Palin: "The Bush Doctrine"

If you watched Charlie Gibson's interview with Sarah Palin, your heart probably stopped, just as mine did, when he asked her if she agreed with the Bush Doctrine.

She had no idea what he was talking about.

In fact throughout the interview, Palin's body language said it all. She was slouched, bending forward. She had a lost look in her eyes, and it was almost as if you could see her brain grasping around for answers. Like a typical student who feels that they're going to fail a college oral examination, she prevaricated every time she was asked a question she didn't fully understand; you could see the panicked "gulp" in her throat. She looked embarrassed ... nervous ... almost apologetic.

And this woman could be a heartbeat away from becoming the "leader of the free world."

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And not just that. But she pretty much turned Russia into an American enemy. Crikey.

The Russian government, whom I'm sure was watching, should come out with a statement about that.

In her ignorance, she's a loose cannon. Geez, for all we know, she could get the Cold War started again with her careless remarks.

American Politics.

I've been following the American elections with some interest, and as I write this I'm watching the reports regarding McCain's choice of running mate.

I find it really weird.

If I were American, I wouldn't vote for Republican myself right now but I find it really strange that the Republican party are choosing Palin as VP.

And it's funny how, even on Fox, the anchors and commentators seem to be grasping at straws trying to make sense of the choice.

Since Obama's speech last night, I've heard pro-Republican commentators criticize Obama for many of the usual things: he isn't experienced, he's too young, nobody really knows who he is.

And now McCain chooses someone who is about as inexperienced as Obama (you might say she's even less experienced; at least Obama worked in public service before entering politics; Palin was a television sports reporter before she entered politics); someone who is even younger than Obama; and someone whom not even the Republican spokespersons being interviewed on television know. Not only that, but she appears not to have any experience in foreign policy at all. So basically what that means is that if McCain dies, the next president is going to be someone who doesn't have any foreign policy experience. And isn't the issue of foreign policy supposed to be one of McCain's strengths?

So that really doesn't make sense, because McCain just crippled his own campaign: now he won't be able to attack Obama on experience.

Theory Number 1. The theory that many anchors are toying with is that maybe McCain chose Palin because she's a woman, so this is their ploy to win the support of female Hillary supporters.

Now to be quite honest, as a woman, I find that analysis a little insulting. If I were a Hillary supporter, I would support her primarily because she believes in the same things I do and only secondarily because she's a woman.

So do these analysts (or, for that matter, John McCain) think that women are so mababaw that they will vote for Palin just because she's a woman, even if she believes in things completely different from what I believe in?

Duh.

Hahaha, in fact if you do want to make mababaw generalizations about the way women vote, then you should bear in mind the generalization that women are much likelier to be cattier about one another than men, so choosing a woman just to get the support of female supporters ... that could actually backfire.

Theory Number 2. Another theory that the commentators are playing with is the notion that McCain chose her to get stronger support from the more extreme right. Apparently, Palin is more conservative than McCain.

But that doesn't make sense either. Instead of trying to attract voters who are most likely going to vote you anyway, shouldn't you be trying to attract the center, the independents, and the right-leaning Democrats?

So weird.

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I dunno ... maybe McCain just has a crush on her. :) (Kidding.)

The only other possibility I can think of is that McCain really thinks he's going to lose and he's desperately trying anything to throw a monkey wrench into the Democrats' momentum.

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Update: Rumors are she's a creationist. Uh.

Last lecture.

Randy Pausch died this week. :(

That's really sad. I got all teary-eyed the first time I watched his lecture on Youtube. What an amazing spirit.



ABC's report is here.

Books, books, books

My husband and I have had a carpenter over these past several days to help us build new shelving and storage units. But no matter how many new shelves we've had built, it seems like we still can't solve our top problem: WHERE TO PUT ALL OUR BOOKS?

I'm startled that I can't find any articles on the web on academicians and their book storage problems, because I know from conversations with my colleagues that it's a problem many of us have.

One of my older colleagues married a fellow-academic, and every hallway of their house is lined with bookshelves. Yet their living room still has stacks of books that seem not to be able to find a home.

Another colleague married a lawyer. He recently bought some new shelves for his house. When I visited his house, however, the number of books on his new shelves was so high that the shelves were sagging in the middle.

I didn't marry an academic, but I married a bookworm who buys books more frequently than I do. And we simply can't seem to find the space to put all our books!

We've resorted to the terrible two-rows-of-books "solution" on most of our bookshelves. We have books under the bed and in cabinets ... but we still have books stacked on our desks and night tables! I've brought as many books as I can to my office cubicle, but I have exactly the same problem at the office as well: the shelf on my carrel has already fallen a few times because of the weight of books, and I already have books in boxes under my desk. Every year, I go through my books to see what I can give away, but it isn't easy--reading books is how I make a living and unlike books-for-leisure which you can read often read once and toss, most of my academic books are ones I need to keep as reference for current and future projects.

If any academicians or bookworms out there have thought of solutions to their book storage problems, please share them with us. Meanwhile, Mike and I seriously thinking of getting an Amazon Kindle to make some kind of a dent on our book storage problems.

Should philosophers be politically active?

I've been thinking about this question in response to a comment from a colleague of mine (who works in the School of Social Sciences) that philosophy, the way it is done in the Philippines, doesn't seem to be sufficiently "applied."

Here's an excerpt from one of my two responses to him:

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I was thinking about how to express better what I said about philosophers feeling that philosophy isn't necessarily an "applied" area of the humanities, because I don't think I expressed it very well. So I'm going to try again, and I apologize in advance if this is a little long ....

I suppose it's something like this. A good economist (I think) presumes that economic development is good, and looks for an economic theory that will best lead to economic development. A good political scientist (I'm presuming) already has certain presumptions about his vision of what effective politics is, and looks for the political theory that will best actualize that vision. A good catechist presumes certain doctrines about God and faith, and looks for the best theological framework to explain those ideas to catechumens in a way that the catechumens can apply those ideas to life.

Many philosophers believe, however, that if a philosopher wants to do philosophy, he has to be "free" enough to be able to question the very notion of "economic development" (not just what it is, but even whether it's actually desirable) or "effective politics" or the presumptions about God and faith.

If he espouses the "application" of only one particular economic or political theory, then that binds him to that theory and stifles the philosophical freedom to question the very premises of economics/politics. As a colleague of mine said, once "application" becomes the "end-goal," you're no longer doing philosophy, but ideology or indoctrination (which is okay if you're, say, a catechism teacher or a political activist, but that isn't philosophy).

(Actually, sometimes I get uncomfortable with the way political debates are handled in school, because I do feel that sometimes they tend to be of the "indoctrinating" type rather than the dialogical type ... but maybe that reflects a failure of us philosophers more than anything else [something I'll talk about again later on].)

This doesn't mean that the philosopher believes his philosophies shouldn't be applied; rather, that the application of philosophies is not necessarily the task of the philosopher himself. The philosopher's job in society is to think about ideas that other people take for granted as "truth" and question/challenge the premises of those ideas, while it's the task of other people to "apply" the theories that they individually choose to subscribe to. Many philosophers feel, however, that the good philosopher himself should never "subscribe" with finality or permanence to any one philosophy because the premise of philosophy as an activity is that the philosopher never has the final answer; he/she always has to be willing to question the ideas he (or others) have previously held.

This also doesn't mean that philosophy has nothing to do with real problems. I agree with you whole-heartedly that philosophy shouldn't just be about dropping names of dead white men (or women), and I strongly believe that any philosopher worthy of the name is motivated by *true* questions (i.e., questions about concrete reality, or tungkol sa talagang nagmemeron, as Fr. Ferriols would say).

That having been said, I personally do think it's wonderful and admirable and important when philosophy-trained people go out and do find practical "applications" for the philosophies they've chosen to espouse for the time being ... however, I also tend to agree that those activities aren't part of philosophy anymore and aren't necessarily intrinsic to the philosophical activity.

The only "application" (if you can call it such) that I do think is an intrinsic part of philosophy is the activity of dialog: I think every philosopher has the responsibility to promote dialog and questioning, and to encourage all people (especially the people whose "jobs" are more "active" than contemplative) to stop every now and then and be willing to critically question their ultimate presumptions.

Through Google, I found this link (PDF) to a document written, coincidentally, by a philosopher who has come to our school a few times to give talks, Fr. Patrick Riordan.

Crikey.

Okay, so the ZTE-NBN thing is sickening.

But having Erap, a convicted plunderer, make a speech about truth and accountability at an anti-corruption rally?

I'm sorry, but you've got to be joking.

And to people who are willing to be bedfellows with Erap; be careful -- it sends the message that it's more important to be anti-GMA than it is to be pro-honesty.

Kadiri!

This whole ZTE-NBN is sickening.

Will this be the issue that finally brings this administration down?

Facebook is owned by Neocons!

It really is, apparently.

Intramuros with Carlos Celdran

So finally, after some years of planning (hehe!), Mike and I went on a Carlos Celdran walking tour. It was a lovely day for a walk, breezy and not too hot; we'd purposely planned to do this in December for the more pleasant weather, but we actually needn't have worried about that, because we ended up walking less than we'd expected (compared with walking tours we'd done in England).

The 3-hour Intramuros tour took us from Fort Santiago to the facade of Manila Cathedral, to San Agustin Church and Father Blanco's Garden, and finally, to Casa Manila (all just a few blocks away from one another). Of course, being a native of Metro Manila, I'd been to all those places before a number of times, but what made the tour amazing wasn't the locations per se (though I'm sure the locations delighted first-timers to Intramuros), but Carlos' colorful, theatrical, sometimes-funny-and-sometimes-extremely-moving romp through the history of Manila.

Indeed, I felt a lump in my throat a number of times during the tour, most especially during Carlos' dramatic description of the rape of Manila during World War 2. I'd learned about it all in high school, of course, but the version in our textbooks had been a highly sanitized version, a month of atrocities crammed into a paragraph. As we sat there in the crypts of San Agustin museum, Carlos' voice transported us back to 1945, and we were surrounded by cries, screams, tumbling walls, and the smell of death and decay around us. (Incidentally, Juan Luna bones are kept in that crypt!)

Most of the tour was very lighthearted, though--funny most of the time, sardonic many times--and we laughed a lot with Carlos, and together with the other Filipinos in the group, we also often laughed at ourselves.

Carlos' love for Manila was evident and infectious. His final line of the tour said it all: "If you want to change the way Manila looks, start by changing the way you look at Manila" (a slight change from the tagline often mentioned in relation to him, "I can't change the way Manila looks but I can change the way you look at Manila"). As Carlos himself pointed out, a lot of tourists consider Manila an "ugly" city, something that travelers should preferably skip over if they're on the way to any other place in the Philippines. But Manila's story is beautiful, tragic, poignant ... and Carlos is one of the best story-tellers we have out there right now.

In a nutshell: Carlos is a really, really good tour guide, among the best I've ever listened to. If you haven't yet, go, go, go on a Carlos Celdran tour; it's an excellent way to spend half a day, and I daresay you'll find yourself a little more in love with Manila after the tour is done.

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Incidentally, it's been my dream for a long time to be a historical tour guide, ever since I went on a tour of Corregidor in college. Now I'm more committed to that dream than ever. (I don't intend to compete with Carlos, of course, haha! He's too good and what he does is unique and precious and all his own. I would do my own thing differently.)

Sheila Coronel

There's a nice article on Sheila Coronel in the Columbia University alumni magazine.

Microplace

Theirs were the only ads on the Paypal homepage, and I clicked on it.

Apparently, EBay has a subsidiary company called Microplace that allows its website users to invest in microfinance project across the developing world. Very very cool idea.

Unfortunately, you can't invest in the Philippines yet (I would've made a payment right then and there had there been a Philippine project). I hope the Pinoys working in microfinance have explored this.

A year of taking the Bible literally

Former Esquire editor A. J. Jacobs, a secular Jew from New York City, decided to spend one year, living out all the Old Testament laws and many of the New Testament ones too as literally as possible, (when it wasn't illegal or impossible to do so, as was the case with the law to "kill magicians").

According to this article, it seems to have started out as a tongue-in-cheek, try-it-just-for-fun experiment (before this, he spent a year reading an entire encyclopedia) ... but it became for Jacobs a true year-long spiritual pilgrimage that ultimately transformed his views in surprising ways. (Well, maybe it isn't that surprising .... I say that, not because I believe that the Bible should be taken so literally, but because I do believe that sacred ritual truly is transformative.)

I'm interested in buying the book.

Palestine

Condi: "It's time for the establishment of a Palestinian state."

It was actually "time" half a century ago ....

Fine-tuning Argument

In past school years, I didn't enjoy teaching Aquinas' Five Ways in my Philosophy of Religion class. I only taught it because I do think it's important to teach at least one text that includes a rational proof for God's existence, and it's the shortest. :) (I did Anselm before--the entire Proslogion--which is very nice [if you do the whole thing and not just the "Ontological" Proof], but it takes too much time.)

But this year I decided to spice it up a little by accompanying the discussion of Aquinas with contemporary arguments for God's existence.

And the result is that I'm enjoying myself a lot more with this discussion. I've especially enjoyed myself with Robin Collins' Fine-tuning Argument (his version of the argument from design). I like. I used to use the entropy argument (look up William Lane Craig if you're interested), but this school year I'm enjoying Collins' more.

College, and the meaning of life ....

From the Boston Globe:

"In the past few weeks, tens of thousands of young men and women have begun their college careers. They have worked hard to get there. A letter of admission to one of the country's selective colleges or universities has become the most sought-after prize in America.

The students who have won this prize are about to enter an academic environment richer than any they have known. They will find courses devoted to every question under the sun. But there is one question for which most of them will search their catalogs in vain: The question of the meaning of life, of what one should care about and why, of what living is for."

The rest of the article is here.

Free will.

Free will is not just in the brain.

Educational Reform.

People keep complaining about the state of public education in our country, but a lot of people who complain, don't think of concrete, feasible ways to improve the system.

I like pragmatic, replicable, feasible ideas and although I'm not directly involved in public education, stories like these make me want to stand up and cheer.

Academic Life.

Please ignore this post. I'm just going to babble nonsensically for a few minutes.

My brother once quoted a professor of his who said, "When you get your bachelor's degree, you think you know everything. When you get your master's degree, you realize you don't know anything. When you get your Ph.D., you realize nobody else knows anything either."

There are lots of things I love about the academic life, and I really shouldn't complain, because I know how lucky I am to be here, to be living the kind of life that I do.

But every now and then, one thing about academic life gnaws at me: the creeping insecurity of a mediocre academician. I know I'm never going to really be an expert at anything ... so why am I here?, I sometimes want to ask myself. And with my field, I don't even know if I'm really contributing anything of value to the world, to the country. :-/

I know what I'm competent at: teaching. Oh how I wish I could just be a teacher.

But sigh, this is the academic life, and while it may look like a walk in the park from the outside, it has its own ratrace, it's own crazy rules of engagement....

It doesn't help that at least once a month, some senior faculty member asks me about my Ph.D....

Sigh.

Creationism reaches the Philippines

Do you remember Sonia Zaide, the history textbook writer?

Apparently she's gone Creationist, in the most extreme sense of the word.

I went to National Bookstore the other day and bought the latest edition of her textbook for 1st year high school students, because I wanted to see what textbooks are out there. The textbook is called,"Philippine History and Government."

Here are some direct quotes.

"Origin of the Philippines. There are many explanations about the origin of our land. As Christians, we believe that the land forms were made by God as part of His creation. Therefore, the Philippines was a part of God's creation of the world. After the Great Flood in the time of Noah, many continents and islands appeared. So the descendants of Noah spread out to many parts of the world."

There's a Bible quote from Genesis, then she mentions legends and myths in the next paragraph. Then in the paragraph after that, she talks about scientists' and geologists' ideas.

Some pages later, she talks about the first Filipinos.

"Who were the first people to live in the Philippines? ... The best explanations we have about our distant past come from three main sources: (1) the story of God's creation in the Bible; (2) the story of evolution made by human scientists; and (3) legends and fairytales made up by imaginative people.

"We will study about all these three explanations about the origin of our ancestors. But because we are Christians, we believe that the story of God's creation of man, as described in the Holy Bible, is the real truth. Therefore, any other explanation about how early man came into being, is only the product of human theory or thinking, and it cannot be the truth....

"According to the Holy Bible, all men and women originated from the first man (Adam) and the first woman (Eve). After the Great Flood, Noah and the three sons left to settle the earth. Noah's sons--Shem, Ham and Japheth--themselves had sons after the flood. One of the sons of the youngest, Japheth, was named Javan (See Genesis 10:1-4). Out of Javan, Noah's grandson, came four sons named Elishah, Tharsis, the Kittim and the Rodanim. According to the Bible, 'From these maritime
peoples spread out into the r territory by their clans within their nations, each with its wown language.' Thus, Fr. Francisco, Colin, a Jesuit historian, wrote that the frist settlers of our country was Tharsis, son of Javan and great grandson of Noah, together with his brothers and their descendants. In time, the descendants of these Biblical characters settled in the parts of the world that e know as Asia, including the islands of the Philippines."

On the opposite page is a chart which shows the names of the descendants of Adam leading to Noah, then: "Noah --> Japheth --> Javan --> Elisha, Tharsis, the Kittim and the Rodanim --> their descendants were the early Filipinos"

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Argh.

I'm Catholic who studied in Catholic schools and in my Catholic education, we never had trouble reconciling an allegorical understanding of the Genesis accounts with the theological truths that: (1) God is the Creator of all, and that (2) there was a historical moment, even with the history of evolution, that a distinct creature called "man" emerged, different from all previous primates. It was never an irreconcilable issue.

A colleague told me that the notion of young-earth Creationism is very recent. The early Church fathers--even Fundamentalists' favorite St. Augustine--read the Genesis accounts as allegories, and they were never apologetic about it. I'll write more about the Church fathers and their exegesis of the Genesis creation accounts another time, but feel free to Google them.

The Beatitudes.

This excerpt, from the book The Political Teachings of Jesus, is reminiscent of my liberation theology classes in college.