Elemental's Excitingly Excellent Random Banter: No.CLXXVII (177)

[DraPrime]

Hey guys, look what I just made!

Spoiler

Show

Whoa, that's quite triptastic. I like it.

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

Oh god, I cannot compete with the multi-quote gods!

Oooh. Very fancy. And if at all possible study the Crusades!
We can be all giggly and exclusive and talk about the Crusades. It'll be fun. Base your degree/module choices on what some girl on the internet wants so she can have someone to talk to about it!
But in all seriousness, the Crusades is a really interesting topic that would also cover the arabic/islamic side of things too.

The Crusades are very interesting! Right now I'm most interested in the early period though, the Rise of Islam up to the Crusades, at the very most going up to the Mongol Invasions.
Also, I just adore the art and the literature and the philosophy and the poetry and a;klahfad;gafdafasas

And you may have guessed from a few things I mentioned offhandedly that I also think linguistics is a very fun thing to do. Especially diachronic change.

My thing for linguistics is actually philology, so hopefully diachronic change will happen sooner rather than later in my courses... Have to get through the basics: syntax and all, first though. *sigh* I sat in one of the Syntax lectures at McGill a while ago, and it seemed like something I could survive though.

Good for me then that my interests are tailor-made to my degree then isn't it!
Although actually . . . five days until THat Which Must Not Be Named begins, and I definitely feel so unprepared and aarrrgh! about the whole thing.
My revision has consisted entirely of reading things, memorising some (okay, a fair few) quotations, and some vague thinking of things and topics.
See, what my examiners are looking for is something interesting that isn't obviously pre-prepared (or 'downloaded' as they so endearingly call it), so for me this is mainly refreshing my knowledge of the texts and loosely classing quotations under certain headings. But as my Shakespeare tutor said, "There is virtually no chance of you writing anything unique or unheard of before. We're just looking for something interesting, and something you clearly thought about before writing."
Oh, and some criticism of things too.
I actually have a chance at venturing original thought in some of my other papers though.

Yeah, my exams include Physics and French, which are haaaaard. The essay-writing ones are easy enough thus far. Already wrote one English lit paper, writing another one today, then I have 3 history papers which are also easy.
3 history papers, 3 physics papers, and 1 english paper, in 3 days. Oh god. Luckily, some of the papers are only an hour long, and the longest is 2 hours, MAYBE 2 and a half. So it's not complete death.

But it is good practice for the kind of thing you're doing, hopefully. I'm feeling very prepared for university.

As someone who's finishing off her undergraduate degree, I can easily say that these three years have been some of the most intense and fun years of my life.
You'll love it.

Oh, I don't doubt that I'll love it! I'm super excited about EVERY aspect of next year! Leaving home, leaving to a new city, that city being Montreal, having more opportunity to practice my French...

I'm just a bit of a ditz really.
Just one who's very good with words. hence probably my ability to make obscure topics interesting.
It'd be amusing if my rants/gushing about things I love/general discourse actually educated people wouldn't it?
Especially as most of the time I just set out to talk about things I like with others. Or, more accurately, to babble excitedly at the uncomprehending masses. Or rant.
I have been told that my rants are fun.

Well, if you claim to be a ditz, you do a damn good job at hiding it with epic rants and intelligent discussion.

History? I'm actually a little bit jealous. That's an awesome area of study. I wanted to take more history electives, but I've got to learn Latin, and possibly ancient Greek.

I wish my high school offered Latin. There's only one public school in the entire city which offers Latin, sadly. However, I think I'd rather learn more... well, languages with more real-life applications. Arabic is probably what I'll be taking in undergrad. Russian is also on my list of "languages to learn".
I've always been a history guy, though. History, language, and music have always been my "things", as far back as I can remember. Despite my math and science teachers attempts to convince me that I love doing math and science and should take maths and sciences in university. I may be good at it, but that doesn't mean I LIKE it.

[LaZodiac]

Today was a good day. I picked up on The Project again, and made stuff work. It rained a lot and I didn't even care.

Awesome! Good luck

*doesn't even know what The Project is

[DraPrime]

Oh god, I cannot compete with the multi-quote gods!

It takes years of practice.

The Crusades are very interesting! Right now I'm most interested in the early period though, the Rise of Islam up to the Crusades, at the very most going up to the Mongol Invasions.
Also, I just adore the art and the literature and the philosophy and the poetry and a;klahfad;gafdafasas

You like the philosophy of Islam you say? Read Averroes! Read Avicenna! They're both really cool!

Yeah, my exams include Physics and French, which are haaaaard. The essay-writing ones are easy enough thus far. Already wrote one English lit paper, writing another one today, then I have 3 history papers which are also easy.
3 history papers, 3 physics papers, and 1 english paper, in 3 days. Oh god. Luckily, some of the papers are only an hour long, and the longest is 2 hours, MAYBE 2 and a half. So it's not complete death.

But it is good practice for the kind of thing you're doing, hopefully. I'm feeling very prepared for university.

Essays...essays...essays...OH CRAP! I have a nine page paper on Thomistic theology to write!

Oh, I don't doubt that I'll love it! I'm super excited about EVERY aspect of next year! Leaving home, leaving to a new city, that city being Montreal, having more opportunity to practice my French...

Montreal? Very cool. It would certainly be better than Providence, Rhode Island.

I wish my high school offered Latin. There's only one public school in the entire city which offers Latin, sadly. However, I think I'd rather learn more... well, languages with more real-life applications. Arabic is probably what I'll be taking in undergrad. Russian is also on my list of "languages to learn".
I've always been a history guy, though. History, language, and music have always been my "things", as far back as I can remember. Despite my math and science teachers attempts to convince me that I love doing math and science and should take maths and sciences in university. I may be good at it, but that doesn't mean I LIKE it.

My high school offered Latin, but I never took it, which I kind of regret. I spent my time learning German and Spanish. Also, do learn Russian. It is in my opinion, the best language around.

In other news, I don't know why this is so funny for me, but it is fantastic.

"The near dead Dumbledore. He is clearly a powerful beast."

Heh.

[wadledo]

My high school offered Latin, but I never took it, which I kind of regret. I spent my time learning German and Spanish. Also, do learn Russian. It is in my opinion, the best language around.

Latin is both an incredibly easy language to learn and completely pointless.
Since most romantic languages have a direct root to it, it's kind of like learning to speak Old English.
Then again, I tried to learn German after I tried to learn Latin, so that was kind of an odd experience.

Also, my Art history teacher continues to mess with me.
Don't tell me that the final exam starts on Thursday, then post the last test on Monday!
It's like she wants half the class to miss these things.

[DraPrime]

Latin is both an incredibly easy language to learn and completely pointless.
Since most romantic languages have a direct root to it, it's kind of like learning to speak Old English.
Then again, I tried to learn German after I tried to learn Latin, so that was kind of an odd experience.

Also, my Art history teacher continues to mess with me.
Don't tell me that the final exam starts on Thursday, then post the last test on Monday!
It's like she wants half the class to miss these things.

Latin happens to be a tool of the trade, so to speak, so I must learn it.

[CurlyKitGirl]

Indeed I did. Many good pictures were obtained I'll actually be coming back to visit my mom (who lives in Vienna), some other family (who live in Poland), and to just do more tourism.

By the way, did you ever go ahead with that Harvard thing?

Excellent! And while I did do the Harvard thing, I didn't get it.

I recommend napping then, if the energy drinks haven't made that impossible. If you're like me though, then you'll just be resilient. It takes a ridiculous amount of caffeine to keep me up.

I'm not much of a napper usually, so I just did nothing all day interspersed with doing nothing while listening to music on youtube.

Not many I think? The medieval part isn't hard for me, given that many of my beliefs dominated very strongly during that era. I think a lot of people ignore medieval philosophy because they're strongly influenced by philosophy from the Enlightenment onward, which stands in stark contrast to the medieval tradition. It gets especially tricky because some people don't consider medieval philosophy to be true philosophy. Too many thinkers of that era (St. Bonaventure comes to mind) fused philosophy to theology so closely that it's really hard to separate the two, partly because some medieval thinkers made no distinction between the two until St. Thomas Aquinas came along and made a generally accepted distinction between faith and reason. Many nowadays want more "pure" philosophy such as the rationalism started by Descartes, so medieval thought goes out the window. I enjoy both fields of thought, so I just get a two for one deal.

Considering that back in the medieval period religion pretty much infused day-to-day life, it's very understandable that many attempts at abstract thought would resort to explaining it via religion or religious/spiritual terms
Me, I like the medieval schools of thought (science, religion, theology, philosophy etc.) because it's more . . . inventive (which isn't necessarily a good thing, science and medicine I'm looking at you) and dynamic than some ore modern ones.
Then again, as my personal tastes lie very much towards the older works in general, there's a fair bit of bias there.
Also I don't actually understand some post-Enlightenment philosophy which is unusual as you'd expect the medieval foundations to be of assistance, but nope.
And oddly, even though I'm areligious for want of a better classification, I find the medieval theories more appealing despite the meshing of theology and philosophy. The Cloude of Unknowynge is somewhat paradoxical because it's all about these high, abstract thoughts, yet in genial prose that make it so much easier to understand than some later philosophies.
Also it's rather fun and sometimes more than a bit ironic.

As for liking metal...how could I not? It's good music. Just yesterday I went out with a few of my brother seminarians and bought this bit of wonder. It might not be great for every occasion (the one who tries to play metal at my funeral is going to find me coming back from the grave full of anger), but it still sounds great.

Nice. That band's not really something I'd have thought to listen to, but I like it. At the moment I'm on a jaunt through cheesy British glam rock because it's so happy and carefree, and I need that after the past few days.

I may be ahead in philosophy, but you're definitely ahead of me when it comes to a lot of the literature and art of that era. Though I might be getting ahead in that area when I start taking Latin next semester, thus making me able to read many of the texts of that era in the original language.

:smallpout:
While I am self-teaching Latin (sloooowly) it's fallen to the wayside recently given That Which Shall Not Be Named. All my envies.
For me, much of the medieval period is important context for the literature - culture, language, schools of thought, politics (my friends are concerned for me because I occasionally struggle to remember who the Prime and Deputy Prime Ministers are even though I can engage in in-depth discussions about the politics of C14^th England), architecture (I don't even know either).
I suppose to be a master of my trade, you also have to be a jack of many.
I wouldn't have thought I knew a lot about medieval art and so on though.

Speaking of medieval literature, may I make a recommendation? I'm pretty sure that you're like me and have a million things you want to read, but I do have to really recommend this work. It's The Consolation of Philosophy by Boethius. Technically not medieval (written not long after the fall of Rome), but it had enormous influence on the medieval period. Boethius wrote it while imprisoned and scheduled for execution by King Theodoric. This happened not a few months after Boethius was on top of the world. He was descended from several emperors and many consuls, and was in a high position under Theodoric. His two sons were consuls. Then all that got taken away, and The Consolation of Philosophy is his attempt to deal with the problem of suffering. If you're as familiar with the medieval era as I think you are, then there's a good chance you know all this, and may have even read this book. If you haven't though, then do. It's very good both as a work of philosophy and a work of literature.

Oh Boethius. Boethius, Boethius, Boethius.
He was all but a set text the moment I started my medieval specialisation because he influence so damn much.
I have read King Alfred's Boethius translation (well, the prose one, not the poetic) and Boece (Chaucer's translation) as well as the Consolation itself. Albeit translated because I know not Latin enough to read Boethius.
I know not if Boethius coined the imagery of Fortune and her wheel, but he certainly popularised it because virtually every single thing in the history of medieval literature talks about her damn wheel (this may be a little hyperbolic). She shows up in Chaucer, in Dunbar, in James I's Kingis Quair, in Gower, in random anonymous poems, in all the things! And two of those poets I referenced by name are Scottish!

Duns Scotus is baffling. He's not wrong like certain philosophers of his era, (I'm looking at you William of Ockham) just very tough to read. "The Subtle Doctor" is a fitting title. His works are full of tiny and subtle distinctions that are hard to follow. During the lectures we had on him I was completely lost. What I understood I did like. His development of formal distinction is cool, especially when dealing with the problem of universals. Still, the man is just so incomprehensible, and dull. He's like Aristotle, in that he's brilliant yet extremely dry, unlike his similarly brilliant but much more enjoyable predecessor (St. Bonaventure and Plato respectively). Even his own order (the Franciscans) poke fun at him for this. In a city near where I live there's a chapel with a stained glass window depicting him lecturing to a class. He himself looks very profound and majestic, with light shining forth from his mouth representing the greatness of his teaching. However, in this window the entire class is asleep. Seriously.

Hehe.
So yet another Brilliantly Important Scholar in His Field is as dull as dry toast. How unexpected. Possibly part of it though was down to scholarly dictates of the time. Duns Scotum was part of the Oxford Franciscan school (ha! My college referenced him! So weird when that happens) which was founded by the first scholastic philosopher to completely understand Aristotle's dual paths thing about scientific reasoning. Maybe it's a founding father's thing?
And it does make some sort of sense seeing as Bonaventure followed and accepted some of Plato's doctrines.
But Lord, yes, seeing as the dunce cap was named after Duns, it does say something doesn't it?

Indeed, it's all about our overlapping specializations. I'm not even that widely versed on all philosophy. I know the medieval and ancient eras pretty well, and I've even got a decent grounding in the Enlightenment, but ask me to tell you more than a few sentences about Kirkegaard, Heidegger, Locke, and many others, and I'll be lost. Then if you take me out of philosophy and stick me into say...advanced quantum physics, then I'm utterly hosed. I've got little to say there.

So basically, picking up what's relevant to what you like?
For me, my philosophic knowledge deteriorates rapidly about 1700 or so. As for the names you dropped . . . I've heard of them. And advanced quantum physics?
It's quantum. Things move around very quickly without moving at all. Probably.
No idea really. It involved numbers.

History? I'm actually a little bit jealous. That's an awesome area of study. I wanted to take more history electives, but I've got to learn Latin, and possibly ancient Greek.

Don't you just hate it when you can't pick an option because it blocks you from other options you need more for your core papers?

Oh god, I cannot compete with the multi-quote gods!

Be glad Thufir's not here as well then.

The Crusades are very interesting! Right now I'm most interested in the early period though, the Rise of Islam up to the Crusades, at the very most going up to the Mongol Invasions.
Also, I just adore the art and the literature and the philosophy and the poetry and a;klahfad;gafdafasas

Then that's what you'll specialise in somehow. If something academic related makes you flail in unbridled happiness, that's what you should do if at all possible.
Here's an odd perspective for you on the First Crusade: one of my set texts for medieval French 1100 - 1300 is the Chanson de Roland which contains many references to the Crusades. Or things that could be to the Crusades. Given it was most likely written between 1098 and 1100, almost certainly relate to the Crusades.
Now imagine a patriotic French chanson de geste (kind of like an epic poem, but not exactly) about Charlemagne and a campaign he went on in the C8^th that could be interpreted as basically the Crusades, but in Spain.
And not as bloody. Involving traitors.
It's one skewed perspective I tell you. FUn though. All those things you can read into it. Like how the author basically canonised Charlemagne by making his sword, Joieuse (OF spelling) contain the tip of the Lance of the Crucifixion (found in 1098) or the virtual halo of pure goodness or all the things!
And it paints a fairly sympathetic (well, fair for its time) portrait of the pagans too. And by pagans I mean the Moors.

My thing for linguistics is actually philology, so hopefully diachronic change will happen sooner rather than later in my courses... Have to get through the basics: syntax and all, first though. *sigh* I sat in one of the Syntax lectures at McGill a while ago, and it seemed like something I could survive though.

Well, you must suffer the necessary demons to get through to the best bits. And they really aren't that hard either. I started learning them in college (UK), so I had a fairly good grounding in 'basic' linguistics by the time I started uni.
Although stay away from the French linguists. Especially Saussure. And Chomsky for that matter.
I'd also recommend learning your IPA soon, because you'll find that when it comes down to mmorphology, dialect and so on it'll be important.

Yeah, my exams include Physics and French, which are haaaaard. The essay-writing ones are easy enough thus far. Already wrote one English lit paper, writing another one today, then I have 3 history papers which are also easy.
3 history papers, 3 physics papers, and 1 english paper, in 3 days. Oh god. Luckily, some of the papers are only an hour long, and the longest is 2 hours, MAYBE 2 and a half. So it's not complete death.

But it is good practice for the kind of thing you're doing, hopefully. I'm feeling very prepared for university.

Aside from the usual caveat that Oxbridge education is not like most universities, university exams don't seem all that hard. It's just up an extra level or two, with more complex things to talk about.
Oh, and those exams? Argh. That's . . . a lot. Mine are all three hours each, one a day, virtually back to back, but I only have seven of them.
That just seems terrible. Especially the Physics stuff, but it always was my least favourite science, even back when I did science.

Oh, I don't doubt that I'll love it! I'm super excited about EVERY aspect of next year! Leaving home, leaving to a new city, that city being Montreal, having more opportunity to practice my French...

At least your teaching'll be in English. It takes me quite a while to work my way through an academic article in French because you need an entirely new vocabulary to understand it. Literally.

Well, if you claim to be a ditz, you do a damn good job at hiding it with epic rants and intelligent discussion.

You've not met me in real life. I babble. A lot. But I suppose it's the internet, and you can't exactly tell me to stop (you can just skip over the post) so I feel freer to ramble on about obscure and random things.

I wish my high school offered Latin. There's only one public school in the entire city which offers Latin, sadly. However, I think I'd rather learn more... well, languages with more real-life applications. Arabic is probably what I'll be taking in undergrad. Russian is also on my list of "languages to learn".
I've always been a history guy, though. History, language, and music have always been my "things", as far back as I can remember. Despite my math and science teachers attempts to convince me that I love doing math and science and should take maths and sciences in university. I may be good at it, but that doesn't mean I LIKE it.

Arabic'd be fun to learn! I think you write it backwards don't you?
Heh. Scientists and mathematicians are always trying to poach to artsy students. Silly people.
Your experience reminds me of how a couple of teachers at my secondary wanted me to take the IB because I was a good all-rounder even though I really wanted to specialise, and it was blatantly obvious back when I was in primary that I wanted to do English. Also didn't help that I'd have compulsory science and mathematics, and while I didn't mind them, I didn't exactly enjoy them. Also my grades were dropping in the latter because I couldn't care less.
Somehow I don't think that would have been a good idea, taking mathematics when I couldn't care less about it.

EDIT:

Latin is both an incredibly easy language to learn and completely pointless.
Since most romantic languages have a direct root to it, it's kind of like learning to speak Old English.
Then again, I tried to learn German after I tried to learn Latin, so that was kind of an odd experience.

*raises hand*
I can read (and speak) Old English, and stumble my way through Latin.
I find knowing the 'root language' of a language or language branch furthers the comprehension of the language in general. And it's fun.
Plus that means you can read [famous work] in the original which is almost always preferable than the translation in most cases.

Also, my Art history teacher continues to mess with me.
Don't tell me that the final exam starts on Thursday, then post the last test on Monday!
It's like she wants half the class to miss these things.

Wow. That's a bit silly isn't it?

[LaZodiac]

Ah, those moments where you feel as though you cannot contribute anything to the conversation what so ever. Interesting to see the back and forth though.

[HalfTangible]

What do people do when they feel their life is a waste and always will be?

[wadledo]

Arabic'd be fun to learn! I think you write it backwards don't you?

Yes, most Hindu-Arabic languages write from right to left, instead of left to right.

Actually, does anyone know where that comes from?
I've never seen anything on the subject.

*raises hand*
I can read (and speak) Old English, and stumble my way through Latin.
I find knowing the 'root language' of a language or language branch furthers the comprehension of the language in general. And it's fun.
Plus that means you can read [famous work] in the original which is almost always preferable than the translation in most cases.

Yes, it's pretty fun. I'm thankfull that my eye is better than my hand, which is better than my ear, which is better than my mouth.

Wow. That's a bit silly isn't it?

This whole course has been a lesson in frustration. First my book doesn't let me into the online course, then the online course doesn't let me into the online book (and is absolutely useless), then the teacher pops tests on us with no rhyme or reason, then she doesn't even get the questions right.
Hopefully I pass, since I only took it to boost my GPA while I'm out of school.

Ah, those moments where you feel as though you cannot contribute anything to the conversation what so ever. Interesting to see the back and forth though.

Now you know how I feel all the time.

What do people do when they feel their life is a waste and always will be?

Because eventually the stars will die and everything will be cold and black.

[Teddy]

Awesome! Good luck

*doesn't even know what The Project is

Neither does the rest of my family. Little brother joked that he should have burnt the materials (sand and motor oil. Their distinct lack of flamability is a non-issue in his hands) while I still had them here at home, but he has no idea about how much that would come back and bite him in the end.

What do people do when they feel their life is a waste and always will be?

Don't, which pretty much is the worst possible advice I could give you without actually telling you to do something destructive. I wished I could help more than that. Sorry.

[Qwertystop]

Whoa, that's quite triptastic. I like it.

Thanks. I had to do a photoshop of the background picture, and the teacher wasn't entirely sure what I was getting at (old geezer...), so I wrote up a no-context excerpt to explain it.

[LaZodiac]

Neither does the rest of my family. Little brother joked that he should have burnt the materials (sand and motor oil. Their distinct lack of flamability is a non-issue in his hands) while I still had them here at home, but he has no idea about how much that would come back and bite him in the end.

Man, now I'm REALLY curious about what you're doing. Tell to Zodi =<

[HalfTangible]

Because eventually the stars will die and everything will be cold and black.

I asked what people do when they feel like that, not why

Don't, which pretty much is the worst possible advice I could give you without actually telling you to do something destructive. I wished I could help more than that. Sorry.

'kay

[AsteriskAmp]

I'm not quite sure about that. It's less a story and more a hypothetical situation. The only daytime lantern that I know of in Greek philosophy involves Diogenes the Cynic. Socrates (or Plato, depending on how you interpret it), says that if you dragged a man out of the cave he would temporarily think it useless, and if he came back he would be killed by those who want to stay.

Well, they DID kill him.

"I teach you the overman. Gravity is something that shall be overcome. What have you done to overcome it?... All beings so far fallen from a height beyond themselves; and do you want to be the ebb of this great flood, and even go back to the ground? What is gravity to man? A laughing stock or painful embarrassment. And man shall be that to overman: a laughingstock or painful embarrassment. You have made your way from worm to man, and much in you is still worm. Once you were splatting, and even now, too, man is more splat than any splat... The overman is not able to go splat. Let your will say: the overman shall not be able to go splat... Man is a rope, tied between splat and overman—a rope over an abyss ... what is great in man is that he is a bridge and not an end."

-Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

I think he was referring to another gravity...

Also, on Nietzsche less known tomes is his philosophy of cooking, titled "Thus Spoke Martha Stewart". Known for the famous quote "the snail is dead" followed by "now proceed to grill it."

That's alright.
I can understand it, it's just I don't have a very philosophical brain. I'm more geared toward science.
Which is a shame that I was forced to give up my hopes of a scientific career due to illness. Still, there's always getting a degree in the future when I have the time and the money.
Edit: And if it gets too deep, I know how to not read things.

Perhaps you'd like Popper, or Lakatos. Both are philosophers of science, and the conclusions they reach are rather clean and concise, not to mention important to anyone who seriously wants to do science as such.

Not many I think? The medieval part isn't hard for me, given that many of my beliefs dominated very strongly during that era. I think a lot of people ignore medieval philosophy because they're strongly influenced by philosophy from the Enlightenment onward, which stands in stark contrast to the medieval tradition. It gets especially tricky because some people don't consider medieval philosophy to be true philosophy. Too many thinkers of that era (St. Bonaventure comes to mind) fused philosophy to theology so closely that it's really hard to separate the two, partly because some medieval thinkers made no distinction between the two until St. Thomas Aquinas came along and made a generally accepted distinction between faith and reason. Many nowadays want more "pure" philosophy such as the rationalism started by Descartes, so medieval thought goes out the window. I enjoy both fields of thought, so I just get a two for one deal.

From what I've heard from several of the members of the philosophy faculty if you try to talk about time you have to go medieval. On the other hand Descartes did throw the idea of relying on your sense out of the window, though he himself did indulge into a theology of sorts at times. Also, "each philosophical movement does not negate those before it, like the fruit does not negate the flower from which it came from", as Hegel would say.

Indeed, it's all about our overlapping specializations. I'm not even that widely versed on all philosophy. I know the medieval and ancient eras pretty well, and I've even got a decent grounding in the Enlightenment, but ask me to tell you more than a few sentences about Kirkegaard, Heidegger, Locke, and many others, and I'll be lost. Then if you take me out of philosophy and stick me into say...advanced quantum physics, then I'm utterly hosed. I've got little to say there.

My philosophy course runs backward, so I get to Heidegger, Hegel, Nietzsche, Popper, Lakatos, Kuhn and Schoppenhauer before even reading Kant which leads to rather interesting classes when the introduction to the philosopher is a 2 hour explanation of why he is disgruntled at a philosopher we have yet to read. On the other hand Heidegger is pretty stand alone, Popper, Lakatos and Kuhn are philosophy of science. On the other hand, 2 hour classes on Kant to be even able to start reading Hegel.

I wish my high school offered Latin. There's only one public school in the entire city which offers Latin, sadly. However, I think I'd rather learn more... well, languages with more real-life applications. Arabic is probably what I'll be taking in undergrad. Russian is also on my list of "languages to learn".
I've always been a history guy, though. History, language, and music have always been my "things", as far back as I can remember. Despite my math and science teachers attempts to convince me that I love doing math and science and should take maths and sciences in university. I may be good at it, but that doesn't mean I LIKE it.

Online latin courses, I think I saw one on TV that promised a native speaker as a teacher by videoconference lessons.

Nothing prevents you from doing a mixed approach. I'm a science person, still going to take all the psychology, theology and semiotics courses I can because... Rennaisance man FTW!

What do people do when they feel their life is a waste and always will be?

Hg(CNO)2, then you go to the garden and see everything in a brighter light.
On the serious hand, find a short term goal to get you going, something that's simple yet challenging.

[Teddy]

Man, now I'm REALLY curious about what you're doing. Tell to Zodi =<

No. I prefer being secretive. It takes away a lot of pressure and lets me stay flexible without stepping on anyone's expectations. Plus, it's the perfect setup for following the principle of underpromise and overdeliver. You basically can't promise any less than nothing.

[LaZodiac]

No. I prefer being secretive. It takes away a lot of pressure and lets me stay flexible without stepping on anyone's expectations. Plus, it's the perfect setup for following the principle of underpromise and overdeliver. You basically can't promise any less than nothing.

Ahh, ok. Can't wait to see what it is though, now that I'm interested.

[Teddy]

Oh, and I also love dropping hints in the middle of the conversation that no one will get or even notice, but which if you got them would disclose quite a lot.

[LaZodiac]

Oh, and I also love dropping hints in the middle of the conversation that no one will get or even notice, but which if you got them would disclose quite a lot.

I'm just going to pretend you're hinting at me to moniter my PMs

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

It takes years of practice.

This is my practice, right here.

You like the philosophy of Islam you say? Read Averroes! Read Avicenna! They're both really cool!

When I visited McGill in March, I sat in on two lectures. One of them was about Islamic philosophy, in brief. It was really short, and really only covered the syntheses of Plato, Socrates, and the Quran. Avicenna, Averroes, and Ghazali were the main names mentioned, if I do remember correctly. It was quite fascinating, but it was very much just a survey of medieval Islamic philosophy. I would have liked it if the lecturer went MUCH more in depth.

Essays...essays...essays...OH CRAP! I have a nine page paper on Thomistic theology to write!

I don't even know what that means. :D
I know next to nothing about theology. However, board-rules and all...

Montreal? Very cool. It would certainly be better than Providence, Rhode Island.

Aye, and the university is just on the bottom and lowest slopes of Mount Royal itself, and it's just the shortest of walks downtown and to the waterfront. It's the BEST location.

My high school offered Latin, but I never took it, which I kind of regret. I spent my time learning German and Spanish. Also, do learn Russian. It is in my opinion, the best language around.

Lists of Languages Gwyn Likes: English, French, German, Russian, Arabic
and luckily I already speak English and passable French.

Be glad Thufir's not here as well then.

I would just give up.

Then that's what you'll specialise in somehow. If something academic related makes you flail in unbridled happiness, that's what you should do if at all possible.
Here's an odd perspective for you on the First Crusade: one of my set texts for medieval French 1100 - 1300 is the Chanson de Roland which contains many references to the Crusades. Or things that could be to the Crusades. Given it was most likely written between 1098 and 1100, almost certainly relate to the Crusades.
Now imagine a patriotic French chanson de geste (kind of like an epic poem, but not exactly) about Charlemagne and a campaign he went on in the C8^th that could be interpreted as basically the Crusades, but in Spain.
And not as bloody. Involving traitors.
It's one skewed perspective I tell you. FUn though. All those things you can read into it. Like how the author basically canonised Charlemagne by making his sword, Joieuse (OF spelling) contain the tip of the Lance of the Crucifixion (found in 1098) or the virtual halo of pure goodness or all the things!
And it paints a fairly sympathetic (well, fair for its time) portrait of the pagans too. And by pagans I mean the Moors.

I'm familiar with the story, but I've never read more than a kid's abbreviated version. It's on my list of "Things I Must Read At Some Point Eventually".
... it's a ridiculously long list.
It sounds like a scream to read!

Well, you must suffer the necessary demons to get through to the best bits. And they really aren't that hard either. I started learning them in college (UK), so I had a fairly good grounding in 'basic' linguistics by the time I started uni.
Although stay away from the French linguists. Especially Saussure. And Chomsky for that matter.
I'd also recommend learning your IPA soon, because you'll find that when it comes down to mmorphology, dialect and so on it'll be important.

I'm somewhat familiar with IPA, but I pick up things like that fast, so I'm not worrying too much about it. The Head of Linguistics has an awesome German accent that makes even basic syntax somewhat fun to listen to. Yeah, the early stuff doesn't seem that hard, or even all that boring to slog through. I'll survive it, for sure!

Aside from the usual caveat that Oxbridge education is not like most universities, university exams don't seem all that hard. It's just up an extra level or two, with more complex things to talk about.
Oh, and those exams? Argh. That's . . . a lot. Mine are all three hours each, one a day, virtually back to back, but I only have seven of them.
That just seems terrible. Especially the Physics stuff, but it always was my least favourite science, even back when I did science.

I've already done 2 Math exams and 2 English exams, each one 2 hours long (I just got back from the second English exam). I also have 2 French exams, but they're short and together are 2 and a half hours, and also there's a week in between my last History exam and my French exams, so that's TONS of time to study.

At least your teaching'll be in English. It takes me quite a while to work my way through an academic article in French because you need an entirely new vocabulary to understand it. Literally.

Oh, I am NOWHERE NEAR the level of proficiency in French necessary to be taught in it. Though if I want to, just for kicks, I can request to take ANY given exam or hand in ANY given assignment in French.

You've not met me in real life. I babble. A lot. But I suppose it's the internet, and you can't exactly tell me to stop (you can just skip over the post) so I feel freer to ramble on about obscure and random things.

Aye, the benefits of not-having-to-read-every-single-thing-in-front-of-me :D

Arabic'd be fun to learn! I think you write it backwards don't you?
Heh. Scientists and mathematicians are always trying to poach to artsy students. Silly people.
Your experience reminds me of how a couple of teachers at my secondary wanted me to take the IB because I was a good all-rounder even though I really wanted to specialise, and it was blatantly obvious back when I was in primary that I wanted to do English. Also didn't help that I'd have compulsory science and mathematics, and while I didn't mind them, I didn't exactly enjoy them. Also my grades were dropping in the latter because I couldn't care less.
Somehow I don't think that would have been a good idea, taking mathematics when I couldn't care less about it.

Also, Arabic script is just so. gosh. darn. pretty.
Arabic script is the most gorgeous form of writing EVER. Also, the things you can do with Arabic script...

Spoiler

Show

Spoiler

Show

That's complete and beautiful art, made out of actual words.
I'm in love with that.
Like, legitimately in love with that.

Yeah, IB was haaard, and it kinda suuuucked, but on the other hand, I'm totally gonna MURDER university. I've already written a 4000-word paper while at the same time writing another 3000-word project, I've taken 12 (mock-)exams in 10 days (not including weekends), I am SET. Even if I did have to take math and a science that I would not have otherwise taken.

[Hydranova]

So what does the jaguar say?

[Teddy]

I'm just going to pretend you're hinting at me to moniter my PMs

Keep pretending then, I'm not making it that easy. You might expect some cryptic updates on any successes or failures I might encounter during the process (as always), and I'll make sure to post the finished result as well.

I'm aiming for 4 June as a definitive deadline. I have my reasons.

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

So what does the jaguar say?

I have no clue, I don't actually speak Arabic. :P
BUT I WILL LEARN.
Eventually.

[CurlyKitGirl]

Allow me to scream in fury briefly because the absolute GIT across the hall from me - the two foot wide hall - is blaring out atrociously bad electro-dance music at club level decibels!!!!!
At twenty past eleven in the evening!
At least everyone else in my staircase is joining in with me on our 'shout the moron into respecting his fellow humans - exam taking humans' crusade!
Lksdnfoiuabrdf S\lacknfs\dl!!!!!1!!eleven!

This far away from calling the Porters!

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

This far away from calling the Porters!

Just do it.

[Qwertystop]

I have no clue, I don't actually speak Arabic. :P
BUT I WILL LEARN.
Eventually.

Probably something jaguar-related.

Would be kinda hard to read that though. It's like a bad captcha, but the letters overlap and make a picture.

[The Succubus]

Just do it.

Release the hounds. Considerably more effective and also more entertaining.

[LaZodiac]

Keep pretending then, I'm not making it that easy. You might expect some cryptic updates on any successes or failures I might encounter during the process (as always), and I'll make sure to post the finished result as well.

I'm aiming for 4 June as a definitive deadline. I have my reasons.

I'll keep that in mind, then

[wadledo]

*stuff*

Play this loudly back at him!
DOOOOO IT!

[DraPrime]

Excellent! And while I did do the Harvard thing, I didn't get it.

Awwww man, that's a shame. It would have been quite cool if you were in Cambridge.

I

'm not much of a napper usually, so I just did nothing all day interspersed with doing nothing while listening to music on youtube.

I napped for most of today, because I slept so little last night. I've actually managed to sleep right past evening prayer and into the middle of dinner here at the seminary, but no one's checking on me so I assume I've gotten away with it.

>_>

Considering that back in the medieval period religion pretty much infused day-to-day life, it's very understandable that many attempts at abstract thought would resort to explaining it via religion or religious/spiritual terms
Me, I like the medieval schools of thought (science, religion, theology, philosophy etc.) because it's more . . . inventive (which isn't necessarily a good thing, science and medicine I'm looking at you) and dynamic than some ore modern ones.
Then again, as my personal tastes lie very much towards the older works in general, there's a fair bit of bias there.
Also I don't actually understand some post-Enlightenment philosophy which is unusual as you'd expect the medieval foundations to be of assistance, but nope.
And oddly, even though I'm areligious for want of a better classification, I find the medieval theories more appealing despite the meshing of theology and philosophy. The Cloude of Unknowynge is somewhat paradoxical because it's all about these high, abstract thoughts, yet in genial prose that make it so much easier to understand than some later philosophies.
Also it's rather fun and sometimes more than a bit ironic.

Post-Enlightenment thought sadly just kind of ignores medieval philosophy. St. Thomas Aquinas occasionally shows up, but mostly because people want to argue against him. St. Anselm's ontological argument for God, which took me a solid hour of thinking to really comprehend, also gets used by Descartes, and then everyone else proceeds to yell at Descartes for using it. It's not surprising that medieval thought really doesn't help with understanding any later philosophy, because rather than being a continuation of past schools of thought like the medieval was, the modern era has branched out in a million ways.

That's actually what I like about a lot of medieval thought. It's a nice continuum that builds on top of and further develops past philosophy. There are disputes (John Scotus Eriugena got stabbed to death by his students because they disagreed with him) and different schools, but overall there's a sense that they take what was good before them, and then try to improve upon it. The Enlightenment and later schools of thought do borrow from the past, but they often try too hard to do their own thing and reject past thought. Also, the late medieval period was probably the last great explosion of Aristotelian philosophy, and as far as I'm concerned Aristotle is pretty much the best of the ancient philosophers.

Also, I know need to read The Cloud of Unknowing. It looks so very interesting. It's a shame that currently I'm reading The Ladder of Divine Ascent, although that's a solid book in it's own right. It's a guide for monks written by the abbot of a monastery at the foot of Mt. Sinai. Yes, the Mt. Sinai. It's interesting stuff.

Nice. That band's not really something I'd have thought to listen to, but I like it. At the moment I'm on a jaunt through cheesy British glam rock because it's so happy and carefree, and I need that after the past few days.

When I need happy cheese I listen to MANOWAR! They're quite ridiculous, but they're so enthusiastic about what they do that I can't not enjoy their music.

:smallpout:
While I am self-teaching Latin (sloooowly) it's fallen to the wayside recently given That Which Shall Not Be Named. All my envies.
For me, much of the medieval period is important context for the literature - culture, language, schools of thought, politics (my friends are concerned for me because I occasionally struggle to remember who the Prime and Deputy Prime Ministers are even though I can engage in in-depth discussions about the politics of C14^th England), architecture (I don't even know either).
I suppose to be a master of my trade, you also have to be a jack of many.
I wouldn't have thought I knew a lot about medieval art and so on though.

I tried self teaching myself, but I found that I just didn't have the time to learn Latin on my own. I will eventually have to do a little bit of self teaching, just because the course I'm taking teaches classical Latin, while I want to know ecclesiastical Latin instead. Still, the switch shouldn't be too hard.

Oh Boethius. Boethius, Boethius, Boethius.
He was all but a set text the moment I started my medieval specialisation because he influence so damn much.
I have read King Alfred's Boethius translation (well, the prose one, not the poetic) and Boece (Chaucer's translation) as well as the Consolation itself. Albeit translated because I know not Latin enough to read Boethius.
I know not if Boethius coined the imagery of Fortune and her wheel, but he certainly popularised it because virtually every single thing in the history of medieval literature talks about her damn wheel (this may be a little hyperbolic). She shows up in Chaucer, in Dunbar, in James I's Kingis Quair, in Gower, in random anonymous poems, in all the things! And two of those poets I referenced by name are Scottish!

A pity that Lady Philosophy doesn't show up more. She was an interesting character. Interestingly enough, Boethius is actually a canonized saint, though it took forever for that happened. He was for a long time confused with another saint named Severinus, but eventually the distinction was made, and Boethius got canonized in the 19th century.

Hehe.
So yet another Brilliantly Important Scholar in His Field is as dull as dry toast. How unexpected. Possibly part of it though was down to scholarly dictates of the time. Duns Scotum was part of the Oxford Franciscan school (ha! My college referenced him! So weird when that happens) which was founded by the first scholastic philosopher to completely understand Aristotle's dual paths thing about scientific reasoning. Maybe it's a founding father's thing?
And it does make some sort of sense seeing as Bonaventure followed and accepted some of Plato's doctrines.
But Lord, yes, seeing as the dunce cap was named after Duns, it does say something doesn't it?

Yeah, some of the more brilliant philosophers occasionally get branded as dumb, hence the dunce cap. St. Thomas Aquinas was called "dumb ox" by some of his fellow classmates because they thought he was stupid. It only became clear that he was brilliant a little bit later. I think there's a certain level of intelligence that makes you look incomprehensibly stupid to others.

So basically, picking up what's relevant to what you like?
For me, my philosophic knowledge deteriorates rapidly about 1700 or so. As for the names you dropped . . . I've heard of them. And advanced quantum physics?
It's quantum. Things move around very quickly without moving at all. Probably.
No idea really. It involved numbers.

Well, I will actually have to learn more about the contemporary and modern philosophers. I just haven't yet touched on them yet. I have had the occasional exposure to them, but only indirectly. For example, last semester I had a course called Philosophy of the Human Person which went from the pre-socratic philosophers up to post-modernism, so while I haven't ever taken course directly on those such as Descartes or David Hume, I've still had courses that do talk about them. So there are some of the modern era such as Hume, Descartes, and Kant that I'm actually somewhat familiar with.

Don't you just hate it when you can't pick an option because it blocks you from other options you need more for your core papers?

YES. So very much. I hate it almost as much as not being able to take a course because I lack the right prerequisites. We have a theology course next semester called "Friars in Renaissance Florence" that I wanted to take, especially since we're taught by Dominican friars who would know something about this. However, I lacked a second tier theology course as a prerequisite, so I'm taking Reformation theology instead.

Then that's what you'll specialise in somehow. If something academic related makes you flail in unbridled happiness, that's what you should do if at all possible.
Here's an odd perspective for you on the First Crusade: one of my set texts for medieval French 1100 - 1300 is the Chanson de Roland which contains many references to the Crusades. Or things that could be to the Crusades. Given it was most likely written between 1098 and 1100, almost certainly relate to the Crusades.
Now imagine a patriotic French chanson de geste (kind of like an epic poem, but not exactly) about Charlemagne and a campaign he went on in the C8^th that could be interpreted as basically the Crusades, but in Spain.
And not as bloody. Involving traitors.
It's one skewed perspective I tell you. FUn though. All those things you can read into it. Like how the author basically canonised Charlemagne by making his sword, Joieuse (OF spelling) contain the tip of the Lance of the Crucifixion (found in 1098) or the virtual halo of pure goodness or all the things!
And it paints a fairly sympathetic (well, fair for its time) portrait of the pagans too. And by pagans I mean the Moors.

*pumps fist in the air*

Expeditio sacra!

Well, they DID kill him.

Indeed, for the high crime of being a serious pain. I get the feeling that whenever most people saw Socrates, they thought "Oh crap, it's that guy. Don't talk to him unless you want to be embarrassed for the next hour."

I think he was referring to another gravity...

Also, on Nietzsche less known tomes is his philosophy of cooking, titled "Thus Spoke Martha Stewart". Known for the famous quote "the snail is dead" followed by "now proceed to grill it."

Heh, and perhaps he makes a distinction between chef and waiter morality, the chef morality of course being much greater, because it has the will to exert power over food, while the waiter just follows orders.

From what I've heard from several of the members of the philosophy faculty if you try to talk about time you have to go medieval. On the other hand Descartes did throw the idea of relying on your sense out of the window, though he himself did indulge into a theology of sorts at times. Also, "each philosophical movement does not negate those before it, like the fruit does not negate the flower from which it came from", as Hegel would say.

I'm guessing that on the issue of time they're referring to St. Augustine. At the end of his Confessions he wrote an extremely influential discourse on the nature of time. I think even Heidegger might have found inspiration in it.

Descartes did throw out the idea of relying on senses...and he didn't. He starts off rejecting sense data, only to go on to explain why he finds the world reliable through the ontological argument for God. He still puts rationalism above empiricism, but he doesn't completely throw out sense experience.

Each movement does in a certain sense build off the past, but sometimes as a reaction against whatever came before. The modern period did that to the medievals, and now the post-modernist philosophers are rebelling against modernist philosophers.

My philosophy course runs backward, so I get to Heidegger, Hegel, Nietzsche, Popper, Lakatos, Kuhn and Schoppenhauer before even reading Kant which leads to rather interesting classes when the introduction to the philosopher is a 2 hour explanation of why he is disgruntled at a philosopher we have yet to read. On the other hand Heidegger is pretty stand alone, Popper, Lakatos and Kuhn are philosophy of science. On the other hand, 2 hour classes on Kant to be even able to start reading Hegel.

Hmmm, backwards philosophy? That's rather interesting. I don't know if I completely agree with the method, but it's interesting. I'm not a fan of the last couple centuries of philosophy (though Kant is kind of cool), but I will eventually have to learn it. I'm actually somewhat familiar with Nietzsche and Hegel, though I don't really like either. Hegel seems to pull his entire metaphysical system out of nowhere. He claims that the whole world is some continually progressing idea in the mind of God, and my response is "Why Hegel? How did you come to this conclusion? What reasoning did you use? Are you just pulling this out of thin air?" Nietzsche on the other hand...just hates good things. Bleh.

Still, Kant is quite cool. I like his categorical imperatives. I even wrote my big ethics paper on them last year.

When I visited McGill in March, I sat in on two lectures. One of them was about Islamic philosophy, in brief. It was really short, and really only covered the syntheses of Plato, Socrates, and the Quran. Avicenna, Averroes, and Ghazali were the main names mentioned, if I do remember correctly. It was quite fascinating, but it was very much just a survey of medieval Islamic philosophy. I would have liked it if the lecturer went MUCH more in depth.

It is worth learning. Avicenna is particularly interesting with his study of causality and metaphysics.

I don't even know what that means. :D
I know next to nothing about theology. However, board-rules and all...

Thomistic theology is the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas. It simply borrows his name, which is fitting. It's fun stuff.

Aye, and the university is just on the bottom and lowest slopes of Mount Royal itself, and it's just the shortest of walks downtown and to the waterfront. It's the BEST location.

Oh man...mountains. Rhode Island has pretty much none of those. One of their highest points of elevation is a garbage dump. I'm so envious.

Lists of Languages Gwyn Likes: English, French, German, Russian, Arabic
and luckily I already speak English and passable French.

I'll support you there on Russian, but the other languages...eh. Arabic does have very cool writing.

Allow me to scream in fury briefly because the absolute GIT across the hall from me - the two foot wide hall - is blaring out atrociously bad electro-dance music at club level decibels!!!!!
At twenty past eleven in the evening!
At least everyone else in my staircase is joining in with me on our 'shout the moron into respecting his fellow humans - exam taking humans' crusade!
Lksdnfoiuabrdf S\lacknfs\dl!!!!!1!!eleven!

This far away from calling the Porters!

This, is why I'm glad I don't live in a normal college dorm.