Some Cool Titles
Sorry I haven’t posted anything for a short stretch; I am in the middle of an essay and exam, both due in a couple days.
One of my biggest irks about blogs is when they are “all-about-me,” diary-type endeavors; so I have fought hard to keep away from it. Unfortunately, since I’m so busy, I can’t take time to write about anything other than what I’m doing immediately, which is my essays. So here is a somewhat (hopefully rare) self-indulgent post.
One thing I love about writing is crafting clever titles.
The paper I am working on right now is an analysis of the film “The Matrix,” and arguing whether human nature is depicted as Platonic (dualistic and separate mind+body), or Thomistic (essential unity between mind+body). I am fighting perhaps an uphill battle, arguing for a Thomist perspective.
My title is:
Ghost in the Machine?:
Exploring Human Nature in ‘The Matrix’
It’s a play on words, invoking the imagery of the Matrix (whereby human minds plug into the machine-software of the Matrix), but also of philosopher Gilbert Ryle’s critique of René Decartes’s Platonic “mind-body” dualistic depiction of humans. Ryle pejoratively described Decartes’s understanding of the relationship of the mind and body as “a ghost in a machine,” and that the body is simply a biological ‘vehicle’ of sorts for the mind.
My other recent paper was titled:
The Insurrection of Resurrection:
A Comparative Analysis of Platonic and Hebrew Human Metaphysics
In this paper, I outlined Plato’s understanding of human persons (mind+body), and then a Hebrew understanding, and how Christianity appropriated ideas from each. Ultimately, I conclude that Christianity has adopted a far more Platonic understanding than perhaps the New Testament warrants, and that Christainity needs a sharp dose of understanding of a bodily resurrection to better grapple with human mind+mody relations.
My friend and blogeague Daniel just wrote a new post at our collaborative blog, “Dust and Light.” He wrote such an awesome title that it practically melted my face off:
The Ammunition of Reduction and the Humility of Christ
Nevermind the fact that I had to read the post to figure out even what he was talking about! It reminds me of the very cool title of a work by John Owen,
The Death of Death in the Death of Christ
That. Is. Awesome.
Okay, back to work…
My name is Aaron Rathburn. I am a senior in philosophy at Calvin College, and formerly studied at Trinity School of Theology (Wales, UK). I am a husband, and father of two. This site is a collection of musings on theology, culture, and more. 
Nice essay titles, but you need to get some brackets in there for them to be properly cool and postmodern. Like Peter Rollins book title, that he nicked off Jamie Smith, _How (Not) To Speak Of God_, or this one from a recent article at the Other Journal, _Death and Christology After (The Death Of) God_. Even I got briefly sucked in to this parenthetical wonderland of ambiguity and intrigue, when I titled a section in my dissertation, _Postmodernity: (Dis)continuity of the Modern_.
On reflection, however, I think it’s all a bunch of pretentious bull[SMILES].
Haha! I forgot about the brackets, I have only little exposure to them. Although I have to say, while you are already jaded toward them from perhaps over-exposure, they seem quite novel to me now, hehe ;-D.
I particularly like your “(Dis)continuity,” kudos on that one
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What is needed are: brackets both square and round, slashes, all lower case and perhaps a more politically correct way of spelling God. So what about this: [(the death/life of) the death/life of g-d]. Now that’s a cool title
Haha! Agreed, that is definitely one whopper of a title ;-D.