I don't know anything

"I know that I know nothing" - Socrates

In my english and philosophy lectures the concept of knowing nothing and accepting your ignorance. I was perfectly okay with this concept and let it sort of sit in my brain for a while until it hit me.

We actually really know nothing. Well, at least I do not know anything. Mark Edmunson's essay Why Read? which we read in english, essentially stated that one must abandon their past to fully examine a text. We must admit we know nothing, that we are ignorant. It also has a concept of "knowingness" which is essentially what is expressed by academics, they seem to know everything but they really know nothing. This concept is also explored in Plato's "The Apology".

After this sat in my brain for a while I finally absorbed it fully. I absorbed the concept that nobody really knows anything over a year ago. We can't be certain, we can only be almost certain, or likely. But what hit me was that I admire academics way too much.

I see people, maybe not necessarily famous academic geniuses, but teachers, professors and authors as these super geniuses. They get paid to tell me things and they earn money off of the text I am reading, so they must be right, right? Wrong. I was aware of this concept previously too, I just never made the entire connection until this week. Thanks brain.

But academics can't be trusted. Well, they CAN be. But they shouldn't be.

Also, you are not an academic who knows everything if you just know one thing. People frequently feel they are educated in all things when they are experts in one thing. I am really pushing "The Apology" on you, now. I love Socrates. So many people get annoyed with him. I just love dialectics.

Anyways. Don't trust academics. Listen to them without bias and then question the shit out of everything they say. That is my advice.

Don't even listen to me. I realized with my blog I try to be one of these "knowing people" when really, I also know nothing. I just hope that I am somewhat interesting enough to spark people's interests in some academic topic or even a tidbit of my life that can conjure a discussion or just a thought in your mind that keeps you going.

Also, I am still gathering traffic to my blog. So thank-you, traffic that somehow found me when I am never posting. I want to post at least weekly. I just find since I have started university it is so much harder to sit down and actually write out a full blog post. I will try my best. I promise. I also don't make promises, but I'll make an exception for my lovely corrupted readers. I mean, my lovely skeptics! XOXO;)

No, I did not just sign my blog with "XOXO;)". I take that back! Oh well.

Why every student should learn philosophy

I am enrolled in the Philosophy program at my school and I am planning to do a double-major with English and Philosophy. I love to think and to write, so this makes sense for me. Of course these two majors aren't very logical to go for since they don't provide a good job afterwards, unless you want to go to grad school and become a professor or you want to become a teacher.

Most people I know are either "science" or "arts" people. Either they are better at math and science or they are better at arts subjects. The "in betweens" are the social sciences because they sort of combine science and arts, like Psychology and Sociology. I used to want to major in Psych (and I still might) but that is besides the point.

The point is that being an arts student is extremely rewarding. I am not saying "Quick! Everyone go get an arts degree!" I just mean that at some point in your life you should either enrol in a single credit of philosophy, english, history, whatever your arts preference or perhaps just read a lot of literature based on a few subjects. I think it is extremely healthy and although shouldn't be a requirement, should be strongly recommended by most universities to have to have at least 1 credit in an arts subject.

I was reading an article in Macleans (here) about french students who think Philosophy shouldn't have to be a requirement since it doesn't prepare you for the "real life".

The real life?
THE REAL LIFE?

The real life should involve questioning, studying and your mind playing an active role in the understanding of great metaphysical questions and the questioning of ethics. The mind should have to do this. Why? It's simple. Blind commitment. If our society just keeps progressing we are going to start forgetting why we do the things we do. For example, Why do we shop in grocery stores instead of farming? Why do we want to get jobs? These questions are things everyone should have to really think of and answer. It doesn't even have to be ancient philosophy, it should be modern philosophy.

Maybe this is an over exaggeration and a fallacy, but I am just trying to prove to you that it is important to question things and if you have to force a mandatory philosophy credit upon students to get them to start questioning things, then do so.

If I could have it my way, I would have Philosophy a mandatory credit in high school for grade 11 students, just when they are starting to try to figure out their futures. If I could, I would also make philosophy a mandatory credit in university for first year students, although there are no assignments and although the reading is "recommended", the attendance is necessary, you have to pass by having attended something like 95% or even 100% of all classes. This way it barely takes away from your actual subject of study since there is no outside work, just perhaps a 1-3 hour lecture per week, for one or two semesters. That is it. No laptops, as well, so you have to pay attention. If I could have it more my way, again, I would have a seminar once a week as well in small groups so they can discuss what they learned in the lecture earlier in the week.

I want to ponder on my "modern philosophy" point. I think that people should have a healthy skepticism. Maybe the university philosophy course can be chosen more specifically to be a historical philosophy from a certain time period, a general overview or a more "modern" philosophy. Basically, questioning things that are around us today, like I said earlier like "Why do we go to the grocery store instead of farm?". Being able to question these things just makes us understand the world around us, a little more.

But the learning of philosophy or any other arts subject definitely doesn't have to happen in classrooms or lecture halls, it can happen in libraries, on the internet, or even alone.

I do understand how people find the study of things like literature, philosophy and history to be completely useless, but it isn't. People think that since it doesn't lead to a career that it is worthless to society. These people are the ones who tend to forget that getting a career isn't the be-all and the end-all.


If you are interested in learning anything about philosophy in specifics I suggest:
- Starting off with some Plato which is fairly easy to understand or perhaps Nietzsche if you have an advanced reading level and want to be slightly entertained because Nietzsche has some crazy ideas (which I love)
AND/OR
- Just question things around you
AND/OR
- Enrolling in one college credit at the college or university near you, perhaps you can just enrol in a "non-degree" which usually means that you can walk into any class and just pay attention, not get a degree and not have to do any work
AND/OR
- Have fun reading the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy http://plato.stanford.edu/ This is the best resource for everything philosophy. It is highly reliable and you can certainly learn from it. I've used it for research projects in the past but I suppose you could just read it for fun if you wanted to

Having fun expanding your minds!

What's new, Scooby-Doo?

I am going to be focusing on a few key things to get my mind established. Logic make some of? Grammar make good of!

Okay, so I have a few things to talk about.

1. My recent trip to visit the university I will be attending this fall

2. Current things I am thinking about

3. What I am thinking of doing as a career

4. Poetry

(Oh boy)

1. My Recent Trip to the University I will be attending this fall

I am going to be attending Nipissing University this fall and for the third time I visited the university for an Orientation. What was nice about this one is that you actually get to meet students that are in your program, or ones similar. I got to meet a few interesting individuals and some people too! (Cue the laugh track). Sorry, bad joke. No, I got to meet a few interesting students, which was nice. There weren't any other people (that I noticed/met) that were also in philosophy. I met one other in political science with me. I met a bunch of people from History and Fine Arts. I also met two interesting professors. 

My mom and I stayed in the residence there, and it was really nice. I was sitting in the room on my ipad eating soup (this sounds sad, but it wasn't) and I was just thinking about how in two months, this will be where I am living (not that exact dorm house/room, but you get the point). 

Overall I had a good time. I didn't learn too much. I did learn now I cannot complete a BEd at Nipissing, which I wasn't necessarily planning to do, anyways. I can go somewhere else (as long as I am accepted). But Nipissing is no longer accepting psychology and political science as teachables, so I can't enter the BEd program afterwards. I might go to York, but that is very far into the future.

2.  Current things I am thinking about

Time to enter my mind. I am thinking about reading a lot. 

Thinking about reading.

Not even reading. Well, I am.

I know I am going to be doing a lot of reading in university, which I don't mind, but I just have a slight concern. I cannot stay awake while reading something that doesn't interest me. This may apply to many different people, but it applies especially to me. In grade 12 english I was literally trying so many different things to stay awake while reading Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh (which I originally chose to read for my independent study). I would overload on caffeine, contort my body into different positions, get comfortable, get uncomfortable, go in bright light... nothing would work. I kept falling asleep. Literally passing out. I think my solution to this in university will be reading in a public place. I hate falling asleep in public places, so I will probably read somewhere public like the library, but sit somewhere with minimal distraction so I can focus. 

Another thing about reading is that I got a bunch of books from Amazon.ca and Chapters.ca to read this summer. I am halfway through one already. It is a book of poetry, but I will talk more of this later.

3. What I am thinking of doing as a career (Also, what's my major?)

Since I was at Nipissing the past two days, I have really been thinking hardcore about my major. If you follow my blogs, you know this is a common theme I talk about. What will I study? What will I do as a career? 

Currently I am choosing to double-major in either Philosophy, Psychology or Political Science. I am pretty much 100% going to be studying philosophy, but obviously, I am not going to commit until I have to. I am taking all of the first year prerequisites for these subjects and I don't have to declare my major until I begin selecting my second year courses. 

I want to take philosophy because it combines a few of my favourite things: thinking, questioning things, history, greece/rome, eastern cultures. I like to think about thinking, it is as simple as that. (Or is it?)

I want to take political science because it is interesting to me and I may possibly want to be a politician someday. So that could be a good choice.

I want to take psychology because I love education and psychology has a strong focus and interweaving with education. I also love the mind and thinking (as related to philosophy). 

In the end, I want to become either a politician, teacher or professor. I want to either be a strong political influence or politician (a MPP or City councillor or mayor), be high up in the school board, be a principal or do something do help education, or be a teacher of philosophy and whatever my second teachable turns out to be in a high school setting, and lastly I might want to be an education professor. 

I don't need to choose (yet). It's just haunting me. 

4. Poetry

As stated earlier, I have been more interested in poetry lately. Most poetry goes completely over my head and I dislike it, but I have this small book of poetry written by a Canadian, just based of of their life. It is interesting to me. I think I find it interesting just because I think people are interesting... and this poetry helps me get into the mind of this random person. It's not hard to understand, it's pretty clearly stated.

I didn't like the Poetry unit too much in my writer's craft class in high school, but now I don't mind poetry. I started writing some stuff, and I will be honest with you - I am not good at it. 

My mind doesn't write in verses yet. It can't be poetic. I think the more poetry I read, the better I will get.

And that is it for now. I am hopefully going to stay on top of blogging. I am going to be reading more often, so I might blog about things I am reading about. Who knows? Life is a mystery.

#3 30 Day Writing Challenge- A Book I love

A book I love. Hmm...

I could pick from a couple. I am not a big book reader because I am too lazy to make the time to read. But when I do read, I read a lot of non-fiction. The last book I read was Deborah Kenny's Born to rise.

But my favourite book would have to be Bossypants by Tina Fey. It is an autobiography about her life.

Tina Fey is one of my favourite writers, comedians and actresses. She's a big role model to me.

I love Bossypants so much because it is hilarious.

A lot of people who know who Tina Fey is just think of her as an actress or a comedian and then think that her book might be bad because she's just an actress. But she's a writer! She wrote for SNL for 9 years, and originally her major in university was english before she switched to drama.

Her book is amazing. It is also the only book I've ever read cover-to-cover, twice.

I want to read it again, I haven't read it since last summer.

I would read it just because it's so funny. Even for the moderate fan of Tina Fey or even SNL because she does mention Saturday Night Live quite often. Or even the aspiring comedian because she talks about her rise to fame... sort of.

This is part of the back cover of the book. 

Too busy, not busy enough

I have had a lot of "bloggable" things on my mind lately. My computer has been acting up lately, so I didn't get a chance to blog each thing individually, in depth. So I will just generally talk about what I've been thinking about.

I have been extremely bored all week. Bored and lazy. I have had nothing to do at school, and I had supply teachers all week. I always save my homework and assignments for Sunday mornings, so this morning when I had 3 things to do, I was so excited. I have just been so unchallenged lately. Peer tutoring is the only challenge I have at school. Things just seem to be moving so slow.

I have been so lazy--- and STRESSED OUT about BEING lazy, that on Saturday I woke up, got dressed, and started crying because I had to go to work. I took the day off as a mental health day. I just needed a day off, even though I have pretty much had the whole week off. But I am glad I did it. I just needed that day. It is weird that even though I have been bored all week that I needed to take another day off.

All I know is that I need a new challenge. I think I am going to pour my energy into three things:
1. My half marathon is on Sunday, so I am doing last minute training stuff. Sort of, I don't want to injure myself again! But today I am running 10k, but I am doing it at a fast pace. Tuesday or Wednesday I am going to do 15k-21k then on Friday I am going to do a little run, maybe 5k or so, just before the weekend. Also, I'm going to pour my energy into my bodybuilding as well. Today I am doing back. Monday I am doing abs and chest. Tuesday I am not sure if I am doing anything other than running or cardio. Wednesday is Shoulders, Thursday is back, Friday I am not sure if I am going to the gym, but if I do I am going to do a lot of stretching. Saturday I am going to toronto and then Sunday is the half marathon!
2. I am trying to read this book, but it is hard to get through the first few chapters. It's a sociology book I picked up from chapters, I thought seemed interesting. It's called "Going solo" by Eric Klinenberg.
3. I am going to start writing my essay for writers craft. I decided my final project is an essay. My topic for the essay is either "Why people think I am smart" or "Why I am not smart". It's going to be a satirical essay. But it is going to have to be pretty long. I think the rough copy is due in 2-3 weeks.

I hate having too much to do, but I also hate having too little to do. I need to find my balance.

Let's do this!