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LOST PIECEan undergraduate journal of letters
VOLUME II, ISSUE IIOn A Darkling Plain
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Copyright, Lost Piece; All rights reserved.
No part of this journal may be used or reproduced by any means,
graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, record-
ing, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the
written permission of the EditorInChief except in the case of brief
quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. Te works included
in this journal are printed with explicit permission of their authors.
Lost Piece: An Undergraduate Journal of Letters
Te University of Notre Dame
Center for Undergraduate Scholarly Engagement
PRINED IN HE UNIED SAES OF AMERICA
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LOST PIECEan undergraduate journal of letters
VOLUME II, ISSUE IIOn A Darkling Plain
Editor-in-Chief
Stephen Lechner
Editors
Raymond Korson
Josef KuhnConor Rogers
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Something of a Mission Statement
From the Editors
Lost Piece exists to facilitate undergraduate reading, discussion,
and writing of an intellectual nature beyond course curriculum
and without distraction from the grade point average.
Lost Piece seeks to help undergraduates to complement
and even unify what they learn in their classes withtheir own personally driven intellectual pursuits.
Te goal of Lost Piece is to combat mediocrity in all
things, and particularly in all things intellectual.
Lost Piece holds that the goods proper to intellec-
tual activity are ends in and of themselves and are to
be sought regardless of whatever recognitions may or
may not be extrinsically attached to such activity.
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able of Contents
Lost Piece: Volume II, Issue II
Something of a Mission StatementFrom the Editors ..........................................................................4
Meet the WritersLost Piece ......................................................................................7
o an Overwhelming QuestionStephen Lechner ............................................................................9
MatchstickLeah Coming ................................................................................13
Te Abyss of ReasonGabriel MacDonald ......................................................................15
Life Does Lingeraylor Nutter ................................................................................23
God, Evil, and EvolutionDylan Belton .................................................................................25
OpheliaChristina Mastrucci ......................................................................39
Fiction and I
Nicolle Walking .............................................................................41Tat Rare, Random Descent
Brittany Bergeson ..........................................................................45
FaithJames Schmidt ...............................................................................47
Sliced n Diced
Josef Kuhn .....................................................................................55Stern ChaseJohn Ashley ....................................................................................57
SlicedClaire Kiernan .............................................................................61
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Contribute to Lost Piece
Please consider writingwhether essay, poem, story, or what-have-
youfor the Fall 2011 Semester of Lost Piece. Write what you
think is pertinent to the life of a student, whatever that might be
Pose a question
Or offer an answer
Write at whatever length you need
But write well.
Submit your work to Steve Lechner
at [email protected] April 30th.
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Meet the Writers
Te Program ofLiberal Studies:
So it turns out that PLSstudents dont only like to talkabout such trivial things asfree will or the meaning of
life as approached throughthe lens of certain GreatBooks, but they also like,even need, to engage ideaswherever they can find them.Tats why a few of them got
together to watch movies everyweek, first as a social eventand later more as a discussiongroup. Tey like to think theyare staying true to the spiritof the word seminar (which
literally means seedbed) byholding profound conversa-tions on their own from whichthey hope to bear the fruits ofnew ideas, serious dialogue,and lasting friendships.
Istum:(Also called Tat Ting) Treeyears ago, a group of friendsdecided to get together everyweekend to start a literarysociety. Its members include
students from the Colleges ofArts and Letters, Science, andEngineering, but strangelynone from the college ofBusiness. Tey write, simplyput, despite the obvious fact
that they are only tyro writ-ers, and they criticize eachothers writing as best theycan. One of their goals is tobring back the essay (whichliterally means an attempt)
as a form of writing and asa rhetorical work of art. Tegroup takes its name fromone of Ciceros orations.
Tese groups have contributed to the writing of the Fall 2010
Edition of Lost Piece. We encourage you, as an undergraduate,
to contribute your writing to future editions whether individu-
ally or as part of any such intellectual society. You can send
your writing and feedback to the editor at [email protected]
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:
is a group of undergradu-ates who meet together todiscuss issues of importance,ranging from theology to
philosophy to current issuesin any and all fields. It is acasually structured, sociallyengaging event that welcomesthe opportunity to find bothcommon ground and a mul-
titude of opinions on topics.And they drink tea, too.
Mustard:
Mustard is Notre Damesundergraudate creative writingclub. Tey share their writingwith each other and offerconstructive and friendly criti-cism of their work at their 9:00PM Wednesday meetings inthe Gold Room of La Fortune.Writing is encouraged, though
not required for participa-tion, and new members arealways welcome. [email protected] information.
Te Philosophy Club:
Te Philosophy Club isa group of a few dozenundergraduates who enjoyarguing, using big words,
attempting to answer lifesgreat questions, asking morequestions, and arguing.
Te Orestes Brownson Council:
As a club, OBC is focused
on better understandingthe Catholic intellectualtradition and its interactionwith philosophy, politics,and culture. It takes itsname from the AmericanCatholic political thinkerwho is buried in the cryptof the Basilica of the SacredHeart, Orestes Brownson.
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o an Overwhelming Question
An IntroductionStephen LechnerClass of 2011Editor-in-Chief
Heres a story: tell me if Ive
told it correctly. Once upon
a time, in a world called TeWest there was a vast culture
of people which somehow,
not altogether clear as to how,
found itself believing in God.
At some point in time, a lot of
people in the West began to askwhence they got that belief, and
for some reason, not altogether
clear as to what reason, a lot of
those people decided that they
didnt like the answer they got
as to whence they got that beliefin God, so they decided to stop
believing in God. Ten a mad-
man with a ferocious mustache
ran around the West holding
a lantern looking for God, and
when everyone told him thatthere was none to look for, he
shouted that God is dead, we
have killed him, leaving many
people very confused. Many
people laughed at him and for
a long time nobody made much
of the poor fool, but eventually
people began to realize that if
God is not around, then there
is no obvious moral, political,
or otherwise social authority tothe world that they inhabit, and
no obvious reason to suffer the
slings and arrows of outrageous
fortune. Having lost God, they
all went ballisticsome went
into hiding in their upper roomsand waited, perhaps, for the
wind to blow, others built little
castles which they named the
world and proclaimed them-
selves as God of the world,
and some took up lanterns and
ran off to search the highways
and byways to compel God to
come back to the West whether
he liked it or not. And that is
the state of the West today.
Make what you like of
this story, for it is just that, a
story, and stories are by their
nature fiction. Sometimes they
attempt to be factualand
factual is a useful description
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for certain storiesbut if its
a person whos telling it, then
a story is fiction and there is
nothing to be done about that.
Abraham Lincoln was shot in
1865. Tats fictionif for noother reason than that 1865
cannot be anything other than
a subjective evaluation of time.
Somebody once decided that
that should be the year 1865
A.D. and everybody agreedand still does agree with that
person. Of course Abraham
Lincoln was shot in 1865 is
true, and anybody who says it
is not true should be told that
they are wrong, but whoever
said that fiction should not be
true does not know what fiction
is about. No one will deny that
Te Little Princeis fiction, but
there is far more truth to that
story than there is to most any
history book printed today.
My intention in telling
thisstory is to present a
not-unusual account of our
own cultural passage from
Medievalism to Modernity to
Postmodernity. But what are
Medievalism, Modernity,
and Postmodernity? Like
1865, they are terms of
subjective evaluation, but unlike1865, they are far less clearly
communicative. Modernity
and Postmodernity are
especially obscure. Teir
meanings change depending on
their contextsa philosopherwill use them in one way but a
political theorist, a sociologist,
and a literary scholar will each
use them in a very different
way. And this probably owes
to the terms themselves.
Modern is, properly speaking,
a synonym of contemporary,
though according to this
not-unusual story that I have
tried to present, Modernity
began sometime in the 16th
century and Postmodernity
began in the late 19th. If
Postmodernity started then,
are we living after what is
post-contemporary? And
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what will happen when people
decide to distinguish themselves
from Postmodern? It seems
we have spent our prefixes.
Some readers may protest,
Why does ones belief or disbe-lief in God define whether one
is modern or postmodern? In
fact, ones belief or disbelief in
God does nothing of the kind.
What I suggest defines someone
as either being modern orpostmodern is their responseto
their belief or disbelief in God.
Te people in the West who
decide not to believe in God are
modern not because they deny
Gods existence but because
they are comfortablewith a life
without God;1the same people
having gone ballistic are post-
modern not because they believein God, but because, whether
they believe in God or not, they
are uncomfortablewith a life
without God. Such a life leads
them to what . S. Eliots Te
Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrockcalled an overwhelming ques-
tionwhy? Tey are post-
modern because they have made
Prufrocks realization, that...
1 I dont suppose, however, that we should just let the theist go on this oneit
may very well have been a wrong kind of theistic comfort at life with God, a
thing very difficult to prove, that inclined the modernist to disbelieve in God.
No! I am no prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will doo swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the Prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculousAlmost, at times, the Fool.i
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i Eliot, . S, Te Love Song of J. Alfred
Prufrock, in Collected Poems 1909-1962;
Harcourt, Inc., New York, 1991, page
7; It isnt fair to reduce Prufrock s
overwhelming question to why?
Part of what makes it overhwleming
is that it is a difficult question to
formulate. But why is an approach
to it. Te whole poem, in fact, is an
attempt to pose the question, and thus
the poem is a very good exemple of a
postmodern reaction to the world.
Te pieces in this issue are
many and different, but they
are linked together by what
Matthew Arnold once described
as a darkling plain. Tese are
pieces that react, in some way oranother, to Modernitya time
where humanity ruled supreme,
unchallenged by mystery, a time
of interesting and important
progress, a time of seeming
order and stability, but a timethat brought what was for
Arnold and Eliot a terrifying
emptiness. Tese pieces are
decidedly Postmodern, for
what is found in them is the
realization that ruling the world
is a big chore, and that who- or
whatever may or may not be
in charge, humanity is not in
charge. Tat, at least, is my
own subjective evaluation.E
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Leah ComingClass of 2013Mustard
I will not tell you that my aimless
vigil before the electric lamp provoked the anxiety
which was determined
by a child picking futilely at leprous sores.
I will tell you that I propped against the pole, a spectatorto the fulfillment of
the previous instants portent
and the streetlight nodded awake at
its accustomed time.
Te pregnant certainty circulated
as lymph and humor through
the dirty pipes of a matchstick girl,
on her knees in immigrant streets
even as she whistled her exile
her craterous lips attested that
I d be agonizing over how to say
Matchstick
A Poem
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I squeeze the prophesies out of every
patch of ground my feet compress.
I cant reconcile this belief
that whatever happens is determined
with my unwavering investment in life.E
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Gabriel McDonaldClass of 2012Philosophy Club
For the last three or four
hundred years, it has been
fashionable to consider all ofones beliefs the product of
reason. Were it not enough
that we human beings had to
go under the distinction of
rational animals, we now even
live in what Enlightenmentpop culture has dubbed the
Age of Reason. Tough that
title properly only refers to that
period in history, starting some-
time in the 17th century, when
a class of bourgeois intellectualsfirst concocted this notion
that no human belief is valid
unless it can be shown to stand
up to this nebulous concept
of rationality, this was really
only the beginning. Te Age ofReason has not ended, has in
fact only proliferated; what was
once just an upper-class fad has
now grown and infested every
segment of human society all
over the globe, and while many
consider this a great victory for
our species and for the cause of
establishing a utopian society in
which the poverty gap is elimi-
nated and niceness reigns su-preme, the painful truth is that
this triumph of reason is, at
best, nothing new, and at worst,
the greatest disaster in human
history. Allow me to present
my reasons for saying this. First, the obvious question:
What is reason and what
about it inspired our illustrious
Founding Fathers to worship it?
Put simply, reason is the process
by which we determine whether
a given set of statements can
be true. o give the most basic
example imaginable, we know
the statement Dog ulterior
cavort definitely cannot be true
because its not even a coherent
statement. o get slightly more
complex, we can take the two
statements Il Gattopardowas
written by Luchino Visconti,
and Il Gattopardowas not
Te Abyss of Reason
An Essay
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written by Luchino Visconti,
and determine that, for all we
know, either statement could be
true, but they cannot both be
true.1And how did our human
reason allot us such profound
knowledge of the universe? Itsreally quite simple: Tis little
gimmickknown as the Law
of Non-Contradictionis built
into our language system. We
decided, by inventing language,
that we werent going to allowpeople to assert something
and assert its negation at the
same time, because that would
just be confusing. Its not like
we had to go out and hunt
down that knowledge on ourown, we gave ourselves that
knowledge thousands of years
ago, kind of as though we put
it in a time capsule for future
generations. How clever of us.
Tere are two importantthings to note here. First,
reasonor rationality, if you
willis an inherently linguistic
concept. It is a function of
language and not of the world
that our language is meant to
describe. Secondand this is
the real atom bombjust as our
language is arbitrary, the laws of
reason are arbitrary too. Just as
we didnt have to use the word
squid to describe an animal inthe genus architeuthisand could
just as easily have called it a
parlor grand piano, the syn-
tactical rules which tell us how
sentences must be set up and
which ones guarantee the truthor falsity of which others, all
these are just as arbitrary. Te
point of these rules is to have a
convenient way to infer a whole
bunch of other true statements
from just one statement. For ex-ample, when Jacqueline tells us
that her car is red, we know that
it isnt green, that it isnt brown,
that it isnt blue, and a plethora
of other facts about it without
having to do any research atall. We didnt have to allow
1 For those of you who were dy-ing to know, the second is true. IlGattopardo was written by Giuseppedi Lampedusa. Luchino Viscontidirected the 1963 film version.
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ourselves such bold inferences,
but if we hadnt our language
would be pretty pointless.
If all of this sounds to you
like a lot of stupid hogwash
that nobody cares about, youre
probably right, but rememberthat the decision to base human
knowledge on reason is often
compared to the invention of
the wheel when people discuss
its importance in the develop-
ment of human society. Itsimportant to remember that,
while these principles may seem
so basic and obvious to us that it
feels like we knew them in utero
and didnt need to have them
painstakingly explained to usas I just attempted to do in the
last two paragraphs, they have
not always been unanimously
accepted. In ancient Greece,
it was common practice to
determine truth by finding outwho could shout their opinion
the loudest, or by just accept-
ing whatever the conquerors
claimed to be true, but then
a mischievous neer-do-well
named Socrates came along
and suggested that we all argue
using reason for a change, and
he was executed. But his legacy
lived on, and his commitment
to using reason in human
discourse eventually becamethe norm, totally unthreatened
until Nietzsche showed up
more than two thousand years
later and said that Socrates
was actually a total jerk and we
should all go back to determin-ing truth by seeing who shouts
the loudest. But fortunately
this idea was dismissed as the
ranting of a syphilitic nutjob
and reason has stayed in vogue.
It is important at this pointfor me to clarify that, despite
my uncharitable remarks about
the Founding Fathers earlier,
I wholeheartedly agree that
Socrates rationalist project
was a big step forward forhumanity, and I am fully
committed to his goal of using
reason in allargumentation,
no matter what the subject
or who is arguing. But now
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it comes time for me to draw
the fundamental distinction
between the Socratic rationalist
project and the Enlightenment
rationalist project.
Remember that all therules of logic, championed by
Socrates and later formalized by
Aristotle, despite their longev-
ity and the fact that none of
them have ever been seriously
contested, are fundamentallyarbitrary. Tis means that, while
we can use them to compare
statements against one another
and to juice further statements
out of one statement, it is
impossible to use reason to
conjure a truth right out of
thin airwith the exception
of totally vacuous truths like
the rules themselves. Aristotle
himself readily acknowledged
this and never claimed that any
of his logical rules or categories
by themselves could give anyone
knowledge, but could get you
off the ground if you start by
accepting some truths as given.
Tis sort of modesty was totally
alien to the gentlemen of the
Enlightenment, who were pre-
sumptuous enough to claim that
they could come to indisputable
truth about the universe bymeans of reason alone. Tough
they all inevitably failed to do
so in spectacular fashion, this
method of thought has inex-
plicably lingered and continues
to corrode society to this day. It bears mentioning why
they thought they could build
this ower of Babel in the first
place. Te one-word answer:
Science. Advances in science at
the time of the Enlightenment
had done wonders as far as
giving people knowledge that
they were confident to declare
objective, much more so than
the dominant mode of think-
ing: Just believe whatever the
Church tells you. It is impera-
tive to remember that, contrary
to popular belief, Socratic
rationalism had not in any way
diminished at this time, and
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people were still challenged to
employ reason in determining
their beliefs. For example, one
might argue for the existence of
God by saying that you should
believe in God because if youdont God will damn you to
hell. Tis argument may sound
like crap to us, the enlightened
of the 21st century, but if
you think about it, it is actu-
ally a perfectly well-reasonedargument. Te statement You
should believe in God does in
fact follow from the statement
God will damn you to hell if
you dont believe in Him. Te
only residual problem is where
you got that premise from. Back
during the times leading up to
the Enlightenment, higher-ups
in the Catholic Church were
more than happy to give the
hoi polloi all the truths they
wanted to use as premises for
their arguments. Tis system
worked splendidly for more
than a millennium and only
broke down because eventually
there came some people who
didnt accept these truths.
Te intelligentsia of the 17th
century, even the churchy ones,
didnt like using the truths
they were given by the Pope andhis minions, because they found
another source that they liked
more: scientific experimenta-
tion. Rather than just accept
that the moon was perfectly
round because the Church hier-archy, who believed everything
that St. Tomas Aquinas told
them, who believed everything
that Aristotle told him, said it
was, they figured it was more
reliable to just look at the
moon and manifestly see that
it is notperfectly round. I must
insist, however, that the only
thing making this method a
better source of truth than the
Church method is that people
were more inclined to accept
it. Certainly there were valid
reasons people were more will-
ing to accept itit was based
on repeatable experiments, it
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matched our sensory experi-
ences, it was more useful for
technological purposes,
etc.but this did not neces-
sarily make it any truer, it only
made it more widely accepted. Again I find nothing to
object to. I too prefer the
scientific method of mapping
the lunar surface to the believe
whatever the 16th century
bishop tells you method. Teproblem comes when these
Enlightenment bastards
decided they could use this
scientific method to learn every
possible conceivable truth about
everything.Tis would be kind
of like if oyota were to find a
hot chick who was so good at
attracting customers to a sports
car exhibition that they decided
to make her CEO of the entire
company. In their irrationality,
they somehow forgot that all
they had actually done was find
a better way to design wind-
mills, and here they thought
they had found the font of all
knowledge and immortality.
Tat was their first mistake. Te
second was confusing science
with rationality, an absur-
dity which persists to this day.
Again, this was all a result oftheir intoxicated overconfidence;
they were so convinced that this
new science thing was such an
incontestable source of truth
that they dubbed any refusal to
accept the truths of sciencesomehow as a logical fallacy.
Te problem with this way
of thinking is that, while this
whole science thing is terrific at
answering questions like Why
does the redAurora Borealis
require colder temperatures
than the green? and What is
the atomic mass of a tungsten
atom? when it comes to ques-
tions that most of us find more
pressing, questions like Why
am I here? What does it mean
to be a good person? and Why
cant you turn right at a red light
in Quebec? science turns out to
be astonishingly inept. Tis did
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not upset the Enlightenment
thinkers in the least. Since
they had already made the egre-
gious flaw of identifying their
scientism with rationality the
next (il)logical step would beclaiming that alltruths, even
non-scientific ones, could be
derived from this same rational
process that they had invented.
Te most shining example
of this can be found in TomasJeffersons wildly influential Te
Declaration of Independence. In
it, he starts off right away by
deeming all the truths he is
about to proclaim self-evident.
Tis is the staple tactic of the
Enlightenment; since there
is absolutely no scientific
evidence for the existence (or
even coherence) of the concepts
he recklessly puts forward here,
the only possible way he can
make them fly is by declaring
them to be self-evident. Tat
is, since there is never anything
binding anyone to accept
something as a basic truth,
human beings being mentally
capable of refusing to believe
whatever they want, the only
way he could use these ideas as
the basis for his argument was
to claim that only ninnies rejectthem, just as with the empiri-
cal truths of science. It was a
brilliant move, considering how
his ideas were so self-evident
that he was the first person in
history to come up with them,and here, ironically, marks the
first time in human history that
irrationalismhad become the
dominant mode of thinking.
What is the cost of all
this? Te most important
consequence of this or any other
system of thought is its effect
on ethics. As I said from the
outset, the mildest outcome the
Enlightenment view of ra-
tionalism could possibly have
produced is that nothing im-
portant has changed. One could
argue that the ethical theorists
of the Enlightenment merely
used their new system to justify
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ethical preconceptions and then
tweaked a few in order to adapt
it to modern conventions. Of
course, theres no scientific
basis for any idea of morality
or ethics, so whenever anyonegoes around declaiming that
we all need to believe in science
and rationality and once we do
well all start being nice to each
other, what he means is that we
all need to believe everythinghebelieves, beliefs which are
of course all self-evident when
examined under the light of
reason, and theneveryone will
be happy. In this view, nothing
has changed, and todays politi-
cal pundits are just carrying on
the old tradition of all societies
who have insisted that everyone
convert to their ethical system
because thats what their God
wants everyone to do.
But perhaps Im being too
nice to the Enlightenmentia.
Perhaps its not so innocuous
to try and base all our beliefs
about morality and justice
on this fictitious concept of
scientific rationalism. o base
such beliefs on God is perfectly
coherent, since the idea of God
is of a being who is actually
invested in human moralityand social justice. If no God
exists, it might not be in our
best interest to base our morals
on such an idea, but even then
it would be better than trying
to base them on an irrationalview of rationality, one which
not only has nothing to do
with ethics or morality but is
directly in conflict with them.
o do that would be to act just
like Wile E. Coyote, walking
out over this empty abyss of
reason, only able to stay in the
air because were all too stupid
to realize that theres nothing
holding us up. I only hope we
can find a better support for
humanity before somebody
thinks to look down.E
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aylor NutterClass of 2014Philosophy Major
Life does linger it seems
SometimesUpon the frailty of an hour
Upon the creases cut of an old mans face
Upon the petals fallen of a flower
ime does creep it seems
SometimesUpon the patter of a wave at shore
Upon the unseen glance of a strangers stare
Upon what lies behind a solitary door
But passion resounds sometimes
It seemsUpon temerity
Upon the one so meek, so mild
Upon the one who sees
It is the ephemeral
Tat seeps
Into eternity
E
Life Does Linger
A Poem
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Dylan BeltonClass of 2012Philosophy Club
I have been thinking about
evolution. In fact I do quite a
bit of thinking about evolution,
as it is my intention to make a
career writing about its theolog-
ical implications. Te question
I would like to address in this
reflective paper is this: are we
able to harmonize a Christian
view of suffering and beauty
with the evolutionary view of
creation where death and suf-
fering has played such a crucial
and prevalent role? Tere is atension here, and it is one that
cannot be swept under any rug,
for there is no rug big enough to
hide this specific problem. Tis
is, I believe, one of the many is-
sues raised by evolution that hasyet to be adequately addressed
by Christians. Indeed, a harmo-
nizing of the theory of evolution
with orthodox Christian
doctrine is an absolutely crucial
issue facing Christianity in the
21st century, and one that needs
to urgently be addressed by a
new generation of Christians
with the same fervency thatcharacterized the early Church
fathers as they defended the
faith against all odds. Let me
further add that I believe this
harmonization mustbe accom-
plished in order to stem the tide
of an ever-growing secularism
and diluted spiritualism that
is infecting modern Western
society with an astonishing
moral degeneration and general
mediocrity. With that said,
I must forewarn the reader
that this paper is more of a
reflection on the problem than
a systematic analysis, and will,
therefore, not offer a thoroughsolution to the problem
highlighted. Tese are thorny
issues and I would not dare to
suppose that I am intellectually
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capable of solving them.
Before getting started, it is
best that I make a few confes-
sions. I am not a Catholic; I am
not even sure if it is permissible
to call myself a Christian, forat this point in time I find
myself unable to intellectu-
ally surrender to all of what
Aquinas called the Mysteries of
the Faith. I am revealing this
because I believe it to make all
the difference in the world; it
means that I am not approach-
ing this issue with what St.
Anselm called an experienced
faith, a faith that is lived and
breathed so that it quite literally
animates and shapes the very
manner by which one views the
universe. Tis no doubt serves
as a crucial disadvantage, as
I am indeed tryingto grapplewith the question from an
inside perspective. I have
read enough theology to realize
that this may by all means be
a futile endeavor. But I will
nevertheless attempt it. I am so
profoundly and deeply moved by
the Christian image of God and
the Christian worldview that it
is in my eyes the onlyalternativeto the deeply and inherently
pessimistic and nihilistic natu-
ralist worldview that currently
holds sway in academia. Tis
essay, then, is not being written
in a tendentious spirit. In fact,
I believe the default position of
someone in my position is to
humbly accept the limitations
of my young and eager mind
and the fact that I am by all
means in a state of spiritual
infancy. Te problem may not
be with the Christian response
but simply with my intellectual
and spiritual incapacity.
How Came the Problem?
Now that we have some
preliminaries out of the way,
I would like to begin by
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addressing a specific claim
made in an article in a previous
edition of this publication.
Indeed, it was this claim that
served as the impetus for the
issue that this paper is an at-tempt to highlight. It may seem
that I am veering a bit off topic,
but bear with me. I think that
by reviewing how it was that I
came to write this paper that
the reader will be able to grasp
more clearly the issue at hand.
In his piece Everything
is Beautiful, Ray Korson
made the following daring
statement: everything is
objectively beautiful.iWhat
could this mean? And whyis it
that someone would hold this
position? Te answer, it seems,
stems from an adherence to a
certain Christian metaphysicalframeworknamely, a Tomist
metaphysical framework.
Korson provided the following
succinct summary of Saint
Tomas Aquinas take on the
abstract notion of beauty:
all of creation shares the
property of beauty because it
shares the same creator, God,
who imparts the attribute ofbeingto all members of reality,
which partakes in the truth,
goodness, and beauty of being
as such.iiTe idea is that simply
by virtue of partakingin the
Being of God, allof creation is
imbued with beauty. Tis is, I
believe, the primary reason for
whyone would make the bold
claim that Korson made and
just what it is meant to mean.
However, I was not satisfied.
My initial reaction to the
claim was this: the claim that
everything is objectively
beautiful can, as far as I can
see, be understood in two ways.First, it could mean just what
it seems to mean at face value.
Te dance of the falling autumn
leaves is beautiful; the doorknob
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on my flat door is beautiful; the
suffering of innocent children
too. But this, I am sure, is not
what was meant. So perhaps
Korson meant something
more like this: there issucha thing as objective beauty,
but it does not follow that
everythingis beautiful. How
so? Tink of objective truth.
Te definition of something
being objectively the case is
that it does not depend on our
human perspective for making
it so. For example, propositions
are statements that we affirm
as being either true or false, so,
presumably, propositions are
objectively true or false. But we
can make a distinction within
the category of objectively true
propositions. Firstly, there are
necessarily true propositions. Forinstance, that2+2= 4, or that
no man is taller than himself, are
necessarily true: they are true
in all possible worlds. But there
are also propositions regarding
the actual world that we would
lump into the objectively true
category. For instance, that
Mount Everest is the worlds
highest peak, or that dinosaursroamed the earth millions of years
ago. Yet from the observation
that there are such a things as
objectively true propositions, it
does not follow that every propo-
sitionis objectively true. Some
propositions are just flat out
false. Te proposition Gandhi
was the cause of World War II is
certainly not objectively true.
Korson perhaps, then, has
something similar to that in
mind, although applied to the
concept of beauty. Perhaps we
should rather say that although
absolutely everything is not
objectively beautiful, thereis such a thing as objective
beauty and we simply have
to search deeper to find it.
Beauty will differ, of course,
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in that beauty is a quality to be
found in a vast array of things.
We describe many objectsin
the external world as being
beautiful (paintings, forests,
statues). We also describecertain eventsas being beautiful.
An event could be anything
from a parents first look at
his or her newborn baby, to a
rousing performance of the first
movement of Beethovens 5th
symphony. Tere is some quality
to these objects or events that
moves us deeply; this quality,
I presume, is beauty. If one
agrees with Korsonand I
agree with him on thisthen
it is not simply that weproject
our own culturally constrained
subjective notions of beauty
onto these objects or events;
rather, it is that beauty is afeature to be found in themthat
we perceive. Or to put it in a
more Platonic tone, theseobjects
and eventsparticipatein Beauty.
Te Problem
Tat was, then, my initial re-
sponse upon reading the paper.
It dawned on me, however, that
my response was inadequate
and that there is a deeper issueat hand here. Recall that within
Aquinas metaphysical frame-
work, all of creationis deemed
beautiful merely by virtue of
its participation in the Being
of God. So how is it that one
can make a distinction between
things or events that are beauti-
ful and things or events that are
not? Tey are beautiful simply
by being things or events in the
actual world. So what are we to
do with the suffering of sentient
creatures? Te suffering of a
sentient creature is, I take it, an
event of some sort; but it not an
event we are quick to place inthe category of beautiful. Yet if
everything is beautiful by virtue
of simply being, then the suffer-
ing of a sentient creature, as an
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event, must be beautiful. But
we usually take the suffering
of a sentient creature notto
be an event possessing the
quality of beauty. Most of us,
I hope, are reluctant to watcha suffering creature and call it
beautiful. Tese events strike
us as intrinsically not beauti-
ful. One could, of course,
simply concede that this vast
amount of sentient suffering
was, and is, beautiful. Tis
is perfectly fine, but it is
surely not a conclusion that
spontaneously flows out of
us. Nor, as we shall see, does
this response align with the
traditional Christian response.
So how are we to fit this
specific Christian conception
of beauty and suffering into
the evolutionary frameworkwhere the death and suffering
of sentient creatures has been
so prevalent and essential to
the evolutionary processes?
Christianity has always
had a response to the issue
of suffering and its place in
the universe. Te orthodox
Christian response has been
that death and suffering arean unwelcome consequenceof
sin; they areperversionsof
the natural order that did
not feature in Gods initial
plan for creation. In Aquinas
words: the penalties, such as
hunger, thirst, death, and the
like, which we suffer sensibly
in this life flow from original
sin.iiiTe early Christian
response to death was one of
pure hatred and disdain for
what was considered, through
Christs self-offering sacrifice,
a defeatedfoe. We find this
quite explicitly in the writings
of Athanasius, that championof Christian orthodoxy. In his
On the Incarnation of the Word,
Athanasius writes, by the
Word made Man, death has
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been destroyed and life raised
up anew.ivTe general idea is
that death and suffering are a
resultof sin and to be overcome
once and for all when the
process of recreationhas beenfulfilled. Te biblical narrative
represents what in literature is
called a U-shaped-comedy
plot (comedy in the technical
sense, not the common usage
indicating humor). Te plot
follows this pattern: Creation
(perfection)>fall (suffering,
death, etc)>election>Christ
event>renewed creation
(perfection). Imagine this
pattern in a U shape begin-
ning with creation and ending
in renewed creation. Tis is the
orthodox Christian picture of
creation and its explanation of
suffering, as I presently un-derstand it. If one accepts this
view, then one could respond
that the suffering of sentient
creatures is a perversion of the
natural order and can therefore
not be deemed beautiful by
virtue of its being a perversion.
Tis is where the issue of
evolution becomes particularly
pertinent. Evolution paints aradically different picture to the
U-shaped plot and renders the
notion of suffering and death as
a perversion quite untenable if
we take the Christian message
to be cosmic in scope. Evolution
flattensout the U and leaves
us with a zig-zagging line that
either represents a meaningful
desperate, dramatic striving and
struggling ascent towardgreater
meaning and beauty as creation
draws ever nearer to a Divine
Omega-point, or it represents
a meaningless scribble moving
towards utter nothingness.
Creation certainly did not startout with what we usually take
to be perfection. If there is
one thing that evolution has
shown us quite conclusively, it
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is that the death and suffering
of sentient creatures has been
occurring for far far longer
than any of our pre-Darwinian
ancestors could have possibly
imagined (I am dulled by theusual pessimistic tone that this
tale is usually recounted in,
but bare with me for now). Te
suffering of sentient creatures
was in existence far before we
homo-sapiens arrived on the
scene, so it is not possible that
human sin was somehow the
cause of all suffering. Death
and suffering seem to not be a
perversionthat entered creation
due to human sin into a state of
initial perfection. Indeed, the
death of unfit individual crea-
tures and species is what drives
the evolutionary process. Tis
historical prevalence and impor-tance of death and suffering in
the evolutionary history of life
seems to render the traditional
Christian response to suffering
unsatisfactory. If this is correct,
then one cannot maintain that
death and suffering are not
beautiful because of their being
a perversion of the natural
order, for they appear to haveplayed a critical rolein the de-
velopment and diversity of life.
Response
Now an obvious response
would be to simply note that I
am presently guilty (admittedly
so) of a grossly simplistic and
literal reading of the bible, and
that the ramifications of the
fall are clearly notcosmic in
scope. One could say that the
Christian narrative is one where
the only participants are man
and God, so that the death
and suffering that entered in
with sin clearly pertain strictlyto a unique form of human
suffering and death. One would
simply point out that there is
no tension here at all, for the
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biblical narrative has nothing
to say at all about naturalistic
explanations of creation and the
suffering of non-human crea-
tures. Tere can be no conflict
between evolution and traditionor the bible because, while the
former deals with the natural
world, the latter deals with the
human condition and salvation
as it pertains to mankind. I
would add (acting as my own
opponent here) that I have
neglected mentioning the great
apostles creed, or what is some-
times called the rule of faith,
i.e. the essential doctrines of the
faith. And if one turns to the
essential doctrines, one will find
nothing regarding the suffering
of all creatures or a detailed
account of creation. Te bible
and the creeds are simply silenton the matter, for, you might
say, they are dealing solely with
the human condition, salvation,
and mankinds relation to God.
Tis is a fair answer and
in many ways solves a lot of
problems, and I would take
something of this approach to
the problem myself. But I would
like to point out a few things.First, if creation is imbued
with beauty by virtue of its
participation in the being of
God and only human suffering
is to be deemed a perversion
of the natural order, then we
are still stuck maintaining
that the death and suffering of
all sentient life besidehuman
suffering and death is beautiful.
Again, this is perfectly fine,
but it is not something we seem
willing to affirm . Second,
take this passage from Saint
Paul: we know that the whole
[of] creation has been groaning
in labor pains.v
Althoughhumans were no doubt at the
center of Pauls understanding
of the Christian gospel, he
did understand salvation as
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having universalimplications.
Te whole of creationis mov-
ing towards re-creation. Tis
seems to hint that the suffering
and death in all of lifewill be
wiped away. By shrinking theChristian message into a purely
anthropocentric one, we extract
humans from a much larger
universalnarrative drama that
has been, and is still, unfolding.
I am afraid that I cannot as
yet offer any systematicpositive
contributions to this discussion,
as these are issues I am grap-
pling to come to terms with.
With that said, I would like to
present a few conjectures. Tese
are mere musings that I think
are worth pondering over. I will
be leaving the issue of beauty
aside, as it is beyond my ability
to even begin to deal with; Iwill only offer some thoughts
on this issue of suffering.
Firstly, I think a point that
is quite easily forgotten in this
sort of discussion is that the
evolutionary history of life on
this planet has been more than
just a bloody and ruthless battle
for survival within, and among
rival, species. Tere has been,and is, plenty of harmony and
cooperation within and between
species, especially as one
ascends the evolutionary tree
to the more complex creatures
that have reached what may
be called a higher level of
consciousness. I am sure that
we have all watched footage
of some mammal taking care
of its newborns, or of dolphins
playfully whisking through the
ocean waves. Tere is a playful
and harmonious element to
life that has arisen through
the evolutionary processes,
which gives us ample reason tosuppose that there is far more
at work than inter- and intra-
species carnage. I mention this
because there is this enormous
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unwarranted tendency for us to
focus on the more sinister side
of the evolutionary process.
But back to Christianity.
Tis problem of suffering has
been, and still is, particularlyproblematic for the Christian
who is committed to maintain-
ing that love is the defining
characteristic of God. Tis
brings the obvious and tedious
question of whyit is that a God
of Love could allow such suf-
fering. I do not wish to address
this issue. It is a mystery we
simply have to live with. What
I want to highlight is the fact
that the Christian claim that
God is Love was, and remains,
not nearly as scandalous as the
Christian claim that God has
taken on the form of man, lived
among us as one who servedothers, and suffereda gruesome
and humiliating death at the
hands of the beings whose very
existence He held in being. Tis
is surely themost scandalous
claim ever to have been uttered
by human lips. For many an
ancient (or modern) pagan,
the extreme and revolutionary
nature of this claim was and isenough to render it laughable.
After almost 2000 years of
Christianity and 300 years of
Enlightenment intellectual
propaganda, all too many of us
moderns have lost all touch with
the scandal that isChristianity.
So what does this have to do
with evolution? Well, let me put
it like this: God suffered. God
identified Himself with the
suffering of sentient creatures.
In other words, we are not alone
in our suffering. I cannot say
much more about this, for it is
a mysterium tremendum. I ask
only that the reader reflect onthe claim that God suffered,
and what it could mean in the
context of evolution. I think it
perhaps holds the very key to
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harmonizing the vast suffering
of sentient life and the Christian
image of a God of infinite Love.
Te question, of course,
is how would this change
anything given the problemwith the traditional Christian
response to suffering? Did
Christ affirmthe goodness or
beauty of suffering? Surely not.
Or is it simply a way to provide
humans with hope? Perhaps.
But this seems a little vapid.
It certainly does not appear to
get us out of the problem of
all of creation being beautiful
by virtue of being. Tese are
questions for another time.
In Closing
o many, the evolutionary
history of life on earth provides
knock-down proof that theuniverse is void of meaning and
purpose, let alone beauty. Tis
is an intellectually bland and
spiritually shallow response.
It is within this evolutionary
framework that we mustfind
purpose. In On Christian
Doctrine, Saint Augustine made
clear that what was worthy in
paganism ought to be adoptedby Christianity in the service
of the faith.viTe wisdom of
the philosophers, for instance,
provided Christian thinkers
with an opportunity to shed
light on the faith. Christianity
cannot lose this mindset. Like
the wisdom of the ancient
philosophers, the findings of
modern science, especially when
it comes to evolution, must be
embraced and incorporated
into the Christian worldview.
Indeed, I would go so far as
to say that unless we manage
to sanctifythis evolutionary
image of life, mankind is sureto sink slowly and nonchalantly
into the swamp of nihilism
and a numb despair whilst this
planet marches forth on its
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path toward cold lifelessness
after our sun finally burns out.
It would be a sin to end on
such an ominous tone, so let me
end on this quote taken from
Darwins Origin of Species:
i Korson, Ray. Everythingis Beautiful. Lost Piece1.II
(Oct 2010). Print. Page 26
ii Korson, Page 27
iii Aquinas, Tomas. Summa
Teologica, III q. 1 a. 4 ad. 2
iv Athanasius. On the Incarnation.
rans. A Religious of C.S.M.V.New York: St. Vladimirs Seminary
Press, 1944. Print, Page 37
v Romans 8:22, emphasis added
vi Augustine. On Christian
Doctrine. Book II, xl-xlii
Tere is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers,
having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and
that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed
law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most
beautiful and wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.
But that is not quite
uplifting enough. I think
the next passage from Isaiah
52:7 will do the trick:
How beautiful upon the mountains
Are the feet of the messenger who announces peace,
Who brings good news,
Who announces salvation,
Who says to Zion, Your God reigns!E
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Christina MastrucciClass of 2011English Major
Ophelia
A Poem
on a Spartan cot her body breathes
that sleep of death.
on a bed of blood
her mortal coil shuffles, aching
to be healed, or else shed.
she feels simply too old to die.
though some say too young is the crime,a greater age yields a greater grasp
on that unspoken, blacked out sky
we call dying.
humanist, existentialist,
idealist: her mind is climbing that mountain(from which no traveler returns)
for a spark of understanding.
realist, empiricist,
nihilist: she finds no flame at the summit
(no undiscoverd country)
of something to call home.
ergo, to her, that home cannot exist.
what then is the brook by the willow
but a sirens kiss?
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yet she cannot rise to meet the water,
for her limbs fail her.
still she can see the charming brook
through her prison window.
if she does not see the flame, is there not a spark?dualist: her doubt cannot persist;
she wants either the fire or the dark.
she must see it to believe it.
she must feel it to perceive it.
her mind, if it explain not,it says there is nothing to explain.1
it does not matter. no difference.
not even thoughts of endless depth
can keep her skin from crumbling.
More water, nurse, more water.
not even water can revive
a heart refusing to live.
Its getting dark. but it is day.
the shade falls down around her
as she gazes, one last time,
at the light dancing on painted stars
and the words expire from that tired soul
who only yearns to be born.E1 Bram Stokers
Dracula
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Nicolle WalklingClass of 2011Program of Liberal Studies
Te date is December 16, 2010.
Te setting? A poorly lit corner
of an almost empty caf. Te airhangs thick and warm with the
smell of espresso. Nicolle sits down
at the small table, weary. Fiction
looks up from its mochaccino.
Fiction:Whats wrong, Nicolle?
Nicolle:Oh, just finals week.Te biannual barrage of tests
and papers, the endless memori-
zation of facts that I will surely
forget in a month or two, the
pairing of caffeine binges and
sleep deprivation driving me
surely ever closer to madness
Fiction:You know you
dont really talk like that.
Nicolle: I know. How
have you been?
Fiction:Tats what I wanted
to talk to you about today.Ive just been feeling, oh I
dont know, neglected. By
you. Maybe neglected isnt the
right wordIm just confused
about our relationship.
Nicolle:What do you mean?
You know I like you. Adore
you even! I mean, just look
at how long weve been
together! Te Boxcar Kidsback in elementary school
Fiction: Boxcar Children.
Nicolle:Whatever. Boxcar
Children. But do you re-
member that historical fiction
period that I went throughin junior high? Oh, and all
of that Lord of the Rings fan
fiction I wrote in high school?
Fiction:How could I forget?
You learned Elvish! Such
dedication. But thats where
my insecurities come in now.
Where is your dedication?
Nicolle:You know Im
afraid of commitment.
Fiction:Oh God, based solely
on the number of phases weve
been through, I know that.
Also, on a somewhat related
note, no more experimental
surrealist phases, okay? Tat
was some freaky shit.
Fiction and I: Coffee and Cigarettes
A Play
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Nicolle:You know I cant
promise that. And you
were totally into it.
Fiction sighs heavily,
looks distressed.
Fiction:Basically, what Imasking is this: what do you
want out of this relationship?
Nicolle:Tats a big question.
Fiction:Its an im-
portant question.
Nicolle:Okay, okay. Iguess I want you to always
be there for me
Fiction:I amalways
there for you.
Nicolle:Um, I wasnt finished!
Ive barely begun, really. I want
you to be there for me, to be
the one to whom I can relay
my fears, my doubts, my joys,
and my dilemmas regarding the
shortcomings and strengths of
humanity. I want you to help
me work out these ideas, to helpme present them to the world
in hopes that others might
also recognize and celebrate
our inextricably intertwined,
shared human experience.
Fiction:Well thats fair enough,
but isnt that what you use
your witter account for?
Nicolle:Oh, shut up. You
know I only use witter tokeep track of whats relevant
in the pop culture world,
which, by the way, is stillpart
of that shared human experi-
ence I was talking about.
Fiction:Pop culture? Sonow youre going to use me
to make others understand
the joys and tribulations of
Lady Gaga? Oh, great.
Nicolle:Tats not exactly
what I was going for, but thats
not a bad idea. No, but to get
back to what I was saying, I
want you to explore the human
experience with me, the world
with me. And I dont care
how we do it. Modernized
fairy tales exploring genderroles? Awesome! Postmodern
pastiches depicting loneli-
ness in the suburbs? Sounds
great! Small town mentalities
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scrutinized in stream-of-con-
sciousness narratives? Lets
do it. I want us to try it all.
Fiction:Tis seems like
a very lofty goal.
Nicolle:All I want to do inlife is make good things and
love everyone. Easy-peasy.
Fiction:Um, okay?
Nicolle:Never mind.
Fiction:No no, I think I under-
stand what youre saying. I needto be there to help you express
yourself and your ideas about
the world around you. And
you intend to do this in any
sort of form that aligns to your
personal whims at the time.
Nicolle:Yeah, basically.
Fiction:I can do that, but I
also have a request of you. If
you want to get something out
of me in this relationship, you
have to give something too.
Nicolle sighs heavily,
looks distressed.
Nicolle:Okay, shoot.
What is it?
Fiction:I want for you to
spend more time on me. You
love writing, I know you do.
Remember all those afternoons
in London when you would
sit in the grass at St. James
Park and write for hours inyour notebook? Tose are
some of your fondest memories
of last year! But think about
how much time youve wasted
lately poking mindlessly around
all corners of the Internet orlistening to om Waits instead
of developing that idea about
the girl cutting her hair in the
mirror. I like that idea. Youre
not going to become a better
writer if you dont dedicate a
significant amount of time to
me. You know Im right.
Nicolle:You are right, but
you know I love om Waits.
Cant I listen to him and
write at the same time?
Fiction:Tis isnt an
open relationship.
Nicolle:WaitIve got a great
idea: the girl in the mirror
idea butin the style of a om
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Waits spoken word piece: bleak,
disturbing imagery paired
with colloquial phrasing and
rhythmic sentence structure.
Fiction:Oh, I like it.
Nicolle:I knew you would.
Fiction:Okay, fine. Music hasa welcome place in our relation-
ship, as do the visual arts.
Nicolle:And pop culture?
Fiction:Only if Im al-
lowed to grumble about
it from time to time.Nicolle:Deal. Im glad we
had this talk, Fiction.
Fiction:I am too. I feel much
better about the direction in
which were heading. Want
to grab a smoke after this?Nicolle:You know
I dont smoke.
Fiction:In this story you do.
Nicolle:I love you, Fiction.
Fiction:I like you too, Nicolle.
Nicolle and Fiction exit the caf,pulling cigarettes and lighters from
their coat pockets as they go.E
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Brittany BergesonClass of 2011Mustard
Tat Rare, Random Descent(I think I made you up inside my head)
A Poem
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James SchmidtClass of 2013Istum
If you are curious aboutwhat someone is doing
usually a good wayto satisfy that curiosity is tolook at them. So I peer aroundmy desk and find that myroommate has his book openin front of him and his faceis oriented toward it. I say,
without much thinking aboutit at all, that he is reading. But
what about actions that areprimarily or essentially mentalphenomena? He may be look-ing off into space (whatever
that means, since what he islooking at is obviously notspace), but I would not say heis looking off into space. Atleast if I did, it would not bean accurate account of whathe is doing. What he is doing
is gathering his thoughts for apaper or recalling the delightfuldinner he had with that girllast evening. In those casesperhaps the best thing to dois ask: what are you doing?
Tinking. Well obviously, Ididnt really think you were
just staring off into spaceWhat are you thinking about?After all, the object of whichone is thinking determines thekind of thinking he is doing.1
So lets say the mental actionin question is prayer. I wantto look at it in a manner that isaccessible to people who do notthink prayer is what pray-ers
think it is. If we ask someonewhat he is doing he may sayI am praying, but the veryquestion I am calling to mindis What is that? o whichhe will probably say talking toGod and this answer is the oneI want to examine, even if wedo not accept that he really istalking to God or that there issuch a thing that someone cantalk to (in the first case we couldmerely think him a hypocrite
or babbler without denyingthe existence of the perceived
Faith
An Essay
1 I find the connection between
the object of our actions and our
actions very interesting. I hope to
pursue the question at some point.
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object). In that case, we wouldnot describe what he is doing astalking to God but as talkingtogether with thinking that
what he is talking to is God.So if I am conversing with afriend part of what drives me isthe belief that he is here. But
you is here, and so that ques-tion doesnt play a role in myinquiry. But when someone istalking, it is usually directed at
someone and the person talkingshould be able to say somethingabout who it is directed to.
No doubt we see a diffi-culty because my talking to youdoesnt involve any questioningthat I am indeed talking to you.But talking to God is differentbecause talking to him is notonly something that atheistsdoubt the authenticity of, it isone that seemingly believershave no ostensible way to
validate. So if someone asks,Who are you talking to? I willpull my friends arm and sayLook here. Te same cannotbe done with God. I supposepart of the reason is because
of the way one talks to him. Iasked a friend what prayer isand he told me that we set upa projection of what we believeto be God in our mind andtalk to
that. I think it is a good
description,2except that thosewho believe in God would notsay they are talking to a projec-tion but that we are talking toGod. So how can we reconcilethe statement, I am talking to
myself, (which is manifestlynot God) with the statement,I am talking to God? Teyseem to utterly contradict. Tisis an interesting problem, but Ithink the apparent contradic-tion is a superficial one and onethat is practically unavoidablein common language. Say aperson is sawing a plank andalso making a squeaky noise
with the saw.3 He is not doing
2 It is the one I want to use to
bridge the gap between an atheistand someone who thinks he is reallytalking to God, because I think it is adescription that both can agree with.3 I take this example fromAnscombes Intention, and thespirit of it, namely an action positedunder certain descriptions.
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these two things separately,but we need not describe bothtogether in order to describe
what he is doing. He is sawinga plank. Whatever else hemay be doing in sawing theplank is not the critical issueat hand when we ask Whatis he doing? Let me returnto the original question withanother an example.4Suppose
you are talking to a friend on
the phone. Te description youwill probably give of what youare doing is just that: talkingto a friend. But I say that isnot all you are doing: you areholding something in your handand you are speaking wordsinto some inanimate object- aphone- which receives your
words, transmits them, and spitsthem out somewhere else. Butit happens in such a way thatI dont really quibble with you
when you say you are talking toa friend, even though, properlyspeaking, what you are talkingto is hopefully notyour friend.
Presumably the example ismeant to show the plausibility
that a projection in our mindcan serve- in the way a phonecan- as an intermediary forour communication with God.Now the important questionbecomes how I can justify thatsuch an intermediary mustbeused in order to communicate
with God. With a friend overthe phone, you can in theory,
validate his existence by e.g.going over to his house. In ad-
dition you probably didnt beginyour friendship by calling himup; you met him. For now I will
just deal with the justificationfor the use of intermediary. Fora person who prays, the claimis that God canbe validated byexperience. Now this is awfullypeculiar because it cannot bedone in the same way that Ipull my friend over to you andsay Here he is! But that justmeans that the validation, if it
is anything, is a different kindof validation. For example,
4 I owe the use of this ex-
ample to a friend, though I am
not sure he knew at the time the
significance to be found in it.
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you live in Chicago and I sayyou should meet my friend Joe(I do not live in Chicago). Icannot pull him over and showhim to you. Te best I can
do is tell you where to go andwhether you do that or not isyour prerogative. Since talkingto God takes place withyourprojection of him inyourmind,the best I can do is tell you howto get to it. What happens, in
theory, is that that projectionis validated in the prayer.
Tis too is strange sincethe thing to be validated mustto some degree already beaffirmed. It is not that case
with my friend. I say I havea friend and you say I do notbelieve you. Ten I say Fuck
you, here he is. But say it ismidnight and I come to you in
your room and say, Youll neverbelieve who I saw just now at
the library: aylor Swift! Teonly way you can verify what Isaid is to go there yourself. Butit is midnight and you are tiredso the only reason you wouldgo is if you have a reasonable
amount of certainty that I amnot messing around with you.
Tat certainty (in what I say)is really a certainly that shereally is at the library. So it
is not always ridiculous that acertain level of trust in a claimis needed in order to validate it.I say a certain level but I do notknow what that level is. If youasked a praying Christian, Do
you believe that you are really
talking to God? they wouldprobably say yes, but I haveno idea if they would say thatthey knowit. And I agree thatsaying something can be a verydifferent thing from being right
while saying it; I know plenty ofpeople who make claims that Ithink are straight up stupid. Butthat is irrelevant: I am sayingthat ifit can be known, thenthe way it is to be known is bytrying it out, which admittedly
involves a bit of pre-knowledgebelief in the thing to be
validated, and the only way myclaim can be validated (if it canbe) is by doing what I say, notthinking about it. Luckily for
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me, this also means that myargument cannot be invalidated(probably because if you failedI could say try harder... I havea feeling something like this
was going on in Platos caveanalogy: You couldnt seethe Good? Tat must mean
you arent a philosopher!)Even if this is true, it is
entirely appropriate to ask whyit should be that way. After
all, if there is an infinitelypowerful being, he could havemade the world in a way suchthat his existence needs noantecedent belief to be known.I dont doubt this for a mo-ment. And I see this as a greatproblem in the philosophy aboutChristianity: if it is true (as Ibelieve it is) then why didnthemake it in that way. It seemsthere is an impasse at thispoint, because I certainly do
not have the answer, though ananswer to this question probably
would be the very thing thatwould convince people faith issomething worth having. I willtry to approach the problem
from a human perspective.Say that you have grown tolove someone (so not e.g. yourparents or siblings) and at somepoint in your relationship you
express this love, for exampleby saying I love you. We couldcall this a critical point: theresponse to that expressiondetermines everything. It couldbe something like, I love youtoo or I, on the other hand,
do not love you or, perhaps,But how do I knowthat youlove me? Perhaps you can tryto prove it5by taking over the
world for that person, but it ispretty easy to see the difficultyof proving such a claim in the
way that you would e.g. prove amathematical proposition. Tebest you can do is offer evidence
5 For an interesting reflection on this
idea I encourage my reader to read
or see the play Proof. Some people
think it is about a crazy mathemati-cian or a mathematical proof. My
opinion is that it is actually about
the basis of assent to the truth of a
claim, which in this case, is trust in
a person, and the basis of that
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for the claim but even thenFor example you say, I will
be faithful to you for the restof my life, and your fidelityup to this point is offered asevidence for the claim. Maybeit is evidence, but I think a verypoor kind of evidence (thoughI guess better than if you hadcheated already), since the way
you will be in ten years is verydifficult to determine (I mean
impossible) by the way you arenow. Tis fact should causepeople to question what level ofknowledge they should have ina person before they get mar-ried. I have heard people justifycohabitation for this reason by
saying that only by it can youhave sufficient knowledge ofthe person you are dedicating
yourself to. It is interesting tonote that the success of mar-riages is found more on the
side of those who dont makeuse of such verification. AndI think the reason is becausesuch verification simply cannotbe found. o think that it canis to deceive oneself about the
basis of human relationships.Te basis of them is trust in aperson; trust, not knowledge,that that person will notbetray you. But they very wellcould, and that is the thingthat makes vulnerability sucha painful thing to deal with
when it is exploited. But it isthe vulnerability that makes theacceptance of their trusting sur-render meansomething. If you
say I love you and I say Ah yes,of course you do. I know thisbecause x. Terefore, I love youtoo my response to you is not aresponse toyou, it is a responseto my mathematical deliberationover x. If a person withholds
giving or receiving love for orfrom another until they havemathematical certitude aboutthe security of that investment(of their self), that person isgoing to live a solitude that
borders the loneliness of hell.6
6 In the Popes book Introduction to
Christianity, he sets up the machinery
to establish this conclusion, that love
is impossible without faith. He does
it much more elegantly and thor-
oughly, but it is also more theological.
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Mathematicians are crazypeople and it would do wellfor humanity to keep mathcaged up in its box (perhapsmathematicians too!), andlimit the expectations for thatlevel of certitude only to thosethings from which we canreasonably expect it. o failin this with respect to humanrelationships would be to misssight of what they are ultimately
about. My impression is thereis something like this goingon with divine faith. Te onlyquestionable thing is that myfaith in my friend is faith abouthis character, which is based- asleast in its early stages- uponmy history with him, a historythat has no doubt about hisexistence. Te question I havenot covered is why existence[ofGod] is one of those thingsabout which we are supposed to
also have faith. On this pointI have nothing to say now.E
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a
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Josef KuhnClass of 2011Program of Liberal Studies
Sliced n Diced(dont we love our salads and plastic surgery) A Poem
Te state of the Arts
and Sciences today
is sliced updiced up.
Pick your occupation
from the slate
Dr. Chef will prepare it for you
just waitfor your weekend
vacation on a plate
prescribed vocation
spread-eagled Man
in a circle
laid out on a dissection table.
No, I
dont want to be sliced up
diced up.
Mix
your colors.
Emancipate
your palate!
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But
Reality demands it
Practicality demands it
Modernity demands it
University demands it
Economy demands itaxonomy demands it
Te Progress
and Wealth of Nations
brigands it.
Backback in the
age of Man
in shacks, or before shacks
the Noble Savage
dreamt by ceiling painters
back in the day of lionsCuisineArt
chunked chicken
did not exist.
Te flesh was roasted,
the body eaten whole.
(Renaissance Man may be a myth.)
But you could yet exist
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John AshleyClass of 2011Philosophy Club
Its a terrifyingly bright day.
Te sun blazes like a white-hotquarter. And theyre coming.
But they shouldnt be. Tey
dont come out during the day.
Tey dont come out during
the day! Teyre supposed to
stay under the ground. Whycant they behave, like good
little terrors of the night?
I walk, more quickly. Sweat
pops out on my forearms. I stay
out of the shadows. Tats where
they hide, now. First, theylurked in the tunnels, in the
sewers, places where no sunlight
could be found. Ten the dead
of a new moon night was good
enough for them. Ten any
night, dark, stormy, or clear.
Now the shadows cast at noon.
I turn the corner, onto the
square. Its desolate. Everyones
elsewhere. Somewhere. Not
here, where they should be.
My mind trips, stumbles.
I fall to the ground.
I can see them, but just,
in the corners of the corners
of my eyes. So faint, but
just there enough to thrownormality off the rails, like
a long-lasting nausea, a vile
stench for the minds nose.
I get up, recover. Deep
breaths. Balance returns. I
dont move and screw myeyes shut. I open them again.
Teyre gone. Gone! I want to
shout and scream, but dont.
Tat might bring them back.
I realize, then, that I will not
survive till tomorrow, unless
I take action. I have to run.
And more than run. Flee.
Escape this town-gone-mad.
I start walking again, stick-
ing to the middle of streets
weirdly empty of cars, taking
the most well-lit if not most
direct way back to my house.
My mind firms in resolve, at
times even daring to suppose
that they couldnt have been
Stern Chase
A Story
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following me. After all, they
dont come out during the day.
Tey just dont. And the one
time that they did...my mind
retches at the memory, and
I think I pass out. Just for amoment, though, and Im still
in the middle of the street.
Te forces of my sanity blow
their horns, sounding a regroup,
and then a counter-charge.
Plans start to form. Ill packquickly, get in the car, and drive
out. As quickly as I can, and
good luck to Sheriff Fort if she
tries to stop me. If shes in his
pocket. In their pocket. Who
knows? But she did stop David,took his license and keys for...
something. And Ill be safe, too.
Its bright day, not night. I wont
end up like Rick and Molly, at
the base of the seaside road...
I walk past the church, then,
and look up out ofwhat?
Reflex? Curiosity? But it undoes
me. Te church is bright, empty
except for the preacher leaning
on the wall. He looks at me and
smiles, like a hound. He raises
a hand in greeting. It seems like
the gesture that ends the world.
I run.
And I see them. Teyre
following me. Following him. Te preacher starts walking,