Project before Procrastination

In English, we're working on philospohy. This comes mostly in the form of two projects: a presentation on a philosophy, and a report on how literature has influenced our own philosophy. Considering the last suject in English was religion, my teacher seems to be aiming for subjects that are best left alone around me.

I'll got into the project of influence first. I have to write about how literature has influenced my own personal philosophy. This would be easy, except that literature has had only minor roles in my philosophical developement. I began thinking about philosophy as a kid with the, very creepy question, "why am I me?" I was brought up Catholic, which usually means leaving all those answers to faith, but in junior high I moved into science and rationalization. I spent those years trying to understand existence. In the middle of it came what has been the single greatest influence on my philosophy: Neon Geneisis Evangelion. (What? You were expecting maybe Sartre?) This might seem strange, but the last two episodes of Eva are actually very weird and ... the expression "mind fuck" comes to mind. I spent two weeks trying to wrap my head around the idea that our preception affects or even effects the world. It also had other ideas, but basically, for me, it turned philosophy from something that you wrote in stone into a playground. That opened the floodgates for ideas like Orson Scott Card's philotes, quantum and string theory, and many more.

Since then, I've decided that I think the world exists for something, but I don't know or care what. Even if the answer to life, the universe and everything is ever solved (forty-two), I doubt it will be in my lifetime. So for all intents and purposes, I consider my life absurd, without meaning, and I live how I want. Oh, and hoping the thin line over to religion breifly, in case I haven't said this already, I don't believe in or care about life after death. I'm hoping for nothing, I could use the rest.

Whatever other influences in philosophy I've picked up from books affect more my interactions than my fundamental doctrine. Hamlet was the first time I realized just how mortal I am. It wasn't his famous soliloquy, it was simply "there is no good or bad, but thinking makes it so." That phrase, and other parts of Shakespeare made me realize that other people had had my same thoughts and just how similar we are in thinking as humans. Before then I had also always thought myself alone in my beliefs. It also gave me something to quote for my ideas or morals, but thinking back, I don't know how I got there. Lack or good and evil stemed from my thoughts of perspective, objectivity and subjectivity. It came from realizing that there is no quantifiable good or evil and that they are mearly opinions, at most, social norms. I can't think of any book that influenced this.

That covers my raison d'etre and morals, now for my modus operati. My choices (actually, I'm a hardcore determinist, but that a belief and impractical for everyday life) I make based off of two things. The first is video games. This may sound weird, but I've learned a lot about myslef from video games. I know that I usually play the good guy, and that because I've found that it gets me more. If you give to others, they'll give back. I don't consider this some devine law (see golden rule, "what goes around comes around," and karma), just good sociological advice. It doesn't always work and it's not always direct, but it has worked for me (that, some luck, and good planning are what I think got me to Japan). In a way, it's its own greed. The other thing is that I like to keep things interesting. That's why I like chaos and anarchy (please remember back to the entry where I explained that by chaos, I don't mean death and destrution). I like adventure and doing things spontaniously. I like walking around cities to see what I can find, even if I end up walking in circles all day. I'll make mistakes, even on purpose if I think I'll get something out of it. I'd go as far as to say that my eccentricity keeps me from going crazy with bordom. Oh, and for the report, I'll find a way to link this last thought to the ending of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere.

For the report, I'll also be looking for ways to link this all to Dr. Seuss, Calvin and Hobbes and other kids' books (hence my earlier entry).

That was my take on one of the projects (now you see why philosophy is a bad topic around me). The other project, I'm working with two others on existentialism. It's strange because my beliefs are almost entirely opposite this, yet I find it very practical. It most revolves around the ideas that we are what we do, that we are free, we are responsible for ourselves, we are what we make of ourselves and cetera. I would prefer some component of thought and not action, but like I said, it's practical.

Our project comes in two parts: a hand out and a presentation. I've designed pamphlets and I'm waiting for word from the other members of my group before I start working on the presentation. I've also looked up a lot of the information we need for the project. We deligated different parts ot different people, but after my last group projects, I'm not taking chances. I've already found what information I need and I'm looking for the rest while going over everything I can find of value. I'm not saying that the others aren't doing work, they have, I just don't want to be sitting in this seat at two the morning it's due because someone didn't get something done on time. I don't want to take over, but I want to have a backup. I usually do this by simply doing all I can and saying "this is what I have, do whatever you want with it," ("all I have" usually including more than was expected of me).

I might put the project up on here if anyone's interested.

Anyways, I'm going to write more, but in a new post.

Oh, right the title. Existentialism is usually defined as "existence before essence," so I swapped existence for our project and essence for procrastination. That would be more profound if I had time to think about it.