An exploration of romanticism in the world of the caped crusader with reference to the work and ideas of Goethe and Schopenhauer. Characteristics of Goethe’s Romanticism present in Batman: • Heroic despair – isolation of Batman, melancholy that leads to the creation of Batman prominent feature in Romanticism. • Attraction to the darkside – evil forces in Gotham City hold a mystifying hold over Batman. • Nightmare landscape – Gothic architecture, Gotham is a physical manifestation of Bruce’s fears. • Wasteland – Wayne manor is the wasteland representing some aspect of lack in Batman’s world. • Ambivalence – present in the ordinary citizen in Gotham City, resolved themselves to a life where crime and fear are a major factor. • Villainy – endless supply of villains and arch-enemies in Gotham City. • Murder – Bruce Wayne’s parents are murdered when he is a child. • Death – death of Bruce’s parents marks the death of his innocence. • Impossible love – Bruce’s lack of relationship is a source of sorrow and insanity. Relevance of Schopenhauer in Batman: • Batman is unable to achieve happiness because it is something that does not exist. • Suffering is an essential part of life. • Batman displays a great amount of sympathy for others and is particularly sensitive to their pain, characteristics of Schopenhauer’s good man. • However, he has not quite freed himself from his will and as such will never achieve any value in his life according to Schopenhauer. Only in non-existence can he seek refuge.
Category: 2005
My territory for this project is The Big Issue Magazine, which after a thorough study illustrated a multiplicity of recurring themes, namely those of alienation, exploitation and ideology and the broader issue of social exclusion. “The Big Issue was set up as a business in 1991 to give homeless people the chance to make an income. It campaigns on behalf of homeless people. It allows homeless people to voice their views and opinions.” It is essentially concerned with giving those people remaining in poverty a voice in the media but also to provide a positive image of the homeless themselves, within society. I decided to use Marx and primarily his and Engel’s text The German Ideology as one of the prominent sources for my essay. This is for numerous reasons. Firstly, I wanted to look at The Big Issue Magazine in terms of Ideology and consequently the impact differing ideologies have on society (for this I also looked at the ideas of Louis Althusser). I also hoped to appropriate his views on alienation and exploitation to the modern consensus of what it is to be homeless and in poverty. However, I discovered that it was possible to suggest that although Big Issue vendors appear to be “helping themselves” they too are in the midst of exploitation at its most sinister level. This discovery lead me to the text by David Harvey entitled The Condition of Postmodernity. It discusses the fact that since the 1970’s there has been a somewhat disintegration between the differing classes of society and this provides a veiling, a montage of fictional images, so to speak, of the community’s true circumstances. So my project therefore concentrates itself on this change, namely the modern and postmodern attitudes towards the inequality of people and consequently society’s attendance to such matters.
Aim: To discover why certain types of heroes are popular in films, animation and graphic novels, and why we are attracted to such qualities. Method: Analysing some of the more interesting and obscure characters to ascertain why people are attracted to more nihilistic, free-thinking traits. To do this I will look at ideas such as nihilism, escapism and boredom, and correlate them with research into transcendence, innocence, naivety, and rebelliousness. Characters explored will include Roman Dirge’s Lenore, Jhonen Vasquez’s Johnny The Homicidal Maniac (pictured above), the residents of Sobriety Straight in Dame Darcy’s Meat Cake, and the Norse God Loki who features in The Mask. Sources: The Modern Stranger – Lesley D. Harman, Comic Book Nation – Wright, Dame Darcy’s Meat Cake Compilation – Dame Darcy, JTHM – Jhonen Vasquez, Lenore: Noogies – Roman Dirge.
• My chosen territory: magazine advertising • My aim: explore the field of magazine advertising, investigate the truth within, and discuss in reference to the changes in the philosophies of truth. • My workbook explains how the concept for my project evolved from researching my chosen territory, and lead into the philosophy involved. • I started to research a few facts and figures about advertising in the media, and then gathered some examples of the advertising itself. • Then I began to investigate the possible philosophical issues that could be involved, for example: Karl Marx – discussing the power of the consumer on ads – the ‘masses’ have become the middle classes, who hold the most jobs, consume the most goods, and provide the state with the most revenue. Bertrand Russell – the pursuit of happiness – an admirable social goal, which he defines as “a profound instinctive union with the stream of life”. And also, Marcuse, Adorno, and Horkheimer – in respect of manipulation -they formulated the Frankfurt School vision of the innocent man and the guilty social institutions. I took a closer look at Sigmund Freud who described how non-satisfaction of powerful instincts leads to ‘cultural frustration’. And also his nephew Edward Bernays, perhaps the world’s first Spin Doctor, he called for the implementation of mass psychology by which public opinion might be controlled. • But then I struck on the concept of truth. Its significance and value is universally recognised, and yet is often manipulated by the advertising industry. Surprisingly, a complete account of the nature of truth has been notoriously elusive. Whereas the aim of science is to discover which of the propositions in its domain are true, i.e. which propositions possess the property of truth, the central philosophical concern of truth is to discover the nature of that property. It is not, What is true? but rather, What is truth? • There are 3 main theories. Firstly, the Correspondence Theory – an Aristotelian thesis, perhaps the most widely held account, it states that a belief is true provided there exists a fact corresponding to it. However if it is to provide a complete theory of truth, then it must be supplemented with accounts of what ‘facts’ are, and what it is for a belief to correspond to fact. • A popular alternative is to identify truth with verifiability. This idea can take on various forms. The Coherence Theory, developed by Bradley and Brand Blanchard, involves the further assumption that verification is holistic. Another version, from Dummett and Putnam, states that a true proposition can be verified by the appropriate procedure. In mathematics this amounts to the identification of truth with provability and is sometimes referred to as ‘intuitionistic truth’. Such theories however, appear to overestimate the link between knowability and truth, for we can easily imagine a statement that, though true, is beyond our power to verify. • The third major theory is the Pragmatic Theory, which argues that true beliefs are a good basis for action, and takes this to be the very nature of truth. True assumptions are said to be, by definition, those that provoke actions with desirable results. But again, the central objection is that the link it postulates, in this case between truth and its utility, is overestimated.
Aim To discover the importance of contemporary television broadcasting to the nature of our society and culture. Objectives 1. To explore the key concept of ideology as interpreted by poststructuralists such as Foucault and Althusser as well as the Gramscian notion of hegemony. 2. To investigate the way that we are unconsciously manipulated into receiving cultural values and class position by the world around us. To show that existing within the context of a society dominated by the influence of a capitalist media engine shapes the normative conditions of these evaluations, and illustrate how constant change allows modern capitalist society to revamp and perpetuate itself through self-referential discourse. 3. To trace some of the patterns and phenomena in our modern media. To establish what might have caused the proliferation and success of ‘reality television’ and the cult of celebrity. To understand how television invades our homes and turns us into consumers in our own front room, transforming unique individuals into aspiring capitalists engaged in the systematic labour of production and consumption. Method Close reading of texts such as Foucault’s ‘The Archaeology of Knowledge’ and ‘Power/Knowledge’ and Gramsci’s ‘Selections from the Prison Notebooks’ as well as an examination of recent trends in television and the effects of modern celebrity on individuality.
A Rhizome, as in the Botanical definition means a plant which grows horizontally and in a discontinuous manner by sending out runners. Deleuze and Guattari’s comes from this idea of roots of becoming divergent. The Rhizome is different to the arborescent root. The growth is vertical not horizontal. This is a tree like structure which, in terms of within the music press represents a hierarchy of opinion or influence. With the rapid growth in different music publications the structure of the business may be changing as technology and the demands of the consumer change. Also with the creation of different genres or sub cultures comes the demand for attention and often publications specific to that genre or style. With this interest in turn comes the capitalist interests and the potential for what Deleuze and Guattari call deterritorialization; a move from the minor to the major due to capital. The importance of having an independent music press for the consumer and for bands/artists. Is an independent and honest music media something that we should be concerned about or something which the masses really want- The need for some direction, for leaders. What are the arborescent papers or programmes now? Has the shift changed, or is it changing and do organs such as NME and channels such as MTV still exert the massive influence over the music press. The change is a change from totalities and uniformity, the power structure of the arborescent in which everything derives from the same homogenous, commanding trunk. The change is a change towards a decentred production of information which resists any temptation to coagulate around a power source, around uni-polar modalities, in favour of a free associating heterogeneity of all, a true multiplicity, a rhizome.
A look into the shifted ideals of religion, human spirituality and the replacement of conventional religion with new spiritualities. Objectives To investigate what has happened to religious belief since the enlightenment. How conventional religion has slowly throughout the last two hundred years become fragmented and changed along with its effect on human spirituality. The damage that the enlightenment did to major religions. The effect lack and subsequent regaining of faith In new and different ways. Our attitude to religion has changed so far, that although we now believe ourselves to be free of its grasp, we are more under its thrall. Concepts: Replacement of Religion, shifting role of religion and human frailty of will. Territory: Religion throughout Europe since the Enlightenment
The Aim of this project is to explore suffering in society. My project initially centred on answering the following questions 1 What is suffering? 2 Does suffering help define our existence? 3 If so, why do we use suffering to define ourselves? 4 Does suffering help us understand the problems we face, or create more? 5 Why do we use suffering more than other emotions, such as happiness, to examine and define our lives? After answering these questions I then applied the answers I found plus the theses of the two philosophers above to the crisis of depression in the modern rich western society.
Territory: The picture here shows a detail of one of the feature pyramids of the Kostnice Sedlec Ossuary in Kutna Hora, near Prague. The Ossuary contains a jar of earth reportedly from Golgotha, and important Christian site, making the chapel an extremely popular place to bury loved ones. Over-population of the graveyard led to the creation of the Ossuary in 1511. Initial Aims: The Sedlec Ossuary has left a lasting impression on me and I wanted to sort out for myself why it had the impact it did. This helped me to generate a list of basic questions to answer, some of which were: ▫ How much is identity an abstract concept? To what extent is it bound up in our bodies? ▫ Do most people experience a crisis of identity as some philosophers believe (eg Sartre’s crisis of the enormity of our freedom) or is it only provoked by trauma? ▫ How rigid is our personal identity? Is identity purely conscious or can our identity remain even if we do not? ▫ Are we alienated from our bodies or united with them through our identity? ▫ How does identity work in a social situation? Key Concepts and Philosophical Models: The most obvious key concepts are identity and the mind/body divide. My chosen philosophers as key thinkers and their works are: ▫ Hegel: The Phenomenology of Spirit ▫ Beck & Beck-Gernsheim: Individualization Basic Overview: ▫ Hegel: Use and abuse of the master/slave relationship. ▫ Beck & Beck-Gernsheim: Individualization as a concept is self-perpetuating.
Fear has always been with us. Fear has always been used in politics, as a means to control, both for the good and for the bad. Hobbes: The fear of the state of nature, led the people to accept a sovereign. Montesquieu: The fear of the tyrannical despot means people are bound to democracy. Tocqueville: Fears of the consequences of being ostracised by society mean people have conformed to the tyrannical majority. 9/11 has brought about a new kind of fear in the people of the U.S.A. It caused paranoia about a devastating attack from an anonymous face to spread through society. The people in their abject fear have turned to the government to protect them. The style of government they have chosen that they feel will protect them best is a new brand of conservatism, one that is even further right on the political spectrum; this government is Neoconservatism. What of this regime that is here to save us? It again marks a change in society. For centuries in western societies we have moved towards progressively freer societies. The implementation of a Neoconservative government, has changed this, we are seeing the abolition of civil liberties, no trial by jury, the detainees of suspects in prison for years without charge. This is not peculiar to the U.S buts its influence as the one true super power is immense, and it has sparked similar policy changes elsewhere. The political thinker Leo Strauss has heavily influenced neoconservatives. In particular his doctrine on natural right. We must try and understand the work of Leo Strauss, if we are to understand what the people find so attractive about this style of government. The Neoconservatives are particularly influential in the areas of defence and foreign policy, the two key areas for the protection of the U.S.A from the “axis of evil”. Again we must turn to Strauss to understand how his philosophy has influenced the policies that affect us all today.
There is currently a spectre haunting the modern world, whose presence demands the attention of socioeconomic, political and intellectual institutions to which it is opposed. It has claimed thousands of lives, initiated wars, undermined international law and called into question modernity’s ideological foundations; and yet, discourse on terror has failed to confront its true origins. Knee-jerk condemnation and bureaucratic rationality continue to dominate responses, manufacturing consent while excluding any form of self-reflexivity or discussion. In situating terrorism in the dialectic of modernity, this project aims to assert the absolute necessity of such a re-evaluation in finding a solution. Key themes • Problems of the inherited language: Towards redefinition of ‘Terrorism’ • The legacy of the Enlightenment and the task of Philosophy. • Power bases and the assertion of legitimacy. Fundamentalism vs. Liberty. • Towards a resolution: forums of discussion and devolution and hospitality
Questions I will be asking 1. Why do people travel and emigrate? 2. How has travel had an affect on cultures? 3. How has the world changed through the rise of the business? 4. How has society integration benefited and impeded cultures and communities. Aims In this project I aim to explore a number of different ideas involving travel. I will be trying to explore the way in which travel has had an impact on modern societies whether it be through modern mass travel, economic needs or personal exploration. I will be examining the positive and negative aspects of travel on a social level, philosophical level and ethical level. The environmental problems have become major ethical concerns today. I will also be examining what motivates us to travel. In particular I will want to explore the influence that the west has had on Asia especially Japan and see what effect it has changed cultures. The major idea I want to explore is what can other cultures teach us about the world. I will be exploring these ideas in relation to Hegel’s Philosophy of History and Lyotard’s Postmodern Condition. Sources • Georg Hegel- The Philosophy of History • Jean-François Lyotard- The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge • Shlomo Avineri- Hegel’s Theory of the Modern State • J. Christopher Holloway- The Business of Tourism • Bella Dicks- Culture on Display.
Part 1 Using literature by Terry Eagleton, David Harvey and Hal Foster I explore the idea of postmodernism, including its evolution from modernism and its contradictions and definitions. Concluding with an in depth look at works by Jean Baudrillard and Fredric Jameson in preparation for the main body of my argument. Part 2 Looks at house music culture, its origins from Chicago and influences from the rest of Europe. Using knowledge from part one, I explain how through sampling and recycling, house music is a perfect example of a postmodern aesthetic. I also present neo-conservative postmodern arguments written by Steven Redhead, Hillegonda Rietveld and Simon Reynolds that house music is culture of abandonment, disengagement and disappearance. Part 3 Focuses on the growth of raves in the eighties Britain, and legislation introduced by the government to prevent free parties taking place. Researching into the idea of Techno-shamanism and the tribal nature of house culture, I argue against the arguments presented in part two, and with my own argument, contend that house music can be used to escape postmodern society.
Science behind the teaching: Learning modalities; performance standards; causal relationships; systematic enquiry. Hegellan Schooling. Primary school : “Thesis” (Building blocks of knowledge) Secondary school : “Antithesis” (Reflection and cultivation) College and Uni : “Synthesis” (Facts in and of themselves) Does being “free” mean being dependant on the influence on institutions?
Can subjective experience ever be explained? There is an inner dimension to our lives, which constitutes our entire awareness of ourselves and our world. Whether one is a reductionist, functionalist or qualia freak, subjective experiences are unique experiences, which others can never know; proprioception is our own. How does the brain process the information it receives through the senses? Where are memories stored? How are they even created? Objects must exist in the world in order to be perceived, however, this world in which we perceive objects, is not the real world. We do not experience the world as such, merely; we process the effect it has on us. The objects in the outside world are signaling their qualities inwardly, which means the object must be a thing inside our head. Seeing produces the thing that is seen. The object is before our eyes, yet the image of this object is behind our eyes; a copy. We experience the qualities of an object, its representation is in our minds; the world is forever on the outside. To what conclusions did Thomas Nagel (1937- ) come with ‘What is it Like to be a Bat?’ Do animals and plants experience qualia? How do people with illnesses such as dementia, schizophrenia, nervous disorders, autism or colour blindness perceive the world? How is one affected if their sense of smell, or sight should fail? The brain serves as the organ of the mind; if it is affected in any way, the entire body is affected and can change dramatically. The mind is what the brain does. This is evident when people develop an illness of the brain; their entire self becomes altered because the brain is no longer in a state of normality, the body expressing this change. When certain areas of the brain become, even slightly, damaged, such as the any cortex, the hippocampus or the amygdala, the individual will cease to be able to recognize things, forget certain elements of speech or not be able to link certain features together in order to create a face, for example. Remaining senses are heightened and much more sensitive is one should be taken away, altering perception greatly. Henry Huxley (1825-1895) suggested animals are conscious automa, devoid of mental states. What makes us afraid? What shapes our mind to view things in a certain manner? What goes on in a new born baby’s mind? The way an individual is brought up, affects their perception of the world dramatically; depending on one’s parents’ beliefs, or religion, family customs et cetera one’s perception of the world will be very different to another individual’s with different upbringing. Despite a baby’s lack of communication skills, it is unlikely that one will be able to make a baby co-operate so that its brain activity can be measured. Babies do not have a sense of co-operation, or a sense of anything much, their minds are impressionable and ready to be moulded, this is an individual experience and chance to teach another being the correct morals of life. Why did the ‘Hard Problem’ bother John Locke (1632-1704) so extensively? Does it seem logical that a piece of live, visual cortex in a Petri dish might be producing the same experience as a brain producing a yellow perceptual experience? Are you the only rational person alive, whilst everyone else is a zombie? These hard questions are addressed in the hard problem, whether one is a believer or not, it stands in the laws of biology and the progress of modern medicine to determine the truth.
The Transhuman. For Deleuze we should understand reality as an acentered system of forces. Becoming has no fidelity to distinctions of species or genus, but should be understood as the complex movement of non-linear flows. To think in this way is to pass beyond the human to the transhuman. The Return of Human Nature. DNA boosted Darwinian theory by enabling it to explain the process of heredity.The study of populations using statistics enabled us to posit species-typical behaviour. Biotechnology and the Transhuman. The new human sciences which underpin our understanding of human nature also allow us to change that nature. But are we not already Transhuman? How might we understand our emerging ‘pharmacological society’? Therapy or ‘enhancement’? The genotype determines the phenotype? How far does the phenotype extend? What about our social, cultural and technological relations? ‘The coils of the serpent are even more complex than the burrows of a mole hill’ How did we become neurochemical selves? How did we come to understand our sadness as a chemical imbalance in the brain, able to be corrected by psychopharmacalogical products? What is ‘natural’ for us must also be manufactured We posit what is natural once we are able to manufacture it.
Place: The Suit, as an image, as an androgynous construct Aim: My intention is not to assess the concept of promiscuity from a moral standpoint but more to suggest that it has been illustrative of the move away from what is essentially feminine to a world where women themselves in terms of what is masculine and how this gendering is representative of our move away from nature towards into an age of complexification Masculine and feminine: towards an age of androgyny? What is masculine? What is feminine? Indoctrinated definitions of gender through the ages from Plato to present day, the implication of gender classification on social constructs Promiscuity I will initially focus on the idea of promiscuous behaviour, how and why there has been an increase in women partaking in this behaviour (if this is the case) and the social ramifications of this. The issue is the promise of sex totally free of reproductive consequences, a myth that has served men not women. Our sexual culture which promotes pleasure over responsibility has ignored the reproductive capability of women’s bodies. Pose the question do, and if so why do women replicate men, instances of masculine behaviour, women at work etc why is success viewed in male terms, i.e. mothering undervalued, all the traditional female roles considered irreverent in modern society Masculinization. From Greek thought there has been a separation of culture and nature into male and female categories. Since the mechanical age we have become first mechanized and then manufactured, our bodies are commodities Promiscuity could be predicted as the result of a complex system, a particular way of handling material objects, everything has to be consumable. Promiscuous behaviour ultimately an expression that has been mechanized and commodified until it has become transparent. It is because we have become separated from nature that women have become masculinized, progression away from nature.
Outline: In this project I will be using the Robinson Library as my territory as I feel it is a good example of Modern building which is now essentially a Post Modern centre of knowledge. Aims: o To provide an exposition of Modern and Postmodern architectural styles and why they were introduced. o I will provide additional material about other libraries e.g. some from the baroque period to explore whether Modern architectural styles are detrimental or complementary to a centre of knowledge. o To explore the Postmodern idea of communications leading to a networked society. o To show that the rise of information technologies has led to the dilution of information and knowledge. o To show that computerised communication systems are creating an increasing alienated society. Sources: The key critical thinker I will be examining will be David Harvey and his book ‘The Condition of Postmodernity’. Other sources will include: Lyotard, Jean – Francois: The Postmodern Condition Castells, Manuel: The Rise of the Network Society Jacobs, Jane: The death and life of great American cities McGuigan, Jim: Modernity and Postmodern culture I will be using books from the Robinson Library, internet resources, information from magazines/newspapers and photographs taken in the Robinson Library and around Newcastle city centre to illustrate my project report.
Territory. I began by looking at computer games as my original territory, but this shifted as I progressed with my research to incorporate the wider realm of technology in more general terms. Concepts From my original territory I identified the concepts of Virtual Reality and Artificial Intelligence as my primary areas of research. I then furthered this to also explore the scientific rational project, with the growth of technology as a branch of this, and I further extended this to include the inhuman aspect of technology and a possible human disenchantment with this. Method. I began by exploring the nature of virtual environments and the interactions between the player controlled character and other intelligent aspects of the environment such as other characters or the surroundings themselves. This however led me to look at the fundamental concepts underlying the creation of virtual environments and artificial intelligence. I began to see the ‘rise in technology’ that was becoming prevalent within contemporary society and looked to find a philosophical background in which to interpret this theory. Philosophical Ideas. I looked at Heidegger who saw that technology was a means to achieve a certain purpose. However I also found the thoughts of Max Weber interesting, who saw technology as an area of disillusionment to people within modern society. He saw that very few people truly understand the world of technology around them and so we become disenchanted with our technological aspects of society. Also Lyotard saw the ‘Inhuman’ aspect of technology and the attitude of humanity towards it. Conclusions. I look to reconcile the modern world of computer generated virtual worlds with the different attitudes towards technology within general society.
OBJECTIVES – To look at what is thought to be the Italian Mafia in Twenty First Century Southern Italy in the light of philosophical theories. – Take specific aspects of the Mafia thought such as the attitudes towards death, silence and their own identity in an attempt to understanding the conditions that must be upheld by a Mafioso. SOURCES -G.W.F Hegel’s Lordship and Bondage that features in The Phenomenology of Spirit. -Karl Marx and Frederick Engel’s Communist Manifesto -Thoughts presented in these texts in reference to the Mafia through the eyes of Bataille, Deleuze and Nietzsche. -Secondary reading in both Marx and Hegel. -Contemporary Italian and British Newspaper articles. -Contemporary BBC Internet Website news articles. -True Life Crime books written on the Mafia. TERRITORY -Exploration into the Sicilian Mafia; Cosa Nostra, through the means of contemporary documentation of the events involving the Cosa Nostra as a whole and more specifically particular Mafiosi . TRANSITION OF CHANGE Section 1- How the birth of the Cosa Nostra in Sicily which was born out to a class struggle to which the theories of Marxism can be applied has, over the years moved towards being an organisation which incorporates notions that can be more aptly applied to Hegelian thought. Section 2 – The transition of change of the self consciousness of a Mafioso who desires to become a Capomafia in reference to Hegel’s Lordship and Bondage.