If Pride Goeth Before the Fall, I Hope Some God Will Save Us All

"I've heard that your Gods older 
Buddha Allah Krishna 
Manifest with many faces 
Worshipped the world over in foreign places 
I assume your God must love you 

I know Jesus loves me 
And my God is good and great and true 
But if pride goeth before the fall 
I hope someones God will save us all 
Save us all 
And love the sinners too"

-"Save Us All" by Tracy Chapman

This is the end to one of Tracy Chapman's songs on her album Our Bright Future. It's a folk song, but it is so witty with lyrics, rhythm, and rhyme that I just love it. And what an interesting concept she introduces at the end of this song. The first few verses are about how she knows Jesus loves her and how great he is, but at the end she demonstrates a sort of acceptance for all other religions (mentioning Buddhism, Islam, and Hinduism to be exact). At the end she sums up the idea that she ascribes to her Christianity, but it would seem she only hopes there is some God that will save her - even if it is not a Christian one.

That's such an interesting idea. We can believe what we want, and in the end hope for the best. I would say that she is speaking about relativism, but it really is not that. I seems as though she accepts the idea of an absolute diety situation, but she just hopes that diety will take care of her. It's rather reminiscent of Sikhism or Bahai. Such an idea is difficult to put into a blog, but anyway, I hope you understood what she is singing about.

That's just a thought for the day. Nothing very interesting has been happening here except the heater in my house is broken so I'm sitting next to the fire. Cute.

Has It Really Been This Long? Well, Here Is an Update and a Discussion on If the World Is Real.

...here is a short update with some other thoughts. 

Apparently, I'm not that great at keeping constant with my blog. I should do better, though. Here is an update on what has been happening in my phenomenal field (to use a psychology term, lol).

I have planned my graduation date - April 2010. If everything goes as planned, I will have a B.S. in psychology as well as a minor in logic a year earlier than traditionally scheduled. I have gone through the rest of my semesters and terms at BYU and selected what classes I will take and when. Also, I'm am planning on trying to graduate with Univeristy Honors, in

 which case I will have to write a thesis. At this point I am still deciding what the topic should be, but I will let you know when I decide. I am taking the LSAT next summer, too.

Tracy Chapman released a new  album a week ago, and I love it. It's very different from her older stuff - as each album is unique for her - and this one is quite eclectic in its style. She is going on a solo tour this year to celebrate 20 years since she started performing. I can't wait for her to come to the US to tour (she is touring in Europe right now), and I will not miss her concert for anything!

Aside from that wonderful bit of news, I'll leave with a thought. I've been thinking a lot about how the only thing a person can prove is that he/she is thinking. Descartes coined the thought, "Cognito ergo sum," or "I think, therefore I am." However, beyond that, anything we think is true is based on an assumption. If I interpret what I am looking at as an external reality, that is assuming that my mind is not producing the image for any other reason than photons striking the retina. However, we must remember that our visual field exists only in the mind. What we hear, smell, taste, etc. is all just an experience interpreted by senses of the mind. We also experience feelings and drives in a real way, and these are brought to the attention of our consciousness. Yet, they are not objective because it exists only in the mind as interpretations. So, we can never know for certaint that they are accurate representations of the external world, assuming that there is one. Those with schizophrenia, for example, really do experience things that we do not. Yet, it is very real to them, and they act in a reasonable manner as to how to work with that.

So how do we solve this problem of uncertainty that the world might not be real? Well, I know that when I am hungry, feeding the body that I experience has having some sort of control over usually takes that hunger drive away. I may not know for certain that I am really feeding a body I claim is mine, but every time I do, that unpleasant feeling seems to go away. And so, we may be able to know that the world is real, that experience is objective, and so on, but my solution is that it is impractal to act in a way that disregards the experience. If I choose not to eat because I don't know if it is really doing anything, I will still feel hungry. I might as well cause this body to eat.

From this bottom-up reasoning, it is important to remember that everything we experience is completely subjective. That being the case, no one will ever experience the same things, assuming they are real and not figments in your mind (I say "your" instead of "my" because you are reading this now, not me). We are fundamentally different from experiencing senses, emotions, drives, etc. We cannot judge other people because we do not and cannot know their experiences and why they act the way they do. We cannot tell them how they ought to act, either, with absolute authority. To do so would be so overreach our boundaries. Sure, we have tendencies that are studied in psychology, but I am sure one reason that the discipline has trouble defining actual laws is because we are diverse from personal experience. I'm sure that could be worked into a law at some point, though.

And that is one of my thoughts. I hope it made sense to you.

Tracy Chapman is Amazing and Makes Me Want to Be a Philanthropist

And that title wasn't meant to be funny like some others ones on here, lol.

I love Tracy Chapman, as I have mentioned before. Right now I've been studying geology because I have an exam I need to take tonight, but sometimes I get distracted because I somehow find my fingers taking my computer to Youtube to watch Tracy sing in videos. And then I can sit there for hours just clicking on all of them.

I don't really have time right now to put up a blog of much substance because I need to get back to studying (and by that I mean Tracy Chapman on youtube is calling), but I wanted to share this video to anyone who may read this. I had not seen it until just now, and I love it.

Arson at a Bon Fire Earns About.....No Cool Points

I went to see the movie Mad Money today. It was a really good movie, and it starred Diane Keaton, Queen Latifah, and Katie Holmes (I think), the first two of whom I am a huge fan. I certainly recommend it.

After returning to my apartment, Moe and I decided to tag along with some people from the ward (for non-Mormons, that is a set congregation at an LDS church) that were going to have a bon fire. I really wasn't excited, but decided to go anyway because a) I didn't feel like doing my laundry and b) I haven't been to a bon fire yet this year and figured I should just to say I went.

The first location was blocked off, so we ended up going to some cabin resort area in the canyon and they built the fire on couple feel of semi-packed snow. And by semi-packed, I mean it was hilarious to watch the group ahead carefully step on the surface with a random one or two dropping knee deep. I could probably watch it all day, especially if one of them is wearing sandals. True story.

So we were there, and I must say we witnessed some of the most retarded things. The winner was the idiot that decided it would be cool to toss the bottle of lighter fluid into the fire with the remaining fuel still inside. Smart, guys. We're all huddled around a fire, and you want to earn your nightly cool points with arson and waste. Oh, and pollution from the melting plastic. Then I remembered I'm in a freshman ward, and some people may not have had sufficient frontal lobe developement to understand that this is a bad idea, and no one will laugh or think you are as hot as you apparently think you are. But anyway, they tossed it in, the fire suddenly grew, everyone jumped back, and I feared for my hair for a second (hairspray).

And then this idiot tries to explain to us that there was no reason to be afraid because it was impossible for the plastic bottle to explode from the lack of pressure. Shut up, wigger. We know. Regardless, a mass quantity of lighter-fluid in a bon fire is not a good idea if everyone is standing close to the fire, especially when everyone will be tripping over the snow to avoid getting their eye brows singed.

People this weekend basically annoyed me, so that's why I may sound more cynical than anything. It'll get better though, promise, lol.

Mmm..... eating a thawed out, pre-cooked chicken teriyaki breast is a delicious midtime snack. The outside burns your mouth, yet the inside is perfectly frozen! Happy mediums are certainly not desireable at this hour.

I love Tracy Chapman. Certainly, she is one of my all-time favorite music artists. And I love this video of her singing, so you should watch it. Love.