Sources

Below are listed the sources I used for the philosophers' points of view. Check out the links if you want to do any further research on the topics covered:

1. Article: Reneé Descartes' Musicae Compendium. Retrieved from http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/eresources/exhibitions/treasures/html/222.html

2. Hegel, G. Hegel's Philosophy of the Right [electronic version]. Retrieved from http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/pr/prfamily.htm

3. Outline of Great Books [electronic version] (2002-2003).  Aristotle On Friendship. Retrieved from http://www.publicbookshelf.com/public_html/Outline_of_Great_Books_Volume_I/aristotle_bdd.html

4. Moseley, A. Philosophy Of Love (2006).  Retrieved from http://www.iep.utm.edu/l/love.htm#SH2a

5. Nolan, L. Descartes' Ontological Argument (2006). Retrieved from http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes-ontological/

6. Marx, K. The Power of Money (1844) [electronic version]. Retrieved from http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/power.htm

7. Burgess, B. The Educational Theory of Socrates (2008). Retrieved from http://www.newfoundations.com/GALLERY/Socrates.html

Philosophy Class

Taking philosophy class has been a greatly enriching experience for me. I managed to excell in the course with very little difficulty. This is because this course calls for critical thinking and reflection - while other classes such as math or science may require painful memorization and studying from a textbook, philosophy actually makes you think and arrive at your own answers or theories. In this way, you can rarely stumble upon an incorrect answer, because philosophy revolves around different opinions and perspectives - unlike math where 2 + 2 always equals 4... (except in George Orwell's "1984" where it equals 5). 

There are some ideas that I learned in philosophy class which will be engraved in my mind forever - for example, Plato's allegory of The Cave. Watching interesting, thought-provoking movies like The Matrix, Contact and Zelig helped to make some of the topics easier to comprehend, and more relateable. 

One special thing about this class was the effect it had on the students. Learning different philosophers theories in a way sets us free from "the cave", and enables us to start viewing the world around us in a different way. Things we ignore and simply take for granted, like time and personal identity are now things we look at with wonder and amazement, wondering the true nature of these concepts.

To conclude, this class has definitely affected me in a positive way. I have gained a broader view of the world around me, and have greatly enhanced my reasoning skills. Hopefully philosophy is something I will keep with me for the duration of my life, because it is important to ask questions - maybe even more important than it is to get answers. I'd have to say that throughout all my years of high school, this was probably one of my favourite classes.

Music

"Music is the movement of sound to reach the soul for the education of its virtue" - Plato

Music is arguably the most popular art form, and has been throughout history. Though it has evolved drastically over the years, its popularity has not decreased. Since philosophers talk about art and aesthetics, I wondered if they had anything to say about music. 

Descartes, as stated in his Compendium on Music, believed that music could be separated into three major components, the first of these being the mathematical. As far back as it dates, music has always maintained some sort of rhythm, and thus has always been interlinked with mathematics.In an argument with Pythagorus, one can assume that Pythagorus would use music as proof that numbers are the basis of all things. The second component was "the nature of sensory perception". Though I am not certain, I believe he is talking about what we now consider the components of music (rhythm, pitch, tone - anything we can experience and analyse). The third component is the most interesting. Descartes talks about the effect of this perception on the listener. This was something he realized could not be measured scientifically - but was something psychological. 

Though I am not a fan of either math nor science, I must agree that the scientifical/mathematical aspects of music our vital. Our ears and brains are designed in a way that only mathematical use of rhythm and pitch will seem aesthetically pleasing to us. As for Descartes third component, I do believe that music can have an effect on the soul. In classical music, composers would incorporate tension and release into their music - because the relief of tension is said to be the foundation for the greatest moments in our lives. I disagree with Descarte's placement of music as a study of metaphysics, however. I believe that the effect music has on us is psychological and not spiritual. For example, certain songs may revive fond memories of the past, inducing a highly emotional state. On that note, here is a song that brings back memories for me, and perhaps was the song that got me into music in the first place. 

Spiritual Life

The existence of God is perhaps one of the most widely-debated, and most controversial topics in human history. There are many opposing views as to whether or not God can possibly exist. First, I will briefly explain the position of both sides.  

Descartes is one of the many philosophers that did believe in the existence of God. Descartes reasoned that we do possess this concept of a perfect being, an idea which could not possibly be created by imperfect beings like ourselves. Therefore, a perfect being (God) must have placed that idea within us. So basically, for us to have the idea of an omnipotebt being like God, he must exist.

Philosphers like Hume were skeptical about God's existence, and even went as far to deny it's possibility. These philosophers utilised our perception of God along with logic to disproves his existence. Two examples of their arguments are as follows:

1) God VS Evil - Evil does exist in the Universe. God is not only omnipotent (all powerful) but also benevolent (all good). For evil to exist, God must either not be all powerful, or must, in fact, be malevolent.

2) Argument Against Omnipotence - There is no such thing as omnipotence - an all powerful being can not possibly exist. This argument is usually followed by a logical paradox, such as:

If God is truly omnipotent, could he create a rock so heavy that even he could not lift it?

I am a Christian, baptised as a Catholic to be specific, and I do believe in the existence of God. Though religion may have it's negatives, a world without religion would be a much harder world to live in. Believing in an afterlife can help make us less afraid of our inevitable deaths. Praying to a God or going to church can help relieve stress in times of turmoil - we are reassured by the fact that there is someone looking out for us.

Personally, I do not take many of the stories in the bible literally. I believe that arguments concerning God's omnipotence or benevolence are completely useless - for they are attacking only a certain perception of what God possibly is. I believe God to be more abstract - a being that allows us freedom of choice, allows us to have control over our own lives and actions. Perhaps my all time favourite perception of God is in the following clip, taken from an episode of Futurama:

School Life / Academics / The Future

“Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned in school" - Albert Einstein

Academics

Knowledge. As human beings, we move forward in persuit of knowledge and the truth. But there are many doubts as to what it is possible to know, what we can be certain of, and how we can obtain - if there even is - a real truth. 

According to the Greek philsopher Socrates (469 BC - 399 BC), there are two types of knowledge: trivial and important. Most of us possess what he would label as trivial knowledge. Trivial knowledge is knowledge that may only be useful to ourselves, but not to mankind as a whole. 

With the exception of classes within the life sciences, I believe that much of what we learn in school is trivial information. In school, we learn countless information from textbooks. The problem is, we learn to memorize formulas and definitions. Consequently, we forget everything we have learned a short time afterwards.

School should exist to teach us not only about the world, but about life. It should focus more on teaching us proper human behaviour, and how to fit in with society. Socrates would agree that we should learn about human nature, and how best to act. 

In my opinion, the majority of what we learn in school does not reveal to us any real truths. Everything we learn can be doubted, therfore my philosophy on school would probably be most similar to that of Descartes (1596-1650). Descartes eventually came to the conclusion that no "real truths" could be learned in school. He set out on a quest for true knowledge, and only in the end realizing that true knowledge can only be discovered by the self - through reasoning and critical thinking.

School Life / The Future
Since I am now in Grade 12, my school life is not as focused towards academics as it is to planning for the future. This entire year seems to revolve around making choices that will affect me for the rest of my life. All in one year, I must decide where to attend University, what classes to take, what future career I aim to have...

Personally, I do not believe in planning to far into the future. I am a simple person, who enjoys day to day life. Consequently, the pressures of being a Grade 12 student can be extremely overwhelming. 

I thought long and hard as to what I can use to properly represent my feelings about school life and worrying about the future. I decided the best fitting song would have to be Scream, from High School Musical 3, sung by Zac Efron as Troy Bolton. If you haven't heard this song already, enjoy:

Money

"The writer must earn money in order to be able to live and to write, but he must by no means live and write for the purpose of making money" - Karl Marx

We live in a society that revolves around money. Money itself is paradoxical - though we believe that money can be used to solve all problems, it can also be said that money is the cause of all problems. 

In essence, possession of money is the possession of property. Many philosophers have voiced strong opinions against money and personal property. The most prominent would have to be none other than Karl Marx, who is widely regarded as the founder of Communism. 

Marx observed that money had become the main means of life - that it had somewhat gained a state of omnipotence. He also concluded that money is power, and that the extent of our power is the same as the extent of our monetary power. Similarly, Marx states that money is the difference between who we are and what we are capable of. For example, he states, "I am ugly, but I can buy for myself the most beautiful of women. Therefore I am not ugly, for the effect of ugliness — its deterrent power — is nullified by money"

Personally, I take a similar view to Marx, believing that money has obtained too much power. I do not believe that class systems should be completely abolished, but I do believe that we should progress towards a world without money. 

While money does maintain some order in society, it is at the same time the cause for all disorder. A significant percentage of crime is fueled by poverty, or desire for money. Most wars faught on our Earth are battles for power, power obtained through superior economic status. 

If money can be the cause of such corruption and violence, then why do we have money? The the pros really out-weigh the cons? Is it possible to imagine a world without money?

Possessing and focusing on obtaining material goods prevents us from truly enjoying life. People will work and slave day to day, with all of their energy devoted to their jobs. To some people, life is simply an endless cycle: They make money to buy material possessions. Then there are bills to pay, so they work and work to pay for the bills that keep on coming. This principle can be best explained by the following lyric:"Buy this car to drive to work, drive to work to pay for this car" - Metric.

A particular novel that comes to mind when thinking about money is Chuck Palahniuk's "Fight Club". In Fight Club, the protagonist becomes fed up with his consumerist lifestyle and teams up with a man named Tyler Durden. Together, they plot to bring down society by completely destroying any trace of the credit record - thus erasing all debt and knowledge of wealth. It is interesting to consider what would become of the world in such a case, if all of a sudden all our debts were erased and we were free to start over.

"It is important to point out that regardless of the social system, whether fascist, socialist, capitalist or communist, the underlying mechanism is still money, labour and competition... the reality is that "monetary-ism" (so to speak) is the true mechanism that guides the interests of all the countries on the planet. The most aggressive and hence dominant variation of this monetary-ism is the free enterprise system." - Zeitgeist Addendum

The following is a song that I wrote myself concerning the topic of money:

Money - Jay D

Love

In my opinion, the word "Love" is one of the most vague words in the English langauge. No other word has so many possible definitions, no other word can be applied to so many situations, no other word can be so misinterpreted or misunderstood. 

In philosophy, there are many different natures of love. Three "natures" of love, which were established by the Greek, which I'd like to discuss are: Eros, Philia, and Agape. 

Eros - The greek meaning of the world constitutes passion, usually of some sexual implication. The philosopher Plato, however, established a different definition for the word. In Plato's opinion, eros is "the love for the beautiful." Basically, Plato defines eros as love for a true form os something which we percieve as beautiful. This love is not bound to human affection; it can extend to appreciation for beauty in nature and art, etc. Eros constitutes an extreme desire - an intense longing for this beauty. 

Philia - Unlike eros, philia does not constitute an intense desire. It more so consist ofaffection and appreciation. This type of love can be applied to friendship or even family. Aristotle's view of philia when applied to friendship clearly annotates necessary properties for this relationship. People seek someone who is kind to them, admires them and shares their thoughts and views. According to Aristotle, the most compatible people will produce the best possible kind of friendship - and can possibly develop into love.

Agape - In a nutshell, Agape is the love shared between God and man, and exteneds to the love for mankind in general - the one form of love which I unfortunately must say I am not sure I possess... This love is taken from phrases in the bible such as "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might" (Deuteronomy 6:5) and "love thy neighbour as thyself" (Leviticus 19:18).

Source - http://www.iep.utm.edu/l/love.htm#H4

As high school students, one way or another we experience each form of love at some point. There are two forms of love that I truly belive in and they are as follows:

1) Love for a hobby - it is important to have something in our lives which we hold to the highest possible value, something that we can emmerce outselves in. For me, two things come to mind. The first is music. My relationship with music has grown over the past few years, and perhaps is the only relationship I am guaranteed to have for the entirety of my life. 

2) Love for another person - When I say this, I am reffering to bonds that emerge themselves as a result of your iteractions with people. Love within a family is not necessarily reflective of love - you cannot tell whether or not you would feel the same about thos people if you were not forced to spend so much time with them. Love for another person you meet at some point in your life, however - specifically a form of love that goes beyond friendship - is necessary in my opinion for experiencing true happiness.

I will not divulge any personal information whatsoever, but I will say this: For the first couple years of high school, and I'm sure many people will agree, we all experience several "crushes". This form of love we feel for someone, who we possibly do not have a strong relationship with, is common in high school. After the jump, you can hear a remake of a song I wrote and recorded first back in Grade 9. That song is the embodiment of romantic relationships at a younger age. Below it, is an example of a type of relationship that can form at this point in my life. Being a huge fan of Pokemon at the time, I always had a desire to see Ash and Misty end up together. But although they were close friends, there was never any admittance by either character that they had feelings for each other beyond friendship - that is, until a soundtrack came out with this on it, which is perhaps my favourite love song of all time. Video provided below. (And theres also a video of one of the themes from Mother 3 [my favouite video game ever!] called "Mother 3 Theme of Love". Its a beautiful song thats very fitting for the theme of LOVE in general)

Finally, I believe that music is a wonderful way for expressing love. Following is a list of some of my all-time favourite songs about love (not necessarily "love songs"):

Misty's Song - Pokemon

All My Loving - The Beatles

If We Were A Movie - Hannah Montana

I'm In Heaven - ATC

Make You Mine - Vanessa Hudgens

When The Day Met The Night - Panic At The Disco

About A Girl - The Academy Is...

The Artist - The Hush Sound

I Miss You - Blink-182

Ok well technically I can go on forever with this so just enjoy the songs I posted below...

Crush - Jay D

Misty's Song:

Mother 3 Theme of Love: