THE CONFESSING COW

John Brown and Anti-Slavery

2012-02-15T00:00:00.002-05:00

John Brown and Anti-Slavery: Although the above video is largely unrelated to the antebellum history of John Brown the abolitionist, its anti-war message resonates powerfully. Bob Dylan's lyrical talents are unique, as he articulates poignant views on socio-political events in the form of folk poetry. Similarly, the story of radical abolitionist John Brown has undergone a kind of folk transformation. Beginning with his three-day raid on the federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry, (West) Virginia in October 1859, Brown epitomized the growing intensity of the American anti-slavery movement. The raid's main purpose was to acquire weapons (rifles and pikes) for African-American slaves in the surrounding communities. In fact, Brown believed the raid would be a quick stop followed by a strong push southward along the Appalachian Mountains. He also believed that hundreds of slaves would join. He was wrong. Before Harper's Ferry, however, Brown's interest in abolition had developed over many years. Having been profoundly inspired by notions of religious equality and anti-slavery, which emerged in the Second Great Awakening of the 1820s and 1830s, he intended to become a Congregationalist minister and preach about abolition. But the murder of abolitionist Rev. Elijah P. Lovejoy pushed Brown to radicalize his anti-slavery views. For example, in the mid-1850s, Brown traveled to Kansas to clash with pro-slavery forces and make Kansas into a free state. Despite their futility, Brown's forays in Kansas served as a dress rehearsal for Harper's Ferry.

On the Poetry of Phillis Wheatley

2012-02-01T00:00:00.006-05:00

On the Poetry of Phillis Wheatley: With the publication of Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral (1773), Phillis Wheatley became one of the first published African Americans. Prominent political figures like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson were even aware of her poetry in the succeeding decades. But what made Wheatley's poetry particularly intriguing was the passion she exhibited for memorializing the dead. Perhaps this passion grew from her conversion to Christianity as a young slave learning to read from the Bible. In effect, Wheatley's sincere Protestant beliefs helped legitimize her poetry in the eyes of a potentially skeptical white audience. One example of Wheatley's passion for memorializing the dead included the poem On the Death of the Rev. Mr. George Whitefield, 1770. Since Whitefield was one of the primary preachers in the First Great Awakening, a time of heightened religious fervor during the 1730s and 1740s, Wheatley praised him as a "prophet." Whitefield's central message encouraged a self-driven religious experience, without regard to race, class, or gender, and Wheatley embraced it as such. She ultimately understood Whitefield's sermons (and the First Great Awakening) to be forces of theological liberation, which helped assuage the spiritual needs of Christianized African-American slaves (like herself).

Kafka's "Das Urteil"

2012-01-15T00:00:00.001-05:00

Kafka's "Das Urteil": Even though the above video refers to what is perhaps Franz Kafka's most famous short story, "The Metamorphosis" (Die Verwandlung), it's another one of his short stories, namely "The Judgment" (Das Urteil), which contains equally profound existentialist themes. Published in 1912, Kafka's "Judgment" embodies the modern psycho-social intricacies that tend to define a father-son relationship. The father's demands often weigh heavily on the son, and that is precisely what occurs in "The Judgment." Since Kafka was familiar with the writings of Nietzsche and Freud, he frequently incorporated a kind of existential psychology into his literary works. In "The Metamorphosis," for example, Kafka uses an absurdist approach to the problems of existential thought and primordial pain, as the story's protagonist, Gregor Samsa, attempts to cope with the morphing of his physical body into a bug. In "The Judgment," however, Kafka conveys a deep, personal reflection by the story's main character, Georg Bendemann, on his father's criticisms. These criticisms become so severe that Georg can no longer internalize them, and thus, he chooses to commit suicide by leaping from one of the many bridges that span the Vltava River in Prague.

On Salvation and the End of Time

2012-01-01T00:00:00.001-05:00

On Salvation and the End of Time: Two ideological constructs of Christian theology come to mind when considering topics such as salvation and the end of time: soteriology and eschatology. As for soteriology, theologians focus their studies on the Gospels' resurrection stories, which generally concern either Lazarus or Christ. In effect, salvation is a "free gift" that originates from God's divine sovereignty. And depending on one's personal engagement with Faith and free will, salvation can either be accepted or rejected. Regarding eschatology, however, people will necessarily be confronted with the choice of salvation at the end of time. To gain perspective on end times, theologians emphasize the Book of Revelation, which foretells apocalyptic events and Christ's Second Coming. In a historical context, therefore, every generation feels like it's the last one on Earth. But this kind of thinking largely materialized in the 1840s during the Second Great Awakening in Upstate New York. Encouraged by the teachings of Baptist preacher William Miller in the 1830s, people attempted to discern an exact date in either 1843 or 1844 for Christ's return. After questions about which Jewish calendar to use when calculating a date, the Millerites (as they became known) finally decided on October 22, 1844. And when Christ did not return on that date, the Millerites labeled the event The Great Disappoint. An intriguing coincidence: Nietzsche was born in Prussia seven days prior to this event.

The Origins of Industrial Music

2011-12-30T00:00:00.016-05:00

The Origins of Industrial Music: With the arrival of Nikolaus Otto's internal combustion engine (ICE) in 1862, factory work became increasingly automated (more so than in the days when steam engines reigned supreme). Factory workers, especially in Otto's home country of Germany (which did not officially unify until 1871), began to incorporate the rhythmic sounds and vibrations of ICEs into their daily routines. The types of sounds that workers often heard included the engine's compression hiss and metal on metal clanging. In other words, the ICE was perhaps the earliest source of industrial music. Although James Watt's steam engine had existed in mills and factories for about 100 years at that point, it proved very inefficient when compared to Otto's ICE. And considering the mass production of automobiles (with ICEs) after the turn of the twentieth century, the industrial sound became both personal and widespread. However, it was not until the 1970s microcomputer revolution that bands like Kraftwerk and Tubeway Army could electronically re-create industrial sounds with their synthesizers.

QUESTIONS!

2011-12-15T00:00:00.010-05:00

QUESTIONS!: Do I exist? How do I know I exist? Why do I exist? What does it mean to exist? For what larger purpose(s) do I exist? When will I not exist? Does existence precede essence? Why is existence temporary? How does existence relate to Faith? Will the length of my existence heighten or lessen my Faith? Is Faith without works dead? Will Faith alone (sola fide) bring my soul to eternal life? What is the soul? Does every body possess a soul? Do animals have souls? What happens to the soul upon death? What if I doubt the existence of death? How does doubt affect my Faith? Is doubt the origin of wisdom? Does doubt beget sin? Does doubt lead to despair? How does despair prevent me from 'dying the good death?' Will despair lead to revelation? Is revelation the origin of wisdom? Does revelation beget conversion? Is conversion the final determinant of salvation in the Faith-building process? What have I become? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Am I dead? Does God exist? No, He is eternal.

Jonathan Swift and Anglo-Irish Satire

2011-12-01T00:00:00.034-05:00

Jonathan Swift and Anglo-Irish Satire: As a literary genre, satire is perhaps one of the most effective tools for social commentators to use while critiquing society. In Jonathan Swift's eighteenth-century writings, a unique blend of irony and sarcasm is certainly present. By ridiculing some of the more pervasive problems in Anglo-Irish culture, such as poverty and prostitution, Swift seeks to shame his readers (fellow countrymen) into improving Britain's lot. For example, in his 1729 A Modest Proposal, Swift famously argued that Ireland's poor ought to sell their children as food to the wealthier classes in British society. In doing so, the poor would eradicate their biggest economic burden while simultaneously feeding others. Swift even outlines a variety of ways to prepare children for cooking, so as to obtain maximum flavor potential. This kind of political satire not only mocked British policies toward Ireland's poor, but also specifically derided the methodologies of noted seventeenth-century English economist William Petty. In fact, some of Petty's early ideas contributed to the development of modern economic concepts like the "division of labor" and the "labor theory of value." Yet Swift merely understood Petty to be a bureaucratic pawn in Oliver Cromwell's government: someone who fudged socioeconomic data to support public initiatives.

Resocializing the Imprisoned

2011-11-15T00:00:00.023-05:00

Resocializing the Imprisoned: Resocialization is the unique psycho-social process by which prisoners get re-integrated into regular society. The process occurs during incarceration whereby psychologists and sociologists have a set period of time to study the changes which define an inmate's personal outlook. Parole boards, in particular, take into consideration the degree of change in prisoners' attitudes as they prepare to re-enter regular society. But critics of resocialization see it as an oppressive process that undercuts a prisoners' true individuality. Forcing change upon someone is neither natural nor organic. Fundamental change, especially in someone's personal disposition, must be an internal process, and resocialization seems to constitute an externally coercive regime. The idea of eroding an inmate's individuality through mandatory haircuts and uniform clothing only appears to create a perverted system of dependency in prison settings. Yet I suppose that's the price one pays for being convicted of a crime. I wonder how French critical theorist Michel Foucault might react to resocialization. Similarly, how much does resocialization really help former criminals transition into regular society? That is the primary question which parole boards and other prison officials ought to be asking themselves.

Nietzsche's 'Ode to Eternity'

2011-11-01T00:00:00.011-04:00

Nietzsche's 'Ode to Eternity': At two distinct points in Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883), Nietzsche offered an ode to express his love of eternity. It went as follows: "O man, take care! What does the deep midnight declare? I was asleep - From a deep dream I woke and swear: The world is deep, Deeper than day had been aware. Deep is its woe; Joy - deeper yet than agony: Woe implores: Go! But all joy wants eternity- Wants deep, wants deep eternity." For Nietzsche, eternity was the only 'woman' he ever loved. And through Zarathustra's futile attempts to find the Overman (Der Übermensch), Nietzsche conveyed his philosophical doctrine of eternal recurrence. Rooted in the idea that science had already determined time to be cyclical, eternal recurrence was a wholly Romantic doctrine. It longed for simpler times when both lies and truths were obvious to the common man. And likewise, when relativism served no legitimate purpose in the development of national cultures. But as German-American existentialist philosopher Walter Kaufmann discovered, Nietzsche's 'Ode to Eternity' was eerily similar to Friedrich Schiller's "Ode to Joy" (Ode an die Freude), which placed man's earthly sufferings and God's eternal rewards at the center of its poetic thrust.

How "Working-Class" Is Socialism?

2011-10-15T00:00:00.006-04:00

How "Working-Class" Is Socialism?: Not very, is the short answer to this question. Aside from Eugene V. Debs, who worked as a boilerman in the railroad industry and participated in the 1894 Pullman Strike as leader of the American Railway Union (ARU), socialism, and by logical extension, communism, have largely been the products of highly-trained technocrats and other intellectuals. For example, one would be hard-pressed to find historical accounts of early socialist/communist thinkers like Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels toiling away in factories along the Rhine. Although Engels did observe the drudgeries of working-class England when he visited Manchester's textile factories in the early 1840s. One-hundred years after Marx and Engels, however, Austrian economist Friedrich von Hayek stated that "Socialism has never and nowhere at first been a working-class movement." While this might be somewhat of an overstatement, Hayek understood that socialism, as an ideology of the downtrodden masses, rests unabashedly on the supreme assumption that a central authority, i.e., a national government, can somehow consolidate and utilize all earthly knowledge for the purposes of equalizing society. While this idealistic assumption may sound appealing, the logistical difficulties behind central planning in this fashion simply preclude most forms of socialism.

Young America to the Rescue!

2011-10-01T00:00:00.013-04:00

Young America to the Rescue!: In an 1837 editorial for the Democratic Review, John L. O'Sullivan (pictured above) wrote that "all history is to be rewritten." This modest statement largely defined the main purpose of the Young America Movement. Modeled after certain intellectual groups in Europe (Young Italy, Young Hegelians), Young America advocated political reforms for all Americans. And as a group of young Democrats living in New York City during the mid-nineteenth century, the movement was mostly urban and middle class. In particular, O'Sullivan was perhaps best known as the man who coined the phrase "Manifest Destiny" to depict America's westward expansion in the 1840s. Yet aside from promoting the politics of Jacksonian Democracy, the movement also intended to change American culture. Through the strategic use of visual arts, Young America hinged on the works of American artists like Asher B. Durand, Thomas Cole, and William Sidney Mount. These artists specialized in natural landscape paintings, which hinted at America's innocence and youthfulness. In fact, many of Young America's landscape painters belonged to a concurrent art movement known as the Hudson River School.

The Turning Point of Turning Points

2011-09-15T00:00:00.010-04:00

The Turning Point of Turning Points: The first three days of July 1863 were perhaps the most important three days in American military history. In Adams County, Pennsylvania, near the town of Gettysburg, the Army of the Potomac (Union) clashed with the Army of Northern Virginia (Confederacy). In the month prior to the battle, Confederate troops had been pillaging various towns across Southern Pennsylvania in search of supplies (shoes and food). But these Confederate troop movements had a secondary purpose; to draw part of the Union Army away from its garrison around Washington. Confederate General Robert E. Lee arranged his troops to do battle in a town with sprawling fields, rolling hills, and minimal military significance. And on July 1st, Lee gained the upper hand over Union General George G. Meade, as Confederate troops bombarded the Union's low-lying positions with artillery fire. Yet July 2nd proved a watershed in the battle, as Confederate troops moved to attack a variety of Union positions. The hand-to-hand combat at Little Round Top occurred on July 2nd, as Colonel Joshua Chamberlain (depicted by Jeff Daniels in the above video) guided his Union troops to a gut-wrenching victory. Gettysburg's third day (July 3rd) offered archetypal imagery for the American civic consciousness, as it included Major General George Pickett's ill-fated Confederate charge, which gave the Union military momentum for the remainder of the Civil War.

On the Psychology of Diasporas

2011-09-01T00:00:00.021-04:00

On the Psychology of Diasporas: In the postmodern West, we collectively struggle with the idea of homelessness, especially as it pertains to nationhood. Those who, by historical chance, ended up in lands far away from their true homeland are often subjected to intense ethnoracial scrutiny. Perhaps nationalism is to blame or maybe we need to reevaluate fundamentally the meaning of "citizenship." Yet it is the perverted notions of human dignity such as racism and ethnocentrism which push people to foster unruly mechanisms of exclusion and abandonment. The pseudo-romantic idea that our peoples were somehow better off in their original homelands will be challenged by any postmodern understanding of the past. You ultimately have no original homeland on Earth. As Nietzsche once stated, "Woe, when you feel homesick for the land as if it had offered more freedom - and there is no longer any land." The postmodern condition is currently eroding any ideas of racial purity from our collective unconscious. Today we are told NOT to think in terms of race, ethnicity, nationality, religion, gender, and class because each concept only breeds injustice, inequality, and intolerance. But we MUST continue to think in those terms precisely because they help us identify, and even rectify, the injustice, inequality, and intolerance of yesterday.

Hip Hop as Social Commentary

2011-08-15T00:00:00.024-04:00

Hip Hop as Social Commentary: Born in the midst of generational change, the hip-hop subculture can be viewed largely as an artistic response by African Americans to the unfulfilled promises of the Civil Rights Movement. In the 1970s and 1980s, black New Yorkers, especially in the Bronx, Harlem, Queens, and Brooklyn, struggled with various pathologies of the postmodern ghetto. Such pathologies included high teen pregnancy rates, high abortion rates, high suicide rates, high dropout rates, high homeless rates, high crime rates, high unemployment rates, and high disease rates. In particular, the sheer level of rat infestations in Section 8 public housing complexes was deadly at times. But it's important to remember that not all urban blacks considered themselves "victims" in a larger socio-political struggle. Black agency was certainly evident in the hip-hop subculture that grew from what were perceived by outsiders as dire conditions. And often, it's from the most severe oppression that the most unique creativity stems. Take the above video for example, which entails New York City rapper Nasir Jones (Nas) in his early days. Ironically, Jones hails from the largest public housing project in North America (Queensbridge, Queens).

Mary Rowlandson and Praying Towns

2011-08-01T00:00:00.012-04:00

Mary Rowlandson and Praying Towns: In February 1675, Indians from the Narragansett, Nipmuc, and Wampanoag tribes attacked Lancaster, Massachusetts. As King Philip's War was underway, they took Mary Rowlandson and her three children captive, in addition to other local Puritan settlers. And since Lancaster was a frontier settlement in close contact with the Praying Town of Nashoba (Littleton), it had numerous missionaries working there. Puritan missionaries like John Eliot established Praying Towns across the Massachusetts Bay Colony to convert local Indians to Christianity. Rowlandson's husband, for example, was the town minister in Lancaster. Ultimately, however, she recounted the harrowing tale of her 11-month captivity in The Sovereignty and Goodness of God (1682). The historical marker pictured above signified the location where Rowlandson's captivity ended, which occurred near Mount Wachusett in Princeton, Massachusetts. Boston residents, particularly women, raised enough money to ransom Rowlandson away from the Indians' sacred grounds at Wachusett.

Ridiculing Mariology

2011-07-15T00:00:00.015-04:00

Ridiculing Mariology: Despite its name, Mariology is not the rational study of Mario from the Mario Bros. video game franchise. In fact, Mariology constitutes a theological examination of Mary as the Mother of Christ. For Catholics, Mariology symbolizes the logical extension of Christology, especially since it offers a fuller understanding of Jesus' life as a man in the world. Protestant theologians, however, generally claim that although Mary's role in Christ's life is significant, having a theology of her beliefs and teachings venerates her as a kind of goddess. In this sense, Mary's role can be seen as somewhat diluted when studying the historicity and ministry of Jesus. But the Catholic counterclaim to Protestant reservations about Mariology entails the idea that Mary's Immaculate Conception and Assumption into Heaven are two primordial pillars unto which Christians should morally ascribe. In effect, Mary represents a model of virtue that pertains to a level of Christian mysticism beyond the scope of Trinitarian theology. Mary ultimately resides just below the Trinity on Christianity's hierarchy of importance, as she is clearly the most important female figure in the entire religion.

On Surrealism

2011-07-01T00:00:00.019-04:00

On Surrealism: Although labeled a cultural movement in early twentieth-century Europe, surrealism mainly pertained to the visual arts. Its core tenets were largely philosophical insofar as surrealist artists encouraged observers to think through the confusion and unexpectedness in their works. Artists such as René Magritte (whose work Not to be Reproduced - 1937 - is on display in the above picture) and Max Ernst fit the surrealist mold by featuring the element of unconscious surprise in their paintings. The twisting of reality was certainly avant-garde at the time, especially since it signified a new barrier of consciousness for the mind to overcome. In Magritte's Not to be Reproduced, the man expects to see his face properly reflected in the mirror, as the book on the mantelpiece is accurately reflected. But the man only sees the back of his head, which either complicates or resolves the primordial pain of vanity for him. If there ever was a painting that captured the dysfunctional nature of existential anxiety, this was it.

Fast Food Philosophy

2011-06-15T00:00:00.018-04:00

Fast Food Philosophy: When one thinks of the American fast food industry, he or she probably envisions hamburgers, french fries, and soda. Yet there is a great deal more to the multi-billion dollar industry that seeks to maximize sales and minimize costs. Just as Henry Ford developed the assembly line to boost efficiency at the Ford Motor Company in the early 1900s, so too did Ray Kroc with McDonald's in the 1950s. The ability to mass produce a combination of meat, potatoes, and carbonated soft drinks brought McDonald's to the forefront of corporate America. Nevertheless, it was the booming car culture of the American West, particularly in California, that cemented the idea of "fast food" in connection with "magic motorways." Post-World War II American culture demanded convenience, as people sought to exit the city's core in favor of suburban tract housing along the city's edge. Commuting to work on freeways in one's car became the newest and most convenient form of transportation. And as Aldous Huxley wrote in his Brave New World (1932), "Speed is the only truly modern sensation." Ultimately, the combination of speed, convenience, and efficiency helped solidify the American fast food industry as a consumer staple by the late twentieth century.

Our Best Days

2011-06-01T00:00:00.045-04:00

Our Best Days: Some might say our best days lie in front of us. But do they truly understand what lay behind us? I say the best days of Western civilization have passed. When sailors enjoyed limitless views from ships' masts. Call me dystopian! Call me irrational! Call me what you will! At least I will not be medicating my unfulfilled hopes with a little green and white pill. It's practical to be realistic and feasible to be pessimistic. For idealism, in the long run, only makes you caustic. Disenchantment and disillusionment are patently creative forces. Just look at how most existential philosophers frame their discourses! Yet there is serious peril looming on the horizon. And it's not something you can fix with a phone call on Verizon. There will be days of grief and days of strife. The kind of utter confusion which makes you question the general purpose of life. But if we face our future with cautiously optimistic outlooks, then we might as well refocus our collective attention on those grand old Bible books. Because the stakes are too high and we have too much to lose. Unless, of course, you're one of those who fails to choose.

Ladytron and Electroclash

2011-05-15T00:00:00.015-04:00

Ladytron and Electroclash: As an English electroclash band, Ladytron is essentially composed of two male DJs and two female singers. But role changes frequently occur throughout many songs. Having formed in Liverpool in the late 1990s, the band focused on developing sounds that reflect a distinctive blend of pop and electronic music. With primary influences originating in the New Wave movement of the early 1980s, particularly the experimental rock group Roxy Music (from which Ladytron derives their name), the band relies heavily on synthesizers, vocoders, and drum machines. The above video is a good example of how Ladytron generally structures their songs. Although the song in the video is actually a remix, it still demonstrates both the vocal and notational complexities of a typical Ladytron song. In fact, the band thrives on remixes, as they have put out a remix album for every studio album released. And despite their existence for over a decade now, the band has yet to acquire mainstream, popular recognition.

On American Race Theory

2011-05-01T00:00:00.016-04:00

On American Race Theory: In American race theory, there are three basic pillars of thought when determining racial problems. As critical race theorist Derrick Bell has noted, they include the constitutional contradiction, the interest convergence principle, and the price of racial remedies. For the constitutional contradiction, American law originally consisted of a two-track system: one for white (property-owning) males and one for everybody else. When crafted in 1787, the Constitution counted (black) slaves as three-fifths of a person, even though in 1776, the Declaration of Independence had claimed that all men were created equal. As for the interest convergence principle, it entailed racial advances for blacks only when they also served white interests. For instance, in the early Cold War, the Soviet Union pointed to Jim Crow laws as signs that the United States was not living up to its original creed of liberty and justice for all. Therefore, passing the 1964 Civil Rights Act became a product of interest convergence among blacks and whites because the Soviet threat loomed particularly large under Premier Khrushchev. Lastly, the price of racial remedies were the high social costs that blacks and whites alike incurred to create a more equitable American society. One such racial remedy involved urban desegregation busing (pictured above). At times, students became pawns in this vast social experiment, especially when racial tensions erupted into violence.

The Scopes Trial

2011-04-15T00:00:00.011-04:00

The Scopes Trial: In 1925, the Tennessee legislature passed the Butler Act, which precluded public school teachers from teaching evolutionary theory. This law cause immediate controversy, as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) openly challenged it. John T. Scopes, a high school biology teacher, agreed to violate the statute for the ACLU by teaching some of Charles Darwin's ideas from On the Origin of Species (1859). Scopes' actions landed him in jail with a $100 bail and a grand jury indictment. The indictment led to a criminal trial, which was the first to be broadcast nationally on the radio. Aside from the radio, the trial attracted two of the nation's most prominent lawyers at the time; William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow. The above video contains remade theatrical scenes from Inherit the Wind (1955), where the legal and theological debates of the prosecution and defense are on display. Although the ACLU originally planned to attack the constitutionality of the Butler Act on the grounds that it violated a teacher's right to academic freedom, Darrow later centered the argument on the difference between literal and allegorical interpretations of the Bible. Ultimately, the court found Scopes guilty of violating the Butler Act, as it upheld the law's constitutionality by stating it did not favor a particular religious view concerning man's origins. The Butler Act remained state law in Tennessee until 1967.

C. S. Lewis and Christian Apologetics

2011-04-01T00:00:00.015-04:00

C. S. Lewis and Christian Apologetics: In 1952, C. S. Lewis published Mere Christianity as a literary adaptation of various radio talks he gave to the British public during World War II. Considered a seminal work in Christian apologetics, which defines the rational basis for Christian belief, the book defends Christian morality as a fundamental precipitant of reasoned judgment. In effect, Lewis claims that Christian morality consists of three basic levels. The primary level concerns social interactions among individuals and followed the Golden Rule of doing unto others as you would have them do unto you. The secondary level entails the creation of a balanced relationship between one's body and one's soul while the tertiary level involves the nurturing of a faith-based relationship between oneself and God. For Lewis, many people, Christian and non-Christian alike, do not think of morality beyond the primary level. But as Lewis argues, if one's personal relationship with God, soul, and body is non-existent, then deep-seated insecurities and a lack of self-respect can end up negatively affecting his or her interpersonal relationships. In short, the secondary and tertiary levels of Christian morality are often as important as the primary level for building a wholly just society.

City of the Future

2011-03-15T00:00:00.020-04:00

City of the Future: While its earliest promoters dubbed Los Angeles a "city of the future," much of the city's urban and suburban history can be defined in terms of ethnoracial tensions. Founded as part of the Spanish Empire in 1781, the town (pueblo) became colonially controlled by the United States at the end of the Mexican-American War in 1848. At that time, it contained numerous Mexican families who had established huge haciendas for ranching and other agricultural purposes. As the twentieth century dawned, however, Anglo Americans began moving to Los Angeles in droves, especially since the city's Mediterranean climate and cheap land proved an appealing combination. Yet this mass influx of Anglo Americans began to alter many of the local Mexican-American cultural customs. Sonoratown, which was one of the city's first Mexican-American barrios, became racially isolated and spatially separated due to de facto segregation. And when African Americans started migrating to Los Angeles in large numbers, particularly after World War II, the city's ethnoracial tensions exploded into race riots (Watts - 1965). Even though Asian Americans constituted an important demographic in Los Angeles' social history, it was the racial tensions between the trifecta of blacks, Mexicans, and whites that often brought the city to Hell and back.

On Healthcare Philosophy

2011-03-01T00:00:00.012-05:00

On Healthcare Philosophy: As a fundamental social institution, healthcare seeks to maintain and improve the well-being of people. Healthcare philosophy, therefore, centers on the study of how the healthcare process achieves its objectives in caring for patients. It also questions the general viability of healthcare's various sub-structures including, medical ethics, health economics, health politics, clinical trials, and quality assurance. In effect, there are two basic philosophical paths to understanding healthcare as a social institution: existentialism and phenomenology. From an existential perspective, the individual (patient) is at the center of the healthcare process. That is, he or she effectively controls the extent of their medical treatments from birth to death. From a phenomenological perspective, however, the individual can never account for all of the internal/external forces (phenomena) acting on his or her mind/body. Thus, phenomenologists like Heidegger would suggest that patients ought to approach healthcare from the potential consequences of the absolute negative. In other words, the possibility of entering "the Nothing" (or the total negation of tangible reality) should always be present in the patient's mind when receiving healthcare.

Existentialism in Trainspotting

2011-02-15T00:00:00.018-05:00

Existentialism in Trainspotting: As a philosophy, existentialism is purposefully ambiguous. It seeks to emphasize the primacy of individual choice, and that, through choice, individuals can either supply or detract meaning in their lives. External forces acting on individuals are important, but an individual's existence ultimately cannot be defined by them. Thus, if individuals are the final determinants of giving their lives meaning, then they ought to scrutinize deeply their choices. Yet there are elements of transience and permanence in existential philosophy that manifest themselves lucidly in the industrialized world. These elements are certainly present in the hobby of trainspotting. For example, when a train passes a trainspotter, there is a unique self-reflective response that occurs in which the trainspotter realizes the transient nature of his existence on Earth. But through the use of a camera, the trainspotter is able to create an aura of permanence from his particular vantage point. So, whereas the train represents the impersonal passing of time, the trainspotter signifies the personal supplier of meaning to the event. And at bottom, existential philosophy is only meaningful if one takes it personally.

1 9 6 8

2011-02-01T00:00:00.021-05:00

1 9 6 8: If there was one year in the twentieth century that historians could designate as the most tumultuous, 1968 was it. Aside from the societal impact of World War I & II (and their immediate aftermaths) on the twentieth century, 1968 represented the apex of a worldwide counterculture movement. This movement generated both liberal outbursts and conservative backlashes in domestic politics (RFK assassination/Chicago Seven/Nixon election), racial integration (MLK Jr. assassination/Fair Housing Act), labor rights (French student strikes), liberation theology (Medellín Conference/Humanae Vitae), foreign immigration (Enoch Powell's "Rivers of Blood" speech), and guerrilla warfare (Tet Offensive). It also signified the early unraveling of Soviet-style communism in Second and Third World countries, and likewise, Western efforts to contain it. For example, when Alexander Dubček became the Premier of Czechoslovakia in January 1968, he attempted to reform the communist regime (Prague Spring) by relaxing state control in socio-political areas like economic planning, speech censorship, administrative authority, and intrastate travel. These reforms ultimately elicited disdain from the Soviet Union, as it would later invade Czechoslovakia in August 1968 with help from its Warsaw Pact comrades.

Derrida and Deconstruction

2011-01-15T00:00:00.027-05:00

Derrida and Deconstruction: Founded on ideas of textual description and literary analysis, the deconstructionist philosophy attempts to uncover the basic contradictions and irreconcilable ironies of a text. Developed by French post-structuralist philosopher Jacques Derrida in the 1960s, deconstruction requires an in-depth examination of a text's elementary structure to identify its questionable features. Although a text may appear cohesive and cogent on the surface, it will begin to unravel after applying the deconstructionist framework to its content and organization. Despite deconstruction's novel philosophical underpinnings, its approach to literary analysis is not entirely new, but the emphasis that deconstruction places on analytic rigor is. Critics of deconstruction, however, claim that it's nothing more than intellectual nihilism at best because all wholesome works of fiction and nonfiction can be reduced to what are seemingly incompatible parts. In effect, there are no meanings to a text beyond its words, grammar, and structure. Yet if anything, deconstruction teaches writers to be bold with their prose, as it can always be deconstructed for innate contradictions, fallacies, generalizations, ironies, and prejudices.

On Communal Sacrality

2011-01-01T00:00:00.029-05:00

On Communal Sacrality: In Homo Viator (1962), French existentialist philosopher Gabriel Marcel espoused a kind of communal philosophy that specifically pertained to sacrality. As a former atheist who converted to Catholicism around his fortieth birthday, Marcel focused his thoughts on the idea of reciprocity. Central to this idea was the sacred inter-subjectivity (common grace) of all human-to-human relationships. Marcel's communal sacrality, therefore, originated with the reciprocal nature of humanity's common grace. His communal philosophy was also akin to Emmauel Levinas' conception of face-to-face contact whereby individuals became enraptured by the Divine spark evident in each others eyes. But the phenomenological concerns raised in Heideggerian philosophy (Gelassenheit) were diametrically opposed to communal sacrality. In effect, the essence of a community stemmed from a spontaneous amalgamation of people who did not necessarily coalesce through inter-subjectivity. And even though Marcel and Heidegger attended the same academic conferences on occasion, they never openly debated their philosophical qualms.

The Ever-Evolving Post-Punk Genre

2010-12-30T00:00:00.027-05:00

The Ever-Evolving Post-Punk Genre: Tracing its origins back to the late 1970s, the post-punk genre developed in a hybridized manner. It borrowed the basic elements of original punk rock and combined them with the stylistic features of New Wave music in the early 1980s. The melding of these two musical genres gave post punk a wholly modern and experimental feel. Common instruments included drums, guitars, bass guitar, synthesizers, drum machine, and vocoders. Bands like The Cure (depicted in the above video) and Talking Heads became closely associated with post punk, even though some critics would argue that these bands belong more to the New Wave genre than post punk. Additionally, there is a psychedelic component of post punk that recalls aspects of the hippie subculture in the 1960s. This component centers on engendering erratic tones not only in the singer's voice, but also in the music's notational progression. Above all, post punk offers its listeners the ability to experience a variety of musical genres as one.

Black Swan Market

2010-12-15T00:00:00.020-05:00

Black Swan Market: On Monday, October 19, 1987, stock markets around the world declined by massive margins. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) in New York, which often comprises the 30 largest publicly traded companies in the United States, shed over 20% of its value. It was the biggest single day (percentage) drop in the index's nearly 100-year history. And since the DJIA generally signifies a bellwether for the nation's financial markets, broad-based losses continued to widen across the country. Although the systematic declines had originally started in Asia, they spread across Europe and into the Americas. This October crash became known as "Black Monday," as financial analysts began to digest the extent of the damages. Lawmakers sought answers through congressional hearings. The primary culprit appeared to be a mix of investor confidence and electronic trading. Interest rates remained high during most of the 1980s to "break the back of inflation." And with the advent of computerized trading programs, investors began to trade stocks on a whim. Therefore, trader psychology became an essential component in determining the market's overall direction.

Brutalism in Architecture

2010-12-01T00:00:00.009-05:00

Brutalism in Architecture: Often characterized by sharp geometrical repetition in the form of raw concrete, brutalist architecture signified Western diplomatic stoicism in the Cold War. Having originated in Western Europe in the 1950s, brutalism's aesthetic appeal centered on creating an atmosphere of impersonality. At the time, Americans and Western Europeans maintained a dreadfully serious outlook toward the communist threat posed by the Soviet Union. One of brutalism's main purposes, therefore, was to prove that liberal democracies, which had failed during both World Wars, could be just as efficient and disciplined as totalitarian regimes (but without the blatant civil rights violations). Even though the basic philosophical tenets of brutalist architecture contain utopian underpinnings, its two major principles include repetition and rigidity. Brutalism's repetitive nature gives it a sense of consistency while its rigid (angular) geometric features engender an aura of permanence. In short, brutalist architecture represented a Western effort to demonstrate the socio-political stability of postwar democratic societies.

On Behavioral Psychology

2010-11-15T00:00:00.014-05:00

On Behavioral Psychology: From classical conditioning to cognitive dissonance to latent inhibition, behavioral psychology is the study of various decision making processes in rational beings. On an elementary level, classical conditioning involves the presentation of various stimuli to a subject and the measuring of that subject's response to each one. This mental process is on display in the above video, which features British comedian Eddie Izzard satirically applying the psychological concept of Pavlovian response to cats. Partially related to classical conditioning is cognitive dissonance. Considered part of the rationalization process when an object of desire becomes seemingly unattainable, cognitive dissonance leaves the subject convinced that that previously desired object is no longer desirable. A final concept related to behavioral psychology is latent inhibition. It mostly entails the delayed or non-existent response of a subject to a perceived stimulus. As an unconscious reaction by the mind to limit or even prevent a subject's response, latent inhibition can signify either psychosis or genius in an individual.

Strauss and Neoconservatism

2010-11-01T00:00:00.011-04:00

Strauss and Neoconservatism: Having partly originated in the writings of American political philosopher Leo Strauss, neoconservatism is a set of beliefs that melds economic liberalism with social conservatism. Although Strauss' works do not explicitly use the neoconservative label, they do present a feasible alternative to the political philosophy of the New Left. In effect, Straussianism constituted a right-wing version of American Marxism in that its adherents worked under a broad structural framework. This framework specifically repudiated the excesses of individualism, which Strauss understood as being indicative of both relativistic and nihilistic thinking. Modern American liberalism was becoming increasingly hedonistic and aimless, especially with respect to public policy. Early neoconservatives therefore sought to correct this hedonistic aimlessness by fashioning a kind of politics rooted in the core values of capitalism, democracy, and freedom. The value-driven approach adopted by neoconservatives that emerged in connection with Straussianism became a mainstay in American politics during the 1980s and 2000s, particularly in the area of foreign policy.

Race Riots and the Ghetto Underclass

2010-10-15T00:00:00.022-04:00

Race Riots and the Ghetto Underclass: A number of American cities erupted in ethnoracial violence during the 1960s. Struggling with the effects of multiform segregation, which was an urban socio-political process marked by the spatial separation of various ethnoracial groups, the ghetto underclass rioted. Essentially, the ghetto underclass comprised the social class that existed below the working poor. In 1965, the federal government issued the Moynihan Report, which attempted to address the basic sociological concerns of inner-city African-American families. It effectively stated that without viable access to employment, black men were unable to carry out their familial duties. The disintegration of the African-American family structure was therefore considered a potential cause of urban ethnoracial violence. After pervasive urban rioting throughout 1967, the federal government investigated the problem with the Kerner Commission in 1968. Ultimately, the Commission's primary conclusion pointed to multiform segregation as precipitating the rioting and that only a governmental plan for total integration, which included education, employment, and housing, could alleviate the problem.

Mining for the Future

2010-10-01T00:00:00.026-04:00

Mining for the Future: Apart from war-related inventions like radar and rocketry, mining has facilitated more engineered innovations in the industrialized world's infrastructure than any other industry. In Technics and Civilization (1934), historian Lewis Mumford concluded that mining engineering had raised the quality of life for many humans by making the inconvenient convenient. From tunnels to railroads to elevators, the mining industry was the first to develop and utilize these technological innovations on a large-scale. For instance, the ideas behind square-set bracing, which constituted a method for reinforcing mine shafts, was an effective precursor to the development of reinforced concrete in the 1890s by French engineer François Hennebique. Without reinforced concrete, many of today's bridges, dams, highways, and skyscrapers would not exist. Nevertheless, the origins of mining date back to the Paleolithic Age (c. 40,000 years ago). As a process, mining involves the extraction of minerals from the Earth. These minerals are initially confined in an ore material, but later become refined into a purer substance. Coal mining, for example, is perhaps the most pervasive and pernicious form of mining today. Although coal represents one of the world's most abundant resources, mining it can release various toxic gases, including hydrogen sulfide.

Alternative Rock Returns to Its Roots

2010-09-15T00:00:00.019-04:00

Alternative Rock Returns to Its Roots: Although it did not become popular until the 1990s, alternative rock (alt-rock) was an established musical genre by the 1980s. Alternative rock's origins, however, date back to both the psychedelic and hard rock bands of the 1960s and 1970s. For example, bands such as Led Zeppelin and The Who are considered precursors to alt-rock, especially given their edgy styles. Yet perhaps the most intriguing aspect of alternative rock is its overwhelming emphasis on simplicity. On the surface, that last statement may seem like a contradiction since "overwhelming" and "simplicity" are not terms that generally go together. But the fact remains, alt-rock bands often consist of only two members; a guitarist and a drummer. The vocals can be a shared duty while a bass line might be added during the recording process. Nevertheless, by the 2000s, many alternative rock bands had drifted toward pop rock and other watered-down genres. As a result, there are very few alt-rock bands today that seek to rediscover the genre's true roots.

Foucault and Rehabilitation

2010-09-01T00:00:00.015-04:00

Foucault and Rehabilitation: When French critical theorist Michel Foucault published Discipline and Punish in 1975, he reinvigorated the philosophical debate concerning criminal justice systems. Prior to Foucault's work, it was generally assumed that criminals and criminality were the products of failing liberal democracies and that only through measures of austerity could crime be controlled. But after a critical examination of the history and theory surrounding Western penal codes, Foucault concludes that the primacy of individual choice still supersedes the shortcomings of any criminal justice system. That is, just as criminals choose to perform illegal acts, or acts that detract from the public good, so too can those criminals choose to be rehabilitated. Having been influenced by Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals (1887) and Jeremy Bentham's Panopticon (1785), Foucault argues that in most penal systems the prosecution possesses more rights than the defendant. In effect, the power of knowledge in criminal procedure is the supreme privilege of the prosecution. And like any process, there are always unintended consequences. Yet they can be mitigated by emphasizing the innate self-worth of the person behind the criminal. And through measures of rehabilitation, some criminals can ultimately rejoin society and avoid recidivism.

The Aesthetics of Machinery

2010-08-15T00:00:00.022-04:00

The Aesthetics of Machinery: German engineering has always devoted considerable attention to melding aesthetics with physics. With its sleek appearance, 450 horsepower engine, and aerodynamic design, the 2010 Audi RS5 is a perfect example of how German engineering combines beauty and power, especially in the automotive industry. And there is a unique philosophical tradition in German engineering that seeks to balance the idealism of design with the pessimism of production. The idealism of design necessarily precedes the pessimism of production, as Immanuel Kant's eighteenth-century idealism became eclipsed by Arthur Schopenhauer's nineteenth-century pessimism. As the last known Enlightenment philosopher, Kant focused on the "thing in itself" (noumenon), which is a belief that the objective nature of a thing is known only to the mind. This kind of thinking can be contrasted with sensory perception and its emphasis on the appearance of a thing (phenomenon). Schopenhauer criticized Kant's idealism as being blind to the idea that a thing's aesthetic value often supersedes its moral worth. In fact, Schopenhauer replaced Kant's noumenon with the human "will to live" (Wille zum Leben). The "will to live" gives people a sense of practicality, which helps them to be more realistic (pessimism) when confronting the Truth behind the world and its appearances.

On the Constantinian Shift

2010-08-01T00:00:00.014-04:00

On the Constantinian Shift: When Roman Emperor Constantine I converted to Christianity in 312 AD, the religion emerged from its otherwise underground status. The following year he issued the Edict of Milan, which legalized Christian worship throughout the Roman Empire. Constantine I's conversion experience (depicted in the above picture) occurred just before his legions were about to fight in the Battle of the Milvian Bridge. Prior to 313 AD, Christians faced persecution from Roman authorities - examples included being thrown to the lions in the Coliseum for public entertainment or being crucified (upside down at times) as Saint Peter was. In their willful attempts to worship the Trinity, early Christians often assembled in caves marked by the fish symbol (ichthys) because in ancient Greek the word for "fish" was the same as "savior." With their symbolic use of language, they not only avoided certain persecution, but also established basic theological decrees to govern the Church's liturgical processes. These processes eventually became standardized in 325 AD at the First Council of Nicaea, where early Church Fathers achieved consensus on the elemental beliefs of Christianity.

Cancer Concepts

2010-07-15T00:00:00.011-04:00

Cancer Concepts: As a class of diseases that involves the uncontrolled growth of cells, cancer generally ravages the mind, body, and soul to the point of non-existence. Most cancers present themselves as malignant tumors that tend to divide and conquer otherwise healthy tissue. Cancer treatment, for the most part, includes three basic options: surgery, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy. While surgery entails the physical removal of cancer, chemotherapy treats the disease systemically with agents that inhibit the reproductive capacity of cells. Radiotherapy, on the other hand, uses ionizing radiation to cause cell death in targeted locations, which also alleviates the various symptoms that are typically associated with a cancerous malignancy. But the ultimate philosophical questions surrounding cancer do not necessarily involve how to treat it. Existentially speaking, the causes and purposes of cancer serve as the primordial pillars in a philosophical debate. For if Sartre is correct, and existence does indeed precede essence, then cancer can be understood as a natural component of the body's self-destructive mechanisms. That is, when the time comes to move from this life into the next, the body initiates a series of ruinous processes to incite cell death. And as Nietzsche concludes, "there is more wisdom in your body than in your best wisdom."

The Frontier Experience

2010-07-01T00:00:00.022-04:00

The Frontier Experience: When the 1890 United States Census declared the Western frontier closed, few people understood the implications behind it. In 1893, historian Frederick Jackson Turner published "The Significance of the Frontier in American History." This essay sought to explain the origins of American exceptionalism in the context of westward expansion. For Turner, the process of settling the West became an essential component of both American individualism and identity. The ideas of westward settlement and expansion were not exclusive to Turner's "Frontier Thesis," however. In 1845, New York journalist John O'Sullivan popularized the term "Manifest Destiny" (God-given right to go West) in reference to the annexation of Texas. Now that American frontiersman had God on their side, it was only a matter of willpower for the West to be made into a distinctive region. With the closing of the frontier, the nation had effectively exhausted its continental territory. Turner therefore assumed a Malthusian perspective toward the American West where population growth and food production must be balanced. If population growth far exceeded food production, then the West would potentially face abandonment, as its geography was not conducive to large-scale settlement in the first place.

Deindustrialization and Urban Blight

2010-06-15T00:00:00.016-04:00

Deindustrialization and Urban Blight: The net loss of industrial output in most cities is the primary effect of deindustrialization. As a structural process, it particularly affects cities where manufacturing constitutes the largest component of the urban economy. With the decline of the automobile industry in Detroit, Michigan, the city has become a poster child for deindustrialization. At the same time, the steel industry in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, has largely evaporated, and thus, the area between the two cities is known as the Rust Belt. But is deindustrialization an entirely negative aspect of urban life in this region? Sure, it creates urban blight in the form of abandoned warehouses, factories, and houses. And it even highlights the racial tensions that stem from 'white flight' and labor segmentation. Yet deindustrialization also leads to economic opportunities in the form of deflated real estate prices. Developers are therefore able to engage in the urban renewal process more easily by purchasing and renovating unused or foreclosed buildings. In short, the deindustrialization narrative in urban history will continue to serve as a key framework for examining any city's basic socio-economic structures.

Sacco and Vanzetti

2010-06-01T00:00:00.017-04:00

Sacco and Vanzetti: As a classic case of nativism, the Sacco and Vanzetti trials of the 1920s originated with the First Red Scare. Born in Italy in the late nineteenth century, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti immigrated to Massachusetts in 1908. They adamantly supported Italian anarchist Luigi Galleani, who was a known proponent of anarcho-syndicalism. Fraught with ideas such as "wage slavery" and "trade unionism," anarcho-syndicalism essentially focused on building structural anarchy into the labor movements of the early twentieth century. When Sacco and Vanzetti eventually met in 1917, the political climate in the United States was very anti-radical. The Bolshevik Revolution in Russia coupled with the general nervousness surrounding World War I pushed many American authorities to embark on political witch-hunts. Given the reactionary atmosphere in America at the time, immigrants, particularly those from Southern and Eastern Europe, were synonymous with radical beliefs. Sacco and Vanzetti experienced the consequences of anti-radicalism when they faced their impending executions (under the banner of sedition) in 1927 for two murders and a robbery that they may or may not have committed.

Define: Lutheran Dilemma

2010-05-15T00:00:00.018-04:00

Define: Lutheran Dilemma: When Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses on the doors of the All Saints' Church (Schlosskirche) in Wittenberg in 1517, he precipitated a theological dilemma of monumental proportions. As an Augustinian monk, Luther exhibited a staunchly individualistic outlook toward matters of Christian theology. The doctrine of justification, which entailed a sinner's conversion to righteousness in the eyes of God, became a central tenet in his theological teachings. More specifically, Luther believed that Faith alone (sola fide) was the final determinant in the process of justifying mankind. Nevertheless, Luther had visions of himself falling on an eternal ladder that stretched between Heaven and Hell. They haunted his conscience to the point when he confessed to a priest who told him to do what lied within himself. That response did not placate Luther's dilemma. He saw the Roman Catholic Church as growing increasingly corrupt. For example, the selling of indulgences - where parishioners could purchase either full or partial remission for their sins - infuriated Luther. After his formal excommunication in 1521, Luther sought to establish a new church that conducted services in the vernacular (German) instead of Latin. This change appealed greatly to a wide degree of commoners, as it increased access to the liturgical processes of Christian worship.

On Israeli Foreign Policy

2010-05-01T00:00:00.028-04:00

On Israeli Foreign Policy: When Israel became an official country in May 1948, she confronted five Arab armies on her newly established borders. Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria each invaded Israel in the name of Pan-Arabism, which sought to reassert Arab control over Palestine. But it was the ideology of Religious Zionism that helped the Israeli people remain resolute and fend off their Arab foes. This strain of Zionist thinking has become central in the political processes that define Israeli foreign policy. Ever since the country's early foreign ministers; Moshe Sharett, Golda Meir, and Abba Eban, Israel has demonstrated a strong inclination for self-determination whereby her national interests supersede the collective interests of her Arab neighbors. For example, when Palestinian Arabs fled Israel at the onset of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, they were not allowed to repatriate. At that time, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, who simultaneously headed the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Israeli government, employed a variety of heavy-handed policies toward Palestinian Arabs. His thinking centered on the idea of "peace through strength." Therefore, if Israel pursued aggressive settlement policies through mechanisms like the National Water Carrier project, then Palestinian Arabs would necessarily recognize the permanence of Israeli statehood, and thus, political stability in Israel would subsequently ensue.

Grand Theft Auto: The Game

2010-04-15T00:00:00.010-04:00

Grand Theft Auto: The Game: If there ever was a video game that resembled what English political philosopher Thomas Hobbes referred to as the "state of nature," then Grand Theft Auto (GTA) certainly qualifies. When Hobbes published Leviathan in 1651, England was on the verge of entering a de facto military dictatorship under the rule of Oliver Cromwell. The traumatic events of the English Civil War in the 1640s pushed Hobbes to question what would happen to a society devoid of government. As a result, he conducted a hypothetical thought experiment in which men proceeded to fight each other in the name of land and liberty (bellum omnium contra omnes). As for GTA, the idea of a "war of all against all" becomes a virtual reality when players are immersed in a world where objective morality ceases to exist. Players can steal cars, kill pedestrians, rob stores, and even copulate with hookers. Critics claim that the game's graphic imagery incites violence and sets a poor example for young children. But the game can also be considered a teaching tool with regard to the importance of having a strong central government, especially in a society of ruthless individuals.

Just War Theory

2010-04-01T00:00:00.011-04:00

Just War Theory: American Protestant theologian, Reinhold Niebuhr (pictured above), advocated a theory of "just war" that eventually morphed into the Christian Realist movement. Originating with Catholic theologians like Saint Augustine of Hippo and Saint Thomas Aquinas, a just war is fundamentally conducted from a defensive standpoint. Basic requirements (jus ad bellum) include just cause, comparative justice, and legitimate authority. Yet with the advent of the Cold War in 1945, Christian Realism brought a hawkish attitude to American foreign policy. As a religiously rooted ideology, it helped Americans cope with the prospects of imminent war. And Niebuhr recognized that attempting to meet every stipulation for a just war would hamper the ability of the defender to prepare an adequate defense. Therefore, sometimes the best way to defend a territory involves going on the offensive. Preemptive war signifies an off-shoot of this kind of thinking. For example, the Bush Doctrine in Afghanistan and Iraq applied the principle of preemption to combat global terrorism. But it is never enough to strike preemptively and then leave one's opponent wallowing in the wake. A comprehensive plan for recovery (nation building) must be implemented in order to mitigate the potential for future aggression.

Tesla's Alternating Current

2010-03-15T00:00:00.019-04:00

Tesla's Alternating Current: Serbian inventor, Nikola Tesla, is often shunned in favor of Thomas Edison when examining the historical development of electrification. Having secured nearly 300 patents over the course of his life, it was clear that Tesla had a profound impact on the Second Industrial Revolution. Beginning in the 1880s, large-scale electrification efforts were underway in the United States. Edison supplied New York City with its first electric grid while George Westinghouse discovered the utility of copper as an electrical conductor. But it was Tesla who devised the theoretical basis for alternating current (AC), which made long-distance electrical transmission networks possible. Tesla's work, however, ignited an intellectual debate with Edison over what constituted the most efficient way to distribute electricity. Edison advocated a direct current (DC) system of electrical transmission that maintained a constant level of voltage throughout the network. Tesla criticized Edison's DC system by citing the high amount of electricity that went to waste while sustaining a constant level of voltage in the electric grid. In an AC system, transformers represent cost-effective devices for converting high transmission voltages into low utilization voltages. This feature, along with successful installations of AC power at Niagara Falls and Chicago, effectively ended the debate over AC and DC systems.

Marcus Garvey Goes Back to Africa

2010-03-01T00:00:00.004-05:00

Marcus Garvey Goes Back to Africa: In August 1914, when the guns of World War I erupted, Marcus Garvey founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA). Unlike the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), which originated five years earlier and primarily addressed African-American issues, the UNIA sought to uplift African peoples from around the world. As time progressed, the association started a weekly newspaper called The Negro World and various black-owned corporations that operated in the economic sectors of trade, transportation, and manufacturing. Even though the UNIA headquartered most of its functions in the United States, Garvey pushed for an increased emphasis on Africa. By the mid-1920s, he attempted to organize a Pan-African movement for the repatriation of African-Americans in Liberia. The ultimate objective of the movement was to develop basic infrastructure such as roads, schools, and factories in an effort to resettle the country. Unfortunately for Garvey, the Liberia program had to be abandoned due to unforeseen conflicts with American and European imperial designs.

When the Guns Blared...

2010-02-15T00:00:00.017-05:00

When the Guns Blared...: In late 1942, the German Army (Das Heer) introduced the Tiger I (Panzer VI) tank. It was the German Army's answer to the Red Army's infamous T-34, which roamed the Eastern Front during Operation Barbarossa. As a heavy tank, the Tiger's armor represented one of its most formidable aspects. Likewise, the tank's 88mm gun also instilled great fear in the Allies. Yet due to the Tiger's nearly impregnable armor, it was rather slow when compared to the U.S. Army's M4 Sherman. Another downside related to its heavy armor was the snail-like pace of the tank's production capacity. But the Tiger signified a quintessentially German tank. Its assembly process followed the business paradigm of quality over quantity; unlike the Americans who pursued the exact opposite paradigm. In its first years of operation, the Tiger scored big gains as it advanced across the Eastern Front deep into the Soviet Union. At the same time, the German Army created reserve (mechanized) divisions in France to help fortify the Western Front. Ultimately, the Allies overwhelmed the Germans with superior productive capabilities, and thus, ended the myth of invincibility that surrounded the Tiger.

Politicizing through Ridicule

2010-02-01T00:00:00.016-05:00

Politicizing through Ridicule: In 1971, the godfather of community organizing, Saul Alinsky, published his Rules for Radicals. It primarily addressed the New Left movements of the 1960s, which sought to broaden the ideological stance of the Old Left - where traditional Marxism (class-based oppression) and trade unionism reigned supreme. Although he despised labels and never officially joined any political organization, Alinsky's words and actions surely placed him in the liberal camp. By its very nature, community organizing is a left-wing phenomenon, especially since it focuses heavily on shared interests instead of self-interests. And Alinsky's Rules for Radicals has become the quintessential manifesto for community organizers, as it juxtaposes Machiavelli's elite (sustaining power) with Marx's proletariat (attaining power). In effect, Alinsky admonishes his readers to attain power is by ridiculing the politics of those who already have it. That is, make yourself a victim of the Establishment or the ruling political structure. Victims garner sympathy and sympathy provides victims with social mobility. The cycle builds upon itself until the victim eventually becomes the perpetrator. Much of what Alinsky professes leads the reader to believe in the old Nietzschean aphorism that "might makes right." In a way, therefore, Alinsky's ethics are purely subjective, which is why community organizing often lacks a clear sense of purpose.

Batman and the Jungian Self

2010-01-15T00:00:00.017-05:00

Batman and the Jungian Self: In the psychology of Carl Jung, there is a specific reference to the Self. As an archetype, it serves as one of the most fundamental features of a person's psyche. It also marks the intersection between the mind's conscious and unconscious elements. The core component of the Self, however, resides in the process of individuation. For Jung, this process involves bringing the unconscious aspects of one's mind into the conscious. Perhaps individuation is best exemplified by fictional superhero Batman. His Self certainly follows a unique pattern of development, as it consistently undergoes a transformation from wealthy citizen to communal vigilante. In fact, the story surrounding Batman's transformation is not all that unbelievable. As a billionaire philanthropist, Bruce Wayne acquires a sense of extreme self-discipline after his parents' murders and becomes motivated by both revenge and love. But what makes Batman particularly appealing is his relentless drive for self-actualization or what Nietzsche calls the "will to power." This drive helps him pursue Gotham City's most notorious criminals in a way that only he can.

Newman's "Grammar of Assent"

2010-01-01T00:00:00.017-05:00

Newman's "Grammar of Assent": In 1870, John Henry Newman published An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent. As a Cardinal in the Catholic Church who converted from Anglicanism, he adamantly defended Christianity in the face of British empiricists like John Stuart Mill. One of the key points in the book entails the notion that a person of Faith does not have to understand fully what he worships. That is precisely where Faith plays its most integral role in the process of religious conversion. Of course, there are times when people cast doubt and demand answers rooted in a scientific rationale. But when taken to an extreme, that kind of thinking only leads to solipsism. And as a logical fallacy, solipsism states that nothing exists outside of one's own mind. Adhering to such a philosophical doctrine would perhaps be the greatest display of personal arrogance since Narcissus first discovered the beauty of his own reflection. Above all, however, Newman believes the human mind is engaged in an unending search to close the logic-gap that stems from the innate flaws of deductive reasoning.

'80s Synthpop at Its Best

2009-12-30T00:00:00.016-05:00

'80s Synthpop at Its Best: New Wave music in the 1980s can be characterized as a synth-revolution. Although synthesizers had been around since the late 19th century, it was not until the 1970s that they became compact enough to be used on a wide scale. These new synthesizers could synchronize with other electronic instruments and even tap into the developing world of computer software. For the most part, New Wave music originated from the British punk scene in the late 1970s. Bands like New Order and Men Without Hats came to define the New Wave genre in the early 1980s. But by the mid-1980s, New Wave had spawned a sub-genre called Synthpop. With its central focus on the synthesizer, Synthpop first gained notoriety in underground music circles. In fact, New Order and Men Without Hats scored their biggest hits, "Blue Monday" and "The Safety Dance" respectively, with a synthesizer at the crux of each song. Synthpop, therefore, continues to grow and develop even in today's watered-down pop scene, as bands like Ladytron, Justice, and Vitalic are pushing the sub-genre forward.

The Infamous "K-Hole"

2009-12-15T00:00:00.017-05:00

The Infamous "K-Hole": Recreational use of ketamine has skyrocketed in recent years. Like most anesthetics, its recreational value went undiscovered until decades after it was first synthesized. In the early 1960s, scientists began to develop anesthetics with reduced psychoactive side effects. Ketamine was one of the primary drugs to originate from this development process. And as such, it underwent immediate testing in both animals and humans. Essentially, the drug acts on the central nervous system by inhibiting neuron transmission, which impedes the brain's ability to access memory. This effect made the drug a hit among wounded soldiers in the Vietnam War, as their brains were unable to process the pain "memory." Today, ketamine is primarily used in veterinary medicine because it still possesses a variety of hallucinogenic effects, many of which are similar to PCP. As a result, the drug is also used in the "rave" scene, where ecstasy (MDMA) and other amphetamines are popular. Where the term "K-Hole" becomes relevant is when a ketamine user consumes a particularly high dose. The net effect of such an act will cause a kind of paralysis where the user experiences a psychedelic detachment from the body.

Nat Turner's "Confessions"

2009-12-01T00:00:00.013-05:00

Nat Turner's "Confessions": In the early morning hours of August 21, 1831, a slave rebellion erupted in Southampton County, Virginia. Led by Nat Turner, an African-American slave who saw himself as a prophet, the insurrection resulted in nearly 200 deaths overall. Although the revolt only lasted two days, Turner evaded capture until October 30, 1831. While awaiting trial, Turner's lawyer, Thomas Ruffin Gray, visited him in jail. Gray subsequently proceeded to interview Turner about why he decided to organize and carry out such a heinous act. Turner's responses were deeply religious. Rooted in Judeo-Christian principles, Turner wished to deliver his people from bondage, much like Moses and the ancient Hebrews in the Book of Exodus. He claimed to have visions from God, which inspired him to take up arms. There were solar eclipses and other celestial happenings that also pushed Turner to act. After the interview, Gray compiled his notes into a book and published it as The Confessions of Nat Turner. But to what extent can this book be considered historical evidence? Authorship is the primary question of concern, as Turner merely dictated his responses to Gray. Nevertheless, the book does offer valuable insight into Turner's mind.

"The Second Sex"

2009-11-15T00:00:00.014-05:00

"The Second Sex": When French feminist, Simone de Beauvoir, published The Second Sex in 1949, few understood its significance with respect to the emerging philosophy of existential feminism. In fact, one of the most well-known phrases surrounding the feminist movement originated with Beauvoir's book. It follows that "One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman." Such a statement makes an important distinction between the terms of 'gender' and 'sex.' Whereas 'gender' is more of an acquired trait, 'sex' is a permanent condition. Today, people can have 'sex' changes at the hands of a skilled surgeon, but attributes of their original 'sex' still exist underneath the surgical work. Building on the themes expressed in Beauvoir's "Second Sex," Betty Friedan published The Feminine Mystique in 1963. This book effectively launched feminism onto the same stage as the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s; as Friedan went on to establish the National Organization for Women (NOW) in 1966. Much of the feminist legacy, however, has shifted in scope since the mid-twentieth century. Naomi Wolf, the woman in the above video, advocates "third-wave feminism," which basically seeks to redefine the feminist movement in the wake of the Cold War by getting women more involved in politics and creating a greater awareness over issues like reproductive rights and sexual harassment.

Maslow's Hierarchy of Inborn Needs

2009-11-01T00:00:00.010-04:00

Maslow's Hierarchy of Inborn Needs: When American psychologist Abraham Maslow first published A Theory of Human Motivation in 1943, it was truly revolutionary. Part of what made Maslow's theory so compelling was its application of a scientific rationale to basic questions of human behavior. He argued that a person's elemental needs such as food, water, and shelter must be met before that person could move up the pyramid to be concerned with other (less important) priorities. And there is certainly an intricate connection between each level of human needs. For example, belonging is a need that entails the idea of people as being inherently social creatures. Maslow's argument, at least on the surface, appears logical. But upon further investigation into the belonging level, one will find that it is, in fact, the most difficult need to secure. The mere existence of the Kierkegaardian Self, which is innately unique and individualistic, counteracts the need for large-scale societal belonging. Of course, people can self-actualize, albeit perversely, without feeling a sense of belonging to society at large. Radiohead's song "Creep" speaks almost exclusively to this kind of psychological trauma.

A Theory of Prejudice

2009-10-15T00:00:00.045-04:00

A Theory of Prejudice: What is it about preferential thinking that makes people categorize others into social groups? The answer undoubtedly lies with the difference between familiarity and strangeness. Of course, there is the old cliché that familiarity breeds contempt; but on a more instinctive basis, strangeness also spawns antagonism. It appears the two most visceral emotions that stem from familiarity and strangeness are hatred and anger (not kindness and curiosity), respectively. According to American psychologist, Gordon Allport, "anger is a transitory emotional state" while "hatred is more deep-rooted" with an element of permanence. Expanding on this distinction, Aristotle alluded to the idea that "anger is customarily felt toward individuals only, whereas hatred may be felt toward whole classes of people." Such a claim is particularly evident in the experiences of young children. Whenever a young child encounters a stranger, even if that stranger makes a friendly advance or gesture, the child will typically withdraw and cry. The doll experiments of Kenneth and Mamie Clark, which served as evidence in the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education case, helped to explain the ingrained nature of racial prejudice in young children. For both black and white children, the white dolls consistently proved more appealing. With a proper education, however, these kinds of preferential thoughts can be mitigated.

Secularizing the Mosaic Covenant

2009-10-01T00:00:00.008-04:00

Secularizing the Mosaic Covenant: The Mosaic Covenant symbolizes a specific contractual agreement between God and His chosen people, namely the Israelites. God put forth his Ten Commandments to guide the Israelites in their collective quest for communal harmony. Yet with the birth of Christ, which Kierkegaard refers to as "The Instant," a New Covenant permeated the Judeo-Christian tradition. By no means did this New Covenant invalidate the Mosaic One. It was still immoral (against God's will) to murder and steal and commit adultery. But the Old-Testament consequences behind such actions became somewhat muddled, as the New Covenant offered salvation to even those who broke the Mosaic Law. And it was precisely this kind of redemptive Grace that weaved its way into the founding documents of republican societies throughout the Western world. A social contract, as Jean-Jacques Rousseau once wrote, forms when "each of us places his person and authority under the supreme direction of the general will, and the group receives each individual as an indivisible part of the whole." This statement speaks to the fundamental principles of Christianity whereby man holds Faith in Christ to fashion wholesome communities rooted in self-evident truths like liberty and equality. Rousseau merely uses secular language like "the general will" to avoid having his argument corrupted by the controversial nature of the Catholic Church in eighteenth-century France.

Hell Masquerading as Progress

2009-09-15T00:00:00.022-04:00

Hell Masquerading as Progress: In his essay What is Metaphysics? (Was ist Metaphysik?), Martin Heidegger asserts that human existence is constantly on the edge of the Abyss. That is, each person faces the prospects of non-existence on a constant basis. A certain Being-toward-death (Sein-zum-Tode) exists to put each person in despair from time to time. It is that primordial feeling of anxiety, which subtly creeps into humanity's collective unconscious, especially in times of extreme self-awareness. This anxiety constitutes an irrational fear, which is neither directed at a specific entity nor governed by personal insight. As a result, one becomes increasingly hardened in his attempts to repress the visceral fears that afflict him. Such a reaction can lead to an agoraphobic outlook where one finds the world outside his or her home to be riddled with elements that incite despair. Take, for example, flying on an airplane. Trust of aircraft machinery by a person must occur before the process of aviation can happen. After attaining this trust, a basic co-relationship develops in which people become machines. When the pilots grasp the controls, they are, for all intents and purposes, man-machines (Die Mensch-Maschinen). And whenever turbulence strikes, it reminds people of the greater-than-thou physical forces acting on the aircraft. At that point, death is merely an accepted risk that one assumes while flying.

The Suburban Ghetto

2009-09-01T00:00:00.018-04:00

The Suburban Ghetto: Suburbanization, at least in the 1950s, was an exclusive process. It entailed the movement of whites from an area of high concentration in the city to an area of low concentration in the country. And like the inventions of jazz music and the hamburger, suburbanization was a wholly American phenomenon. Europeans never quite adopted the cookie-cutter style housing techniques, as they preferred to use brick and mortar instead of wood. There was simply less land available in Europe for this kind of mass development. Even so, planned communities effectively became the norm throughout post-World War II America. These communities came to fruition in the midst of Jim Crow. The federal government in the 1930s, with New Deal agencies like the Home Owners' Loan Corporation (HOLC), systematically sought to prevent certain social groups from moving to the suburbs. By denying loans to people in urban minority neighborhoods and guaranteeing them to white contractors who built massive suburban communities, the federal government essentially controlled the sociological aspects of suburbanization. The classic example is Levittown, New York (pictured above). Between 1947 and 1951, this suburb saw a net increase of 20,000 homes; but not one of them contained a black family.

Fox News' "Red Eye"

2009-08-15T00:00:00.024-04:00

Fox News' "Red Eye": This late-late-night talk show on the Fox News Channel (FNC) has quickly made a name for itself. Having begun in February 2007 with a 2 AM Eastern Time slot (now it's at 3 AM), part of its viewership relies on those who record the show and watch it later. Although its main competition comes from re-runs on other cable news networks, Red Eye performs consistently well in the ratings. The show's creator, Greg Gutfeld, is a witty conservative pundit who used to be the chief editor of Maxim magazine in the United Kingdom. Other permanent faces on the show include T.V.'s Andy Levy, who serves as the "Ombudsman," and Bill Schulz (a relative of William Dawes, Jr. - the "other" rider with Paul Revere), who is the show's liberal voice. And there are always a few guests on the show each night who proceed to offer their opinions on the topics being discussed. One of the particularly comical episodes involved Gwar's lead singer Oderus Urungus serving as the show's interplanetary correspondent. Occasionally, Gutfeld will lament to the camera that his show really sucks and wonders why Fox News continues to air it.

Social Networking and Narcissism

2009-08-01T00:00:00.024-04:00

Social Networking and Narcissism: In today's information-driven world, no mechanism has revolutionized the process of communication more than the internet. As a global network of interconnected computers, the internet serves as a postmodern means of not only commerce, but also community. And it is the development of these cyber-communities that fundamentally alters the egos and personalities of the people who engage in them. For one thing, the explosion of social-networking websites, such as Facebook and MySpace, which critics claim are nothing more than cash cows for advertisers, has led some people to the precarious zone of situational narcissism. Psychologically speaking, this kind of narcissism is emblematic of extreme self-love, as users of a social-networking site attempt to augment their communal importance by carrying out such acts as acquiring friends, displaying photos, and updating statuses. The fact remains, however, that communal importance is a self-perceived notion. According to Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, human beings are meant to rise above the petty concerns of communally-reflected glory. Social networking fills the mind with vices rather than virtues. Instead of living like a herd animal, which is what social-networking websites do to us all, we ought to disconnect and see what our true collective potentiality holds.

The Irrational Man

2009-07-15T00:00:00.023-04:00

The Irrational Man: Have not you heard of that irrational man who in the bright morning took up his pen and wrote about the existence of God? Call him a theist! Call him irrationally pious! Call him what you will! But God knows that only irrational men understand the true basis for Christian worship. Some might say prayer is merely a form of lip-service to God. Some might say God is dead. Some might say religion is for those who do not possess thoughts of their own. Well, according to that primordial Frenchman, Pascal, 'the heart has its reasons, of which, reason knows nothing.' The idea of God resides deep within our collective unconscious. Besides, is not there an absolute dependence upon something higher than ourselves? How do you explain the very nature of your inner-most Being? Reason gets you far, and the "will to power" (Der Wille zu Macht) gets you even farther. Yet it is the soul that ultimately pushes you above and through to the next life. Comprehending the soul means understanding resurrection. Death is not the end. There will be times of doubt and pain. And when the hand of death is approaching, be not afraid, for eternal bliss lies just beyond its touch.

Jefferson's Utopian Experiment

2009-07-01T00:00:00.019-04:00

Jefferson's Utopian Experiment: In what was perhaps the greatest sentence ever written, Thomas Jefferson composed the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom in 1779. When it later passed the Virginia General Assembly in 1786, after support from James Madison, it marked the first law of religious freedom in a modern world republic. In the statue, Jefferson purports a simple, but effective argument for religious freedom in republican societies. Given that "Almighty God hath created the mind free," then it was only natural to make religious worship a free and open practice. He realized that the worst kind of tyranny occurred when religion and government worked hand-in-hand to create a theocracy. State-imposed religion curtailed man's free will. Now it is important to remember that Jefferson drafted this statute during the Revolutionary War. There was no guarantee that the American confederation would survive the British onslaught. Even so, after securing an alliance with France in 1778 and winning a mere three out of nine major battles, the Continental Army persevered on its way to eventual victory over Britain. Aside from the military campaign, Jefferson's statue represented an alternative course in the ideology of republicanism. It allowed for the creation of a wall that separated religion and government. Thus, Jefferson's statute is either a gateway to secularization or a symbol of common sense.

Nine Inch Nails Reinvigorated

2009-06-15T00:00:00.066-04:00

Nine Inch Nails Reinvigorated: After several unsuccessful bids to carve out a living in the music industry with various bands, Trent Reznor finally enjoyed the benefits of widespread notoriety with the release of Nine Inch Nails' (NIN's) first album, Pretty Hate Machine, in 1989. Generally described as an industrial metal group noted for eccentric tones and heavy drum and bass elements, NIN has effectively become a musical genre in its own right. The above video is actually a remix of the 2005 NIN song "Only." It includes a visual interpretation of the lyrics (which are solipsistic in nature) and it incorporates animation from The Sims 2. Although the remix is neither produced nor engineered by Reznor, major portions of the original song are still intact. As for the bigger picture, NIN is considered one of the most creative industrial bands that originated in the 1980s. With songs like "Wish" and "Happiness in Slavery," both of which won Grammys for Best Metal Performance in 1992 and 1995 respectively, Reznor truly puts his soul into NIN's music. And likewise, one must commend him for maintaining such a high degree of musical integrity throughout NIN's existence.

Technics in Time

2009-06-01T00:00:00.024-04:00

Technics in Time: The origins of the mechanical clock can be traced back to a French monk at the close of the tenth century named Gerbert d'Aurillac, who later became Pope Sylvester II. Attributing full credit to him is still controversial, but the general implications of the mechanical clock's invention are widespread and undeniable. At that time, the monastery was the seat of a regular life where bells rang at specified intervals to call the monks to prayer. Although sundials and water clocks had been in existence for thousands of years, the invention of the mechanical clock signaled a fundamental change in the progression of daily life. As a result, a definitive form of social regimentation developed in urban life around the thirteenth century. The drive for routine and rigidity stemmed primarily from the introduction of the mechanical clock, which demanded efficiency, punctuality, and responsibility from all citizens. Such a radical departure from previous epochs in human history, where people subjected time to their individual needs, could only mean that modern man was a creature that necessitated discipline. And it was precisely this healthy appetite for discipline that led to the foundation of modern capitalism. Man was finally able to self-actualize and create a better future for himself by furthering innovation.

Family Guy: A Crude Reality

2009-05-15T00:00:00.025-04:00

Family Guy: A Crude Reality: No cartoon series has had a bigger impact on the world of cable television than Family Guy. Sure, there are other cartoon shows like South Park and The Simpsons, but Family Guy currently airs on as many as four channels during the week. In 2008, creator of the series, Seth MacFarlane, became the highest paid television writer in history after signing a four-year, $100-million contract with FOX. Given Family Guy's liberal slant, Rupert Murdoch, current Chairman and CEO of News Corporation (owner of conservative media outlet Fox News), clearly put business over politics. Part of what makes the show popular is its controversial depiction of middle-class family life in America. Nothing in American culture, especially Christianity and conservatism, is safe from the sarcastic commentary that arises from characters in the series. In fact, the show frequently uses cutaway gags and tangential vignettes for comedic purposes. Another common feature of Family Guy involves the blatant self-awareness of its characters to know when they are on television. Otherwise known as metahumor or "breaking the fourth wall," such a tactic merely enhances the comedic response from viewers.

Half-Way Covenant

2009-05-01T00:00:00.012-04:00

Half-Way Covenant: Conceived by New England Puritans in 1662 as a means to incorporate partial church membership, the Half-Way Covenant offered a viable alternative for congregants to participate in ecclesiastic circles without having had an authentic "conversion experience." Reverend Solomon Stoddard advocated this doctrine in order to extend the church's influence throughout the Puritan community, which was becoming evermore impious due to the growing commercialization of New England in the late seventeenth century. The central problem, however, rested with the third generation of Puritan settlers, whose religious affinities seemed increasingly aloof. Less parishioners received baptism, and thus, the rights to exercise the church's fundamental dogma. Therefore, ministers preached warnings of moral decay, otherwise known as "jeremiads" after the ancient Hebrew prophet Jeremiah, as a great fear of societal declension swept through the colony. Often cited as one of the first religious crises in early America, the controversy surrounding the Half-Way Covenant served as a precursor to the First Great Awakening, which entailed Reverend Jonathan Edwards delivering his notorious Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God sermon in 1741.

Slavery Produced Racism

2009-04-15T00:00:00.026-04:00

Slavery Produced Racism: It seems counter-intuitive to assert that slavery produced racism. Ideologies generate practices, which in turn, lay the groundwork for institutions. Yet as the peculiar institution of chattel slavery solidified in eighteenth-century America, the ideology of racism grew to facilitate slavery's support of the cheap labor demands of major Southern planters like Landon Carter and William Fitzhugh. In American Slavery, American Freedom (1975), historian Edmund S. Morgan argued that colonial Virginia initiated the first laws to suppress free blacks. Although slavery had existed for centuries prior to the founding of America, in the Old World it centered on prisoners of war and basic criminals, while in the New World it became racial. In fact, according to historian Winthrop D. Jordan, racial slavery was only about 150 years old by the time it reached colonial Virginia in 1619. By the 1680s, after Nathaniel Bacon's infamous rebellion, Virginia planters went from holding white indentured servants to driving black slaves. But race was not their primary motivation in making that transition. In fact, it was their deep-rooted belief in protecting the property rights that brought about this act. To colonial Virginians, the threat ultimately posed by landless whites (former indentured servants) proved more pernicious than that of enslaved blacks.

Against Boredom

2009-04-01T00:00:00.022-04:00

Against Boredom: Amen, amen, I say to you. For what would Christ do? Would He save you from becoming one of the dead? Perhaps that is all in your head! Maybe it is better to focus on this life. Of course, you could always end it with a knife. As Nietzsche once wrote, "Against boredom, even gods struggle in vain." It is that feeling when everything becomes one and the same. Is not Christian love the product of fear? That question will certainly provoke a sneer. The image of Christ on the Cross surely proves that question wrong. And it even makes the laundry list of complaints by atheists not-so-long. Yet whenever I look at my watch, I see my life slipping away. I hope I do not expire today. But there is one thing I would like to do before I go. And that is to take it slow. With one life to live, unless you are a Hindu. It can very easily turn into absolute poo. Yet I cannot afford to let that take place. For if I do, I will be on my way to Hell with great haste.

The Daft Punk Story

2009-03-15T00:00:00.016-04:00

The Daft Punk Story: As an electronic music duo from Paris, France, Daft Punk has certainly pushed the limits of the genre to new heights. Thomas Bangalter and Guy Christo have taken elements of older electronic groups such as Kraftwerk and Tangerine Dream, and given them a wholly postmodern feel. Like Kraftwerk, Daft Punk sees an explicit connection between electronic music and robots. As a result, Bangalter and Christo frequently dress as robots in their music videos and during live performances. The atmosphere that stems from such antics is very conducive to the deliberate nature of their music. In fact, most of Daft Punk's songs follow a pattern of progression and regression that seeks to invigorate the technologically-oriented minds of their fan base. For instance, the song "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger," which is on display in the above video, has a musical score littered with crescendos, decrescendos, and repetition symbols. In short, it is this kind of musical notation that defines the electronic genre today.

Christianity and Communism

2009-03-01T00:00:00.016-05:00

Christianity and Communism: One of Christianity's major tenets emphasizes the inherent sacredness and equality of a community. Whenever people gather in the name of Christ, He is present. This divine sacrality merits attention insofar as Christians comprehend the full implications of what they worship. Take the archetypal image of the Last Supper, for example. It highlights equality in a communal setting, as God Himself is effectively on the same level as His disciples. And in doing so, it lends itself to an ideology like communism, which understands the civic virtue of a community in a more secular, albeit atheistic, fashion. An image of the Soviet Politburo could just as easily be superimposed over the Last Supper. Given that Christianity is fundamentally antagonistic toward socio-economic hierarchies, it is essentially analogous to the classless society that communism endorses. In fact, Christianity, as an agent of inversion, seeks to level all hierarchical orders that inevitably rise from social constructions of knowledge like gender, race, and class. The True Levellers, who assumed their name from a passage in Acts of the Apostles, were a prominent social group during the English Civil War that called for a leveling of the property distinctions in England, which they perceived as the root of all class consciousness. This kind of thinking found its way into separatist Christian sects such as the Pilgrims. When they conceived of their Plymouth Colony in America through the Mayflower Compact, the Pilgrims understood the necessity for equalizing social conditions among members in their community. The dire circumstances that befell them in early America forced the Pilgrims to put aside their petty differences and bind together in a collective effort to survive. The problem is, of course, communism ceases to function as a workable ideology in a society driven largely by notions of private property and individualism.

The Video Game Evolution

2009-02-15T00:00:00.019-05:00

The Video Game Evolution: First-person shooter (FPS) games have been in existence since the days of Doom back in 1993. But it was not until the 1997 release of GoldenEye 007 for the Nintendo 64 console that the Video Game Evolution truly soared. Its connection with the 1995 GoldenEye movie only heightened the game's popularity. Prior to James Bond mania in the late 1990s, most, if not all, FPS games were made for the personal computer (PC). And given that PC technology was slow to personalize the video game industry, home consoles such as Nintendo 64 became extremely popular. To streamline sales and make matters more cost-effective, video game companies like Nintendo decided to adopt the old "loss leader" marketing technique whereby the consoles themselves sold at prices below their production costs and the video games sold at prices higher than their production costs. This business model is similar to the razor and blades paradigm invented by King C. Gillette at the turn of the twentieth century. In short, the Video Game Evolution began to assume all kinds of themes after GoldenEye 007 popularized the genre of first-person shooters. Video games like Half-Life moved the genre in the direction of science fiction while simultaneously spawning the field of tactical first-person shooting with Counter-Strike.

Why Chicago?

2009-02-01T00:00:00.018-05:00

Why Chicago?: According to American environmental historian William Cronon, Chicago developed as "nature's metropolis." The land upon which Chicago sits today was conducive to the growth of a major urban area. A low-lying ridge (Valparaiso Moraine) exists about ten miles west (and south) of the city. This ridge ultimately determines how water flows to the Atlantic Ocean. East of the ridge, water streams into Lake Michigan and eventually out the St. Lawrence River. West of the ridge, water trickles down the Mississippi River into the Gulf of Mexico. With respect to shipping, this distinction in water flow patterns is key. Early Chicago entrepreneurs quickly realized that they could ship goods to Europe by way of New York (Erie Canal) and South America by way of New Orleans (Mississippi River). The geographic location of Chicago necessarily enhanced its prospects for trade. Railroad barons saw huge potential for expansion, especially regarding the agricultural development of the Midwestern plains. Texas cattle ranchers would drive their herds as far north as Kansas in order to meet the railroad lines that would take their cattle to Chicago slaughterhouses. And given the heavy demand for railroads to transport everything from farming produce to raw materials, Chicago became the railroad capital of the United States by the late nineteenth century.

The Art of Intellectual History

2009-01-15T00:00:00.022-05:00

The Art of Intellectual History: For some people, intellectual history is nothing more than the history of philosophy. To others, it is the history of ideas. All of the various -isms conceived throughout history can be considered elemental parts of larger ideologies or sets of beliefs that determine the way whole societies function. Intellectual historians find that what happens in people's minds is more valuable and intriguing than what occurs on battlefields or in courtrooms. Generally, religious history and cultural history are portrayed as subsets of intellectual history. Religious movements like the four Great Awakenings and cultural movements like the Enlightenment are just a few examples of when ideas changed the fundamental course of social progress in Western civilization. More specifically, the Puritan settlements in seventeenth-century New England had profound implications for the intellectual development of early America. Some intellectual historians actually prefer an anti-intellectual approach to history whereby instinct trumps reason. Therefore, what people feel is more important than what they think. Feelings presuppose thoughts, and thus, they are more visceral in the overall human experience. And as Martin Heidegger so eloquently stated in his essay entitled What Is Called Thinking?, "the most thought-provoking thing in our thought-provoking time is that we are still not thinking."

That "Otherness"

2009-01-01T00:00:00.029-05:00

That "Otherness": In twentieth-century America, race relations were often unstable. As noted civil rights activist and sociologist W. E. B. Du Bois suggested, the African American constantly battled with the dilemma that existed between his blackness and his American citizenship. There was a distinct "color line" that persisted among whites and blacks. How could the United States endorse liberty as a civic virtue and then substantiate de jure segregation to keep blacks in their place? This contradiction tugged at the root of the African-American identity crisis. Du Bois argued that African Americans possessed a kind of "double consciousness" in The Souls of Black Folk (1903). What was it about being a black American in the early twentieth century that elicited feelings of "otherness" in the faces of whites? Nevertheless, the United States could no longer promote a colorblind society. Recognizing race was vital to realizing inequalities. If one recognized race, then one became cognizant of the separation that existed between the races. And like the Brown decision in 1954, which stated that separate educational facilities were inherently unequal, Americans began to understand that programs such as mandatory busing and affirmative action had to be enacted to rectify the inequities among black and white Americans.

Kraftwerk - Das Model

2008-12-30T00:00:00.009-05:00

Kraftwerk - Das Model: After thirty years, Kraftwerk's "Das Model" is still a popular song and not just in electronic music circles. In fact, metal groups like Rammstein have covered the song, as well as alternative groups like The Cardigans. Even so, the song is considered by many to be a harbinger in the genre of electronic music. Much like The Beatles' song "Hello Goodbye," this song speaks to how human beings perceive one another. And for that reason, "Das Model" is highly existential in its overall tone. The lyrics talk of how a model has to quickly change her entire disposition whenever there is a camera present. She has to contain a split personality in order to survive the brutally critical world of modeling. She is deeply self-conscious about her appearance and overly self-confident in her talents; a contradiction in outlooks to say the least. Yet the ability of the model to straddle both her personal world and the modeling world is precisely what attracts the singer to her. What's ironic here is that whenever Kraftwerk performs the song, they are in the spotlight just as models are. As a result, the band itself has to adjust to being viewed by hundreds, if not thousands, of pairs of eyes all at once. Certainly, that kind of pressure makes one question the true extent of his or her capabilities.

The Conscience of an Atheist

2008-12-15T00:00:00.041-05:00

The Conscience of an Atheist: Is the human conscience fundamentally opposed to atheism? It's difficult to see how a rational person could devote full attention to both his conscience and atheistic outlook. The human conscience is, at bottom, wholly oriented toward God. To be clear, every person is naturally endowed by God with a conscience. Like ideas and words, the human conscience has evolved. The question then becomes whether each individual chooses to utilize his conscience. In choosing not to utilize his conscience, man embarks on a basic separation from God. And it's precisely this separation which pushes man to develop ardent beliefs in the material world. Yet atheists believe in more than just matter. They believe in time, energy, mortality, and rationality. To suggest that theists do not hold these beliefs as well is simply ludicrous. Even so, Article 20 of the Catholic Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et Spes (Joy and Hope) states, "Favoring this doctrine [atheism] can be the sense of power which modern technical progress generates in man." This statement effectively captures the origins of atheism; the Industrial Revolution. In short, without God, there would be no atheists, because (a.) He would not have been there to create them in the first place, and ( b.) there would be no One for the atheists to oppose.

Kleist and Romanticism

2008-12-01T00:00:00.021-05:00

Kleist and Romanticism: One of the most prodigious authors in the literary genre of German Romanticism, Heinrich von Kleist often lived in the shadows of bigger names like Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Friedrich Schiller. As a result, he constantly felt pressure to write short stories and perform plays at his very best, especially since most of his vocal critics seemed to express a perpetual disregard for his works. Probably his two most reputable works include Penthesilea (1808) and The Marquise of O (1808). One of Kleist's marquis literary techniques involves the anachronistic insertion of an idea into a historical situation, which can leave the reader both bemused and intrigued at the same time. Mark Twain clearly borrowed this technique when writing A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889). Above all, Kleist's work exemplifies class consciousness and misogyny in the Napoleonic Era. Alternatively, Kleist did articulate a series of philosophical sentiments in pamphlets such as On the Gradual Production of Thoughts Whilst Speaking whereby he advocated acting before thinking, which certainly qualified as a major ideal in the Counter-Enlightenment movement.

American Cynicism

2008-11-15T00:00:00.017-05:00

American Cynicism: Mark Twain, whose birth name was Samuel Clemens, once said that "No one but the dead have free speech." Through his notebook, which was published posthumously in 1935, one can peer into the mind of probably the most cynical American literary in the nineteenth century. Some people consider his work to be quite humorous while others find it somewhat troubling. Either way, Twain had a knack for systematically dissecting whatever was most common in American folkways and laying them out for all to see their true colors. Any conventional pattern of behavior or quirky mannerism that held some peculiar value in American society was up for criticism and scrutiny from Twain. Perhaps Twain's staunch cynicism was precisely what drove his literary genius forward. It was undoubtedly the prime catalyzing force behind his 1873 satirical play entitled The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today whereby he sought to expose the vast extent to which avarice had infected postbellum America. In a way, Twain was a true activist. Even though his cynicism was what encouraged him to act in many instances, he certainly did possess the proper intentions when attacking a particular social stigma. And given that Twain lived in what was possibly the most dynamic period of change in American culture, one can better understand his avid skepticism. With so much change, there was bound to be those who doubted and scrutinized; Twain simply made a living out of it.

Poe and Poetry

2008-11-01T00:00:00.010-04:00

Poe and Poetry: The man for whom the word "poetry" is named; well not exactly, but it's an interesting coincidence nonetheless. Along with German existentialist philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, Edgar Allan Poe qualifies as one of the most "insane" writers of the nineteenth century. And it was this insanity which helped him produce some of the most brilliant pieces of writing in the modern literary world. For starters, his poem entitled A Dream within a Dream is eerily similar in content and context to that of Die achte Elegie (The Eighth Duino Elegy) by German poet Rainer Maria Rilke, and yet, Poe's poem came about seventy years prior. Both poems are wonderful examples of how poets possess the keen ability to trace the gods, and thus, build a bridge between the world of mortality and that of the hereafter. In a sense, one must be able to read Poe and realize that his language is highly theosophical. That is, it contains a vibrant mix of both theological and philosophical sentiments. For instance, in his epic "prose poem" entitled Eureka, Poe seeks to formulate a comprehensive understanding of the universe through a wide variety of intuitive suggestions. Think of it as a massive plate of food for thought. Even so, Poe's food is apparently quite tasty, as there is a plethora of scholars dedicated to studying his works.

Facing the Consequences

2008-10-15T00:00:00.008-04:00

Facing the Consequences: Breathe! Not too much though, for you might inhale some of the carbon monoxide coming from that flaming car! What a way to go out! Smoke inhalation - isn't that nice? And yet it is happening all the time to those who smoke cigarettes. Ah, the consequences stemming from human actions are dreadfully serious, but when is man going to realize this rather mundane fact? Where is Mr. Discipline when you need him? It seems to me that he has been on a permanent vacation to Never Never Land since the end of World War II. The fate of Western civilization rests on the shoulders of Mr. Discipline. He taught us how to export more than import. He taught us how to produce more than consume. And he taught us how to win more than lose. Perhaps Mr. Discipline was wearing a mask when he taught us Westerners how to thrive. Maybe his real name is Confucius, and quite frankly, the way the Chinese are prospering these days, that idea would not be all that unbelievable. Even so, as a self-indulgent individual who comes from a decadent Western society, I tend to endorse the notion that once man starts something, he simply cannot help himself to stop.

The Mighty Blackstone

2008-10-01T00:00:00.001-04:00

The Mighty Blackstone: Is there any part of high living today that does not reap the benefits of industrialization? Take ice cream for example - a modern delicacy - enjoyed by many thanks in large part to the innumerable processes of industrialization. It was so keen how rivers had flooded the lands so they could be made fertile, and yet today, man seeks to control the river with his intricate methods of irrigation. And what about this process of industrialization? Why did man betray the river? Rivers used to make the land arable in a natural fashion, so man would go to it. Now, man makes the river work for him by harnessing its great powers for industrial gains like electricity. Where is the divine justice for nature? Could it be held in the dreaded flood? Or the bitter yet subtle existence of erosion? Floods and erosion never used to be seen as a problem. That's because property was never considered valuable if it was located on a river's flood plain. When did value get assigned to property that exists on risqué grounds - like those multi-million dollar mansions that sit on canyon cliffs in Malibu, California? In any event, people in the United States can trace their industrial origins back to the mighty Blackstone and the factory-infested path that it carved through the rocky ledge of New England.

Roentgen's X-ray Radiation

2008-09-15T00:00:00.001-04:00

Roentgen's X-ray Radiation: In late 1895, German physicist Wilhelm Roentgen discovered X-ray radiation. This discovery would eventually land him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1901. At the time, many people did not quite understand the magnitude of Roentgen's achievement. Yet it soon became clear that he had stumbled upon something vastly significant for the advancement of not only medicine, but also for science as a whole. Comprehending the physics behind such a discovery is mind-boggling, but then again, so is the physics behind most of mankind's everyday appliances like the microwave and the television. And that is one area where modern-day society is falling apart. Man is no longer required to possess a working knowledge of the complicated technologies that surround him on a daily basis. Fifty years ago, people understood how their cars operated. It was a typical father-son bonding experience to get out there and change the oil of the family Oldsmobile. Nowadays, changing the oil is a highly sophisticated process with strict environmental regulations due in large part to the increased use of computers in cars. When will the final straw break? When will man realize that the more he employs advanced technologies, of which only a select few understand, the more he will increase his chances of creating what Heidegger calls the "Supreme Danger?" And where does the "Saving Power" reside in all of this?

Sartre and Sickness

2008-09-01T00:00:00.005-04:00

Sartre and Sickness: Classically absurd and yet classically French are two characterizations often attributed to Jean-Paul Sartre's first novel Nausea. Published in 1938, it is widely regarded as a quintessential work in existential literature. In fact, the protagonist, Antoine Roquentin, finds it increasingly difficult to define himself as a human being in the circumstances surrounding modern life. He is eerily similar to the protagonist, Holden Caulfield, in J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye (1951). Roquentin sees other people living according to the way in which they perceive themselves in the mirror every morning. The superficiality behind such actions truly starts to affect him in a nauseating, albeit existential, fashion. So what is the cure to this nausea that masquerades among inanimate objects and presents itself on the breaths of other people? There is no cure. People like Roquentin try to seek refuge in the domain of their inner Selves; however, that just leads to more sickness. Perhaps Sartre said it best when he stated that "Genius is what a man invents when he is looking for a way out." This statement surely encapsulates a variety of sentiments echoed throughout existentialist literature. And even Sartre himself refused to be labeled anything other than a pure exception, as he declined the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1964.

Complete Justice = Complete Catastrophe

2008-08-15T00:00:00.005-04:00

Complete Justice = Complete Catastrophe: The ecophilosophy of Garrett Hardin regards this equation as central to its core principles. In his 1968 essay entitled "The Tragedy of the Commons," Hardin explains how every rational being will seek to maximize his gain in the event that everything becomes the common property of all. Some see this notion as a seething critique of communism, and in particular, the Soviet farming policies related to collectivization. One sure way to solve the problems stemming from common ownership is to advocate a policy of privatization whereby only a limited number of people have access to certain resources. Given that the world itself possesses only a finite body of goods, man must put into place a series of control measures with respect to the environment. One area in dire need of regulation is the burgeoning growth of human population. Hardin firmly believes that the freedom to breed, as laid out in the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), is an insidious concept. The primary basis for his reasoning is derived from the fact that those who have many descendants are actually doing a serious disservice to society in the sense that they overburden the welfare system to safeguard their own aggrandizement. As a result of this kind of thinking, many people have characterized Hardin as being both aloof and cynical; however, like the Malthusian limit, he has certainly hit upon something important.

Ontology vs. Technology

2008-08-01T00:00:00.011-04:00

Ontology vs. Technology: There is little doubt among people today that technology has fundamentally altered man's relationship with not only the Earth, but also with his Self. In Martin Heidegger's noted essay The Question Concerning Technology, he refers to nature as "the enframing" whereby a systematic ordering of the natural landscape by mankind has resulted in a seemingly unrecognizable and irreversible situation that constitutes our present condition in the world. Not being able to recognize and understand the changes brought by technology to the earth and to the Self holds drastic consequences for the future. Today, mankind can operate a high-definition television or a super-charged automobile without having to comprehend even an inkling about the large degree of physics behind their respective operations. And this is precisely where a heavy emphasis on the fields of science and technology have come to supplant the most basic and primal elements of man's being-in-the-world, namely that of Faith and Grace. Take for example the posted picture above. It is the Sylmar Cascades in Southern California, which consequently enough, mark the effective terminus of the Los Angeles Aqueduct. Without the Sylmar Cascades, which require vast amounts of energy to pump precious quantities of water through the Newhall Pass, the more than ten million people in Los Angeles County would be facing a serious water crisis (not that they already are). And how many Angelenos can honestly claim to understand the immense risks involved with living on the edge of Western civilization?

Wittgenstein and Wonderment

2008-07-15T00:00:00.006-04:00

Wittgenstein and Wonderment: In his Philosophical Investigations (published posthumously in 1953), Ludwig Wittgenstein offers a variety of novel interpretations regarding the true nature of analytic philosophy. Concerning philosophy itself, Wittgenstein claims that all philosophical problems stem from a mere misunderstanding of language. What one person means by the word "phenomenology" for example, may be radically different from what another person means by it. Although there may be a general, philosophical definition of the word "phenomenology," the definition is postulated with a set of words that inevitably projects a so-called "meaning" onto it. Therefore, one cannot actually satisfy the logical conditions necessitated for a "meaning" rooted in language, especially since language itself constitutes an ever-expanding group of words with meanings that often presuppose their use(s). In this instance, Wittgenstein demonstrates how the "meaning" of any particular word presupposes our capabilities of using it to articulate or develop an effective manner of communication. Thus, even though language is fundamentally a public phenomenon, as one person utilizes it to communicate with another person, it is ultimately formulated in the private constructs of the mind.

The Ineffability of Modernity

2008-07-01T00:00:00.015-04:00

The Ineffability of Modernity: What's that sound? That sound that eerily creeps up behind you when you walk down the street. Is it the sound of urban sprawl? Is it the sound of reindustrialization? It's catching up with you every moment of your existence on the Earth. There is no exit. Nobody can escape the sound. It's delicate and ineffable at the same time. It masks itself as progress. Machines working hither and thither, cars traveling to and fro, planes taking off and landing, but it's all helter-skelter in the end, right? Yet we are creatures of the 21st century. And what does that entail? Are we inevitably condemned to self-inflicted triviality amidst modernity's constant motion? Or are there ways for man to overcome himself and achieve true meaning in today's world? In a way, man has certainly lost his ability to know himself. Answering what used to be simple questions like - Who are you? - and - What do you want to be in this world? - has become utterly difficult. Likewise, articulating what it means to be a human being in the 21st century is nearly impossible. People who define themselves by their material possessions only get distracted and lost in them over the long term. Thus, man has created the infamous Attention Deficit Disorder (A.D.D.), just as he has with various other social anxiety disorders. But it's that SOUND which clouds each one of our individual concerns, and until we learn to transcend that SOUND, we will be locked in this vicious cycle of modernity.

The Origins of Mechanized Warfare

2008-06-15T00:00:00.004-04:00

The Origins of Mechanized Warfare: Achtung - Panzer! is a book by long-standing German General Heinz Guderian. First published in 1937, the book remains stalwart in the face of contemporary military strategy whereby the deployment of mechanized, armored divisions is central. The prospect of marrying army divisions with tanks, mortars, and other forms of mechanized artillery was a rather novel concept at the outset of World War II in Europe. Similar calls for mechanization were asserted by French commander Charles de Gaulle in the 1930s, but those calls were not heeded in France like they were in Germany. And it is fair to say that these innovative war tactics, embraced by the Germans, were a major reason why the Battle of France (Fall Gelb) lasted a mere two months in May and June 1940. As a result of Guderian's treatise on mechanized warfare, the German Army fashioned a series of Panzer Korps in order to bring his war theories to fruition. These Panzer Korps were outfitted with German Panzer and Tiger tanks which relied more on speed and nimbleness instead of armor and defense like the French FT-17.

The Ripples of Divine Revelation

2008-06-01T00:00:00.006-04:00

The Ripples of Divine Revelation: The penultimate Pastoral Constitution to originate from the Second Vatican Council in November 1965 was Dei Verbum (Word of God). And in this fundamental Catholic document, the Church discussed the nature of God's Word, as revealed to man in the form of Sacred Scripture. Karl Barth, who was a Protestant theologian of Swiss heritage, explicated much about the nature of divine revelation in his thirteen-part volume Church Dogmatics. For the most part, Barth claims that theology itself is NOT the Word of God, but rather Christ-in-the-world embodies the Word of God. To him, the Church was the eyewitness of Christ-in-the-world, or what Kierkegaard referred to as "The Instant." From the moment Christ set foot on the Earth, divine revelation began rippling outward in all directions, like when somebody throws a rock into a pond. In reference to Dei Verbum, the Catholic Church saw the existence of Christ in human form (and in history) as the glowing beacon to which all people ought to aspire. But this Christlike model depends on the fact that it was God with whom man was communicating. And like Barth said, "The goal of human life is not death, but resurrection." This statement blissfully encompassed all there ever was and all there is to be in this world.

Business Ethics

2008-05-15T00:00:00.004-04:00

Business Ethics: It seems to me that there is an evident contradiction in the term "business ethics." On the one hand, "business" innately implies a certain degree of self-interest while on the other hand, "ethics" calls for a universal recognition of proper behavioral practices. Therefore, business ethics is fundamentally about finding an appropriate balance between the self-interests of business and the universal interests of ethics. Yet how does one come to find this balance? Well, for one thing, locating this delicate balance must come from within the individual. That is, a man in pursuit of business ethics must possess faith in the virtue of justice. Having even a limited understanding of the role that justice plays in the business world will put a man leaps and bounds ahead of his so-called "uninformed" colleagues (see the picture of disgraced and now deceased ex-Enron CEO Ken Lay above). In a 2004 best-selling book by John Perkins entitled Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, the concept of business ethics has become distorted by the postmodern drive for commercialism in the world's industrialized nations (G8). Perkins highlights the issue of giving monetary aid to the Third World in the form of categorical grants and strings-attached loans. To burden the Third World with debt is to control their resources, and thus, control their people.

The Native American Bind

2008-05-01T00:00:00.002-04:00

The Native American Bind: How have the Native Americans found themselves in a serious bind today? Well, if we look to history, we find that there was not much a choice for these people. Native Americans, on the whole, see themselves as integral parts of the land, not as superior beings who challenge nature through reason, science, and the will to power. Right here, we find our first fundamental tenet of Native American culture which appears to be at odds with the Western (Christian) world. Whereas Christians view the world and everything in it, including plants, animals, and other resources, as existing for man's use; Native Americans attempt to live in harmony with the Earth by not altering it in any significant fashion. An example that speaks greatly to this contradiction is the natural phenomenon in weather known as a drought. When a drought, or lack of water, becomes a problem in the Western world, rivers are dammed, canals are constructed, and aqueducts are laid so as to prevent any sort of recurring water shortages. For Native Americans, a drought is a natural component of the land, and therefore, it should be handled in a harmonious manner. Although Native American methods for managing natural catastrophes tend to be labeled as "primitive," many of the so-called environmental crises in the Western world, like toxic waste, are complete non-issues for Native peoples. Thus, Western man has in fact created a lot of his own problems.

The Secularization of Original Sin

2008-04-15T00:00:00.007-04:00

The Secularization of Original Sin: In Section 38 of Being and Time (1927), German existentialist philosopher Martin Heidegger offers a secularized version of the Christian doctrine of Original Sin. Just as the birth of every Christian is fundamentally marked by sin, so to is the birth of every human being. Yet sin is not the term used to describe this affliction, since it is religiously loaded. For the most part, Heidegger asserts that man finds himself "thrown" into his worldly existence and that his subsequent life is "entangled" in a number of predetermined features like race, class, and gender. The two German terms Heidegger uses in his writing are Verfallenheit (Entanglement) and Geworfenheit (Throwness). Both terms are related to the basic element of chaos (non-existence) that constantly hangs over every human life. And it is precisely this notion of chaos which pushes man into a state of anxiety (Die Anfechtung) over his seemingly finite, fragile, and solitary existence in the world. For Christians, however, the sacrament of Baptism is the manner through which this Original Sin is wiped clean. Even so, Heidegger claims that man can never fully eliminate the affliction of anxiety in his life, especially since it constitutes an elemental aspect of being-in-the-world. In short, man is always on the verge of non-existence, and therefore, he will consistently find anxiety waiting to consume his everyday state-of-being.

Either Faith or Reason or Both?

2008-04-01T00:00:00.001-04:00

Either Faith or Reason or Both?: It would seem, at least on the surface, that faith and reason are two fundamentally incompatible concepts. Faith begins precisely where speaking ends. And if the spoken word is one of the major signals of reason, then it would appear that faith constitutes a diametrically opposing idea to reason. In fact, faith is often viewed as a primary tenet of the irrational side to the human experience. Aside from speaking, faith also begins where thinking ends. In effect, the mind has to shut out all possibilities of the "other" in order to engage fully in the process of faith. Defining the "other" is important insofar as it relates to faith. Basically, the "other" is anything that seeks to attack, disprove, or unravel faith. Scientific proofs and other forms of hard data are the common ways that humans attempt to shake and test faith. For this reason, it is rather simple to see the rise of science and technology as a potential barrier to building and growing one's faith. And if what French mathematician and Catholic apologist Blaise Pascal says is correct, then God is "infinitely incomprehensible," and therefore, Christians cannot rationally defend and/or explain their faith.

Schopenhauer the Hedgehog

2008-03-15T00:00:00.006-04:00

Schopenhauer the Hedgehog: In 1851, German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer expounded his conception of "The Hedgehog's Dilemma" in his work Parerga und Paralipomena. For the most part, this dilemma is concerned with the idea that hedgehog's can only get so close to one another before they inevitably hurt each other with their spiny backs. (In fact, just for clarification, hedgehogs do not possess "large" spines on their backsides. There might have been an error in translation from the German to the English with regard to porcupines and hedgehogs.) Regardless, Schopenhauer takes this apparent paradox in the animal rationale and applies it to the human condition. That is, when two people become close with each other, most likely married couples or good friends, the potential for hurting one another is a lot greater than if the two people were unacquainted. At the same time, if two people who know each other well remain apart for a long period of time, then the mental anguish of loneliness may start to consume them. In coping with this dilemma, man is often inclined to turn inward and become anti-social, especially since this act appears to be the best way of safeguarding his dignity. Needless to say, the hedgehog's dilemma has become a popular concept in psychology, as couples seeking marriage counseling are made aware of this contradiction. The ultimate solution to this problem of human interaction seems to involve the locating of an optimal distance between subjects. In other words, finding a so-called "comfort zone" is the key to coexistence.

Zion and Its Elders

2008-03-01T00:00:00.009-05:00

Zion and Its Elders: Pictured above is Theodor Herzl, the man who is often considered the primary founder of modern Political Zionism. He was a Austro-Hungarian Jewish journalist living in the latter half of the nineteenth century. At the time, Europe saw the rapid growth of anti-Semitism in numerous countries like Germany, Austro-Hungary, and Russia. Even France could not eradicate its virulent anti-Semitic forces, as it plunged into a decade-long dilemma known as the Dreyfus Affair. It was this incident in France that caught the attention of Herzl. As a result, he decided to dedicate his time and effort to the creation and promotion of a back to Palestine movement (Zionism) for the Jewish peoples around the world. Such a concept was not new, it had existed ever since the days of the Jewish diaspora. However, the most novel feature of this movement was the fact that it contained vast socio-political implications for the European Jewry. As the rise of nationalism swept over Europe throughout the nineteenth century, the Jews were consistently set apart from any sort of grandiose nationalistic vision, which tended to be vaguely "Christian" in nature. And since they were frequently seen as a nation within a nation, European Jews needed a refuge where they could be free from the persistent persecution that they faced in the form of pogroms. Unfortunately for Herzl and other Zionist leaders, securing a place for the Jewish people in an area that was dominated by Muslims of the Ottoman Empire would prove quite difficult.