Interview with VideCorSpoon

My name is a take on Dante Alighieri's La Vita Nuova (the new life),but particularly in reference to the heart's captive soul "A ciascun'alma presa." The small sonnet was in regards to Dante as a young boy of 9 completely captivated with his all-time crush Beatrice. The spoon part is in reference to a hilariously inappropriate joke.

My avatar depicts a skull with a crown with a stained glass background visible through a bullet hole. The skull and crown was actually something that I picked up from my early days on Halo 2. I suppose the icon grew on me and I use it for most forum I use (from investing websites to computer websites to good ole' philforum. The skull and crown is also a nice homage to the "all is vanity" lithograph by Charles Allan Gilbert.

My user title is "conspicuous moronicus." Anything said in Latin sounds profound, and anything said in pig-Latin sounds confounding! LOL! Honestly, I don't know what was going through my head when I put it down, but it has been my user title ever since I started and I don't have the heart to change it now. If I did change it, it would be to "There's a problem with the gizmos? STOP THE GIZMOS!" The signature is from Pythagoras. Honestly, I'm not much of a fan of Pythagoras, but the quote is strikingly appropriate. My original quote was, "man doth like an ape, that the higher he climbs, the more he shows of his behind" by Sir Francis Bacon. Always an amusing critique of human progression.

After I graduated (squared), I had an enormous amount of time between that and law school. As far as I am concerned, if I have more than two months of free time doing nothing mentally productive, I end up losing the little edge I tend to think I have. Thus, in order to keep my edge from dulling, I joined philforum! The quality of the members and the moderators were very excellent and, interestingly enough, what tipped the scales for me to choose this forum over the others was the aesthetic appeal. Truth be told, many of the other philosophy forums have about as much order and aesthetic appeal as a flea circus (which many may actually like). LOL! What's the point of doing something if you don't look good doing it! Bella figura! LOL!

Well, I joined in March of 2008 (wow it seems like such a long time ago). My location is indeed in Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love and the home of the original flash mob. It is an utterly fantastic city, and it is often sunny in Philadelphia LOL! I have made around 1,500 posts. Most of these posts are either hilariously short or exceedingly lengthy. I like to thank as many people as I can, especially when the discussion, argument, etc. is well founded and of good quality and the people are genuine in their response. My thanked to thank/you ratio is 1.3-1, so I am pretty happy with that. I try to be as even as possible. My rep is 17, although I have absolutely no idea what on earth that measures. LOL!

I know a little about a lot without thought for much of little consequence. LOL!

Just a few. I love History (my primary major along with the second major in philosophy at school), and I do freelance genealogical work for friends, family and the occasional person they reference. It's actually a very easy thing to do, and you can do a lot more now that genetic testing has become so cheap. I also like to write (albeit in a sterile historical sense). And sweet bejezus do I love to read (I usually manage a book a week? most of the time from the B&N bargain section LOL!). Always love to fiddle around with the latest gadgets, so technology has become a big interest lately. Also, I do more than a fair share of online investing, which keeps me close the computer many hours a day (and also gives me the time to post on philforum). I also like sports (i.e. running, soccer, etc), and anything that I take a passing interest in at the time. Also very interested in law, law related history, etc. but I think that is more rolled into philosophy in my opinion.

I would be lying if I said that philosophy did not in some way coincide with my other interests, especially as far as my affinity for law is concerned.

honestly I can't think of anything else that would be that interesting to mention. I have been gradually writing a small 5x8 280 page book on fundamental notions in modern philosophy for the past year (which incidentally explains why I spend so much time on those types of posts) and almost have it through the semi-middle stages (without front/back matter, etc). We'll have to see how that all ends up. The way modern publishing has become, it is actually pretty easy to get something published per se. But I think regardless of what happens when I shop the manuscript around, it was something fun to do. BTW, I am totally ok with winning the lottery so that I can just write and write and write. I have a few other topics I wanted to write about after the modern philosophy book, from English constitutional history/early American colonial law to the British military purchase system. Interesting factoids, there was a time when lawyering was prohibited in America and you could purchase a colonelcy in the British army at one time for kids as young as 8 years old. Seriously, there is not enough time in the day.

I really like the philosophy 101 section. The posts tend to be a little more directed towards academic philosophy than opinion, which is always nice to take part in since it forces you to substantiate your comments most of the time. But other than that, the metaphysics section is always fun, the logic forum, the modern philosophers, ancient philosophy, etc. If it's interesting, I'll say something on it.

I have, but it has been a recent thing. I started a small little blog series on Godel Esher Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid, which is a fun little book on thought experiments and so on.

Sexy

Extremely long. LOL! I can't bring myself to write posts that lack too much essential detail. Honestly, it does not take that much time to put it all down on paper, so it is not a matter of time. I tend to put down a lot of information (often more than what was asked) and then let the person to whom it was addressed take what they will from it. Better to give a lot of information than give too little. The addition of my version of humor is a whole other story.

I would love to see formal debate forums opening up in the future.

I had originally majored in biology at university and I always tended to take philosophy classes for fun. As I lost interest in biology, I tended to lean more towards philosophy in any case, so I switched to philosophy and history and the rest is? well... history.

I really don't have any particularly gleamy-eyed views of how philosophy is important for me. I tend to think of philosophy as a tool (skill) to use in conjunction with other things, like history, art, etc. Of course, I'm not that cold towards philosophy, but that is my general view. But keeping philosophy somewhat objective tends to clarify a lot of issues that arise later and streamlines the whole process.

Tools (skills) can constantly be improved, changed, etc.

Everything is relative.

If you approach it in certain ways, philosophy can greatly increase your writing skills, your argumentative skills (consequentially you logical reasoning), your coherence, your style of prose, and your ability to help others reach goals that you may have had a rather difficult time obtaining. If anything, one of the best benefits of philosophy is the ability to show others what you know (and learn from others) and spread the information around? make philosophy viral... like keyboard cat (the first part, not the second).

I really don't think there are any particular drawbacks to philosophy. It's always good when philosophy moves forward (based on positive or negative content). I suppose if I could suppose any particular drawbacks, it would be when misconceptions in philosophy (content, conveyance, demeanor, etc.) negatively affect philosophy students. Nothing really wrong with that, only it's sad to see it happen.

Metaphysics, ancient philosophy, logic, bioethics, etc. Actually, it's hard to choose a favorite.

Probably existentialism, but only insofar as I don't really get as much pleasure reading Kierkegaard as I do Aristotle.

Honestly, I think it would be the collection of modern philosophers. Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, etc.

Nietzsche. Seriously, nothing against him, but I really just don't get any personal enjoyment out of his work. Which is interesting considering how interesting and provoking his works really are, but I was just never able to get into it. To tell the truth, I'm rather pissed at my overall response to his books.

Honestly, who knows. I am actually a follower of the fairly obscure historian Rhys Carpenter and polar alignment shifts and how they affect civilization. So when you rely on historians to tell you about weather patterns, honestly you don't have much of an opinion at all. However, I am still relatively angry about the whole titanic thing, so in order to fight the iceberg menace, I support global warming.

probably a little more conservative but not entirely. Each side has their own pluses and minuses.

formal (unless I'm in an informal mood)

ignorant, because then and only then are you truly smart (or wise... however you choose to look at it) LOL!

That's like asking whether you prefer mountain dew or crab juice. Ehhh? of course? I would choose crab juice.

awesome... pure? awesome.