...empty, false and worthless (if I could, I would clear them out of my mind altogether). I will get into conversation with myself, examine myself more deeply, and try in this way gradually to know myself more intimately. I am a thing that thinks, i.e that doubts, af?rms, denies, understands some things, is ignorant of many others, wills, and refuses. This thing also imagines and has sensory perceptions; for, as I remarked before, even if the objects of my sensory experience and imagination don’t exist outside me, still sensory perception and imagination themselves, considered simply as mental events, certainly do occur in me. But all this [that is, the whole of the preceding paragraph] is impossible ·for three reasons·. •First, though it is true that my knowledge is increasing, and that I have many potentialities that are not yet actual, this is all quite irrelevant to the idea of God, which contains absolutely nothing that is potential. Indeed, this gradual increase in knowledge is itself the surest sign of imperfection, ·because if I am learning more, that shows that there are things I don’t know, and that is an imperfection in me·. •What is more, even if my knowledge increases for ever, it will never actually be in?nite, since it will never reach the point where it isn’t capable of a further increase; God, on the other hand, I take to be actually in?nite, so that nothing can be added to his perfection. •And, thirdly, strictly speaking potential being is nothing; what it takes...
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...perspective differs from one another. The various approaches analyze the social research on the basis of three grounds: Thematic analysis, meta-narratives and mini-narratives and lastly, cause-effect analysis. The changing pattern of the philosophical foundations continuously enriches itself with new dimensions and views about social world. Approaches of philosophy of science in social research There are certain approaches of philosophy of science in social research- * Realism * Empiricism * Positivism * Post positivism * Idealism * Rationalism * Functionalism * Structuralism * Utilitarianism * Instrumentalism * Feminism * Materialism * Skepticism * Nomothetic and Ideographic * Solipsism * Atomism * Holism * Perspectivism * Relativism These are described below- * Realism: Realism is a perspective of social research which represents itself as a dominant indicator on International politics. Context makes the situation. * Ontology: Social reality is stratified into three domains: * the empirical observations are made up of experiences and events through observations; * the real events whether observed or not and the reality consists of the existing processes, powers * Power and causal mechanism that generate events * Epistemology Social reality can be viewed as a socially constructed world in which social elements are the products of social actors. The main aspects of realism...
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...In One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Ken Kesey exposes us to the world of mental illness and mental wards. Kesey exposes us to two therapeutic strategies, external discipline and solipsism. Although Nurse Ratched was technically the medical professional, McMurphy inspired the healing by encouraging self healing and helping them escape Nurse Ratched’s control. As the person who had been on the ward the longest, Nurse Ratched dominated the ward as the leader, even though she was unqualified to hold that level of jurisdiction on the patients’ medical treatment. She controlled the ward by making everything fit into the molds she desired. The ward was the world that she could make perfect with rules, schedules, drugs, staff, and fear. By ordering...
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...Berkeley: to exist is to perceive or to be perceived 'To exist is either to perceive or to be perceived.' - How would you explain Bishop Berkeley's idealism to someone who knew nothing about philosophy? This is a good essay. Many students are very puzzled by Berkeley's claim that his theory is intended as a 'defence against scepticism'. I don't know what a 'real' tree is, because I have never met one, and never will. All I know is my perception of this tree and other trees like it. - This seems an open invitation to the most extreme scepticism which denies that the objects of our perception exist. Berkeley's answer is that there is no 'real' tree, in the sense of some object or entity that exists apart from perception. All there is, is the possibility of my perceiving the tree, of enjoying my tree-perception, vouchsafed by God's unwavering attention to all the objects of his creation, which exist as nothing more than perceptions in God's mind. This response differs from another possible anti-sceptical response which avoids the God-hypothesis altogether. Why not say that the 'possibility of my perceiving the tree' is just that and no more? There is a hypothetical statement - or list of hypothetical statements - whose truth is equivalent to the 'existence of the tree'. You know what a 'statement' is, and what 'truth' means. You know what it is for a statement to be hypothetical ('if A then B'). Why not stick with that? The clear advantage of this theory - also...
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...total self-consciousness, a thoroughgoing solipsism? The argument (or rather the summary sketch of the later argument) concerning God is the key stage which enables him to take this step. It is not uncommon for first-time readers of the Discourse to find this section rather problematic and to offer the comment that Descartes is here simply placating religious authorities rather than being sincere in his affirmations of belief. Whatever the nature of Descartes' religious beliefs (and there seems little evidence that his statements about them are not sincere), it's important to note that the paragraphs about God are an essential part of the philosophical argument, a necessary logical foundation for the method he is proposing. Without them, the certainty he is seeking would not be available. The argument for the existence of God is, in part, a traditional one, as Descartes acknowledges. Since he has ideas of perfection and all the flawless qualities of God, he questions where these might have arisen. As a limited and imperfect human being, he does not have those qualities himself. And they cannot have come from sense experience of nature or from outside natural sources (all of which he has discounted). Hence, the idea of such qualities must have come from somewhere else, from some being that manifests these qualities and is of a higher order of goodness than himself, that is, from God. The existence of God is thus necessarily true (2). The perfection of God then enables...
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...The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien ENG 1300 W5A2 Andrea Carr South University Online The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien “The Things They Carried” is one of several short stories written by Tim O’Brien that brilliantly portrays a squad of young American soldiers in the Vietnam War. Each of the short stories builds on the last but in The Things They Carried the author places focus on how immature boys cope and their transformation into young men and responsible leaders. O’Brien is not a character in the story but the fact that he is fluent with military lingo and conveys great passion and a working knowledge of the military suggests that he was a soldier. He tells his war story of soldiers’ experiences with obsession, duty, regret, burden, comradely and maturing. He achieves this by describing every facet of the items they carried with great accuracy and detail. The things they carried as they are depicted in the story represent literal things, emotional things, psychological things and symbolic things all weighing in at different levels of importance. There were physical as well as emotional things they carried on their missions, both were equally burdensome. O’Brien states that during missions many of these items were discarded no regardless of their importance to achieve a higher level of comfort. The author further states that the choppers would effortlessly replace the discarded items. In research conducted by Michael Tavel Clarke he implies...
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...sensory appetites, which is like you said deceitful. Our body is not our true self. Our true self is our mind...
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...Mathematics is not murder; murder has no tongue yet evidence can speak beyond a reasonable doubt. A judge can conclude something to be true due to the preponderance of the evidence by their authority alone. In mathematics there is no judge, there is no jury, and there is no authority, there is only truth and falsehood. Our society prides itself on each’s ability to have an opinion on everything no matter how ludicrous. However, in mathematics is that your opinion is irrelevant unless you can prove it beyond “beyond reasonable doubt” and you can prove it it be absolutely true. In this essay I intend to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that absolute certainty is attainable in theoretical mathematics, and to investigate into the possibility and...
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...is that trust is to place confidence in something or someone, which in this instance is something – our senses. For example, everyday I place trust in my driver Seth’s ability to maneuver and speed through Ghanaian traffic without crashing, a remarkable feat as traffic here is impossibly disorganized. No matter the danger, I always get back in the car with him; that is trust, this could also be considered a necessary risk, but that is beside the point. Moreover, truth is an equally multi-definable word. For the purposes of this essay, truth is any fact that, no matter who or what you are, it remains the same. For example, pure water boils at 100 oC at 1.01 x 105 Pa, nobody can deny that no matter whom or what you are, and therefore it is true. In terms of senses, this essay will deal with our human sense perception: sight, touch, hearing, smell, and taste. Instinctively, the first turn I take when answering this question is to look at it scientifically. In my IB Physics class we have learned, for example, in terms of science, when we think an object is a certain color, it is actually precisely not that specific color. Color is transmitted through light, light is a wave and each color has a different wavelength that differentiates it from the others. Objects can either absorb or reflect certain colors depending on their wavelengths. Therefore, the color that we see something as, is the color that it is not. The shorts I am wearing at this moment in time seem to be red, but what...
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...How the Democratic Republic of Google is testing China's appetite for democracy itself. Published Jan 15, 2010 Google's decision to defy Beijing's rules censoring the Internet could be seen as an isolated event—one company pulling out of China for a set of specific reasons. Certainly many other firms are acting that way, hoping to continue their pursuit of profits in the fastest-growing market in the world. But in fact Google's decision reflects important and expanding strains within China, and in its relations with the rest of the world. "China places unique limits on information," Google CEO Eric Schmidt pointed out to me last week. It is the only major country with an elaborate, formal system of censorship that all information-oriented companies must accept. That's why in China, if you type the words "Tiananmen Square" or "Dalai Lama" into Google (or Baidu, the country's leading search engine), you will find mostly blocked sites. At the same time, China has been busily developing the world's most elaborate apparatus devoted to cyber-spying and cyberattacks. Chinese hacking has ramped up over the past few years, directed not only at human-rights organizations, but, importantly, at foreign businesses and governments. Many, if not most, such attacks originate from China; former National Security Agency director William Studeman has called them the "biggest single problem" facing the U.S. national-security establishment. Great powers spy on each other, but China's efforts...
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...The idea that everything is not as it seems is a consistent theme in modern media. One may even argue that it is even more prevalent in postmodern media. It’s an idea that grips our fear that everyone who smiles at us has something to hide, that it’s “too good to be true.” Looking at examples such as The Matrix and Inception, we can see that these ideas go from the purely situational to believing that the entire world that we live in may just be a figment of our (or someone else’s) imagination. However, this fear is not a purely modern/postmodern concern; the idea that we aren’t fully aware of the real world was present in the ancient philosophy of Plato, specifically with the Allegory of the Cave. In modern philosophy, this school of thought,...
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...Looking at a painting on the internet is not remotely the same experience as seeing the work in real life. Walter Benjamin suggested that this is partially because photography is an imperfect medium in terms of capturing the true essence of an object, and partially because the physical and historical presence of a work of art in space and time has significance to us. Although Oscar Wilde and his aesthetes would disagree, in art, beauty comes from the viewer’s perceived connection with the artist, of understanding his/her ideas and of perceiving the artist’s subjective truths. Beauty seeks to connect us on a deep, primordial level to the human experience. Art, at its core, seeks to tell stories and reveal mystic truths about the human condition....
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...Individualism The Opposite of Collectivism Individualists societies are those in which the interest of the individual prevails over the interest of the group, and in which people are accepted to look after themselves and their imigiate families. Or The habit or principle of being independent & self reliant . “A culture that celebrates individualism & Wealth” Or A Social theory favoring freedom of Action for Individual over collective or state control. :Encouragement has been given to individualism, Free Enterprise, an the pursuit of Profit. Or Synonyms of Individuals are Independence, Self Direction, Self Reliance, free thinking, Free though, Orginallity. Individualism Individual is the moral stance, Political Philosophy, Ideaology, or Social outlook that enfaces the moral worth of the individual. Individualist promote the exercises of one’s m goal’s & desire and so value Independence & Self reliance & evocate that interest of the individual should achieve precedence over the state or a social group, while opposing external interference upon once on interest by society or institutions such as the government. Individualism makes the Individual its focus and so starts “with the fundamental premise that the human individual is of primary importance in the struggle for liberation” Liberalism extentionalism and anarchism are examples of movements that take the human individual as a central unit of analysis. Individualism...
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...One of the most prominent issues being discussed in postmodern literature is the concept of self-identity. Many of the texts in this genre feature characters that are on a quest of self-discovery. Two such examples of this are Haruki Murakami's Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, and Paul Auster’s memoir, The Invention of Solitude. Both of these texts explore the meaning of self, but address the issue in different ways. Murakami’s novel suggests that solipsism gives rise to the loss of identity, while Auster argues the opposite, suggesting that within the confines of enclosure, the individual discovers his/her identity. This article will entail a discussion of Murakami’s text, and the second installment will entail Auster’s memoir. Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World thrives on the idea that individuality does exist, but attaining a sense of self in this novel is a difficult goal that most people never achieve. This is largely because objects and possessions replace the self and the characters become synonymous not with personality traits, but with physical objects. The narrator in this novel is a nameless, faceless person, and Murakami ensures that readers get minimal physical description of all the characters in the text. The narrator describes people by the objects they possess, and tries to define people through these objects. For example, the granddaughter is known as “the everything pink girl” because she wears only pink clothes (164). Her attire...
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...With its exemplary cinematography, distinctly bold colour palette and unique sound design, Wong Kar Wai’s ‘Chungking express’ (1994) possesses some of the most evocative and powerful imagery in modern cinema. One of the most dynamic shots, lasting just thirteen-seconds, 29 minutes into the story is of a mysterious woman in a blonde wig (Blondie), played by Brigitte Lin. The character is shown via a mirrors reflection as she looks up at the ceiling, speculating on human behaviour. It’s interesting to note that the subject has been shot from above. Not only does this reiterate her position of vulnerability, make us focus on the dialogue but also gives us the impression that in her state of depression she will be swallowed up by the frenetic pace and lifestyle of Hong Kong. While Blondie is narrating, the camera slowly eases into the subject, but comes to a halt before we get a clear close-up shot of her face. It’s almost as if the director has nearly allowed us to finally connect with this recluse but then terminates the intimacy. It reveals a lot about her character. She is cold, aloof and taciturn. This is the point where she exhibits some of her opinions and feelings which is why we get the zoom up. She is in her most vulnerable state of the film. The fact that she is so prominent within the frame demonstrates that this is the closest we have been to Blondie. However, the cameras movement ceases before a more detailed shot is included which is frustrating for the audience...
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