It's only words

Without going into the philosophy of language (yet), words are interesting.

What I'm thinking about just now is words that we use without necissarily thinking about what they mean. An example I see a lot on the news is 'insurgent'. What is an insurgent, and are they really that bad?
Also, grooming, in reference to paedophiles grooming children in chat-rooms. What do we actually mean by that?
These probably aren't the best examples, and they're perfectly good words to use if we know what we mean by them.

What about things like 'race'. We'd all agree that discriminating against someone on the grounds of race is bad. The first problem with that, is that the existance of human races is a theory propagated by racists. It therefore adds legitimacy to theories we are using it to disagree with. Vicious circle!
The second problem, is what do we mean by bad? What makes something bad?
Without going into different ethics systems, it's not something a lot of people could answer.

Then what about words like 'love'? What, in the immortal words of Haddaway, is love? Few people could define it, yet we all talk about it.

I don't think we have much choice, but it's maybe important to realise we don't always know what we mean. Afterall, how is anyone else supposed to know if you don't?

andrew

Beeb news

Sorry, just had to share this.

Oh come on...

I mean really...why is this in the news?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/north_east/6150548.stm

I know not much happens [bad welsh accent] down in the valleys [/bad welsh accent], but still. It says absolutely nothing.

Read it, do you learn anything at all? Do we really care about what kind of sauce the writer likes?

Oh well, still love the beeb...

Quick rant about the Blair administration

90 day detention

In any political system, the executive are always going to want more power. It's perfectly normal, you would too if you were in charge.

In any half decent political system, Parliament and the judiciary are there to curb that power.
With a parliament that does nothing more than rubber-stamp the government bills and a judiciary which is subservient to it, what can we expect?

Bloody Britain...

andrew

Identity

Quick musing from good old Jeremy Kyle - what makes our identity?

I think this is possibly one of the most important questions we can ask, and there are probably as many answers as there are people to ask. The issue in question was a girl who'd 'never had what most of us take for granted - identity', because she didn't know if her dad was really her uncle (or vice-versa).

This led me to wonder (and bore my flatmates with the the question) if that really is as important to our identity as we make out. I think identity is definately in part defined by other people's perceptions of us, and this is no doubt influenced by who our parents are. I would have thought though, that our upbringing (whether it was her 'real' dad bringing her up or not) would (or maybe should) be of more importance than who they are. Upbringing will have an important effect on how we act, which is an important part of who we are.


This brings up lots of questions that I'll maybe think about later. Is it our actions or our thoughts that define who we are? If somebody has never met anyone else, do they have an identity? Does the total amnesiac (that wonderful philosophic invention, a man who forgets everything after a few seconds) have an identity?
The neurologist and writer Oliver Sacks' character Jimmie G in The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat is a perfect example - he's lost the ability to create new memories due to a degenerative brain condition and the story follows his search for identity.

Just a thought,

andrew

Back again

Thought I'd take a trip back into the blogosphere once more. As ever, I've nothing to say, and I'm writing on the assumption that few people will read it.

In some ways, it's a sort of quasi-cathartic venture (though maybe only in as much as it might clear my head of some of the rubbish which gathers there and leave me to think about more important things) and at the same time (and possibly more importantly) it's more interesting than the essay I'm supposed to be writing just now...

If anyone does read it, comments and all would go down well - I like a bit of reaction...

I'll find something interesting to say soon.

Toodles,

andrew