Noli Timere Cladem Sed Ab Eo Disce!

Don't Fear Defeat But Learn From It!

I am NOT doing well in Latin class right now, and to be honest I'm slightly concerned that I will fail to pass...again. And if I fail to pass I won't try a third time. I will take French and pass in one term what I've attempted for three semesters, now.

I believe I have mentioned previously that I prefer to do what I think is hard, rather than what I'm good at. I like to try to do things to prove I can.
But I'm not stupid...failing a class twice is pretty much proof that it's time to move on. But, if I do fail Latin again and switch back to French, I will be extremely lucky in that the things I've learned in the past two years will be extremely useful not only in learning another language but in regular writing. I know more about grammar and composition now then I have ever learned in English class.

So I've decided not to be defeatist about the fact that I'm not doing too well. I'm going to learn what I can from it and go from there. And I find that this should also apply to everything else I do. If a friendship ends, or a relationship goes screwy, there's no reason to think of it as a failure, but as a learning experience. Knowing that I will never have children makes it much easier to say no to a guy asking me out now, even if he's cute, if he wants kids down the road. And this means I can pass on the advice to other people. So here's my advice for relationships--from a philosophical standpoint.

If you're old enough to start to care about what might happen in the future of a relationship, make sure you both agree in three things : sex, finances and kids.  Anything else can be reached through compromise. If one of you wants a house and one wants an apartment--get a townhouse. If you want a huge dog (oh, say, an old English mastiff) and he doesn't like dogs--get an easily taken care of dog (NOT a long-haired energetic monster, either!) But if he wants children soon and you know you'll never want them or not for a long time (or want to adopt and he insists on biological) DON'T say yes to another date! If she thinks you should have your own bank accounts and each pay only your own bills and you think a joint account and a cash "fun money" allowance is the way to go DON'T move in together! If he is strongly monogamous and gets jealous at cuddles and kisses with friends at the club and you don't think he has any right to know who you're sleeping with on any particular night DON'T sleep together again!

Optimism is all well and good in love and relationships, but these three core ideals won't change (don't give me that sh*t about women changing their minds about kids, not wanting them and not being ready for them are two completely separate things!) Optimism in school is just as fantastic...but don't waste another year on something you just cannot do.

Solomnus Pro Infirmus Est--Terminus Hebdomadis Convivium Est

Sleep is the for the weak, the weekend is for partying.  (lit trans the end of the week is a party)

I went to Billy Connolly on Friday night and a super round of birthday parties on Saturday. I will actually have a post again on Sunday night after my father tries to explain that philosophers need to pay attention to Quantum String Mechanics (Mechanics, not theory...those damned Right-Wingers think "theory" means it can be argued.)

Celer Vilis Bonus Duo Trium

Fast, Cheap, Good --Two of the Three

Now, I of course learned this little three-legged law back in Econ class...but it's not the only tres triumvirate there is. (That's a pun, get it?)

Work, Social, Love -- You get ONE, baby!

That's right, you get only ONE aspect of your life to go GREAT at any one time. All three can go okay, two can go well...but if you try to focus on one to make it really stand out, the others that are okay always fall. Seriously. Say you start dating someone new (that would be "love" *ahem*), your friends (that's "social") start to complain that you're not giving them enough time...or your boss (do you really need me to tell you that's "work"?) wonders why you're late in the morning or falling asleep at your computer.
Human beings can't win when it comes to managing their lives. We're just not made to operate in this regimented world where there's so little overlap. If we met our spouses (spice?) at work, it would be understood by everyone around. Our friends would be in our typing pool (do we see where this is going along Ange's line of mysogeny?) and all would be right in the world.

Because women are inundated with the idea that we must please everyone all of the time we can't do it. So, you know, I feel guilty about putting myself first. I feel guilty about a lot of things. But I never feel guilty about doing something for someone else...why is that?

Non Vir--Solus Homo

Not Man--Only Human (The adjective "Solus" is masculine, that doesn't make "human" refer to men only. All careers are feminine nouns.  Do we really want to be less open minded than the Romans about gender, people?)

Could it be that without the fighting between men and women for dominance we'd be too dangerous to other races/countries? Is that why we differentiate between genders in things even those that don't need to be differentiated? Okay, I get the idea of gendered bathrooms, even if I think full length unisex stalls make more sense. I get the idea of dressing babies in different colours just to spare the parents having to constantly answer the question "is it a boy or a girl". (Which is itself a stupid question. A healthy baby is a good enough thing to occur, gender withstanding!) But what the hell is up with words like "man-bag" and "man-whore".
I have grocery bags, shoulder bags, carry-on bags, messenger bags...I don't have a woman-bag. Why is there a need to specify that the bag a man is carrying is not a shoulder bag? It's kept on his shoulder, it carries things that don't fit in his pockets, it frees up his hands. Why the hell is carrying a bag such a negatively feminine idea that "man" has to be put in front of the word to make it acceptable to carry something that from its appearance is not gendered but immensely practical? 
And does "whore" really need to have the word "man" in front of it? It's already an insult, isn't it? Do you have to specify that you're only insulting his sexual proclivities and not also implying that he's feminine. Does calling a guy a "whore" really imply he's feminine, anyway? I don't think so. Himbo/bimbo is another one. "Man tart" is possibly the most absolutely ridiculous one I've heard. 
Not to say that "man" in front of a word traditionally applied to women is always stupid. Man boobs, for one. Breast implants aside, there's only one way a guy gets these and it's NOT from a distinct inflow of estrogen (notice I say guy, here. I believe MTF trans should be given the label of female as soon as they identify, I don't care what other steps they've taken.) So that one can stay.


But really, I can't help but think there must be some reason that even women use these stupid terms...as if even they agree that it's demeaning for a man to have a non-gender specific word applied to him without first making it "manly".


Simone De Beauvoir...where are you when we need you?

Vitia Futilis--Assimulabimini...Tempore.

Existence is Futile--You Will Be Assimilated...by Time.

I missed Monday night because once I finished writing my paper on the philosophy involved in W.B. Yeats' "An Irish Airman Foresees His Death" I had to fold laundry (TWO sets, what's up with that?) and go to bed.

So to make up for it, here's an interesting idea that I'm actually considering for my Master's thesis instead of the ontological and epistemological uselessness of gender identification. Then go watch Dr Who. You're welcome.

Does time flow, does time exist, how does time flow, how does time exist?
It doesn't. Almost too easy, right? But it doesn't in the way that depth doesn't exist. That is, there is something that exists IN the third dimension, and the second and the first...but there is no -third- dimension that exists independently without something in it. That's right, I'm a realist. Deal with it. But it is the same way with time. Time does not exist except for the fact that we as a species can identify that time exists. If a tree falls in a forest it makes no sound unless a human hears it. Prove me wrong, listen to a recording of a fallen log. Oh, right, you just heard it!
On top of the lack of existence of time, however, is the flow of time. Does "Tempus Fugit"? Nope. Not at all. However, Fugimus In Temporem, We Fly Away In Time. I mean, the same way there is no third dimension without there being something to exist in that third dimension there is no fourth (or 3 1/2th, whateves).  We have a dimension of time because we move within it.

Now, here's the thing I'm not sure about: are we continually different beings? We flicker between each non-important change until we no longer recognise ourselves. I am NOT a baby (shut UP, okay?) I am not an old woman (I SAID shut UP!). But somehow I seem to be getting from one to the other.
Plato's forms...Aristotle's ideals...how do I change when my properties cannot change but must be replaced? How can I be tanned now when I wasn't tanned at birth, if it's an essential property. And if it's not an essential property then why is the colour of my skin the only thing separating me from some doppelganger wandering around Vancouver? (Seriously, I got asked TWICE what my name is and if I'm from Edmonton. Do two other women have peacock hair, or do they think I'm their friend, now changed? WTF?)
I get this image that within each second, we flicker in and out of existence...becoming that slightly different person we need to be to make the "passage of time" worthwhile.
Or maybe I should really NOT be allowed to watch "Bill and Ted" right before reading Prior.

Hopefully, now that the crunch before finals is over, I'll be more interesting. Don't count on it but I think my next post will be about sex, if at least about gender politics.

Dominica Non Numerat

Sunday Doesn't Count

I am not able to philosophise. I was up late, got up early, drank too much and worked too hard.

All the muscles in my body hurt. And why? Because I was the Princess at Noir Fetish Ball (NSFW). What does that entail? Well, I didn't manage to get past the front bar at the club for an HOUR; I had too many people to greet and chat with. I always knew where the host was, to make sure issues could be resolved immediately. I was there FAR past closing to make sure everyone was gone and all the stuff came home. And when I didn't want to deal with something, or needed someone to do something outrageous...out came the lanyard that says "Princess".

Needless to say, I might have been slightly drunk with power (and particularly awesome beer thanks to Ezra at The New Cobalt). But I'm a benevolent dictator so I can't see how that could be a bad thing. Also, if I'm a benevolent dictator then the dictatorship is theological. I answer to a higher power...namely the promoters. And they're MUCH worse. LOL

Back at philosophy tomorrow, after writing a paper interpreting the moral purpose of Yeat's Irish Airman.

I lead an interesting life.

Mox Heri Fit Hodie et Heri Numquam Venit

Soon Yesterday Becomes Today and Tomorrow Never Comes.

There is a certain type of person who lives in the past. When fights occur, things done days, months, even years in the past are brought as accusation. They lend themselves to the anger of the moment and punishment can be meted. You might be thinking this certain type of person is "woman"; you would be wrong.
I am a very present-oriented person. I know how I feel now, at this moment. Perhaps I can think of what's occured over the past week...sometimes the past month. I do not care or consider what happened months ago when making decisions. I do not bring up what happened last week that made me mad, when arguing, unless it is an example of a repeated behaviour that is the focus of the discussion. I do not care if you never call me, if we're discussing the fact that you're always late, for example (obviously an example as I hate talking on the phone). This might seem, to people confused by the stereotypical "woman's argument" of constant reminders of failure, to be a godsend. This is not the case. Because while I will not remember the bad things you've done, neither will I remember the good. Oh, joy, that if I haven't been taken to dinner this month I will complain that I -never- get taken to dinner, never mind C Restaurant just last month. (Specific, yes. This is the closest you're getting to an apology, you-know-who-you-are.)

But the other part of this little time-dilation of mine is that I am FEARFUL of the future. I do not like to plan for it. I do not like to think on it...and when I do think on it it's in the most negative way possible. It's not a stunted adolescence type thing, I don't think. (There's plenty of other evidence for that!) It's simply that I am always striving to make my present as pleasant as possible (notice the "hedonist" in the label up there?) that I can't think how change could possibly be a good thing...even if it's success! I know I should be planning how to get into grad school. I know I should at least be planning what to do if I don't get in right away. But I'm not. I can barely focus on the paper that I have due in three days (no worries, it's all written in my head.) I know I should enjoy the time I have with friends, without concerning myself as to whether our friendship will change for the worse if things alter right now. If I don't call someone for days it's often because I'm afraid that I haven't called them in a while (remember the selective past memory?) and they'll be upset. It's Schrodinger's Friendship...if you don't call there's as much possibility that they're not mad as that they are. It goes for relationships, too. I do not like them to change. Even in the best ways possible, I know it's always the worst thing I can do. Luckily I'm also a romantic, so after digging in my boot heels I still fall head over heals or the equivalent.

What I'm saying is, the past is a distant memory, the future should never arrive, and the present that I have is pretty damned awesome. Thanks, every single one of you around, that make it that way.

Exstincta Sum

I am burned out.

Seriously, I have nothing to talk about: I'm stressed about the end of the term, I got a really crappy mark on my Lit paper, I'm dealing with a stressed out friend, I'm not quite sure what the hell is going on in my life.

I'm going to take the day off.

Difficila Pensa Non Semper Optimae Res Facere Sunt

Difficult Tasks Are Not Always the Best Things to Do.

I got 76% on my Ontology paper but 93% on my Lit one. Yet, my focus if I choose to go on with philosophy will be on reality, modality, existentialism and gender roles.
I have published one short story in all my years, no novels at all, but my poetry seems to be a big hit.
Why? Why is it that I feel the need to strive to succeed at things I'm obviously less talented at? Why don't I publish poem after poem. Get a degree in Literature and teach new kids the difference between who and whom for the rest of my life? What is this need I have to prove I can do what I see other people doing, even when I am inherently bad at it?

Because I find them rewarding, I suppose. The fact that I'll never publish a story doesn't mean that I'm not proud to have written them. I wrote two novels, how many people that you meet say that? And even though I'll probably graduate with too low an average to get into a Master's program, I will still be able to say I have a degree in Philosophy and my favourite writers are Russell and Kripke, not Atwood and Shakespeare.
More accurately, though, my poetry doesn't say anything about me or the way I think. It is a series of words put down on paper to express a single thought at a single moment. There is no deep meaning to anything I do that I succeed at.  It's only in my failure that you see what I actually am.

Is that a human trait, I wonder? Or is it Middle Child Syndrome? My sister is ridiculously gifted in artistic endeavours; she understands literature and cares about it in a way I never will. I do not like to read literature. Hell, I'm not a fan of poetry. To succeed with something I don't like seems cheap to me, a cop out. And I don't think there actually is a philosophical stance to most literature. There's a point, certainly, often a moral. But the moral rarely has anything to do with the Philosophy of Ethics--it's usually a nice way of convincing people to either keep their heads down and do what's best for the community or to think for themselves and make sure to do what they think is best. Anyone else notice the dichotomy? Yeah, me too. Morality is for philosophers that don't care why the sky is blue, as long as we can all see it.
(On that topic, the double rainbow meme is my favourite one ever. What does it mean? Isn't it nice to ask?) I don't want to do the easy thing and have an easy grey life. I want to be stimulated and frustrated and have someone tell me I'm an idiot for saying something that another person praises. I don't have anything to contribute to philosophy that someone smarter than me, and more able to express themselves, can contribute. But Imma ride one their coattails 'til they get wise to my attention-seeking ways.

Pulverem Pulveri Est Quod Oculus Talio pro Oculo Est

It is Dust to Dust Because an Eye is Payment for an Eye

We are a vindictive species. We build celebrities up to tear them down. We wallow in the disgrace of unpopular politicians and revel in the failure of the popular ones. We like to know we are not the only average smucks...if you stick your neck out you'll end up with egg on your face.

So here's a thought...what's up with the penal system? In a short discussion on suitable punishment for violent crime that I was involved in (in order to get juiciness to write on this, of course) one participant suggested that "rotting in jail is a much better sentence than ending someone's life. Can't do much reflection or suffering in death." Yet I can remember (not clearly, as I was young and more interested in NKOTB than in opinions on capital punishment) hearing something that stuck with me, namely, that "we put down mad dogs, right? Should mad humans be different?"What is the point of the judicial system, anyway?
I don't trust the current judicial system enough to commit to capital punishment, but I will defend vehemently anyone who kills in self-defense or the defense of another. I would quite happily break Mr. Pickton's neck for him if he'd just step this way, because I am sure, I am sure, that he did what he's been convicted of. I don't believe in ending someone's life just because they've commited a capital crime. Rather, I think it's important to remove dangers from society so that society can thrive. And some people are just going to be dangerous until they are no more. I also don't believe that the penitentiary should be used to make someone suffer for their crime or give them time to reflect on the consequences of their actions. The only way one person can be absolved of the guilt of what they've done, in my mind, is to repent of it and make restitution with the victim...if not the victim then to society as a whole. Jail is an outward sign of paying that restitution and it's a time to learn that the repentence is needed, not through reflection but through understanding the point of society--why you hurt yourself by hurting others. Pain and suffering is not the goal, I hope, I think...but we are a vindictive species, like I said.
We are so vindictive, and so selfish and self-involved and greedy and cowardly that we have jails, and tough on crime legislation, and bickering over the necessary punishments because we need to prove to ourselves that crime doesn't pay. That the only reason we go to work, or school, and listen to teachers and bosses tell us what to do, is because it's the only smart way to get ahead. If we commit crimes we'll be stuck in little rooms of boredom and pain. We're smart for not pushing the envelope, we're smart for playing it safe. Just like we build up people to tear them down, we revel in the misfortune of others that might have taken a misstep because it's reinforcement that we've done right by never straying from the acceptable path. 
I'm not anarchistic because I think I won't get my fair share, I'm not a hedonist because I'm too dumb to know better. I am who I am because there is nothing to be afraid of in living by what you know, deep down, is right. And the only way I can know what's right is by knowing the point of it all. And the point is this : we're each of us here to make sure that the species survives and we get and give no more chance than and to any other. But that's it. I don't commit capital crimes because that deprives someone else of the chance, but I certainly don't need to stare morbidly at crime statistics to reassure myself that I'm doing the right thing. And I don't need to rant endlessly about the wrongness of how or if we kill each other...because we'll keep doing it. 


But I won't. 
Unless it's Robert Pickton.

"Two roads diverged in a wood and I//I took the one less travelled by" -- Robert Frost

Amor qui eius facis est

Love is what you make it.

The Beatles (Paul, especially) got it just right. So why is it, then, that we differentiate the types of love? Eros, Agape, Paternal/Maternal, being in love, loving someone, liking someone...it goes on. And what about the 7year itch? Does that mean you don't love your partner, even though just the thought of never seeing them again might cause your stomach to clench in anxiety whilst you gaze in transfixed desire towards a person you've never slept with before and can't bear to think of never touching. Is that love? It's not worth it to satisfy that craving and risk losing the companionship of a near decade, is it? Even if that new person might be your "soul mate"? Of course it's not...because cheating is wrong. I don't disagree with Dan Savage completely in this, though. I think trying to control your partner's sexuality to match your own is a kind of cheating, too. I just don't think that two wrongs make a right. Communication, people! But that infatuated lust that can sometimes become a longterm commitment because the guilt of ending longterm relationship for sexual satisfaction isn't love. If you actually do fall in love whilst currently emotionally entangled, I see nothing morally wrong with ending one relationship for another, so I guess Queen (mostly Brian May) had that right too. You don't stop loving one person when you start to love another.
But I digress, I was discussing the labelling and qualifying of love. Being in love and loving someone are two different things, hands down. But I don't see why I can't love someone in an "eros" kinda way at the same time I'm IN love with someone else in the same way. And by the end of my last long-term relationship I definitely was in love with my partner in an "agape" but not "eros" fashion. Can you love someone like a brother but still want to sleep with them? Can you be head over heels in love with someone and have no desire to ever see them naked? Why is a definite sexual element required for mainstream culture to consider a relationship healthy or permanent? "Hetero life mate" may be a jokey term but it's pretty damned solid as a possibility. Not everyone's going to find the sexual partner of their dream but I betcha they have a best friend...even if it's their pet. (And no, I'm not going to start an ethics conversation on bestiality.)
What is it about love that scares us all, not just philosophers, musicians and romantics, so much that we must label every little aspect of it? And when we no longer feel that need as a society and know only that we care, on some deep level, for many someones in combination...will that make us something more than the jealous, needy creatures we are now? Homo Amans--the loving man.

"And in the end, the love you take//is equal to the love you make" -- Paul McCartney.
"Too much love will kill you, it will make your life a lie.//Torn between a lover, and the love you left behind" -- Brian May.

Dominica Non Numerari Potest

Sunday doesn't count

Sorry, folks. I got some information from a close friend tonight that wipes any philosophy but socio/politico from my mind.

I am VERY proud of the members of the military that I know.
You are doing what you know is right.
Whether I, or anyone else, agree with reasoning doesn't matter.
You are doing what you know is right, and I am PROUD to know you.
I am proud OF you.

Come back with your shield or on it. But please, with it, or I'll hunt you down.

Soldiers, military, anyone in past service. Thank you.

Pulchritudo Est Maior Sapientia

Beauty is Greater than Wisdom

"So smart it's scary."
That's how I've been described by acquaintances, friends, strangers in bars. I can't say it's really thrilling because I think intelligence is nothing to be proud of. I was born with the brains I have, I have no reason to think I'm better than others. I'm also a very very fast runner. No one says I'm so quick it's scary. It's supposed to be a backwards kind of compliment, I'm sure. But saying I'm the above basically describes the person speaking as somewhat less intelligent than I. That's just wrong.
We idolise musicians, actors, sports stars. We don't idolise research scientists, doctors,...,not even philosophers (and of COURSE we should idolise them!) Everyone we idolise can do something we can't. So to describe my brains as something feared, even when the fear is colloquial, is making a mockery of something that we all have. I use large words. I speak with correct (or nearly correct) grammar. I like to find out things that don't matter, and I argue when I don't agree. But there's absolutely  no reason to think that I'm any more intelligent or any smarter than anyone else.

Can't you love me because I'm beautiful?

Possibilia Omnia Sub Sole Sunt

All Possible Things are Under the Sun

Having a look at possible v necessary in Ontology class these days.  It's amazing to find that I actually -have- been thinking about all of this for the past thirty*ahem* years.

It's also really disappointing to realise that Kripke's right and there is absolutely NO chance that I'll ever get to pet a unicorn. Cornelia is disappoint. (There's only one person in the entire world (our actual world) who might get that reference.)

I'm a writer, so of course I need "make believe" in my life without fear that Heinlein's views of pandimensional solipsism actually apply. But I've also been a devoted fangirl of Terry Pratchett so I allowed that his theory of the trousers of reality might have something to them. I don't know now, though. Kripke's argument that the identifier of "unicorn" is established as myth only seems pretty solid. It is a necessary fact about unicorns that they exist in a non-real sense, just as Quine's Pegasus exists as an idea but not in reality. So even if we were to posit that there are, in some possible world, fossilised remains of horse-like creatures with horns growing from their foreheads, they couldn't be called unicorns.  And if in the deepest jungles of Brazil some logger stumbled across a virgin with a horned, horse-like creature with its head in her lap (and don't get me started on the sociological implications of that aspect of the myth, please) it wouldn't be a unicorn. Not to say we wouldn't -call- it a unicorn, because we're lazy humans so of course we would. But it would be disappointingly banal, the same way that dragons turned out to be dinosaurs. Wouldn't dinosaurs be even cooler if we hadn't originally thought they could breathe fire and the huge ones could fly?

Dammit, Kripke, you owe me a pony.

Parsimonia maior pars commenti est

Parsimony is the greater part of a lie.

I just wrote on my dislike of lying. While my reason seems noble I must admit it is not the entirety...which really gives weight to my title, doesn't it? I avoid lying because it has become an abused art. It is so badly performed an act that people will now swallow anything they're told simply so they don't have to call others out on how horridly they've told a lie.
I think it would be so wonderful if people would follow Robert Heinlein's advice. There are three ways to tell a good lie :
1) Tell just enough of the truth to make it seem like the entirety
2) Tell a lie with as little information as possible.
3) Tell the truth in such a way as to make it seem like you are lying.

Obviously the third is very difficult to do. The other two come down to one point - don't say ANYTHING.  My favourite response to a nosy question I don't want to answer is stony silence. (Okay, I kind of understand why I sometimes come over as a bitch.) If it is a question that the interrogator has a right to ask, I say as little as possible while not seeming to leave anything out. Allusion is also a benefit.

If people made more of an effort, so would I. Until such time, however, I'll simply continue telling the truth...or not speaking.

Like that will ever happen.

Daily blogging - Part Two

"Philosophy is trying to label things." So said I today while discussing aesthetics with an Art History major. She'd recently sat through a seminar with a Philosophy professor, and by the end of it she and her friends were rather perplexed by what the prof thought of as important.
In my Phil of Art class we spent three months trying to determine what makes something art, what aesthetics mean. It turns out that actual artists and critics don't give a flying funk, they just want to know if it's GOOD. Well, what do you know? Philosophers don't care. That old saying "I don't know what is art but I know what I like" doesn't apply to us. I don't care if it's GOOD art, apparently, I'm just supposed to care if I can classify it as such.
And luckily, that's pretty much what I do. If something that is not being used for any mundane purpose it put forth to me I judge it. I love dada. Man Ray, Dali...Duchampe. Art isn't necessarily beautiful (although Dali's paintings were certainly aesthetically pleasing). And it isn't necessarily difficult or complex (although Man Ray's photography often surpassed his painting in that area). And sometimes it is a political statement about art itself (thank you, M. Duchampe!). But what art is, to me, is something whose main purpose is to achieve an aesthetic response. Not to follow the rules, not to break them. Not because someone says it is, or to force them to say why it isn't. I think art is in what we breathe...but I think the air molecules might say the same for our lungs...so red and smooth (or black and phlegmy in my case).

My writing isn't art...even my poetry isn't art. Emotions aren't art. Emotional expression isn't art. Emotional evocation is.

My god, I'm a solipsist.

Daily blogging

I'm going to attempt a daily blog, since with school and other things (read : social life) I am again not participating in NaNoWriMo. And yes, I'm fully aware that I'm not beginning at the beginning, so to speak. I will continue to aim to discuss philosophy in daily life, but I'm sure on occassion there will be frivolity. Perhaps on those days I will simply link toWhen Not To Say We Should Still Be Friends and continue with my romantic obsession with romance. We shall see.

In the meantime, I have a question : how tightly do you stick to your moral values? And when you fail to stick to what you have always believed to be right, do you suffer the cognitive dissonance in silence or do you reevaluate your world view?
I think I'm aiming for a corresponding theory with enough cohesion to justify my true beliefs, but I'm a pragmatist. Why suffer for my mistakes when my weak flesh doesn't stand up to my lofty ideals?

I lie, sometimes, because it's easier. Not about the big stuff, which is strange. But since I believe lying is a form of shame and I try not to do anything I'm ashamed of, I shouldn't lie. Yet I find myself doing it more often these days, in an effort not to disappoint people who have different values or ideas than I do. I could stand up for myself, justify why I do or say something instead of lying...but it doesn't seem worth it sometimes. I suspect it's my hedonistic side sticking out. Why fight when it's not going to get what you want? Still, I sometimes chide myself...

Why do we do what we know we shouldn't?