User:Eric Herboso/Bio

NOTICE: The entirety of this page is archival material, even if it says otherwise. I simply do not have time to update my wikipedia profile pages with the same consistency as I can my twitter profile at @EricHerboso or my facebook profile at facebook.com/EricHerboso. If you want current info, please go there. What follows below is for archival purposes only.

If you've come to this page, then you must be interested in learning more about me. Unfortunately, getting to know me is a very difficult process.

Immediately below, you will see information about me and ways of finding more information. Afterward, I have some copies of archived material written long ago. Please note that only the recent top portion of this page is to be used in understanding who I am currently; the later archived portions are present only for reference, and may not be indicative of the truth any longer.

For more in-depth information on my favorite media, please see User:Eric Herboso/Media; for quotations by me or enjoyed by me, see User:Eric Herboso/Quotations; and for a list of links to outside sites that I enjoy or are affiliated with, see User:Eric Herboso/Links.

For my public blog, please see Eric.Herboso.com, or, if you are a personal friend, I may give you access to my private journal at EricJHerboso.LiveJournal.com.

About Me
In a crowd, I either stand out or am invisible, depending on your point of view. I'm the guy who eats in a restaurant while reading a book, and hangs out downtown just to write in my journal. I'm the guy who sits in a park feeding birds while thinking about philosophy. I'm the guy who wears all vegan fair trade clothing and spends my time working and volunteering to help make the world a better place. I'm the guy who unwinds each day playing video games and watching netflix, or listens to podcasts or NPR anytime he drives his Volkswagen beetle to Asheville for a movie. I'm the guy who submits papers to academic journals for fun and writes creative nonfiction on the side that never gets published.

Yeah. I'm that guy.

Archived from facebook.com/EricHerboso (2011)
Enthusiastic dreaming is good for the soul. Unfortunately, for a strict philosophical skeptic like myself, this requires creating informed value out of apparent valuelessness. Fortunately, I've become quite adept at just that.

I'm always terrible at self-descriptions. Every time I try to make a comment on myself, I have flashbacks of Gödelian self-reference.

I am...

...vegetarian with aspirations of veganism and serious thoughts on fructarianism.

...fervently pacifist, even to my own detriment.

...in love with philosophy, specifically in deciding what we may know.

...significantly interested in metamathematical systems, such as mathematical logic or axiomatic set theory.

...economically and politically liberal, with ideals more toward a Tolstoy-style anarcho-socialism.

...a strict agnostic and philosophical skepticist, with no preference toward nihlism except as justified by Occam's razor, which I don't find to be justified in the least.

...extremely wordy and patently ignorant.

...ellipsis-happy. (c;

Archived from User:Eric Herboso/Bio (2011)
At heart, I am a philosophy person with a pronounced bent toward mathematics and logic in general. Yet I possess a strong sense of right and wrong that is not justified, but only felt. It is this moral sense that predominately guides how I live my life.

I also have a strong passion for writing. It is only through the written word that I am fully able to best express myself; due to a slight speech impediment and an infamous knack for forgetting suitable synonyms unless I am seated w/ a pen in my hand, I will never be much of a speaker, however well I may write speeches.

Despite these quirks, I remain a hopeless romantic--a lover of love itself--constantly looking forward to the day when my hopelessness will be disproved by counterexample.

I am vegetarian, with aspirations toward veganism; I am a fervent pacifist, with ideals far from what is practical in today's world; I am socially liberal, with leanings toward a Tolstoy-style anarcho-socialism; I am a determined skepticist, a strict agnostic, and a beleaguered instrumentalist; I am argumentative, painfully outspoken, and dreadfully afraid that my subconsciousness is but temporarily hiding a closet capitalist nature, fully bent on rugged individualism and the justice of the capable serving above and without the worthless.

I am Eric Herboso. I am me, and no other. I am.

Archived from User:Eric Herboso/Bio (2007)
I'm always terrible at self-descriptions. Every time I try to make a comment on myself, I have flashbacks of Gödelian self-reference. But I suppose I might as well try.

Hi. (c: I'm Eric Herboso, a 25 year old math/philosophy major at Spring Hill College in Mobile, Alabama. This last part is important because academics really is my 'schtick'; I plan on becoming a professor of mathematics one day, even though I really consider philosophy to be a more worthwhile subject to study.

I love to think. Considering things is my second favorite thing to do--and arguing about things is my first. Just about every idea I've so far encountered in my life has seemed interesting to think and argue about, but I've spent a great deal of more time on some things than others.

And that may explain why I'm an extreme skeptic. (Excessive argument does seem to have that general effect upon people.) I'm agnostic, with no preference toward platonic ideals except that I would wish it were so, and no preference toward nihlism except via Ockham's Razor. And to be honest, I think Ockham's razor is quite a bit more blunt than most scientists are willing to admit.

Despite this, I am vegetarian with aspirations of veganism and serious thoughts on fructarianism. I am fervently pacifist, even to my own detriment. And I am constantly discouraged by the evils of the world around me. Don't ask me to explain how this paragraph jibes with the preceding one unless you want to get into a huge discussion. /c:

I suppose I should also point out my specific academic interests, since it is so important to me. I'm really into metamathematical systems, such as mathematical logic or axiomatic set theory. I'm in love with philosophy--specifically in analytics, confirmation holism, and skepticism. (Keep in mind that I don't necessarily adhere to such ideals, but nevertheless find them interesting and worthwhile to think about.)

Politically, I lean radically to the left, even by European standards. I am economically and politically liberal, with ideals more toward a Tolstoy-style anarcho-syndicalism/anarcho-socialism than anything else. If you don't know what that is, please feel free to ask--and if you do know what that is, please don't think I'm too much of a nutcase. (Ahem.) Despite my political leanings, I'm still surprisingly quite interested in Leo Strauss, Niccolo Machiavelli, Plato, Aristotle, and even Ayn Rand, for goodness' sake! After all, just because I love to read their arguments doesn't mean I agree with them. (c;

Anyway, that's me. There's still other stuff to say, I suppose, but it's more conducive to list-making than an open-ended essay such as this. Nevertheless, I must also point out that I am an avid reader. Please keep in mind that when you read my list of authors and books below, you will not be exposed to half of the books I find interesting. I read about three books a week, except when I get burned out, and then I'll go without reading for a month.

I also simply adore writing. I keep a blog up at livejournal.com/users/EricJHerboso and I update it fairly regularly. (At least I try to.)

I play games a lot, by the way. I have this passion for video games that really isn't justified at all; my favorite is an rpg series named Lunar, translated into English by Working Designs. I simpy love their translation. It reminds me of Douglas Hofstadter.

That reminds me: I'm really interested in languages. Unfortunately, I'm also really bad at them. I know English better than most, but I always envied those geniuses who could just pick up language after language, seemingly with no problem at all. My first second language is ancient Greek; I'm able to read textbook Greek now, but stumbling through Greek Loeb Classic Library editions takes me absolutely _forever_. .:sigh:. My next challenge will be to tackle German; this is because I'm extremely into philosophy, especially the Greeks and the Germans, for different reasons.

But I digress. I meant to tell you of my love for games. My favorite two-player game is definitely shogi, which seems kind of like Western chess when you first look at it, but really is far more complex and interesting. I also enjoy go and chess, by the way. And scrabble. I love scrabble. And Diplomacy and Axis & Allies and Heroscape and Magic: The Gathering and--well, I actually think it's in my best interests to stop before I delve too much further into such aspects of my personality.

I also watch a lot of anime (and manga), though I must admit that most of what I've seen is quite subpar. So far, I've been introduced to around twenty complete anime series, and I only really enjoyed five of them. But isn't that how it always is, no matter what medium one is speaking of? My favorite is Kino's Journey, followed closely by Escaflowne, for a very different reason. I generally enjoy shojo anime, so long as it's not too 'out there', and there's a bit of shonen that I like as well.

And a few additional list-type items should probably be mentioned: I like to just observe people, watching them go about their lives from a safe distance. I'm a bit introverted, so I never really speak to anyone on anything resembling a personal level, but I make up for it by having intense conversations (and arguments) with myself, and imagining the people I see around me as actual people who knew whom I was as a real person. (I often feel a bit akin to Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, for different reasons.) Not everyone recognizes that I am introverted though, as I deal with it in an odd way at times: by acting as though I were extroverted. But it's just an act. I'm president of my college's Philosophy Club, an officer of the English Club, a writer/editor for the school's literary magazine (The Motley) and school newspaper (The SpringHillian), and pretty much the only serious pure mathematics student on campus (it's a small university).

Oh, and one last thing: I have this really bad habit of hypocritically straying from my own ideals from time to time. It's not healthy, and I'm never happy with myself when I do it, but it does happen, and I figure I should be up front about that, since I'm nowhere near perfect in what I am, do, or say. .:sigh:.

Archived from LiveJournal (2007)
You know, it's always really tough to describe oneself. Sure, you can list your interests, and maybe even give a few anecdotal accounts of you living your life. But to really get at the core of whom a person is requires something more. You must put forth a worldview that truly reflects one's inner thoughts. A manifesto that clarifies one's intentions. This LiveJournal entry will attempt to do just that.

But first, I must start with the basics.

My name is Eric Jonathan Herboso, although I regularly go just by Eric Herboso online. At one point in my past, I used my middle initial more often (this explains my LJ username), but no longer. I also have a number of pseudonyms that I no longer actively use; these include Garacan, MG377, and Martican Garamonde. In some places, I also go by a separate pseudonym which I will not disclose here.

I am twenty-five years old. I was born on 1 July, 1981, within five minutes of the exact middle of the year, in Mobile, Alabama, USA. I have lived most of my life in Alabama, though I have also lived for long stretches in Fort Collins, Colorado, and Germantown, Maryland. I will be moving to Annapolis, Maryland, very soon for college.

I am a lifelong student; I realized pretty early on that I love academia, and I never want to leave college. So after I get my degrees, I will be staying in college indefinitely as a teacher and student. Currently, I am finishing up my bachelor's degree in pure mathematics at Spring Hill College in Mobile, Alabama, and I will be starting at St. John's College in Annapolis, Maryland, in September to study philosophy at a great books school. Afterward, I plan to receive my doctorate in mathematical philosophy.

Archived from LiveJournal (2005)
At heart, I am a philosophy person with a pronounced bent toward mathematics and logic in general. Yet I possess a strong sense of right and wrong that is not justified, but only felt. It is this moral sense that predominately guides how I live my life.

I also have a strong passion for writing. It is only through the written word that I am fully able to best express myself; due to a slight speech impediment and an infamous knack for forgetting suitable synonyms unless I am seated w/ a pen in my hand, I will never be much of a speaker, however well I may write speeches.

Despite these quirks, I remain a hopeless romantic--a lover of love itself--constantly looking forward to the day when my hopelessness will be disproved by counterexample.

I am vegetarian, with aspirations toward veganism; I am a fervent pacifist, with ideals far from what is practical in today's world; I am socially liberal, with leanings toward a Tolstoy-style anarcho-socialism; I am a determined skepticist, a strict agnostic, and a beleaguered instrumentalist; I am argumentative, painfully outspoken, and dreadfully afraid that my subconsciousness is but temporarily hiding a closet capitalist nature, fully bent on rugged individualism and the justice of the capable serving above and without the worthless.

I am Eric Herboso. I am me, and no other. I am.

Archived from MySpace (208)
I'm always terrible at self-descriptions. Every time I try to make a comment on myself, I have flashbacks of G&ouml;delian self-reference. But I suppose I might as well try.

Hi. (c: I'm Eric Herboso, a math geek/philosophy nerd with a heavy ethical bent. I graduated from Spring Hill College in early 2007, and plan on attending grad school at St. John's College in Annapolis, Maryland in late 2007. I'm one of those people that loves college so much that the concept of leaving college is completely out of the question. If I have it my way, I will be working in a college environment for the rest of my life. (Probably as a math professor, though I personally consider philosophy to be a more worthwhile subject to study.)

I love to think. It isn't often that you can find me not considering something or other. Pretty much the only time I'm not actively trying to understand one concept or another is when I'm meditating (this happens once or twice a month), zoning out during a reflex game (like Mario or Desktop Tower Defense), or having sex (I guess you could include masturbation, too.).

I'm a skeptic, strictly agnostic in the philosophical sense (I'm what you would call atheist in the practical religious sense), and pacifist. I have a vested interest in morality in general and meta-ethics in particular.

As a skeptic, I have no preference toward platonic ideals except that I would wish it were so, and no preference toward nihilism except via Ockham's Razor. And to be honest, I think Ockham's razor is quite a bit more blunt than most scientists are willing to admit. (Philosophy of science is a hobby of mine.)

I am also vegetarian with aspirations of veganism for ethical reasons. I try to be healthy as well, but it is a difficult process, as I am addicted to caffeine products and have so far been completely unsuccessful in abandoning cheese.

Also, I'm severely introverted. I never really speak to anyone on anything resembling a personal level (mostly because it's exceedingly difficult to find persons who are worthwhile investments in terms of my personal time, but I make up for it by having intense conversations (and arguments) with myself, and imagining the people I see around me as actual people who know who I am as a real person. (Don't try to understand that last sentence too carefully; it's not quite as important as it might at first seem.) Interestingly, not everyone recognizes that I am introverted, as I often deal with it in an odd way: by acting as though I were extroverted.

On to my interests....

My academic interests are mostly philosophical; in mathematics, I only have fun with metamathematical systems--straight computation bores me, and proof creation, though admirable, gives me headaches. I prefer to deal with talking about methods of proof than to actually do proofs. The distinction here is a fine one, and it sometimes is a concept that people I meet haven't thought of before. If you're at all interested, I highly suggest you ask me; it makes for a great discussion topic (that is, if you're a nerd like me).

My political interests are extremely liberal; I have ideals more toward a Tolstoy-style anarcho-syndicalism than anything else. If you don't know what that is, please feel free to ask--and if you do know what that is, please don't think I'm too much of a nutcase. Ahem. Despite my political leanings, I'm still surprisingly quite interested in Leo Strauss, Niccolo Machiavelli, Plato, Aristotle, and even Ayn Rand! After all, just because I love to read their arguments doesn't mean I agree with them. (c;

My physical interests are much more limited than most. I don't enjoy many sports, though I occasionally play defense in soccer, and I'm the equivalent of a black belt in tae kwon do and karate. For the record, I'm horrible at soccer, but I'm good enough in martial arts to have actually taught at a dojo for a while. Granted, it was my uncle's dojo, but that still counts, doesn't it?

My musical interests are very diverse. I'm a percussionist, having played in numerous jazz bands (though never for profit), and I taught drums at a middle school band class for a year. Today, I mostly just listen, though I keep a pair of drumsticks handy 'just in case'. Favorite genres include big band, celtic, and classical, though I also enjoy many other styles on a regular basis. I love going to sleep each night to the sound of a favorite musical phrase and the light hum of a fan.

Beyond that, you should know that I'm a heavy reader/writer, and I not only write in one journal or another on a daily basis, but I also read around three books a week, except when I get burned out, and then I'll go without reading for a month.

And lastly, (but certainly not leastly,) I am an avid gamer. I adore the game of Go, though I am not very good at it. I also enjoy Diplomacy and Shogi, as well as video games such as Starcraft and Desktop Tower Defense. I also play Magic: the Gathering. Obviously, I enjoy a great deal more games than just this, but these are some of the highlights. A more fleshed out list can be found at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Eric_Herboso/Media.

If you really want to know more about whom I am, I must highly recommend that you take a look at my journal, at ericjherboso.livejournal.com. Happy reading. (c;

I'd like to meet...

Someone who is intelligent enough to actually think on a regular basis, and like it. Someone who cares about the world, even if they don't think there is any good reason to. Someone who actually enjoys learning new things, and is always trying to improve themselves, by whatever method they see fit. Someone who at least attempts to enjoy life, even if all they keep getting is more and more depressed. Someone who likes to talk and discuss and read and argue and think and be.

In other words, someone who hasn't already clicked off of this webpage in disgust. If you've read this far, then it's pretty likely that you're the kind of person I'd like to meet.

By the way, although I would love to meet any new people who fit this criteria, please note that I am not interested in pursuing a romantic relationship with anyone other than my love, of whom I have (thankfully) already found. So please, if the only reason you have for contacting me is to go out with me, then save yourself the trouble and just don't contact me at all. But if you have a true interest in connecting with another person, I would love to hear from you. After all, that would make you part of a very elite group, and you'd be a rare friend for me to find indeed.

Interests

I'm most interested in metamathematics, analytic philosophy, practical ethics, beautiful literature, and films that make me cry.

If you're interested in seeing a complete list of my favorite media, please visit en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Eric_Herboso/Media.

Music

My music tastes are quite broad in comparison to my other interests, as you may have noticed from my personal internet radio station at the top of this page (last.fm). I enjoy J. S. Bach, Glen Miller, Duke Ellington, Neutral Milk Hotel, Peter Schickele, Dresden Dolls, Nobuo Uematsu, Yasunori Mitsuda, Yoko Kanno, the pillows, Jared Hudson, and many more. If you're really interested, you can check out my personal internet radio station at www.last.fm/user/EricHerboso, or just hit the grey 'play' button above.

Movies

Favorite movies include anything by Charlie Kaufman, Serenity, Amelie, The Princess Bride, and every Miyazaki film ever made.

Television

I enjoy Cowboy Bebop, Vision of Escaflowne, Neon Genesis Evangelion, FLCL, and Kino's Journey. Occasionally, you'll also find me watching the Sorkin seasons of The West Wing, MythBusters, Daria, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, or even listening to Schickele Mix. Oh, and I can't go without mentioning Firefly and Battlestar Galactica. I used to say that I never watched tv, unless I was playing a video game or a dvd. Now I can no longer say that, thanks to Firefly and Battlestar Galactica almost single-handedly.

Books

Favorite authors include Howard Zinn, Richard Feynman, Stephen Jay Gould, Douglas Hofstadter, and Noam Chomsky in nonfiction, and T. S. Eliot, J. D. Salinger, Orson Scott Card, J. K. Rowling, Nick Hornby, Plato, and Ayn Rand in fiction. Note that just because I like a writer does not mean I endorse the author. (That means you, Card. Asshole.)

Heroes

"' Heroes are like shadows. The closer you get, the smaller they appear. '"

When I was young, I had a hero. But then I met him, and found out whom he really was. I no longer have heroes.

The closest thing I have to a hero is perhaps Bertrand Russell, followed closely by Peter Singer. If you don't know who they are, a quick google or wikipedia search will suffice. But I doubt anyone cares enough to learn.