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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Rambi who wrote (53114)	8/26/1999 1:48:00 AM
From: Neocon	Respond to of 108807

Thanks, Penni, I like those quotations a lot....

To: Rambi who wrote (53114)	8/26/1999 3:40:00 AM
From: Neocon	Respond to of 108807

Brevity: I went to St. John's College. It is a liberal arts college....If St. John's were a typical college, that might suffice, and as a practical matter, one might be limited to that. But it conveys a totally false impression. St. John's has two campuses, one in Santa Fe, one in Annapolis, each with about 400 undergraduates, and nowadays about 200 graduate students, although there are no accommodations for the grad students on campus. They follow the most comprehensive Great Books Program in the country. There are seminars on Monday and Thursday nights, for about 2 hours, although they frequently go a bit overtime. We begin with the Iliad and the Odyssey, read Plato and Aristotle, many Greek tragedians, a couple of historians, and a couple of comedies by Aristophanes. The only Roman author we do freshman year is Lucretius, representing the Epicurean doctrines. Sophomore year, we do selections from the Bible, Roman authors, scholastics, and early modern authors, including Francis Bacon and Shakespeare. Junior year we pick up at the 16th century, and stop at the end of the 18th. Senior year, we do 19th and 20th century authors. We read philosophy, theology, literature, history, and some historical documents (such as the Constitution) for seminar, and discuss what we have read. We also have 4 years of classes in language, covering elementary Greek, French, and some English poetry; and math, starting with Euclid, touching on the origins of analytical geometry and the calculus, and ending up studying non- euclidean geometry and the special theory of relativity. We had 4 years of science when I was there, one year of measurement theory and chemistry, one year of biology, and two years of physics, but I believe it is only 3 years now. We had music for one year, and now they have an art class. As much as possible, original texts are used, although there are obviously classes in which supplementary text books are required....This conveys the truth of St. John's a little better, but it is still not the "truth", which would take much more time to develop...

To: Rambi who wrote (53114)	8/26/1999 8:47:00 AM
From: Neocon	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 108807

Penni, since you seem to be unusually good at getting the point, I will use you for continuing the thought: When we deal with religious subjects, regardless of whether real or imagined, we are dealing with matters that are very far removed from common experience. Naturally, such topics put a particular strain on language. It is not unusual for religious language to seem either banal or bizarre, as the case may be. Usually, the more banal sorts of religious expression seem to belong to those with a dearth of linguistic resources. Frequently, we feel as if the expressions are inappropriate to the dignity and mystery of the subject, even when we do not presume to know that they are wrong. A classic example is the expression: "I am a jealous God", which seems petty. However, even if God were not subject to the emotion of jealousy, it may be that it is an apt, and even vigorous expression of the truth, which is the categorical demand that the Creator not be confused with lesser beings. On the other hand, some expressions seem so rococo as to be paradoxical, for example, the doctrine of the Trinity, the idea that God is both three persons and one essence, and that the persons are "of the essence". Whatever idea the Trinity is meant to convey, clearly it doesn't quite make sense. And yet, it may be the closest expression of the matter available, since the situation is beyond experience. In philosophy, Plato contemplates a similar problem in the analogy of the cave. Those trapped in the cave see only flickering shadows of the way things really are. What if someone were unchained, and taken outside the cave, to gaze on things as they really are? Returning to the cave, how would he convey his experience to the others, who knew only the shadows? We need not take Plato's scheme of things literally to see that the great philosophers have offered us deep insights into the nature of things, such as would not be an immediate product of common sense, and that they would inherently have difficulty conveying these thoughts to others, to whom they were novel. Again, it is not unusual to find writing on philosophy obscure, or, in some instances, deceptively naive, as they struggle with the difficulty of expression. We need to understand the problem better, to appreciate the success and limitations of speech about the most important things, and to develop patience with the more demanding authors.....