Planet Olin

I spent Friday afternoon at the Adsis house again. It was really good to spend time talking and laughing with them. I got to share a mother’s joy in watching her son start to walk. Alex has really come a long way in the months that I’ve been here, and though he’s still not sure about letting go of the coffee table, he’s started to take his first steps. After lunch Chelu and Pedro zonked out on the couch. It was pretty funny to see them side by side with their heads leaned over in the same direction just sleeping. It took them about 5 minutes.

Saturday afternoon I helped prepare vegetables for the gran Paella Solidaria. At my church, we were having a big fundraiser to send money to Medellin , Columbia . We were selling lunch (Paella). Their slogan was 1 plate here, 5 in Medellin . Anyway, I never chopped so many onions in my life, and oh did it burn. On Sunday, I saw the huge frying pan they had borrowed. It was about 7 feet in diameter and was made to serve about 600. It was pretty crazy. For those who don’t know Paella is a typical Spanish dish (of Valencia ) that’s mostly fried rice (flavored with saffron which isn’t really saffron since saffron is expensive) with vegetables and meat (especially seafood). Also more squid than I’ve seen in one place before. Unfortunately it was unbearably hot and not many people ventured out from their homes, so I believe we ended up serving around 250 people. Washing the frying pan was an adventure to say the least. In the end and after expenses I think we will be able to send about 1000€ to Columbia .

Today I helped Martin carry his bags to the bus station. He’s off to Prague . It was kind of sad to see him go. We even got him to go out to a Tapas Bar with us last night. He kept thinking I was saying Topless Bar (he speaks English too), so at first I was having hard time convincing him to go. Anyway it was the first and last time that he went out while here in Spain as far as Lucian and I know. We already have someone to replace him though. Somehow Lucian has connections, but anyway, a French girl that has an internship at the University this summer has already started moving in. Her Spanish is better than mine was when I got here and she knows some English. However, though she’s been told multiple times that I don’t speak a word of French, she continues to talk to me in French. If there’s something that she can’t seem to remember in Spanish she goes to French and looks at me expectantly. She came only yesterday and I think already it’s been clearly demonstrated that I don’t understand her when she speaks French. Also asked me if I thought she could where a thong to work (she meant sandals). Ahh well, the joys of international living situations. Lucian and I are both here only another 2 to 3 weeks, so she’ll be on her own then.

Other than that study study study. Hope everyone is enjoying their summers back home in the States or Uganda if you’re Simon.

This is from a while ago, but I figured I'd put it up. Still remember that cursed day...

Argh

So yesterday was an off day. Couldn’t believe how many mistakes I was making and how little I was understanding. I can’t even remember some of the stupid things I said. For just a sampling…

I got up out of a chair and all of my joints cracked. Sonia thought I was dying, but I said not to worry, my knees and my screws always do that. Should have been ankles (tornilla, tobillo). I knew that Oscar had founded the adsis house in Chile . We were talking about that and I asked him when he melted the house (fundir, fundar). Later when working with their computers, I tried to say something about how XP worked with externals, I something completely unintelligible came out that was neither English nor Spanish. I have no idea… It went on from there. This, of course, is in addition to the habitual grammatical errors, using el when I should use la, or incorrectly conjugating my verbs. Sometimes I’m just back to square one. :)

This is hilarious,

http://youtube.com/watch?v=d9UXw0fQmno&search=hey%20thanks%20for%20reading%20my%20comics%20today%20by%20the%20way!

Compliments of Mr. Chavez.

This will mostly be throwing some pictures up for the family since I haven´t blogged in forever. Someone in the comp. lab is listening to Pearl Jam. I like it, but others don´t seem to appreciate it so much. It´s 22 degrees and sunny and I´m happy to be here despite the fact that I have loads of work to be doing. I hung out my laundry this morning and am going to miss the ability to do that. When I go home from the lab, I´ll stop on the way and get a loaf of bread for 42 cents. This evening I´ll be running with Jochen again. It´ll be one of the last times since he doesn´t have to take exams (only a certificate of attendance) and will be going home soon. Tomorrow I´m going to check out Zamora with Sonia. It´s not too far and the University of Salamanca has a campus there that she attends. So that´s life in a nutshell. Some days I´m lazy, but today I´m ready to live, read, learn Spanish and run.

So it was great to visit London and see Pearl and David. This was about a month ago now...I think. Though there wasn´t much sun, the weather was nice and didn´t really rain on us ever. I was actually rather unimpressed with Buckingham Palace though the flowers out front were pretty. The gardens in general were impressive and the flowers were in full bloom, so it was gorgeous.

This was the gate to the Palace. I thought the crest was kind of neat. This was probably the most impressive part of the palace, from the outside anyway.
So this is a view of Parliament and Big Ben and the River Thames (pronounced Tems apparently). Pearl and I actually waited and were able to go in and watch some of a meeting of the House of Commons. It was actually a few committees about the government in Northern Ireland. It was interesting and fun to watch how they went back and forth.
Taken from the bridge and looking in the opposite direction I can see the London Eye and the Aquarium. Yes the London Eye is a giant bicycle wheel and it costs 13 pounds to ride it. Kind of neat though.
Also in Westminster (other than the palace) is of course Westminster Abbey. I liked it. This where Kings and Queens, etc. are coronated by the Archbishop of Canterbury whom I believe is otherwise unconnected with this church.
This is just a view of the skyline complete with Pearl´s egg, her landmark for getting home. Apparently, they actually call it the gerkin, but it doesn´t look like a pickle, it looks like an egg.
Most of my time spent in the UK was spent wandering around. I enjoyed it. I now understand the Mind the Gap t-shirts which I´d not even heard of before. I was introduced to authentic British culture such as Pret sandwiches and Fish and Chips. I don´t have pictures of it, but the National Library was impressive. They have an amazingly complete collection of stamps. I also saw the original Alice in Wonderland among other books, and Pearl and I saw Magna Carta. It was strange to be there seeing that. Not your everyday type of activity. Well, I should probably head off and do some work. I think I´ll probably skip bloggin about Cáceres and Plasencia, but that´s alright. They´re in Extremadura, the autonomy south of where I am. They were pretty and I´m glad to have visited them, but there was nothing too amazing. I´ll try and write something about graduation in the near future. I won´t have digested all of that for quite some time. And here´s a picture of the Great White Pelicans in the park in front of Buckingham Palace.

In the words of Mark Somerville (who had a great commencement speech, by the way), I'm a little glad and a little sad to leave Olin. I will miss everyone terribly - I apologize for not saying goodbye to everyone in person, but I lost it at the end and it was better to just leave. I'm excited to see what the next classes will make of Olin now that we're not there to say "You can't do that!"; I am, however, equally worried for the same reason. But I trust that everything will be fine.

California is beautiful, sunny and warm without being too hot, and it's wonderful to just sit. Not even read, just sit and be. I haven't done much of that recently, and I miss it. That's not true, I am actually waiting in between processing the vast mountain of laundry I brought home. And realizing that I screwed up and packed some of the clothes I need for Belgium into the boxes that will arrive next week. Oh well...I'll deal.

This project started as an attempt to document the ethics of everyday life. It would find the little dilemmas of every day life and analyze them with respect to various existent philosophies and literature in the field of classic and applied ethics. This project did not intend to pass judgment on the behaviors observed, but instead bring them to the forefront of consciousness. I think about the ethical implications of everyday actions a fair amount, and hoped to raise awareness in others. If I managed to raise a single question in a single person's mind, then the project was a success at some level. If it managed to make questions in several people's minds, all the better.

Over the course of the project, I did learn several things myself, some of which had to do with ethics and some of which did not. From an ethics standpoint, it is difficult to analyze a behavior without making a judgment about it. When writing about cheating, I found it incredibly difficult to keep my opinions to myself. I've been raised with an honor code from the youngest years of my education; it has been engrained in me that cheating is always wrong. Thus, when trying to be objective about cheating, it was tempting to only present that cheating is wrong. Personal beliefs were not meant to have a place in this project, but in retrospect, there are places where they become obvious.

In the course of writing and observing, I found many more topics to write about than I could possibly include in my deliverable. Had I chosen to write about a new topic every day, I likely would not have run out. Where is the article I wanted to write about promiscuity? What about the points I was hoping to make vegetarianism? Is it ethical to keep secrets? There are so many topics in the ethics field that choosing a tiny subset proved a challenge. Even within the chosen topics, it seemed like there could be more depth. There should be a post about governmental lies, or maybe lying in a religious context. Choosing topics was an almost agonizing task for all the topics that had to be left out.

Outside of ethics, a lot was learned about the nature of self directed projects and motivation. I suppose the largest lesson would be to choose a project you are certain you are passionate about.

Altogether, the project was worthwhile. Given more time I would love to write about all the topics I never got the chance to consider. I would love to have daily observations about ethics, musing on the ethically questionable behavior of the day. I would love to read more applied ethicists, spreading their teachings to the masses in a more manageable format.

I would love to continue this project, but it's probably time to move on.

When speaking about living a moral existence, it really breaks down to a sense of obligation. How much obligation do you feel towards others? How much obligation to yourself do you have? How much obligation ought you have towards others? Is your obligation only towards your family? Your immediate community? The world at large? How should we act because of our obligations? These questions validly affect our interactions and attitudes with those we meet and those we don't.

With so many questions, all intertwined, the best approach seems to be to divide the questions along to whom (or what) is a person obligated and what is the extent of this obligation.

Although some philosophers, Kant in particular, discount obligation, other philosophies seem based around the idea of obligation. Peter Singer, who inspired this entire topic, is a utilitarian whose writings strongly support the idea of obligation. When utilizing utilitarianism, it is possible to imagine a situation wherein one might calculate what will create the maximum amount of happiness, but that this action is an act against self-interest or desire. In this case, the person is still obligated to act upon the calculation, against their will. Singer is famous for taking utilitarianism to an extreme, claiming that all actions should be considered on a global scale. While we live in comfort, the argument goes, much of the world lives in extreme poverty. Small luxuries we afford ourselves would financially be enough support to drastically improve the life of someone living in extreme poverty. This argument calls for utilitarians to be obligated to all citizens of the world, not just themselves or those in their immediate surroundings. Further, Singer's work calls for a high level of obligation in that we should live with the bare minimum to be comfortable while giving the rest to others so that they may live with the same level of comfort. A counter argument to this large sense of global obligation often lies in the practical application - the philosophy is good in theory, but much harder to act upon completely in reality.

Hobbes, as has been brought up in earlier pieces, is often cited for his philosophical belief in self interest. Hobbes philosophy is actually based in the belief that we only have the obligation to obey the laws of nature. The major law of nature, aside from such things as the laws of physics, is that organisms must look out for their own well being; it is never in one's interest to fend for organisms outside one's self and perhaps one's brood. This view point would be considered the opposite of Singer and the utilitarians. Once one eliminates obligation, the question of amount of obligation becomes arbitrary. A good argument against Hobbes is the concept of mercy; Hobbes philosophy leaves no room for mercy or in many cases emotion in general. Hobbes philosophy can be considered egoist, isolating, and cold.

Hume falls somewhat between Singer and Hobbes in philosophical use of obligation. Hume divides the possible human actions into subcategories based upon whether the subject would commit the act naturally or must be artificially provoked, and whether the action fulfills a sense of duty or is committed for a different reason. As "natural" actions would happen due to self interest, they are excluded from the consideration of obligation. Within the remaining actions, Hume considers that obligation only exists where the subject wants to give the recipients pleasure. In this case, it is up to the person acting to determine whether or not a certain action is an obligation and to what degree it is an obligation. A person may decide that they wish to please the world, and thus move towards Singer's view point, or may decide that they only wish for their own happiness and move towards Hobbes's end of the spectrum. Further, not all decisions need make the same people pleased; a person may vary to whom they are obligated depending upon the act. The key to this philosophy is intent - if one intends to do something in order to make others happy, one is obligated. The glaring significant argument against this philosophy is that it really stands for very little, especially if it is combined with lying to one's self. One might not need to feel obligation, unless there is a desire to feel obligation.

Although all these philosophies address obligation in various ways, each is a drastically different take on the situation. In theory, each of these philosophies not only applies to obligation to people, but also obligation to larger community-type systems such as ecosystems.

What do you feel obligated to and why?


This blog post is based on "Feelings of Obligation" by William Neblett, "Famine, Affluence, and Poverty" by Peter Singer, "Hobbes's Concept of Obligation" by Thomas Nagel, and "Hume's Account of Obligation" by Bernard Wand.

So it's been a few weeks now since I went to Sierra de Béjar. Pearl came to visit from London, and we went with Sonia. It's about an hour south of Salamanca (the city), and just barely within the province of Salamanca. It was really good for me to escape the city for a day. The gardens and green spaces here in Salamanca are gorgeous right now as they're colorful and filled with flowers, but it's not the same, and there's just not open space. So we went hiking on a route that took us past Peña de la Cruz and Peña Negra (Cross Peak and Black Peak, respectively). It seemed like a fairly long hike up, and was steeper at the end. Peña de la Cruz was first. It´s a giant cross built from granite. The mountains are just covered with huge, round, granite rocks.

Here´s Pearl and Sonia accompanied by the large pieces of granite. View of the other part of the mountain range on the way up. It had snow, so we decided to save that for next time. After much more hiking, we found ourselves at the top of Peña Negra. We're currently on a shorter little range of mountain, and you can see the other one over yonder. In between lies a valley. Driving into Béjar you can see up the valley and see just the dam from below. It was neat to hike up over it and see the lake from the top.And looking off in the opposite direction...The clouds were actually surprisingly close and eye level. It really played with our perception. It's hard to focus on a cloud. Mmm...so pretty.

It's been forever since I've blogged, so I felt like I should take a moment to write something. Since Easter break I've made trips to Sierra de Béjar, Cáceres, Plasencia, and London. Photos and more details are forthcoming. For me time is moving at Mach 5. Could be mach 4, but after it reaches mach speed I can't really tell the difference. I've finally grown accostumed to living here and all too soon I'll have to go. I've really bumped up the working. This month is now crunch time. It's not like crunch time at Olin where you've been working and stressed all semester and now you have to do more. No, I've got it pretty easy. It's more like I've had the same work to do for the entire semester, have only done a small fraction of it, and now I have the remainder sitting in front of me. It shouldn't be undoable though.

My professor for Social Movements in Contemporary Spain took time to explain the final exam yesterday. I'll have the choice of doing a historical commentary on some article pertinent to the history studied in the class or I can expound upon one of the chapters I've read in the book. We have to read and report on 5 chapters. It seems that his motivation for giving a final is another way to make sure that the students know the material (of course). However, what he means by that is that they've actually read the book and that their reports and summaries aren't simply plagiarized and if they are, that at least they've memorized them. He said flat out that he'll be looking for plagiarism and that he expects it. Not only that, he said that he knows that he has to be more careful with the Spanish students and European students in general than with the Americans who usually seem to do their own work. Such a different world here. Talking to my Erasmus friends and my roommates, the general philosophy seems to be that if you can cheat or in some way take advantage (be it in school or in other sectors of life), and do it without getting caught, then you deserve respect. More power to you, you've cheated the system. I don't know where this mindset comes from. It's not everyone, but it's prevalent nonetheless and I don't like it.

In other news I was accepted and will be working as a LeadAmerica Team Leader this summer. I'm excited. It's not a high-powered engineering internship, but my coming back late ruled out those options. It's only three sessions, but it will be a good opportunity for me. I really enjoy working with people, organizing events, tutoring, etc. I might even be chipper. We'll see.

I'll be going back to Olin for commencement. I decided I couldn't miss it and bought my overpriced fly from europe ticket. For random Olin people reading this, I'll need a place to sleep Thursday through Sunday nights. :) Thanks!