June 5, 2009
Hello Fellow Students.
In researching for my online tutoring system, The VTA Method, I interviewed dozens of students and asked them how they became successful so successful in school. The one thing they all had in common was their mind shift from thinking they knew they were going to succeed to knowing they were going to succeed.
Difference between Believing and Knowing you will succeed in University
Let me describe the distinction between believing and knowing. Believing you’re going to succeed at something is when you don’t exactly know how you’re going to accomplish a goal but you have the faith that you will be able to achieve it. This, in itself is a rare and highly successful way to think. Many successful students and people have this mindset and have accomplished great things by implementing this kind of mind shift.
Knowing is a little different. Knowing your going to succeed is having the same mindset that you will be able to achieve your goal BUT having a fully laid out plan to accomplish said goal. So believing you’re going to succeed is having faith that you will be getting an A on a paper, knowing you’re going to succeed is having all the research, brainstorming and essay outlines completed and refined ready to be used to write an amazing paper. You first need to believe before you know, and knowing requires quite a bit of testing and refinement, but once you know it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.
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May 27, 2009
The Ultimate Utilitarian
So last post I talked about the fundamental aspects of Utilitarianism, if you haven’t checked it out, I highly suggest you do. Go check out my post 1 on Utilitarianism. Today I’m going to talk about the pro’s and con’s of utilitarianism and my arguments as to why it is so clearly a great way to run your own personal moral compass.
Why Philosophy Snobs don’t like Utilitarianism
Many philosophy snobs see utilitarianism as an ethical dinosaur and lacking any clear ideology. Deontological ethics which does not see the consequences of an action as its moral determinant; and virtue ethics which focuses on the character of individuals to guide actions rather then looking at each action individually, pretty much think utilitarianism is bullshit. I have had heated discussions with many philosophers on the subject and here are the major critiques and my rebuttals.
The Qualitative Nature of Happiness
Utilitarianism sees people’s happiness as a single factor when in reality each person experiences pain and happiness individually and cannot therefore be aggregated into a single variable. It is impossible to quantitatively compare one person’s pain to another person, therefore choosing action that creates pain or happiness based on more than a single persons happiness cannot be aggregated and therefore should not be taken action upon.
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