Yes, I saw it. Yes, it is freaking hilarious. No, you should not see it. Because it is evil.
That's my story and I'm sticking with it. If anyone wants more details, we can hash it out in the comments.
So the big news: Capria and I are in the new place. It's great. It's got room, it's got character, it's got everything we need and want. So we are very thankful.
We are going camping this weekend, which should be great.
Thanks for all those expressing concern for my eye. It's back to normal. I wish I had taken pictures.
Historically, the philosophically-minded who have the bright idea to foray into the wild and wonderful world of the philosophy of science are often appropriately accosted and crucified by the scientific community. But then again, I often assume history makes exceptions. So, acknowledging that any real scientist has the right to step in and tell me to bugger off, I want to offer a few thoughts on the evolution/intelligent design (ID) debate that caught my attention yesterday in a NY Times article as well as a feature in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer on the Discovery Institute, a think-tank significant in the ID movement.
I’m going to take us back to highschool logic class here and talk about induction and deduction. Inductive logic, as you will recall, is based on deriving conclusions based on observable premises. Induction does not have the logical strength of deductive logic, in which, to quote the ever-trusty Wikipedia, “the conclusion is of lesser or equal generality than the premises, as opposed to inductive reasoning, where the conclusion is of greater generality than the premises.” So, to return to the hot topic, it seems evident that both evolution and ID are based on forms of inductive logic. Both try to offer conclusions of greater generality based on the specific observable premises. Darwin sails to the Galapagos, checks out a few finches, and claims that there must be a material explanation for the diversity of species. Evolution is such a material explanation. Michael Behe does the exact same thing with blood clotting, arguing that it cannot be explained by evolution and could only exist as the result of ID.
The interesting thing to me, and this is where I am going out on a limb, is that evolution can then be utilized for certain forms of scientific deductive reasoning which lead to new and possible inquiry, whereas ID does not allow such a possibility. Why? Because ID as a first principle ultimately ends up outside our ability to observe or calculate. It is beyond the material and while the material may give evidence that it is there, that is about all you can do with it. Which is fine, but not very helpful for science. Evolution, on the other hand, gives you a working premise by which new experiments, predictions, and observations can be generated. For example, according to one of the scientists quoted in the Times piece, the discovery of DNA was generated by the theory of evolution: if this material reality is at work, there must be some sort of code used to pass genetic information from one generation to the next. So scientists went to look for it. Evidence that an intelligent force created the universe is out there. But it doesn’t give us a method for further inquiry the way evolution does.
This, I think, is one key reason why scientists might be so up in arms over this debate. Sure, there are those who have an ideological commitment to secularism who are also in fighting mode (see Herbert A. Hauptman in the article cited below). Nevertheless, from a methodological perspective ID and evolution start at the same place but end up in different possibilities which are significant to science. One of these applications provides a material metalogic for exploring the world, while the other, because it is intrinsically an immaterial induction, cannot really be generalized by scientists for discovering how the world works now.
Which, in my mind, shows that (in theory) these two systems are actually not fully incompatible. As a case study, look at the Newtonian world view. God made the world like a giant watch run by ordered, observable, material principles. And then He stepped aside. Newton went at the world in an attempt to understand those material principles and so, from one perspective, he was as “atheistic” as Darwin. The point is that he was trying to understand the material reality he lived in using material principles. Many of the scientists of his day followed this program during the week and then went to church on Sunday to worship a God who in His infinite wisdom had made such a world.
I’m not calling for some sort of “ne’er the twain shall meet” dualism. I am all in favor of intelligent design scientists saying what it is they are able to say. But I also see that in one sense intelligent design cannot be a replacement for evolution. Perhaps a good ID scientist can tell me why I’m wrong. I’d be interested to hear.
[In a totally separate issue, for this discussion I have chosen to ignore the Foucauldian/Lyotardian critique of science as simply another discourse formation, etc. etc. (If you really want to see scientists foam at the mouth, just say Bruno Latour.)]
Check out this article (which I read after writing this entry.)
Another interesting read is the "Wedge Document," which the Discovery Institute acknowledged as its own, although unfortunately I was unable to link to it from their site. Here is DI's response to certain critics of the document.
I finished my intensive French class. I will be taking more french over the next few months, but this will be only a couple evenings a week. This was a good move, I think, as I have learned a lot and am in a good position for further studies.
The eye is coming along. Hopefully I will be able to go off dialating drops soon so I can actually see clearly.
We move in next Saturday. I am going to try to get some pictures of the new place posted up here in the not too distant future.
So the rest of the summer will shift to my master's project and the up coming quarter. This should be fun. I really can't believe how much I enjoy what I do. I think there must be something wrong with me.
In a few weeks we are going camping with some members of Capria's family. This should be a lot of fun.
That's all for now. I guess this post is kind of boring.
This may be old news to many of you, but I can't stop thinking about it.
Granted, there is some cheesy stuff on here, a lot of "I'm ok, you're ok," etc. But beyond that -- what does postsecret do for people? Is it the feeling of true anonymity which the internet can no longer give? Is it purgation?
It would be easy for someone to compare this to a religious confessional, but that would be wrong. The good catholic goes to the confessional to escape punishment from a God who already knows what he or she has done. That is, catholicism utilizes a panoptic reality. Postsecret is a way to escape and then reenter the social milieu. It takes that which is truly hidden from public discourse and then hands it over to that same social structure. On postsecret, one reveals that which is invisible. And, according to many of the comments, it makes people feel better. Why? Because it is spoken? Because others can look at it and say "you're not that bad"? (Which, incidentally, is not always a healthy excercise, in my mind.)
I can't help but think that this is an example of the "real" invading the "virtual." Material objects are created with real hands to express authentic emotions in a way that the virtual cannot.
So here's the question: would you post a secret?
On Monday afternoon, I was playing racquetball for the second time in my life. I am not the most athletic of individuals (although of course you would never guess this from my carved physique) and so it usually takes me a while to get my coordination down. The tragic result of this learning curve was a racquetball straight to the left eye at point blank range.
Now, I was wearing my regular glasses and had assumed this would provide enough protection. However, I was mistaken. Both lenses were knocked out and sent spinning across the court. When I took my hand off my eye, it looked like blood had smeared down onto it and I was afraid I had cut myself. My comrades told me that this was not the case. However, I knew that something was wrong as they proceeded to become fuzzier and fuzzier. By the time I made it to the locker room, it was as if a white sheet had been laid on top of my left eye. I could see light and changes in light, but that was it.
Since the campus drop-in center was closed, I walked to the emergency room. This was about 530 pm, and the place was packed. There was an elderly lady in a stretcher and any number of fevers, headaches, and sprains. To top it off, an already admitted patient began fighting with his doctor in an attempt to flee the hospital. I could see him swinging his shoes at the security guard, who was all but helpless as the patient was three time the guard's size. He finally made good at his escape, but they called the cops and got him back.
I tried to call Capria on the security phone, since the guard had taken the courtesy phone for some reason. Unfortunately, I could only get out that I was at the emergency room and I couldn't see before the guard returned and kicked me off. Fortunately, she was able to find me a little while later.
I noticed a sign that said "triage" on the door. This was not comforting when I was one of the first people to be called back, long before the many others who had been there before me. The nurse took a look at my eyes and asked me if I had always had one blue eye and one brown eye.
"No," I said.
She laughed. "You do now." I looked in the mirror and, sure enough, it was brown.
So to cut the rest of the story, they sent me up to ophthalmology where they did a series of examinations, including a ultrasound on my eye to check for retinal damage. They told me that I had blood in my eye, technically called a hyphema. Here is a rather large picture of an eye with a hyphema. The thing is, my eye was 60-70 percent full of blood, while this person probably only has maybe 20%. So that gives you an idea of how it looked. And that was also why I couldn't see and my eye appeared brown.
So, two days and steroid, dilating, and inter-ocular pressure reducing drops later, I can see much better. Although everything is still a bit fuzzy. I celebrated by renting the entire first season of The Sopranos last night. We got through the first of four disks. What a great show.
Also, the med students loved me. Everyone wanted to take a look at it. It was pretty cool, I have to admit. But I am not playing another sport with out true protective glasses.
So I have been busy with more French and finding an apartment. Which, I am happy to say, we have. You can see a small picture of the outside of the building here. We have been looking for a number of months for a new place, although the intense searching didn't kick in until the beginning of the month. The apartment we found is from the 20s and really cool inside. Moreover, it has more room than we currently have and it is three blocks from where we live now. We are super excited. I'll add new address and whatnot here when I get it.
I have been cooking a lot since I am home most afternoons. This is also very nice. I realized one day that taking the time to make a good meal that you enjoy both preparing and eating is pretty much my definition of the good life. And that if you can do it, then do it. We also started the coolest culinary tradition in the Jaussen household thus far. For the last three saturdays we stop at the local fish market for fresh filets and cook them up that night. So far we have had salmon (twice) and tuna steaks. If you have any recommendations, please let me know.
The summer reading has been a bit scattergunned but actually I am quite happy with the way it has shaped up. I got to read some cool novels (House of Leaves is a great read, although time consuming) and some cool philosophy as well (de Certeau's Practice of Everyday Life is definitely worth the effort). I still have a list, of course . . .
I will try to be a bit more regular with this thing in the next month or so. Once we move I am accquiring a new computer as well as home access.