love is one of the biggest issues dealt with in the matrix trilogy. love is also one of the key virtues that is needed to progress in Plato's view of the world. the interconnected nature of man is a principle that is accentuated by the fact that love is a necessary human virtue to have in order to make an impact on others and this world. Neo used love as a tool to motivate his actions and it was love that was the difference between him and his predecessors and what makes the journey to fulfill his purpose successful. without love the human resistance to the machines would never have been able ot work and the humans would have been wiped out. love is used as an inspiration point for neo's actions and the lives saved by many people.

Ancient philosophers had an incredible influence on their societies that can only be paralleled to religion's influence or the scientific influence today. In the days where people were taught by philosophers like socrates and aristotle their beliefs were what drove the educational ways and what people knew and leaerned to be the good. the role of religion in the ancinet greek society was not near as invasive as modern religious teachings. I guess it's more of the fact that the greek gods did not have teachings only perceived influence on nature and the orgin of the world. in modern times people looks to religions to answer the old philosophical questions from old writings by the founders of each religion. but now the ideas are turning to be older and the only people who have influence on followers of the religion are the interpreters of the ancient teachings. the answer to the good life is as simple as being commited to a lifestyle and belief system. Is this a progression of ideas towards a better and more meaningful life? I believe that Socrates would disagree as there is not a quest for knowledge and wisdom in the majority of the modern religious ideas. the principle idea of divinity for socrates was that only through logic and the pursuit of knowledge will we ever know what the divine is, and this is the sort of thinking that promotes finding truth and true wisdom in this lifetime.

what would socrates think about the way that people are treating the world today? the way socrates wanted people to think was thinking critically of the decisions of the mainstream world. now people are creating harmful actions to the world, like create pollution and spill oil in the ocean, and its treated as something that is acceptable to society. the earth itself was something that the greeks appreciated and treated it with a sense of divine care as it was a product of the gods. would socrates, someone who died for his beliefs as opposed to leave his beloved city, condone burning coal and polluting the earth at our own whim? i would like to believe it would be something that he would detest and if it would any way harm the greater city it would be disgraceful to socrates. bringing up some sort of future decay in a point about socrates may be outlandish but the idea remains of what the ancients believed the earth to be and what kind of esteem they held their cities is something that is not as present in today's world.

Why have so many philosophers since the days of the ancient Greek philosophers not had a lot to say about the nature of being? Is it the idea that so much more a focus has been placed on the actual actions and life of an individual as opposed to the nature of reality? Even before postmodernism opened up the doors for complete moral relativism and subjectivity, the world of philosophy was unfocused on the escaping idea of what is truly underneath our perceptions. The rise of science has had a large influence on what people believe and the desire for people to look past the knowledge that is given to them and wonder what exactly we can know for sure. Some on the ancient Greeks contemplated things about the world that were not proven for over two thousand years, like the idea of tiny elements that made up the world that were called atoms by people like Democritus. Ideas like this are no longer really found except for people who are on the cutting edge of research of science. The world has been deconstructed by the scientists and people who were once seen as the great minds of their time, like the ancient Greeks, are now looked down upon and the mysteries that they once uncovered and wondered about are swept aside by computers and people who no longer care about the underlying reality of the world we live in.

How does philosophy run through your mind on a daily basis? Is it something that you think about when you make decisions? Is it a tool to finding meaning and worth to your life? Without it can one really live a happy and fullfilled life? To me philosophy is something that takes form in a way that shapes the way I think about what is important to me and how I want to make my life. Also it helps change the way that I go about doing everyday actions at times, like walking down the street listening to my ipod, and how the little things can help make the world more beautiful and enjoyable. Part of using philosophy as a tool to find truth is the basic use of the mindset of an aware person and participant in this world. The world is full of people who have their own way of looking at the world and finding one's own path through all of that is what makes using philosophy beneficial as to not get sucked up in others' viewpoints. Being able to see what people think and use that as a foundation to pick my own path is part of why philosophy is part of my life and knowing that many others have walked this earth and put their ideas onto paper is a great part of trying to understand what great people have thought about and tried to do and all I can do is try my best to make something out of the life i have been given by using my mind and imagination to create something beautiful to hold on to.

the nature of emotion

many philosphers make out life to be one of thought and intellect, but there is not as much focus of one's emotions. Emotions are what arguably drives the real forces of human nature, whether or not people agree with that it has merit. The drives may not be full of logic but when someone feels a deep desire of anger, greed, love the reaction is displayed and the action is committed. Humans have been driven by all sorts of emotions and whether or not it is the ideal "good" life that is desired by many of the ancient and modern philosophers it is the point that makes people unique. if people lived their lives based on logic then many people would not find joy or happiness other than in contemplation and idleness, part of what makes this world good is the fact that people can be expressed and in a sense felt by those around them. the interconnectedness of people to each other is part of the bond that makes emotions possible and integral to every type of action and feeling that it projects. being part of this world is something that philosophers do not generally hold in high praise but in doing that part of what it is to be human is rejected from that person.

One of the most interesting distinctions to me is the way that plato and aristotle differ on the means of achieving a good and aware life. plato focuses on the journey itself to awareness or an intellectual plateau. the act of asking oneself what to pursue in life is the point that plato harps on and challenges individuals to do in order to get something meaningfull out of life. aristotle wants action from people, and this action is what drives people to do things that are good and from that people see what is the good in people and this touches the divine. the method that aristotle uses appears to have an influence on the existentialist movement, which is incredible that such an old philosophy drove a major movement in the 19th and 20th century. both of these ways to the good life are usefull throughout history and even in the modern age and thats pretty dang cool.

why i believe that aristotle is not a hippie

i would like to start by saying that in no way is this entry anti-hippie. I started to think about people who had radical ideas of our recent history and an interesting thought came to me: what would Aristotle have been like, let alone, what would he have said about the hippies. Aristotle's idea that love is intertwined with truth it about as close as his beliefs get to the free lovin spirit. He supports the idea of political science as the ultimate outcome of a good acting person. The hippies are not known for liking political systems even if it was towards the human process. even the idea of taking "mind expanding" drugs for the hippies is not how Aristotle would want people to see the divine, he would rather people see it in their actions driving toward the good, the ideas of meditation and peace are not the one's that Aristotle would enjoy as he likes action and the pushing of ideas. The last thought i had of this nature was would Aristotle think the hippies are happy as they give free love and are not a benefit to his society and protest the government, I say that he would believe them to live an empty life. If only he was born in the 1960's

reflecting on the matrix

Having seen The Matrix multiple times before, I never really looked too much into the ideas that stood behind much of what the movie is trying to convey. One of my favorite ideas that is used by the movie that is tied to an ancient is the idea of flux as it is said by Heraclitus. The matrix itself is constantly being changed and moved by the underlying code of numbers that keeps the matrix running and never consisting of the same thing but always appearing constant. I always liked the idea that the matrix was made as just numbers that were behind the images that we perceive and that it represents reality, which is where Pythagoras is found in the movie's philosophy. The idea that this futuristic reality is filled with ancient philosophies gets back at part of what we are studying these ancients for and why people should study them, that even in the future the world may be made up of the same thing that people have thought for centuries.

Part of what is mentioned in Martin Luther King's letter from Birmingham jail is the idea of learning from the past, trying to break out from the oppression of evil or injustice that can be presented to anyone. What has been talked about in our classroom lately is the question of what can be taken from these ancient writers? Can they be seen as philosophers, authors, or visionaries? MLK refers to the ancient writers such as Aquinas and Socrates and their beliefs and how they can still relate today, an aspect that many current people still forget, especially in the political scope. The idea of freedom and personal rights is something that Aquinas believed as it was rooted in the eternal, while Socrates practiced "civil disobidience" in order to show an aspect of the political system that he believed was flawed and not thought about. This is a reason that the ancients, however long ago, can still be relevant today, even now people do not recognize what MLK's message contained and just appreciate him at face value for what he gave but not always why he sacrificed himself for his cause. Regardless of the era people should look to the people who made a difference and why they acted accordingly, and people from earlier in time can still have a lot to say in contemporary times.

Intro

Currently I am a student at Baylor university studying psychology and philosophy. Most of where I feel my education is focused is on the ideas and studies surrounding people and their lives in a general sense. Psychology is about figuring out the brain and human function, along with characteristics and behaviors that follows the human race around. Philosophy is more focused on knowledge and what we as humans have the capacity to understand and what could be out there that we try to understand. I enjoy the environment that I study in for two main reasons. First, Baylor is a private university where small class sizes are very common and interaction between class mates is common so it brings the ideas of each person into a class setting where diverse ideas can be found and thought about. Second, the fact that it is a Baptist university also brings a strong pull to a religious aspect of education and learning, which helps foster a general knowledge of, mostly Christian, religious views as it is one of the biggest aspects of human life that most people on earth acknowledge. This is the focus and setting of what I have been learning about the last few years and although broad it will shed some light on the ideas and specifics of things that I talk about as my year goes on.