J'Accuse- Seminar

As mentioned in the previous blog, Emile Zola wrote J'accuse to expose the real culprits behind the Dreyfus affair. Because of his action the right hated him, but the left loved him. Maybe it was wrong to call him the origin of the power of the media today, but he was definitely a milestone; to what we know and what happens in the press today.

Emille Zola was born in Paris on the 2nd April 1840, he was the son of an engineer and his wife. He grew up in Aix-en-Provence. After his farther died Zola worked several clerical jobs, eventually moving to writing literacy columns for Cartier De Villemessamt's newspapers. In these columns his political attitudes began to show, he was very critical of Napoleon III and anti-catholic. After he wrote J'accuse he fled to England, to avoid his prison sentence, but returned to Paris after Dreyfus was pardoned; and Zola's charge was dismissed. Zola died on the 29th September 1902. Some suspected he died of carbon monoxide poising from someone stopping up his chimney, but it was never proved.

J'accuse reminds me of investigative programmes such as channel 4's dispatches and BBC's Panorama; it also reminds me of the whistle blowing sight Wikileaks. These types of platforms investigate and probe behind close doors to get to the bottom of issues. It is investigative reporting and journalism, like these sources, that challenges authority, similar to what Zola achieved. The news and media are now, arguably, the fourth estate, the first being religion (clergymen), the second being the nobility (politicians) and the third being the common people. The fourth estate of the news and media is now a powerful force within in our society, and arguably has equal if not more power than the other estates. When the fourth estate is working for good it can uncover scandals, point the finger at the guilty and challenge authority; by putting politicians or members of the police under the spotlight. For example the news and media exposed the MP expenses scandal and brought it to the public attention, this was something that had been going on for a while but as soon as public opinion was directed towards the matter, everything changed and inquests were launched and MP's were sentenced to jail. Also recently the media released footage of a peaceful protester being violently pushed over by a member of the police. It was deemed that the protester was killed unlawfully and the policeman involved is now facing a jail sentence.

However the fourth estate can mould and manipulate public opinion in a negative way and exploit and galvanise moral panics. For example the news and media can make allot of noise about Muslims and other ethnic groups and groups like hoodies, and soon public opinion turns against these groups and people start to hate these groups. When in fact it is only the extremists, of these groups, that are the ones ruining the reputation of others in the group. For example I recently saw on the front page of the Sun newspaper a headline stating "Bin Laden was unarmed when he was killed...just like his victims on 9/11 and 7/7". This is not exactly true Bin Laden had nothing to do with the attack in London on 7/7, the people who carried out the attack, at very best, were only influenced by Bin Laden. But allot of people read the Sun and soon that opinion becomes common sense and soon after that it becomes fact, even though it is not necessarily true. I think the media create and hype up these moral panics so everyone gets scared and starts buying newspapers so they can see what is going on, and as we all know bad news sells more than good news.

I think Zola, and his article J'accuse, is a major turning point in the balance of power, before no one would have accused the government so openly, but now it is common practice to challenge the government. The fourth estate, like Zola, can challenge the balance of power and take it away from the government, but is power better in the hands of the news and media? I personally think power is best in the hands of the people.

The Dreyfus affair

The Dreyfus affair is a huge miscarriage of justice, that involved sending an innocent man to, for a lack of a better word, hell, in the process exposing corruption and anti-semitism within the French army and government. Dreyfus was a Jewish captain in the French army, he was from Alsace, which is a Provence of France close to Germany. It is these factors that made him the perfect candidate for one of the most atrocious miss-uses of a justice system.

Firstly a bit of context is needed, to shed some light on how the Dreyfus affair come to be. Germany  was under the leadership of Bismarck, who wanted to unify the country. Bismarck was a good disciple of Machiavelli, he goaded France into a war. France was under the leadership of Napoleon III. Napoleon III was captured and eventually surrendered at Sedan in 1871, this was very embarrassing for the French, as the military was held in high esteem, and was apart of the identity of France, so they were disgraced. The temporary government, of France, officially surrendered at Versailles. The Germans, having defeated the French, marched into Paris; they added further insult to injury by, forcing France to pay huge reparations and demanding victory parades through the centre of Paris. France also lost the territories of Alsace and Lorraine to the Germans. During the time when the Germans, seized Paris the wealthy land owners and hierarchy of France fled. When they returned, the landowners, demanded that the people in their properties pay rent for the months they were living in Paris, suffering and struggling whilst the rich ran away. In a reaction to this The Paris commune was established in May 1871, they elected leaders and introduced social reforms, including the establishment of nurseries so woman could work and abolished night time working and separated the state and church. Marx called it "the dictatorship of the proletariat". The commune was slaughtered by the government, using the army to carry out the orders, and an estimated 20,000-30,000 people were killed, it is only an estimate because there was so much killing happening that no one could count it properly. The victims of the slaughter were mainly the working classes. Like the French revolution, the commune, although it did not last long, had a massive impact of European politics.


In the years that passed, since the Germans defeated and humiliated the French, the French wanted revenge and grew bitter towards Germany. In 1894, the French sought to make France great again, one way to do this was to build a vast overseas empire, similar to Britain's empire. During this period of revival the French were concerned about any threats to French greatness, like embarrassing scandals involving the government. They were convinced that a Jewish syndicate was conspiring against the French government; the authorities used this to deflect attention away from their mistakes. An example of this concern to French greatness is the Panama cannel scandal which involved bribes being exchanged to government officials to keep the fact that the company was in finical difficulty quiet. The bribes were handled by two Jewish business man. This was a small catalyst inflaming anti-semitism in  France. In 1894 a spy, working as a cleaning lady in the German embassy in Paris, found secret documents about the French army in a wastepaper basket, she gave them to the authorities, who looked for a Jew in the top ranks of the Military to blame it on, they chose Dreyfus because he was intelligent, a Jew and from the Alsace region. Dreyfus was tried and found guilty, in a secret trial, by the military court. He was publicly stripped of his military rank and his sword was snapped in half in front of his military colleges. No evidence from the trail saw the light of day because the army said it was to secret and could threaten national security. Dreyfus was sent to devils island, where he was chained twenty four hours a day, seven days a week; he was also in a cell in which he could only see the sky. He was not allowed to talk to anyone and after a while in this type of solitude he lost the ability to speak. After a while an officer went over the evidence and discovered the real spy was another officer called Esterhazy. The French military were so desperate to cover up the cover up that they conducted a trial for Esterhazy and he was acquitted in spite of the over whelming evidence against him, but again the military couldn't release the evidence because it was classified information, so no one could see it for themselves. At this stage of the affair Emile Zola wrote the famous article 'J'Acuse', exposing the real culprits behind the cover up. The affair split the right and the left, the right were against Dreyfus and the left were for Dreyfus. Zola became a hate figure for the fight and labelled a Jewish sympathiser, anti-Semites called for his blood; whilst people on the left praised him. Zola was tried and found guilty of libel, but he fled to London. Anti-Jewish riots erupted over France and the right called for Jews to lose their citizenship. The army started to panic a little bit, as they started to recognise the weakness in the case; so more documents were forged by an officer by the name Henry, who later slit his throat in prison when he was discovered.
A change in government brought Dreyfus back, for a second trial, because they wanted to make the right impression and differentiate themselves from the old regime. Dreyfus was a shell of a man, he was found guilty with "extenuating circumstances", which basically meant he was innocent with out admitting his was innocent, and he was sent back to Devils island. He was latter brought back and given a full pardon.

I had never heard of the Dreyfus affair before, naturally I was shocked. I could not believe this grave miscarriage of justice could of happened in modern times. But then I remember other miscarriages of Justice like the Derek Bentley case that streched from the 1950's to 1980's. Derek Bentley was a teenager who was wrongfully hanged in Britain in 1953, when capital punishment was allowed in Britain. He was later found innocent of the crime he was supposed to be guilty of and he was given a pardon in the 1980's. It was this miscarriage of justice, and the campaigning of his family, that lead to capital punishment being appolished in Britain. I was also surprised about how rife anti-semitism was in France, even to the extent that it could be argued it was worse than the Nazis. It was very interesting to learn the origin of the media becoming a recognisable force in society and becoming the fourth state. Zola used his tool of writing to stand up to the government and deny them and exposed the truth, which is arguable the truest and purest journalism there can be. Nowadays the media is always exposing scandals, the biggest one of recent times is probably the MP expenses scandal, which is something Zola probably would of been proud of.

William Cobbett and his Rural Rides

As it was said in the seminar William Cobbett was born in 1763 in Farnham, Surrey. He was taught to read and write by his father and worked on the family farm, before leaving for London. He joined the army and reached the rank of Corporal, but was branded a trouble maker and kicked out, after he tried exposing the quartermaster for stealing from the Army. In 1802 he started a newspaper, the Political Register, and would use this as a tool to wield his political opinion with in the public realm. He had several encounters with the law because of his criticisms of the government, which caused him to flee to America, but he returned to England. In 1821 he toured around Britain and record his journey in his journal and published his findings in the Political Register and a book called Rural Rides. William Cobbett died on 18th of June, 1835.

Rural Rides is a very good portrait of the countryside at the time, it's a hands approach to gathering information, to get a in depth view of what was happening around the country; in terms social, economical and political problems. It was said in the seminar that Cobbett was inspired to do because there were many people in the cities saying things about the country side and throwing wild rumours around; so Cobbett thought he would go see what is really going on.

Reading Rural rides it seems to lay the foundations for many things that we are familiar with these days. To put in context, by today's standards, you could compare it to shows like Top Gear, Grand Designs, Micheal Palin's travel documentaries and David Attenbury's documentaries. Rural Rides is travel reporting, in which someone embarks on a journey to investigate the world and go to places that normal people cant go to. These programmes allow people to experience the world from the comfort of their living room, like Rural Rides would allow people from the cities to experience the country side without leaving their taverns or coffee houses. Although it is a detailed portrayal of the countryside at the time, it is worth pointing out that Rural Rides is littered with personal opinion and bias, for example Cobbett said "All Middlesex is ugly" and "Exceedingly dull". These opinions and bias might compromise the integrity of his report.

It was also said in the lecture that Cobbet's method of journalism, is similar to foreign correspondents that feature heavily on the news these days. Foreign correspondences travel to locations all over the world, to find out what is happening there, to try and gather information first hand and report it back to London, for example. This is similar to what Cobbett was trying to achieve with his tour around Britain, bringing the countryside to the people in the cities. Another example is War correspondents that report from the front line, relaying information that other people do not have access to because they don't want to be on the front line of a War zone.

As I said earlier, Rural Rides could be compared to entertainment shows such as Top Gear and Grand Designs; although what Cobbett discovered was not really intended to be entertaining. I mean in the sense that experts test, critise, review and comment on things that the everyday man faces in everyday life. Cobbett knew allot about farming and on his travels helped farmers out. Whilst reading Rural Rides I could not help but think that Cobbett was the Jeremy Clarkson of his day; someone who knows his stuff about a certain topic, wither it be farming and politics or cars, who is not afford to criticise the government and say his piece of mind. Clarkson comments on the world in his books and offers his opinion on social, economic and political subject manner; maybe not academically all the time, but it is similar to Cobbett. For example Cobbet said "All Middlesex is ugly", and if I did not know better this could of come from Jeremy Clarkson's mouth.

Cobbett uses the term "political courage" when discussing the politicians changing their views to fit with the reformists. I like this term and my understanding of it is the "courage of acknowledging your errors" it takes a stronger will of person to admit they are wrong than to cower behind the ignorance of their mistakes. Most politicians lack this political courage as they are to scared to level with the public and hold their hands up and admit their mistakes because they are to concerned about losing voters. I personally think I would respect, and therefore be more likely to vote for an MP, who does hold his hands up and admit mistakes but tries his hardest to rectify them. An honest MP, that will be the day.

I found Rural Rides an enjoyable and informative read.

Karl Marx

Karl Marx was born in 1818, into a Jewish family; but he later converted to Lutheranism. At the start of his academic carer Marx studied law, but he letter changed to philosophy and would later turn to journalism. Marx  had a heavy interest in revolution, he saw the cracks in society and sought a way to repair them, he embodied the revolutionary spirit. Marx was heavily influenced by the Hegel. Marx moved into radical journalism and in 1844 he meet Frederich Engels and they wrote the communist manifesto. On his tombstone it says "Workers of the world unite".

Marx believed that "The philosophers have only interpreted the world, the point is to change it". Through his background in both philosophy and journalism, Marx could interpret, through philosophy, and change it by the power of journalism. Marx also believed that it is possible to analyse everything through the economic happenings at the time, this is referred to as the behaviour of economics. Marx achieved the combination of Hegel philosophy, British empiricism and French revolutionary politics; making him a significant force in the western world.

In the lecture it was said that:

• Aristotle thought man was a rational animal 
• Plato thought man was a political animal
• Kant thought man was a moral animal 
• Hegel thought man was a historical animal 
• Marx thought man was a productive animal and it was this ability that allowed man to make tools, thus allowing man to become the dominate species

I would like to outline some of the theories that came up in the lecture. The theory of absolute, the spirit is separated into two parts the Zeitgeist is the spirit that is driving us now and Geist is guiding us through history.
There are two sides to the dialect dialogue. They are the Thesis, which is a proposition, and the Antithesis, which is a counter proposition or contradictions.

Another theory was Karl Marx's theory of Alienation. This relies on the first theory of human nature, in which it states the spirit is broken or fragmented because there are three parts to a person, in terms of need, they are:
1) the natural self- we need to eat, drink, breath, everyone has to do it. 2) Alienated self in which the natural needs perverted by capitalism. the need for clothes, commodities and shelter. 3) species self understands we are all part of one another like links in a chain. This will emerge in the communist state. Could these three states of needs hint at our time line of existence. We were lived in a basic state of eating and drinking and living off the land, then the industrial revolution and golden age of mankind breed the capitalist system; and our needs were alienated, this is the age we are in now; maybe the next step is the communist state. Capitalism has ruled the planet for generations; maybe the next step is communism. The example in the lecture, to illustrate the theory of alienation, was that in the capitalist system we are all stationed at various parts of a convey belt, and we have one task to perform, like putting a screw into a thing. We have no idea what this thing will be at the end of the process, we have no idea of what the thing was at the beginning of the process, we have no idea who was before us on the convey belt and we have no idea who is after us; we simple perform are jobs and don't ask any questions, this is alienation. We are alienated from other people, we just do what is asked of us and conform to the needs of the convey belt. Capitalism alienates us from ourselves, we lose our identities and out motivations. Everything, in the capitalist system, is motivated by money; work becomes the loss of the self, as we generally work below others, work does not develop our body or mind, if anything it reduces it. There is no fulfillment or expression of creativity in our work, it is just sitting in front of a computer screen, in a office, mindlessly tapping away at a computer.

Communism, Marx believed, was the cure to the capitalist disease. In communism the thesis is the bourgeoisie, who own and run the free markets and the antithesis's is the proletariat who are the working classes. The bourgeoisie are the ones who run the factors and workplaces that the proletariat's inhabit, it is the bourgeoisie who suppress the individualism and creativity of the proletariat's. One of the main problems of the capitalist system is the rich get richer, whilst the poor get poorer. Another major problem of the capitalist system in the insecurity of industry and business. The bourgeoisie rely on the working classes to buy the products that they produce, the problem is the working classes don't get paid enough money to buy the cutting edge products the bourgeoisie are producing. So if the working classes can't buy the products of capitalism, who is buying them? The insecurity of money is another problem, if the world is gripped by an economic crisis, like we are today, then the bourgeoisie suppress the working classes further, by driving down their wages, making huge staff reductions and shutting down facilities; to mend a problem that the greed of the bourgeoisie caused in the first place. Marx believed to be free, and break the chains that we are held by, the proletariat's need to rise up against the bourgeoisie and communism will replace capitalism and be the solution. In communism there is no difference between mental and physical labour, we would be free to express ourselves with in our work. A person would be a fisherman in the morning, a factory worker in the afternoon and a musician in the evening; working to their full potential and expressing themselves. In theory communism is the better economic system, but in practise there has rarely been a successful example.

In conclusion I would like to consider, is capitalism all that bad? Capitalism and the free market does breed advancements in technology, without capitalism maybe we would not of had the i-pad. Capitalism apparently allows for a free democracy, in which the people of the system have freedom of speech. But in the capitalist democracy are we as free as the bourgeoisie would like us to think we are? When we protest in this country we, cause a little of bit of fuss for one day, then go back to work the next day. Whereas in the Arab revolution the people stayed in protest for weeks and weeks until something changed. They were under a dictator for generations and did not leave until he was overthrown, whereas we in the Britain generally give up after a day because we can not afford to miss one more day off work. Furthermore are we hopeless in changing the capitalist system, as I mentioned when we protest in Britain,  never changes. We are born into this system, we do not chose it, but can we ever get out of it. Capitalism is a fierce beast, it encourages risk taking and gambling with money you do not have, it encourages selfish behaviour and cut throat tactics, is that anyway to live?

Viva la revolution I say.

Romanticism

Romanticism is probably my favourite force within the western world, I enjoy it's influences on music, architecture, art and literacy. It is a reaction to the age of reason, and allows encourages the heart to answer the questions the mind can not. I see it as catalyst that awakened people for the slumber of dogmatic times. I will start with the myth of Prometheus. I found this very captivating, an individual defying the Gods, to steal fire from them and mould man out of clay. However the God's punish him by chaining him to a mountain and sending a vulture to peck at his liver.

I'll try to break down this myth, by offering various readings of the myth, and apply it to the romantic movement and the French revolution. Its easy to see why the revolutionists in France worshipped Prometheus they to wanted to take the fire (or power) away from the Gods (the bourgeoisie) and give it to man (the workers). Prometheus is the embodiment of the revolutionary spirit of liberty, equality and fraternity. We can also pick out certain elements of the myth that reoccur throughout romantic inspired works. Nature with in the myth seems to be a powerful force, the mountains that become Prometheus's asylum, and the vulture that pecks at his liver. This establishes nature as the fierce, powerful yet beautiful force that it is; a co notation that appears in romantic works, such as Mary Shelly's Frankenstein. In Frankenstein the mountains of the Swiss alps and the great lake, rejuvenate Frankenstein's spirits and soul after tragic news strikes the family.

   

I think we can also apply the myth to what is happening in the world today. Prometheus could be embodied in things like citizen journalism and social media. The Gods from the myth, are the Rupert Murdoch's and News International corporation's and governments; and the fire is knowledge. The fire is also the people communicating and sharing information freely and more efficiently. Take the Egyptian revolution for example, people used Facebook and Twitter to organise protests, to tell their stories across the world, to inform the world about what was going on in the country. The government tried to restrict the Internet, but through apps on smart phones and loop holes in the Internet, the Egyptian people prevailed and continued to pass information on. Citizen journalism and social media played a massive part in the Arab uprising; it stole the fire (the knowledge, the information) and gave it to mankind. However in this new reading of the myth, a vulture is on the horizon, that is waiting to peck the liver of citizen journalism and social media. The vulture is rearing its ugly head through Rupert Murdoch's urge to monopolise online news; which is damaging the flow of free information; and restricting the power of the people.

Speaking of Rupert Murdoch, I will now turn to Percy Shelly's 'Ozymandias'. 'Ozymandias' is a sonnet, but not in the traditional sense. It is about a great empire belonging to the proclaimed King of King's, Ramses II, being ravished by the test of time. Even though his empire was vast and mighty, his great bust was buried in the sand. His empire was built on sand, but the sands of time is what dissolved it. The bust was sculpted by a sculpture, a.k.a. a working man; this reinforces the point that empires can not be built without workers. If you suppress the workers for to long, they will rise up, as seen in the Arab revolution. I think comparisons could be made to the empire Rupert Murdoch has built. He has built a vast empire, in multiple strands of delivering information, but as people begin to exchange information freely and without administrating, is his empire beginning to crumble.   

Seminar paper

A Vindication of the Rights of Woman

by Mary Wollstonecraft: Chapter IV

·         “man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains”- agree with this, we are ultimately born, but it is institutions that dictate that we need a job and a salary, but ultimately we don’t need to do anything, it is the idea that we seek happiness for ourselves, we don’t need to breath, we don’t need a job, we don’t need food, but if we want to live we need to breath, if we want a roof over our heads we need money etc, it is our want to maximise pleasure and minimise pain that dictates our ‘needs’.

·         Education “first step to form a being moving gradually towards perfection...but seen only as a preparation for life”- When people are more educated they can be enlightened. Just by participating in education your views are challenged, you are pushed to reach sensible conclusions and taught to consider different points of view to your own. These are all traits of an enlightened being. Without education I think people’s minds rot, as they fall into a day job where they are not challenged.

·         I believed that we were born equal, that men are born equal; however there is deep rooted prejudice towards the sexes. As the reading suggest why do we put women on thrones? Why is it that a man has to pull the seat out for women to sit down at a table, why does a man have to hold the door for a woman? Furthermore we are not physical all born equal, some people are born disabled, and some people are born with conditions that make them prone to aggression and violence. Maybe principally we are should be considered born equal, such as every person should have the right to vote, every person should have the right to walk down the street regardless of their skin colour. But physically we are not born equal.

·         “Man is naturally good, and only by institutions is he made bad”- What about people born with genes that are prone to aggressions and violence, nature Vs Nurture

·         Pleasure is the business of woman’s life- disagree, no one can, and may never know, there purpose in life. Women are capable of deciding what their purpose in life is, just like men can.

·         “Man was made to reason, woman to feel: and that together, flesh and spirit, they make the most perfect whole, by bleeding happily reason and sensibility into one character”

·         But if we were to return to a state of nature, it is un-natural for animals to have one lover. The purpose of live, it is argued, is to reproduce, a lion in the wild does not get married he mates.

·         The concept of love and happiness is a concept of the mind. During the process of a feeling chemical reactions take place in the body, synapses firing in the brain and the mind tries to make sense of this process usually resulting in love, happiness, jealousy etc.

·         We then become slaves to these feelings as they dictate how we behave and act. Feelings also cloud reason and can blind us to truths that we do not want to see.

·         Again maximising pleasure and minimising pain, if we enjoy a feeling we will want it to continue, say a bad relationship for example. If you are getting treated poorly but enjoy the feeling of love you will blind yourself to the negatives.

·         “Educate women like men” Rousseau

·         “And the more they resemble our sex the less power will they have over us”- interesting to consider who has the power between the sexes. “How eager men are to degrade the sex from whom they pretend to receive the chief pleasure of life”. In public it would appear men have the control and power to enslave women, but in privacy women could retain the pleasure that men seek so much, if they do not get what they want. On a side not surely men also enslave other men, in a professional capacity, if women were slaves surely they would do all the menially jobs in a work place, such as working at a desk typing, and men would be in management capacity, but more and more these days this is not the case.

·         “Riches and honours prevent a man from enlarging his understanding” (expand)- Could we be getting blinded by riches and honours and success. We fall into the routines, working towards carers etc, that maybe understanding is hindered. We are surrounded by magazines of how we should look, how we should behave, rich and successful people moulding our understanding. We should distance ourselves from this and re-evaluate our understanding of what it really means to be rich. E.g. rich in friends.

·         “Friendship...it is founded on principle, and cemented by time...The reverse may be said of love”. Is passion and love all it’s cracked up to be, is it not more reasonable to befriend someone first, learn their qualities and drawbacks, before committing an act of passion. When you rush into a relationship because it had raw passion, what is left after the passion sizzles out; you might not even like the person when this happens.  

REASON                                                MEN                                                                      WOMEN

Women are apparently incomprehensible of reason and man acts as a buffer between reason and women, translating reason so women can understand. I don’t think this is the case physiologically there is no difference is the genetic makeup of the brain of a man and woman’s, except maybe size. There is not a special piece of the brain that men possess, that allows reason, so why would women be unable to use reason. 

David Hume

I found Hume very interesting in discussing and reading about. Many of his ideas, concerning our accusation of knowledge made allot of sense; however through discussion in the seminar, that we found Hume can be a bit depressing and leave you feel a bit lost in the Universe. In part I of an Enquiry concerning Human Understanding, Hume describes an optimum state of mind, that I think that is the best state of mind to further understanding and knowledge. "Be a philosopher; but admist all your philosophy, be still a man". in this paragraph Hume asserts that the "Mind requires relaxation", a balance between business and pleasure. Hume describes business as "Industry" and pleasure as social interaction. I read into this that if you busy your mind with constantly considering business, and do not relax your mind, then your mind may burn out and you may become frustrated and drowning in to much serious thought. That is why relaxation is required to re-set your brain and let it re-boot. This important in every aspect of life, the mind and body need rest to function at it's best.

His ideas on accuracy, and how it is advantageous to beauty, is of sound reasoning and something I agree with. Perfection does not exist in the Universe, if it did then we would not be in existence, however the pursuit of perfection can bread something beautiful. I understand accuracy as perfection, to be accurate is to be perfect. A good example is a gymnast coming up with a new routine, their pursuit of everything flowing perfectly can generate a beautiful routine. Although perfection does not exist the pursuit of it defiantly does and this is what produces beauty.

Hume also discusses how our own faculties and experiences shape how we perceive other thought or ideas.I found the topic of how we can imagine a feeling without feeling it, very interesting to read; and how our imagination can take us beyond anywhere out physical bodies dwell, such as the stars in the sky. "Every idea which we examine is copied from a similar impression". I'm not sure if I believe this is true, but Keith Richards once said "There is only one song that was made by Adam...All other songs are copies or imitations of that song". This is an interesting area to discuss. It made me think of critics and how they make their criticisms. In music how can a critic criticise a song, what are they comparing it to? To my knowledge there is not a thing as proper music, or a proper song, good and bad songs are a matter of opinion; but maybe there is one great song, as suggested by Keith Richards and maybe that's what songs are judged against. But without any proof of that song who is to say one song is better than another. Someone might love Wonderwall by Oasis but another person might hate it, who is to say weather it is a good song or not?

During the seminar we discussed how, according to Hume, somethings may not be 100% correct. Just because we are alive one minute there is no guarantee that we will be alive the next; probability is the only certain factor in understanding, However we discussed how the laws of physics must be correct as we have devised quantum mechanics from it, and have evidence that support these ideas and theories. We also discussed how somethings have to be taken at face value, otherwise you would be going around in circles. For example if you are on a train and are calling someone to pick you up at the station at a certain time, you can't say "so I will see you at half past, but I might not because I can't be 100% sure", if everyone acted like that then no one would get anywhere. Of course someone might commit suicide on the tracks then of course the train will be late. Somethings have to be taken on face value, such as physics and science, of course it may be wrong to make assumptions sometimes, but to go anywhere or achieve anything we have to assume somethings.