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Padlet #1: Thursday’s Child & Existentialism

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Padlet #1: Thursday’s Child & Existentialism

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For my first padlet post, I’ve chosen to connect the song “Thursday’s Child Has Far To Go” by the K-pop band TXT to the existentialist perspective presented by Sartre. The song is based off of a traditional Korean nursery rhyme titled “Monday’s Child”:

“Monday’s child is fair of face
Tuesday’s child is full of grace
Wednesday’s child is full of woe
Thursday’s child has far to go
Friday’s child is loving and giving
Saturday’s child works hard for a living
But the child who is born on the Sabbath Day
Is bonny and blithe and good and gay”

The significance of the Thursday line is that the future it predicts is most open to interpretation. The phrase “has far to go” may have a positive or negative meaning, depending on the one interpreting. Either those born on Thursday have great potential or they have a long road to success and many obstacles to overcome. The future of these children echo the words of Sartre when he writes, “man first exists…and only afterward defines himself.” (22) Thursday children must form their own identities and choose their own futures. Sartre also claims that “man is responsible for what he is,” (23) rejecting the idea of a metanarrative where destinies are tied to a certain universal end, or a God who imbues inherent purpose to each human He creates. The futures of the other children in the nursery rhyme are predetermined, but Thursday children are free to choose their own trajectory. This freedom is the pillar of existentialism, and Sartre praises those who wield it to decisively craft a life of action. He claims that “dreams, expectations, and hopes only serve to define a man as a broken dream, aborted hopes, and futile expectations.” (38) There is nothing valuable about a projected image of one’s future, it is the identity and character a person chooses for themself that makes their life worth living. “Life itself is nothing until is it lived.” (51)

Questions:

1. Would Sartre and other existentialists say it is better to be Thursday’s child or one of the others? Why?

2. What would Sartre think of superstitions like “Monday’s Child”? Consider his stance on interpreting signs on pg. 29 of Existentialism is a Humanism.

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thursday's child has far to go | txt (투모로우바이투게더) eng lyrics

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Padlet #2: Creationism vs. Evolutionism & Freud’s Distaste for Religion 

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Padlet #2: Creationism vs. Evolutionism & Freud’s Distaste for Religion 

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(The complete debate between Nye and Ham, which I watched in its entirety to create this post, is 2.5 hours long. For the purposes of this assignment, I linked the short version that gives some of the major points. :) )

In the last chapter of Future of an Illusion, Freud makes this claim about himself and fellow scientists: “Since we are prepared to renounce a good part of our infantile wishes, we can bear it if a few of our expectations turn out to be illusions.” Freud argues that science should be trusted more than religion because of its welcoming attitude towards new ideas. Bill Nye uses a very similar argument in his debate against Ken Ham, a young-earth creationist who heads the online platform “Answers in Genesis”. The Science Guy praises science for its ability to predict using present observations. Science gives us natural laws and processes, and using these laws we can predict how things happened in the past and how they will happen in the future. Nye’s big question to Ham can be boiled down to “Can creationism predict?” Nye finds it hard to accept creationism, especially a young-earth view of it, when all modern discoveries (rock layers, ice and snow layers, the sequence of fossils, radioactive dating) seem to reject this view. As he sees it, Christians take the Bible, which he reminds the audience has been translated hundreds of times, as a more accurate and reasonable assessment of natural laws than what we can observe. Christians, he states, cannot predict how the world will operate, they stake their claims in what this book tells them happened in the past. In summary, he accuses Christians of ignoring their senses and scientific calculations in favor of their belief in an ancient book. I think this also sums up Freud’s argument against religion in Future of an Illusion, Freud just adds a level of psychology to his. To Freud, the unwillingness to shift worldviews specifically stems from biological/relational childhood needs. Following the arguments of these two secular scientists, I have some questions for you:

1. Do you agree that religion rejects change and science embraces it? Furthermore, does an aversion to change make a worldview less trustworthy?

2. How do you reconcile scientific evidence against the Genesis creation/flood accounts with your belief in scripture? Can the two coexist, and if so, how?

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Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham - The Short Version

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Padlet #3: Zuko’s Firebending & Weber’s Idea of a Calling

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Padlet #3: Zuko’s Firebending & Weber’s Idea of a Calling

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The Nickelodeon show “Avatar: The Last Airbender” remains my favorite show of all time. It is set in a world similar to ours, but where many people have the ability to manipulate, or “bend”, one of the elements (water, earth, fire, air). The Avatar is the only person able to bend all 4 elements, and is reincarnated as a deliverer for each generation. The show focuses on the training and final battle of Avatar Aang, whose mission is to defeat the evil dictator (Fire Lord) of the fire nation and restore balance to the world. The scene this padlet focuses on is from the later part of Aang’s training, where he must master his final element: fire. In order to do that, he needed a teacher, and this teacher came in the form of his long-time enemy, and son of the Fire Lord, Zuko. Zuko comes humbly before Aang and asks for permission to teach him, eventually earning the group’s trust. One problem quickly arises, however…Zuko cannot bend as well as he used to. The clip shows Zuko’s thought process as to why this is, and he eventually realizes that his lack of ability is due to a lack of clear motivation. For so long (the 2 previous seasons of the show) Zuko’s firebending was driven by rage. Zuko was burned and cast out by his father, and his hatred and bitterness towards this fact drove him to unleash hot, wild fire. (I’m greatly oversimplifying Zuko’s earlier motivations here, please watch the show, his arc is among the best in cinematic history!!) Now that Zuko had found peace and given up his path of vengeance, he no longer had that rage to rely on. His fire had no fuel. The clip comes from the episode where Zuko and Aang end up having to go to the original source of firebending (dragons!) in order to learn firebending in its purest, truest form. A firebending based on life and warmth rather than destruction and chaos.

I think that Zuko’s change in motivation both represents and contradicts Max Weber’s idea of a calling and its effect on a person. Weber argues that a major contributor to Protestant success is their understanding of their work as a calling from God, and a duty to be fulfilled to honor a being higher than themselves. Because Protestants had a goal in mind greater than themselves, and someone greater than themselves to glorify, their work was more efficient and of higher quality than other workers and businessmen. Before deciding to teach Aang firebending, Zuko lacked a larger purpose, and was able to firebend solely fueled by rage. However, once he joined Aang and made it his goal to help Aang defeat the Fire Lord, his abilities became weaker. How could this align with Weber’s idea that having a calling strengthens a person? I think the answer lies in how Zuko reconciled this loss of ability. Technically, his firebending that was built upon rage and selfish ambition was not true firebending, it was bending of a lesser quality. By changing his perspective and shifting to a bigger picture motivation, Zuko was pushed to seek out the pure source of firebending, and learned to firebend in the way the art was intended to be used (by visiting the original firebenders, the dragons, and being taught by them…you should really watch the episode). Zuko may have had a temporary loss of his immature firebending, but gained the ability to firebend in its purest form.

Some Questions:

1. Do you find that you do better work if you’re motivated by a calling or a goal that is bigger than yourself? This could be Christian or non-Christian motivation.

2. Do you agree with my assessment of how Zuko’s temporary loss of ability both supports and contradicts Weber’s idea of a calling? Please explain your position.

3. If you could bend an element, which would it be and why😁? (Water, Earth, Fire, Air)

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Avatar: The Last Airbender - Zuko Lost His Stuff

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Padlet #4: Sincerity in Film & Postmodernist Nihilism

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Padlet #4: Sincerity in Film & Postmodernist Nihilism

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“Postmodern wink-wink, nudge-nudge storytelling” is a phrase this YouTube video essay uses to describe the current state of film. The creator laments that by disregarding sincerity, filmmakers fail to capture their audience’s attention. Sincerity, he argues, is what connects an audience to a story, and part of the reason epic films like the Lord of the Rings trilogy stir us to such an emotional extent. Humor we’d call “breaking the fourth wall” is becoming predictable and actually distancing us from the movies we’re watching, rather than engaging us with them. The quote from this video that best explains a connection to postmodernism is as follows:

“Imagine having this conversation [ie. about insincere movies] with someone even 50 years ago. They probably wouldn’t even understand what you were talking about! Stories were told to convey truths, share human experiences, to evoke genuine emotion.”

What struck me was the use of the word “truth,” a term utterly rejected by postmodernism. After witnessing the disconnect between story and audience, I propose this idea: When we stop telling stories to convey universal truths, our stories quickly lose purpose. ‘What’s the point of this new, meta, self-aware storytelling?’ the video (and I) ask. Movies become boring, predictable, and pointless. I think this applies to a postmodern, nihilistic view of life as well. A life without a metanarrative, without fundamental truth, is ultimately a life without meaning. This video creator shares that watching movies that utilize meta jokes give the impression that they’re “making fun and punishing us [viewers] for taking any of this seriously.” Can this feeling apply to life as well? Do postmodernism and nihilism simply degrade anyone who believes in something bigger than themselves? If this self-aware, ironic approach to life is what we have left, where is our depth of emotion? Where are our meaningful relationships? Where is our thirst for knowledge and discovery? Maybe Kierkegaard was right. Let’s attempt to infuse some passion back into our veins.

One final thought regarding meta films and postmodernism. In their attempt to be relatable to audiences, they lose the essence of what a story is meant to do. Filmmakers may align with postmodernist Stanley Fish when he states, “Deconstruction relieves me of the obligation to be right…and demands only that I be interesting.” I don’t have to craft a story that teaches a lesson or fleshes out an important part of human existence…I just have to sell tickets.

My questions for whoever responds to this post are embedded within the above writing. To summarize them, and provide some more food for thought: Do you agree that the rise of “breaking the fourth wall” is in line with postmodernist ideas? Do you think this tool of filmmaking is inherently bad? Do you enjoy movies more if they take themselves seriously, or if they include self-aware humor?

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Padlet #5: Mere Christianity & a Non-Pragmatic Reality

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Padlet #5: Mere Christianity & a Non-Pragmatic Reality

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“We pragmatists drop the idea…that Truth is ‘out there’ waiting for human beings to arrive at it.”

This quote comes from Richard Rorty’s Dismantling Truth, a discussion of truth, reality, and objectivism. Rorty defines himself as a pragmatist, a view on objective truth that is outlined in the quote. Rorty does not believe there is a Truth to be sought and arrived at by humanity, but rather that all truth consists of agreed upon ideas of a culture at a certain point in time. Humans, through their construction of societies, fashion ever-changing truths founded in communication with fellow citizens. C.S. Lewis would argue against this theory of truth, and he does so clearly in his book Mere Christianity.

In chapters 1-5, Lewis discusses the logical possibility of a reality above our own, of a standard we did not create but nevertheless acknowledge. In this specific video on chapter 3, Lewis’s ideas about the development of human morality combat 2 misconceptions about humanity’s sense of right and wrong, or what Lewis calls “The Law of Human Nature.” The second misconception will be my focus. Lewis addresses the opposing theory that human morality stems from an understanding of what is convenient behavior for society as a whole. This is similar to the pragmatist’s view of morality developing out of the needs of a certain culture at a certain time. Lewis refutes this argument by claiming it results in a circular argument. By stating that someone should be unselfish for the benefit of society, one may ask in return, “why should I care what is good for society except when it happens to pay me personally?” To which the original speaker may answer “because you ought to be unselfish,” and the conversation returns to its starting point. There will always be that unanswered question of why all human beings should, and often do, value certain characteristics, like unselfishness, over others. Lewis claims that this cyclical pattern of moral argumentation is proof of “more than one kind of reality.” He concludes this chapter with the quote, “there is something above and beyond the ordinary facts of men’s behavior, and yet quite definitely real. A real law, which none of us made but which we find pressing on us.”

QUESTIONS

1. Do you agree with Lewis’s assessment of human morality? In the video, another misconception (at minute 4:30) is debunked, so feel free to discuss your opinion on that (and Lewis’s response to it) as well.

2. Do you think it is possible to hold a pragmatic view of society and be a Christian? For example, does a rejection of a Truth out there for us to find necessarily reject the existence of God?

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The Reality of the Moral Law by C.S. Lewis Doodle (BBC Talk 2, Mere Christianity Chapter 3)