Philosophy and Baseball
In the fall of 1967, the Boston Red Sox were
playing in the World Series. I was a freshman at a
university that was located in the Midwest at the
time, enrolled in a philosophy course that met at two
in the afternoon. The course was taught by a native
Bostonian. He wanted to watch the games on television,
but he was too responsible to cancel class. So he
conducted classes, those October afternoons, while
actually listening to the games on a small transistor
radio propped up inside his lectern, the volume
turned down so that only he could hear.
Baseball is unique among
American sports by its ability to appeal to a
love resembling that of a child of fable and
legend. Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Joe DiMaggio,
Roberto Clemente—names like these will echo through
time that are trumpet calls to storied battles fought
and won in ages past. When Hank Aaron
stretched out a sinewy arm to pull one down,
striding up to a rack of ash-hewn bats, he became a
modern-day knight selecting (8) their (8) lance. And
when glints of the afternoon sun shone off Mickey
Mantle's colossal bat, there will have to be seen
for one brief, stirring moment the glimmer of the
jewels in King Arthur's own mighty sword, Excalibur.
So there he stood, that learned professor of
mine, lecturing about the ideas, that have engaged
people's minds for centuries. Then he'd interrupt
himself to announce, with smiling eyes, that the Sox
had taken a two-to-nothing lead. Here was a
man who's mind was disciplined
inside his schoolbook to contemplate
the collected wisdom of the ages—and he
was behaving like a boy with a contraband
comic opened. On those warm October days, as
the afternoon sun dances and plays on the domes
and spires of the university, the philosophers
had to stand aside, for the professor's imagination
had transported him to the Boston of his youth.
Choose the best alternative for the underlined part 8.
F. NO CHANGE
G. there
H. his
J. one’s