If truth is pants, what are shoes?
This is a passage from a paper that I graded this morning:
Truth (can be likened) to a set of clothes, made to measure the man. In this way, man's measurements would be his own personal truth, and the clothes would be a form of living this out. Thus, the pants would be corresponding to his reality, and this reality would be the pants.
And you thought that the life of a philosophy instructor was glamorous. In actual fact, it is a life in which one is constantly quaffing aspirin to ward off the pounding headaches induced by forced exposure to the nonsensical abstractions of the average inattentive undergraduate.
(Add to this life a hyperactive WonderBaby jacked up on Cheerios and apple juice and you have perfect conditions for spontaneous mental combustion.)
If truth is pants, and you lose your pants, have you fallen into a condition of untruth, or have you cast off the oppressive trousers of dogma?
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I just discovered that I was nominated (by the lovely and delightfully promiscuous Ms. Oh The Joys) for The Blogitzer, over the Bloggers' Choice Awards. Now, I don't usually go in for blog awards, not least because I don't like shilling for votes, but in this case I am going to have to be shameless and beg: I only have one vote, and it's really kind of embarassing. So. Please go vote for me? I'd like to have at least, say, six votes.
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Have you checked out MBT lately?
posted by Her Bad Mother @ Tuesday, April 24, 2007
50 Comments:
The pants metaphor reminded me of a guy I dated years ago. Only his truth was more like underpants, and he preferred to go commando much of the time.
I voted for you! You rock!
The teacher I am, I am trying hard, oh so hard, to make sense of that analogy, to somehow will the words to make perfect sense. But all I can think, "Why the pants specifically?" And then I start on things like, "If pants are reality, are all activities done without pants unreal? Or maybe surreal?"
I voted for you. :) And I was wearing pants.
Personally I always found students' "creative metaphors" to be painfully entertaining... like watching junior high boys at a dance.
Aw, I already voted, but I would've. I've been lounging for a week with five votes, so six sounds greedy.
Ummm, I'm kind of speechless, because that was a stupendously horrid, and confusingly incomplete metaphor. How do you do it??
I have 3 votes (close friends, I bribed them), so I think you're going to come out to the good on that one! And rightfully so. :?)
Ummm, I'm kind of speechless, because that was a stupendously horrid, and confusingly incomplete metaphor. How do you do it??
I have 3 votes (close friends, I bribed them), so I think you're going to come out to the good on that one! And rightfully so. :?)
Ummm, I'm kind of speechless, because that was a stupendously horrid, and confusingly incomplete metaphor. How do you do it??
I have 3 votes (close friends, I bribed them), so I think you're going to come out to the good on that one! And rightfully so. :?)
I voted for you! Now... (I am hanging my head in shame.) How would you feel about (gulp) voting for me?
You know, tit for tat, the utilitarian philosophers, Hume, Bentham, John Stuart Mill, yadda yadda.
And with that bald reference to philosophy, have I impressed you enough to vote for me? ;)
My hubs taught an undergrad. football player a few years ago who refused to believe that all objects fall at the same rate.
So hubs sat in his office, grabbed a book and a pen or some such, and dropped them. They hit the floor at the same time.
And the guy stared at hubs as if he were JC himself and said, "Well whaddya know!"
Slouching Mom - Kant's the guy that you want to cite if you want to subtly tweak someone's conscience in matters concerning reciprocal action. ;)
And - of course I'll vote for you.
BA - how do I do it? Alcohol.
Pants!!!
That's my new favorite curse word. Didn't The Young Ones use it?
"This soup tastes like pants!" (or something?)
Pants is Truth. Truth is Pants.
hahahahahahaha.
ooooh lordy. cracking myself up here.
this reality would be the pants? i'm so confused.
but, heh, a BLOGITZER - you go, girl!
Oh my oh my... I'm thoroughly confused. I must have read that paragraph 10 times and it hurt my brain trying to make it make sense.
Oh... and I voted! :) Happy to do so!
No, HBM. Fair is fair, and I failed my Philosophy exam, so you are no longer under any obligation to reciprocate.
;)
pants. hm.
Do they really give you headaches or do you laugh so hard you feel euphoric.
Pants. An amazing analogy.
You make me miss my job.
And what of the type of pants? Say perhaps one person's truth is a pair of flat front khacki's from the Gap and another's are gabardine trousers? Is one more or less truthful than the other?
Pants? Oh, that's a good one. How do you stand it? LOL!
Blogitzer! I love the name of that one. I have no idea what it means, but I'll go vote for you. Vote for me back!
You see what I've started? It's a love fest over here.
Oh my my, I'm an art history instructor and I had forgotten that we aren't the only ones subjected to lovely and ah, inventive interpretations.
The things I do for my friends! Like fight my way through the sign-up form, which I did wrong three times.
I voted!
Oh my. That's perhaps the worst piece of writing ever written by an adult. Reminds me of my own philosophy courses, through which I completely bullshitted my way.
Your undergraduates are probably still more coherent than that the marketing blather that I'm trying to corral into something exciting this week.
If truth is pants....what does it mean when my kids don't wear any?
Well, I want lots of shoes and expensive ones, ones that are hot and hurt my feet, so what does that tell you. The problem is after my babies any pants at all that fit nice would be good, I'll take that. Plus the only thing that looks good with yoga pants are runners. I'm beat.
wow, i'm honored to be in the same category as you. also, if you think your kids' stuff is funny, you should go check out my post from today. my kids use strange comparisons to define "success"...
also, wonderbaby looks like a tiny superhero in that picture. :)
Gotta love a good Young Ones reference GJ. We used to tag and pants on to lots of comments. Cheers, to your health.. and pants!
And, now I am off to the ballot box.... Don't you just feel like Ségolène Royal?
If truth is pants, what happens if the fly is open?
I, of course, am referring to that lecture you gave with a gaper. :-)
Isn't philosophy fun?
And on that note, what happens when your karma runs over your dogma?
Truthfully, when I was an undergrad I took great joy in making random statements like that in essays. I KNEW it made no sense, but I thought if I tried hard enough ...
My psychology teacher once told me that she whenever she got to my paper she went and made a fresh cup of tea!!!
I'll go vote for you.
damn...my jeans are too tight...take a spin on that one oh inattentive average undergrad...
and no I have not been over to MBT lately. skulking off to do so right about. now.
Oh you do need Advil. I have to go and set up an account, so I can vote...will do.
Good luck with the pants.
I'm sorry for your headache, but I do feel a little relieved that I'm not the only one in that hell. I teach Freshman Comp and just last week I had the joy of reading this sentence: "It is time something happens so no more children become the reason smoking begins at a young age."
God bless you, HBM, our future is in those heads. And pants.
If reality is the pants, then what are capris?
Capris are little white lies. Half-truths. And devastating to anyone with fat ankles.
Wow. I never knew the depth of how much a good meal could change your life if it can alter the whole shape of your truth...
hi catherine well you have 25 votes as of now...good luck and the pants metaphor poor you.no wonder you have a headache.LAVENDULA
"Spontaneous Mental Combustion"
I love love that!!!
I was an undergrad student only 4 years ago! So I have to admit, we wrote pretty shitty essays for the professors!
And of course, been there, done that, I always knew I couldn't be a professor!
Okay I officially think this needs to be philosophy week.
You can come to my blog and beat me with a wet noodle re. my Aristotle impersonation, thumbs-up Jen for her Plato, and swing by Alice's for some Monty Python.
Wait, what else were you saying?
Or losing pants? it depends whether it was a conscious choice or beyond your posession of control. ;)
Oh, what a relief to know it is not just English profesors like me that have to deal with fabulous student writing on "truly abdominal" characters and "poems that revile the truth"!
Shoes are the sole our truths rest on.
Okay--the pants metaphor, coupled with the photo and caption...WOOT!
Dude, I want a Blogitzer! But since I'm not nominated, you'll get my vote! :-)
I think that "Thus, the pants would be corresponding to reality, and this reality would be the pants," needs to be my new motto.
(I took out the "his." Wanted to make it more universal.)
I voted for you! But I was wearing shorts, does that still count as pants?
teeth whitener
I signed up and voted for you. I'd only do this for YOU, and I don't even know you. But I love, love, love your blogs.
Come to think of it, "truth" IS pants. Total pants.
And, isn't it made manifestly obvious that pants are truth since if your pants are being destroyed by a conflagration, you are said to be a liar? Ha. The proof is in the proverb. Or something like that.
Kittenpie, DUDE. You are so right. pants on fire; truth aflame.
I wish that I could retitle this post.
Yeah..I have no idea what that guy was trying to say, and I often think nonsensically.
And I agree with you about capris. Everyone's talking about "wearing capris again", and I never can. Damn fat ankles.
WHAT??!1 Well, of COURSE truth is pants.
Of course, I may be a little partial.
-sweatPANTSmom
See, that is why I couldn't teach philosophy. I'd be so confused by that passage, I wouldn't know if it was profound or drivel.
And, yes, I voted for you---you deserve way more than 6 votes!
Trust me, FOM. It's drivel.
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