Dusk
Mon Mar 19 20:18:01 2007
Spinach and Noodles
- Cooking query: Spinach and Noodles in the same dish: Yes or No?
- Bad pun: LaSaagNe
- Rephrasing of earlier explanation: Resolving empiricism versus logic is a matter of understanding which is given primacy in a philosophy - Deep empiricists would say that logic (and math) is a provisional metaframework to be trusted only as much as any other (regardless of how "formal" things are) and to be modified as more experience warrants. Deep logicians would say that logic/math is a separate kind of knowledge independent of (and possibly superiour to) knowledge empirically gained.
- Regret: Foundational ways of looking at things become so familiar to us that they seem obvious, and that defending them is so rarely necessary that one can easily be caught flat-footed
- Protest today: Fun, for I went with some people I know and we had some philosophy discussion on the way. The protest itself wasn't bad, and I briefly spoke with local news on camera, gave my name, and briefly defended (with reasonable eloquence) the anti-war movement (or at least my perspectives). I didn't join in any of the chants I disagreed with, and had a few good-but-brief conversations with other people there. Eventually the group walked to CMU and across campus, looking for NSH. I split off when the whole group went into a building (getting arrested would be pointless).
- Position: CMU does some immoral things, much of it in NSH. This goes beyond armed robots, and unfortunately my hands are dirty with some of the work I did when I worked there. I do not mind or disapprove of carefully targeted actions that would protest or disrupt those parts of the university that act in ways harmful to humanity. I know a lot more about what CMU does on these fronts than the protesters do.
- Thoughts on activism:
- Don't risk arrest without a really good cause
- When doing direct action, don't get caught. Try not to even be there when the police arrive.
- Don't treat police as the enemy
- Don't chant things you don't believe. Think before you chant.
- You can usually leave at any time
- Don't destroy random things. This won't impress anyone and other protesters might have to stop and clean up your mess and catch up later (happened today)
- Know what you're doing and why
- Anarchists are more inclined to feel than think
- Excitement: Hitchcock class starts back up again tomorrow
- News: Legal proceedings of parental divorce either started or finished today. Hopefully my mom will get/got enough money to live on