I didn't manage to get any studying done yesterday, but I have a fairly decent reason. (Well, better than "I was sitting in front of the computer" or "I was at the void deck with my friends") I had borrowed a few books from my school library (Cold War, Arab-Israeli Conflict, Ethics and Imperial Ambitions) and I found out yesterday that they were already overdue.
Imperial Ambitions is a book of interviews with Noam Chomsky. Chomsky is an amazing intellectual, one of those amazing guys who is incredibly well-read and has thought-provoking views on absolutely anything and everything. He's currently a lecturer on Linguistics at MIT, but his value is far more than that.
In Imperial Ambitions, he reveals, with the ambivalence of a man who has witnessed and considered more than the rest of us, many of the ridiculous atrocities with the US has committed and gotten away with over the years. The truth about Vietnam, Cuba, Nicaragua, Serbia, Iraq and many others is so much more simple than all the complex conspiracy theories we've all heard about, and in that respect it is also so much more horrifying. The hypocrisy is staggering. His insights on "manufactured consent" are enlightening, and his criticisms on foreign policy are moving.
He is an amazing, inspiring man with eloquence, elegance and powerful views that are put across with child-like simplicity. I was so shaken, intellectually, after reading Imperial Ambitions that I couldn't bring myself to pick up my notes because it seemed so petty in comparison to the powerful ideas that I had just internalized and am still working hard to properly absorb.
There is so much we have to accomplish, and worrying about generic examinations seem so foolish and inconsequential in comparison to the issues in the world today. I must remind myself firmly that I have to get past this hurdle if I am to be taken seriously in our society.
Today will be a productive day. To be consistent with what I promised myself yesterday, I'm not going to make further posts until I get a significant amount of revision done. Cheers!
(Do read his debates and views at http://www.chomsky.info/)
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