History of the Day: 11/10

Happy birthday to the Marines, born on this day at Tun Tavern in Philadelphia, PA. Yup. That's right. They were born in a bar. Speaking of the military, Major Henry Wirz, superintendent of the prison camp in Andersonville, GA during the Civil War ... (ahem, that is Wawah Against Nawthun Aggreshun) was executed on this day in 1865. He was the only Civil War soldier executed for war crimes. 'Cause, you know, the Northern prison camps were all sweetness and light.

Happy birthday to Sesame Street! I still remember the Don Piano take on the theme song:

Cloudy night, not even a star in sight,
On my way to where the air is dark.
Can you tell me how to get, how to get to Yellowstone Park?

I'll never get it, NEVER!!!!

On this day in 1975, the 729 ft. freighter, SS Edmund Fitzgerald, sank during a storm on Lake Superior. All 29 members of the crew died. They can thank Gordon Lightfoot for remembering them in song because, otherwise, no one else would.

Happy 48th birthday to Neil Gaiman, one of the most amazing authors I've yet to encounter. He's written children's books such as Wolves in the Walls and Coraline; movies such as Stardust and Mirrormask; and adult novels such as Good Omens (written with Terry Pratchett, another excellent author) and American Gods. It's the latter that has given him the most notoriety and I highly recommend it. You'll never look at our country the same way. The idea behind it is that all the people who emigrated to this country brought their old gods with them who still exist in a much diminished form. But new gods have sprung up based on the idea that those things to which we give our devotion are our gods. Who doesn't have a shrine to the television in their living room? The biggest building in Charlotte isn't a church (like in Medieval times), it's the Bank of America building. Why did Bin Ladin target the Twin Towers on 9/11? And the powerful, new gods are trying to wipe out the old gods. It's definitely ... edgy (to say the least), but a great read. When asked where he got his prodigious imagination and off-the-wall ideas, Gaiman replied:

I wish I had an origin story for you. When I was four, I was bitten by a radioactive myth.

My man! But Gaiman first got famous for a comic book, a modern retelling of Morpheus, or Sandman, the god of the dreaming. Which reminds me that, on this day in 1619, René Descartes had the dreams which inspired his Meditations on First Philosophy. In the book, he attempted to submit the pursuit of philosophy to the Scientific Method, hoping to end the squabble between the prevalent Scholasticism, budding Skepticism and always-present Sophistry. So, what were these dreams and how did they inspire his Meditations?

Have you ever had a dream so real, you had to pinch yourself to see if you were awake? That's pretty much it. Because, if you can't know if you're asleep, then you can't know anything is real. This includes such truths as 2 + 2 = 4 or a circle is that shape in which all edges extend an equal distance from the center. Basically, the first thirty minutes of The Matrix:

What is real? How do you define real? If you're talking about what you can hear, what you can smell, taste and feel then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain.

Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real? What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world?

Descartes, because of these dreams, concluded that, if he was to know anything with certainty, he must start by doubting everything. Only when he could discover one true thing could he proceed. What did he find?

I have convinced myself that there is absolutely nothing in the world, no sky, no earth, no minds, no bodies. Does it now follow that I too do not exist? No. If I convinced myself of something [or thought anything at all] then I certainly existed. But there is a deceiver of supreme power and cunning who is deliberately and constantly deceiving me. In that case I too undoubtedly exist, if he is deceiving me; and let him deceive me as much as he can, he will never bring it about that I am nothing so long as I think that I am something. So, after considering everything very thoroughly, I must finally conclude that the proposition, I am, I exist, is necessarily true whenever it is put forward by me or conceived in my mind.

Put simply, Cogito ergo sum. I think, therefore, I am. That's quite a lot to get out of a dream! Unfortunately, he wasn't able to prove that you or I exist. Sorry!