The Scifly “:Anything one man can imagine , other men can make real.” —Jules Verne
Vol. IX, Iss. 6 November 25, 2008
The Search for Good Sci-Fi (Spoilers Alert) Science Fiction is a genre that more often than not goes horribly wrong. With moon princesses needing rescued, terrifying aliens threatening the fate of the world, and nine different ways to travel at the speed of light, science fiction is not considered great literature by any stretch of the imagination. However, for some authors the beauty of science fiction is that it offers a platform on which certain moral questions can be raised while exploring the different consequences of charac-
ters in response to the questions. A well-known example of this is Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep which explores a world where humans have created clones. In the novel, the clones are considered less than human, consequently enslaved, and forbidden on Earth. Throughout the novel, the main character, a bounty hunter paid to kill errant clones hanging out on Earth, struggles with the question of whether or not the clones are human and have souls as he becomes more familiar with
certain clones. What is intriguing is that the clones, designed to be super smart, lack any sort of empathy, emotions, and hope. The worst fate for a clone is to die because for them there is not a hope of an after life, they are merely machines created by fallible beings that have no real love for their creations. Published in 1968, this novel asked questions that have real significance today as scientists clone animals and attempt to clone humans. Another thought provoking novel is Next by Michael (Continued on page 5)
20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE PSYCHE Video games, iPods, high definition surround sound television – these are becoming part of the daily life of our generation. Turn on your headphones, plug them into your Xbox, pick up the controller, and for a few hours you're in another world, oblivious to everything really going on around you. Or do you even know at all what's really going on around you? Could it be that a video game is a more accurate model for the things we experience each day? Could it be that conscious experience is simply the
effect of chemical reactions in the neurosystem much like the world in the video game is the effect of the Xbox console and game disk? Neurologist Paul MacLean presents us with pages of experimental data supporting his hypothesis that emotion can be reduced to simply neurological activity responding to various stimuli inside or outside the body. Through countless experiments, MacLean and other scientists have found that manipulating parts of the brain actually results in particular emotional experiences or even conscious states. For example, MacLean reports that disruptions in
the limbic system can cause one to see objects which are not real, to enter certain emotional states, and to perceive objects differently from the way others do. As you may see, there is a lot at stake in such experiments. If the reductionistic stances of certain scientists are correct, the meaning of personhood itself would be challenged. Could it be that we cannot help but be enclosed in ourselves and our biological and psychological needs, without any real knowledge of or love for anything greater than ourselves?
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St. Clare, pray for us!
Staff:
Whovians, Trekies, Fanboys, Misties, and other general Geeks of
Laura Berry (LB) Michelle Blohm (MB) Brian D’Amico (BD) Emily Davis (ED) Katherine Eddy (KSE) Layout Editor: Teresa M. Fasanello (TMF) Amanda Lamuro (AL) Editor in Chief: Gillian Lamuro (GL) Callie Langworthy (CL) John Mario Levri (JML) Business Manager: Jessica Kelley (JK) Andy Moe (AM) The Goodkind Gnostic: Michael C. Pezzulo (MCP) Michael J. Ruszala (MJR) Mark Schreck (MJPS) ** Please note that the views expressed in the articles do not necessarily represent the views of the whole staff.
the
Science
Fiction
realm,
I
salute
you!
In this culture of boring and useless apathy, is it not inspiring and only vaguely frightening to find people so entirely devoted to a television show or film that they actually identify themselves by special group title? Is this not exactly what our culture needs, that and a good backrub, and yes, maybe, a dash of Catholicism? But then your beloved editor had a MST3K bumper sticker, has a poster of Doctor Who, varied editions of all (yes, even the “new” episodes) the Star Wars films, and a very worn copy of The Wrath of Khan. “Khaaaaaan!!!!!!!” Shameful, I know, but there is a certain cathartic value
Interested in joining our staff? Email us at notestothegadfly@gmail.com
~Mission Statement~ The Gadfly is an attempt to “bite the sleeping horse” in the spirit of Socrates. It is a student publication whose purpose is to facilitate discussion concerning campus and cultural issues as they pertain to students of Franciscan University. It aims to be a forum for open, well-thought out, and honest discussion towards the end of knowing and loving truth in its most robust sense.
to revealing all of this and that is why the Scifly has come into being. Here we can bite the sleeping Tauntaun, if you will, and release all of our anger against Lukas or invite others to join us in our weird devotion to a time-traveling alien. We can also debate the usefulness of computer games or the moral platform of science fiction. So enjoy, geeks and non-geeks alike, and to quote a supposedly emotionless alien who seemed to lose it in every episode for whatever reason, “Long Life and Prosper.”
Advisor: Dr. John White Advisor Extraordinaire
~The Very Humble Editor
St. Martha, pray for us!
Truths Revealed: Star Wars Edition (straight from the Tauntaun’s mouth) ♦
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R2D2 is a girl robot Yoda is the heinous love child of Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy (You never do see any other Yodas, do you?) Jedis have to cut their hair with their light saber hence the many bald Jedis. Padme had an IQ of 50.
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Emperor Palpatine was just lonely.
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Wookies hate Ewoks. Thinks Yankees and Red Sox. It’s that ugly.
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Jabba the Hut lost weight by going on Jenny Craig’s Meal Plan before filming the Return of the Jedi.
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Lightning is kind of the sucker-punch of the Jedi world.
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The Dark Side is actually stronger, but does not have as good a PR plan.
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Darth Vader loves Fig Newtons.
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Did your professor say something hilarious recently? Tell us about it! Professor Quote of the Week:
“If we grafted a jackass tail on you... Would you be a man or a jackass?” —Dr. Hildebrand on the difference between intrinsic and extrinsic unions.
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St. Radegunde, pray for us!
(20,000 Leagues, from page 1)
If so, love, instead of being a desire for the good for the other and for union with them, would become for the most part a chemical reaction bringing about mutual social benefits. Such is what certain scientists would have us believe, and at first glance, the experiments seem to testify on their behalf. The scientists have completed all the correct steps for a reliable experiment and have had their results replicated by others. The fact is simply this: manipulating parts of the brain can result in altered conscious states. But that's just it: empirical data can only give us facts – they can't directly prove philosophical positions. Many scientists insist that as pure scientists, they rely only on the hard facts of the scientific method and never on philosophical positions. They insist that philosophical positions are just opinions, and thus that it would be unprofessional for a scientist to utilize such positions in his work as a scientist. But a collection of facts without philosophy (by which I mean reason working from first principles on up toward the formulation of philosophical positions) only goes so far. The goal of the experimental method is to develop hypotheses and ultimately theories within a context where the data make sense. But no matter how much a scientist may deny the validity or importance of philosophical principles, his hypotheses neces-
“The fact is that the scientific method can't be proven by the scientific method. Imagine you're trying to explain traffic lights to a person from the Stone Age who knows nothing about cars” sarily presupposes certain premises which cannot be proven by any empirical experiment and which themselves come from first principles. In MacLean's case, I believe his hypothesis that emotion is reducible to neurological activity presupposes at least the following philosophical positions which can't be shown empirically: materialism (that all that has being is made up of matter), scientism (that all knowledge is arrived at empirically), and the theory of evolution by natural selection. The fact is that the scientific method can't be proven by the scientific method. Imagine you're trying to explain traffic lights to a person from the Stone Age who knows nothing about cars. To say that obeying the traffic light is required by law is certainly true, but the meaning of the traffic light goes beyond mere traffic law – traffic law arose from an understanding of the common good in the context of modern traffic conditions. Just as you can't fully explain the traffic light only in
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terms of traffic law, so the experimental method isn't enough to explain a hypothesis; it has to go beyond science to that branch of knowledge by which reason builds up principles from those first principles automatically grasped by the mind – that branch which studies not only the body, but also the nature of being itself. Such is philosophy. Aristotle provides us with a more suitable framework for interpreting the experimental findings above. In De Anima, Aristotle writes that in many cases, objects outside of us are what ultimately cause an emotion and that the bodily processes mediate. Thus, while Aristotle recognized that our emotions depend on the body, he saw the body's faculties not as the ultimate cause of emotion but as a factor which mediates the outside world to us and moves us in accord with it. Thus, within an Aristotelian framework, we could interpret the empirical findings in a whole new light: we could say that even if stimulating part of the brain produces an emotion, this does not mean man has no connection to the world outside. We could hypothesize that according to his nature, man normally responds to certain objects as mediated by his bodily faculties, but that manipulating the brain to bring about an emotion represents a malfunction in the mediation process; the brain is tricked into a response when the natural object is not present. (Continued on page 5)
notestothegadfly@gmail.com
St. John, pray for us!
(Search for Good Sci-Fi, from page 1)
Crichton. The world of Next is one in which scientists are constantly looking to genetics for curing drug-addictions, cancer, etc. while others are creating chimps/ humans who can talk, have feelings, and make moral choices. The author poses the question of whether a person has any rights to their own genes if they contain the cure for cancer or can they be harvested at will for the greater good. He also illustrates how genetic mutation in animals can go strangely amiss when, through the manipulation of genetics, the animals become walking advertisements for different marketing campaigns. Many of these points appear far-fetched, but so did cloning in 1968. My personal favorite work of science fiction is a series of novels by Orson Scott Card that begins with Ender’s Game. The series kicks off with the tale (20,000 Leagues, from page 4)
For Aristotle, man is a rational animal, and within this framework, we could further come to understand that emotion in man is not only higher than that of non-rational animals because man has a layer of more highly evolved brain tissue, but because emotion takes on new meaning and expression on account of his rationality. Even though many of man's psychological characteristics find their rooting in the neurosystem, man's spiritual nature draws even these up into the personal realm in a way which does
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of Ender as he is thrown into battle school at the tender age of six so that he can be groomed into the military leader who will lead the army to fight an alien race which threatens to destroy the human race. Throughout the novels, the author deals with different ethical dilemmas such as the manipulation of genetics to create smarter and faster humans and the resulting chaos that ensues. One of the many interesting points the author raises is the problem of communication between completely different species. Having completely annihilated the enemy who appeared hell-bent on wiping out the humans, Ender discovers that the aliens were attempting to communicate with the humans all along but lacked the means to do so (they had insect-like bodies and no vocal chords or written language, etc.; yes, it is science fiction). He then writes a kind of
life history of the aliens so that the rest of the human race might come to understand the aliens and prevent such an atrocity from happening again. By doing so, Ender turns himself from Savior of the Human Race to Ender the Xenocide and is remembered throughout history as a despicable human being. However, the real question is would the humans have reacted any differently to an alien species which, bearing a very strong resemblance to giant ants, wanted to move into China even if they said please. The humans were quick to condemn Ender when the threat of the invasion no longer existed. While there are many aliens to weed through, bogus science to disregard, and strange outfits to make fun of, science fiction does offer some gems that definitely are thought provoking and perhaps worthy of further discussion.
not happen for non-rational animals. Such a view is in fact fully compatible with the results of the empirical data above and is both true to experience and allows us to defend the dignity of the human person. But in sum, stating that human emotions are nothing but neurological activity goes beyond the domain of science – it is based on a philosophical position and must be refuted with the help of philosophical principles.
What’s on your resume?
~ MJR
~AL
Write for the Gadfly!
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St. Thomas Aquinas, pray for us!
What this campus really needs right now...is a doctor! No, this is not an article on the current state of the health center here at Franciscan University. I know that a lot of people have a score to settle with the place, especially during this cold and flu season, but I have always found that the service they provide is pretty good for their size and available resources. Rather, this article is a sort of prescription for the men and women of this campus when it comes to entertainment. Let’s face it, American television and movies have really been on the decline over the past decade or so and will continue to deteriorate until our Communication Arts majors make it out into the workplace. In the interim between then and now, I would like to suggest that the entertainment-starved students of our University set their sights on the classic series of British science fiction, Doctor Who. Okay, before you turn the page and pass your humble author off as an absolute geek, at least hear me out on the basic premise of the show. Doctor Who follows the exploits of a mysterious man who is known only as “the Doctor” and who spends his days traveling to some of the most exotic locales that you’ll ever see. Along the way, he picks up ordinary men and women who accompany him as his “companions”
and get him in to and out of all sorts of trouble. It all sounds very normal until you take into account the fact that the Doctor’s really a humanoid alien who travels through time and space in a ship that’s perpetually disguised as an old British telephone booth. Okay, so the show is a nerd’s dream come true and your beloved author is an absolute geek, but he’s not the only one. The show ran for decades in Britain in the years following World War II and was recently brought back to life in an updated version that continues to grow in popularity around the globe. While the old show was indeed pretty cheesy and hampered by a budget that even a college student couldn’t live off of, the new series is surprisingly riveting. While still struggling in the special effects department, these recent episodes are carried along by amazingly well-written storylines that can be enjoyed on many levels. This depth of interpretation is what, ultimately, led me to suggest this show to you all. Although Doctor Who is a secular show from a very secular country in Europe, a lot of the show’s content and themes are distinctly Christian and, I’d venture, downright Franciscan.
The Doctor himself is the model Steubenville student, always ready to meet someone new, sacrifice himself for the good of others, or share intimate parts of his life story with people he’s only just met. Taking to heart Fulton J. Sheen’s claim that “life is worth living,” the show’s central theme is the undeniable value of every life. The important characters in almost every episode are ordinary men and women who do extraordinary things after meeting the almost messianic figure of the Doctor. This is not to say that the show is completely without moral fault, as it does often overstep some boundaries and forget that life is not only meant to be lived, but to be lived well. Such ethical missteps are not to be passed over lightly, but confronted head on in an effort to better understand how someone can defend such a position and why, ultimately, they are misled in doing so. In the end, I would still like to heartily encourage you all to give Doctor Who a try. To paraphrase the Doctor’s nemesis, the Master, what this campus really needs, right now, is a Doctor!
~RM
Pop Culture Seminar “Take your stinking paws off me, you damned dirty ape!”
—”The Planet of the Apes” (1968)
St. Teresa of Avila, pray for us!
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That Healthy Sense of Competition Foot of the Cross Household ♦ ♦
Best at Hookah Best at Fundraising
Warriors of Light Household ♦
Best at Super Smash Brothers
AMDG household ♦
Best at Painting Faces
The Disciples Household ♦ ♦
Make a mean apple fritter Best fighters
Lamb of God Household ♦
Have the most adorable initiation process
Living Stones ♦
Have the name most like a rock band
Lions of Judah ♦
Have the most obvious lack of a possible adorable initiation process
The Brothers of the Eternal Song Household ♦
Most likely to be found in mass
In His Image Household ♦
Have the most annoying secrecy code word thing
The Little Flowers Household ♦
Best cardigan
Well, I have learned a lot and I hope you have too. And please if you feel your household was underrepresented or misnamed or just plain libeled, write to us. There is always room for a little healthy competition. ~GL