Introduction
(selling out)
"I think the term "product" has a bad rap. I blame Wal-Mart."
"I think Wal-Mart is evil enough to dwarf the combined sin of the rest of mankind to nothing (in comparison)."
"Wal-Mart is 'selling out' incarnate. Sold out and morally bankrupt."
Yay for shopping at Wal-Mart...
...because the ethical implications of doing so just don't weigh heavily enough on the average middle-class American conscience (conscience? what conscience? that would involve some mechanism of internal reflection. we are too approval-seeking to have developed anything like a conscience.).
The Good Samaritan Experiment
"In the Good Samaritan experiment, even seminary students could not be counted on to stop and help a stranger in need. In the experiment, Princeton seminarians were asked to prepare a report on the parable of the Good Samaritan in one building and report to another building to discuss the parable. The seminarians were randomly assigned to one of three groups, those told that they were running late, right on time, and a little early. While making their way to the other building, each of the seminarians encountered a man slumped on the sidewalk in obvious distress. Of the seminarians told they were early, 63% stopped to help; those on time stopped 45% of the time; and 10% of those running late helped. The researchers found that, "Ironically, a person in a hurry is less likely to help people, even if he is going to speak on the parable of the Good Samaritan. (Some literally stepped over the victim on their way to the next building!) The results seem to show that thinking about norms does not imply that one will act on them.'"
(http://www.experiment-resources.com/hel ... avior.html)
(http://faculty.babson.edu/krollag/org_s ... marit.html)
Moral Care
Why don't we care?
...about large scale exploitation,
starving children in other countries,
foreign wars...
..when none of it affects our immediate interests and well-being?
Why isn't it of interest to us!?
Sometimes we feel somewhat guilty about it, but not enough to move us to action.
Only small minority of us are in the humanitarian "business." Why?
We could all contribute something, and, likely, more than we are.
Moral Obligation
Why don't I look into everything I buy so as to boycott goods from exploitative companies? Why do I eat meat? (Because it's customary and I'm used to it and it would be inconvenient to do otherwise?) Why don't I give money to every television add for charity? Why am I not devoting my life humanitarian causes?
Is this moral failure?
Or is all of the above supererogatory!?
Certainly I am concerned about all of these things, but why haven't I really tackled any of them with more...gusto?
Am I alone in feeling this way?
I keep settling on the idea that I should concentrate moral efforts locally. I should do good where I am.
But then in today's world is there really any excuse for not thinking globally?
It feels like such a battle. I'm one of those people who, when he becomes really passionate about something, devotes all his energy to a single thing. So how do you juggle these global issues with personal life goals. How can anyone have the energy for all of this in life? I guess one ought to find some way to compromise?
Two things:
(1) What moral obligations do you think we have?
(2) Any of the issues I mentioned are up for discussion as well.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Sunday, November 22, 2009
Saturday, November 21, 2009
just found some things I wrote at 17
Me at 17, summer before college, on an internet discussion board, in response to thread topic "If you dont believe in God than why are you kind to people?"...with every pre-college educated word and misspelled atrocity in all its glory absolutely unchanged.
My response to discussion topic:
I used to believe that the only motive for action is ultimately a selfish motive. Everything we do, we do because we want to survive the best way we can. We learn how our actions affect the world around us, some learn better than others, and we constantly manipulate the world around us to achieve the results we want. For example, why would I obey the laws and follow rules, well...even as young babies we discover that there are norms and rules, and the consequences that follow. You can even think of gravity as a rule, a rule that has no moral attachment. "If I drop my toy it will fall to the floor." Then there are rules like "mommy will be angry if I make a mess." As we grow and learn more about the world and the other people in it we discover more rules and how to live with them succesfully.
So why are there philanthropists and acts of charity? Well, most of us know that when we are kind to others it makes us feel good, either about ourselves, or about the world. We also want to construct an image for others to see, we have a reputation to uphold. Why uphold a reputation? Because a reputation proves very useful in relationships.
What about love? If I give my unconditional love to another person it may seem like altruism, but really I know that it's always mutual. If I respect this person and care for them and meet their emotional needs I can expect to recieve their love and affection in return, that makes me feel good.
And when great sacrifices are made? When a person values someone to such an extent that he/she will sacrifice his/her life for that person, maybe this indicates that if he/she were to continue living without the other person he/she would be miserable.
Sometimes I think of it as a more complicated strategy for survival.
Another person in the same discussion thread wrote:
My response:
I'm not sure if I can agree yet, maybe because I see so much less compassion in the world sometimes than you're giving credit, but I would like to think that we all have a deeper instinctive care for the human race, and hopefully we do realize that we won't get anywhere if we have to kill off half the world to get there.
But, I don't think we're giving the selfish emotion enough credit. Being selfish, especially as a tool for survival, isn't shallow at all. I'm thinking for a way to illustrate this...
Before you bring a child into the world, why do you decide you are going to? I have not yet had this experience, so I tread cautiously, but is it because you have compassion for this unborn child, or because you feel somwhere inside you an obligation to keep the human race going?
I would think that this is a more selfish than selfless decision. If I am going to put my "self" in something more wholly than I have ever dedicated myself to anything else before, I am doing it for me, me and my partner. I would not do it for any other reason.
Besides, doesn't love for anything stem from selfish desire? I love a great many things, for me those things seem to affirm who I am, my existence, if you will.
And actually, now that I'm thinking on this I'm a bit confused by what you wrote Alun. How can we associate compassion with selflessness? Wherever passion is exerted there are always reasons of pure selfishness behind it.
Me ruminating, still in the same discussion thread:
I don't care if you live your life being the kindest person on the earth, I would agree with your behavior, and I would love to be your friend, but I can't quite have all the respect for you in the world if you're making choices because someone else told you to.
Now, I believe people do what they believe to be right, but then that means that theists believe that religion is good and truthfull, not on account of their own moral values, but because they believe in God's.
If this is true, it's not a very stable grounding for morality. It becomes a source for theists to justify their actions, and it's just plain...plain something...not good.
How can we learn to be better, more moral species if we are limited to following directions? (Isn't it obvious that God's directions have always been confusing and even misleading at times?)
/end 17 year old me.
God, I haven't changed very much at all. In fact my 17 year old self just persuaded me again to believing that "the only motive for action is ultimately a selfish motive."
On the one hand, this makes me proud of where I was at 17.
On the other hand, it scares me that I am not really much more advanced in my thinking than I was at 17. Makes me question the value of all my classes at university. Have they really helped me advance intellectually?
My response to discussion topic:
I used to believe that the only motive for action is ultimately a selfish motive. Everything we do, we do because we want to survive the best way we can. We learn how our actions affect the world around us, some learn better than others, and we constantly manipulate the world around us to achieve the results we want. For example, why would I obey the laws and follow rules, well...even as young babies we discover that there are norms and rules, and the consequences that follow. You can even think of gravity as a rule, a rule that has no moral attachment. "If I drop my toy it will fall to the floor." Then there are rules like "mommy will be angry if I make a mess." As we grow and learn more about the world and the other people in it we discover more rules and how to live with them succesfully.
So why are there philanthropists and acts of charity? Well, most of us know that when we are kind to others it makes us feel good, either about ourselves, or about the world. We also want to construct an image for others to see, we have a reputation to uphold. Why uphold a reputation? Because a reputation proves very useful in relationships.
What about love? If I give my unconditional love to another person it may seem like altruism, but really I know that it's always mutual. If I respect this person and care for them and meet their emotional needs I can expect to recieve their love and affection in return, that makes me feel good.
And when great sacrifices are made? When a person values someone to such an extent that he/she will sacrifice his/her life for that person, maybe this indicates that if he/she were to continue living without the other person he/she would be miserable.
Sometimes I think of it as a more complicated strategy for survival.
Another person in the same discussion thread wrote:
Compassion is an emotion--that's not up for debate, right? It responds too automatically to just be us thinking that, "well, if I help them, they'll help me later, plus that chick'll think I'm deep..."; it doesn't always go like that, so it's got to be built in. We thus associate it with selflessness in general, even though we aren't always selfless for the sake of compassion.
My response:
I'm not sure if I can agree yet, maybe because I see so much less compassion in the world sometimes than you're giving credit, but I would like to think that we all have a deeper instinctive care for the human race, and hopefully we do realize that we won't get anywhere if we have to kill off half the world to get there.
But, I don't think we're giving the selfish emotion enough credit. Being selfish, especially as a tool for survival, isn't shallow at all. I'm thinking for a way to illustrate this...
Before you bring a child into the world, why do you decide you are going to? I have not yet had this experience, so I tread cautiously, but is it because you have compassion for this unborn child, or because you feel somwhere inside you an obligation to keep the human race going?
I would think that this is a more selfish than selfless decision. If I am going to put my "self" in something more wholly than I have ever dedicated myself to anything else before, I am doing it for me, me and my partner. I would not do it for any other reason.
Besides, doesn't love for anything stem from selfish desire? I love a great many things, for me those things seem to affirm who I am, my existence, if you will.
And actually, now that I'm thinking on this I'm a bit confused by what you wrote Alun. How can we associate compassion with selflessness? Wherever passion is exerted there are always reasons of pure selfishness behind it.
Me ruminating, still in the same discussion thread:
I don't care if you live your life being the kindest person on the earth, I would agree with your behavior, and I would love to be your friend, but I can't quite have all the respect for you in the world if you're making choices because someone else told you to.
Now, I believe people do what they believe to be right, but then that means that theists believe that religion is good and truthfull, not on account of their own moral values, but because they believe in God's.
If this is true, it's not a very stable grounding for morality. It becomes a source for theists to justify their actions, and it's just plain...plain something...not good.
How can we learn to be better, more moral species if we are limited to following directions? (Isn't it obvious that God's directions have always been confusing and even misleading at times?)
/end 17 year old me.
God, I haven't changed very much at all. In fact my 17 year old self just persuaded me again to believing that "the only motive for action is ultimately a selfish motive."
On the one hand, this makes me proud of where I was at 17.
On the other hand, it scares me that I am not really much more advanced in my thinking than I was at 17. Makes me question the value of all my classes at university. Have they really helped me advance intellectually?
Friday, November 20, 2009
fantasy
"If you travel to Japan you might see an interesting cultural phenomenon: middle-age well-to-do business men spending a inordinate (in my opinion) amount time and money buying anime comics and toys (which are everywhere). To a Western mind this seems very unusual and at times when considering all the peculiar idiosyncrasies of this culture I even wonder if modern Japanese culture is in the middle of mass psychosis. I am not saying that you cannot find such escapism in the West, there is plenty of it here, as well, from Wiccan godessess who talk to the trees in their backyard, to hardcore Trekkies, to religious head-laying tongue-speaking fanatics, to sugarcoated reality everyone sees on tv everyday. But how important is fantasy to psychological well-being? Or should I say, just how damaging is reality to a mind?
They teach prisoners of war and those who are subjected to sensory deprivation, for example, to "find their happy place" in order, I assume, to forestall or prevent a complete nervous breakdown of the mind. All over the world children are told fairy tales, either in the form of books, stories, or Disney cartoons, or are told fictinal explanations to natural phenomena.
Does this then imply that reality is a stressful thing for a child and can damage its psyche if not buffered against with make-believe stories? And what of adults? Or should I say, and what of adults under normal, everyday circumstances?
It is clear to me that fantasy world provides a buffer against reality that might be otherwise psychologically damaging to the psyche. What is not clear to me is when the use of fantasy is overused, or is unwarranted. In the case of the Japanese businessman: is his reality so harsh as to warrant such flights of fantasy to preserve his psychological well-being? An even better question, is the harshness(or stressfullness) of his reality equivalent to the degree of his fantasy? And on the flipside, can the degree of fantasy tell us about the harshness (whether real or perceived) of the reality of the individual?
What I am getting at is: can we simply live and work and think in reality? Wouldn't a world be a better place if all people actually functioned in reality? Should we make more effort in bridging the gap between the inner world and the outer world? Because I see that this gap getting bigger and bigger, as if people are pushing away against reality.
And for those with "creativity"argument , can't we be creative and real at the same time?"
I don't think it's the case that reality is too harsh for the Japanese businessman, but that reality, with all it's social conventions, restrictions, and mindless routines--real or percieved--seems rather dull and monotonous for the middle-aged well-to-do Japanese businessman. Escaping into a thrilling anime story is a way to feel, if only superficially, the emotion and excitement deficient in one's day-to-day life.
I think this is a symptom of modern day alienation, which is, in turn, the effect that modern societies and their political economies have on individuals. For so many, the goal is to get the credentials to get a good-paying job to afford to have a life of plenty. The problem is plenty of what?
"...modern man lives his life according to what others expect him to be rather than on what he really is"
"...the mask of uniformity merely disguises real feelings"
modern man is "taken away from [his] true self by his subservience to artificial needs"
~The Philosophy of Rousseau, Ronald Grimsley
They teach prisoners of war and those who are subjected to sensory deprivation, for example, to "find their happy place" in order, I assume, to forestall or prevent a complete nervous breakdown of the mind. All over the world children are told fairy tales, either in the form of books, stories, or Disney cartoons, or are told fictinal explanations to natural phenomena.
Does this then imply that reality is a stressful thing for a child and can damage its psyche if not buffered against with make-believe stories? And what of adults? Or should I say, and what of adults under normal, everyday circumstances?
It is clear to me that fantasy world provides a buffer against reality that might be otherwise psychologically damaging to the psyche. What is not clear to me is when the use of fantasy is overused, or is unwarranted. In the case of the Japanese businessman: is his reality so harsh as to warrant such flights of fantasy to preserve his psychological well-being? An even better question, is the harshness(or stressfullness) of his reality equivalent to the degree of his fantasy? And on the flipside, can the degree of fantasy tell us about the harshness (whether real or perceived) of the reality of the individual?
What I am getting at is: can we simply live and work and think in reality? Wouldn't a world be a better place if all people actually functioned in reality? Should we make more effort in bridging the gap between the inner world and the outer world? Because I see that this gap getting bigger and bigger, as if people are pushing away against reality.
And for those with "creativity"argument , can't we be creative and real at the same time?"
I don't think it's the case that reality is too harsh for the Japanese businessman, but that reality, with all it's social conventions, restrictions, and mindless routines--real or percieved--seems rather dull and monotonous for the middle-aged well-to-do Japanese businessman. Escaping into a thrilling anime story is a way to feel, if only superficially, the emotion and excitement deficient in one's day-to-day life.
I think this is a symptom of modern day alienation, which is, in turn, the effect that modern societies and their political economies have on individuals. For so many, the goal is to get the credentials to get a good-paying job to afford to have a life of plenty. The problem is plenty of what?
"...modern man lives his life according to what others expect him to be rather than on what he really is"
"...the mask of uniformity merely disguises real feelings"
modern man is "taken away from [his] true self by his subservience to artificial needs"
~The Philosophy of Rousseau, Ronald Grimsley
Thursday, November 19, 2009
why you should read The Value of Philosophy
This-
...sounds familiar.
[EXCERPT]
The value of philosophy is, in fact, to be sought largely in its very uncertainty. The man who has no tincture of philosophy goes through life imprisoned in the prejudices derived from common sense, from the habitual beliefs of his age or his nation, and from convictions which have grown up in his mind without the co-operation or consent of his deliberate reason. To such a man the world tends to become definite, finite, obvious; common objects rouse no questions, and unfamiliar possibilities are contemptuously rejected. As soon as we begin to philosophize, on the contrary, we find, as we saw in our opening chapters, that even the most everyday things lead to problems to which only very incomplete answers can be given. Philosophy, though unable to tell us with certainty what is the true answer to the doubts which it raises, is able to suggest many possibilities which enlarge our thoughts and free them from the tyranny of custom. Thus, while diminishing our feeling of certainty as to what things are, it greatly increases our knowledge as to what they may be; it removes the somewhat arrogant dogmatism of those who have never travelled into the region of liberating doubt, and it keeps alive our sense of wonder by showing familiar things in an unfamiliar aspect....sounds familiar.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
life?
By all means, be grounded. Be grounded in whatever it is you hold sacred, whatever you hold dear to your heart, whatever you rely on for foundation. But sometimes do not be afraid to balance on one foot. You may discover that there is more to life.
By all means, question everything. Question God, question authority, question your self. But sometimes do not be afraid to get messy. The journey of life is better forged with energy, creativity, and living, than by hacking away at all things with the tools of logical necessity.
By all means, question everything. Question God, question authority, question your self. But sometimes do not be afraid to get messy. The journey of life is better forged with energy, creativity, and living, than by hacking away at all things with the tools of logical necessity.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
vile music
Dr. Brian Russell says:
I listen to Marilyn Manson’s music now, but I used to think he was just some kind of freak whose songs I didn’t understand. He dressed strange, seemed weirdly sexual, was the center of lots of terrible rumors, etc. My opinion was that he was, as Dr. Russell put it, “psychologically-bizarre at best and downright dangerous at worst.” My opinion has changed. My earlier opinion of him was based on rumor. I had know idea who he was or what he sang about. So, I was curious and looked into it one day. I started listening to some of his songs — tried to make out what they might mean. It’s important to me that the music I listen to isn’t senseless noise and actually has a point. I cannot like music if I judge it to be morally flawed. It's true, Marilyn Manson is often graphically grotesque and sometimes sings about "violent" subject matter. But that’s not enough to dismiss the music as “bad.” You must look into the meaning of music and image. There is both great beauty (good) and great ugliness (bad) in the world and an entire range in between; should it be surprising that this is reflected in art? Secondly, if you don’t understand the meaning of a song or picture (or what the intended meaning is), then on what basis do you judge it good or bad?
If you’re following me, here’s the big point I’m trying to make: If something is to be deemed bad, there should be a good reason why. I honestly see merit in Marilyn Manson and meaning in a lot of his work (some things I still don’t understand). To some extent I have to interpret what I know and hear of him, but I’ve gathered a good perspective of him now from sources like his music, his interviews, and his writing. It’s often hard to tell who someone is at first glimpse. So, figuratively speaking, I’ve done some intense observation.
I would recommend you do the same. There are plenty of youtube videos of him in interviews. Watch them — I think it’s important to understand people who are different from ourselves.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkxomNoPN-Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY1×7o7WjB4
This is a pretty great interview of "early" Marilyn Manson:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPfWnMXGmhE
Now an even bigger point to all of this is that if we were more willing to make an effort at understanding each other (and things that are strange to us) instead of being dismissive, I think our society, our culture, would be a healthier one. We wouldn't have so much to repress if we more communicative and understanding. Some people don’t feel like they fit into society, and at the same time can’t leave society. We’ve all felt this way in a small scale situation, e.g. at school or in a new place. If you ignore and distance yourself from “mis-fits” and make no effort to understand...what else is there for a “mis-fit” but to spiral further and further into deviancy (being different). Why would a social deviant try to become part of a society that ignores, looks down on, makes fun of, pre-judges, and cares nothing to understand him/her? If people communicate and try to understand each other I believe we would see less violently extreme behavior. That’s my theory anyway. And that’s why it’s important not to throw all weird, mysterious, shocking things into one category: BAD. A more sophisticated approach is necessary.
I wrote about a case back on May 26, 2009 involving the vile music of “artist” Marilyn Manson, and since it’s been a few months, I think my bottom line bears repeating: A person who enjoys graphically, grotesquely-violent music and imagery is, in my opinion, psychologically-bizarre at best and downright dangerous at worst, and I think it’s reasonable for a parent to worry that a person (whether it’s his or her own child or someone with whom his or her child associates) who not only enjoys but creates such imagery is at the dangerous end of that spectrum.But, concerning music/entertainment influence on young people, I think the issue is not as black and white as the above.
(http://girlpundit.com/2009/09/study-this-with-dr-brian-horrorcore-killer/)
I listen to Marilyn Manson’s music now, but I used to think he was just some kind of freak whose songs I didn’t understand. He dressed strange, seemed weirdly sexual, was the center of lots of terrible rumors, etc. My opinion was that he was, as Dr. Russell put it, “psychologically-bizarre at best and downright dangerous at worst.” My opinion has changed. My earlier opinion of him was based on rumor. I had know idea who he was or what he sang about. So, I was curious and looked into it one day. I started listening to some of his songs — tried to make out what they might mean. It’s important to me that the music I listen to isn’t senseless noise and actually has a point. I cannot like music if I judge it to be morally flawed. It's true, Marilyn Manson is often graphically grotesque and sometimes sings about "violent" subject matter. But that’s not enough to dismiss the music as “bad.” You must look into the meaning of music and image. There is both great beauty (good) and great ugliness (bad) in the world and an entire range in between; should it be surprising that this is reflected in art? Secondly, if you don’t understand the meaning of a song or picture (or what the intended meaning is), then on what basis do you judge it good or bad?
If you’re following me, here’s the big point I’m trying to make: If something is to be deemed bad, there should be a good reason why. I honestly see merit in Marilyn Manson and meaning in a lot of his work (some things I still don’t understand). To some extent I have to interpret what I know and hear of him, but I’ve gathered a good perspective of him now from sources like his music, his interviews, and his writing. It’s often hard to tell who someone is at first glimpse. So, figuratively speaking, I’ve done some intense observation.
I would recommend you do the same. There are plenty of youtube videos of him in interviews. Watch them — I think it’s important to understand people who are different from ourselves.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkxomNoPN-Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY1×7o7WjB4
This is a pretty great interview of "early" Marilyn Manson:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPfWnMXGmhE
Now an even bigger point to all of this is that if we were more willing to make an effort at understanding each other (and things that are strange to us) instead of being dismissive, I think our society, our culture, would be a healthier one. We wouldn't have so much to repress if we more communicative and understanding. Some people don’t feel like they fit into society, and at the same time can’t leave society. We’ve all felt this way in a small scale situation, e.g. at school or in a new place. If you ignore and distance yourself from “mis-fits” and make no effort to understand...what else is there for a “mis-fit” but to spiral further and further into deviancy (being different). Why would a social deviant try to become part of a society that ignores, looks down on, makes fun of, pre-judges, and cares nothing to understand him/her? If people communicate and try to understand each other I believe we would see less violently extreme behavior. That’s my theory anyway. And that’s why it’s important not to throw all weird, mysterious, shocking things into one category: BAD. A more sophisticated approach is necessary.
ideology = fate
You know your ideology is kind of like your fate. It's shapes your character. I think it's uncommon for people to actively shape their own ideology--to be aware of how they see the world and go through a process of molding a new view. If you control your ideology, I see it as controlling your fate. Really controlling your fate. (control fate? -- I'm not even sure I understand what I'm trying to mean by this.)
"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." Proust
But how much control over ideology can a person have? I don't know. I was trying to point out that this realist, individualistic, classically liberal ideology (I don't know what else to call it), i.e. looking with this pair of eyes, overemphasizes an empty idea of freedom that is at the same time a trap.
"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes." Proust
But how much control over ideology can a person have? I don't know. I was trying to point out that this realist, individualistic, classically liberal ideology (I don't know what else to call it), i.e. looking with this pair of eyes, overemphasizes an empty idea of freedom that is at the same time a trap.
Thursday, November 12, 2009
tragedy
(loosely connected thoughts)
To be frustrated, angry, confused, this is nothing new in life. Yet these emotions continue to surprise us. And the potency of pain never wears away. It bites just as hard or harder each time. Thinking "Oh, I've felt this before..." does nothing to lessen the hit. Familiarity with feeling does not diminish its impact.
Yes, we can now take anti-depressants, mood stabilizers, what have you to block a good amount of the pain of feeling, at the expense of doing just that, severing yourself from your own emotions. People on meds do commonly report feeling numb and emotionless. "Chemical imbalance." What they're really saying is that you have a disposition, the tendency, to predominant unhappiness. Detrimental to yourself and others. So you must artificially check your emotional lows (and highs) and re-condition yourself to manageable (acceptable) levels. But you can never "re-condition" it away.
Of course, I'm aware that life can be overwhelmingly good, too. But my point is about fate. Necessity. Somehow, I think, we have to come to terms with the fact that we are all fated to go through pain, anger, confusion, frustration, sadness, i.e. formidable unpleasantness, over and over, again and again, that we do not have the control our realist, individualistic, classically liberal ideology says we have. In America, in general, we strongly recognize in ourselves, through the cultural mirror of ideology, the rational subject, unbridled autonomy ("Be anything you want to be!" / "Land of opportunity!" / "You have the power to change anything!"), individuality, independence, and unique identity. But this is a mis-recognition of what we really are, and of the real conditions of life and living. A set-up for disappointment and an impediment to understanding.
We cannot simply free ourselves of the bad, i.e. ugly emotions and life's tragedies. We cannot simply change our mind or alter our perceptions about life's tragedies. We cannot be consoled by reason either. In fact, we know that it is often useless to say/think "Well, if I had only done such and such, this wouldn't have happened. Next time, I'll avoid it all." It can frustrate us forever. We must often just accept it. And simply making ourselves feel better (or, not as bad) about tragedy through perceptual reconditioning only ever works, in my experience, to avoid bad feelings and never really helps one reach a better understanding. But the bad--pain and suffering--are just as much a part of living as the good, and will always be. Of necessity. Did you forget? We are all fated to die. And we must live with this knowledge, or be lucky enough not to think about it, or perhaps have the good fortune to understand something of death (though nothing of the power to change it). And so it's all very tragic, isn't it?
But tragedy, since the Ancient Greeks (see: Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, etc.), has also been a major source of enlightenment, wisdom, and meaning, in addition to distress.
There is something to the study of tragedy that I think can help me reach a meaningful understanding of the human condition and cope with life in a way that is not mere avoidance or false hope or quick and easy rationalization of life's tragedies, but an honest appraisal of them.
In my view, there is a challenge to not become so hardened and bitter towards life that you resign from creativity, and wonder, and from putting yourself out there to confront the world.
To live.
But this is all kind of bullshit isn't it? It's all just varying levels of sophisticated rationalization. What is not--poorly constructed or otherwise--a rationalization?
Tragic.
To be frustrated, angry, confused, this is nothing new in life. Yet these emotions continue to surprise us. And the potency of pain never wears away. It bites just as hard or harder each time. Thinking "Oh, I've felt this before..." does nothing to lessen the hit. Familiarity with feeling does not diminish its impact.
Yes, we can now take anti-depressants, mood stabilizers, what have you to block a good amount of the pain of feeling, at the expense of doing just that, severing yourself from your own emotions. People on meds do commonly report feeling numb and emotionless. "Chemical imbalance." What they're really saying is that you have a disposition, the tendency, to predominant unhappiness. Detrimental to yourself and others. So you must artificially check your emotional lows (and highs) and re-condition yourself to manageable (acceptable) levels. But you can never "re-condition" it away.
Of course, I'm aware that life can be overwhelmingly good, too. But my point is about fate. Necessity. Somehow, I think, we have to come to terms with the fact that we are all fated to go through pain, anger, confusion, frustration, sadness, i.e. formidable unpleasantness, over and over, again and again, that we do not have the control our realist, individualistic, classically liberal ideology says we have. In America, in general, we strongly recognize in ourselves, through the cultural mirror of ideology, the rational subject, unbridled autonomy ("Be anything you want to be!" / "Land of opportunity!" / "You have the power to change anything!"), individuality, independence, and unique identity. But this is a mis-recognition of what we really are, and of the real conditions of life and living. A set-up for disappointment and an impediment to understanding.
We cannot simply free ourselves of the bad, i.e. ugly emotions and life's tragedies. We cannot simply change our mind or alter our perceptions about life's tragedies. We cannot be consoled by reason either. In fact, we know that it is often useless to say/think "Well, if I had only done such and such, this wouldn't have happened. Next time, I'll avoid it all." It can frustrate us forever. We must often just accept it. And simply making ourselves feel better (or, not as bad) about tragedy through perceptual reconditioning only ever works, in my experience, to avoid bad feelings and never really helps one reach a better understanding. But the bad--pain and suffering--are just as much a part of living as the good, and will always be. Of necessity. Did you forget? We are all fated to die. And we must live with this knowledge, or be lucky enough not to think about it, or perhaps have the good fortune to understand something of death (though nothing of the power to change it). And so it's all very tragic, isn't it?
But tragedy, since the Ancient Greeks (see: Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, etc.), has also been a major source of enlightenment, wisdom, and meaning, in addition to distress.
There is something to the study of tragedy that I think can help me reach a meaningful understanding of the human condition and cope with life in a way that is not mere avoidance or false hope or quick and easy rationalization of life's tragedies, but an honest appraisal of them.
In my view, there is a challenge to not become so hardened and bitter towards life that you resign from creativity, and wonder, and from putting yourself out there to confront the world.
To live.
But this is all kind of bullshit isn't it? It's all just varying levels of sophisticated rationalization. What is not--poorly constructed or otherwise--a rationalization?
Tragic.
Friday, November 6, 2009
choosing a career
From "The Point of Departure, Chapter 5: The Long Walk"
What it all comes down to IMO is the "for the sake of..." What is all this productivity for the sake of?
Calculated optimization doesn't exactly leave a lot of room for people to reflect, to dwell, to think slowly. In fact, we often retreat into our busy lives to avoid thinking about something or other that bothers us. Our lives hum at a pace that makes it difficult to dwell and spend a lot of time thinking deeply about ourselves and the world. I resent that. Especially now that I am scrambling to complete law school applications, hoping that, since I have no idea what I want, a law degree will afford me more time and more options.
I needed to free my mind to do what I had never done before—figure out what I really wanted from my career—but I had spent too long concentrating on projects that required intensive analytical thinking without any personal involvement. I found that I couldn’t just shut down the logic and dream for a while.Our society just isn't built so that we can all take the time to figure out what we really want in life. It is so essential we maintain some expected level of productivity. Sometimes I get the feeling that I am a package moving through a production line. Especially in college I've made myself so busy with chasing "success" that to stop and rethink the idea of success is to lose ground in getting it. The day-to-day is a constant barrage of email, schoolwork, DEADLINES. One random obligation after the next is how life feels sometimes. Like you said, sometimes you have to reclaim your life because we often revert to autopilot in the face of routine expectations. We live in a system that aims to maximize time, output, profit. We are trained to quantify, calculate, reason. We are told that we must be productive.
What it all comes down to IMO is the "for the sake of..." What is all this productivity for the sake of?
Calculated optimization doesn't exactly leave a lot of room for people to reflect, to dwell, to think slowly. In fact, we often retreat into our busy lives to avoid thinking about something or other that bothers us. Our lives hum at a pace that makes it difficult to dwell and spend a lot of time thinking deeply about ourselves and the world. I resent that. Especially now that I am scrambling to complete law school applications, hoping that, since I have no idea what I want, a law degree will afford me more time and more options.
Monday, November 2, 2009
pessimism / optimism
Is the world a good place? Does it want us to be happy? Or is it a horrible place where we can only do our best to battle or avoid its "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune"?
People don't really have any business thinking that the world thinks, much less that it thinks about them. I try not to moralize the world.
Somehow we have the (mis)fortune of being materially configured such that we (1) have minds and (2) experience suffering, elation, hate, and desire in a world that is utterly unaware of itself and lacks all capacity to feel.
It's just a category error to ascribe any kind of mind or morality to the world. If you expect the world to be nice, you will die thinking it hates you -- or else you will develop rationalizations for why you must be "tested" in such horrible ways. But, having lost all expectation that the world regards you at all in any manner, the issue becomes a non-issue and you are free to get on with things, or do whatever it is you do to cope.
Even if hell exists and we're in it, hell itself does not punish. It can be punishment, but cannot punish. Punishment is deliberate -- only by conscious design or purpose. The world is indifferent. It doesn't have a mind to mind us -- much less punish us.
The world is a giant operant conditioning chamber complete with random reinforcement and certain death, and as a species we face extinction or evolution, a fate that is, I'd say, largely out of our control. That much is certain.
Bottom line is: A bit of pessimism might be a call to action, but too much is completely disabling.
"Antonio Gramsci famously called for 'pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will': the one the spur to action, the other the resilience to believe that such action will result in meaningful change even in the face of adversity."
People don't really have any business thinking that the world thinks, much less that it thinks about them. I try not to moralize the world.
Somehow we have the (mis)fortune of being materially configured such that we (1) have minds and (2) experience suffering, elation, hate, and desire in a world that is utterly unaware of itself and lacks all capacity to feel.
It's just a category error to ascribe any kind of mind or morality to the world. If you expect the world to be nice, you will die thinking it hates you -- or else you will develop rationalizations for why you must be "tested" in such horrible ways. But, having lost all expectation that the world regards you at all in any manner, the issue becomes a non-issue and you are free to get on with things, or do whatever it is you do to cope.
Even if hell exists and we're in it, hell itself does not punish. It can be punishment, but cannot punish. Punishment is deliberate -- only by conscious design or purpose. The world is indifferent. It doesn't have a mind to mind us -- much less punish us.
The world is a giant operant conditioning chamber complete with random reinforcement and certain death, and as a species we face extinction or evolution, a fate that is, I'd say, largely out of our control. That much is certain.
Bottom line is: A bit of pessimism might be a call to action, but too much is completely disabling.
"Antonio Gramsci famously called for 'pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will': the one the spur to action, the other the resilience to believe that such action will result in meaningful change even in the face of adversity."
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