It begins...
So I woke up this morning, did my traditional muttering about having to get out of bed, got dressed, opened my blinds and gasp there's snow all over the bloody place. Apparently the wind I heard last night was just part of a storm. I realize this brands me as a very poor Canadian, but I really am not a fan of snow. Sure, it looks pretty. And makes things look Christmassy and stuff. And it covers the mess that is our lawn. But it's cold. It's not fun to walk in. And did I mention it's cold? Winter sucks.
Anyway, sitting at the OC computer lab at the moment. Have 20 mintues to kill before a meeting with Elaine. Get to talk about my ethics proposal and how to make my intro more interesting. I've come up with a few thigns to improve, all based on comments from my second reader, but I don't know if they'll make a better "story". We'll see how it goes. After meeting with Elaine I'll be heading over to the library where I'll be reading/commenting on articles for Psychopathology tomorrow, starting to work on my Psychopathology essay (which is now due on Monday, yay), and maybe thinking about my Utopian Fiction essay (which isn't due until the 7th, so I have a lot of room to procrastinate on that one). At 7 I'm meeting my Advanced Stats students, probably tutor them for an hour (yay $15). Then I'll head home, play WoW, watch Band of Brothers, play more WoW, and go to sleep. All in all a thrilling, yes thrilling Thursday afternoon.
So. I'm doing a presentation on the book "We" next week for Utopian Fiction. It's actually a pretty interesting book, the first real dystopia that we've read so far. It sort of takes the stance that, in order for people to settle into a society and stop questioning whether things could be better, we'd have to abolish imagination. Makes sense, over all. If you can't imagine things being different, then people would never complain. Things are as they are, as they're meant to be, the only way they could be, no worries. I think I'm going to be focusing my little presentation on that. How any society could be termed a utopia if no one wants things to be any different. And is imagination what makes us different as a species? Without imagination, without the ability to question and fantasize and explore new ideas, would we still be "human"? Along those same lines, is a utopia even possible? Could there ever be a society where everyone is truly, completely satisfied, never wanting anything more? Very, very unlikely. If nothing else you'd have to get rid of things like sadism, masochism, sociopathy etc. Good things to get rid of, no doubt, but what would that mean for us as a species? Do we need the crazy geniuses? In my presentation on bipolar disorder (manic depression) one of the questions the prof asked was: if we could completely cure it, would that be a good thing? Would we lose some of our most creative works? So many poets and artists and writers and composers have suffered from various mental illnesses. How necessary is that for their craft? Is it worth the possible loss of such a rich part of our culture to ease the suffering of all these people? Could we, as a reportedly empathic/compassionate species, answer that question negatively?
[Edit: 1:55] Meeting with Elaine went pretty well. I am officially turning over a new leaf. Spending a lot more time working on my thesis, going to ask questions when I don't understand her comments, and over-all stop viewing this as an unpleasant chore, and rather as an important learning experience. I am a new thesis student! Hey, it could last...
Anyway, sitting at the OC computer lab at the moment. Have 20 mintues to kill before a meeting with Elaine. Get to talk about my ethics proposal and how to make my intro more interesting. I've come up with a few thigns to improve, all based on comments from my second reader, but I don't know if they'll make a better "story". We'll see how it goes. After meeting with Elaine I'll be heading over to the library where I'll be reading/commenting on articles for Psychopathology tomorrow, starting to work on my Psychopathology essay (which is now due on Monday, yay), and maybe thinking about my Utopian Fiction essay (which isn't due until the 7th, so I have a lot of room to procrastinate on that one). At 7 I'm meeting my Advanced Stats students, probably tutor them for an hour (yay $15). Then I'll head home, play WoW, watch Band of Brothers, play more WoW, and go to sleep. All in all a thrilling, yes thrilling Thursday afternoon.
So. I'm doing a presentation on the book "We" next week for Utopian Fiction. It's actually a pretty interesting book, the first real dystopia that we've read so far. It sort of takes the stance that, in order for people to settle into a society and stop questioning whether things could be better, we'd have to abolish imagination. Makes sense, over all. If you can't imagine things being different, then people would never complain. Things are as they are, as they're meant to be, the only way they could be, no worries. I think I'm going to be focusing my little presentation on that. How any society could be termed a utopia if no one wants things to be any different. And is imagination what makes us different as a species? Without imagination, without the ability to question and fantasize and explore new ideas, would we still be "human"? Along those same lines, is a utopia even possible? Could there ever be a society where everyone is truly, completely satisfied, never wanting anything more? Very, very unlikely. If nothing else you'd have to get rid of things like sadism, masochism, sociopathy etc. Good things to get rid of, no doubt, but what would that mean for us as a species? Do we need the crazy geniuses? In my presentation on bipolar disorder (manic depression) one of the questions the prof asked was: if we could completely cure it, would that be a good thing? Would we lose some of our most creative works? So many poets and artists and writers and composers have suffered from various mental illnesses. How necessary is that for their craft? Is it worth the possible loss of such a rich part of our culture to ease the suffering of all these people? Could we, as a reportedly empathic/compassionate species, answer that question negatively?
[Edit: 1:55] Meeting with Elaine went pretty well. I am officially turning over a new leaf. Spending a lot more time working on my thesis, going to ask questions when I don't understand her comments, and over-all stop viewing this as an unpleasant chore, and rather as an important learning experience. I am a new thesis student! Hey, it could last...