Showing posts with label Facebook. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Facebook. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Thursday, June 13, 2013
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Saturday, January 26, 2013
Facebook Miscellany 1/13 - 1/26
The most important news on the internet: J.J. Abrams to direct Star Wars VII. To me, this is wonderfully good news, as I have enjoyed all the Abrams films I've seen. According to IMDB, "'Argo' director Ben Affleck was also in contention [to direct]." (Insert huge gasp of relief here.)
I think the funniest response I've seen so far has been this one:
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| Star Wars Episode VII: Revenge of the Lens Flair |
A note on why I like him: of the first three Mission Impossible movies, (the ones I've seen), #3 (directed by Abrams) was my favorite, while #2 (directed by John Woo) was an abomination that ought to be fed to the ravenous bug-bladder beast. What is interesting is that, in M:I2, the villain threatened to release a virus that would kill billions, and yet I could not motivate myself to care if the hero succeeded (I was hoping he wouldn't, so the heroine would be forced to throw herself off a cliff). In M:I3, we are never told what plot the villain is attempting. There is no on-screen threat beyond the hero and his new bride. And yet I cared intensely.
And getting me to care about Tom Cruise is a feat in itself.
Monday, January 14, 2013
Saturday, January 12, 2013
Week in Review
For the imaginary reader who isn't also Facebook friends with me, I'm going to start archiving some of my statuses and links from Facebook here.
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The Bad Catholic drinking game.
It will be hilarious when Marc's readers die of catastrophic liver failure.
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On Monday:
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So, after hearing from all my Facebook friends with South Bend/Notre Dame connections about how awesome the football team was, I decided to tune into the game on Monday and they got demolished. They must be seriously overrated.
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The Bad Catholic drinking game.
It will be hilarious when Marc's readers die of catastrophic liver failure.
#
On Monday:
What is wrong with me?!?! While driving today, I noticed the shadow of the car in front of me rotating about the car as it made the sharp turn through the cloverleaf on-ramp to the freeway. My thought, "Oh, real-time
rendered shadows!"
Pick a random patron saint for the new year!
I got Saint Alphonsus Maria de Liguori, patron against arthritis and scrupulosity and for final perseverance. I wonder what's in store for me this year?
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So, after hearing from all my Facebook friends with South Bend/Notre Dame connections about how awesome the football team was, I decided to tune into the game on Monday and they got demolished. They must be seriously overrated.
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Quote of the Year/Century/Millenium:
"The essence of modernity is the death of the spiritual. A modernist is someone who is more concerned about air pollution than soul pollution. A modernist is someone who wants clean air so he can breathe dirty words.
"A modernist cares about big things, like whales, more than little things, like fetuses; big things like governments, more than little things like families and neighborhoods; big things like states, which last hundreds of years, more than little things like souls, which last forever." —Peter KreeftGood ol' Peter Kreeft, channeling the ghost of GK Chesterton, it appears.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Quaestiones
Question 1: Whether Blogging Is Permissible when One has Given Up the Internet for Lent.
Objection 1. It would seem otherwise, since the blog itself, and the means of posting to it, reside on and require access to the Internet, respectively.
Objection 2. Furthermore, merely writing the blog posts offline in a word processor, then uploading them on Sunday would also violate this resolution, since the essential nature of the promise--to avoid the frivolous use of time on the Internet during Lent--is still broken by spending time on a pursuit that has as its natural end a form of communication that requires the Internet.
On the contrary, blogging is not essentially different from writing for printed media, which is a worthwhile and non-trivial pursuit, and not covered by any promise to give up the Internet for Lent.
I answer that, the vow to give up the Internet during Lent is a shorthand method of stating "giving up frivolous pursuits using the Internet," which the Philosopher surely would have agreed is one of the primary usages of the Internet. However, especially for one who has vowed to spend more time writing during Lent, blogging is not necessarily a frivolous pursuit, so long as care is taken to avoid the Five Lowest Forms. In fact, for one who has promised to spend more time writing, a blog is no different than any other media for the promulgation of the written word.
This simplistic understanding of the prohibition of the use of the Internet during Lent, in fact, stands as an obstacle to one who must write more, especially if his primary word processor is an online application. Clearly, one can promise to write more and also simultaneously not waste time on the Internet.
This is particularly evident for one whose job requires use of the Internet and email. Since his Lentent penance cannot supersede his duty to use the just fruits of the Internet to do his job, it can clearly be seen that giving up the Internet for Lent does not include all uses of the Internet, but merely those that are contrary to productivity.
Reply to Objection 1. While blogging does indeed use the Internet in myriad ways, both as a means of creating the content (form) of the blog post, and of posting the content for others to read (matter), this usage of the Internet can promote a self-betterment and more effective use of time, which is not what is intended to be avoided when one gives up the Internet for Lent.
Reply to Objection 2. That blogging is not essentially different from other forms of the written word seems to lend credence to the idea that blogging is allowed to one who has given up the Internet for Lent. If an act is no different from another act, any prohibitions against the one ought apply to the other, and should the first be acceptable, so ought the second.
Question 2: Whether Posting on Facebook, or Linking to Blog Posts on Facebook Is Prohibited to One Who has Given Up the Internet for Lent.
Objection 1. It would seem otherwise, since if one is permitted to upload the written word to a blog, one ought further be permitted to promote that written word in other venues.
Objection 2. Furthermore, what is a Facebook status update, if not a short blog post?
On the contrary, Facebook is a tool for socializing. To post a status update or link a blog post without a continued presence does a sort of violence to one's friends who reasonably expect to converse, but the continued presence constitutes a trivial usage of the Internet, which is not allowed by the vow.
I answer that, Facebook is, by its very nature, a frivolous use of the Internet. Surely, it is written, "can anything good come from [Facebook]?" The limitation of status updates to a mere 420 characters means that a status update cannot contain any of the intellectual depth of a blog post. These status updates cannot ever be considered anything but triviality.
Additionally, while simply posting a link to a blog post may not, in and of itself, violate the prohibition against the foolish use of one's time, the Theologian surely would have written that Facebook represents such a great time suck that one should not even log in, even for such a noble purpose as publicly promoting the written word, for the temptation for he who has given up the Internet for Lent is simply too great to justify the noble intent.
Reply to Objection 1. Promotion of the written word ought always be guided, as should every aspect of life, by the virtue of temperance. Because one is allowed to further the cause of the written word does not mean one should use every conceivable method of doing such. This is particularly true for those methods that tend towards triflingness.
Reply to Objection 2. While the Five Lowest Forms may tend towards the puerile nature of a Facebook status update, the latter, by its nature, must be different from a thoughtful and intelligent blog post. Those things which are said in the High Forms of blogging cannot be replicated in a Facebook status update.
Question 3: Whether a 19-Month-Old May Post Pictures to Facebook when His Father has Given Up the Internet for Lent.
Objection. It would seem otherwise, since 19-month-olds cannot use the Internet, let alone Facebook, without the assistance of their fathers. And since fathers who have given up the Internet for Lent are prohibited from using Facebook, the 19-month-old must respect his father's sacrifice and not tempt him to post picture on Facebook.
On the contrary, Lenten prohibitions must never fall on others to enforce. A father's vows should not in any ways place undue burden on his son.
I answer that, the duties of a father cannot be superseded by his Lenten penance. Since many depend on him, such as his son who cannot use the good fruits of social networking without him, and his parents, who depend on the numerous photographic evidences of the well-breeding and good rearing of their grandchild, the father must never abandon them. Surely, the Angelic Doctor would agree that the judicious and temperate assistance lent to his son to post pictures on Facebook does not violate prohibitions against frivolous use of his time on the Internet.
Reply to Objection. The 19-month-old's inability to share in the fruits of friendship without his father's assistance means that the father's penance cannot preclude the possibility of assisting his son.
Objection 1. It would seem otherwise, since the blog itself, and the means of posting to it, reside on and require access to the Internet, respectively.
Objection 2. Furthermore, merely writing the blog posts offline in a word processor, then uploading them on Sunday would also violate this resolution, since the essential nature of the promise--to avoid the frivolous use of time on the Internet during Lent--is still broken by spending time on a pursuit that has as its natural end a form of communication that requires the Internet.
On the contrary, blogging is not essentially different from writing for printed media, which is a worthwhile and non-trivial pursuit, and not covered by any promise to give up the Internet for Lent.
I answer that, the vow to give up the Internet during Lent is a shorthand method of stating "giving up frivolous pursuits using the Internet," which the Philosopher surely would have agreed is one of the primary usages of the Internet. However, especially for one who has vowed to spend more time writing during Lent, blogging is not necessarily a frivolous pursuit, so long as care is taken to avoid the Five Lowest Forms. In fact, for one who has promised to spend more time writing, a blog is no different than any other media for the promulgation of the written word.
This simplistic understanding of the prohibition of the use of the Internet during Lent, in fact, stands as an obstacle to one who must write more, especially if his primary word processor is an online application. Clearly, one can promise to write more and also simultaneously not waste time on the Internet.
This is particularly evident for one whose job requires use of the Internet and email. Since his Lentent penance cannot supersede his duty to use the just fruits of the Internet to do his job, it can clearly be seen that giving up the Internet for Lent does not include all uses of the Internet, but merely those that are contrary to productivity.
Reply to Objection 1. While blogging does indeed use the Internet in myriad ways, both as a means of creating the content (form) of the blog post, and of posting the content for others to read (matter), this usage of the Internet can promote a self-betterment and more effective use of time, which is not what is intended to be avoided when one gives up the Internet for Lent.
Reply to Objection 2. That blogging is not essentially different from other forms of the written word seems to lend credence to the idea that blogging is allowed to one who has given up the Internet for Lent. If an act is no different from another act, any prohibitions against the one ought apply to the other, and should the first be acceptable, so ought the second.
Question 2: Whether Posting on Facebook, or Linking to Blog Posts on Facebook Is Prohibited to One Who has Given Up the Internet for Lent.
Objection 1. It would seem otherwise, since if one is permitted to upload the written word to a blog, one ought further be permitted to promote that written word in other venues.
Objection 2. Furthermore, what is a Facebook status update, if not a short blog post?
On the contrary, Facebook is a tool for socializing. To post a status update or link a blog post without a continued presence does a sort of violence to one's friends who reasonably expect to converse, but the continued presence constitutes a trivial usage of the Internet, which is not allowed by the vow.
I answer that, Facebook is, by its very nature, a frivolous use of the Internet. Surely, it is written, "can anything good come from [Facebook]?" The limitation of status updates to a mere 420 characters means that a status update cannot contain any of the intellectual depth of a blog post. These status updates cannot ever be considered anything but triviality.
Additionally, while simply posting a link to a blog post may not, in and of itself, violate the prohibition against the foolish use of one's time, the Theologian surely would have written that Facebook represents such a great time suck that one should not even log in, even for such a noble purpose as publicly promoting the written word, for the temptation for he who has given up the Internet for Lent is simply too great to justify the noble intent.
Reply to Objection 1. Promotion of the written word ought always be guided, as should every aspect of life, by the virtue of temperance. Because one is allowed to further the cause of the written word does not mean one should use every conceivable method of doing such. This is particularly true for those methods that tend towards triflingness.
Reply to Objection 2. While the Five Lowest Forms may tend towards the puerile nature of a Facebook status update, the latter, by its nature, must be different from a thoughtful and intelligent blog post. Those things which are said in the High Forms of blogging cannot be replicated in a Facebook status update.
Question 3: Whether a 19-Month-Old May Post Pictures to Facebook when His Father has Given Up the Internet for Lent.
Objection. It would seem otherwise, since 19-month-olds cannot use the Internet, let alone Facebook, without the assistance of their fathers. And since fathers who have given up the Internet for Lent are prohibited from using Facebook, the 19-month-old must respect his father's sacrifice and not tempt him to post picture on Facebook.
On the contrary, Lenten prohibitions must never fall on others to enforce. A father's vows should not in any ways place undue burden on his son.
I answer that, the duties of a father cannot be superseded by his Lenten penance. Since many depend on him, such as his son who cannot use the good fruits of social networking without him, and his parents, who depend on the numerous photographic evidences of the well-breeding and good rearing of their grandchild, the father must never abandon them. Surely, the Angelic Doctor would agree that the judicious and temperate assistance lent to his son to post pictures on Facebook does not violate prohibitions against frivolous use of his time on the Internet.
Reply to Objection. The 19-month-old's inability to share in the fruits of friendship without his father's assistance means that the father's penance cannot preclude the possibility of assisting his son.
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