Thursday, October 2, 2014
Augustine and what is eternal
"On the Free Choice of Will" discusses the concern with evil and the possibility that evil must be something that is learned. Can everything be learned? Augustine says that this obviously is not true because evil is not a thing, and is instead the absence of a thing. There is nothing to learn because there is an absence of reason. If everything could be learned then things like desire could be learned, which is a natural thing. We desire things that can be taken away from us. Desire is not a material thing so can it be taken away from us? What can you get that you cannot lose? There are still things that you could lose that are not material, like trust, as we talked about in class. But things that do not change and things that are categorized as being "eternal" stay the same even if they have different symbols, like numbers (reference in class). There is no real difference between objects in a way because how can you categorize things when there are so many exceptions, like what is eternal and what is not and what is material and what is not. Is there any way we can say something is truly "eternal?"
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Connor, it is interesting that you ask if desire could be taken away from us because its lack of materiality would suggest it couldn't, yet trust in the same way could be lost. I think that this comment poses another question: What aspects of self are so integral that they become eternal, and which are merely aspects that shift and change and disappear with time? Trust and desire seem to perfectly contrast to answer this question. While you may "lose" someone's trust--in the colloquial way rather than a literal sense--can you truly lose a desire? Surely, we can lose a desire for a certain person or food, but desire itself is arguably not something which can be completely separated from humanity. We may lose trust entirely, resting upon the predictability of the self, looking with a wary eye to the rest of the world and finding peace in only solidarity. Desire, on the other hand, seems to be as natural to humanity as an instinct. The desire for food, the desire to live, the desire to persevere (with the exception of mental disorders which distort reality) have continued throughout humanity to be true.
ReplyDeleteThis, however, brings up the point we discussed in class, that humans themselves aren't eternal as we had to be created. But could that not breed the argument that even numbers are not eternal as they are likewise created by human conception? Connor, I'm not sure how to answer your question; I think that in order to do so we must establish what the guidelines would be for anything that isn't eternal. What is eternal seems relevant to humanity--it is more difficult to think outside of ourselves and consider a world in which our temporary stay cannot be eternal.
Amanda Eliades
I agree with the argument that Amanda points out here. I believe anything created by human conception cannot be considered eternal even though numbers never change. I also believe that humans cannot decide what is and is not eternal because we ourselves are not eternal. We had to be created by God and there is always an end to human life, natural or unnatural. Nobody lives forever, unfortunately, and because of that, humans are not eternal; therefore, we cannot judge what is eternal and not. I believe something has to be eternal to decide what is and is not.
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