Thought of the Day

There is a difference between intelligence and education. I believe that they can be related, obviously. However, there are many individuals that have "educations" but whom are not intelligent, or at least lack intelligence to some degree. I'm sure we can all think of at least one individual that has a "good education" but lacks common-sense, logic, and reasoning capacities to whatever extent. Also, we can all probably think of someone who may not be "educated" in the traditional sense, but yet they are very intelligent and educated in different ways, sometimes better. After all, "life experiences" are the ultimate education, and these all happen to everyone, however, some have more than others.

Word of the Day - Quixotic

Quixotic -

Quixotism is the description of a person or an act that is caught up in the romance of noble deeds and the pursuit of unreachable goals. It also serves to describe and idealism without regard to practicality. An impulsive person or act can be regarded as quixotic.

Quixotism is usually related to "over-idealism", meaning an idealism that doesn't take the consequences into account. It is also related to naïve romanticism and to utopianism.

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quixotism

This is by far one of my favorite words, which is ironic due to the fact that I hate what the word represents. I believe that this word describes what has become, or is becoming, of a lot of Americans. Americans, especially Liberals and the left, are quixotic, that is, they are impulsive, overly-idealistic, and do not look at the total picture or are incapable at looking further into the issues at hand. They act on emotion and are, for-the-most-part, shallow-thinkers and "surface reactors", that is, they see things at face-value and make rash and emotional judgments based on the surface appearance of things. Quixotic people, to me, make decisions, a lot of times, based on political correctness, or what they perceive as the "right" thing to do with little or no regards to logic, human nature, or it's full and real impact. I believe that this way of thinking, no matter how well-meaning, is unproductive and does not drudge up the real issues and only provides for a superficial existence. Quixotic individuals lead fantasy lives and are sheltered from the true nature of things. They are overzealous, do-gooders that sacrifice true understanding for a false sense of well-being. They also put burden on those people which would be negatively impacted by there ill-thought-out decisions.

Thought of the Day

It is my contention that the biggest threat to this world and humanity is that of un-checked human proliferation and the inability of humans to cohabitate peacefully over the-long-run. I argue that with each new human, the value of existing humans is diminished, i.e., the more people that exist the less important "human-life" becomes, in the context of the whole. Also, the collective impact of individual humans is less, especially given the fact that the more people who exist, the more variances between humans exist. Thus, “individual” influence and compatibility is decreased with the expansion of the human population. Moreover, I believe that this is a "hard fact" and can never be mitigated within the confines of our present global condition.

It is no secret that with most things, the more we have of any given item, the more dispensable these items become. As harsh as this may sound, humans are objects, albeit sophisticated objects. Therefore, it is logical to believe that with the more humans that exist the less “important” they become; obviously from the stand-point of the whole.

Furthermore, the more distance and degrees-of-separation that exist between humans the less consequential their existence to each other becomes.

Human nature is at the root of these conditions and from the high-level perspective it is an inevitable fact that, if not addressed, will increase the violence nature of humans and the exponential diminishment of the value of human life.

Word of the Day II

Maxim -

(1.) A saying that is widely accepted on its own merits.

source: "maxim." WordNet® 3.0. Princeton University. 01 May. 2008.

(2.) An expression of a general truth or principle, esp. an aphoristic or sententious one.

source : "maxim." Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Random House, Inc. 01 May. 2008.

(3.) A succinct statement or observation of a fundamental principle, general truth, or rule of conduct.

source: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/maxim

I choose this word because I personally like maxims and think that they play an important role as a literary device as well as in rhetoric.

Some of my favorite maxims are:

You can't judge a book by it's cover.

Actions speak louder than words.

Word of the Day

Truism -

A truism is a claim that is so obvious or self-evident as to be hardly worth mentioning, except as a reminder or as a rhetorical or literary device.

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truism