Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/28/2002 12:48:00 AM (Archive Link)
In relation to the previous post, I realized that the relationship of parent to child would also have the life-changing effects described. However, since I'm not a parent myself (despite a dream that Anne once had), it didn't immediately occur to me.

Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/26/2002 01:11:00 AM (Archive Link)
It's been brought to my attention that most of my blogs have a somewhat negative tone. As a result, I'm posting a blog that's more positive. This concerns my best friend/fiancée, Anne. We've been together for three years now and engaged for five months. There's nobody I love more nor is there anybody more important to me. People often say that such and such person has changed them and it's true in my case. I still remember when I came back to college in the fall of '99. It was in the early summer of that year when I fully realized that I loved her. Quite a realization really. I had liked plenty of girls before her but never had I even approached the point of love. To have arrived at that milestone and to know that she had also come to it in relation to me was soul-shaking. There was somebody in my life about whom I cared more and was more concerned about than myself. I'm of the opinion that while many will put others above themselves, it is largely in isolated cases and in time-limited circumstances. The exception to this takes a religious experience or a romantic one. There are special relationships in which one is willing to change forever for another. True change from who or what they presently are. How one thinks, how one behaves, how one dresses. This isn't done to satisfy the other exclusively, but done in sacrifice to and for the other; done because of the sustained importantance and love of that person. Some is done consciously but much also takes place unconciously. The influence of one on the other and vice versa occurs over time. It's as if (analogy warning) there are two stones being rubbed against each other. There is friction and grinding, but over time, the two stones will fit together perfectly. So as I was saying, the special romantic relationship causes sudden change that the person is willing to be permanent not only for themselves but also for the other because they want to be with the other permanently. This was my case that summer. Getting back to the fall, I came back and many of my friends commented on how much I had changed in just three months. They all remarked that I seemed happier, freer, more open... just all around a more contented person. And they were right. The love of a woman and my love for her had wrought a change in who I was. Those changes are still ongoing and I'm delighted they are. For I know that as long they're occurring, my love is still strong, and that even when our personalities grind against each other, we're just trying to become that better matched. Anne, I love you.

Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/25/2002 01:48:00 AM (Archive Link)
One of the interesting things I've noticed about this whole Enron thing is the apparent dichotomy between how Enron was treated and Arthur Andersen is being treated. When Enron went under due to the willfully unethical acts of a few tops executives, putting many people out of work, the public cried for those newly unemployed. Yes, it was a sad thing indeed. These workers in a large energy concern that was really only a recent creation and had a wacky business plan at best were now without a job. We said, “It isn’t fair! This wasn’t their fault!” Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton even chased the headlines down to Houston where they demanded the government make special welfare available to the unfortunate souls (of course, after their photo ops, they promptly evaporated from the scene).

In the case of Arthur Andersen, they may go bankrupt because of the negligently stupid actions of a few people in their Houston office. However, nobody seems concerned about the 28,000 employees who may be put out on the street all over the country if the firm goes under. Rather, the public wants blood. They want to see the Andersen charged with all sorts of heinous offenses. They want to see an almost 90-year-old (and until recently, well-respected) accounting institution torn to shreds. I really find it quite amazing on several points.

First, people seem to be more willing to excuse Enron’s actions than they are Andersen’s. Enron conceived and executed the plans that led to its downfall. Andersen was supposed to be Enron’s overseer to make sure everything was above board and apparently through either knowing complicity or professional blunder, Enron’s actions were not condemned. But let’s make no bones about it: Enron did them. The blame for the bankruptcy lies with them. Yes, you can blame Andersen for not doing its job, but I don’t see how you can heap so much more persecution upon them than on Enron. Society seems to like looking for somebody else to make responsible for another’s actions. We like to make a victim out of the criminal. So this is what we are doing with Enron. Its accounting sins are the fault of Andersen’s bad oversight. Poor, poor Enron would never have hidden all that debt in those shell corporations had Andersen raised it right with firm discipline and said, “Bad Enron! Bad!” You can blame Andersen for not performing its duties to the extent it was supposed to but don’t you dare blame it for what Enron actually did.

Second, Andersen is being made out to be a backwards firm that engages in all sorts of accounting shenanigans. Rather, it’s being made out to be the only backwards that engages in all sorts of accounting shenanigans. Of course, that’s not true… it’s not backwards and 99.9% of its dealings involve no shenanigans. From my reading and point of view, it seemed to suffer from certain policies and practices that were driven by the competitive and profit-driven industry more than anything else. What I find strange is the evil public eye being cast upon Andersen while ignoring the other four “Big Five” firms. Make not mistake, whatever Andersen was doing wrong, you can be sure the others were or are doing as well. They just weren’t exposed in the way Andersen was and I’m sure they’re more than happy to let Andersen take the heat while they quietly (very quietly) make changes in their own organizations to prevent similar problems, or at least similar exposés. They’re probably drooling over the clients they can gain should Andersen dissolve, not to mention the amazing abundance of talent that would suddenly be on the market. I think some news agencies would have one or two hot stories on their hands if they stopped concentrating on Andersen so much and looked at suspicious practices and client-dealings at the other accounting firms. Of course, that would take effort and much newsgathering nowadays abhors effort. It prefers the news that’s ready-made and investigative reporting that doesn’t go beyond a human-interest story the public will lap up on a prime time newsmagazine show. And besides, something that would involve the expertise (from experts, not pundits or talking heads) needed to investigate accounting practices elsewhere would only be for the intrepid and patient few.

Third, I think this perfectly illustrates the public’s obsession for things that it clearly doesn’t understand. I’m indicting myself with this. I’m not business or accounting minded. While I grasp the pared down “Enron Bankruptcy For Dummies” version of events, I would never (at least at my current level of education) understand the details of what happened. And my own dealings in business show that there are tons of little behind the scenes details, conversations, and decisions that affect what happens and we’ll never know about. So while I can put my two cents in, I can take some pride in admitting that I don’t fully know what’s going on. Ahhh… the Socratic spirit within me lives again.

Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/23/2002 02:16:00 AM (Archive Link)
What other things annoy me? Well, let’s see… political correctness ranks near the top. I consider society’s penchant of it to be absurd. Invariably, it springs from the desire to not offend people. While this seems like a find thing, and often it is, it can also be taken to extremes. At its root, I believe, is politeness. You don’t insult people, especially stranger, because it’s impolite. You don’t e in public because it’s impolite. You don’t walk around because it’s impolite. If you’re being impolite then you’re offending people, generally the public at large; you’re an affront to their sensitivities. What I find bizarre is the abundance of concern about offending nobody. Frankly, you’re always going to offend somebody no matter what you do. Even your attempt to be non-offensive to one group will be offensive to another. One of the new articles that I love reading on a weekly basis is one entitled, “Tongue Tied” and it appears every Monday on FoxNews.com. It details the wackiness of political correctness. A recent column detailed how a high school choir dropped out of a Red Cross fundraiser because the Red Cross deemed that their song selection’s inclusion of religious (Christian) themes and language was inappropriate. The organizers wanted to be sensitive to those who were non-religious and non-Christian. I believe the terminology (and I will search for the exact quote) was that their commitment to the religious diversity of the audience led them to take such an action. I adore that word choice: “diversity.” Another case is a worker who was fired from a public library because she refused to remove a simple cross necklace while on the job as her supervisor demanded. Again, the reasoning was that they wanted to be sensitive to the wide variety of people who use the library and their diversity. What I find baffling about this is the idea that it’s in the interests of diversity. Diversity means the many in its various forms. Prohibiting the expression of one view doesn’t contribute to diversity, it takes away from it. Of course, that’s in its logical, pure sense. However, nowadays it’s been made to mean that respecting diversity is not offending the diverse. (As an aside, I’ve noticed that PCness often takes on the tones of Orwellian newspeak. Diversity is elimination. Freedom of speech is total censorship of speech. The majority is the minority.) As I’ve said, you’re always going to offend somebody. Most often, these people are going to be an extreme minority. In the case of the necklace, a cross pendant is going offend a very small minority of people. Few would think such a symbol (which itself has become as much a fashion symbol as a Christian one) is oppressive or insulting or that it’s an attempt to force a religion on them. Rather, people would be fine with it. Not approving, not disapproving, just non-committal and at peace with such a display. A pentagram pendant, on the other hand (as the knee-jerk counter-argument would be that if you allow a cross, you must also allow something commonly seen as bad), would be offensive to a vast majority. We should be concerned about the majority, but not the minority. It is ludicrous that we should allow the most sensitive person in society to determine what the rest of society does and thinks. Applying PC legalistically is absurd. Applying it with common sense is needed. The boringly obvious counter to this is that we must protect the minority… they must be protected from the tyranny of the majority. Tyranny, yes. From feeling bad, no. I’ve read the Constitution. I’ve read the Bill of Rights. I’ve read the Declaration of Independence. I’ve read a number of important nation-building documents. The common theme is that the important rights to which people are naturally entitled are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I never read anything about the right not to be offended, or the right not to be annoyed, or irritated, or miffed. And the right to the pursuit of happiness doesn’t cover it. It’s the pursuit of happiness, not happiness itself. You must pursue happiness; chase after it. There’s nothing that says the government or entities or people must clear everything from your path of achieving bliss. There’s nothing that says you will get handed happiness on a silver platter (I sound like my mom now). Life is rough. It’s hard. You’re gonna get miffed. You’re gonna have people who will say something mean to you. You’re gonna be offended by something people do or say or wear. You’re find yourself in the minority sometime. But as long as the majority isn’t impeding your ability to live, your ability to be free, or your ability to pursue happiness, it’s done what is necessary to grant you your inalienable rights. If you actually want to be happy, you have to engage in the pursuit. Happiness takes effort.

Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/23/2002 02:15:00 AM (Archive Link)
I always have disliked the task of trying to find a job. You send your résumé out en masse so that you may be judge solely on a piece of paper. After that you have to sit through a thoroughly stressful interview in which you are continually plied by questions about this or that type of situation and how you handled it. Worse yet is the uncertainty about what you’ll do for a job. Ya gotta make that money and nobody likes no knowing from where that money is going to come. I really have no right to complain, though. I’ve been extraordinarily lucky when it comes to employment. I’ve never stayed out of work for long and have gotten decent to good jobs when I’ve hooked on someplace. I consider it divine guidance. God’s looking our for me. So knowing how hard it is for some very experienced and very qualified people to find employment, I, a philosophy major relatively fresh out of college, hardly have the place to whine.

Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/20/2002 11:53:00 PM (Archive Link)
Incidentally, any comments about these blogs, should you happen to come upon them may be directed towards danman78ks@yahoo.com.

Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/20/2002 11:51:00 PM (Archive Link)
While I’ve mentioned moral relativity, I might as well continue. There are few things that I really despise. One of them is moral relativism. I can’t stand it. This is the notion that this or that opinion, idea, religion, etc. is equally true as any other opinion, idea, or religion, etc. Essentially, there is no truth. At least that’s my contention. Yes, yes, the moral relativist will claim that he does believe in truths… many truths… in fact, the air is thick with truth and falsity is a rare element indeed. Fortunately, I hold the upper hand because I think he’s wrong but he thinks I’m right. Tragically, though, I think he’s wrong that he thinks I’m right. Anyway, when everything is put on the same level of correctness, there ceases to be a necessary distinction between that which is right and that which is wrong. Ideas come to be happy little neighbors on an exceedingly dull plane in which everybody is right. In this manner, there is no longer “truth,” there is just, well, “is.” Now that I think about it, it’s a very socialist/communist metaphysical outlook. There’s nothing true, there’s nothing false… everything’s just been leveled out to a nice “ok.” However, these happy neighbors really don’t get along very well. (Alas, it’s the unfortunate nature of ideas that they can’t build high privacy fences to keep out the crazy things the guy next door is doing.) You see many ideas are just flat out mutually exclusive from each other. A monotheistic religion like Christianity is mutually exclusive from a polytheistic religion like Hinduism. One says there is only God, the other says there are many gods. You just can’t reconcile that. They can’t both be true. Logically, it doesn’t work. Yeah, that’s right, logic. That wacky male construct. If you don’t like it, feel free to argue against it. Only please do it in the irony booth to your right. So as I was saying, only of them can be true. In the realm of ideas, there are multiple cases of this. What it comes down to is somebody’s gotta be right and somebody’s gotta be wrong. The relativist will say that in actuality both are correct for that person in their own way. Hooey. One’s gotta be right, the other’s gotta be wrong. These aren’t just some personal choices somebody makes, these are hard-edged right or wrong ideas. To agree with the relativist is skirting the issue and abdicating responsibility for making important and difficult choices. Instead of wrestling with a number of hard topics, you come out with stock answer of saying everything is right, it’s whatever you think. It reminds of when I did debate in high school. I was a 2N. This stood for second negative and meant that when my partner and I were on the negative side of the argument, I would get up second and attempt to defeat my opposition’s affirmative position. What this involved was giving disadvantages to their plan using evidentiary material you hauled around with you. Well, if you weren’t very good at debating or if you just didn’t have anything other idea how to fight it, you would use a generic “disad.” This was a disadvantage that you could link to nearly any possible affirmative argument and related in vague ways at best. It was the last (or first) resort of the novice, the dim-witted, or the ill-prepared. I suppose this is how I view the relativist.

After that long digression… Without ever researching the issue, I like to think that relativism came about through the philosophical notion that man is unable to know truth. This is a consistent theme invigorated especially by Descartes and going forward. Often the philosophers will attempt to build back up epistemological possibilities after undergoing great labors to knock them down. Despite the constructive effort, the ing doubts remained. Can man ever truly know what good, pure, unadulterated “truth” is? It seems iffy at best. And with this I agree. However, somewhere along the way, this idea that we lack the capacity to achieve knowledge of truth mutated (not morphed, mutated) into there being no truth at all… that because we can’t know it, it’s not there. That crazy epistemological problem again. I disagree with this. There is truth and while maybe no or few ideas have fully achieved those ranks, all get closer or farther away from it. Our lack of being able to fully identify all those more true ideas doesn’t mean we should stop trying. I think we come upon many by trial and error. And I’ll expound on this more later. I’m getting tired.

Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/20/2002 10:58:00 PM (Archive Link)
I went to see David McCullough speak tonight. He was a good speaker with a clear view of early American history… not only from the modern perspective but also in seeing it in its own right. His thorough research for his John Adams biography included not only reviewing the Adams-related material itself, but also involved him absorbing the culture of the period. He read the authors, plays, and periodicals of the time in order to get a sense of the popular thought and phrases in Adams’ day. He tried to gain an understanding of the essence of Adams’ time so as to gain an understanding of Adams himself. I respect that. I rather dislike people sitting on the throne of moral relativity and (ironically) moral evolution and have them looking back into the past casting judgment upon it without ever having the foggiest conception of what it was in itself.

Another point I particularly liked was during the question and answer session. A local teacher asked Mr. McCullough what he thought of the quality of history textbooks, specifically those that got things wrong, e.g. an atomic bomb ending the Korean War (although my favorite gaffe is a science textbook whose picture caption described a particular bacillus… the picture was that of Linda Ronstadt). His immediate response was that they were stupid. Not just accidentally incorrect, but neglectfully stupid. I tend to agree. The best part, though, is what he suggested for such textbooks… which in his opinion included all but 3 or 4. One should take all the pages out, cut off the page numbers, remove random pages (every tenth one or so) and then shuffle the remainder. When you’re done, hand the mixed-up pile to the student with the instructions to put the pages in order and to also figure out what’s missing. While this was obviously quite witty, I also think it would be (as he mischievously thought) a remarkably effective manner for people to learn history. Instead of just learning (read: memorizing what the book tells ya) and spitting back the strings of events and dates in the book, you would be forced to do some meaningful research into the matters. Only by doing so would you gain the necessary information to accomplish the task. Learning by necessity. I would dearly love to read about some teacher trying this. Heck, it would benefit me to try it. Let’s see… I’m sure I still have that ratty old high school history book around here somewhere…

Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/17/2002 10:57:00 PM (Archive Link)
Right now, I'm showing the Blogger to Anne.

Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/15/2002 05:28:00 PM (Archive Link)
I have little idea who will actually end up reading this thing but I can pass around the address to whomever I feel like giving it. Like Anne, my finacee. Hi Anne!

Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/15/2002 05:21:00 PM (Archive Link)
This is my first post, so I'm just testing out the system.