Letters to the Editor

Friday, September 27, 2002

Separated at Birth?

Sirs,

I would like to make an announcement to the Dartmouth community. Ruefully, I realize that I definitely should have made this announcement the first day of freshman year. Had I done so, I could have nipped in the bud the questioning curiosity that surrounds me on this campus. I could have stopped a question that I have been asked far too many times from ever being asked at all.

NO, I AM NOT NILANJAN BANERJEE'S BROTHER!

Nor am I his cousin, his step-brother, or any other relative of any sort. Not by blood, not by marriage. I do not know him. He does not know me. We are unrelated. But every time he writes something for the Review, or some letter to the editor for the Dartmouth, the questions pop up again. No, I'm not his brother. Just because we share a rather uncommon last name (uncommon in America, that is) does not imply that we are related. What I hate most of all about this unfortunate coincidence is the two words that are always floating in the back of everyone's mind whenever they ask me this question: 'conservative,' and, far worse, 'legacy.'

Thank you for publishing the announcement. The more informed the Dartmouth community is on issues like this, the better

Sincerely,

Sanjay K. E. 'Jay' Banerjee '04

Editor's Note: Nilanjan Banerjee '00, a Brahmin, is the former Travel Editor of the Review. He was featured on the cover on the May 28 issue of the Review and has contributed such seminal pieces as 'Eurotrash Invicta' (TDR, November 17, 1998) and 'Finding Destiny in Ascutney, Vermont' (TDR, April 24, 2000).

Regarding Awe

Sirs,

It gave me good pleasure to read Andrew Grossman's review of my presentation on the emotion of awe ('How's the awe going?' TDR, May 22, 2002); few campus publications engage student research. While Mr. Grossman gave a generous summary of some of my hypotheses, and proposes some interesting extensions of my theory, several points within his article should be clarified.

I do not hold that 'when one experiences awe...one 'comes to the realization of certain truths,'' but instead that in self-reflection many people believe they come to such realizations. I hold that emotions provide no independent epistemological or metaphysical information.

That humans have latent avoidance-responses (which I colloquially called 'fear') in a wide-variety of situations, even to very weak degrees, would not make 'early man paralyzed on the analyst's couch with neurosis,' as Mr. Grossman puts it. Other less incapacitating emotions usually have more motivating power than weak fear; additionally, the ability to reason, particularly strong in the human species, tends to prevent inconsistent or irrational emotions from having too much influence on a person.

Mr. Grossman's assertion that 'The appreciation of a pleasant vista carries no evolutionary advantage' has been contradicted by many theorists over the past decades. Such vistas tend to provide good vantage points, helping one espy food, shelter, travel, and enemies. Aesthetic merit, generally speaking, can be evolutionarily explained: by a response to color differentiation (especially vis-?-vis location of fruit); symmetry and order (as easy to remember); human appearance of health; excitement; cultural bonding; etc.

Mr. Grossman's article continues with his proposal for a better theory of the emotion. His analysis is not convincing because of its lack of rigor and explanation, but his attempt is noble. Awe has rarely if ever been discussed in the expected literature, so any earnest work is desirable. But because the objects to which this emotion responds tend to have high cultural and personal value, the thoughts occasioned by experiences of this emotion tend to be exalted and self-referencing, and the astonishment of the sensation make difficult cool reflection, objective analysis of the emotion is difficult.

Mr. Grossman's article is though, in the end, disappointing, for he writes: 'The solution to Moore's mistake is simple.' My hope throughout my presentation was to show that solutions are not simple. Such trivialization of the academic pursuit of knowledge—that problems are 'simple,' that distasteful theses are 'mistakes,' that though a speaker specified he would delineate only the barest outline of his theoretical basis these intimations can be called 'just post-hoc rationalization'—undermines the author's intention to engage seriously the topic or me.

Christopher Moore '02

Abandon Hope

Sirs,

Yessssssss!

So there is hope out there! I'm a high school junior who is realizing all the so-called great institutions of this nation are hardcore liberal bastions. As a devoted conservative and talk radio addict, I'm just thrilled to know that there is hope for this country out there. The best of luck to you and [to] our cause.

John Gounley

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