86 How I Failed Ethics

Em Am D


[Verse]
       G                      C             D
Though majoring in Visual and Environmental Studies
    C                      Am         D
And minoring in History of Sci
  G                            C         D
I had to retake Ethics from my Mennonite professor
    C             D           G
For whom my skepticism didn't fly


[Interlude]
Em Am D


[Verse]
    G                                  C             D
The first time I made mincemeat of the standard propositions
  C                            Am           D
Establishing a so-called moral science
    G                      C           D
And I declared morality an offshoot of aesthetics
    C             D        G
And got a failing C for my defiance


[Interlude]
Em Am D


[Verse]
   G                       C               D
So next semester I back to Divinity School trotted
   C                           Am         D
Proverbial tail not between my legs
    G                                  C           D
And spent the whole course positing my own ethical system
      C             D                G
While other college students emptied kegs


[Interlude]
Em Am D


[Verse]
G                        C                   D
Information ethics, cyberethics — both since taken —
      C                        Am          D
Said: Maximize the information flow
  G                       C                  D
Toward a hypothetical end state in which the cosmos
   C           D           G
Consists entirely of our info
    G                         C             D
And at the highest level possible, not only data
    C                       Am           D
But data about data dot dot dot
   G                             C             D
Or life on top of life on top of life, et cetera
C              D                  G
Profundity, my mother'd say — I'd not


[Bridge]
Em    Bm    C
Em    Bm    Am    C
Bm          D


[Verse]
   G                          C                 D
My Mennonite professor did concede I'd done the coursework
  C                                  Am           D
Although my system left him quite dismayed
  G                              C           D
Depending, as it did, on neither history nor Jahweh
    C            D              G
And gave me, finally, a passing grade