On 'Hating' Men
I wrote this one a while back and was inspired by a single question I often am asked....just having some fun..
Hate, like its fraternal twin, love, are words used too freely and possibly unduly...maybe. To detest or to abhore, such verbage implies malicious intent to the object of 'in'affection. Such consumption and absorption in the intent may breed irrational and extraoridinary behavior. Looking at our lovely twin: one definition of many (words, words, words) may involve feeling of intense affections, attachment, fervorous amour toward the object of affection. Consumption and absorption also, a possible consequence. What, if at all, makes this 'pair' a reality? These twins, ideals, forces, nouns, are not to be recognized by science (at least using our current and crude tools for measuring). While many hypotheses have been put forth, as well as theories created by all of us, the scientific method has been abandoned so where is the pith and marrow behind our theories? The observations, the experimentation followed by the careful calculations, the analysis? No results, no conclusions, but theory? Trial and error does not seem to work on these twins either, as painful recollection may reveal. Even the consequence or supposed correlate of this pair cannot be adequately measured, as learned from Prof. Kinsey.
The Twins, possibly another unique anomaly of the cultured primate.
The "Hating Primate"....or loving....or nothing.
Consciousness has duped me again. Living on Science Alone may be my vulnerability.
posted by MegaColon @ 5:07 PM
7 comments
7 Comments:
Do I need to puff on the old "Temptation" pipe to get this?
Didn't I hear you "spit" this at a spoken word poetry slizaam- voice over with the baseline from "nothin but a g-thang"? I thought it sounded familiar.
eh?
It all made perfect sense at the time. Puns..supposed polar opposites being very similar..the possibility of throwing away terminology merely because it evades detection from the scientific method???? Come on??? At least it was not as long as Toddricks damn it!
TT,
It seems like a constant question in your response is "what is an emotion?" I saw you define it in terms of a response: emotion x is that thing that produces physical response y.
Those types of definitions are problematic because it brings up a lot of questions about the nature of the relationship between x and y, and thats another problem in itself.
Don't you think that one day with things like functional MRI or whatever else we come up with, that we'll be able to match a particular brain state to a particular emotion. Then there will be no question about what "love" or "hate" is, it'll just be defined as a particular brain state. I can anticipate a few problems with this that still echo the problems you outline. Like the subjective nature of emotion, but I'll bet there is at least one identical thing (probably more like a bunch of things going on at once that produce one identical "thing") that goes on in the brains of people who say they are in love, that doesn't happen with other things.
We will probably have to revise many of the definitions of the words we typically use, but we do that all the time.
Sorry for the add on, but I reread your post and thought of something else. There's some classic equivocation in your last question assault? It seems you took "real" to mean in one sense, "exists (full stop)" and in another "exists to me." If you read your questions with only one definition of "exists" the problems aren't as difficult.
The other thing is that you might be well informed to read debates (philosophical debates, the kind that confuse just to cofuse) about dualism vs materialism. Most of your questions would be answered if you first answer the question about dualism.
I'd be happy to talk about this stuff next week.
This is poetry do what you will with it. What I LOVE about literature and poetry is this....you never really know what the it means, that is up the author. Poets have the luxury of defining words. This is not a thesis but a musing.
amusing. haha.
On a philosphical note...
The tools we use we use to measure "things" in science may not be any less valid than tools used by philosophers, lawyers or theologians to measure their "things." (remember we share some of these things, which is why there are so many heated debates between groups) These tools of measurement are all based in individual or shared perceptions created by the creative human mind. The myopia of these individual groups is stiffling as is my own dependence on science alone. (The dandy warhols sing a great song about this!!)
TT, I'm going to have to default to Hallmark Shakespeare "What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
by any other name would smell as sweet." Whether you call it love or some neuronal process, its the same experience. The psychological hit you make take by learning that you really are a bunch of chemical reactions probably wouldn't last long enough to matter. That might sound crazy, but I'd bet it's true. The overwhelming fact would be that you still experience everything in the same way with or without the scientific information. The thoughts you may generate could differ, but the experience (ie the way your body responds to external sensory stimuli and the consequent processes that turn that "experiential" data into a particular brain state) would be the same.
I think.
Lets talk start a new blog for materialism some other time.
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