Philosophy

"The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point, however, is to change it."

Marx.

Philosophy and academic study undoubtedly are about understanding and interpreting the world.

I personally firmly agree with Marx here that a further purpose of philosophy and hence of academic study in general is also to change the world as the philosopher sees fit, and to work out how to do so.

"AQT"

"The Taliban are challenging our way of life."

Well firstly they don't exist.

Secondly, even if they are you can't just kill them all. Even if you do

they may still come back.

The "Taliban"

- is not an organisation as implied

- is not one entity as implied

- is not an army as implied

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Shall I go on?

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the "7/7" bombers weren't in "Al Quaeda".

Mainly because it doesn't exist:)

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And then there is the entity "AQT"

"Al Quaeda/Taliban"

A fiendish conflation of 2 non-existent entities :)

Is this an enemy that we need?

An enemy that we need to create to justify our war?
Someone on whom to take out our own hatred of ourselves?

A simple "badguy" catch-all label?

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http://www.stopwar.org.uk/

John Simpson

John Simpson said corruption is rife in Afghanistan.

It is ALSO rife amongst the "Western" governments and aid contractors as well as the Afghans.

The "Elgin Marbles" and "Kettle Logic"

This is the thing I was trying to remember about the arguments about the Parthenon Frieze.

It's called "Kettle Logic."

http://www.pocm.info/kettle_logic.html

One thing that this maybe suggests is that if you have more than one argument in favour of something it can sometimes suggest that you may not have any at all.....

With regard to the British Museum; their BEST argument is undoubtedly that keeping the Parthenon Freize in London perhaps allows more people to see it.

The fact that they may try to introduce other arguments when they don't really have any other arguments makes their case more suspect in my view.

Calling them "The Elgin Marbles" is a good metaphor for English hypocrisy.

The marbles are respectfully and traditionally called "The Elgin Marbles."

This is in reality nothing more and nothing less than naming them after the person that stole them.

To be honest I hate nationalism and countries more and more really.

So like the Greek philosophers I am willing to be flexible in my view of this and if it were best to keep them in London then that is where I would say they should stay.

But that's just my opinion.

Corrective

If I exaggerate on this blog, I regard it as a corrective.

What's wrong with a minimum safety net?

What's wrong with a "basic safety net" health care for all?

Just as a minimum.

There are no secrets.

There are no secrets. There is only truth and lies.

Hypocrisy

I don't like nationalism.

I don't like violence.

I don't like wars.

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I don't like ETA.

But ETA have every right to be talked to.

They are only asserting what is supposedly the principle on which ALL states are based -

self-determination.

They are also practising what many states practice - violence.

All states are supposedly built on a (violent) assertion of self-determination.

So not to talk to ETA is pure hypocrisy.

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Bookshops

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/aug/04/oxfam-shops-booksellers

"Oxfam is the Tesco of the second-hand book world. It is destroying the industry."

As someone who absolutely adores second-hand bookshops I would be very sad if this were the case.

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Well I would say the following.

If people didn't donate the books they would end up in land fill.

If second hand book shops accepted donations or even paid money for unwanted books then I would feel they have more right to say this.

Generally speaking, they seem to do neither.

I have often tried to sell my valuable unwanted books to second hand bookshops.

They simply do not want to know.

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As far as I can see the internet is surely taking away a lot of the business previously given to second-hand bookshops, in the same way as it is affecting the newspaper industry.

On the internet you can find what you want in seconds. At a bookshop it might take a bit longer.

There is still a gap between Oxfam prices and quality and McWaterstones prices and quality.

The Greatest American Ever