Linguistics in Time

What you see above is the title to my final paper, which I turned in today to HUMA 1301. I'll have to talk about HUMA this time around, as I haven't gone to philosophy at all this week. I've been battling a lovely cold since last Saturday, and as such, haven't been able to wake up to go to philosophy. I've only been to HUMA because this is the final week of class, and I had to literally drag myself out of the house, and arrive 10-15 minutes late both times. But the paper is done!
It turned out that I used both linguistics and language as a metaphor for time, as well as explained how language itself impacted time. I kind of started with simply a metaphor, and then slowly started moving into language impacting time, and how time could be seen through language. Also, for good measure, there was some upper level physics in there :) Apparently, Physics in time is a huge concept, with things like Thermal Diffusion and stuff being brought into it. So even though I was talking about languages, I managed to work in Chaos Theory, Equilibrium, etc. Yay for me.
Well, as I'm kind of sick right now and at work, I'll have to make another post later, hopefully with a bit more content. See everyone tonight in class!

Branches in Time

Well, today's question in HUMA was about people sending messages back through time. I can't remember exactly where this question came from, but in general, we had to answer how we thought it might appear, what implications it would have, etc. if someone from the future were to have the technology to send a message back in time somehow. For my response, I answered that the message might take the form of little things that people consider messages "from God". In any case, the message would have to be as small and subtle as possible; the person from the future sending the message would have to find the smallest catalyst to change in the past, otherwise, the change might butterfly effect and change more than intended. If this were to happen, the future might become worse than intended. Some people argued that it would be best to send a message to the Government, Media, etc, but some, including myself, argued against that for the reason of the butterfly effect again. We said that the message could be anything, either verbal, written, or material, but that material was the least likely. If the message were a material substance actually sent back in time, or a material that was created, that would use up FAR too much energy. Same thing with sending an actual person back in time. Think: sending something or someone possibly thousands of years back in time. We can't be certain, but you might have to rip apart a galaxy or two to create the energy required for that. As for the matter of linguistics in a message, it wouldn't be hard, as chances are we could study the language of the past to communicate with them. If something happened in the course of history that destroyed the record of past languages, pictures would still work just as well. Others argued about the content of the message. Really, it depends on what the future would define as "important". If you're gonna go so far as to alter the course of history about something, it had better be deemed as important. Some argued that it wouldn't be something like "Grandma, don't cross the street today.", as that wasn't important. However, a couple of other people and myself argued that again, you have to define important. If that grandma happened to be able to find the cure for cancer later that day, assuming she didn't cross the street and get run over by a car, then you'd wanna leave that note for her, as I'm sure we could all agree that a cure for cancer is very important.
As for future posts, as we seem to be wrapping up classes here, I'll make some comments about the final essay I'm writing in HUMA. As I said, the prompt is what I think is the best metaphor for time (or at least, the best one that I can stretch to 3,000-5,000 words), and mine is linguistics. Sadly, I've made a TRAGIC, HORRID error in my calendar management, and it's due next tuesday, thursday at the latest, where I thought it was due in two weeks. Oops. So I'll definitely have a post ready by next week, albeit possibly a sleep deprived one.

blah...tired

I kind of need sleep...and I've needed it for the past week lol. I slept in on Sunday until noon when people forced me to wake up. As such, I haven't been paying a ton of attention to the class this week...I'll try to make a decent post after tomorrow's class ^^. Consider this a placeholder.

Time After Time Continuum

Well, after struggling for a long while...I've honestly kind of stopped paying attention in Philosophy sadly. He's not doing a great job of explaining, and I think by reading the original authors talking about their theories of philosophy and religion (see Kant, Descartes, etc.), I'm understanding things better than with his unorganized explanations. It's impossible to organize notes from him, because he just drones on and jumps back and forth so much, it's just impossible to sort out what he says.
Thankfully, there is at least a good reason for me to have taken CV Huma 1301: that class is LARGELY based on philosophy, or at least, crazy as hell upper level physics (thermal diffusion throughout time, anyone?). I mentioned a few posts back about the fact that I needed a metaphor for time. After freaking out enough over how I was going to sound any bit smart while writing this paper, which I probably should considering this is an honors class, I caved in and woke up early to go to office hours with the professor. After talking for a while, we decided that my metaphor would best be linguistics. Looking at it, this can work, especially when you go into grammar structures. Things like the subjunctive II tense: "if ___, then ___" structure. As one of the greatest issues with time we've been dealing with is the irreversability or reversibility of time, this kind of thing would fit nicely. Modal auxilieries also go into that same theory. Looking at interrogative tense, you have everything beginning with an action, and of course all things must be started in time by an action. And so on and so forth. My boyfriend was sitting outside through the thing, and when I came out and told him how it went, his only reply was "I'm glad I wasn't in there....and I'm so sorry you have to do this." Thankfully though, this kind of paper can go on my curriculum vitae in the future, or a resume; considering I want to go into translation, a paper discussing lingusitic theory in relation to time might look pretty good.

The Grim Reaper

Well, to be honest, I kind of skipped Philosophy today, because I had a meeting this morning at 8 AM for work, and afterwards, I was really FAR too sleepy to sit through philosophy AND huma, so I chose to skip philosophy, as I'd never missed it before, and I've missed two huma classes (one because I was sick...and once because I wanted IHOP ^.^).
Either way, HUMA discussions are even more deep than what we get into in philosophy, so it's a pretty interesting class. In today's class, we breifly talked about the impact of knowing that we are mortal, and what that affected. A couple of people were saying that they were more determined to do stuff, saying that they were going to college and whatnot with the ultimate goal of starting their adult lives; saying that if we were immortal, people would procrastinate on starting college and stuff, because they wouldn't be in a hurry. To that, I just had to ask how much fun they thought their adults lives were gonna be, cause they were missing out on some here and now. They were all under the impression that they were just in college, and had to wait and be patient until they could start "adult lives" and be on their own and have fun. I just don't understand that point of view. What's the point of working towards the future if you're ignoring the present? That kind of makes your whole life worthless, because you lose the majority of it if you only focus on one thing. I would also kind of get sick of something if I focused on it completely for so many years, letting it be that much of a focus of my life. Plus, I doubt I have that kind of attention span ^.^ Another guy in class was agreeing with me, and trying to support me, but we just got called hedonists, and the conversation moved on. Sigh.

Sleeping Beauty

Well, in our HUMA class the other day, the teacher posed as the quiz question "If you had an oracle like the Delphi Oracle that could correctly predict the future, would you consult it? Why or why not?" (My personal answer is that i thought it should be consulted on matters that would affect the greater public..but things like one's personal future would increase the suicide rate of the population through sheer boredom. Although that brought up an interesting debate on population control...)
Well, this question sparked a class long discussion, but it started with one girl saying that one of her friends had very superstitious parents. They had her fortune told when she was born, and it said the girl would die by drowning. Thus, she wasn't allowed to go swimming. Aside from the fact that I think that kind of thing is ridiculous, my next question to her was "So how does she take a shower? Moist towelettes? Can you really keep her away from ALL water?" The class thus decided that maybe it wasn't a good idea to consult the oracle, because even if you had one, it was all human interpretation anyway. Would any of you guys consult it?

Well, no class

Well, no class today, for reasons I don't yet know. All I know is that I was seriously depressed when I was there on time for once, with my coffee, all ready to go, when a note on the door tells me waking up on time was pointless T.T. So I went and sat on the picnic tables near the ATEC building and ate breakfast for the first time in ages. I'm not sure browsing the Photoshop Phridays on Something Awful can count as philosophical englightenment...so even though they were pretty funny, nothing really to post on for today.