Defying the Default Setting

by Ana Karina DLC. Sesbreño

23 July 2013
Discussed Articles: David Foster Wallace’s “This is Water” and Gabriel Marcel’s “Introduction”

“I thought I was going to die,” I said the first time I rode a train.

“She’s so annoying,” I say every time someone do things I do not like.

“I don’t deserve this,” I say when bad things happen.

But the worst one is when I ask, “Why me?” 

As you can see, I am a spoiled brat to the core. Well, I used to be.

A few months ago, my dad started becoming really sick (I do not want to specify it, since it’s too personal). Of course, I was initially concerned with his conditions, but as few weeks pass by, I realized that I was more concerned with mine. One night, I just kept on asking God why he would do this to me. 

I was so affected, but I kept (and still keeping) it from my family since I do not want to add to their worries. The whole time, I was so scared that my dad would leave me behind. But, what I failed to realize was that it was not only me who was affected by his sickness, my whole family was too. I was just too selfish and I distanced myself from them thinking that I did not deserve it, but it was a stupid idea. And I was stupid.

I guess, DFW’s article really hit me when he mentioned that I have to become aware of the essential things in life, and that I am part of a greater whole. All is being in Being. I had to start maturing, because there is more to life than, well, me. 

So, I started the ultimate plan of getting my life back together. My checklist included becoming best friends with my sister, going home a lot, and just basically becoming less selfish. Because I realized that in the end, they are the people who matter, who I should give attention too.

But plans never really work out as they do. I wanted the end result of becoming happy, but the process was tedious. Like a semester in the Ateneo, there were hell weeks in this plan. But something kept me going all throughout, and I guess that is where Marcel’s concept of metaphysical unease comes in. There was just this undeniable desire that kept on making me endure all the pain of becoming unselfish (because it is truly easier to just give up). It was like; I knew that something greater was in store for me.

And there was.

After months of hard work, I feel that I am more satisfied with my life right now. It was like a long road, as Marcel again said―the end result was important, but the journey towards it is equally as much. Through the times of backing out in fights with my siblings, making time to meet up with my high school best friends, and spending more time with my family, I experienced some sort of transcendence in a sense that I was able to do things I normally would not have done in my previous default setting. I was able to grow. 

I was able to become more than what I am; I was, I think, able to become a better person. 

I guess the key to living out my life satisfactorily is what philosophy is. It is becoming aware of what makes me happy as DFW said and it is being able to experience transcendence in the quest of a philosophical life that Marcel reiterated. 

Going Places

by Francine Seno
Discussed Text: Wallace, "This Is Water"

My favorite text so far has been David Foster Wallace’s commencement address, where I learned that to fully experience is to venture outside of one’s comfort zone and into an “unknown”, to willingly step out of one’s bubble, to shake oneself out of one’s bland, routine-centered lives and into somewhere one has never gone before. To escape one’s natural default setting requires a conscious effort to shift or to go beyond one’s perspective, to think twice and even question one’s certainties.

This insight is very significant to me as it has so much to do with my one genuine passion in life: traveling.

In no way do I consider myself “well-traveled” – I’ve only traveled a total of 6 times in my life abroad. Locally speaking, I’ve only been to 3 places outside of Manila. Although my experience with traveling may seem limited, I would say that those trips have changed me as a person in ways I didn't know they would and I feel very blessed to have been given a glimpse of the world so early in my life.

When I travel, I get to leave my beliefs and my certainties at home. I am able to see and examine everything I thought I knew in a different light and angle. Going someplace different from your home country enables you to shake up your complacencies though seeing strikingly different situations than those you experience at home. You are awakened in various ways when you find yourself dealing with something that’s far from your daily realities.

Abroad, we are not seen the way we are at home: we are wonderfully free of labels, of social class, of standing, of whatever reputation we may hold back there. Here in this foreign place, nobody knows your name. And precisely because we are freed of these inessential labels, we have the chance and the freedom to come into contact with the more essential parts of ourselves. A lot of people claim to feel more alive when they are far from home.

Of course, it’s not all about what we get from the places we visit, but also what we bring, and leave behind. As tourists, we also carry values and beliefs and news to the places we go. We also have the opportunity to enrich and to impart valuable things to the new cultures we encounter.

In a nutshell, traveling changes us by exposing to us new sights, issues, dilemmas and realities or those that we might otherwise ignore. Traveling also exposes us to parts of ourselves we’ve never discovered before - when we travel places, we also travel to new moods, emotions, states of mind or some “hidden places” inside of us.  Traveling is a quest not just for the unknown, but the unknowing: we may travel not only in search of answers, but of better questions as well.

A Real Analysis of Philosophy

by Wys So

“The Greek language, and it alone, is logos.”

It is one of the statements in Heidegger’s “What is Philosophy?” that has caught my attention. After trying to relate the Greek language (or the Logos) to my life, I’ve found out that I have approached more Greek letters than I imagined. To my surprise, more than half of my life I have been dealing with those Greek letters such as α, β, µ, Ω, £, etc.

Few days ago when I was reviewing for my Advanced Calculus test about real number line, I surprisingly gained some insights about the relatedness of Mathematics and Philosophy. Theoretically, imagine a real number line from negative infinity to positive infinity, this real number line for me is the whole reality itself. From the real number line I choose a subset “S”, this subset can be imagined as a small circle located inside a very, very big circle named “R” which stands for reality. So each and everyone of us has our own “S”, which is our unique life, our daily routine, or the world that we are immersed in subconsciously.
Recalling David Foster Wallace’s “This is Water” lead me to think of a concept in Advanced Calculus called the “boundary point”. David Foster Wallace called our attention to be “aware”, similarly, it’s like telling us to be on the “boundary” of our own “S”. Being on the boundary point and to be aware will help us in realizing that the world is not just about ‘my’s. We are actually living with other people, with many other more subsets on the real number line. In addition, it is also implied by David Foster Wallace that we should go to the “exterior” of our own subset, going “out” of ourselves.

Moreover, Advanced Calculus highly focused on the problems about “existence”. Most of the problems are all about proving. Some of the problems are: Prove that x is an interior point; prove that the limit does not exist; prove that S does not contain its limit point; prove that the union of open sets is open, etc. All of these problems are similar to philosophy in the sense that they are looking for a reason, for an existence, perhaps. In fact, philosophy is about reason, about existence.


And it’s probably why people say that great mathematicians are great philosophers.

Philosoraptor ang Peg

by Anj Nguyen

16 June 2013

Doctor Garcia mentioned that Philosophers deal with language in an extensive manner, they deal with things in another level, a level that we can reach but we’re just too focused on the “what next?” rather than the “what’s happening now?” This is where “This Is Water” becomes relevant because we’re too preoccupied with what we are shown or choose to see that we don’t see what’s really in front of us. This point has been made clear with last week’s discussion. What got my attention though was when Doctor Garcia lectured on knowing more leads to knowing that you don’t know.

When you know something you are made aware of what you don’t know but that’s not the case now, well for me. When I’m taught something, I think, “Cool, I’ll remember that. Next topic!” I don’t think, “Oh what else am I missing in my life??” but when I do, I already consider myself thinking on another level. That’s the thing, I should be thinking on another level all the time because that’s the way we can make the most out of life. Keep opening doors but always explore every nook and cranny of every room because you’ll never know what you miss. This is being conscious of your actions and surroundings, opening your eyes and mind.

I know we all want to learn something new everyday but know that there is no end because there’s always another question to an answer. Try paying more attention to details. Like you should be aware of how awkward you’re being when you stare at someone walking down secwalk, or make like a philosoraptor and ask silly questions because you'll never know where you just might end up

Am I on the right track? This is how I understand things. Being aware makes you realize how unaware you actually are.

After Doctor Garcia’s lecture, did you too become aware of how unaware you are?

On Rembrandt and Aristotle

by Robert Dominic

To understand the painting of Rembrandt entitled "Aristotle Contemplating the Bust of Homer, I decided to establish instead what I understood about Poetry, Philosophy, and their relationship independent of, and in connection to, each other.

Poetry's main ingredients are words. The essence of it is the idea of trying to express the author's understanding of the things around him, and so in effect Poetry becomes a form of answering. And to answer is to define, and to define puts things within certain parameters. Poetry is a form of encapsulation; using words, we are given the power to name and define things and henceforth establish what they are. And so we go back to water: Water is a liquid, it is the main thing that makes up our body, and depending on one's situation, it can kill you or make you healthy.

But then what is Philosophy? I understand Philosophy as the venture into the uncertain. It decides to even take the definite, and find out what made it uncertain before it was even defined in the first place. Philosophy being a matter of asking questions, may not necessarily provide an avenue for answers, but rather greater scopes of question, inquiry, and thought. Water might be a common substance. But what makes it uniquely water? What makes water, water? Going back to the lecture of Dr. Garcia, we know that we can think. But do we know that we think? And if so, there must certainly be the human capacity to think that we think that we think, right? Is this measure of humanity extendable to any being that is non-human? Is this human aspect extendable to a greater form of thinking, and should we deviate from such, does that degrade or devalue us being human?

This then connect and puts together for me the harmony of Poetry, and Philosophy best depicted in Rembrandt's painting. Poetry, much as it expresses and defines the feeling, the thought, or the thing it seeks to depict, kills the question. Being defined, it becomes a display rather than a matter of query. It is the bust of Homer; Homer the poet, is a question that is killed, for he is depicted and defined by his works, and his thoughts put onto paper are what speak for who and what Homer is.

But then there is the connection to Aristotle, alive and not in stone, his hand resting on the bust of Homer. Aristotle, La Philosophe, is that depiction of the life of Philosophy. He is alive, he seeks to contemplate what is established, and take it to the uncertain. Yes, Homer wrote this, lived that, but do his works really define Homer? What if these were merely extensions of the thoughts and observations of Homer, what were his thoughts and what was his own philosophy? Aristotle not only represents Philosophy in the painting, but stands for the life of questioning and actively contemplating the uncertain as well for looking at what is defined and sincerely thinking of what made it come to be defined in the first place; what initiated or stimulated Homer to write, to expressly declare or creatively depict.


As I reflected upon this, I come to the conclusion that Philosophy and Poetry bear their own missions independent of each other, but when they come together, they challenge the human person with the opportunity to exercise his capability to dare to question what is established, or in turn, establish an answer for the questions unanswered for Man.

Open-mindedness and Causality

by June Patrick Bulaon

13 June 2013
Discussed Text: David Foster Wallace, "This Is Water"

After discussing DFW’s This is Water, our class began a discussion on open-mindedness: mainly, to what extent can we be open and does everything actually happen for a reason? Unfortunately, due to some time constraint we weren’t able to completely address the issue and I think some of us, including me, weren’t able to formulate their own ideas with regards to the topic.

Like what DFW already said, everybody falls prey to their own biases. It’s not necessarily something that we choose, though. It could be something that is inherent and imbued within us by nature or by nurture; that is, it could be some outside element that influences us to think or feel a certain way towards something e.g. culture, religion, experience, etc. This creates in us a sort of “default natural setting”, as DFW put it, that makes us view reality in a certain manner without really considering what is.

I view reality as a single solitary piece of diamond: there is only one reality but there are many facets to it. Sometimes what we think is cannot be seen on the surface by other people because it is the side of reality that we choose to look at; that is, there is only one reality but we choose what we make of it.
And I think that’s where open-mindedness comes in. It’s the ability and decision to not only look at a single facet of this reality but to attempt at observing this diamond in its entirety, to understand that each facet has its own beauty and appeal to people, and to choose which facet or image is most appealing and “most rational” to us.
This choice doesn’t mean that any other view is wrong or inferior compared to our own. It just means that our manner of thinking is different from theirs and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I think this difference brings about more opportunities to be more open-minded. As we open up to the thoughts and views of others, we get to see a better view of reality.
Causality, or the attribution of an event to a cause, depends on that choice: the choice to consider and weigh in on the reality that is presented to us. Everything will happen for a reason if we consider that it does.

This, I gather, is the true power of the human mind and what makes us above all animals: our ability to make rational and conscious decisions and thoughts as opposed to always involuntarily going with our gut and instincts.

I found this “meme” on the image sharing site, Imgur, and I think it goes well with the discussion during the last class.  What do you think? Do you agree or disagree?

The Transformative Power of Thought

by Alec Abarro

13 June 2013
Discussed text: David Foster Wallace, "This is Water"

The two fishes have been immersed in the water since, well, forever. So when they are asked, “How’s the water?” They are baffled. They haven’t been on land, or at least felt the air. How can they be aware of the water when it is so constant? It has always been there, engulfing them. The older fish must have experienced jumping out of the water, and felt the breeze. Or perhaps, he had been washed ashore once upon a time, and felt the soil. Whatever it is, the older fish had been exposed to something that is not water. Hence, he became aware to that something he has been immersed in since forever.

“This is water.”

When we are so absorbed in a paradigm, we involuntarily overlook other ways of seeing the world. The younger fishes aren’t even aware of the water they are stuck in. But the older fish does. More importantly, the older fish knows that there is something other than water. He has seen the sky and the earth. His world is that much bigger.

What about us? What are paradigm are we immersed in? David Foster Wallace calls this “default thinking” and our default thinking is the Me, Myself, and I paradigm. We view the world in our perspective. We literally don’t see the world through another person’s eyes. To us, everything happens in a first person point of view. This I paradigm is our water. Now, the I paradigm is not necessarily bad. But what is does is that it made us more self-centered, more selfish, self-interested, self-involved, self-seeking, self-serving. Self. Consequently, we have, more often than not, overlooked the paradigm of you, of us, of togetherness, of community, of fellowship.

But we are better off than the fish, because humans are gifted with empathy. We have the ability to see ourselves in the place of others. As we distinguish the I from the non-I, we start gaining our own identity. We start to become aware of what we do and who we are by differentiating ourselves with other people.

This non-I thinking partnered with the differentiating of the I from the non-I help us gain a new perspective, another framework to see the world and in turn, the self acts differently as it redraws horizons that transforms the space which it lives in. As we put ourselves in the place of other people, we try getting inside their thoughts and feelings to see what they see and in turn, we identify ourselves with another way of experiencing the world. The ability to empathize not only gives us the capacity to recognize another way of experiencing reality but also gives us the opportunity to objectively judge ourselves from the outside, and this shapes the narratives of our lives.

This is the value of a liberal arts education, as emphasized by David Foster Wallace. It’s about the choice of what to think about, of how to think. But what he really means is “learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how you construct meaning from experience.” Liberal arts free us in the default way of thinking we are stuck in, opening our mind and seeing the world differently. When we change “default thinking,” we gain awareness of the self. We learn how to think. But the most important thing is thinking in order to live fuller.

As we transform from within, the activity for the body changes too. Its actions manifest the inner simulation of the perspectives we have and gained. Simply put, another way of thinking produces another way of acting. It allows us to reach an understanding about the self that causes us to change it and bring about a self-transformation. In the end, an Us paradigm benefits the I, the way I thinks, and acts in the community. The I has changed, but this single individual impacts not only the self but others around him. This is the power of thought.

On Open-Mindedness

by Robert Dominic

13 June 2013
Discussed Text: David Foster Wallace, "This Is Water"

It isn't overthinking if we try and analyze if something happens or occurs for a reason, or simply comes about as pure coincidence. In fact, choosing not to exercise this human capability to seek and define the occurrences around us is a dismissal of this capability, and a submission to our default setting of self-centeredness, that if an ordinary thing that occurs does not strike us immediately as intended for us, we assume it simply happened by pure coincidence.

In the matter of open-mindedness and what is morally right or wrong, the basic truth that is self-evident is that we will all look at one thing with different interpretations. That open-mindedness is not meant to establish what is universally and morally right or wrong, because it is not open-mindedness if the aim or goal is to define, and possibly usurp, what is established in our society and in our world as right and wrong. That does not promote the lessening of arrogance that David Foster Wallace sought to highlight in his commencement speech; if open-mindedness deviates from exploring the truths around us and aims to establish what is right and wrong, then open-mindedness becomes a declaration or a claim, not the intended process of choosing how to think and establishing the control and discipline of what truth and point-of-view to observe.