes in 4.5 seconds and pushing through 320 pound offensive tackles just doesn't make much sense to me. Then again, back in junior high I knew a couple of guys who were really big, really strong, and exceptionally fast, and I'm pretty sure they hadn't gone all Mark McGwire just yet. I'm sure the skill set exists, it just boggles my mind.

Like any sports fan, I don't like the idea of steroids invading sports, but I also want the best entertainment possible. We feed it, and ultimately bear some responsibility. I'm not sure if steroids is a big issue in football, and I haven't seen much evidence that it is. With all the hooplah over steroids in baseball, I'm sure I'm not the only one who looks at football players with suspicion. The cynical part of me doesn't ask why steroids aren't an issue in football, but how can they NOT be an issue?

In theory, Wednesdays are my productive day. I do have an extra class, but it is also the only day of the week (the 5-day week) where I don't go to work. So generally, I save Wednesdays to do any running around I need to do. Today, I went to the Centre to sign another form that goes over their sub-leasing policy. I did laundry, bought shower supplies, and finished a book (Mother Night). I then went to the library, returned the book I had just finished, and checked out another. I went to Chili's, read, and had a spectacular burger. I had planned on going back to my room after Chili's to read a little more, and then I had kind of planned on blogging. But, Kenny called me and challenged me to a game of Madden. It was an offer I couldn't refuse. So I walked twenty minutes through the rain and cold for a video game. Long story short, my plans for the evening changed a bit.

So no book discussion tonight. I meant to talk about Fitzgerald and Walker Percy, but it will just have to wait (not that anybody who reads this blog cares about old American novels).

Every time I criticize Republicans, I get like 100 comments from my dad. Yesterday, I posted an article about computers, a video with Will Ferrel singing "Freebird" and a crazy Kubrick-faked-the-moon-landing conspiracy theory, and not a peep. I thought all of those qualified as perfect Bill-bait.

How he helped NASA fake the moon landing, and proceeded to reveal his secret, amid great personal peril, in The Shining.

(HT: The Corner)

I'm about 10 days late on this, but a musical farewell from Conan and friends:


Conan's 'Freebird' Farewell - The funniest videos are a click away

We'll miss you Conan. Fly high.

Gary Kasparov, everybody's favorite grandmaster, writes a book review, but spends more time talking about chess and computers. Since I don't think most people actually click on links, I quoted the most interesting parts. Enjoy:

In 1985, in Hamburg, I played against thirty-two different chess computers at the same time in what is known as a simultaneous exhibition. I walked from one machine to the next, making my moves over a period of more than five hours. The four leading chess computer manufacturers had sent their top models, including eight named after me from the electronics firm Saitek.

It illustrates the state of computer chess at the time that it didn't come as much of a surprise when I achieved a perfect 32–0 score, winning every game, although there was an uncomfortable moment. At one point I realized that I was drifting into trouble in a game against one of the "Kasparov" brand models. If this machine scored a win or even a draw, people would be quick to say that I had thrown the game to get PR for the company, so I had to intensify my efforts. Eventually I found a way to trick the machine with a sacrifice it should have refused. From the human perspective, or at least from my perspective, those were the good old days of man vs. machine chess.

Eleven years later I narrowly defeated the supercomputer Deep Blue in a match. Then, in 1997, IBM redoubled its efforts—and doubled Deep Blue's processing power—and I lost the rematch in an event that made headlines around the world. The result was met with astonishment and grief by those who took it as a symbol of mankind's submission before the almighty computer. ("The Brain's Last Stand" read the Newsweek headline.) Others shrugged their shoulders, surprised that humans could still compete at all against the enormous calculating power that, by 1997, sat on just about every desk in the first world.

...

It was an impressive achievement, of course, and a human achievement by the members of the IBM team, but Deep Blue was only intelligent the way your programmable alarm clock is intelligent. Not that losing to a $10 million alarm clock made me feel any better.

...

Read the rest of this entry . . .

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I'm not sure many people saw this, but it was truly one of the most fascinating things I've ever seen. On live television, the President goes into a room full of political opponents, and takes questions for nearly an hour. It was enlightening, encouraging, and even a little fun.

After reading Hegel, Kierkegaard said something to the effect of, "Hegel answers every question under the sun except for one. Namely, what does it mean to be a man living in the world who must die?"

I have an odd relationship with politics. Part of me really enjoys studying it, for the light it sheds on human interaction. It says a lot about how strong willed we are, and how unbelievably petty and corruptible we can be. Seeing the political process reminds me constantly of how forgetful we are, how thick our desire for retribution is, and how strong our desire for justice is, even if we haven't the slightest idea what justice is. My interest in politics is mostly philosophical, which is hard to admit as a conservative. But really, politics is the one area of philosophy that has always sought to answer the question of human nature. Plato's Republic was really an inquiry into the nature of the soul, just as Hobbes, Rousseau, Locke, and Mill all endeavored first to say something about the Natural Man. Good politicians are those who best understand other people. Successful politicians are able to neutralize their enemies and comprehend their friends. The best politicians are psychologists.

Unfortunately, that interest steers me toward daily political punditry, which drives me crazy. Day after day, it's always the same. The ceaseless back-and-forth, the endless screams. Most of what people consider important (discussions on personal liberty, for instance) bore me to death. It's so banal, so trite. So why do I keep torturing myself? I'm not impassioned about anything political. But I read the news every day. I keep up with a number of political bloggers, and generally have my own take on the news of the day, even if I don't care. Maybe I only tell myself I don't care.

It isn't that I see the political process as unimportant. It is important, if not for me, then for my neighbor. But, ee gads, it makes me silly. I think the problem is that while I find it very interesting, many find politics to be a reason for anger. It turns perfectly civil people into raging baboons. It would be funny, if it weren't so alarming.

I've come around to see politics in the way Kierkegaard saw Hegel. There are many items of great interest in the realm of politics. Through it, we have sought to answer some of the most remarkable questions. But, ultimately, it doesn't answer the one question that really incenses me, the one that might drive me to rage or despair or joy. Who am I and what am I doing here? I would rather have pursued the answer to that question as well as I could while living under the most oppressive regime imaginable, than to be personally free, if autonomy meant being so deranged as to have not the faintest clue to the answer. The vast gulf between politics and religion is really just a matter of the kind of questions they seek to answer, which is why I regard the question of an entangling relationship between the two to be incomprehensible.

J.D. Salinger died today. I can't pretend I was a great admirer of Salinger's, because I wasn't. Catcher in the Rye was better the second time I read it, but still left me scratching my head. To me, it perfectly captured the mid-century malaise of American Literature that carries on to this day. So much alienation, and for what? Salinger outlived almost all of his contemporaries, and eclipsed all of them in sales, despite having been silent since 1965. I imagine there will be some posthumous digging for lost treasures, and maybe a novel or two from beyond the grave.

All my ambivalence aside, Perfect Day For a Bananafish may be the best short story every written (this coming from a Flannery O'Connor fanatic). I would read it again, but it makes me too sad.

I don't think I've ever blogged on sports. Truth is, I find the vast majority of sports commentary to be, well, awful. But I can't help that I really enjoy sports, especially football. I still haven't reached the point where I can stand to watch baseball games, but maybe that will come in time. Anyways, some fairly exciting things happened in my sports world this fall, and I figured I should at least say something about them.

1. The National Championship game pitted my Longhorns against the Crimson Tide of Alabama. Most everyone knows what happened, so I won't recount it. As far as sports go, I don't believe in "moral victories." Either you win or you loose. Still, I don't think any Longhorn fan can be truly disappointed with the result of the game, given the situation. I wasn't upset. I was just proud. I love Mack Brown more than ever.

2. My Dallas Cowboys have had a rough decade, but it seems there is light waiting for us somewhere. Maybe I'm dreaming. They rid themselves of troublemakers and distractions, developed some good, unknown talent (Miles Austin, Felix Jones, Tashard Choice). They beat a very good Eagles team, who had everything to play for, 3 times this season. Of course, they barely showed up in the divisional playoffs. Oh well. Maybe next year. I'm excited about next season, I really am.

3. I watched the NFC championship game in the Student Union building. In the last few minutes of the 4th quarter, when it looked like the Vikings would pull it out, I was fully prepared to come on this blog and write BRET FAVRE IS MY HERO. I was also prepared to call him the best quarterback that I ever saw play. But, those pesky Saints. I never had a reason to dislike the Saints before this year. Their fans annoy me to no end (several of my good friends are Saints die-hards). "Who dat say de gonna beat dem Saints?" Shut up.

If anyone's interested, here's my list of the greatest NFL quarterbacks I've had the privilege of watching play.

1. John Elway
2. Bret Favre
3. Peyton Manning (I expect he'll probably jump up by the end of his career)
4. Troy Aikman
5. Kurt Warner
6. Steve Young
7. Tom Brady (It hurts to put him on this list)
8. Donovan McNabb
9. Dan Marino (I missed his prime)
10. Tony Romo (here's for keeping my fingers crossed)
11. David Carr (just kidding)

Above everything else in politics, idiot populism is the stain I wish we could scrub away. David Brooks' Tuesday column says it better than I could:

It’s easy to see why politicians would be drawn to the populist pose. First, it makes everything so simple. The economic crisis was caused by a complex web of factors, including global imbalances caused by the rise of China. But with the populist narrative, you can just blame Goldman Sachs.

Second, it absolves voters of responsibility for their problems. Over the past few years, many investment bankers behaved like idiots, but so did average Americans, racking up unprecedented levels of personal debt. With the populist narrative, you can accuse the former and absolve the latter.

Third, populism is popular with the ruling class. Ever since I started covering politics, the Democratic ruling class has been driven by one fantasy: that voters will get so furious at people with M.B.A.’s that they will hand power to people with Ph.D.’s. The Republican ruling class has been driven by the fantasy that voters will get so furious at people with Ph.D.’s that they will hand power to people with M.B.A.’s. Members of the ruling class love populism because they think it will help their section of the elite gain power.

So it’s easy to see the seductiveness of populism. Nonetheless, it nearly always fails. The history of populism, going back to William Jennings Bryan, is generally a history of defeat.

That’s because voters aren’t as stupid as the populists imagine. Voters are capable of holding two ideas in their heads at one time: First, that the rich and the powerful do rig the game in their own favor; and second, that simply bashing the rich and the powerful will still not solve the country’s problems.

Political populists never get that second point. They can’t seem to grasp that a politics based on punishing the elites won’t produce a better-educated work force, more investment, more innovation or any of the other things required for progress and growth.

In fact, this country was built by anti-populists. It was built by people like Alexander Hamilton and Abraham Lincoln who rejected the idea that the national economy is fundamentally divided along class lines. They rejected the zero-sum mentality that is at the heart of populism, the belief that economics is a struggle over finite spoils. Instead, they believed in a united national economy — one interlocking system of labor, trade and investment.

...

The populists have an Us versus Them mentality. If they continue their random attacks on enterprise and capital, they will only increase the pervasive feeling of uncertainty, which is now the single biggest factor in holding back investment, job creation and growth. They will end up discrediting good policies (the Obama bank reforms are quite sensible) because they will persuade the country that the government is in the hands of reckless Huey Longs.

They will have traded dynamic optimism, which always wins, for combative divisiveness, which always loses.

Of course, it's not going to pass away. The best I can hope for is politicians like Reagan and Truman who are able to utilize populist rhetoric, while still enacting serious policies.

Catholic Philosopher Peter Kreeft gives a lecture on Till We Have Faces. It's awesome.

Final Season Of 'Lost' Promises To Make Fans More Annoying Than Ever

I saw Up in the Air last night and very nearly hated it. I loved it for the first hour and a half, but the last half hour the movie took a turn that it shouldn't have. Everybody walked out of the theater depressed and emotionally tired. I can only take so much misery on screen.

Paul Krugman will not write a single optimistic column this year.

Over the weekend, beginning on the day of Ashura, violence intensified in Iran. The underwear bomb thing kind of consumed the news, but I think the story in Iran is no less significant. Pray for the safety of those involved.

Not many heard it, but here was President Obama's statement:

The United States joins with the international community in strongly condemning the violent and unjust suppression of innocent Iranian citizens, which has apparently resulted in detentions, injuries, and even death.

For months, the Iranian people have sought nothing more than to exercise their universal rights. Each time they have done so, they have been met with the iron fist of brutality, even on solemn occasions and holy days. And each time that has happened, the world has watched with deep admiration for the courage and the conviction of the Iranian people who are part of Iran’s great and enduring civilization.

What’s taking place within Iran is not about the United States or any other country. It’s about the Iranian people and their aspirations for justice and a better life for themselves. And the decision of Iran’s leaders to govern through fear and tyranny will not succeed in making those aspirations go away.

As I said in Oslo, it’s telling when governments fear the aspirations of their own people more than the power of any other nation. Along with all free nations, the United States stands with those who seek their universal rights. We call upon the Iranian government to abide by the international obligations that it has to respect the rights of its own people.

We call for the immediate release of all who have been unjustly detained within Iran. We will continue to bear witness to the extraordinary events that are taking place there. And I’m confident that history will be on the side of those who seek justice.

Video below:

Read the rest of this entry . . .

With Christmas nearing, I thought it appropriate to share a short thought on the "reason for the season."

In some sense, the Incarnation is the only miracle that ever occurred, in that all other events we call miracles flowed from it, and none would be possible without it. And, increasingly, I believe that it to be the first and last event to truly transcend the possible. Because of it, the Earth has been touched by God, forever. In it, we see the fusion of that which was temporal to that which is eternal. By it, the profane is made holy, the darkness is turned to light, sinners are turned to saints, and the dead live.

For me, this miracle made the Christian story worth believing. However fantastic or unlikely it may seem, it gives me Hope. The image of imperfect beings being joined together in a perfect God is too beautiful for words. The hope of forgiveness - of resurrection - makes life worth enduring.

That God did His greatest miracle in this world will never stop amazing me. He didn't mandate it from Heaven. He came here, and touched a fallen world. God shared in our suffering. He suffered with us. God shared in humanity so that humanity might somehow share in God.

At Christmas, we reaffirm that mystery. We remember it. And God remembers us.

An oldie from the only news source I trust:

In a sudden and unexpected blow to the Americans working to protect the holiday, liberal U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Stephen Reinhardt ruled the private celebration of Christmas unconstitutional Monday.

"In accordance with my activist agenda to secularize the nation, this court finds Christmas to be unlawful," Judge Reinhardt said. "The celebration of the birth of the philosopher Jesus—be it in the form of gift-giving, the singing of carols, fanciful decorations, or general good cheer and warm feelings amongst families—is in violation of the First Amendment principles upon which this great nation was founded."

...

"Sorry, kids, no Christmas this year," Beloit, WI mall Santa Gene Ernot said as he was led away from his Santa's Village in leg irons. "Write to your congressman to put a stop to these liberal activist judges. It's up to you to save Christmas! Ho ho ho!"

Said Pvt. Stanley Cope, who tasered Ernot for his outburst: "We're fighting an unpopular war on Christmas, but what can we do? The military has no choice but to take orders from a lone activist judge."

...

America's children are bearing the brunt of Reinhardt's marginal, activist rulings.

"Why did the bad man take away Christmas?" 5-year-old Danny Dover said. "I made a card for my mommy out of paper and glue, and now I can't give it to her."

Shortly after Dover issued his statement, police kicked down his door, removed his holiday tree, confiscated his presents, and crushed his homemade card underfoot.