Blog Comments #2

Jenise

lol, I love how you are probably doing thhis post on your sidekick.

I see that you agree with Banach, that things must exist before its essence.

But, you say that "the thought of [the present] is causing it to exist" which I think means that the present's essence has existed before the present has existed.

I think you have some validity in your point; there are some things where you think "Oh, I need this thing and I can use this and that to synthesize it." In this case, you have created essence before existence.

I see that this post is still in progress but I hope you incorporate some of Banach's quotes.

It was a great starting post, thanks!

Sam
Takes a great deal to say that you are fake.

We live up to people's expectations and that already makes us fake. Expectations are outside influences that change who we are.

What strike me as interesting is how you connected morality to being authentic. I have never thought that having a good sense of morality would contradict being "real".

But then again, according to Banach, every individual have the freedom to choose what to believe so if you choose to follow a certain morality, then you cannot really be fake about it (in my opinion). Then yet again, society has a lot of contradictions.

The way you said your thoughts are not your ideas sounds like you do not have absolute individuality. Banach says everyone does (but hell, Banach isn't the center of everything). But I think you are pointing out another contradiction made by Banach; how can we be an absolute individual when we are also affected by external factors?

Your post was pretty well written (in my point of view); I just want to ask 'what other contradictions can you think of that this society contains' just to see what you think.

Your blog was awesome and made me think about the contradictions.

Blog Post #2

An existentialist would say that existence precedes essence. You must exist to come up with a purpose to your own life. Sartre thinks that "man exists, turns up, appears on the scene, and, only afterwards, defines himself." I think he is right; a log has to exist before you determine what you can do with it. It does not make sense to think "I need to make a house, what can I use to make a house" and then poof, a log appears. Our ancestors used what was given from nature to create a way of living.

Banach then argues that we cannot accept freedom because we think that we are being controlled by our experiences. We find ourselves "determined by one of the outside influences we find pictured" on our mental TV screen. Then when something goes wrong, we use ourselves as excuses. We blame the outside influences: "I don't know what happened. I guess the beer made me crazy" but really we choose our actions (to drink the beer) so we are really blaming ourselves (Mara?).

Banach thinks that the outside influences act like expectations that we have to live up to but we always have a choice to live up to these expectations or not.

We have become "characters in the plays; we make ourselves into little pictures on our mental TV screen determined by the script written by the expectations of other people." It sounds as if Banach is saying that we allow things to be determined and then act on the determinations. This goes against an existentialist's belief that existence precedes essence. To have others control us eans tto have our essence created for us and we have to live by the essence. Banach says that we do not have to live by the essence created for us; we are absolute individuals who have the right to choose what to think.

Everyone tends to let outside influences choose how we create ourselves. We "let someone else determine what we will be than to do it ourselves, especially when we see our value in terms of the acceptance we get from other people." Other people's values and what they see as "acceptable" change the way we act. Stereotypes are a good example. If someone is born into a Christian family, people are going to expect - who we will call Person A - to believe in Jesus. Person A may not believe in Jesus but Person A is labeled Christian due to Person A's family background so Person A has to follow Christian traditions. This stereotype - label - has created an identity for Person A.

HW 2 - Blog Comments 1

Vincent
As always, you disagree with the texts....

I thought Banach's interpretation is that we are all absolute individuals; that we are alone in this world; that we cannot feel or understand others.

I understand your point; people learn from others and act they way others do. Banach is saying that our individualism is our mind; no one can tell our minds what to do. Even if we learn from others, one person cannot learn the same way or the same exact thing as the way another person learns. We are absolute individuals made up of different experiences.

You have some spelling mistakes; for example in the second paragraph, "know" is spelled "no". Just make sure you proofread.

I feel that Banach is trying to say that existence comes before essence. Without being absolute individuals, we would not be able to perceive the world in a way so that we can create our identity.

It was a different point of view, thanks.

Jia Min
I like your simile to the baby, that was easy to understand.

You are stuck between agreeing and disagreeing with Banach; you understand when he says we are absolute individuals because we cannot truly experience what another experiences. Then you are confused because you think that we cannot be absolute individuals when we are interacting.

Banach is saying we are alone in a way that people do not know what we are really thinking or feeling. Even if we talk things out, the way others understand what we are saying is different than the actual meaning of what we are trying to say. When we are looking at the TV screen, the way our brain perceives the images on the screen is different than the way any one else perceives it. You can still be an individual even if you wear the same shoes as someone because there are other parts of you that make you different.

But I also agree with you when you say that people understand the need for food and shelter; if we are deprived from food and shelter, we would all go hungry and cold.

You use the wrong words sometimes like in the second to last paragraph, you wrote "when" instead of "what". Just watch out for those.

But other than that, your post was easy to understand.. thanks.

Response to Part I of Banach Lecture

To be an absolute individual means to perceive everything using our senses. Our senses only allows us to feel what we, ourselves, feel so we can only know ourselves and are limited to what others know. What we touch triggers our sensory neurons (not anyone else's) to send signals to our brain (not anyone else's) so our brain can process the information. Our senses act like a "television screen", the only way we can perceive the world. I agree with Banach because each and every one of us learn differently. We may encounter the same situation, but the experience - what we take from the situation - is different among us. An absolute individual has an absolute identity; our fingerprints are different, our values are different, and even our facebook page are different.

I had once encountered the same experience Mr. Manley and most of the seniors had. Beginning of last year's chemistry class, we were to observe objects and what we were to take from that is what we perceive the world may not be the world. Our senses bring the information to our brain and our brain makes out the information based on the information delivered by our senses. This concept makes sense as it frustrated many seniors including myself.

I think the absolute freedom of absolute individuals means to do whatever the individual pleases. Of course, there will be consequences to that if another sees an action as immoral. Human happiness can be a lot of things; it is different for each individual. We go on this journey called life to find the happiness that is right for us. As we go on this journey, we encounter other individuals with their own sense of absolute freedom. I feel that something is immoral when it interferes with others' happiness and inflicts damage on others at the same time.

If Banach is right and we are completely alone in this world, I do not think it is a big concern. There is no way for one of us to be in someone else's shoes so why bother worrying about it. I would not say that we are completely alone in this world but see it in a different perspective: each of us is an individual who can interact with others. Each individual is unique and even though we cannot feel what another is feeling, we can still learn from each other and feel connected.