What should I put in the picture box at the top?  I’m sick of my vain profile shot.  I never liked the idea of having it there but I didn’t know what else to put there.  I’m not too keen on this pastel green either.  This WP template has good utility but maybe it is time for something else or at least a new picture.  Tell me young padawan, what should I do?  New template or new picture?  What template and what picture(s)?

This is a public service announcement.  For the love of the blogosphere, please do not tag your blog post “philosophy” unless it’s about philosophy.  Philosophy does not mean undefined, general, random, opinionated, or whatever!  Believe it or not, there are some people who really do want to read blogs about philosophy, and it’s really difficult to find blogs about philosophy, when every third post is tagged, philosophy!  It seems like half the blogs out there are called something like, “Nina’s Thoughts on Breeding Ringtail Lemurs, and Philosophy.”  Come on, Nina, is that really necessary?  Phauxlosophy (or philosospam or spamosophy?) is the most prolific spam on the internet except for “natural anatomy enhancers!”

Now is the time when people the world over reflect on the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King and a story on CNN caught my attention this morning.  Plans are under way to construct a massive memorial to Dr. King in Washington D.C.  The apex is to be a very large granit statue of MLK himself.  A black sculpture who has done many statues of MLK, was contacted for the project but he only works in bronze and so the commitee decided against him.  The commitee decided on a Chinese sculptor (who works in granite) for the project and this has caused quite a controversy.  Many Americans and blacks especially, have been upset by this.  This set me to thinking, are we judging men by the content of their character or by the color of their skin? 

I am constantly amazed at how often people cherry pick the facts to suit their own arguments.  I expect this from advertisements and unfortunately I have grown accustomed to spin in the news, but I am seeing it more and more from people who I would expect better from.  Many of these people are even arguing for positions I agree with, but do it through bad reasoning.  When you argue from poor reasoning you open yourself up to criticism and discredit the position you were arguing in favor of.  You better serve your position by keeping quiet than by deceptive and poor arguing tactics. 

The blogs are the worst about this.  The more I get into blogging, the more blogs I read and it seems that these otherwise intelligent and ethical people believe that they can misconstrue, misrepresent, misquote, and omit anything that is not supportive of their point.  The most common things to cherry pick from seem to be the Bible, the Constitution, the Quran, and now Me!  Oh well, I suppose that comes with the territory.  I honestly cannot understand how someone gets satisfaction from winning an argument or making a profound point when it is based on faulty reasoning.  It is beyond me.  I am behooved.   One of the most common places to find this fake arguing is under the philosophy tag.  I would like to point out that philosopher means lover of wisdom.  You cannot love wisdom if you do not first love truth. 

Another dishonest tactic that is getting more popular, is to make a statement and then cite some fact as support when the fact in reality has little or nothing to do with the statement made.  I am forced to conclude that many people are so blinded by their convictions that they cannot even defend them properly, so blinded that they can no longer see any logic in contrary positions and thus they, cannot make a logical argument against them.  When people get to this point, facts of little relevance become sound and insurmountable arguments to bolster their own position. 

If you truly believed in whatever position you were arguing for then you should be more than happy to bring all the facts to light as they should reveal the truth in your position.  When you feel that you must filter information then you must have very little faith  in your position.  If that is the case then the best that can be said of you is that you don’t know what you believe and the worst is that you are pushing a position which you believe to be false. 

The purpose of engaging in an argument should be to discover the truth, not to bolster your own ego and not to “win” at all costs.  This is especially true when the argument is one sided, as in a blog post (unless you get comments).

“People almost invariably arrive at their beliefs not on the basis of proof but on what they find attractive.” -Pascal

“For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions” 2 Timothy 4:3 ESV