So…more. I found more of this.

I have to sleep but I don’t feel okay. My internal sadness, apprehension, sickness, whatever the fuck it is that is bothering me so bad is manifesting it through my inability to crack a Sorin. I just blew nearly one hundred fifty dollars to try to get one card worth not even a third of that amount. I have problems. I have issues. I feel inadequate. Chelsea cracked a Sorin and good mythics. I crack crap. But then again, there are more important things at stake here, such as my school work and job propsects. Usually, I tend to think these thoughts to make myself better when I compare myself to her, or just as a cheer me when I think of rising GPA, but this semester is already off to bad start. I’ve neglected my schoolwork for various reasons. I can’t get a job, at all. And, well, fuck, I don’t sleep. I don’t get shit done. I feel like crap. Like Crap. There are papers due for things I didn’t even read or understand. I just want to tear my hair off and cry. Coffee is needed her to sustain me through my classes so I can learn something and work on my paper that is due next Monday. I can just sleep through my first class and be awake for my second, something like that. We can try that. Writing always calms me down but the second I stop I know I won’t be okay again. I can feel it coming back, that feeling in my chest that makes me sad, that makes me sick, I don’t know what it is, but its not going away and I’m scared. I wish Allen didn’t have to sleep. I want to be comforted like a small child, or a whimpering puppy in the arms of someone loving, comforting and just….calming. I don’t even know, I just want someone to hold me and tell me that it will be okay and then I actually want it to be okay. I want to get a job instead of just going to useless interviews and being rejected. I just want a job. I should have just accepted that unpaid internship and kept looking. I’m so scared. And now I don’t have time. I am just soscared. So, scared. I will I was skinnier. I will I had actual talent. I wish I wasn’t a philosophy major so people will take me seriously and just give me a goddamn job, even though I am getting response, I completely forgot to respond to that guy from Citelighter. I need to do that.

1. What is the problem or question that Descartes is trying to address in his discussion? Is it the same or different from the problem Hume is trying to address?
a. Hume
i. Hume wants to figure out what is the case that makes us believe in the existence of body. He takes for granted that a body exists in the first place.
ii. He wants to find out the nature laws, like Newton did, and not give the underlying reason why.
b. Descartes
i. Descartes wants to, in a way, remove his grounds for doubt. In the first meditation, Descartes wants to find out what he can be certain out. But, everything is subject to doubt because he can experience everything he experiences now in a dream, or God is deceiving him. In getting rid of his grounds for doubt, he can know what is absolutely certain.
c. Similarities and differences
i. While Descartes is concerned with what he can be certain of, if there is anything he can be certain of, Hume takes for granted that there is something he can already be certain of (whether his body exists or not) and is concerned with what makes us believe in the existence of the body. Hume says, suppose we have a body, what causes to believe that it exists? Descartes says, suppose we are always dreaming or God is always deceiving us, what can we be certain of? Can we be certain that our bodies exist?
2. Is Descartes more or less successful than Hume in addressing the problem (or are they equally successful)? Is it fair to say that Descartes is trying to defeat skepticism about the external world while Hume defends it? What does “skepticism” mean in each case?
a. Hume
i. Skepticism for Hume is to know that everything that happens in the external world is a probability and cannot be deduced and induced from anything.
b. Descartes
i. Descartes is trying to defeat skepticism about the external world because he wants to find out what he can be certain of and by the time he gets around to Meditation 6, he is again certain that he exists, his body exists, God exists and the external world exists.
ii. If he can no longer make errors, and he can connect present with past knowledge, knowing that the senses are more often than true and not false, he does not have to fear that his senses report to him false things and can reject his dreaming ground for doubt.
iii. Skepticism for Descartes is a methodological process of weeding out what is certain and what is uncertain.
c. Who is more successful?
i. Hume is more successful in my mind but both he and Descartes’ answers to the problem above are problematic.
ii. For Hume, the principle that all ideas are copies of impressions present difficulties.
iii. For Descartes, he relies on many innate principles in his proofs, such as the ambiguous innate light of nature which is supposed to make things clearly and distinctly perceivable. Light of nature is completely questionable and it is from this, and the fact that nothing greater can come from the lesser, that he proves the existence of God. And, in God’s perfect existence, he is benevolent, so Descartes removes God as a deceiver from his grounds for doubt. However, what the heck is the light of nature and what the heck does it mean to clearly and distinctly perceive anything?

What is Hume saying?

1. The Question
2.
1. The question
a. Descartes’ question
i. Descartes’ goal, at the beginning of meditation 1, is to establish a foundation for his beliefs by systematically removing all the beliefs of which he is not certain and leaving behind what he can be certain of.
ii. The question Descartes is asking is whether or not material things exist in the external world. At the beginning of meditation 6, he knows that pure mathematical things exist. Whatever he can clearly and distinctly perceive exist.
b. Hume’s question
i. Hume is asking what causes the belief that there is such an external world. He does not want to ask whether there is an external world, he wants to know what causes the belief to arise that there is such a world.
c. Similarities or differences?
i. The main difference between the question Descartes is asking and the question Hume is asking is that while Descartes wants to find out whether or not he can be certain of the existence of an external world, Hume takes this point to be for granted and instead, investigates what makes us believe that such an external world exists.
ii. Descartes believes that we cannot trust our senses with regard to the external world. If we consider a piece of wax, all the information we receive from the senses are constantly changing and the only aspect of the wax that remains the same is that the wax is extended in space. Even then, the wax is malleable and can take on an infinite number of configurations which prompts Descartes to conclude that we can only ever grasp things through a faculty of the mind. Thus, the question that Descartes asks is how can we be certain of an external world? How can we become certain that the external world exists through a faculty of our minds?
iii. Hume, on the other hand, believes that all of our ideas come from impressions. Every simple idea has a corresponding impression. This is the complete opposite of what Descartes believes. Instead of saying that only the mind can grasp what the wax is, Hume says that our senses provide us with impressions of the wax. All of our ideas that we receive from impressions are related through Hume’s principles of association, the strongest one being cause and effect. (?) Thus, the question Hume asks is what causes us to believe that the external world exists in the first place.
2. The answer?
a. Descartes’ response
i. He is certain of the external world because he can connect present with past knowledge using his senses.
ii. Is he trying to defeat skepticism about the external world?
1. In a way, Descartes is trying to defeat skepticism about the external world because he is trying to find what is absolutely certain by getting rid of his grounds for doubt, such as the dreaming doubt. He says that now he can get rid of the dreaming doubt because he is able to connect things with memory.
iii. What does skepticism mean for Descartes?
1. Skepticism for Descartes is a methodological process of finding out what is certain and what is uncertain. He believes that we cannot be certain of the information we receive from the senses.
b. Hume’s response
i. He tries to find out what causes our belief that the external world exists. Is it the senses, imagination or reason? It is not the senses, it is not reason, it must be imagination. Imagination gives rise to our belief of the external world. There is a particular quality in our impressions that makes us think their existence is continued and this quality is constancy. All objects that we think continually exist have constancy which is what makes them different from impressions, which are brief and perishable. But, bodies changes. So, continually existent objects also
ii. Is he trying to defend skepticism about the external world?
iii. What does skepticism mean for Hume?

1. What are they saying?
a. Descartes
i. Descartes is trying to find out what knowledge he can be absolutely certain of. His aim in the meditation is to establish a firm foundation for his beliefs. He gets rid of all of his present beliefs that he cannot establish as absolutely certain and tries to see what he has left with. He cannot trust his senses because everything he senses when he is awake, he can sense when is asleep. He might also just be deceived by God, who has the power to deceive him about anything, even math. So, Descartes’ goal is to try to get rid of these doubts and establish what he can be absolutely certain about, including the existence of the physical world.
ii. He establishes in the early meditations that he does grasp objects through the senses because the senses could be deceiving him. Even if it commonly accepted that what we grasp through the sense is most immediately, Descartes believes that because what we grasp through the senses changes and does not always remain in the object, the objects cannot be distinctly grasped through the senses.
iii. Because Descartes does not trust the senses, everything he establishes comes from the examination of his mind and he finds that in his mind there are these innate principles about the light of nature and God’s perfection and so on.
iv. Descartes also tries to establish the existence God, so he can remove God as a source of doubt. He does so by relying on many a priori or innate principles such as the light of nature.
b. Hume
i. Hume is trying to give you a complete picture of how people form beliefs, not what beliefs people can be certain of.
ii. Hume, on the other hand, begins by saying that every simple idea comes from an impression. We get impressions through the senses. There are no a priori principles or innate principles, every idea we have comes from some impressions. The grounds for believing some comes from experience and not by simply examining one’s mind.
iii. He divides everything into relations of ideas and matters of fact.
iv. All of these ideas are connected or related through the principles of association, the strongest of which is cause and effect. In fact, we cannot every be certain of anything because the only thing that ties together cause and effect is habit. We keep repeating the same actions and find out eventually
2. What is the problem or question they are trying to address? Is it the same or different problem?
a. Descartes
i. Descartes is addressing the question: does the physical world exist or not?
b. Hume
i. Hume is addressing the question: what causes us to believe the physical world exists?
c. Different
i. These questions are fundamentally different. Descartes wants to know whether the physical world exists or not while Hume takes for granted that world exists and wants to know what causes bring about this belief that the world exists?
3. Who is more successful or are they equally successful? Is it fair to say that Descartes is trying to defeat skepticism and Hume is defending skepticism about the external world? What does skepticism mean in each case?
a. In terms of addressing the problems that they pose, they are only successful insofar as they provide a response. Because the two questions are different, it is hard to gauge how much more successful one philosopher’s response is than the other’s. However, both responses have their own problems.
b. It would be fair to say the Descartes is trying to defeat skepticism. Having establish God’s existence, he uses his senses along with memory to conclude that he no longer has to fear that what his senses report to him may be false or that he may be in a dream.
c. Descartes’ skepticism is a methodology that he applies to his beliefs to find which ones are certain and which are not. His skepticism is broad in the sense that it applies to everything, even mathematical beliefs.
d. Descartes believes that the external world exists after establishing that God exists and that he can make mistakes. But, even if his senses are faulty but are most of the time good, he can get rid of his early dreaming doubt because memory can connect his present experiences with his past experiences. If someone, as in a dream, just plops down in front of him randomly, he can rely on his memory and realize that this man has no connection to any of previous experiences or his life in general whereas in a dream, he readily accepts that man’s being there as normal.
e. Hume, on the other hand, replies to his question by examining the possible causes of such a belief. It might have come from the senses, reasoning or the imagination. He concludes that neither sense nor reason can be responsible for an object’s continued existence.
f. Even though Hume provides a response to his question, he is actually defending skepticism about the external world.
Despite the differences between Descartes’ rationalist principles and Hume’s empiricist principles
One of the problems that Descartes confront in the Meditations is the question of whether or not an external, material world exists independently of himself.

In Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes endeavors to find which of his beliefs he can be absolutely certain of, if any of them. He begins, in Meditation One, by subjecting the fundamental beliefs upon which all of his other beliefs are based to doubt. These fundamental beliefs arise either from the senses or through the senses but Descartes does not believe the senses to be reliable. First, the senses are occasionally wrong and it is not wise to trust the senses even if they are only mistaken once. Second, there is no difference between what he senses when he is awake and what he senses when is dreaming. It could just as well be the case that is constantly dreaming. Third, an all-powerful God may be deceiving him about the existence of the sky, the earth, shapes, and size, anything and everything he senses.
By Meditation Six, Descartes has already established that he exists solely as a thinking thing, God exists and God is not a deceiver. But, Descartes has yet to establish the existence of an external, material world. This is the problem that Descartes address in the Meditation Six: does such an external, material world exist? Descartes offers two arguments for the existence of the external, material world. The first relies on a distinction he draws between the intellect and the imagination. There are two distinct faculties, one of intellect and one of imagination. Earlier in the Meditations, Descartes uses the example of a 1000-sided figure, a chiliagon, to exemplify the difference between these two faculties. The intellect faculty can easily conceive of a 1000-sided figure because with the relevant concepts, it can conceive of a figure with one thousand sides. Yet, when we use our imagination to conceive of the chiliagon, the imagination faculty can only muster a vague image of some many-sided shape. In fact, there would be no difference between the imagination faculty’s conception of a 1000-sided figure and a 10,000-sided figure. In both cases, the imagination would bring up the same vague image of some many-sided shape that is neither precisely a 1000-sided shape nor a 10,000-sided shape.
With that said, the faculty of imagination requires, according to Descartes, a different and extra effort than that of the effort needed to employ the faculty of intellect. He attributes this distinction to the fact that there is a body attached to his mind. Whereas the faculty of intellect, when it understands, turns to look at the mind and the ideas in the mind, the faculty of imagination, when it imagines, turns to look at the body and something in the body that is associated with an idea in the mind or a sensory perception. An extra effort is required on the part of the faculty of imagination because Descartes’ mind is tending to something in the body that is not normally associated with the mind. Even if Descartes’ beliefs about the two distinct faculties could somehow prove the existence of an external, material world, given that his body exists and his mind and body are connected in such a way, he dismisses this argument as only a “probable conjecture” (Descartes).
In order to properly define the terms needed to make clear Descartes’ second argument, I will speak briefly about Descartes’ proof of God’s existence in Meditation Three. In his proof, Descartes uses the terms formal reality and objective reality. Formal reality is what something has in virtue of its existence. Objective reality, on the other hand, is the reality that is contained in representations. For example, a dozen blocks of ice all have the same formal reality insofar as each block of ice is a material thing. Now, suppose an ice sculptor carves each block of ice into different animals, each one of these ice sculptures now have different amounts of objective reality depending on what the sculpture represents. The ideas represented by each sculpture are what contain the objective reality while the ice blocks from which the sculptures are made contain the formal reality.
Moreover, Descartes’ proof is founded on several a priori principles, a priori meaning that the justification of these principles does not require anything beyond one’s mind. These principles do not need to be justified by any experience about the world because they can be justified by looking at the ideas already in one’s mind. On the other hand, a posteriori principles do require justification in the form of experience. They cannot be justified by the ideas in one’s mind alone. I believe that when Descartes refers principles shown to him by the mysterious “light of nature” to be indubitable in Meditation Three, he is referring to such a priori claims. He says, “whatever is shown [him] by the light of nature…cannot in anyway be doubtful” (Descartes). But, he provides no further explanation of what this light of nature is or why he believes claims that follow from it to be indubitable. Furthermore, the foundational claim in his proof of God’s existence – that the objective reality of a thought cannot be greater than the formal reality of its cause – is certain because it has been shown to him by this light of nature to be the case. What Descartes means by this claim is that if I were to have a thought about God, this thought of God must have come from somewhere, be it from myself, from the external world, or God.
After dismissing his first argument for the existence of an external, material world as mere probability, Descartes provides a second explanation which relies on what he refers to as his “great inclination” (Descartes) to believe that material things exist. God gave Descartes a great, innate propensity for believing in external, material objects. However, these external, material objects that he is greatly inclined to believe exists must have as much formal reality as his idea of those objects have objective reality. Again, if he has thoughts about external, material objects, then he must receive those thoughts from somewhere. The question remains: from where did he receive these thoughts? Descartes presents several possibilities for what causes these thoughts of external, material objects: a) something unknown faculty in him; 2) God; 3) external, material objects or 4) some other objects entirely. He rules out that the possibility of their being a faculty in him that produces these ideas because he, Descartes, exists as a fundamentally thinking thing and not an extended thing, which is what all of these external, material objects are. God cannot be the source of these thoughts as Descartes has already established that God is not a deceiver. If God were to have given Descartes both a great inclination to believe that external, material objects exist and no other faculty to determine whether or not such external, material objects actually do exist, then God would be a deceiver. But, because Descartes has established in Meditation Four that God is not a deceiver, Descartes concludes here in Meditation Six, that external, material objects exist.
Even after Descartes concludes that an external, material world exists, the Dreaming Doubt remains. In the last paragraph of Meditation Six, Descartes offers a solution to the Dreaming Doubt. By using his memory and his intellect, Descartes can now distinguish between being awake and being asleep. In dreams, it is typical for people or objects to suddenly appear or disappear. However, Descartes observes, this is not the case for when he is awake. If a man were to suddenly appear before him and he is not able to connect, using his memory, this experience of a man appearing suddenly before him, with a previous experience in his life that tells him where this man came from, then he can dismiss the man as a ghost or otherwise not real. There is no continuity between the events that happen in a dream as there is between events that happen when he is awake. Such continuity is what Descartes uses to remove the Dreaming Doubt.
Hume answers the problem of the external, material world using a completely different approach . In the first place, the question Hume addresses in The Treatise of Human Understanding is a different question from the one Descartes answers in Meditation Six. Whereas Descartes addresses the issue of whether or not an external, material world exists at all, Hume takes for granted that such a world does exist and instead, poses the problem of what causes us to believe in the existence of an external, material world?

Plausibility argument
There is a difference between two faculties I have, the faculty of thought and conception or of imagination and we notice they are different. If I ask you to think about a 1000 sided chilliagon, you can think about it clearly because you have the concepts but you cannot imagine it. The difference between imagining something, the point about the wax in meditation two. Why do you have these two things? You have an imagination because you have a thing attached to your mind that is a body, an extended thing and somehow your mind can turn to itself and tend to this attached body which is why it is hard because it is the mind tending to something that is not naturally associated with it. I can understand why there are these capacities that are different and I have them and why this one is easier and hard, it all makes sense if I think I have a mind and that’s a body and they are connected to each other. But, these arguments are plausible.

Descartes However, because these external, material objects all have the reality, formally or eminently, of being an extended thing in space and

At the end of Meditation Six, Descartes concludes that the dreaming doubt in Meditation One is hyperbolic and ridiculous (Descartes). He can use his memory and his intellect, which Descartes believes to reliable having examined the potential sources of the intellect’s error and how to avoid them in Meditation Four, to distinguish between when he is awake and when he is dreaming. For example, if a man appeared suddenly in front of Descartes and he is unable to connect the man’s appearance through memory to a previous experience that explains how or why the man appeared suddenly in front of him, then Descartes would judge the man to not be real. This would have been impossible before Descartes proved the existence of God and established that God is not a deceiver. After all, how can he trust his senses or memory if he could be constantly deceived by an all-powerful God? And, even if Descartes is prone to errors, as long as he contains his judgments to what he is able to clearly and distinctly perceive with his mind, he will avoid making mistakes.
Descartes responds to the question, “Does the external world exist?” by first removing the doubts that he raises against his own beliefs in Meditation One. However, because Descartes relies on certain a priori principles in his proof of the existence of God, I do not believe that he has sufficiently dealt with the possibility of God’s existence as a deceiver. Descartes believes that whatever is shown to him by the “light of nature…cannot be in anyway doubtful” (Descartes 26) but he does not give any justification or even explanation of what this claim means. He basis his proof

He removes the skeptical doubts that he begins with in Meditation One, namely that he could be dreaming and that God could be a deceiver. Because Descartes rejects the view that knowledge comes from what we perceive through our senses, his proof in Meditation Three for God’s existence rests on certain innate, or a priori, principles of the mind. In order to find justification for these principles, we do not need to look beyond the contents of our minds; we do not need any experience to justify these principles. Again, Descartes is able to use the faculties of his mind alone to establish God’s existence as certain by positing the he has an innate idea of God which could not have originated in him. Furthermore, Descartes establishes that God is not a deceiver because, if God exists and his existence is perfection, deception cannot be a part of God’s perfection.

Descartes rejects that knowledge comes from the senses. In Meditation Two, after establishing that he himself exists solely as a thinking thing through the faculties of his mind, Descartes demonstrates that corporeal things are also grasped solely through the mind. He does so by using the example of a piece of wax. The aspects of the wax that we are able to perceive through our senses – the hardness of the wax, the fragrance of the wax and so on – are apt to change. By bringing the same piece of wax close to a fire, the wax loses its hardness, its fragrance and other sensory properties that we previously perceived through our senses. Even the imagination fails to grasp what the wax is: if the wax is a constantly changing, mutable thing then it is able to take on an infinite number of different shapes that is beyond the capabilities of our imagination. The mind, however, is able to grasp what the piece of wax really is: an extended thing in space. Thus, Descartes concludes that the mind alone is needed to perceive the wax is, not the senses or the imagination and this perception can either be confused or clear and distinct. Descartes then posits, at the beginning of Meditation Three, the general rule that everything he clearly and distinctly perceives with his mind is certain.

I have an innate inborn propensity to believe, I know I have these sensory things so they are giving me images of these extended things. They have the reality of extended shape eminently or formally, because you need at least as much reality in the cause of an idea formally or eminently as the idea has objectively. Something in me is capable of producing in me the idea of an extended object and whatever that cause is, it has in it either formally that shape meaning that it is that shape or it has that eminently like God who has the power to produce these things in me. There is a cause, I know it is not me and I am fundamentally thinking thing and not an extended thing. These appearances are either created in me by things that have the shapes or by something else that don’t have the shapes and furthermore I have an innate strong tendency to believe there are these shapes.
Earlier in Meditation Two, Descartes gives the example of a piece of wax to show that only the mind, not the senses, can come to understand material things. It can also be applied here to demonstrate the difference between the faculty of imagination and of intellect. The aspects of the wax that Descartes is able to perceive through his senses – the hardness of the wax, the fragrance of the wax and so on – are apt to change. By bringing the same piece of wax close to a fire, the wax loses its hardness, its fragrance and other sensory properties that he previously perceived through his senses. Instead, the wax becomes soft and mutable and capable of taking on an infinite number of different shapes. But, the imagination cannot comprehend the infinite variety of shapes the wax can take on whereas the mind, the faculty of intellect can conceive of an object capable of infinite variations. The faculty of imagination cannot tell Descartes what the wax really is or what a chiliagon really is but the faculty of intellect can. The faculty of intellect has no difficult conceiving of either a malleable piece of wax that can change into an infinite number of shapes or a 1000-sided figure.

What is Hume saying?
1. The skeptic cannot defend his reason by reason so he is not able to proof that bodies exist using any philosophical argument. The existence of the body is too important to be left to our uncertain reasons and speculations so we should not, “Does a body exist or not?” but rather ask “What makes us believe that a body exists?”
2. What causes us to believe in the existence of a body? He draws a distinction here. Two questions, which are normally found together, are differentiated. Why do we thing that objects continue to exist even when they are not present to the senses? Why we think that objects have an existence distinct from mind and perception?
a. If objects continue to exist even if we cannot sense them, then their existence is independent and distinct from perception and they will continue to exist even if not perceived.
b. Is it the senses, reason or imagination that causes us to think that objects continue to exist?
c. These are the only questions to ask because it is absurd to think that the external world is different from our perceptions.
3. Senses are incapable of giving rise to the notion of continued existence. Senses produce a distinction existence but not a continued one.
4. Senses convey nothing but a single perception and no more. This single perception cannot produce the idea of a double existence but some inference of reason or imagination can. The mind infers from this single perception of relations of resemblance or causation.
5. The difficulty is not concerning the impressions’ natures but their relations and situation. If the impressions presented to the senses are external and independent of ourselves, the objects of the impressions and ourselves must be obvious to the senses.
6. This question of identity is hard and our senses alone cannot answer it. Absurd to imagine that the senses can distinguish between what is us and what is external.
7. Every impression appears to us to be on the same footing. The senses
8. Is it possible for our senses to deceive us? Does this proceed from sensation or some other cause?
9. Our own bodies belong to us and we consider impressions that appear outside us to be external. The paper, the walls, the fields outside the window. You can infer just from using your senses that no other faculty is needed to convince you that there is an external world. But, three considerations object to this inference.
a. We do not really perceive our bodies when we sense our limbs but just impressions through the senses to which we ascribe real and corporeal existence of these impressions through a process that is difficult to explain.
b. Sounds and tastes appear to the mind as separate qualities but have no extension and cannot appear to the senses as if they are external.
c. Even sigh cannot inform us of distance or “outness” without reasoning.
10. …
11. Senses do not give us a notion of continued existence. Senses cannot represent to the mind an actual object or the impression of a continued object.
12. Three different kinds of impressions conveyed by the senses.
a. Figure, bulk, solidity
b. Colors, tastes, smells
c. Pains, pleasures
13. A and B appear the same to the senses and the difference we ascribe to these categories arise not from perception but from something else. B and C are also different not through the senses but through imagination. As far senses are concerned, all perceptions exist in the same manner.
14. We can attribute to B a sense of continued existence without ever referring to reason or any other philosophical principles. Reason can also never gives us the existence of a continued and distinct existence of body. If we think that our perceptions and objects to the the same, we can never infer from one the other from any argument relying on cause and effect to give us matters of fact. Even if we can distinguish them, we can still not argue from the existence of one to the existence of the other. Imagination is responsible for the opinion that perceptions and objects are distinct.
15. All impressions are internal and perishing, so the notion of their continued and distinct existence must be because of some qualities of the continued bodies and qualities of the imagination. Not all perceptions are continued so only some impressions have certain qualities.
16. We do not attribute continued existence to certain impressions because they are involuntary or voluntary.
17. …
18. Objects to which we attribute continued existence have a peculiar constancy and makes them different from impressions whose existence depend on our perception. This is only true of impressions whose objects are supposed to have an external existence and not true of those which do not have an external existence.
19. Constancy is not perfect and there are exceptions. Bodies change position and qualities but they still preserve a coherence and dependence upon each other. The reasoning from causation produces the notion of their continued existence.
20. Opinion of continued existence of body depends on coherence and constancy of certain impressions.
a. Internal impressions also have a coherence but that coherence is different from the coherence of external objects. Passions have mutual connections and dependence on each other but these connections do not need to be perceived to be preserved. The same cannot be said of external objects. External objects

Hume believes that all simple ideas are connected through three principles of association: resemblance, contiguity and cause and effect. Because he spends very little time discussing the first two relations and focuses the majority of his efforts upon the relation of cause and effect, I will only examine cause and effect in this paper. Cause and effect is the strongest, most extensive association between ideas and underlies all reasoning concerning matters of fact because it is able to move past limitations of the senses and memory in linking together simple ideas
Hume believes that all simple ideas are connected through three principles of association: resemblance, contiguity and cause and effect. Because he spends very little time discussing the first two relations and focuses the majority of his efforts upon the relation of cause and effect, I will only examine cause and effect in this paper. Cause and effect is the strongest, most extensive association between ideas and underlies all reasoning concerning matters of fact because it is able to move past limitations of the senses and memory in linking together simple ideas. Using the principle of cause and effect, we can
We are raising Descartes’ skepticism, should I trust my senses? We do trust our senses. Hume is just pointing out that it is a fact aht I believe there is a chair there. That idea has a certain vivacity to me? It came from my present sensory experience, rightly or wrongly. Something I believe are straightforward. How is this idea based in experience? I am presently experiencing. I remember things that I am not experiencing. What about beliefs about the world that extend beyond senses and memory? They have to be based in experience and the question is how? There is only one principle: cause and effect, that allows this to happen. All reasoning that takes us from sense and memory, it is all cause and effect reasoning that gives rise to our beliefs about other matters of fact. How does experience instill in us the belief in a cause and effect relationship? What is the content of that belief when I believe that A causes B?

In a sense, Descartes is trying to defeat skepticism about the external, material world in the Meditations. He applies methodological doubt to
Hume answers the problem of the external, material world using a completely different approach. In the first place, the question Hume addresses in The Treatise of Human Understanding is a different question from the one Descartes answers in Meditation Six. Whereas Descartes addresses the issue of whether or not an external, material world exists at all, Hume takes for granted that such a world does exist and instead, poses the problem of what causes us to believe in the existence of an external, material world? Second, Hume believes that all simple ideas proceed from their corresponding impressions. Both ideas and impressions are kinds of perceptions, the difference between them being that impressions are more immediate and more forceful than ideas. Hume also draws the distinction between a simple idea and a complex idea. Simple ideas are impressions than cannot be separated and are derived from impressions of the world. Complex ideas are not derived from impressions as they can divid
Hume, in A Treatise of Human Nature, maintains that all knowledge comes from sensory experience. In the early sections of the Treatise, Hume establishes all ideas come from impressions.
1) The question they are asking is different
2) They have completely different approaches, namely what they believe about the senses and the mind
3) Descartes is trying to defeat skepticism, Hume is defending it?
4) What is the difference between their skepticisms
5) Neither of them are completely successful, what is wrong with both of their accounts

First, the senses are occasionally wrong and it is not wise to trust the senses even if they are only mistaken once. Second, there is no difference between what he senses when he is awake and what he senses when is dreaming. It could just as well be the case that is constantly dreaming. Third, an all-powerful God may be deceiving him about the existence of the sky, the earth, shapes, and size, anything and everything he senses.
Impressions are like a fresh footprint in wet sand where the contours and lines of the foot are clear and visible. But, when the tide washes over the sand, the footprint loses its distinct contours and lines and becomes like an idea, faint but still visible.
For example, it is obvious that my idea of a unicorn did not come from the senses because I, presumably, have never had any impressions of a unicorn. However, I have had impressions of a horse and a single horn.

Furthermore, even if the senses are capable of giving rise to such an idea of continued existence, then the senses are fulfilling the double duty of not only giving impressions of these external objects but also impressions of these external objects’ continued existences. But, Hume concludes, it is obvious that the senses fulfill only the former duty and convey only impressions of external objects to the mind and not impressions of their continued existence.
In any case, Hume concludes reason is not used to answer either of the two questions he is investigating.
Descartes offers two arguments for the existence of the external, material world. The first relies on a distinction he draws between the intellect and the imagination but he dismisses this argument as only a “probable conjecture” (Descartes). Thus, I will focus on his second argument for the existence of an external, material world.

Brief 1

Religious vs. Civic Sacrifice

Society is no stranger to the notion of sacrifice. A parent sacrifices everything for his child’s future. A lover sacrifices time and energy to please her partner. An athlete sacrifices other pursuits to excel in a certain sport. The list goes on. Yet, the modern concept of sacrifice is different from both the notion of religious sacrifice found in the Hebrew Bible and the notion of civic sacrifice found in the writings of the Ancient Greeks. Religious sacrifice, as portrayed in the Hebrew bible, is a ritual performed to make sacred one’s possessions in honor of God while the Ancient Greeks’ notion of civic sacrifice derives from a citizen’s duty to his city, state or country. The fundamental distinction lies in the role the individual plays in the sacrifice. Biblical religious sacrifice revolves around the individual’s faith and trust in God, in addition to the individual’s fear of God’s retribution. This stands in sharp contrast with the Greek notion of civic sacrifice which is firmly rooted in the belief that the community has prevalence over the individual. This initial differentiation and other distinctions that may stem from it are as exemplified by stories in the Bible and the writings and plays of the Ancient Greeks.
The main difference between religious and civic sacrifice is the role of the individual. The notion of religious sacrifice is representative of one’s personal faith in God while the notion of civic sacrifice focuses on one’s commitment as a citizen to a city or state. A religious sacrifice is the ritualized offering of an object –an animal, a child, a person, even oneself – that makes it sacred through its being offered to God. In Chapter 22 of Genesis, God appears before Abraham and commands him to sacrifice Isaac, his only son, and Abraham does so without objection. After building an altar upon which to sacrifice Isaac, God intervenes and stops Abraham from slaying his son. Knowing now that Abraham is a God-fearing man, because he has not “‘withheld [his] son, [his] only son,’” (Genesis 22-2), God rewards Abraham for obeying his commands. While the Bible does not explicitly state why Abraham follows God’s commands, presumably Abraham is willing to sacrifice Isaac because he trusts God and, at the same time, because he fears the consequences of breaking that trust. Earlier in Chapter 19, as Lot and his wife are fleeing Sodom and Gomor’rah, God warns them, “‘Do not look back or stop anywhere in the valley; flee to the hills, lest you be consumed’” (Genesis 19-17). While others follow God’s command, Lot’s wife looks back and God turns her into a pillar of salt. Abraham’s sacrifice, then, is a test of his personal devotion and trust in God. Where Abraham is rewarded for his faith, Lot’s wife is punished for breaking hers.
While one can make the case that Oedipus’ sacrifice at the end of Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex is also a personal sacrifice, his voluntary banishment from Thebes can be seen as a form of civic sacrifice. Civic sacrifice differs from religious sacrifice in that the individual is removed from the foreground and the community, the city, state or country, takes precedence. One commits civic sacrifice by giving up something, not to make it sacred or to offer it to a deity, but for the benefit of one’s community. The story of Oedipus begins with King Laius receiving a prophecy of his demise at the hands of an unborn son. Laius orders the execution of his newborn babe but a servant takes pity on the infant and leaves Laius’ son on a mountain top. The infant is rescued by a shepherd who names him Oedipus and he grows up in the royal court of Corinth. Destined to fulfill the oracle’s prophecy, Oedipus, the titular character of Sophocles’ tragedy, slays King Laius, saves Thebes – his native land – from the Sphinx, and has children with Queen Jocasta, his biological mother. When Thebes is struck by a plague, Oedipus summons the prophet Tiresias for help. It is then revealed, in an ironic twist, that Oedipus has indeed fulfilled the prophecy received long ago by his father, King Laius. In becoming the king of Thebes, he has committed patricide and incest with his mother. Upon hearing the truth, Jocasta hangs herself in the palace.
To escape the pain of seeing his parents in the underworld, Oedipus chooses to blind himself, “for, had I sight, I know not with what eyes/I could have met my father in the shades/or my poor mother’” (Sophocles 1417-1420). But, to save Thebes, Oedipus chooses exile over death. As the Chorus remarks, “I cannot say that thou has counseled well/for thou wert better dead than living blind” (1415-1416). Oedipus places his civic duty before his personal desires for, perhaps, it would have been easier for him as an individual to end his life in the face of such a shocking and tormenting discovery. As the king of Thebes, Oedipus places his city before himself, saying “O never let my Thebes/The city of my sires, be doomed to bear/the burden of my presence while I live” (1494-1496). The notion of civic sacrifice, as opposed to religious sacrifice, grounds itself in the idea of acting on behalf of a community. While Abraham is commanded by God to sacrifice his son and he does so as a reaffirmation of his own faith and belief in God, Oedipus exiles himself, not so that he, Oedipus, may be redeemed, but to spare Thebes from his fall.
Both notions of sacrifice also differ in what justification is provided for committing each action.
Inherent in the notion of religious sacrifice is the idea of personal faith. Each individual places complete trust in God. Even if one were to question a divine command, God provides justification through the validation of one’s faith, not reason. In Chapter 3 of Exodus, God appears to Moses in the form of a burning bush. During this exchange, Moses repeatedly questions God and seeks justification for God’s directives. God deems Moses to be the person who will “‘bring forth my people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt’” (Exodus 3-10). Immediately, Moses asks God “‘Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh?’” (Exodus 3-11) Moses is reluctant to follow God’s orders because he does not trust in his own abilities, “‘Oh, my Lord, I am not eloquent…I am slow of speech and of tongue’” (Exodus 4-10) What if the Israelites will not believe that God spoke to him? In response, God gives Moses a rod that becomes a snake when cast upon the ground and the ability to turn water from the Nile into blood as signs that he has spoken with God. The only justification God provides as to why people should believe Moses when he tells them that has spoken with God are these signs that will inspire people’s faith. People will believe Moses not because he has convinced them with reason but because he is able turn a rod into a snake or water into blood, a power that must have come from God.
On the other hand, the notion of civic sacrifice centers on the use of reason. When one chooses to engage in civic sacrifice, one justifies the action by the benefit it brings to the community. “Pericles’ Funeral Oration” in the History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides epitomizes the notion of civic sacrifice. Unlike the case of religious sacrifice, the oration provides a different kind of propaganda to justify the Athenians’ civic sacrifice. Whereas God provides signs that establish faith in the individual, Pericles uses the glory of Athens to justify the soldiers’ sacrifices. The funeral oration is given at a ceremony honoring Athenian soldiers who have fallen in the war. During the speech, Pericles glorifies Athenian democracy as unique and extols the Athenian lifestyle; Athens is “a pattern to others than imitators ourselves” (Thucydides, par. 3) and is a city “worthy of admiration” (Thucydides, par. 6), a city of wealth, justice and generosity. Thus, Pericles paints a picture of the Athens “for which these men, in the assertion of their resolve to not lose her, nobly fought and died” (Thucydides, par. 7). Athens is a city like no other and in order to protect this city, as Oedipus protects Thebes, Athenian soldiers should sacrifice their lives.
Furthermore, whereas Moses’ encounter with God depicts the notion of the individual in religious sacrifice, the Athenian notion of civic sacrifice places strong emphasis on the individual acting on behalf and a part of a collective. Despite receiving the signs from God, Moses still begs God to choose someone else. His pleas anger God, who ultimately decides to send Aaron with Moses to speak to the Pharaoh. By following God’s command and leading the Israelites out of Egypt, Moses acts as an individual agent, leaving his life behind to carry out God’s orders. In fact, Moses’ very reluctance to do as God commands him to, as demonstrated by his persistent questioning and doubt, shows that he is acting as an individual. He finally capitulates and does as God tells him to because he has angered God. Unlike the Athenian soldiers who, presumably, fight for the sake of Athens, Moses is acting for himself. Through a personal devotion to God and fear of retribution if he disobeys God’s commands, he leads the Israelites out of Egypt. Indeed, perhaps Moses is acting for his people, but his exchange with God in Exodus seems to imply that he listens to God because it is his religious duty and not his duty as an Israelite.
However, for Pericles and the Athenians, there is no concept of the individual agent. Each person is a citizen of a city or a state, such as Athens, and acts as a member of that collective. Pericles goes on to say “there is justice in the claim that steadfastness in his country’s battles should be as a cloak to cover a man’s other imperfections” (Thucydides, par. 8). Not only should one act to benefit one’s country, but doing so is above any and all other actions. To engage in civic sacrifice, to place one’s country before oneself, is to obliterate one’s “demerits as an individual” (Thucydides, par. 8). Being a better citizen is more important, Pericles claims, than being a better individual. Ultimately, civic sacrifice originates from one’s obligation to a community. As much as Moses may be sacrificing his life for his fellow Israelites, the origins of his sacrifice are found in his faith in God. On the other hand, the Athenians are motivated to sacrifice for their country because they are its citizens. Therein lays the distinction between religious sacrifice and civic sacrifice.
The notion of religious sacrifice differs from the notion of civic sacrifice in that the former focuses on the individual’s relation to a higher power and the latter focuses on the individual as a member of a larger collective. Through the stories of the Hebrew Bible and the writings and plays of the Ancient Greeks, the differences between the two notions of sacrifice become apparent. In Biblical tales, men like Abraham or Moses are called upon by God and carry out God’s commands through their personal faith in God. In Ancient Greek literature, such as Oedipus Rex or “Pericles’ Funeral Oration”, the individual is acts in order to benefit a larger community, be it the city, state or country of which he is a part of. Neither the notion of religious sacrifice nor the notion of civic sacrifice continue to drive society’s contemporary understanding of sacrifice, but the effects both have had on our society is undoubtedly overwhelming.

Works Cited
Exodus. Bible, Revised Standard Version. National Council of Churches of Christ in America. Web. .
Genesis. Bible, Revised Standard Version. National Council of Churches of Christ in America. Web. .
Sophocles. “The Internet Classics Archive | Oedipus the King by Sophocles.” The Internet Classics Archive: 441 Searchable Works of Classical Literature. Trans. F. Storr. MIT. Web. .
“Thucydides – Pericles’ Funeral Oration.” Ancient / Classical History. Trans. Richard Crawley. Web. .

1. What does Socrates means here by the “nature” of piety, as opposed to “an affect or quality” of piety?
a. What Socrates means by the “nature” of piety is what piety is, or a definition of what piety is. For Socrates, a satisfactory definition of piety must be one that is necessary and sufficient and also explains what makes pious things pious. However, in the dialogue, Euthyphro is only able Socrates affects or qualities of piety, which are examples or parts of piety that do not satisfy all of Socrates’ conditions for a good definition.
2. Why does Socrates think that Euthyphro must know the nature of piety, if he is to know that a particular act is pious?
a. In order to truly know something, that this action or that action is pious, Socrates thinks that one must first know what the nature or definition of that particular thing is. We need a general definition of piety, that can be used in any instance to determine whether an action or not is pious. Knowing anything less, or only examples, cannot tell Euthphryo is his actions are pious or not.
3. What is the reasoning behind this claim?
a. Theory of recollection says that learning is an act of recollecting or remembering what our souls knew already (shown in the Meno by the slave boy remembering geometry). True knowledge, though, is different from true belief. True belief is “tied down” and made into knowledge by knowledge of the Forms. We are able to remember what the Forms are by seeing instances of the Forms. The Forms are never changing and immutable whereas objects that we perceive with the senses change and vary from person to person. True knowledge then
b. The Theory of Forms is able to satisfy Socrates’ demanding definitions for what true knowledge is. Socrates asks Euthyphro for a definition of piety that is necessary and sufficient to explain what piety is and also has to explain what makes pious things pious. The Form Piety satisfies all three criteria. The Form of Piety is both necessary and sufficient to make things pious and it also explains why pious things are pious.
c. Socrates thinks that true knowledge, in the Meno, is immutable, does not walk around like statues but are grounded in unchanging things, such as the Forms
4. Is this reasoning sound?
a. Where did we get knowledge of the Forms if the Forms existed before the objects we see now that reminds us of the Forms?
b. Does it have to be the Forms that provide a good definition for Socrates’ ‘what if’ problems?
c. Why do the Forms exist before the actual objects? Shouldn’t it be that the Forms arise from seeing objects, not that they make the objects what they are?
5. Could one consistently accept Socrates’ views in the Euthyphro without acting his claims in the Phaedo?

1. Why is true knowledge supposed to be knowledge of the Forms?
a. What is true knowledge?
i. Something that ties down true belief, something immutable and unchanging, something that provides necessary and sufficient conditions, explains why this thing is this thing, something that is the one form of the things that makes it what it is and gives an account of the reasons why it is what it is
b. Why is true knowledge knowledge of the Forms?
i. The Forms are immutable and unchanging, unobservable and insensible but constitute reality, things are made what it is by its Form, ties down true belief to immutable and unchanging things, gives an account of the reasons why something is what it is
c. How does Socrates argue for it?
i. Using the Theory of Recollection, Socrates argues that true knowledge is knowledge of the Forms. When we see two equal things, we can recollect the idea of the Form Equal because the two equal things are not perfectly equal and from their imperfection we recollect something, the Equal, which is always perfect which means that it existed before in our minds. Knowledge of the Forms is true knowledge because without an account of the reasons why, we only have true beliefs that are not tied down to anything. They are mutable, just as the objects we perceive that are inferior to the Forms. The Forms are also what makes something what it is, what makes a beautiful thing beautiful. A beautiful thing is beautiful for no other reason than sharing in the Beautiful.

When and where does something stop being beautiful and become ugly if Forms never admit its opposite?

golem token 3/3 first strike
white soldier token 1/1
green wolf token 2/2
black wolf tocken 1/1 deathtouch
white spirit token 1/1 flying
germ token 0/0
3x Overrun – 1x from Stewart
1x sunpetal grove
1x Garruk, the Primal Hunter – ordered
3x Avacyrn’s Pilgrim – Jenny

What is a self? What is despair?

But, as K writes, a human being merely considered as this synthesis is not yet a self. According to K, a self is the relation’s relating itself to itself in further relation to a high power, God. What does that mean? A human being is the synthesis of the infinite and finite, the temporal and eternal, the possibility and necessity – these are the conflicting aspects in the self-relation. We, as human beings, are all confronted by the task of reconciling or synthesizing these aspects of ourselves and we become selves by virtue of working, struggling, striving towards the synthesis of these conflicting aspects. These aspects are not synthesized or reconciled automatically for us, which also means that we do not, by default, have selves. We only have selves by virtue of engaging in the activity of working upon ourselves in trying to synthesize and reconcile these conflicting aspects of ourselves. Moreover, when we work upon ourselves in this way, in trying to perform this synthesis, K makes the claim that we are brought into contact with a higher power, a third element in the relation, that actually established this relation. According to K, that higher power is God.

In “…”, K provides an analysis of it what it means to carry out this synthesis correctly and to perform our self-relating in the right way. He also presents an analysis of what happens when we fail to conduct this synthesis properly and fall short of performing our self-relating. K calls our failure to reach perform the self-relation properly despair. Despair is a “misrelation…quote”. We are in despair when we fail to synthesis or reconcile the conflicting pairs of oppositions in us, when we fail to reconcile the infinite and finite aspects of ourselves, the eternal and temporal aspects of ourselves, the possibility and necessity aspects of ourselves. K believes that all of us, whether we know it or not, are in despair. The word ‘despair’ is used by K in a different sense than it is used normally. He distinguishes his usage of ‘despair’ from the common understanding of ‘despair’ as “quote about dizziness”.

The common view is that you yourself know best whether or not you are in despair. K thinks this is incorrect and draws an analogy between the common views of despair to that of views on sickness. No one would say that a man knows the state of his own health best. In fact, perhaps it is better to say that a man is least aware of the state of his health. Doctors, in fact, can better tell when a man is sick than the man himself. Similarly, K believes that the common view, the view that each person knows better about his particular despair, is incorrect. Whereas the doctor has a refined understanding and concept of sickness, the average man does. If it were in fact the case that each man knows best about his own health, then, as K puts it, it would delusion to be a doctor. K goes on to say the situation is similar for a “physician of the soul to despair.” The physician of the soul knows the symptoms of despair and is able to spot it so he will not trust the word of either the man who claims to be in despair or the man who claims not to be in despair in the common sense. Thus, the common view of despair, that everyone knows best when he is or is not in despair, is completely wrong according to K. Moreover, K claims that those who admit they are in despair are actually closer to understanding and to be cured of despair than the person who does not seem to be aware of his despair and is happy and well adjusted.

Despair, as mentioned earlier, is the when we fail to perform the self-relation, the synthesis of the conflicting aspects of ourselves, correctly. In order words, when we fail to reconcile the infinite or finite aspects of ourselves we are in despair and this extends to the other two conflicting aspects K points out.

What is possibility?

Possibility and necessity is one of the three pairs of conflicting oppositions, along with infinitude and finitude, eternal and temporal, that K believes are aspects that we have to synthesize and reconcile in our struggle to become selves. They reflect two different perspectives of the self. Possibility, on the one hand, represents the self’s aspirations, what is possible for the self to become, while necessity represents the self’s concreteness, what the self actually is. Possibility is the self that we are trying to be and necessity is the self that we actually are.

Possibility represents the self that we are trying to become and we understand ourselves in terms of that possibility by virtue of the fact that we are working towards it. Possibility is the self that we are reaching for. For example, I can identity one of my possibilities as that of being a hardworking student. In going through my daily life, I can try to become and working towards being a hardworking student. As K writes, possibility is the self’s task of becoming itself. I understand myself as this possibility, the hardworking student, by trying to become exactly that, a hardworking student. My possibility lies in my trying to become a hardworking student. I am saying, I could be a hardworking student and possibility arises when I start actively working towards being that hardworking student by doing my assigned readings, paying attention in class, studying for my exams and so on. It is the self that we are trying to become and we have possibility insofar as we are working to achieve these possibilities. They are the self’s aspirations in that, more than merely possible, they are possibilities we understand ourselves to be in our trying to be them.

What is necessity?

Necessity is another identity that each of us has and another way to understand who we are. Whereas possibility presents the self that we aspire to be insofar as we striving towards that self, necessity represent the self that we concretely are. It is the self that we find upon honest introspection, when we step back to look at ourselves and see the self that we concretely are. Even if I understand my possibility to be that of a hardworking student, in a moment of somber reflection, I might find that my actions and behaviors are not those of a hardworking student. In fact, I might find that I have fallen short of being the self I am trying to be. While I might believe I am striving to become a hardworking student, I find that there is a different person I am trying to become.

Thus, K illustrates two different ways we understand ourselves. On one hand, there is the self that we each believe ourselves to be, possibility, and there is the different self that each of us actually are when we look back upon ourselves through reflection, necessity. Possibility and necessity are both aspects of the self and in our striving to become selves, we need to synthesize and reconcile these two conflicting oppositions. However, K believes that it is difficult for each of us to see both aspects of ourselves, to see ourselves as having both possibility and necessity. As he illustrates in his discussion of the types of despair we enter into when we fail to synthesize these two aspects properly, K believes that we tend to only see the self’s possibility or only see the self’s necessity. For example, if I understand myself in terms of possibility as a hardworking student, it might be difficult for me to take a step back and see my necessity through reflection and realize that my actions are striving towards a different self. Or, if I understand myself as necessity as the self that I actually am which might not be a hardworking student, it might be difficult for me to strive towards the possibility of being a hardworking student. According to K, in both of these situations, because of my failure to synthesize the aspects of possibility and necessity in myself, I am in despair.

According to K, the despair of possibility is the lack of necessity. When we understand ourselves in terms of possibility, we strive to become the self that think we are. There are an infinite number of possibilities for each of us and to lack necessity is to lack the limitation of the self that we actually are. Someone who loses necessity is caught up in daydreams and fantasies of the self that he is able to become but is not able to actually become anything. “Everything seems possible…” To become engulfed by possibility is to lose sight of the limitations of our life, “ability to obey.” Without necessity, we become lost in possibility because everything seems possible. The possibility of the self, according to K, is, at best, only a “half-truth…”

Despair of necessity, on the other hand, is the lack of possibility. Without possibility, we are struck by the limitations we’ve persuaded or let ourselves be persuaded exist for us. To have only necessity but no possibility is also to be in despair according to K. Necessity represents the self that we are when take a step back from possibility and reflect on what we actually are. Without possibility, one believes one’s life is fixed, you are just what you are. You no longer see yourself as the person you aspire to be. To have only necessity is like to have given up on aspiring to be something, you’re just what you are and nothing else. The only way out of despair by lack of possibility is to gain possibility. When you are confronted with only necessity, your only salvation is to regain possibility. For someone without possibility entirely, the only way to do so is through God for which everything is possible. God is infinite possibility. For the determinist or the fatalist, everything is necessary so he needs God to reintroduce the concept of possibility. If there is only necessity, according to K, the man is the same as the animal. To be able to pray to God reintroduces possibility.

Evaluating K’s claims, some questions raised
What is K’s evidence for all this? He makes this diagnosis and these claims and ultimately that we can only resolve these contradictions through Faith? What justification? Is there anything like argument?

Are they really present in myself?

WE understand ourselves as being the person we are trying to become, we have a kind of ambition for ourselves and a sense of the person we are trying to be and all of the particular things that we do, from this point of view, efforts to be that person. So we can think of ourselves as a fine student or loyal friend, things that like that are ways to identify yourself with possibility. You are projecting towards these possibilities and you are understanding yourself in terms of them. To understand yourself as a loyal friend insofar as you are trying to be a loyal friend. So your possibilities are the identity that you are reaching ahead towards. You think of yourself as the person who is a loyal friend by virtue of trying to be a loyal friend.

Another identity that each of us has, to understand who we were from a different perspective. Your necessity is the way you find yourself to be when you turn around and look at yourself and find that what you concretely have been, the way in which you may understand yourself as a loyal friend by virtue of your effort to be a loyal friend. In a somber moment, you may look back at your behavior and you may discover that in fact you are not a loyal friend and there are all sorts of ways you might have fallen short of being this person you are trying to be.

A difference between two different ways you understand yourself and get your identity. Projectively by believing ourselves to be who we are privately and you get your identity from these moments of looking back at yourself and you find that there is a different person you are trying to become. Are we ever that frank with ourselves? There may be difficulties but it is something that we all seem to do. K’s idea is that they are both aspects of ourselves, difficult to see yourself in both of them and reconcile yourself in both of them and because it is difficult to reconcile that we tend to go in one direction or the other. He makes the point that it is difficult to reflect and see this other side of who you are and this other identity that you have. Possibility transcends who you concretely are but the point is that this a way in which we really do identity ourselves and maybe even more important in our self understanding than other aspects, the optimistic view of yourself.

Despair of possibility – someone who loses themselves in daydreams, fantasies, in the person that he is able to become.

The opposite way of despair as well. You as a synthesis, if you are conscious and can recognize the difficulty of being both, of reconciling your aspirations with your concreteness and K’s diagnosis is the tendency to throw ourselves in one direction or the other. He’s maybe think we do this in a global way but we can think of someone who does this on a case by case basis. Despair of necessity is what we all ordinarily most tink of as despair the frame of mind in which you are struck by your limitations and persuade yourself and let yourself be persuaded to thinkt hat you can’t do anything about these limiations, you are stuck and your life is stuck and you can only be just this. You fall into the despair of necessity when you see that you cannot be your possibilities, you are deteremined to be just this. You can only win back possibility through God. For God everything possible.

What is K’s evidence for all this? He makes this diagnosis and these claims and ultimately that we can only resolve these contradictions through Faith? What justification? Is there anything like argument?

Jesus Jeff, every time you send me a response, it’s like a personal lecture on how to run a club. So, I’m gonna jump right in today:
Given what you said, about trusting my treasurer and having someone who can call me out, I think I’m gonna give Jenny the treasurer position. We’ve talked a little already about the club and I think that she’s capable. Jenny has also already dealt with financing at least the Magic side of things, she’s good with numbers and she’s usually pretty honest with me about getting my shit together.
It’s kind of disappointing that so many good e-board candidates have graduated already or are on leave or are not interested in being on the e-board. I really wanted to have Schnapps be a part of the club because he’s always been completely dedicated to Magic and would do the same for PLAY. But, no such luck. Also, Random question: non-NYU or NYU grads can attend meetings right? Say I want to do a tournament and have it be open to anyone who is interested, can my friends from Baruch or someone I met at 20 Sided at a store Friday Night Magic attend? Does it have to be in a specific venue for it to be open to anyone?
I think I have a good idea of what responsibilities I want to give to people. And by that, I mean I’m gonna paste what you wrote to me into the word document and show it to my e-board members. I also want to keep my e-board small by giving two roles to myself and Jenny and possibly Raf. I’m gonna reserve the VP as the jack of trades backup. At most, I want to assign some minor duties to people who can dedicate time but not enough to the club to warrant a board position. It’s just gonna be four, maybe five, members of the e-board and maybe three other people. PLAY is pretty laid back and tends to function fine on its own. Does that sound plausible? Do I have too few people?
I’m really counting on people to at least show up for our events because I have a million ideas running around. I’m pretty sure that happens to every president and at some point, hopefully soon, I’m gonna realize I have the budget to do 1% of my fantastic dreams. A lot of people like to play and hang out but I’m not sure who’s going to step up. The weird thing is, I did ask Mike why I ended up being a candidate at all and it’s mostly because I showed up. That said, the regular membership attendance of PLAY on Wednesdays is like half a dozen people. Steven shows initiative and keeps things moving and I’ve never really seen anyone else step up. With Magic merging, I’m expecting at least a dozen new “regulars”. I hope I can count on some people.
Also kind of worried about the budget thing, still. I didn’t really expect to get the full budget increase but any kind of increase can add up over the years and I really wish people applied for more budget. If anything, they could have just purchased more board games. I did talk to Mike a little bit about getting Magic cards as a part of the budget. How much trouble am I going to encounter if I try to apply my budget to Magic product? Am I going to be barred completely from buying anything? Worst case scenario is exactly what you described. In any case, I don’t even think we have enough budget it as it to cover all the produce so we’re going to have to subsidize the purchases ourselves.
I’m also concerned about the limitations on prizes. We’re a games club, people play to win and people want to win prizes. I mean, sure, for minor events a pack or two could work out but if I hold a big tournament, I’m not sure how much incentive I can offer members or other people to come play. What kind of trouble am I going to run into? Like, holy cow I’ll get exiled from the All-Square system or I’m just not going to get it reimbursed? Can we appeal to the board or officials for a change in their decision? Are there things, like increased membership and increased interest that we can offer to the board to persuade them? Magic product is at least vital to the Magic half of PLAY but why do I feel like I have to change the club’s fundamental constitution to make the case that Magic cards are vital.
Like I said before, I have ideas for events but I need to make sure PLAY can host everything. The minimum is three and I’m pretty we won’t have issue meeting that requirement. But, how many events should I aim for per semester? How many is way too many? I don’t really know how my schedule or anyone else’s schedule really functions but I don’t want to, even though I do, cram everything into a couple months. I know clubs tend to have semester finale events, but how many other distinct events (as in not general meetings) should I be trying to host?
I want a site. Based on what you said, I want a site. I’ve made some sites and blogs but I’m gonna let Raf double up on web admin duties and maybe just see to getting the site off the ground myself in the beginning. Did anime club host its own site or on the NYU system? I’m still not sure how to edit PLAY’s NYU site. The school official I emailed for access to the listserve and site has not gotten back to me. I really do want to get the site and the listserve and email up and running before school starts so I can, as you mentioned, get the incoming freshman (because I totally hit up the anime club site back in high school) and get some help ready for club fest. Who did the site for anime club? Maybe I can talk to them? Or, was it Raf?
Also, I was thinking about getting people to speak or do panels or events. How much does it cost to get a guest? Does it come out of your total budget? Do we get to pick how much we pay each speaker, if we pay the speakers at all?
And for Clubfest, any general advice on how to attract more people? You have already mentioned giving out candy but just generally, what appeals to people? Or, stands out in the crowd? I guess that’s really personal preference and whether or not someone cares about games, but I want…something flashy. Is that even recommended at all? Am I trying too hard? Also, I do want to get in touch with anime club and maybe set up near them. Is Fei still president?
I do like that elite ranks thing. You make sending out emails look so easy. I feel like I’m going to be the most awkward person to write emails. I need to brush up on those people skillz. Damn.
In terms of room reserve, how far in advance do I have to reserve the rooms? And, who should I really get buddy buddy with in terms of the building staff? Who is the magical lady that can turn other people’s rooms into our rooms?! The rooms you listed, how hard is it to get those rooms through out the year? Are there certain times that are just ridiculously hard to get rooms? Which rooms, for say at most 30 people, is the easiest to consistently book? Also, can we book the lounge on the 7th floor where PLAY normally tends to meet? I think that space is like the commuter lounge but it would be cool to reserve. I’m sad we can’t book the commuter lounge. I thought that it was up for grabs but I guess only for the commuter staff people. At this point, I’m gonna try to get information from Steven about the rooms, grab a semi-large room for the first meeting and see how that goes from there? If I want to hold weekly meetings, should I reserve the same room weekly way in advance or as the weeks go by? What is the best way? Also, how popular are the gaming consoles, etc?
And one more thing: what is the difference between budget and programs? You keep saying we submit programs? How much can these programs deviate from the budget? Am I completely misunderstanding what a program is? Also, how tightly do I or the treasurer have to watch the finances? What are the consequences of losing track, besides not being reimbursed?

My pool of questions is slowly depleting! Or, er, maybe not. I keep getting more questions the more you tell me about things. You are an excellent professor Jeff. Your information and advice will be passed on through the generations of PLAY e-board members. I am honored to have been your student. XDD

I work as a website administrator for XD Trading Corp. I take photographs of their latest products, edit and enhance them using Photoshop before uploading them onto their website and entering the product information in their print catalog. I am also a part time tutor for middle school and high school students. I help them with homework, essay writing, reading comprehension and I do SAT and regents test prep.
Are there any internships available at your firm?
Tell me about your firm?
What are the responsibilities for this position?
ScrippsNetwork
Reading Partners
• Teach kids to read
•
Office of the Comptroller
Media 4 Humanity
• Trafficking of children
• Literacy initiative
Lawline.com
• Provider of continuing online legal education
• Ranked 21st best place to work
• Stream courses on mobile devices
Chartis