Yesterday's issue of The Washington Post included an article explaining that two Adidas officials (and an aspiring NBA agent) are on trial in a federal court in New York. The men broke NCAA recruiting rules and allegedly defrauded the colleges recruiting a high school basketball player from Michigan (Will Hobson, "Any probes by NCAA will wait till trials end," Page D1, October 6, 2018).
The same day, I received the Fall 2018 issue of the Georgia Tech Alumni Magazine. Its cover included the teaser: "Inside the deal with Adidas." An article by Tony Rehagen provided the following details: over six years, Adidas will provide a total of $17.46 million worth of apparel and $1.2 million cash. (Adidas will give bonuses if the football team or men's basketball team appears in a championship game.) According to the article, "college athletics is big business."
And that includes branding. As part of the deal, Tech revamped the teams' uniforms (all featuring the Adidas logo), with a new color and new wordmark (here). The football helmet has a new version of the GT logo. The football team also got a renovated locker room that cost $4.5 million; of course, it features the Adidas logo also.
The men and women who play on these teams will also get workout gear to wear around campus. But they won't be compensated when Adidas or Georgia Tech sells replicas of their uniforms to students and fans, because of NCAA rules. The athletes' compensation is restricted by the NCAA, a cartel that exploits them and refuses to share the millions that it receives in various media and marketing deals (including deals for video games featuring players' likenesses, an issue in the O'Bannon lawsuit). The players have no association to represent them; they have no power except the power to opt out (which some do, working in professional leagues without playing for college teams).
Because of the NCAA, Adidas supposedly commits a crime when it gives money to high school athletes, but it is acceptable to give gear and money to the athletic departments who are recruiting and exploiting these athletes. The trial in New York is about people who broke NCAA rules, but the NCAA is the guilty party.
Sunday, October 07, 2018
Sunday, July 08, 2018
Interior Castle
Interior Castle, by St. Teresa of Avila (1515- 1582), describes seven sets of "mansions" that represent different states of the soul. (All quotes here from the translation by E. Allison Peers.)
"We shall never succeed in knowing ourselves unless we seek to know God: let us think of His greatness and then come back to our own baseness" (First Mansions, Chapter 2).
“All that the beginner in prayer has to do … is to labour and be resolute and prepare himself with all possible diligence to bring his will into conformity with the will of God" (Second Mansions, Chapter 1).
"Love consists, not in the extent of our happiness, but in the firmness of our determination to try to please God in everything” (Fourth Mansions, Chapter 1).
"In such spiritual activity as this, the person who does most is he who thinks least and desires to do least: what we have to do is to beg like poor and needy persons coming before a great and rich Emperor and then cast down our eyes in humble expectation" (Fourth Mansions, Chapter 3).
The description of the Fifth Mansions includes the image of the silkworm:
“The silkworm is like the soul which begins to utilize the general help which God gives to us all, and to make use of the remedies which He left in His Church -- such as frequent confessions, good books and sermons. The soul begins to live and nourishes itself on this food, and on good meditations, until it is full grown. … Let us hasten to perform this task and spin this cocoon. Let us renounce our self-love and self-will, and our attachment to earthly things. Let us practise penance, prayer, mortification, obedience, and all the other good works that you know of. Let us do what we have been taught; and we have been instructed about what our duty is. Let the silkworm die -- let it die, as in fact it does when it has completed the work which it was created to do. … When it is in this state of prayer, and quite dead to the world, it comes out a little white butterfly. … everything it sees on earth leaves it dissatisfied, That soul has now delivered itself into His hands and His great love has so completely subdued it that it neither knows nor desires anything save that God shall do with it what He wills.”
In the Sixth Mansions, the soul longs to be with God: "That sight of Him which it has had is so deeply impressed upon it that its whole desire is to enjoy it once more. ... The best medicine is to occupy oneself with external affairs and works of charity and to hope in God's mercy. ... Our best plan is to place ourselves in the Lord's presence, meditate upon His mercy and grace and upon our own lowliness, and leave Him to give us what He wills."
In the Seventh Mansions, "all three Persons communicate Themselves to the soul and speak to the soul and explain to it that He and the Father and the Holy Spirit will come to dwell with the soul which loves Him and keeps His commandments. ... the soul will very seldom think of itself; its whole thought will be concentrated upon finding ways to please Him and upon showing Him how it loves Him. This, my daughters, is the aim of prayer."
I began to think of the soul as if it were a castle made of a single diamond or of very clear crystal, in which there are many rooms, just as in Heaven there are many mansions. … Let us now imagine that this castle, as I have said, contains many mansions, some above, others below, others at each side; and in the centre and midst of them all is the chiefest mansion where the most secret things pass between God and the soul.This spiritual guide, written for the instruction of the saint's fellow nuns, doesn't precisely specify the distinctions among these mansions, but it does provide guidance on how to pray and do God's will.
"We shall never succeed in knowing ourselves unless we seek to know God: let us think of His greatness and then come back to our own baseness" (First Mansions, Chapter 2).
“All that the beginner in prayer has to do … is to labour and be resolute and prepare himself with all possible diligence to bring his will into conformity with the will of God" (Second Mansions, Chapter 1).
"Love consists, not in the extent of our happiness, but in the firmness of our determination to try to please God in everything” (Fourth Mansions, Chapter 1).
"In such spiritual activity as this, the person who does most is he who thinks least and desires to do least: what we have to do is to beg like poor and needy persons coming before a great and rich Emperor and then cast down our eyes in humble expectation" (Fourth Mansions, Chapter 3).
The description of the Fifth Mansions includes the image of the silkworm:
“The silkworm is like the soul which begins to utilize the general help which God gives to us all, and to make use of the remedies which He left in His Church -- such as frequent confessions, good books and sermons. The soul begins to live and nourishes itself on this food, and on good meditations, until it is full grown. … Let us hasten to perform this task and spin this cocoon. Let us renounce our self-love and self-will, and our attachment to earthly things. Let us practise penance, prayer, mortification, obedience, and all the other good works that you know of. Let us do what we have been taught; and we have been instructed about what our duty is. Let the silkworm die -- let it die, as in fact it does when it has completed the work which it was created to do. … When it is in this state of prayer, and quite dead to the world, it comes out a little white butterfly. … everything it sees on earth leaves it dissatisfied, That soul has now delivered itself into His hands and His great love has so completely subdued it that it neither knows nor desires anything save that God shall do with it what He wills.”
In the Sixth Mansions, the soul longs to be with God: "That sight of Him which it has had is so deeply impressed upon it that its whole desire is to enjoy it once more. ... The best medicine is to occupy oneself with external affairs and works of charity and to hope in God's mercy. ... Our best plan is to place ourselves in the Lord's presence, meditate upon His mercy and grace and upon our own lowliness, and leave Him to give us what He wills."
In the Seventh Mansions, "all three Persons communicate Themselves to the soul and speak to the soul and explain to it that He and the Father and the Holy Spirit will come to dwell with the soul which loves Him and keeps His commandments. ... the soul will very seldom think of itself; its whole thought will be concentrated upon finding ways to please Him and upon showing Him how it loves Him. This, my daughters, is the aim of prayer."
Wednesday, July 04, 2018
The Perils of Meritocracy
The meritocracy that exists in American society is the subject of two articles that consider current events and classical philosophers.
In The Washington Post, Fareed Zakaria argued that meritocracy is under assault and under siege. This meritocracy replaced a aristocratic system, led by WASPs, that "rewarded wealth, social status, and family connections." In First Things, Patrick J. Deneen explained this American aristocracy was stable because both the working class and the elites believed two premises that were first described by Plato in the Republic: (1) all citizens (both classes) are united by their commonalities (e.g., belonging the same family or clan) and (2) each person belongs to a specific, distinctive, and unequal class. When all believe both premises, the working class accepts the inequality, while the elites use their wealth and power to help others and serve the common good.
Today, this consensus appears to be unraveling. Zakaria criticized a proposal to change the criteria for admission to New York City's selective, specialized high schools. Socially liberal elites are uncomfortable admitting that there is a hierarchy of talent. Deneen made the same point and stated that today's elites embrace inclusion---we're all equal, and no one should be left out---because they take the first premise as given. The elites deny the second premise, however, which allows them to ignore their responsibility to the common good by emphasizing inclusion and claiming that those who are not elites chose their fate. Their blindness is the result of rejecting Christ's commands.
Zakaria concluded that, despite its faults, no alternative is better than meritocracy. Deneen concluded that, because the elites whom this meritocracy created refuse to acknowledge their position and fail to work for the common good, the working class will continue to support populist rebellions.
Sources:
Deneen, Patrick J., "The Ignoble Lie," First Things, April 2018. https://www.firstthings.com/article/2018/04/the-ignoble-lie
Harris, Elizabeth A., "De Blasio Proposes Changes to New York’s Elite High Schools," The New York Times, June 2, 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/02/nyregion/de-blasio-new-york-schools.html
Zakaria, Fareed, "American meritocracy is under attack," The Washington Post, June 29, 2018. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/meritocracy-is-under-attack/2018/06/28/e9f689d0-7afb-11e8-93cc-6d3beccdd7a3_story.html?utm_term=.b0d259db9570
In The Washington Post, Fareed Zakaria argued that meritocracy is under assault and under siege. This meritocracy replaced a aristocratic system, led by WASPs, that "rewarded wealth, social status, and family connections." In First Things, Patrick J. Deneen explained this American aristocracy was stable because both the working class and the elites believed two premises that were first described by Plato in the Republic: (1) all citizens (both classes) are united by their commonalities (e.g., belonging the same family or clan) and (2) each person belongs to a specific, distinctive, and unequal class. When all believe both premises, the working class accepts the inequality, while the elites use their wealth and power to help others and serve the common good.
Today, this consensus appears to be unraveling. Zakaria criticized a proposal to change the criteria for admission to New York City's selective, specialized high schools. Socially liberal elites are uncomfortable admitting that there is a hierarchy of talent. Deneen made the same point and stated that today's elites embrace inclusion---we're all equal, and no one should be left out---because they take the first premise as given. The elites deny the second premise, however, which allows them to ignore their responsibility to the common good by emphasizing inclusion and claiming that those who are not elites chose their fate. Their blindness is the result of rejecting Christ's commands.
Zakaria concluded that, despite its faults, no alternative is better than meritocracy. Deneen concluded that, because the elites whom this meritocracy created refuse to acknowledge their position and fail to work for the common good, the working class will continue to support populist rebellions.
Sources:
Deneen, Patrick J., "The Ignoble Lie," First Things, April 2018. https://www.firstthings.com/article/2018/04/the-ignoble-lie
Harris, Elizabeth A., "De Blasio Proposes Changes to New York’s Elite High Schools," The New York Times, June 2, 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/02/nyregion/de-blasio-new-york-schools.html
Zakaria, Fareed, "American meritocracy is under attack," The Washington Post, June 29, 2018. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/meritocracy-is-under-attack/2018/06/28/e9f689d0-7afb-11e8-93cc-6d3beccdd7a3_story.html?utm_term=.b0d259db9570
Friday, March 23, 2018
The Case against Automation
In "Skilled Perception, Authenticity, and The Case against Automation," David Zoller argued that we shouldn't automate everything. Automating an activity implies that satisfactory performance of that task is sufficient; there is no need to do it excellently. But doing something excellently is necessary for happiness (cf. Aristotle).
Moreover, each person defines himself by certain vocations (such as being a parent or a teacher or a firefighter), and fulfilling each vocation requires doing certain types of activities. Automating those activities would contradict the requirement of the vocation. For example, how can one be a teacher if the associated activities such as demonstrating and explaining something for one's students are done by machines or computers?
Acquiring the skills to perform the duties of a vocation requires training, which requires activity. One cannot learn to perform a task that, because it is automated, one never does. Because humans and the time and resources available are limited, one can pursue only a limited number of vocations, and so one's skills are limited, which makes the skills that one has mastered more valuable as a sign of one's competence and ability to accomplish something.
David Zoller, "Skilled Perception, Authenticity, and The Case against Automation," in Robot Ethics 2.0, Patrick Lin, Ryan Jenkins, and Keith Abney, editors, Oxford University Press, 2017. ISBN: 978-0-19-065295-1.
Moreover, each person defines himself by certain vocations (such as being a parent or a teacher or a firefighter), and fulfilling each vocation requires doing certain types of activities. Automating those activities would contradict the requirement of the vocation. For example, how can one be a teacher if the associated activities such as demonstrating and explaining something for one's students are done by machines or computers?
Acquiring the skills to perform the duties of a vocation requires training, which requires activity. One cannot learn to perform a task that, because it is automated, one never does. Because humans and the time and resources available are limited, one can pursue only a limited number of vocations, and so one's skills are limited, which makes the skills that one has mastered more valuable as a sign of one's competence and ability to accomplish something.
David Zoller, "Skilled Perception, Authenticity, and The Case against Automation," in Robot Ethics 2.0, Patrick Lin, Ryan Jenkins, and Keith Abney, editors, Oxford University Press, 2017. ISBN: 978-0-19-065295-1.
Sunday, March 18, 2018
Wuerl on Amoris Laetitia
This month, Cardinal Donald Wuerl, Archbishop of Washington, D.C., issued Sharing in the Joy of Love in Marriage and Family: Amoris Laetitia Pastoral Plan. The document discusses the apostolic exhortation written by Pope Francis and proclaims that all Catholics are called to experience the joy of love.
The desire to love and to be loved is a deep, enduring part of our human experience. God has written onto each human heart the desire for self-giving love, reflected in the divine plan for marriage and family. That plan offers a profound “yes” to true joy in love. It gives us an invitation to experience Christian hope in the love of God that never ends.The archbishop emphasized that those who have been hurt by others especially need our love:
With humility and compassion, the Church also wishes to encounter, to listen to, and to accompany those whose experience of human love is marked by disappointment, pain, and obstacles.Their pain is made worse by our society, which is secular, materialistic, and individualistic:
Particularly challenging is an individualism that is concerned only with one’s desires, as well as the throwaway culture that sweeps away marriage and family whenever they prove inconvenient or tiresome.
The often not so silent pressures of popular culture forcefully propose a “new normal” that sells short the dignity of the human person.Pastors and ministers must lead the process of accompaniment with love:
The Holy Father gives priority to the practice of pastoral accompaniment, which in its most fundamental aspect involves leading others closer to God. We begin each encounter mindful of everyone’s innate human dignity.
[Accompaniment] calls for a conversion of heart. The minister is called to recognize that beyond the assurance of doctrinal statements he has to encounter the people entrusted to his care in the concrete situations they live and to accompany them on a journey of growth in the faith.In addition, in our families, parishes, and communities, we are all called to help each other grow in faith and hope and love.
Accompaniment is a collaborative effort of priests and laity who understand themselves to be missionary disciples, who experience the love of the Lord in their encounter with him and who seek to share it with others. Pope Francis invites all of us to this practice of accompaniment.In particular, the family can be "the site of God’s revelation lived out in practice." But we must recognize that no one is perfect; it is not a matter of who is right and who is wrong; everyone needs God's mercy.
Each of us is a sinner in need of wholeness. ... Each of us is in need of this healing, and so we journey together as brothers and sisters united in our common need for the love and mercy of God that heal every broken human heart.
Sunday, February 25, 2018
Chaput on Fides et Ratio
In the March 2018 issue of First Things, Archbishop Charles J. Chaput discussed the lessons of Fides et Ratio, Pope John Paul II's encyclical on faith and reason. (Last year I discussed this document here.)
Archbishop Chaput highlighted the pope's emphasis on truth:
The search for truth and the capacity to love are both important and are not opposed to one another.
Archbishop Chaput highlighted the pope's emphasis on truth:
John Paul II argues that the search for truth is central to any genuinely human culture. The drive to understand the world and our place in it is one of the most basic human hungers. Truth is not the enemy of freedom but its foundation, since it gives us the capacity to love reality as it really is. Knowledge of the truth expands our freedom to love.
The search for truth and the capacity to love are both important and are not opposed to one another.
We can only resolve our inner confusions about life by seeking the objective truth about things, and by exploring that truth with others who hold us accountable to reality. As John Paul states bluntly, “Truth and freedom either go together hand in hand or together they perish in misery.”But searching for the truth is not limited to scientific, empirical research.
The aim of any true philosophy, it notes, should be to find the unity of truth in all things, an understanding of the whole. This demands an engagement with the classical discipline we call “metaphysics,” ... an exotic word for a very basic subject: the study of the deep truths and harmonies built into the world.As we journey through Lent towards Good Friday and Easter in a world that denies the existence of any truth beyond this world, we must, as the pope wrote, seek answers in Jesus Christ:
Reason cannot eliminate the mystery of love which the Cross represents, while the Cross can give to reason the ultimate answer which it seeks.
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