NP - Klimt 1918 - Cry a Little
By the way, the songs I'm listening to while typing these posts, if you click on them (like the one above ^^^) it takes you to that band's myspace.com page, where theres often samples of them you can hear.
Someone wanted to interview for their dissertation project, and I havent gotten around to answering the questions they asked. But I might get around to it. In the meantime here they are, it would be great if you guys could give your own answers, I'd be interested to read them, and you might influence my own views when I get around to answering them. Post em in the comments, or in your own blogs, but link me so I can read them!
The questions are:
'what is your view on how Islam is presented by extremists?'
'Do you think that there are explicit contradictions between the teachings of your faith and the views of extremists?'
'do you think there has been a breakdown in traditional values of Islam or do you think they are just as prominent in light of modernity and globalisation?'
Another thing I wanted to blog about was the use of language in...well...everything. Its all about language and how we use it. It completely manipulates us and how we think about things, and how we act. A good example is how the US classifies people in Guantanamo Bay as 'enemy combatants' not 'prisoners of war', and thus does not have to provide them with the rights they are guaranteed in the Geneva Convention. Theres other examples too. One of my favourites is the word 'good', used in business for a product. The word 'good' automatically implies that something is, well, good! And thus, desirable. Milk is a good. Flu tablets are a good. Cigarettes are a good...wait a minute...
Another good one is the word 'interest', i.e. what you get if you keep money in the bank - and what the bank takes from you when you borrow money. Interest. What a lovely word, full of...good things. Interest...but why not taxation? It could be considered a form of taxation after all - in return for using this service, a small tax is levied. But tax is an ugly word. How about 'fee' then? Charge? Usury? All ugly words. Lets go with interest. Interest is good. Its in your interest to get interest...right?
The power of language...gotta love it.
Posted by illogicist at 4:59 PM
2 Comments
Interesting! some words do have a psychological advantage over others. Reading your post, I did wonder if those words were originally "made up" to benifit a specific entity. Today however a good is an item that increases utility or is marketable for sale(yes, cigrattes increase utility to smokers), we still can use product in this context. Interest, is used to explain the cost of repaying a loan. Taxation, is the fee imposed by Gov't. I guess we can use fee or surcharge- isnt that what Islamic banks call it, since charging interest is Haram?
I guess we use the words that sound best to our customer base.
In short, I agree with you.
Hahaha. I don't have significant comment to make but I gotta say, I loved this post.
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