Hmmmm.....Discounts galore for "running out the clock."

Woop-fargin'-eee.

Fencing - 1948 Olympics.

None of that electrical nonsense - they've got judges in all four corners.

There's something about the form that seems "off." The fencer on the right is standing up too much. The American on the left is pulling her left foot (and seems to be off target.) Also, notice that they aren't wearing the jackets that follow the target area for foil.

"Ukraine's Fencing Pin-up."

Stop Thrust in Time

Good form.   

This is a pair of American fencers.

May eternal light shine upon her.

Earlier this week, I was informed by her brother that Marianna Bernadette Gabriela Vallejo de Emparan - Mari - Hoover '78 - passed away of a brain aneurysm. I met Mari at the CSUF Debate Institute in 1976 and dated her on and off at Bullard, FCC and UC Davis. I'd run into her brother Andy at odd and weird places over the last three decades, but hadn't seen Mari in over 20 years.

In an alternate history, Mari and her family would own a quarter of California.

Mari leaves behind a husband and a son and a daugher who must be in their late teens or early 20s.

Mari was a gentle soul with an interest in reading and theater and dance. Her passing leaves a hole the life of her family and friends.

Frances Berry and Mike Ribera...

...were a couple in - the couple for - Bullard High's Class of 1977. The Ribera boys were a virtual clan peppering the high school with their names all starting with "M" - Mike, Matt, Mitch, Mark.

Unlike a lot of high school sweethearts, Frances Berry and Mike Ribera were married after high school and raised a family and were still together when Mike passed away from cancer in his 53rd year.

Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. May the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

This should be good.

Craig Bernthal is taking a sabbatical from Fresno State to write a book on J. R. R. Tolkien's sacramental vision in The Lord of the Rings.

That should be a best seller.

For Deirdra ...

...who was learning to play this on the piano for my father, who would have turned 85 yesterday.

Eternal Rest.

EDWARD JAMES BRADLEY | Visit Guest Book

Lt. Edward James Bradley (USN, Ret.) passed away Friday, February 17, 2012 from congestive heart fail-ure. He was sur-rounded by his loving family, his wife, Betty, sons, Peter and David, and granddaughters, Morgan, Deirdra and Meredith, and by his friends, Rick and Nancy Quan.

Mr. Bradley was born on March 15, 1927 in Brooklyn, New York to Dan and Rebecca Bradley. He enlisted in the United Sates Navy in 1944 at age 16 with a special waiver from his parents. He became a "Mustang Lieutenant" and retired from the Navy in 1969. He then obtained college degrees, including a Masters, and taught as a second career at Juvenile Hall for the Fresno County Office of Education, retiring in 1996. He was also a Past Grand Knight of Knights of Columbus Council 6092.

Mr. Bradley was a world traveler from his years in the Navy. He was also a wise, patient and loving man, who could be fierce in his loyalties. He was an unforgettable character with a ready wit and a willingness to use it. He is missed by his family and friends.

Visitation will be held at Farewell Funeral Service on Thursday, February 23, 2012 from 5:00 - 8:00 p.m. with a Recitation of the Rosary to be held at 6:00 p.m. A Mass of Christian Burial will be held in the Guadalupe Chapel at St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church on Friday, February 24, 2012 at 11:00 a.m. Interment will be held at San Joaquin Valley National Cemetery in Gustine.

Published in the Fresno Bee on February 22, 2012

Here is a video put together by my very talented oldest daughter:

More on Teleology, including the Final Cause of Beauty.

A lawyer - but not me - writes:

Jim and Peter,


Jim introduced the words vs. meaning discussion in response to my proposition that,

“First, the fact that we choose (some would say, are evolutionarily driven) to assign meaning to something, doesn’t prove that there’s any meaning there beyond our arbitrary assignment of meaning.”

My point was really pretty simple-minded, and I hope that it’s not necessary to get into the linguistic tall grass on this issue, because I haven’t given the linguistic aspects a great deal of thought, much less study.

When I refer to “objective” or “arbitrary/subjective” meaning, I am referring to the question of whether the meaning that was assigned represents a truth that should apply to everyone similarly situated, or just to the person who assigned the meaning. (N.B., I typically use “arbitrary” and “subjective” interchangeably, but am open to being persuaded that one should distinguish between them.)

In these terms, objective meaning exists when a proposition has falsifiability (a la Popper). Jim mentioned the proposition that “It is raining.” While it may or may not, in fact, be raining, the proposition that it is raining is a testable one, so regardless of whatever words are used to express that proposition, it is one that has an objective meaning.

I do not know whether he miswrote or I misread, but I interpret Peter’s second paragraph in his email below to define all meaning in terms that I would describe above as objective. Perhaps Peter does not include statements of values, opinions, etc. as being “propositions”.

However, we all know that there are statements that reflect meanings that are subjective. Just try answering a woman’s question, “Do these pants make my butt look fat?” Or, a more current example: “Millionaires and billionaires should pay their fair share of taxes!”

Statements or propositions of opinion, judgments, values are inherently subjective: reasonable, informed people can disagree. The exception would be where there is some external authority (logic, revelation) that converts them into universal truths.

Craig has raised an interesting point in this area, when he talks about elevating beauty to a status above truth (or, perhaps, knowledge). In my terms, in order to do that he must believe that there is an objective standard of beauty. I do not share such a belief in objective beauty – it really is in the eye of the beholder, and judgments on beauty differ among cultures, individuals within cultures, and over time. Nonetheless, I love the image that Craig poses of, “Dame Beauty stands there with a ferule smacking the knuckles of Truth.” My world is so much more prosaic! Alas.

In sum, I think that all of us in this discussion probably agree that materialists act as though there are propositions that are very important in their lives (such as moral judgments that others should live by), which they treat as objective, but which science cannot reach one way or the other. I also suspect (but cannot prove) that science never will be able to do so, because the nature of those propositions is not falsifiable in a Popperian sense.

Where Jim and I tend to disagree is the extent to which logic can suffice, or revelation is required, to deal with that sort of proposition, and that’s a different discussion entirely.

An English professor responds:

Let me say rather that Beauty raps our idea of Truth on the knuckles to push us in the direction of greater Truth. In describing reality, physicists are right to distrust ugly equations.

On the fat buttocks issue, it is much more politic to go with the idea that beauty and truth are subjective, but line up a panel of experts and they'll be at least as close in their assessments as olympics diving judges.

I don't think that beauty is merely subjective. Has anyone read Umberto Eco's The Aesthetics of Thomas Aquinas? That looks like a good place to start thinking.

My response:

Russ, all -

Subjective, objective and arbitrary -

The point I was making is that all propositions/meanings are discovered outside the person for who experiences the meaning or states the proposition. Things are meanings or propositions because they are about something, and that something is not arbitrary or pure subjectivity. Even the proposition contained in the statement like "I like ice cream" is about something - ice cream and my preference for it - and however much it may be about my subjective preference, it is not "arbitrary."

A point here is that propositions that are apparently "subjective" are still "objective" in the sense that propositions are truer or falser to the extent that they are a product of the mind and the mind seeks the truth, which means the conformance of the mind to reality. The reality in the statement "I like ice cream" is that I really do prefer this thing called ice cream.

Beauty -

Classical philosophy recognized that truth, beauty, goodness and being are fundamentally the same thing. Something cannot be good without actually existing. Something cannot be beautiful without existing. Something cannot be true without existing. Something cannot be beautiful without also being good. Something cannot be beautiful without also being true.

And something cannot be true without being beautiful.

As Gilson, and others. point out, an odd meta-principle used by scientists in deciding the truth of a theory is whether it is beautiful. In this sense "beauty" means simplicity, elegance, fruitfulness and the ability to explain facts without ugly epicycles.

This is one indication that beauty is not "arbitrary" and that it is an objective fact of reality.

Another indication is illustrated by the question of whether a beautiful sunset would be any less beautiful if no one was there to appreciate it?

A third indication is that there are things that are universally understood to transcend time and culture in their beauty.

I suspect that before the Modern era the assertion that beauty is purely a matter of taste would be incomprehensible. In the Modern era, it seems apparent that art has seen a departure away from the classical ideas of beauty that has sent it in search of idiosyncratic meanings.

There can be beauty in such art because there can be art and goodness in such art, but it may be more debatable because such art is not trying to ascend the ladder of existence to the highest place where beauty, truth, goodness and existence are unified.

Modernity denies the unity of truth, goodness, beauty and existence or that there can be an ordering of beauty or truth or goodness or existence. A casualty of this attitude is that Modernity denies people the virtues by which they can decide whether something is more beautiful than another thing.

This attitude leads us to our confusion about subjectivity and objectivity of beauty. Let's say there is a questionable bit of Modern Art. I say it is ugly; an art critic says it is beautiful. Who is right? The answer is not that we are both right. The answer is that there is beauty in the art - and there has to be because the art exists and therefore has being and therefore has goodness insofar, at least, as it exists - but neither one of us may be properly ordered with respect to our appreciation of beauty.

Let's consider the clear case of disorder and the good and the beautiful. In movies and books about serial killers, it is a cliche to have the killer describe their deeds as being works of art. This seems like nuts - and it is - but insofar as executing a plan efficiently and cleverly can be called beautiful, then the precise, meticulous murders of serial killers of fiction are beautiful.

The problem is that serial killings are not ordered toward the human good or to love. Because they aren't ordered to the human good and love, whatever "beauty" there is in such things is warped, distorted and disordered. Things that are warped, distorted and disordered are things that essentially lack existence or the good that is proper to them, and things that lack their proper good also lack their proper beauty. They are, in a word, ugly.

Similarly, because Modern Art denies the traditional ordering of beauty toward love or humanity it creates things that are distorted, warped and disordered. It seems obvious to any objective person that Modernity has been singularly responsible tor generating the most mediocre and ugly art ever created in the history of man.

In other words, the denial of telos leads to the belief that all things are subjective which leads to the loss of meaning and leads to ugliness.

An English Professor's additur:

Taking Yosemite Valley as a less fraught example than the human form, isn't the fact that so many people are astounded by it, and that they have to go to Yosemite Valley itself to be fully astounded, no matter how many memories they have, indicate that the beauty and sublimity of the place reside there, with at least a measure of independence from the minds that apprehend it? What Peter says makes sense to me. Beauty reveals an underlying order, which is itself intellectually beautiful, and also true. Keats got the right message from the Grecian Urn.

 

The Word Nerd Cometh.

In legal practice, "tax" can be a confusing word. As applied to the costs that are recoverable after a party wins a lawsuit, to "tax costs" means either the amount that a prevailing party is permitted to recover from the losing party or it means the amount that the losing party can subtract from the prevailing party's cost bill.  For example, Federal Rule of Civil Procedure, Rule 54(d)(1) provides:

"(1) Costs Other Than Attorney's Fees. Unless a federal statute, these rules, or a court order provides otherwise, costs--other than attorney's fees--should be allowed to the prevailing party. But costs against the United States, its officers, and its agencies may be imposed only to the extent allowed by law. The clerk may tax costs on 14 days' notice. On motion served within the next 7 days, the court may review the clerk's action."

On the other hand, California law recognizes that the losing party can file a motion to "tax costs", i.e., challenging particular items in the prevailing party's cost bill.

Undoubtedly, this confusion has something to do with semantics of taxation as it is experienced in regular life; taxes take things away from us; they do not give us anything.  So, to "tax costs" seems to mean that something is being deducted or taken away from costs.

On the other hand, the etymological roots of "tax" include things like "enroll" or "enlist."  The Online Etymological Dictionary advises:

tax (v.)


late 13c., from O.Fr. taxer "impose a tax" (13c.), from L. taxare "evaluate, estimate, assess, handle," also "censure, charge," probably a frequentative form of tangere "to touch" (see tangent). Sense of "burden, put a strain on" first recorded 1670s; that of "censure, reprove" is from 1560s. Use in Luke ii for Gk. apographein "to enter on a list, enroll" is due to Tyndale. The noun is recorded from early 14c. Tax shelter is attested from 1961; taxpayer from 1816.

Wordorigins.com supports the notion that "to tax costs" is to add costs to the amount levied on the losing party:

tax


Word History

Date of Origin 13th c.

Tax originally denoted ‘assess an amount to be levied’; the notion of ‘imposing such a levy’ is a secondary development. The word comes via Old French taxer from Latin taxāre ‘touch, assess, appraise’, a derivative of tangere ‘touch’ (source of English contact, tangible, etc). From taxāre was derived the medieval Latin noun taxa ‘tax, piece of work imposed’, which passed into English via Anglo-Norman tasque as task (13th c.).

However, given the confusion of the word "tax," it might be better to avoid it entirely and use the word "recover" in the former situation and "object" in the latter.

An interesting sidenote is that the name of the vehical that takes us to the airport is derived from the word that signifies government oppression:

Etymology of taxi, tax.


The word taxi is shortening of the taximeter cab (introduced in London in March 1907), from taximeter (automatic meter to record the distance and fare) [1898] from the French taximetre, from the German Taxameter (1890), which was coined from the Latin taxa (tax, charge) from taxo (to evaluate, to put in an order, to fix the value of a thing, to rate, to tax, to touch), from the Greek verb tasso (to put in an order, to fix the value of a thing; τάσσω).

From the same root:

English: taximeter, taxation, tax- (-collector, -free, -payer etc), taxis, taxology, taxonomy, task.
French: taxer, taxation, taxe, taxi, taximetre, taxiphone, tache
Italian: tassare, tassazione, tasso, tassi
Spanish: tasar, tasacion, tasa, taxi, taximetro
German: taxieren, Taxierung, Taxe, Taxi, Taxameter

This makes some sense in light of the notion that "taxing" signifies "adding up," and not, as we normally think, "taking away."

In other news...

....jury awards $1.2 million in damages for wrongful termination of Walgreen's pharmacist.

Great Moments in Fresno Legal History.

Remember the Fresno Alarm Company that thought that a great motivator for its employees was to spank them?

Well, the case is back in court.

And, yes, I'm interested because I have a piece of the action.

Discrimination in America.

Professor Timothy Larsen offers a story that brought back some memories:

John had been a straight-A student until he enrolled in English writing. The assignment was an “opinion” piece and the required theme was “traditional marriage.” John is a Southern Baptist and he felt it was his duty to give his honest opinion and explain how it was grounded in his faith. The professor was annoyed that John claimed the support of the Bible for his views, scribbling in the margin, “Which Bible would that be?” On the very same page, John’s phrase, “Christians who read the Bible,” provoked the same retort, “Would that be the Aramaic Bible, the Greek Bible, or the Hebrew Bible?” (What could the point of this be? Did the professor want John to imagine that while the Greek text might support his view of traditional marriage, the Aramaic version did not?) The paper was rejected as a “sermon,” and given an F, with the words, “I reject your dogmatism,” written at the bottom by way of explanation.


Thereafter, John could never get better than a C for papers without any marked errors or corrections. When he asked for a reason why yet another grade was so poor he was told that it was inappropriate to quote C. S. Lewis in work for an English class because he was “a pastor.” (Lewis, of course, was actually an English professor at Cambridge University. Perhaps it was wrong to quote Lewis simply because he had said something recognizably Christian.) Eventually John complained to the department chair, who said curtly that he could do nothing until the course was over. John took this to mean that the chair would do nothing and just accepted the bad grade.

In my case, it was an Economics class in 1979 where I defended nuclear power in the face of the TA's condemnation of nuclear power.  After that, I couldn't get better than a "B", which made Econ my worst grade in college.

It happens.

In an alternate universe where Spock has a goatee, pale is cool.

As a melanin-impaired redhead, I find this Indian ad touting the efficacy of a skin-whitening cream to be hilarious:

Skin-whitening creams for men and women have proved popular in India. Still, foreign companies have been criticized in the local media for playing up a perceived preference for lighter skin color.


Last year a column in the Times of India, lampooned the introduction of "Healthy White Skin Lightening Body Milk" by Vaseline as designed to ensure "an Aryan glow from head to toes."

At the time, the piece noted that the billboard advertising included the following pitch:

When it's healthy and cared for, our skin has the natural ability to maintain a light tone and clear texture. Unfortunately, when it's exposed to the sun, the skin's natural lightening processes are interrupted. Pigment producing cells become increasingly active, tanning the skin, and leaving it several shades darker than it's supposed to be.

New, Vaseline Healthy White skin lightening body milk works with the skin to reverse signs of darkening and prevent future pigmentation. A balanced combination of vitamin B3, yoghurt serum and conditioning moisturizers hydrate and even out skin tone. Triple sunscreens help prevent future darkening and encourage the skin to lighten itself.

Curse those active pigment producing cells that leave skin darker than it's supposed to be.

Happy Father's Day.

Ignore the odd-looking red-headed man and watch my uber-talented daughter's latest video creation.

Amazon delivers.

Amazon has just delivered a softwar package that allows Kindle users to organize their books into collections.

Since I've got 17 pages of books, articles, magazines and pdfs on my Kindle, that is a very good thing.

Why God became man.

Your questions.  Anselm's answers.

Red Dawn - New and Improved!!!

Now, with Chinese Commies.

Cousin Dan may not be selling out to the Libs:

If we could wave a magic wand and do just one thing that would bring true happiness to the right-wing blogosphere, what would it be? Make sure Nancy Pelosi got tossed out as speaker of the House after the Democrats lose big in the November elections? Guarantee that the next Sean Penn movie would be a big bomb? Ensure that President Obama would be brutally skewered by Jon Stewart every night, just as he was Tuesday night?

Right now, if we could measure things on our trusty conservative ecstasy meter (which has just emerged from the repair shop after bursting into flames after Elton John performed at Rush Limbaugh's wedding), I'd say that the winner would be the news that Hollywood is about to release a remake of "Red Dawn," the 1984 John Milius Cold War fantasy-thriller about a courageous scrum of young patriots who fend off a Soviet invasion of America. The original film has long been a cult favorite among conservatives, who rarely find any movies to call their own coming off the liberal Hollywood assembly line.


So all across the conservative blogosphere, the word is out that -- miraculously -- Hollywood has made a $75-million movie about kicking Commie ass, with the Commies this time being of the Chinese variety. No one is more enthused than Jason Apuzzo, who just posted a big piece about the film's bona fides on the Libertas Film Magazine, a newly revived version of the blog that set the standard for smart conservative film writing and in its first weeks of new life has already easily surpassed Andrew Breitbart's Big Hollywood, if for no other reason than that Apuzzo and his film-loving cohorts (including the always provocative Govindini Murty, who recently weighed in with a stirring defense of "Sex & the City 2") don't spend all their waking hours simply bashing all the usual lefty Hollywood suspects.

And:

But yes, the Commies do get their butts kicked in the new film. So I guess conservatives do have something to look forward to. But if they want to do something constructive to ensure that "Red Dawn" makes it to theaters, I'd advise calling Rupert Murdoch and ask him if he'd spend some of the money he normally puts into the salaries for all those blond chicks on Fox News and give "Red Dawn" a nice slot on the Fox release schedule. After all the money he's made off of "Avatar" and its lefty propaganda about global warming, it's the least Mr. Murdoch could do to level the playing field.

What's wrong with listening to podcasts about the history of Minoan Bull Leapers?

Someone sent this to me, because, they said, it reminded her of me.

Service above Self.

My friend Carolyn Moebest has a wonderful essay reflecting on what it feels like - and what it means - to see her son enlist in the Marines. 

One of the timeless truths of life is that "they also serve who stand and wait."