blog.shimer

Natural Sciences 2

Cameron Pilger sorting fasteners.

     This semester I am taking Natural Sciences 2 with Stuart Patterson. It's my earliest class, but it doesn't start until 11:30, so I have the mornings for the gym and a nice breakfast.
     I have not taken Natural Sciences 1 yet; our school does not work that way. I have to take the 1's and 2's before the 3's and 4's, but a 1 does not come before a 2. The numbers are just a way of differentiating between the courses.
     So far in Nat Sci 2 we've read quite a bit of Aristotle. On the Soul, Classification of Animals and Generation of Animals. Next we're to read some Lamarck.
     I took Biology, several different Biology classes actually, in high school and I always just accepted what the textbook told me. Yes, you can classify animals and yes, there are specific ways of doing it. It may have been the only subject I did not read and think "why?". Now, reading the Aristotle, I am wondering that. How did we get to this classification system? What makes this one, over any others, correct?
     We approached this question with the Fastener lab yesterday. We split into groups and pairs and put on our classifying hats. My partner in crime was fellow first-year Cam(eron) Pilger, who was kind enough to allow me to document our trials and tribulations in the classifying world.
     We were given a cup of fasteners (screws, nails, push-pins, etc) and then had to decide how to separate them into groups using their characteristics.
     Cam and I were Hardware Dichotomists. We created a tree of sorts to classify all of the species of fasteners. We had to decide what was a large enough difference that it made one screw a different species from another, and not just a different race.
     At the end of the class we looked at the work of each group. We had all done it slightly differently and it really was interesting to see the problems everyone had come up against.
     All in all, it was an extremely useful lab in helping further my understanding of classification and even allowed me to sympathize a bit with Aristotle's struggle. We were working using his ideas as well as others we've seen or heard of; he was forging all new paths, refuting what had come before him.
     Cam and I are working on our lab report now. Next class we'll be looking at real animals and what makes them similar enough to be grouped together or different enough to be separated.
     I know that this was just an exercise to help us understand and to put the reading into some context, but every time I go to a hardware store now, I'll be thinking of all of the species of nails there are to choose from.

Playing: Civilizations War
Classes Today: Social Sciences 2 and Humanities 2

Face-to-Facebook

     Many people, I think it's safe to say the majority of people, at Shimer have a Facebook. They communicate on one another's walls about parties or readings and post a good number of photos from Shimer events. If there is going to be a party, the invitation is going to be sent out using this site because even at a small school like ours this is easier than texting/calling everyone.
     Shimer itself has a Facebook and so do some of the counselors in our admissions office. Adding them in no way increases your chance of getting into our school, but it does immediately increase your idea of the inner workings of the social aspects of Shimer. There are many groups, like "So I'm thinking about going to Shimer..." that current students will answer prospective student's questions in. It can be a really helpful tool.
     However, the use of Facebook can also spiral out of control. Addiction is a problem. Students constantly on Facebook, updating their statuses every few minutes, typing conversations on friends' walls while they talk to the person in the very same room!
     This is entirely leaving out the dependence to Facebook games that keep some Shimerians up until one or two in the morning. Or the constant perusal of classmates' photos, comments being made about documented moments both online and in person.
     "Alex, did you see the video I posted on you wall?"
     "Oh, no. When'd you do that?"
     "About five minutes ago."
     Just too much is expected of me! How am I supposed to keep up with the times if they're changing every few minutes? I choose to allow myself to fall behind.
     There is the group, a very small group, of students at Shimer who do not subscribe to this trend. Myself included last semester. However, I gave in and reactivated my Facebook, mostly to keep in touch with friends back home.
     The ones still holding out against this force rely on students with Facebooks to relay information about the upcoming parties and events. Sometimes important details are forgotten in this transfer, like the fact that a surprise party was supposed to be formal or which bus to get on.
     Choosing whether or not to become a part of a networking site is a serious and personal choice. I say, hold strong you who resist.
     But find someone with a Facebook to keep you updated.

Playing: Turret Defense
Classes Today: Natural Sciences 2

Snow

It's well known around here that I don't like the city. I loathe it. I'm a country girl to the core, and just about everything about the city irks me. But if there is one thing I really love about the city, it's snow at night. The way the falling snow looks in the streetlit night is something you don't get in the countryside. I couldn't get a picture that did it justice. I think I got a little closer with words. The only way I can describe the beauty of it is to say that it is like a million, million stars dancing together in their grand, cosmic ball, twirling, tumbling, falling to the ground.

The snow at night in the city is its own cosmos. A beautiful, lovely cosmos. It makes me wonder if anyone else sees it the same way. 

Co-Operating

     A word on roommates.
     Not everyone likes them. Sometimes you cannot stand them. It's a luck of the draw really. I got pretty lucky. My roommate and I are incredibly different, but we mesh really well. She's clean and I'm messy, but I keep my mess out of her space and she ignores that a small swamp (one which she and my friends affectionately refer to as "Little Florida") is growing out from underneath my bed.
      I like food, and I'm willing to try anything once, but she's a food inventor. She eats the craziest things and I try them so that I can honestly say it's gross. I love video games and she really doesn't get them at all, but she's willing to listen to me talk about them, for a while at least.
      The important thing here is that we started our roommate relationship before our friendship. We respect one another's space and privacy and accept each other's neuroses (ok, mostly my neuroses, but whatever) as part of the other person. We built a place that both of us feel safe in and like to come home to after classes.
      Now that all of that mush is out of the way, we mostly are awesome roommates because of the AMAZING stuff we do together. At the beginning of the year we bought a painting in a thrift store and carried it (together) miles (I'll say about four and she'll correct me that it was probably only one) back to the train.
      The best thing that we co-own, however, is the gun-egg mold. I know, you're jealous (and confused because you don't know what I'm talking about, but you're still jealous). Basically it's a cookie cutter that you can fry an egg in and the egg comes out in the shape of a gun. Everyone wants one, it makes eating fried eggs feel dangerous (and not just to your arteries) and somehow more delicious. It's something I'm proud to own, but what makes it great is that I have someone who's just as excited about it as I am.
      That's a really big and important part of the college experience, the roommate experiment. All I did was be completely honest and respect roommate boundaries and it has turned out great.

     Now she and I are looking for a yard gnome. Jealous? I know.

Balancing Act

     As this is my first post, I will make a short introduction. My name is Alexandra Rosenberg, I'm open to cool nicknames, but most people call me Alex. Originally from South Florida, I now plan on forever calling Chicago my home. I'm in love, madly, with this small world around me.
      Of course, being a Shimer student, the question I get asked the most is "why Shimer?". Next on the list is "why are you so pale if you're from Florida?" but I usually just ignore that one. So, why Shimer? My story is a little different from others. I went through high school certain to one day be a journalist. I was Editor-in-Chief of my high school newspaper and of the literary magazine. I was published in city and county papers and online. My heart was set on NYU and I had never heard of Shimer.
     Then monetary complications arose and NYU was no longer an option. I was heartbroken. It was surely the end of everything, I'd have to go to a community college and live at home. This went on until I got something in the mail from Shimer. An advertisement and it spoke to me in ways even NYU hadn't. I knew that this had been the real plan all along, that my drive for NYU had been a stepping stone to get to Chicago.
      After last semester, I knew this was the right choice. I knew I could thrive in no other place than at Shimer. I still plan on being a Book Editor one day, I'm just going to use a very different path to get there. I spent my Winter Break speaking at middle schools in my county about journalism, but I slipped in a little about the Great Books program as well. I'd say things like, "journalism helps you understand and appreciate the world around you, much in the way reading original texts at Shimer is helping me now" (see? I'm sneaky, like a ninja).
     Coming back to the Windy City from Florida (which is also very windy) after break, it took a few days to transition back into Shimer mode. I had spent my break seeing friends and family, reading quite a bit, playing video games and swimming. Now I have to remember to bundle up before going outside (winter in SFL is a week or two long and rarely gets below 40) and to get my reading for class done before anything else.
     I like the reading for my classes, honestly, I do. Even when they're not the most enjoyable things I've ever read I realize I can still get something out of them. However, I really like other things too. Things that take up way too much of my time sometimes. Things like video games.
     Now, I wouldn't say I'm an addict (my roommate and friends back home may disagree) but I do enjoy several hours of sitting in front of my television screen and exercising my thumbs. I play Wii, as many students here do, but Nintendo is no longer where my loyalty lies. I am an XBox lover, through and through.
     I spill blood in Call of Duty, pull pranks in Bully, crank out the music in Guitar Hero, devote days to Oblivion, and now I've become a zombie for Mass Effect 2. I love video games, and I see nothing wrong with that love--it's a healthy, happy compulsion of mine. Mostly.
     I even did last semester's Writing Week project on video games. I wrote a twenty-page paper on their history and ethics. The point is, I came to Shimer to do what I love, read. But I love other things too, and that's alright. The reading takes up a lot of my time, but budgeting my time and being responsible leaves me plenty of time to give into my video game cravings too. It's all about finding the balance.

Back from Break, New Year's Resolutions and other Activities in the Shimer Singularity

I'm sure you've noticed the gap in post dates - that's because our winter breaks tend to be long, starting after Writing Week in the beginning of December until classes start again at the end of January. Yes. Be jealous of a 6-8 week vacation. We don't get many breaks during the semester!

No matter how hard I try, though, I can't escape Shimer's event horizon, so it was inevitably a part of my break. Once you're out of class where you do nothing but read, you will... read in your free time. I got through quite a few interesting things, including Wanting Enlightenment is a Big Mistake!, My Stroke of Insight, Stiffed (some of it) and Pride and Prejudice (not quite finished, but I appreciate it much more than when I tried to read it in seventh grade).

Having received several cookbooks for Christmas, I spent a great deal of my time testing them out. (I shall win converts to veganism with vegan cookies. Muwahahahaha!) Perhaps if I remember to clear my camera card, I'll have pictures of them soon! Then you can have some, y'know, if you stop by Admission someday...

My New Year's Resolution? To get more sleep. It sometimes makes class discussions interesting (the lack of it I mean) but inevitably staying awake is infinitely more worthwhile. Either that, or find a really good blend of black/green tea.

But I'm looking forward to my classes! I'll be in Humanities 4 (already loving Nietzsche's "On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense"), Social Sciences 4 (Weber... WEBER!) and the Tale of Genji (Eastern Studies elective on one of Japan's early novels, written by a court lady, on life at court... I'm really excited for this!). So the schedule is full but promising.

My last guilty activity, before disappearing over the event horizon, is gaming.

Crazy, Crazy, Crazy

This past week has been crazy. Times three. What with the getting back to Chicago after a ridiculously long day of traveling, trying to get all my books and having to return to the bookstore twice to pick up ones I didn't get the first time around, finding people to give them hugs, and trying to get back into a balance of procrastination and reading, I am tuckered out. I honestly did not want to get out of bed this morning, despite calling it a night earlier than usual. 

But despite all the craziness, it's been exciting. I missed everyone, and I missed having classes. I'm taking a whole 18 credit hours this semester. That's a lot. I'm kinda terrified, but I'm pretty sure I can handle it. All my classes have been great so far, too! Biblical Studies promises to be interesting and thought-provoking, Social Sciences 2 has already lead us to a brief discussion about eating broccoli being just, and Natural Sciences 4 has left me with a tingly feeling of being somewhat clever. Not enormously clever, mind you. Just somewhat, for now. My first Tale of Genji class meets Monday, and I'm certain it will be awesome. 

With a semester bound to be awesome, who wouldn't be excited to be back? I'm even loving the craziness of it all. It's just part of the excitement, after all.

It is good to be back.