Personal Blogs

I'm trying to live a life of study at the moment. I try to study at least one thing a day (something I'm struggling with at the minute). I've tried to just focus on the main things I care about (such as literature, creative writing, informal logic, Italian language) but sometimes something random will catch my eye. Here's what I've studied over the past month.

I was on RationalWiki when I stumbled across Pyrrhonism. Pyrrhonism is basically where you question absolutely everything (think an extreme sceptic). There's a funny dialogue on the RationWiki entry that goes something like this: I was asleep but now I'm awake. But what is asleep? And how do I know I'm awake? What is awake? To live your life like that would be insane.

I'm trying to learn Italian. To help me do this I've been close reading a short story intended for kids. It's called Il Gabbiano e la Balena (The Seagull and the Whale). From this I've learned the following words: accanto (near or next), cui (relative pronouns that, which, who, whose, whom), nuotava (swam), grazioso (delightful; this also has other meanings but I've forgotten them), piume (I think this means plume or feathers; I guessed this from context but forgot to check if it's right).

Finally, I've studied one or two literary theories. I only did a little on traditionalism and formalism. I'll have to study them in more detail at some point. I'll try and spend the next couple of days gaining a basic understanding of the other theories and then I'll move onto learning about literary movements. At the minute, I just want a basic understanding of these things, to prepare me for future modules.