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I have reading about Stanley Cavell since 10:30 this morning, minus a few hours for eating and dozing off. I want to read about 15 more pages before 10 pm, which is when watching Eternal Sunshine (thank you, DC++) will occur. This is doable in theory, but perhaps not in practice. My eyes have stopped functioning as information processors and I have been reduced to simply staring.
Cavell, for those of you who care, is a philosopher (modern, American) who has managed to somewhat walk the line between analytic and continental philosophy. He has done this in part by writing a lot about movies and Shakespeare. I'm not reading much of that; mostly about language. And mostly what other people have said about his writing about language, which is mostly based on his reading of Wittgenstein. So we're all running around reading each other, but that's actually more than okay in this case because he says that asserting one's own existence is best done in reading and writing, and engaging with someone else's writing (not commenting or arguing, but thinking through and about) is another method of this same assertion. This means that I exist because I am here writing about him, so take that, Descartes!
I'm halfway through my actual finals and have more reading to do before I start writing this paper. Tomorrow is my day off, so I have to be extragood for the next two hours. We realized last night that this is what "Swarthmore" is about. They say it's intense and they say it gets to people, and yes, I have been stressed on some level for over a month now. All of this work is manageable, but Drew has been in here giggling maniacally in the face of his two unstarted 10 page papers and there has been a lot of unnecessary (yet cathartic) screaming about problems in philosophy of mind.
That may be all that there is to say. This semester has been quite something. I wonder what it's going to be like being home, coming back, etc etc. I'm not quite ready for this to end, but I think that's because there's not going to be enough time to process the end until it has already occurred, and that bothers me a little bit. Nevertheless, off I go to get all of this done and stay smiling, to sleep out in the woods and do "something awesome" with Ross, and to fly home in just over 7 days.
Cavell, for those of you who care, is a philosopher (modern, American) who has managed to somewhat walk the line between analytic and continental philosophy. He has done this in part by writing a lot about movies and Shakespeare. I'm not reading much of that; mostly about language. And mostly what other people have said about his writing about language, which is mostly based on his reading of Wittgenstein. So we're all running around reading each other, but that's actually more than okay in this case because he says that asserting one's own existence is best done in reading and writing, and engaging with someone else's writing (not commenting or arguing, but thinking through and about) is another method of this same assertion. This means that I exist because I am here writing about him, so take that, Descartes!
I'm halfway through my actual finals and have more reading to do before I start writing this paper. Tomorrow is my day off, so I have to be extragood for the next two hours. We realized last night that this is what "Swarthmore" is about. They say it's intense and they say it gets to people, and yes, I have been stressed on some level for over a month now. All of this work is manageable, but Drew has been in here giggling maniacally in the face of his two unstarted 10 page papers and there has been a lot of unnecessary (yet cathartic) screaming about problems in philosophy of mind.
That may be all that there is to say. This semester has been quite something. I wonder what it's going to be like being home, coming back, etc etc. I'm not quite ready for this to end, but I think that's because there's not going to be enough time to process the end until it has already occurred, and that bothers me a little bit. Nevertheless, off I go to get all of this done and stay smiling, to sleep out in the woods and do "something awesome" with Ross, and to fly home in just over 7 days.