Metacognition: A Tribute to Aristotle

This Black Friday, I declared that I needed some new clothes along with some new furniture, hence went to Woodfield Mall at 4 am and purchased some shirts and a couple of pants for dirt cheap. However, my favorite furniture store in the world was not having a Black Friday sale, which was quite disappointing. The moment I walked into IKEA, there was very little of what I'd expected. Low prices were scarce and discounts were applied to only the products that I didn't need. Overall my expectations were debilitated, although I purchased the table and bookshelf that I needed.

Returning home, while having loose Swedish furniture pelt my shoulders due to the construction on my street, I carried my new furniture and clothes up to my room only to find how filthy my room was. My eyelids jumped in shock, as I started to pick up my clothes and place my books aside to have them placed on the new bookshelf. Sadly, I was far from building my furniture for I had to transform my sea of papers into a neat stack. As I did so, I took the time to observe the papers laying on the floor and the miscellaneous wrappers as well. I regretfully reminisced to the day before when I had made this mess to find my insurance forms.

As time poured into the drain, the infinite quantum of sheets and wrappers allowed me to run across a few memories. The guitar tabulates of Stairway to Heaven reminded me when my friend Allen and I attempted to master the song. The A- final essay I wrote Freshman year reminded me how proud I was in that moment. I also found a Snickers wrapper when a few of my buddies and I slept over and snuck out to 7-11 to get it. After holding it for a few seconds, I realized how nasty it was that it was preserved with a bunch of papers and threw it away immediately. Copious stacks were made, excluding the wrappers, and every single one was stacked in categories of School, Music, and Artwork. I kept imagining my earlier years and how I wanted to go back in time to endure the bliss of my achievements, and failures weirdly. I then imagined how it'd be like reminiscing at an older age, which began to sadden me. Then my thoughts expanded into thinking how I would think back in college or when I'm married. In an instance, I omitted these thoughts after seeing that an hour had passed and it was time to assemble the furniture. After cleaning up the mess I'd made, I felt terrific, just as if I'd finished my homework. In other words, I was heavily alleviated to know my room was sort of clean and now my mom won't nag at me anymore.

Now, going to the clothes and furniture. The clothes I hang in my closet in an instance. All you have to know about the furniture is that I cut myself on the corner of a shelf and I had developed a callus on the side of my finger, due to the cheap Allen wrench IKEA had provided me with to screw in the bolts.

As I slowly placed the stacks of paper onto the new table and bookshelves, I came back to reminiscing about my memories and how precious they are. These are some of the things that will  matter to you more than anyone else, and taking the time to look back on all these things, I realized I had a legacy to leave behind. The more I make to myself, the more I can reminisce and learn from my achievements and failures.

After that, I went to bed.

Therefore, The papers I stacked are organized so I can go back to it whenever I can, and I believe that's the way our memories should be, like an IKEA warehouse, which by the way is a horrible metaphor and so I apologize.

Images' origin - http://photos.orblogs.com/photos/2007/07/Ikea-Warehouse.jpg

Carry It Forward: Sophie's Understanding

As discussed in class, our universe is yet to be discovered for there is bound to be greater finding. For all we know, the universe is expanding, changing in ways that we can only guess what it would be like. For all we know, we can be part of another galaxy, or one of the many universes currently present in space. There are indeed theories such as the "M Theory," or multi-verse, in which there are other universes in different dimensions, but we can only be so sure. And so to this day, we can only try to assume there is something out there, past our Andromeda galaxy and past our solar system. The thing is that the studies we are undergoing are becoming much more complex, meaning more questions to whether or not it can be or should be. However, the question is should it aught to be?

Baltasar Gracian, a Spanish philosopher, once said that the studies of our world and our being is questionable in many ways, so copious in fact that he resorted to simplifying his mind. Gracian spent most of his life studying the things around us, and he envisioned it to be so complex, he came to the realization there is no happiness in trying to answer your own questions. Throughout his life, Gracian wrote manuals criticizing other philosophers and politicians, such as Machiavelli, to try and create an ideal image of what he believed to be reasonable (e.g - qualities which make the sophisticated man of the world). Gracian was able to do so by disobeying his superiors, or by questioning religion itself, like many such as Martin Luther. Ironically, what Gracian then did in his old age was resort back to religion. Although this may seem like an unorthodox thing to do, he realized there is no need in trying to transcend our knowledge all at once. Thus, he simplified his mind and began to reflect on what he had discovered in his early years to recur his findings.

The message I'm trying to convey is not to give up on thinking because you might think it's too complex. I mention Gracian because he was one of the many philosophers of his time (The Baroque) and even now who attempted to transcend the common thinker to see the flaws and try to cope with new ideas to allow it to flow better. Of course all ideas cannot be as immaculate as the skies blue, but Gracian took the time to observe and recreate. Gracian happened to resort to religion due to his own beliefs, the message I'm trying to convey is if we look at things both ways, then it will give us a wider, broader perspective on what goes on on our planet. There are obviously questions that will be brought up to mind and restrict your ideas, definitely, but isn't it better to have them in mind? After all, Plato, Aristotle, Gracian, Locke, and many other philosophers contributed ideas that acted as stepping stones into our modern day world. Many times, philosophers questions one another to try and expand their thinking to fill in the gaps of others' ideas.

There's the old saying diversity is good, look how America turned out. Ideas start as thoughts and those thoughts, if achieved to some degree, become theories. Within the process in which the idea becomes a theory, it must undergo agreement, in other words a sort of universal balance; a sort of intervention. In my belief, i truly advocate conflicting arguments to a topic if the contributions are fair and reasonable. Therefore, diversifying ones' ideas may lead to something greater and expand its territories, kind of like how we view the universe.

Taken from the Humanities homepage

Best of Week: Maya Lin Documentary

Maya Lin is an amazing artist who dedicated her time and ideas into monuments that would preserve history. She did so by tinkering with every detail of her work; improving it and adding a greater meaning into her art. One of the ways she was able to add meaning was the connections she had made in her marble sculptures, such as the one she has in Alabama. The marble circle she had made simply told the story of what many African Americans faced and the events that changed the lives of many. She made it simple and clear to the visitors and added a spark of light into as well. She added water to show how everything flowed, and she did so by making sure the flow was even and altered everything to make it near perfect.

I believe that Maya Lin has allowed for viewers of her works of art to capture the perspective of what she was thinking to add a greater meaning. She did it really well with her marble sculpture and I believe that's what art should be like, simple and pristine.

Best of Today: Athens

In class, we were given a question on why Alberto taught Sophie about Athens, and then given a quiz. Sophie was given a video with Alberto in Athens and then they go back in time to meet up with Socrates and Plato. When Sophie was asked by Plato the question about how all cookies were baked to be exactly alike. However, Sophie questioned Plato by question the question itself. It was evident that not all cookies were the same and some were baked more bitter than the others.

Socrates was a man of wisdom and one of the most amazing people of his time. Socrates understood reasoning with others was a logical thing to do, however some believed he would use this reasoning to overthrow the government and the state as well. His ideas were therefore subversive to many. Because his ideas were so different and radical, many saw his ideas as a threat of lesser value. It's quite ironic because of the fact that Athens was a center of learning, where philosophers from other colonies came to spread ideas and learn.

Many philosophers and intellectuals in the past have perceived Socrates as a noble whose thoughts transcended the norms. Sadly in his own time, it was perceived very wrongly and rejected. In the novel, Alberto explains to Sophie that it is the nature of the philosopher to question the thoughts and actions of his contemporaries and to challenge the status quo, then they will always face persecution. Hence criticisms and the act of omitting ideas.

Going back to the cookies, although Sophie believed that not all cookies were the same, she comes to realize that its' purpose is the exactly, if not almost, the same as another cookie. Here with Socrates we find how his different idea was not considered the same because his ideas reflected upon questioning the government and the state, However, the purpose of the idea is as similar as another one. Ideas are meant to be expanded and editted, however people saw the cover of the book itself rather than what's inside it.

iMedia: A Blue Future

Going back to the late 90s, or the pre-millenium era, I found one song that I always enjoyed so much as a child, and that song is Blue (Da Ba Dee) by Eiffel 65. When it first came out, the song became an instant hit with its simple lyrics, simple beats, and its loose repetition, that for some particular reason seemed to intrigue the general audience at the time, and even today.

When the video first launched, the band, Eiffel 65, is supposedly outer space fighting aliens and flying around somewhere within the confines of the universe. This to me reminds me of Space Odyssey 2001, where humans existed in space with complex machineries and the ability to wander around the galaxy. This is obviously science fiction, and this is how we portrayed the future, a Jetson-ian kind; with flying cars and robots. When the band was creating their music video, they tried to recreate the future, with blue aliens and the ability to travel around space. However, when I look out the window, I see vehicles with four wheels and computers that are a bit more well refined. We're getting close, but not quite. The truth is, we try to uncover our future because time walks right pass you and you don't even notice it. Most of us wonder what life's gonna be, and the music video portrays an assumption based on what we envision the future to be. However, the futures not only about flying cars, nano technology, and Eco-friendliness, it's about how things change with what we had or have now.

Now Blue (Da Ba Dee), it's a popular song and it's kinda old too, so what does it have to do with anything with our modern society? If it doesn't ring a bell, pop music today has a lot of repetition, and sometimes not making any sense at all. Now before I attack pop music, I'd like to say that it's impacted the public with its easy to follow lyrics and fun to dance to beats. In fact, we had music like this in the 80s too. Even in the 60s with The Trashmen's "The Bird is the Word." The reason this kind of music has impacted the public is because in my opinion, it doesn't require a lot of focus on the lyrics but the rhythms and the beats. Music today has become more complex with more complex beats and rhythms aided by complex synthesizers and such, but it follows the same roots as Blue (Da Ba Dee). Music changes as the earth spins.

So Blue (Da Ba Dee)'s lyrics don't seem to mean anything, but some of the songs on the radio or out on iTunes today have no meaning whatsoever. I can probably name 10 songs that epitomize what I'm saying. Now if you're wondering where I got the audacity to pour my biased opinion, it comes from listening to the radio. I find myself in my car listening to B96 or KISS FM and most of the time I don't bother listening to the lyrics because I can barely decipher them and just follow along with the rhythms instead. However, when the radio plays the same songs every 4 hours at a time, it gets sickening after a while. Now I'm not saying the music today is all that horrible, I truly believe there are some good artists who enclose a fair amount of effort into their music. The sad part is when you go to a Homecoming dance or some sort of party at some kid's house, the music we're going to listen to is sadly going to be the one's that are on B96. This is our generation. Pop music means popular, and just because it's supposedly popular doesn't have to give off a lot of meaning whatsoever. We start from the 60s and 80s where repetition becomes a song, and now songs that are demeaning to woman and talks about partying until you drop and etc. Is that really what we want the pop culture to think and be influenced by? Well at this state we can only predict so much. But look on the bright side, at least these artists are making a living. And so to conclude, regardless of whether pop culture will be maintained or not, I believe pop music nowadays is just rubbish, and from the looks of it, it's only influencing itself. And as the great Andy Warhol once said, "Isn’t life a series of images that change as they repeat themselves?"

Image's origin - http://www.genetologisch-onderzoek.nl/wp-content/image_upload/andy-warhol-marilyn.jpg