Those emeralds aren't green, they're grue
I'm in a dream 'til I come to
I do not know what I once knew
My brain is in a vat of brew
A god will ever make debut
What ought to be is just what's true
To multi-worlds, I could pass through
That stone I kick won't scuff my shoe
I'm not myself but a
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References (from Wikipedia), by verse:
| 1. Two Dogmas of Empiricism 2. Grue and Bleen 3. Dream argument 4. Gettier problem 5. Brain in a vat | 6. Philosophy of Religion 7. is-ought problem 8. Multiverse 9. Samuel Johnson 10. Personal identity |
• • • • •
If I were to choose 'my favorite philosopher', it would be Richard Rorty1. Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature2 is something I've returned to often. The story in that book of the Antipodeans—persons who have brains but no minds!—was my introduction to his synthesis of 20th century pragmatism and deconstruction of twenty centuries of philosophical troublemaking. One of his last writings was a short essay published in Poetry3 last year, just a few months after his death.
Today would have been his 77th birthday. As a way of celebrating his birthday, I wrote the above 'philosophical' poem.
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1. Wikipedia: Richard Rorty
2. Google Books: preview of Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature
3. Poetry, November 2007: The Fire of Life
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