Time for a pause and some re-imagining.
It really does me no good to order the two spaces Im concerned with into primary and secondary, since what plays on the computer is real in the sense that I perceive it and what makes it is just as primary as anything else. The equations that describe GT3 effects are the same equations that describe motion in reality. Newtons laws apply to GT3s effects just as they do to elephants and feathers. A lot of writersfrom the Ancients to the Modernshave knocked heads over where to start with differentiating between what is out there, our relationship with objects (subject-object philosophies) and how out there should be described, categorized, and judged against a perceivers position, from Plato to Husserl. By I dont intend here to chase after Leibniz in this telling of an experience. For Schopenhauer, the way the world is laid out for us is a reflection of the way our minds operate (for us the mind operates the way it operates and not some other way) at a lot of levels (thanks John for reminding me of this). We make ourselves and the world. The world is mass and we order it or disorder it. This makes sense in a lot of ways, but also presents problems when we begin to talk about and, again, differentiate between different kinds of things in the world in orders of complexity and mutuality, rocks, trees, love, and their causes, effects, and natures. When we ask the question what is love we arent asking a kind of question that will result in the same answer as will come with the question what is a rock?
There is no primary space then, only a continual dialectic between this and that, me and myself and my dog. That water dripping in the faucet all night is proof of something. Given this problem, I think its best that rather than working with classes I work within a dialectical pretension and describe different kinds of spaces and their characteristics, from the space of a poem to the space of interactive fiction to the space of a sim to the space of memory, all of which are different but share certain characteristics.
You fill your classroom with space interconnected to Literature. Appropriate to reaching your students, you use elements that will lure their doors open. Each student in a different time zone and capacity of space. They emerge with ideas that expand your lesson into places unknown until success is exploited.
When class is over, space continues to travel in route. It travels to other classes, jobs, and possibly some escapes out of the atmosphere and into infinity.
Don’t mind me, Steve. I’m practicing.
So what are you practicing for?
The Praxis is coming up this Monday. I am actively reading and responding to keep myself at a comfortable flow and pace. Your writing is inviting and it tends to offer a lot of space for me to respond. I just hope I’m sticking to the subject matter.
For me to continue to read and write after the exam has passed will be a challenging commitment, and perhaps it could drive you crazy too. Actually, any suggestions you can come up with on some interesting topics and/or books relating to Western Civilization I, preclassical to reformation, or U.S. History II, reconstruction from 1865, are welcome and would help me get a jump on the fall semester. I’m tempted to pick up Amistad, after listening to David Pesci’s great introduction to it at the Writer’s Festival; Unfortunately, I would have benefitted from the book Amistad last semester when I took U.S. History I. I will get to it sometime, but with a heavy class load next semester I want to get familiar with the classes I am taking.