Jeffrey Luk's Blog

 Okay, forgive me for being parasocial. I'm watching jasontheween's prom night stream and the vibes are absolutely off. Before, Jason and his date Sakura got matching nail designs -- with Sakura having a "J" drawn on her nails. But later on in the night, Sakura half jokingly tells him that the "J" isn't for him but for his cameraman Jawhn. Jason asks her to take it back. She doesn't. The vibes immediately fall off. The car ride back is awkward as hell. It's obvious Jason wants to say something and Sakura's talking just to talk.  When they get back, Jason's friends are all telling him to keep shooting his shot and don't take the joke too seriously. But Jason's never had something like this happen to him so publicly. Yea, he's been "lil bro'd" before, but not to the extent of being in such a cuck position. It's absolutely infuriating to be put in that position. His friends are correct to say that he should take...

The Department of Defense functions primarily as a defense agency -- for the protection of private property. This is why we oftentimes need to secure the property of our citizens overseas (i.e. escorting US-flagged vessels in the Middle East).  But if the highest good is the aim of this institution, then other aims might suffer.  I had a Pakistani classmate complain to me about how their government was headed by corrupt government officials that took bribes from the United States and always sought to increase funding for the military rather than for any social programs. He blamed the US for the root cause of the Pakistani government's current situation.  First, on moral responsibility. From a Pakistani perspective, agreeing to US terms is a bribe. When one accepts the bribe, one might ask whether the bribe-maker or the bribe-acceptor is morally complicit. Intuitively, both are. So therefore, both the Pakistani government and the US are complicit in keeping Pakistan corrup...

Suppose I got plastic surgery to fix my nose. WhenI have a child and see my own features reflected in them, do I begin to resent them? Part of me thinks so. Cosmetic surgery is more than just a procedure to make me feel beautiful. It is also a rejection of my true authentic biological self (which, one can argue, is not me, in the sense that I am an embodied mind). But it says something about me — and even if I can’t put a finger on it, I doubt it is something positive.  Unconsciously, one might begin to imprint these insecurities onto his or her children. I think it’s sad that children are brought up to hate themselves in the same way that their parents do.  Note that this doesn’t just apply to cosmetic surgery. Certain flavors of interracial marriages, self-hatred of one’s own height/beautiful features, extreme misandry/mysogyny, internalized racism/hatred of their own race, or even genetic disabilities may have one developing insecurity such that one begins to become increas...

Corporate personhood is a legal/ethical concept in which organizations have the ability to own property, be held morally responsible, be allowed to go through due process, and enjoy civil rights that may previously have been exclusive to a nation's citizens.  I don't think this is coherent because corporations are certainly not moral persons.  But, interestingly enough, one can draw an analogy to Nozick's restrictions of a state's powers. Nozick believes the state to be made up of private actors, and because no organization can have more powers than its constituents, the state cannot have residual powers (the ability to tax or tariff, give welfare, or to conscript, or eminent domain). This in and of itself is controversial, but if corporations are also limited in power by their constituents (because they are made up of a contractual agreement by individuals), then corporations do not have residual powers. I wonder if corporations (or organizations in general) may be ove...

I understand that the Bible does not necessarily provide a comprehensive moral theory. There are times when proper, methodical exegesis is necessary to derive certain flavors of Christian ethics. These, however, are inevitably influenced by non-Biblical sources. For example, much of virtue ethics is derived and appropriated from Aristotelian ethics.  I want to focus on verses speaking out against alcohol use in the Bible. There are many of them, and they seem to prohibit drunkenness rather than alcohol use at large. Ironically, Jesus's first miracle is turning water into wine. Let's take a look at scripture:  Ephesians 5:18 Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit, Proverbs 20:1 Wine is a mocker and beer a brawler; whoever is led astray by them is not wise. Proverbs 23:20-21 Do not join those who drink too much wine or gorge themselves on meat, for drunkards and gluttons become poor, and drowsiness clothes them in rags. The moral ...

Discussing politics with friends is often exhausting and antagonistic. But because of how much I love philosophy and debate, I really do think that it's worth it to deal with the bad actors. But when I engage the typical layman, who has minimal exposure to philosophical discourse and only has exposure to your typical FOX News, CNN, or ABC, I think that I can identify two big barriers to being able to fruitful political discourse.  1. Inability to properly define terms or share/access certain concepts.  A lot of philosophy is built on intuitions about what things mean. For example, the debate over the proper definition of what counts as a conscious subject is primarily a debate over what intuitions come with the word/label of consciousness . Most theories of consciousness require representations. First-order representational theories confers consciousness to beings that have the ability to represent the world in their mind -- for example, seeing the color red or experiencing sm...