Metaphysics pub quiz
Nov. 17th, 2004 03:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomusTry my metaphysics pub quiz. It consists of ten questions about your relationship with metaphysics. The respondent with the most anti-metaphysical set of answers wins a shinto phallus and a night with Devon Aoki (or partner of their choice, if not a lesbian). The respondent with the most metaphysical set of answers wins the Metaphysician's Magic Pointy Hat. (Whether it's a magic hat or a dunce's cap depends on the angle it's viewed from, and whether the winner inks out the D or not.)
Here are the questions, followed by my own personal answers:
1. Do you think that 'Reality is elsewhere'?
2. Do you think that 'If my life as I live it were all there is, I'd top myself right now!'?
3. Do you notice yourself downgrading your environment because it's not really where your concerns are?
4. Is your body going to seed because you're off in some other world, for instance a computer world or a TV world?
5. Do you subscribe to the core beliefs of Marxism, Christianity, or Platonism?
6. When was the Golden Age, and when will utopia come?
7. Do you accept personal authorship of your own parallel worlds, or know the names of the people who designed them? Or do you call them 'objective'?
8. Do you find yourself using the word 'timeless' when you praise things?
9. What would a world in which people wholly accepted the present as 'all there is' be like? Better, or worse?
10. How will these questions change if physicists discover the Higgs Boson or 'god particle'? (Beware, trick que-whoooooooooooosh OMG, where am I?
1. Do you think that 'Reality is elsewhere'? I think it's my natural tendency, because I'm a dreamy cerebrotonic ectomorph like the kind Swift describes in Gulliver's Travels inhabiting the flying island of Laputa: 'These dreamy philosophers were so absorbed in their speculations that they employed attendants called "flappers," to flap them on the mouth and ears with a blown bladder when their attention was to be called off from "high things" to vulgar mundane matters.' Nevertheless, the fact that I employ people to flap me out of my reverie shows that my heart is in the right place.
2. Do you think that 'If my life as I live it were all there is, I'd top myself right now!'? No. I like my life.
3. Do you notice yourself downgrading your environment because it's not really where your concerns are? I do, yes. Although I mock Radiohead for that 'I don't belong here' sentiment they're always promoting, I share it a lot. But my ideal, the one I'm working towards, is belonging, and accepting.
4. Is your body going to seed because you're off in some other world, for instance a computer world or a TV world? My legs feel as if they're trying to decide whether to just walk off and leave me. 'He doesn't seem to need us any more, so what the fuck?'
5. Do you subscribe to the core beliefs of Marxism, Christianity, or Platonism? They're all there. I've rebelled against Christianity and Platonism, less so against Marxism. But whether I reject them or not, they've all left tire tracks through me.
6. When was the Golden Age, and when will utopia come? The Golden Age and Utopia are both permanent courts of session.
7. Do you accept personal authorship of your own parallel worlds, or know the names of the people who designed them? Or do you call them 'objective'? I accept authorship for them, or know who authored them, and don't call them objective. I try to make them more like scaffolding than buildings -- quick to assemble and quick to take down.
8. Do you find yourself using the word 'timeless' when you praise things? No, although it might have slipped past the censors occasionally.
9. What would a world in which people wholly accepted the present as 'all there is' be like? Better, or worse? It would depend on the quality of the environment they were in. I think if that happened in a degraded environment, it would be a recipe for hell on earth. If it happened in one that people had cared for and nurtured, it could be paradise on earth.
10. How will these questions change if physicists discover the Higgs Boson or 'god particle'? (Beware, trick que-whoooooooooooosh OMG, where am I? That's a trick que-whooooooooooosh OMG, where am I?
Here are the questions, followed by my own personal answers:
1. Do you think that 'Reality is elsewhere'?
2. Do you think that 'If my life as I live it were all there is, I'd top myself right now!'?
3. Do you notice yourself downgrading your environment because it's not really where your concerns are?
4. Is your body going to seed because you're off in some other world, for instance a computer world or a TV world?
5. Do you subscribe to the core beliefs of Marxism, Christianity, or Platonism?
6. When was the Golden Age, and when will utopia come?
7. Do you accept personal authorship of your own parallel worlds, or know the names of the people who designed them? Or do you call them 'objective'?
8. Do you find yourself using the word 'timeless' when you praise things?
9. What would a world in which people wholly accepted the present as 'all there is' be like? Better, or worse?
10. How will these questions change if physicists discover the Higgs Boson or 'god particle'? (Beware, trick que-whoooooooooooosh OMG, where am I?
1. Do you think that 'Reality is elsewhere'? I think it's my natural tendency, because I'm a dreamy cerebrotonic ectomorph like the kind Swift describes in Gulliver's Travels inhabiting the flying island of Laputa: 'These dreamy philosophers were so absorbed in their speculations that they employed attendants called "flappers," to flap them on the mouth and ears with a blown bladder when their attention was to be called off from "high things" to vulgar mundane matters.' Nevertheless, the fact that I employ people to flap me out of my reverie shows that my heart is in the right place.
2. Do you think that 'If my life as I live it were all there is, I'd top myself right now!'? No. I like my life.
3. Do you notice yourself downgrading your environment because it's not really where your concerns are? I do, yes. Although I mock Radiohead for that 'I don't belong here' sentiment they're always promoting, I share it a lot. But my ideal, the one I'm working towards, is belonging, and accepting.
4. Is your body going to seed because you're off in some other world, for instance a computer world or a TV world? My legs feel as if they're trying to decide whether to just walk off and leave me. 'He doesn't seem to need us any more, so what the fuck?'
5. Do you subscribe to the core beliefs of Marxism, Christianity, or Platonism? They're all there. I've rebelled against Christianity and Platonism, less so against Marxism. But whether I reject them or not, they've all left tire tracks through me.
6. When was the Golden Age, and when will utopia come? The Golden Age and Utopia are both permanent courts of session.
7. Do you accept personal authorship of your own parallel worlds, or know the names of the people who designed them? Or do you call them 'objective'? I accept authorship for them, or know who authored them, and don't call them objective. I try to make them more like scaffolding than buildings -- quick to assemble and quick to take down.
8. Do you find yourself using the word 'timeless' when you praise things? No, although it might have slipped past the censors occasionally.
9. What would a world in which people wholly accepted the present as 'all there is' be like? Better, or worse? It would depend on the quality of the environment they were in. I think if that happened in a degraded environment, it would be a recipe for hell on earth. If it happened in one that people had cared for and nurtured, it could be paradise on earth.
10. How will these questions change if physicists discover the Higgs Boson or 'god particle'? (Beware, trick que-whoooooooooooosh OMG, where am I? That's a trick que-whooooooooooosh OMG, where am I?
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(no subject)
Date: 2004-11-19 12:29 am (UTC)1. Do you think that 'Reality is elsewhere'?
No. Reality is what is. Where would we be if reality were elsewhere? Even fantastic constructs within our minds exist and are the product of reality.
2. Do you think that 'If my life as I live it were all there is, I'd top myself right now!'?
It makes no difference to me whether there is life outside of my own. I'll never know one way or the other.
3. Do you notice yourself downgrading your environment because it's not really where your concerns are?
I think I have a tendency to downgrade my environment when I'm not particularly enjoying my situation; I'll turn my thoughts to less immediate affairs simply to avoid the challenges of my immediate surroundings. It could be argued that a lot of intellectual discussion is simply a means for escape from ones environment.
4. Is your body going to seed because you're off in some other world, for instance a computer world or a TV world?
I don't understand what is meant by "going to seed". I do believe that while I use the computer (some 10+ hours a day, on average - by both profession and obsession) my body deteriorates, which is why I counter the "mind time" (in front of the computer) with "body time" (spent at the gym).
5. Do you subscribe to the core beliefs of Marxism, Christianity, or Platonism?
I subscribe to my own personal belief system which may or may not contain elements of the above.
6. When was the Golden Age, and when will utopia come?
We're living in the Golden Age. Utopia is both impossible and unbearable.
7. Do you accept personal authorship of your own parallel worlds, or know the names of the people who designed them? Or do you call them 'objective'?
I don't own any parallel worlds.
8. Do you find yourself using the word 'timeless' when you praise things?
Only when referring to a certain drum and bass album from the late 90's.
9. What would a world in which people wholly accepted the present as 'all there is' be like? Better, or worse?
In such a world it would be impossible for any tasks which take a long time to be completed. As such, we wouldn't have musical instruments, farming, schooling, or really anything which makes the modern world what it is. While I acknowledge that currently there is a need for people to concentrate less on the future and more on themselves in the here and now, a world in which nobody thinks ahead would simply stagnate.
10. How will these questions change if physicists discover the Higgs Boson or 'god particle'? (Beware, trick que-whoooooooooooosh OMG, where am I?
*sploink*