What is Law?

What is law? Law is a set of rules that is designed by government for people to follow. But what if the law is unjust? What if we do not believe in law? Must we still obey it by all means necessary?

St. Thomas Aquinas quoted that: “An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distort the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority.” I personally find what St. Thomas Aquinas said very convincing, more importantly, I find even the law in religion matter can also be unjust. “Law is written by human, regardless of whether the law was supposedly passed by God’s word or government, in the end it is still written by human. Who knows if the law from the Bible is actually based off from God’s word or not, but if the rules are written down by human, then the rules can be bias; considering the fact that everyone holds different opinions, and perspective.

For instance, before the civil right movement, by law, all non-white minorities were considered to be lower class, slavery. African American was not allowed to sit in the area with the white American, and that was the law for many years. Until the civil right movement, people decided to take a stand to that unjustful law, people gathered and acted on the civil disobedience. Even today, we have Occupy Wall Street, or just last week, a group of college students protested in from the Baruch College for the extreme high tuition.

Law is created by human, which means no law is perfect. Since no human is perfect, which is why if there is an unjusted law happen, we must take on the action and try our best to fight against it but in a peaceful matter. 

Mill Vs. Marx

Classical liberalism is concerned with the danger to individual freedom from government interference, as well as the power of majority opinion in areas of culture and lifestyle. In contrast, Marx argues that under the capitalism, people will be trapped economically; since the freedom in economic, the rich will be richer and the poor will be poorer.

I feel that both ideas present a very good conviction for its own opinion; however, I do see flaws in both of them. Such as, Mill believes that people should have the right to decide what is best for them, if the situation is only a self-concern matter, government should not interfere. To certain extend, I do agree with Mill. Marriage for instance, it should be a self-concern matter, even for homosexual, government, religion should never interfere. Everyone has their own belief in religion; just like in our liberty of rights, freedom of religion. Marriage is a form of belief, some believes it is a religion ritual, some sees it as a business transaction, and some feels that it is ceremony between two individuals that are in love with each other. Shouldn’t the homosexual have their own freedom of rights as well?

Nevertheless, under some situation, I do feel that the government should have the right over individual. For example, drunk driving is not only a self-concern matter, in statistics, a lot of car accidents happen due to drunk driving. Or abortion, some may debate that is a self-concern matter, but it is not. If a woman decides to get an abortion, what she is trying to do is to end a human life. In those cases, the government should step in and prevent those actions from individual.

On the other hand, Marx argues that capitalism will lead to dangers in the economic system. Since with the freedom in the economy, the rich will become richer and the poor will remain poor. In a way, Marx is right on that theory. That is why we have the occupy Wall Street today, it is the result from the capitalism. Nonetheless, without the capitalism, our economy in this country would never have grown. Without the works from capitalists our country would more likely to become like most of the Eastern Europe countries, or perhaps North Korea. People are only allowed to have certain wealth that the government allows them to have, or like China, the one child policy, and because in the Chinese tradition, male are favorable, the parents are likely to abort any female infant, which causes China to have such an unbalance gender population.

Mill and Marx’s theory both have their pros and cons, to pick one over the other is hardly reasonable. The keyword for people, the individuals to learn from both perspectives is “balance”. If people have too much freedom, failures are meant to happen. However, without freedom, our living-style will become pet-like. 

Buddhism in America

The goal of life in Buddhism is to find release from our narrow concern with ourselves and our own interests, and the desires and cravings that make us restless, discontented and unhappy.

The lifestyle of a Buddhist, giving up their desires, clashes with that of an American, who we teach to be go-getters. However, although differences between the two ways of cognition exist, it is not impossible for an individual living in America to follow the teachings of Buddha.

In America, we encourage people to achieve their dreams and teach them to think and act in a way that is best for themselves. We instill the thought that nothing is impossible, making people believe that their dreams can come true. Buddhism, on the contrary, is the exact opposite and teaches one to give up their desires to achieve a state of enlightenment. Regardless, both decisions are based on the path that their individuals choose to follow. Considering the fact that the United States was founded on the belief in freedom of religion and expression, following the lifestyle of a Buddhist in America is possible.

Buddhism focuses on detaching oneself from their desires and wishes, but to begin the path toward enlightenment, an individual must first choose, wish, and desire to become enlightened. Since that is a self-made decision with freedom, I find there is a hypocrisy within the theory of Buddhism.

Is there a God?

Cosmological argument states that there exists a First Cause or an Uncaused Cause in the universe, and by extension is often used as an argument for the existence of an “unconditioned” or “supreme” being, usually identified as God. On the other hand, the Design Argument proves the existence of God by focusing on the universe as a whole and portraying it as a machine. Machines have intelligent designers and like effects have like causes; therefore, the universe as a whole has an intelligent designer, which is God. (Encyclopædia Britannica 2011)

Those theories are powerful and cause people to believe that perhaps there really is a God. People feel compelled to explain our existence, and therefore do so by believing God created us first. Mankind must have a creator itself, just like every human being must have a mother in order to exist. Thus, the theory makes a very good argument and compels people to be convinced in the existence of a God.

The arguments are very convincing on the surface; many people would not need stronger conviction to believe in God. However, if we break these arguments into pieces, we start to recognize small flaws. As an example, the cosmological argument states that the universe is created by a being outside of the universe, God. However, since all existence requires an explanation, God’s existence itself must first be explained by a third-party source. As another example, in the Design Argument, William Paley compared a watch and the universe: Like a watch, the universe exhibits such a complex design that it could only have been the creation of an intelligent will. In short, all things must have a creator, designer. It is true that for a watch to exist, there must first be a designer. However, this designer does not design time. Time is an existence that is neither created by a watch designer nor God. Time is a neutral stimulus; its existence cannot be explained by either argument.

I find neither argument is convincing in providing the existence of a God. However, I can understand why other people find it convincing enough to believe in the existence of God - because they only look at the argument on the surface and refuse to question the existence of a Supreme Being.

Are humans just like computers?

                Are computers intelligent? Is there any difference between computers and humans? These are the questions that people sometimes wonder about. Computers are only as intelligent as humans make them to be. Humans input knowledge and software into the computers; in a way, it is almost the same as our society inputs knowledge into our brains, trains us the humans to think and to perform in the way society wants us to.

                For instance, thousands of years ago religions had a very powerful influence on people and government; people were forced to learn and to accept that there is a god governing all of us and whom we must obey. In short, religion created society’s norm back then. And as people were growing up, they were conditioned to think that there could be a high and mighty god, which controls everyone’s life. Therefore, people would react by often praying/talking to air and think they are talking to god regarding all the good and bad that happened to them.  It is same as we humans program a computer. We condition the computer to perform and react to achieve a certain desired result.

                However, there is a difference between human and computer, which is emotion. Computers do not have emotion. They are dead-hearted machines which do only what human what it to do. On the other hand, with humans, our emotions help us as individuals decide whether the knowledge that was inputted by society is right or wrong. For example, years ago, homosexuality would be seen as a sin, because human were conditioned to think that way by society/religion. Society thought that if it forced that knowledge onto humans strongly enough, people would suppress all homosexual desires. But human emotions are strong. We might be able to suppress the emotions, but we could not take the emotions away. For a homosexual person, eventually his homosexual desires will surface into his mind and that particular person would start doubting the knowledge that society has been putting into him.

Mind and Brain

In philosophy, Descartes believed that the mind and body are two different substances; our mind is the one that provides us with feelings, wishes, desires, and individuality. In short term our mind is just a soul. The body that Descartes described is our brain; it gives awareness of our thoughts, actions, it is simply just an organ that helps us function on daily basis. As much as I find Descartes’ theories interesting and insightful, as a psychology student, I have to disagree with him on this topic. 

In psychology we have learned all different types of development of personality; it could be by genetic, environment, social circle, past experience…etc, our brain is like a computer, it stores the data and memory, processes it, and then configures all the information, and calculates it for a solution which in the physical world would be our action, emotion, and behavior. 

Our mentality is based on all that we have learned and experienced. What we feel in the present is based on the past; our past makes us who we are today, and who we are in the present shapes the future form of ourselves. Our brain figures all of these steps out, it controls our mental and physical state. People often do many things and feel various emotions without knowing why. This is not because we have an external soul from someone else that is trapped in our body, it is simply because as human beings we do not spend enough time on reviewing and understanding our past, environment, and social circles.

As humans, we are physical and emotional beings. Our mind is our brain, to know what we know, and to feel what we feel is understanding how our brain works.

True knowledge = Individual perspective

    Pragmatism and Feminist Epistemology both challenge our view of what we have learned about defining knowledge. Pragmatism means that the conceptions are to be sought in their practical bearings, that the function of thought is to guide action, and that truth is preeminently to be tested by the practical consequences of belief. Feminist Epistemology is concerned with the ways gender influences our concept of knowledge.
   
    Immanuel Kant believes that knowledge is limited within the bounds of possible experience and is not available to metaphysical. In short, knowledge equals experience. But each different experience leads to different knowledge, so is there an absolute general knowledge that everyone should know? I am not referring to simple mathematics such as 2+2=4 or dogs tend to have four legs. I am talking about more abstract concepts, such whether there really a God or whether homosexuality really is a sin. If we look at those questions from a pragmatist viewpoint, then perhaps we can understand why everyone has different opinions and possesses a different answer. For instance, hundreds of year ago, it would be consider a death worthy if anyone did not believe in god or follow orders from their religion. People had to believe in whichever religion had the most power back then. Or in Iran, homosexuality is viewed as a crime; homosexuals are killed or put into mental institutions. People were taught to think certain way, and their actions and beliefs were forcefully built inside them. The people know that there are consequences to what they choose to believe, and how they think and act.
   

    Feminist epistemology, on the other hand, would argue the issue from a gender perspective. For example, a few years ago, women were never really the bosses of anything; it was very rare to see a woman sit on a high position in any political, financial, or intellectual setting. But now women are empowered all over the globe.  In the United States, we had Hilary Clinton run for the presidency in the Democratic Party and Sarah Palin actually get the Republican nomination to run as Vice President. Many fathers now opt to be stay-home fathers, while their wives go out working in the world. Many women all over the world have become high executives and CEOs in many big corporations. All these changes are still new for us and may still seem as a shock for some people, but why? Why the shocking emotion, why are these changes just happening now? Feminist epistemology explains how our knowledge was influence by the concept of gender, which was passed-down from the elder generation with the traditional point of view on gender. Feminist epistemology believes that tradition belief has to change, men and women are different by gender, but both are equal.
   
    By understanding Kantian theory, pragmatism, and feminist epistemology, I have to come to the conclusion that knowledge is based on what we have experienced and what our surrounding environment has input to our brain. However, is our knowledge also equal to truth? Is there really a God? Is homosexual really a sin? The way I see it is that, our knowledge may begin from experience and input by others, but the knowledge we have is adjustable, changeable. Our knowledge should not be what others have informed us, or based on some past experience, because the truth to others may not be the truth to us, and the experience from the past may not be the same as the reality of the present. Therefore, our own individual knowledge should be what we feel the most comfortable and happy with. People who believe or do not believe in God, or homosexuals who choose to act on their desires, should make those decisions through free will and not be based on our surrounding environment or previous experience/influences.

Experience + surrounding influences = 1^st stage of knowledge. Self analyze + free will = true knowledge.  

Experience = Knowledge?

What is Knowledge? By the definition from Merriam-Webster dictionary, it means the fact or condition of knowing something with familiarity gained through experience. In Kantian definition, knowledge is limited within the bounds of possible experience and is not available to metaphysical.


The two definitions of the word knowledge are quite similar. We must ask ourselves, what is knowledge? Does everyone has the same knowledge? Do we all think alike, feel alike? If we don't, then obviously we would not have gone through same experience, and with different experience, we would have gained different knowledge, individual knowledge. 


Let us take this topic step by step. Immanuel Kant talked about our senses are the first basic idea for us to experience anything in this world. We all can feel hot, cold, pain, tickle by using our senses. How do we know a fire is hot? We understand fire generate heat and warmth by reading books, or studying science, but that is just a truth by using our reasoning. In order to actually know how hot a fire actually is to a point that we know it could burn our skin, is by standing next to a fire to feel. Our skin can sense the heat that is generating by a fire but like I said before, we all sense things differently. For some, they may have to stand a bit closer to the fire in order to feel the heat, and for some they can stand a bit farther and still be able to feel the heat. Therefore, our knowledge of the fire's hotness is different, individual.


Another example that I can say about knowledge is death. What is death? Everyone know the universal truth/definition of the word "death", which is being dead. However, can anyone possibly have the knowledge of death without being dead? We can talk about how we feel about death, or what our beliefs on death, such as, some may believe if you are Christian you may either go to hell or heaven after you are dead, but how can anyone be sure if you haven't experienced being dead? Some may answer, I just know it because that's what I learn from bible, church, or my priest and my parents told me so. But that is just a believe system, the truth for you particularly, same as learning the definition of what is hot and death, no one can possibly know about any knowledge until they have actually experienced it first. 


Our knowledge is individual, we can only know what we know but we cannot know what others know. Simply because we have never experienced what they have experienced before, we may share some common experience that is similar but no experience is exact. For instance, we all have experienced what breaking up with someone feeling like, therefore, we sometime feel symptomatic for those who is currently going through a break up because we understand how they feel in that common situation, but we would not know exactly how they feel. 

What is real?

What is real in this world? Is what we see, hear, touch, taste, feel, and experience is real? Is this so call "Earth" that we have been living is even real? After learning about Descrates' methodological skepticism, I start to question about the meaning of "truth". How often we just blindly believe things, until it becomes impossible to believe them? 


The answer is, yes, we do do that quite often. For instance, if few strangers have been telling you that the person you have been in a long term relationship with is cheating on you, the chances of you to go right ahead to believe them is, well..., I would have to say it is not that high. Why? Because just like what Jack Nicholson said in the movie, A Few Good Men, "You can't handle the truth." To know learn about the truth, we have to accept all the ending outcome, even the worst possibility. It is our human instinct to deny what we don't know/don't want to know. So that we can live on with our "happy" daily life, at least not until when we have all the reasonable resources that left us no choice but to believe what is really right in front of us, which is the "truth". 


Some people may say to deny the truth could be a foolish act, but is it? To be able to understand and accept the truth knowledge, we must first admit that all we have learned before the truth is false and the knowledge we already have is unreliable. For religious people, they must first believe that there is no such thing as God. For children, they must first acknowledge that their parents are not necessary their biological parents. A happy married couple, they would have to accept the possibility that his/her mate has been cheating on him/her. Or for a government, they must first admit to the whole country and themselves that what they have been doing for the nation is only causing damages. 


The thing is, people do want to learn about the truth, just that we worry what we learn may not be what we like to learn. Therefore, majority of the time we choose not to learn about it, so that we can protect our feelings. 

Allegory of the Cave

In the Allegory of the Cave, Socrates suggests that, without philosophical education, we are all like the prisoners in the cave. To understand what being as prisoners in the cave is, we must understand why Socrates thinks that philosophy is important.

Socrates believes that what we know about the world is what the world wants us to know, therefore, our knowledge to the world is limited. Human is imperfect and the world that we live in is created by human, which means the world we live in is also imperfect. By being human is not about achieving the perfection, but to learn how to improve our imperfection. In order to achieve that goal, we must challenge ourselves to think and question about what we know, what the world wants us to know. It is then we can see the problems within our life and the world, and to find a solution to solve the imperfection. 


In order to improve ourselves, we must challenge and free our mind to think and question outside of our comfort zone, the boundary line  that the world set for us. 


Socrates believes that life with philosophy is pessimistic. I think the word pessimistic is a bit exaggerated, but I do believe that life without philosophy would blind us from the truth about our own individual life, our community, our government, and our world. Also, without the truth, we would forever cage ourselves as a slave of this world. 

Testing

Testing