Musings
by Roedy Green ©1996-2008 Canadian Mind Products
These are random thoughts, that don’t
fit anywhere else. Perhaps some day I may develop some of them into full blown
essays. I hope they work both as Deep ThoughtTM humour, and sometimes
to prang your brain into thinking afresh.
Humiliation Rituals
Have you noticed how humiliation has become the national sport of America? Some
examples include:
- Donald Trump and “You’re fired!”.
- American Idol where the week’s loser is publicly shamed then kicked off
the show with the camera glued to his face to catch every nuance of distress.
- The Jerry Springer Show where couples tell the nation every embarrassing fact (or
fiction) they can come up with about their ex.
- The Maury Pauvich Show where young women are humiliated when their promiscuity
is exposed in detail to the nation as DNA test after DNA test fails to find the
father of their child.
- The frequent use of the terms kick ass and kick butt.
- Giving college students ten times more work than they can possibly complete,
then shaming those who crack under the pressure and drop out.
- America invades tiny third world countries and grinds them under its heel.
Forgetfulness of Money
What did people do before the invention of money? They tracked who had done whom
a favour. They made allowance for disability and unusual capability to
contribute. In general, people helped each other, unless they couldn’t.
Everyone knew how much each was contributing and and how much each was consuming,
and used social pressure to keep this in reasonable balance. People did not move
far from where they were born, so everyone knew everyone else quite well. There
was no way to pull a dirty trick or to do an unusually good turn without
everyone knowing about it. Reputation was thus more important then than today.
The immense convenience of the invention of money allowed even total strangers
to safely do business. When a man walks into a country club and asks to join,
money erases the history how he came by it. He may be a faith healer, swindler,
gambler, speculator, monopolist, advertising executive, embezzler, Ken Lay, Dick
Cheney, Conrad Black, drug dealer, arms dealer, thief, bribe taker, blackmailer
etc. someone who came by the money without providing a service to others. Or he
made have toiled producing food, goods, services, inventing, entertaining,
managing in any one of millions of ways of serving his fellow beings or his
planet. What is most peculiar is even when we know how a person came by his
money, we tend to treat all equally, honouring the wealthy crooks with just as
much respect as the wealthy Nobel prize winners. Before the invention of money,
we would have ostracised the crooks, not idolised them.
Mosquitos
From the point of view of a mosquito, the universe is a banquet laid out by God
for their exclusive use. The sole purpose of humans is to supply blood to
mosquitos. They are much like Nazis or Americans who imagine planet earth’s
resources are for their exclusive use and they have the right to take them by
force or treachery from anyone.
Desecrating Graves
On 2008-04-26, somebody wrote the letters FLQ (Front
de libération du Québec) the name of a defunct separatist group,
on the mausoleum of Pierre Trudeau, a former prime minister of Canada. The
country is up in arms. I find this a gross overreaction, ironically giving the
vandal just what he wanted. Had the vandal written this on Mr. Trudeau’s
door while Trudeau were still alive, it would not even have made the local
papers. There is weird superstition that insulting the dead is somehow more
hurtful than insulting the living. Nobody felt the least compulsion to refrain
from insulting or criticising Mr. Trudeau while he was alive. In a similar way,
Americans were far more upset that the Iraqi resistance dragged the corpses of
American soldiers behind a truck than had the Iraqis done so while the soldiers
were still alive. A number of people threatened to kill me when I criticised the
actions of Canadian soldiers killed in Afghanistan. Yet they are only mildly
disgruntled when I criticise the actions of living ones. It does not seem to
matter that the dead soldiers never even heard my condemnation of their deeds.
Dead people are no more saintly than living ones. It is a goofy Kristian
superstition that the dead feel pain both physical and emotional and require
special protection we don’t extend to the living.
If you are Dumped
Especially if you have issues with the abandonment lifetrap,
likely the most painful thing that will ever happen to you in your life is you
will be dumped suddenly. Oddly, in your entire education, your teachers never
spent so much as an hour on how to deal with this blow. Here is a crash course:
- Getting dumped happens to nearly everyone. It is just others handle it better
than you and are better at concealing their hurt.
- Don’t expect others to be particularly solicitous. To them, the dumper’s
flaws are blatantly obvious. They don’t feel your insane attraction. To
everyone else, the solution is obvious, move on; forget the past. The dumper is
not worth wasting any more emotional energy on.
- No matter how attractive the person who dumped you appears to you now, they are
not the only person for you.
- You probably feel totally blindsided. With time, you will gradually recognise
the many forewarnings they gave you.
- The dumper had mixed feelings about leaving you. That is why they had to
convince themselves you were an ogre, to cement their resolve.
- The dumper is not your one and only true love. Your true love would not
treat you that badly.
- When someone tells you they hate asparagus, does that provide information about
them or about asparagus? When your lover dumps you and says they hate you with a
ferocious intensity and always have, is that an accurate, unbiased evaluation of
you and your future relationship potential with all others? Of course not! It is
a heat-of-the-moment venting.
- Before you get involved with someone, find out if they make a habit of suddenly
cutting off old lovers, friends or acquaintances. If they do, you will
eventually be on the list.
- A dumper is someone too immature to take the time to dissolve a relationship
gracefully, with consideration for the feelings of all concerned. It requires
kindness and patience. Being dumped is a bit like taking a spoonful of oatmeal
in the eye flung by a two-year old. Don’t take it seriously!!!
- Watch the Jerry Springer, Steve Wilkos, Montel Williams and Maury Povich daytime
trashy TV shows. You will see dumpers from hell beating up on exes who usually
do not deserve such abuse. You don’t deserve it either. Note how in every
case the dumpee is well to be rid of such a shrew/slut/bully/sadist. The same
applies to you!
Sci Fi Anomalies
Science fiction so often jars me with its logical inconsistency. For example:
- On Star Hunter, the holographic communications have more
interference than ’50s TV through rabbit ears.
- On Star Trek Next Generation, the new species they encounter always
use compatible cell-phones and speak 20th century American English.
- On the original Star Trek, the advanced communication system did
not include a caller id feature.
- The replicators can’t create spare parts for the engines or medicines.
- Fireballs from explosions move in slow motion making it possible to outrun them.
- In Star Wars, no one has yet invented automatic target lockon, or
computer controlled navigation.
- Humans, a recently evolved intelligent species, are always able to outsmart any
other species they encounter.
- When Spock announces a probability of survival to 4 decimal places, no matter
how close to 0, you know all the regular actors will survive intact for the next
episode or sequel.
Deja Vu
I am astounded how rapidly technology advanced once the notion of it got started.
Even ancient societies seemed to rapidly develop such technologies as astronomy
and masonry. It looks as if our technological civilisation will self-destruct
within a another hundred years. Technology seems like a century plant that lies
dormant and then every once in many, many decades blooms for a night. This led
me to wonder if a technological civilisation like ours, with an understanding of
quantum mechanics and electronics, has ever evolved then quickly self-destructed,
so thoroughly that it erased its tracks. I have seen some tantalising hints in
global mythology. I asked a paleontologist friend what paleontologists far in
the future might find remaining of our civilisation to mark its passing. She
replied “bricks”.
Relative Cosmetology
Other than the Geishas of early Japan, there is a group that engages in tooth darkening
cosmetology. They treat their teeth with a scalding hot dark brown dye up to ten
times a day. Some resort to burning the brown leaves of a toxic plant and
inhaling the sticky tars to stain their teeth. This tribe are commonly known as
Americans.
The Cosmic Etch-A-Sketch
The history of life on earth is like a cosmic Etch-A-Sketch. Life doodles theme
and variations in abundance, then something comes to shake the earth to all but
erase the profusion, be it an astroid hitting, or a species too intelligent for
its own good. Then, after a brief recovery period of 10 million years or so, it
starts doodling in earnest again, but with slightly less exuberance than before.
We arrogant humans imagine the that extinction of man is synonymous with the
extinction of life.
The Devolution of Competition
“Ecosystems that have not been disturbed for long periods of time (whether
by humans or natural disasters) tend to read a state of dynamic equilibrium
which ecologists call a climax phase, meaning that
organisms have adapted themselves to one another in such a way as to avoid
direct competition, to keep energy flow-through to a minimum, and to recycle
energy flow and nutrients as completely as possible. They have formed, to use an
anthropomorphic term, a community.”
~ Richard Heinberg
 |
recommend book⇒Party’s Over: Oil, War, and the Fate of Industrial Societies |
| | paperback |
|---|
| ISBN10: | 0-86571-529-7 |
|---|
| ISBN13: | 978-0-86571-529-5 |
|---|
| publisher: | New Society Publishers |
|---|
| published: | 2005-06-01 |
|---|
| by: | Richard Heinberg |
|---|
| Predicting chaos unless the U.S. — the world’s foremost oil consumer — is willing to join with other countries to implement a global program of resource conservation and sharing, he also recommends a “managed collapse”, that might make way for a slower-paced, low-energy, sustainable society in the future. website. The opening chapters of the book give a lucid, simple, but not simplistic recap of the basic physics, biology, history and ecology you need to know as background to understand the energy crunch. When I was reading this section, it dawned on me that most Americans are completely ignorant of this basic science. That is why they approach the energy and global warming problem is such a superstitious and irrational way. |
|
In
other words, animals over time learn to avoid direct competition, because
competing wastes too much energy. Animals evolve to avoid competition by
specialising to stay out of each others’s way. In a similar way, bloody
battles for mates eventually evolve into dancing competitions. Even human
executives do this. Competition between corporations gradually tends over time
to devolve into informal co-operation and price fixing and only ritual
competitivness. Competition in a capitalist system must be fostered. It does not
maintain itself naturally.
 |
recommend book⇒Evolution of Cooperation |
| | paperback |
|---|
| ISBN10: | 0-14-012495-0 |
|---|
| ISBN13: | 978-0-14-012495-8 |
|---|
| publisher: | Penguin |
|---|
| published: | 1990-04-26 |
|---|
| by: | Robert M. Axelrod |
|---|
| Using computer modeling Axelrod discovers the power of a simple tit for tat strategy in dealing with others. He also discovers the mathematical conditions under which people co-operate, collude, compete, aid each other or refuse to offer reasonable assistance. He also explains the mathematics of why corporations tend toward price-fixing and other co-operative behaviour with their competitors. |
|
Atrocities
The atrocities of the Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan are nothing new. They
are a direct consequence of imbalance of power. Americans overwhelm their
victims in technology and wealth. That power necessarily corrupts. Humans, not
just Americans, are hard wired to abuse excessive power over others. It took 500
years for the atrocities of the Spanish Conquistadors to become widely known.
Spaniards, Nazis, Russians, Americans… like all humans, are deeply in
denial of their own atrocities. They work hard to keep them hidden and to attack
those who expose them.
“The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by
his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them.”
~ George Orwell
War as a Game
When animals fight, it is over territory. They also have ritual battles to
determine whose genes will sire the next generation, but rarely are the
combatants seriously injured. When human leaders fight, it is over territory,
natural resources and national prestige. When ordinary humans fight it is much
like a football game. They fight to the death simply because their side is
fighting. They root for the home team, no matter how badly the home team has
behaved. Even Nazi mothers were proud of their sons. Even the mothers of serial
killers (both civilian and military) insist that their sons are innocent of any
wrongdoing. In humans, team loyalty nearly always trumps justice.
Unscrupulous leaders like John McCain, Dick Cheney and George Bush exploit this
naivety and urge their fellows on to greater illegal mayhem, simply for national
pride and the supposed shame of losing/withdrawing/calling off the attack. They
trick their fellows into expensive wars, with no prizes to be gained from
pursuing them. McCain, Cheney, Bush and their backers reap hundreds of billions
in war profits. Their dupes reap a lifetime of sorrow and guilt.
“The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by
his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them.”
~ George Orwell
Respect
It quite enough to expect that we tolerate each other and our various
customs. It is wrong to demand we pretend to respect each other’s
delusions, which includes all religions and cults.
Naming
How could you name children in a gender-equal way? In Canada where I live, a
child receives the surname of his or her father. In Iceland, a child receives
the surname of his or her mother. In old Norse, a child received the surname of
his father’s given name, e.g. Lief Eric’s-son. Politically correct
couples try to solve the problem by concatenating the mother and father’s
surnames, e.g. Blumé-Temoin This solution won’ work for successive
generations since the length of surnames would double with each generation. So
here is my proposed solution modeled on the Spanish convention. When a person
marries, they acquire a second surname. So, for example, when Mary Smith marries
John Jones, she becomes Mary Smith de Jones, and he become John Jones de Smith.
A female child takes the surname of her mother, e.g. Smith. A male child the
surname of his father, e.g. Jones. If the father is unknown, a male child takes
the surname of his mother. The naming system parallels the way it is possible to
trace the purely matrilineal line, mother of mother of mother, or the pure
patrilineal line using DNA, but it much harder to trace the mixed ancestors.
Nostalgia
Scientists tell us they are on the brink of extending life to 200+ years. I don’t
think I could bear it. The nostaglia would be far too intense. Actuaries tell us
that even with medical technologly allowing an infinite lifespan, the average
age of death would be only 200 — from death by misadventure. As a result,
we would become too fanatically concerned with safety to enjoy our lives,
putting on helmets to climb the stairs.
Fairness
Life is fundamentally unfair. Some people are better looking, healthier and
wealthier even when they put no more effort into it than anyone else. Others
have to bear poverty, ill health, deformity, disease or minority status through
no fault of their own. You can make yourself unnecessarily miserable or even
crazy if you deny this fundamental fact of life. Christians are wont to denial
on the grounds of wishful thinking or logical consistency — how could a
loving God possibly have created such an unfair universe? Hindus rationalise it
with their notion of reincarnation. Christians imagine misfortune is caused by
God punishing secret sins. Acknowledging the unfairness is not to say you accept
it or approve of it. You can’t do anything about a problem until you stop
pretending it does not exist.
Industriousness
Before the industrial revolution, man depended on manual labour for agriculture.
Everyone had to work hard from dawn till dark, or people would literally starve
to death. Industrious was prized at the most important virtue. Sloth and
idleness were serious sins. Today we still highly value industriousness.
Conservatives still advocate leaving to die those who are not sufficiently
productive. We reward with billion dollar salaries the CEOs whose companies most
industriously produce goods, mine minerals, consume energy, promote consumption,
gobble resources, pollute the air, soil and water, erode the soil, log and pave
the forests, pump greenhouse gasses into the air, and that holiest of all
activities — “stimulate” the economy (i.e. increase optional
consumption). We most admire the rich and famous who excel at flamboyant, novel
and conspicuous waste. The planet is reeling from the onslaught of these type A
individuals.
Oops, maybe industriousness is not such a virtue any more.
A Tibetan and an Amazon river basin tribesman were each asked what they thought
of western civilisation. Oddly, they gave identical answers. They replied, “What
is the matter with your women? They are supposed to stop the men. Everyone knows
when you let men cut down trees, they don’t know when to stop.”
We need new values.
- It is good to leave a light ecological footprint.
- It good to live comfortably consuming the least amount energy and goods.
- It is good to discourage others from wasteful habits.
We need to start throwing virtual tomatoes at the dinosaurs who are still
frantically working hard to destroy the planet.
Idea Contagion
I have often wondered how a truly nutty idea like Naziism, Christianity or
fanatical Islam can take hold of a population. Notice that such ideas get little
traction in areas where there are only a few adherents. Yet when the idea
reaches critical mass, it takes over the entire population, even including
people who ought to know better. Man has sheep genes. He does not like to be at
odds with his fellows in his beliefs.
Small Minded Cruelty
There is something so petty, small-minded and cruel about a society that forbids
sex only to those in the stage of life who want it most badly.
Ambiguity
English is so ambiguous, e.g. “I don’t want a car.” can have
at least five meanings:
no current need
I don’t want a taxi just now. I am not going anywhere.no need
I live on an tiny island. What on earth would I do with a car?no lack
I don’t want for a car. I am fully satisfied in the car department. I have
3 vehicles already.would prefer something else
Dear sugar daddy, I want diamonds, not a Rolls.active rejection
I detest cars. They pollute and the repair people are all crooks. I wouldn’t
take one if you gave it to me.
Since I think in English, this muddied ambiguity infects my thinking too. It is
not necessarily clear even to myself when I say “I don’t want a car.”.
Intuition
“Anyone not shocked by quantum mechanics has not yet understood it.”
~ Niels Bohr
Many people seem to think our scientific theories of the very small and very
large cannot be true because our intuition rejects them as absurd. Ask the
question the other way around. Why does our intuition work so well on the mid
size? We evolved in a 3D, mid-sized world, dominated by a tiny frequency band of
sunlight and nasty predators. We needed a brain with computational shortcuts for
dealing with it. We never had the need to evolve the intuition “modules”
to deal instantly with a broader world, the quantum small, the cosmic large or
4D. We can deal with them, but only with the ponderous tools of mathematics.
Conceivably within a century, you might be able to get such intuition modules
installed. This could lead to a period of rapid breakthrough since the behaviour
of the mico and macroscropic universe would become obvious.
Impotence
I think most people give up too easily to work for world peace, end world hunger
or save the environment because they have preposterously high expectations. They
imagine if they work for a few days then the world should noticeably
change, as if they were some sort of deity. You are one of 6 billion people. If
you manage to have any more than 1/6,000,000,000 of the total human effect on
how the planet runs, you are doing better than average. Pat yourself on the back,
even if you can’t see the effect.
“Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you
do it.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
The oceans were created one raindrop at a time. The pyramids were built one
stone at a time. Be glad there are so many millions of others working on your
project too so that the end result will be far more magnificent than anything
you could possibly have accomplished alone.
“It’s the action, not the fruit of the action, that’s
important. You have to do the right thing. It may not be in your power, may not
be in your time, that there’ll be any fruit. But that doesn’t mean
you stop doing the right thing. You may never know what results come from your
action. But if you do nothing, there will be no result.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
Admiring Bodies
Admiring bodies is like admiring butterflies or flowers. You must do it purely
for the moment.
Enjoyment
Here are three tricks to enjoying your life:
- Learn to get off on little things, like the pleasant feeling of a brush on your
scalp, or warm water on your back in the bath.
- Do what you like doing. So many people slave away at pointless jobs they detest.
- When trivial stuff upsets you, ask yourself, if we were about to be nuked in 10
minutes, would this matter? Where does this fit in the hierarchy of cosmic
significance?
Wealth
I am continually baffled why people who hog 500 times the normal size of slice
of the world resource pie are considered admirable. Surely they should be
ostracised as gluttons, thieves or con men. There is no way anyone
deserves a 500 times bigger slice of the pie than others. There is no
conceivable amount of labour they could perform to justify that. When someone
accumulates that kind of money, they had to cheat. They either got away
with some criminal act such as theft, gouging, confidence games or monopoly or
they found some legal loophole in the monetary system to trick others into
giving without compensating return.
Even worse, when these people commit conspicuous consumption or conspicuous
waste, they are committing an environmental crime; they are deliberately
despoiling the environment. When they overconsume, others have to go without.
What is admirable about that? Even at the height of the famine in 1985,
Ethiopian farmers were growing strawberries for the breakfast tables of the
world’s wealthy.
UFOs
I find it strange when people tell me they don’t believe in UFOs (Unidentified
Flying Objects). What do they believe? That every flying object
has been identified? That every flying object not identified was a hallucination?
That there are no new types of flying objects to be discovered? Surely not.
Last Days
Unless you die suddenly of a heart attack, you will probably end your days in
bed unable to do anything much but read or watch TV. Yet many people paddle
furiously all their lives to amass a fortune they won’t ever need. You won’t
have any need at all for a big house, a big car, lavish meals, a private jet or
jewelry. Perhaps it would make more sense to enjoy life with all its varied
activities while you still have your health, especially exploratory travel.
Cash Back
I avoid any company that offers me cash back. They are
trying to pull a fast one, and this is just the first of many ways they will
attempt to screw me. A cash back scheme has six disadvantages:
- You pay more sales tax than had they just reduced the price.
- When you have to mail in the rebate request, you find you need copies of
receipts, packing boxes, and anything they can think of you might have discarded
to void the offer.
- Most of the time the company refuses to pay the rebate, claiming it is expired.
They will just sit on your application for 6 months to make sure.
- You won’t get your money until many months later if ever.
- They are counting on the process of getting your rebate will be so onerous you
won’t bother.
- The handling costs the company much more than just reducing the price. They are
screwing you out of that difference. This is also true of preferred customer
cards that add to processing costs and make checkout lines longer.
Leadership
Society overvalues leadership. A society of egotists each dead set on dragging
everyone along their way won’t get anywhere. On the other paw, a
society of sheep is vulnerable to an evil or incompetent leader, like Hitler or
Bush, whom they blindly follow simply because he is the designated leader. What
you need are people who will fully co-operate so long as the leader is going in
roughly the right direction, but who will dig in their heels when they believe
he is taking them in a foolish direction. There is a superfluity of would-be
leaders motivated mainly by desire for limelight. The true power is in the
seconder, who selects the best approach and champions it.
Games
When baby animals play, it is obvious to us they are rehearsing adult activity.
It has a serious purpose. Likewise, when we arrange activities for young humans,
we are teaching them to rehearse adult activities, for example:
- dolls: care of children.
- board games: strategy, keeping track of money.
- basketball: teamwork
- music videos: sexual flirtation
- listening to music: drugs, crime
- hockey: fighting, revenge
- video games: killing, raping, stealing
- football: war, turning an arbitrary goal into a life or death pursuit.
I am surprised parents are so careless about the lessons they give their
children.
9/10 Empty
Have you ever opened a package to discover it was 9/10 empty. Why did the
manufacturer do that?
- To deceive you into thinking you were getting more product that you were.
- To make the product take up more shelf space so that you would me more likely to
notice it.
- To provide more surface area on the package for advertising images.
Manufacturers continue these unethical and wasteful practices because they are
more competitive. They won’t stop to consider the ethical or environmental
effects until there are honest and frugal packaging laws. Such laws won’t
harm manufacturers, so long as there is a level playing field. Such laws will
actually make them more profitable since they won’t need to waste so much
money on excess packaging.
Hell
I have no experience with other life in other parts of the universe to compare.
Statistically, earth is probably just average. However, I can’t help but
feel in my gut that earth is one of the more hellish planets. What on earth
possesses us humans to do such things as:
- Refuse to allow those in unbearable suffering to die in peace in the manner they
wish. We would never dream of such cruelty to a terminally ill puppy.
- Kill, torture, maim, rape or steal from each other in war and claim we do it for
altruistic motives.
- Wage all out war on nature trying to kill off every last species. We happily
steal the food supply or habitat of any other species, even for the most
trifling convenience (e.g. for fashion).
- Fight to the death with each other over made up stories about an all-loving
deity.
- Honour military serial killers with medals and treat with utmost disdain those
who take pleasure from anything but the most humdrum sex.
- Claw each other for more wealth to the point of harming ourselves with
overconsumption, denying others life, and destroying the ecosystem that sustains
us all.
Perhaps it is for the best that we humans are destroying the ecosystem that
sustains us. Perhaps sacrificing even a whole planet is a worthwhile sacrifice
to prevent us humans from spreading like a cancer throughout the galaxy. Earth
will recover from the blow we inflicted in another 10 million years, an eye
blink in geological time. You could think of man as failing a difficult test,
one a species must pass before proving himself worthy to colonise space. He must
get into space without destroying his home world first.
Whipped
As a gay man, I feel sorry for straight men. They are so pathetically needy for
sex and the approval of women they will twist themselves into all manner of
unnatural shapes hoping women will approve. Unfortunately, most women don’t
like men the way they come out the box. They can’t stand men unless they
pretend to be tame, domestic and completely monogamous, quite unlike the way men
are naturally. They guilt trip them into thinking there is something wrong with
being male. Eventually a man who contorts himself this way rebels, and ends up
hating his female partner for tricking him into wasting his years as a mere
shadow of his authentic self. She is baffled. She had no idea of her
transforming power over him.
Maya Angelou
Maya Angelou has one of the great voices of the planet. It feels like warm water
poured over my back in the bath. Somehow just listening to her say ordinary
things with her beautiful precision restores my faith in humanity. A religious
person might explain it as like being in the presence of a saint. Some of the
other delightful voices include Barbara Jefford, Peter O’Toole, Michael
Yorke, James Earl Jones, Christopher Plummer, Sean Connery, Kelly LeBrock,
Leonard Cohen, Roberta Flack, Judy Collins, Felicity Kendal, Michael Caine and
Sebastian Spence.
Planetary Despair
Especially after viewing a documentary like What
A Way To Go: life at the end of empire it is hard not to despair at how our
fellow humans are so dead set on destroying the planet and with it all or nearly
all of human kind. Here are some ways to cushion the emotional blow:
- There are 6 billion people on earth. Properly your share of the enormous task of
saving planet earth is only 1/6 billionth of the job. Since most people are
deadbeats or actively evil, your share increases to perhaps 1 billionth of the
job. Do you think you can bear a burden that heavy?
- You don’t have to do everything. You can pick out tiny part of the problem.
Other people will handle the rest.
- The earth has had multiple mass extinctions in past. Life recovered after about
10 million years. That sounds a very long time to a human, but is not that much
in geologic time.
- Humans are just another animal. When locusts, lemmings or tent caterpillars
overpopulate and strip their environment, we don’t weep when their
populations crash back down to sustainable levels. We are mildly relieved. Why
should we react to a human population explosion and crash any differently? Look
at this not as a human, but from the perspective of all life on earth. Life will
give a collective gasp of relief when humans are humbled.
- Humans surpassed the sustainable population about the time of the American civil
war when the world population was 1 billion. The 5 billion we have added since
then have been only temporarily sustained by the cheap energy of non-renewable
fossil fuel.
- We expect far too much of our fellow humans. Even though humans can rationally
predict the consequences of their actions, they are still motivated by ancient
drives for power, sex, food, territory just like other animals. We humans are
incapable of acting in our own best interest, even when we are aware of what we
are doing to hurt ourselves. We get in trouble because our technology magnifies
our power to endlessly satisfy unslakable lusts. Imagine humans as monkeys
playing with guns, cars, explosives or an assembly line pumping out an endless
and overwhelming supply of bananas. Humans too, are driven by their standard
monkey motivations. It can be comic.
- Let us presume we are doomed. It truly is hopeless. We are all going to die, and
take most of the species of earth with us in any one of a dozen plausible
scenarios. In the meantime, will you feel better wallowing in despair or taking
action on the off chance it might make things better? I started gay lib back in
1969 when everyone was opposed to me, even the gays. People were so opposed that
about 300 of them called to shower me with abuse each day, and about three of
them each day threatened my life. (To put it in perspective, Martin Luther King
got 40 death threats a day.) I did it just because it felt right to protest the
injustice. Never in my wildest dreams did I think my actions would make any
difference. Yet within two years we had the first gay rights legislation. You
never know. People are herd animals. They can turn on a dime, even after
centuries of bovine stupidity.
“Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you
do it.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
- Many years ago I asked my Dad why he sometimes bought lottery tickets. I said, “Surely
you now the exected value of the ticket is less than half the ticket price. On
average you lose money.” He replied that he did not see lottery tickets as
an investment, but as entertainment. With the ticket you could imagine how fun
it would be to win. Without a ticket you could not. Saving the world works the
same way.
- There was once a priest who prayed every day for 50 years to win the lottery. He
wailed at God that an upright fellow such as he surely deserved the prize. God
in frustration finally thundered back, “You could at least have made it a
little easier for me by buying a ticket.” Saving the world works the same
way. And I mean saving it literally, preventing its utter destruction.
- Scientists tell us there are trillions of planets in the universe. Weeping over
the failure of earth to thrive is like gnashing over your teeth over the failure
of a single dandelion seedling.
“One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total
extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly.”
~ Woody Allen
Good Deeds
The cleanest, easiest high is doing something nice for someone else. Given how
little effort is required, how intensely pleasant the high is, and how there is
no hangover, just a nice glow that can last for years, it is amazing how rarely
people use this method purely to make themselves feel good.
Learning Tools
Since children are sponges absorbing new behaviours from whatever they see, you
can consider anything you expose them to as a learning tool. There is no such
thing as simple entertainment. What are you intending to teach them when you
give them a video game like Microsoft Halo or Grand Theft Auto or taking them to
see a preacher milking the crowd by threatening hellfire or taking them to a
movie like Death Wish?
Freedom
The word freedom means the right to conduct your own private affairs
without outside meddling and concomitantly allowing others to do things, that
don’t concern you, that you don’t like, without interference.
Americans use the word quite differently. They imagine people are free only when
the think like Americans, believe in Jesus and work primarily for American
interests.
Conformity
People happily rebel in ways that don’t matter. For example they will wear
a ring in their tongue, get a tattoo, shave their head, design an eccentric
beard, or wear some highly uncomfortable clothing. They will refuse to
standardize on computer function keys or MIME
types. They will refuse to conform to naming
conventions with programming computers. Yet when it comes to rebelling in a
way that matters e.g. expressing unpopular religious or political beliefs,
people turn into perfect sheep. They are too afraid to say what is in their
hearts, even when what they have to say is blindingly obvious, e.g. that war is
bad for children and other living things or that the rich are screwing the poor.
The Great Error
Nothing causes more suffering than this great error. A great love of your life
rejects you or dumps you. You are seduced by some of their positive qualities
into thinking they are the one, and now life cannot continue without them.
However, there were not your true love. Your true love would never treat
you that way. The dumper was an imposter.
Predictions
Like predictions in the bible, these predictions are undated. You can thus never
prove them wrong. At worst, you can have a false alarm.
- It will be mandatory to wear a helmet on public transportation.
- It will be illegal to drive cars on city streets for reasons of safety, speed,
fuel economy and traffic density. Cars will be driven by automation.
- Taxis will outnumber private vehicles for economic reasons. They don’t
need parking and they don’t lose value sitting in a garage rusting. They
work full time.
- China and the USA will hold a war in a hapless third country, ostensibly over
green house gas emissions and other pollutants. However, the actual reason will
be the usual excuse for war, economic hegemony.
Economics of Fashion
Consider how economics drives fashion. The general principle is whatever is
fashionable requires affluence. Fashion is primarily an affluence display. For
example, in cave man times being fat was in because food was hard to come by.
Consider the Rubenesque Venus statues of the period. Today, the poor balloon up
on Kraft Dinner, and wealthy require personal trainers and expensive diets of
fresh organic foods to stay slim. In India today, rich women still roll their
enormous bellies voluptuously, rubbing it in to the undernourished general
populace. In medieval times, a pasty complexion was in. Serfs were tanned from
field labour while wealthy women could stay inside and avoid such coarse labour.
Today the poor toil in sunless offices while the wealthy tan on Caribbean
beaches. In days when it took hours of servant labour to starch and iron your
clothes, wrinkles in clothes were a disgrace. Today they are in, since they
require more expensive natural fibres. In days when people wore their clothes
until they wore out, tattered clothes were shameful. Today they are in because
it takes so much labour to create the tattered look and new mass manufactured
clothes are so cheap. Diamonds and gold are preferred as personal decoration to
African beads, not because they are more colourful or beautiful, but simply
because they are rarer and hence more expensive. The results of plastic surgery
are bizarre: bloated pitted lips, wind swept faces, bug eyes…, yet
because the procedures are expensive and hence inaccessible to the average
citizen, the results are considered fashionable. Similarly expensive makeup and
nauseating perfumes prevail over pleasant inexpensive alternatives. Males
traditionally participated even more in fashion that women, though today women
seem to drive fashion. You saw men adopting digital watches when they first came
out and were very expensive. Now they are going back to less accurate, more
expensive analog watches, simply because everyone can now afford an accurate
digital watch. They will buy a pair of socks for five times the going rate
simply because of a bold designer logo that shouts “This guy is so rich he
can waste money on overpriced socks”.
Humanity’s Rites of Passage
Like a young man sent on a dangerous vision quest to prove his mettle to be
considered a man in the tribe, humanity is beset with four increasingly
difficult rites of passage.
- We have developed weapons terrible
enough to destroy all of humanity if not all higher life forms. We must
individually develop the wisdom not to use them.
- We are drastically altering the planet with our economic activities. We must co-operate
with everyone else on the planet to refrain from damaging the eco-systems and
causing massive including rapid climate
change.
- The earth reverses
magnetic polarity about every 200,000 years on average. The last time was
780,000 years ago. We are in the process of a flip right now. Though it is a
somewhat random event, most likely in about 300 more years, the earth’s
magnetic field will temporarily disappear, to be restored in about another 1000
years. So what you say? Who will even notice but a few boy scouts? The earth’s
magnetic field is protects us like a force field from cosmic radiation. We will
unprotected from particle bombardment from space and from the sun, causing
additional cancers and disruptions of satellite communications. To deal with
this lesser threat we will have the even more difficult task of co-operating
actively to deal with the problem.
- The resources of earth are finite. We must learn to share them fairly and to
avoid bearing more children than the planet can currently sustain. This requires
overcoming our deepest biological urge — to survive and populate
at the expense of others.
So we must pass from individual restraint, to passive collective co-operation,
to active collective co-operation, to overcoming our genetic nature —
quite a challenge.
“You do not have to change: survival is not mandatory.”
~ Dr. W. (William) Edwards Deming, on Overcoming
Resistance to Change
Punish The Crime
I often see a judge throwing the book at someone who has had an accident while
driving drunk. Similarly I see a judge harsh with someone who has an accident
because they did not properly maintain their vehicle. But the crime is not
having an accident. It is driving drunk or failing to maintain a vehicle.
Whether there is an accident is irrelevant. The punishment should be the same
for driving drunk whether or not there is an accident. Judges are too harsh with
those who have an accident and not harsh enough with those who don’t.
Gullibility
When people go to a David Copperfield magic show they will see the impossible.
Yet no one presumes a miracle was involved even if for the life of them they can’t
figure out any possible way Mr. Copperfield could have pulled the illusion off.
Yet when most people hear of some rather minor children’s magic, like
changing the colour of a liquid, third or fourth hand, even via anonymous
reporters, even when there are no details, even when the alleged magic happened
hundreds or thousands of years ago, they are absolutely certain a true miracle
occurred. Such is the immense power of wishful thinking.
Insurance
Insurance is deceptively advertised as if it magically protected you from harm.
It does no such thing. It merely gives you legal right to wrestle with the
insurance company for some money long after the unpleasant event. It would make
more sense to spend some money on prevention, e.g. air bags in your car, or a
high crash test safety rating vehicle, or having your house wiring and heating
updated. You might move away from an area prone to tsunamis, floods, wars,
earthquakes or industrial accidents. That will actually protect you from harm.
Chiropractors
I have often wondered why chiropractors, the people to correct bone alignment,
have a reputation for quackery. Here in BC where all manner of medicine is
covered by universal health insurance, chiropractors are excluded. No other type
of medicine can instantly relieve pain. Perhaps professional envy is the root.
Housework
Most people treat housework as drudgery. They postpone it and suffer the
consequences of living in dirt and less than ideal sanitation, getting a
reputation as a slob not to mention the Herculean task of getting the house
ready for guests. When they do it, all they can think about it what a waste of
time it is, and how they would rather be doing something else.
Instead, treat it as a game, where the goal is maximum efficiency — to
keep your place as clean as possible with the least effort. You constantly work
at finding ever more efficient ways to do things. This keeps your interest up. I
discovered that for example, by treating the kitchen floor as if it were a work
surface, and giving it a quick wipe with Lysol all purpose spray cleaner each
day, it never needs to be washed, and it is always sparkling clean, though I do
rinse it with water from time to time. This also keeps any dropped food from
being ground into the floor. I found that letting the dishes soak in a pan
outside the sink keeps the sink free for other uses. I found that oven cleaner
will instantly clean anything with baked on grease, not just ovens, especially
white ovenware. Experiment with different cleaning tools and chemicals to find
the ones optimal for each job. If you live with someone else, you will find they
automatically are less likely to leave messes than before.
Silicon Sociopaths
A sociopath is someone who carefully monitors his victim and does and says
whatever it takes to please them as a preliminary to manipulating them. He is
not constrained by morality, social convention or inhibition. This sounds much
like what we could expect from an artificially intelligent silicon companion.
Blind Obedience
The greatest of all sins is blind obedience. Without it, the power of an evil
man to cause harm is limited to killing perhaps 100 people. With even a million
blind followers, he can kill and torture by the tens of millions. Blind
obedience allows not particularly malicious men to commit the most hideous
atrocities, and feel profoundly virtuous about them.
Pornography
The elderly like to tsk tsk at the young over pornography because, even in
fantasy, they find it too absurd to imagine coupling with the perfect specimens
it portrays.
The Biggest Mistake Of My Life
I am telling you his story in the hopes it will help you avoid making the same
mistake. It cast a pall over my whole life, even bigger than contracting HIV. In
the early 70s I lived with my lover whom I was head over heels in love with. I
remember thinking to myself with a mild tinge of regret that I had reached the
pinnacle of happiness. It could not get any better than this. Then one day, out
of the blue, he told me that he hated me, had always hated me, had only
pretended to love me the last few years, and that I was so horrible that I
should never get involved with anyone else again. I made two errors:
- I assumed that since he knew me better than anyone, his assessment must be
accurate.
- I was well aware of my faults, but I was baffled that he could go instantly from
100% positive to 100% negative. I figured it required some extraordinary
explanation such as drugs, devil-worshipping cult or some sort of hypnotic
possession.
His personality change was so drastic I told myself that I should put my life on
hold until he returned to normal. I should dedicate my life to his recovery. I
should patiently wait for him to come back or later resume the same sort of
friendly relations I had with other ex’s. Unfortunately, with a couple of
exceptions, he refused all communication. I had to get all information on how he
was doing third hand.
I soon learned he had found someone else, but I still could not see why that
would explain his sudden change in attitude to me. In retrospect, I had seen him
dump friends suddenly for unknown reasons. I also discovered there was a drug
component.
My vigil went on for about a dozen years, then gradually dwindled in intensity
for the next twenty. However, I never again let myself trust anyone. I always
held back. It was like a constant note of sadness in my life. Later partners
were irritated knowing I was still pining for him. I had put so much pain into
this vigil, it was hard to give it up.
Oddly, watching the Jerry Springer Show was the most healing. I watched women
surprising their boyfriends or husbands with the news they were dumping them for
other men, then proceeded to humiliate and insult their old boyfriends on
national TV. It had never dawned on me this was anywhere near normal behaviour
for the human species.
I think the mechanism goes like this. The dumper feels guilty at leaving, so
decides to vilify the dumpee in her/his mind in order to justify it. It may also
be that the dumper has accumulated a pile of unexpressed resentments. They
finally get the courage to state them only after deciding to leave.
The important thing is, don’t pine! If your lover doesn’t
want you any more, you are not a good match. They won’t be happy even if
you do get back together. Move on!
Toilet Seats
Why is it women get upset if you leave the toilet seat up, but don’t mind
a bit if you leave the lid down?
I Am An Idea
“Sometimes the first duty of intelligent men is the restatement of the
obvious.”
~ George Orwell
We now know that you do not directly experience reality. In a manner something
like a computer’s, you process the little electrical signals coming up
your nerves into your brain. Your brain creates a dream/hallucination loosely
based on this digitally encoded information. Everything you subjectively
experience is an idea/dream/hallucination. So even when you think about yourself,
it is still just an idea. Thus, what you subjectively experience as “yourself”
is just an idea. It flits in and out of your consciousness just like any other
idea. I expound on this in my essay Experience
is a Hallucination.
Fruit Baskets
Why do we humans bring fruit baskets and flowers to people in hospital? A
primitive human has genetic programming that says “When I am deathly ill,
and food is scarce, it is best that I die and thus save food for my kin who will
carry on my genes. If I drag on, we will all end up dying.” To turn off
this programming, you must convince the subconscious of the ill person that it
is summer and food is abundant, so there is no need for his sacrifice, hence the
fruit basket and the flowers, which will work even if he does not eat the fruit.
The gifts also say “We would rather you lived; we feel in no danger from
you consuming food if you continue your life.”
Lotteries
Let us say you buy a $1 lottery ticket each month for a prize of $10 million. To
offer that prize, there must be about 20 million tickets sold each month. You
will win on average once every 1,666,667 years.
The age life on the earth is about 3.5 billion years. If you had been playing
since the first microorganisms formed, you would have won about 2100 times.
The age of the earth is about 4.5 billion years. If you had been playing since
the formation of the earth, you would have won about 2700 times.
The universe is 13.7 billion years old. If you had been playing since the dawn
of time, you would have won about 8220 times.
Kindness
The periods of peak happiness in my life occur under three conditions:
- I perform an act of kindness.
- Someone performs an act of kindness for me.
- I witness someone performing an act of kindness for another.
Scientists have discovered that serotonin levels increase in all three
situations, and also that immune systems strengthen. I makes me wonder why
people don’t seek out kindness with the same assiduousness they seek out
money, status, sex and excitement. It works much better and is some much easier
to achieve.
Get Goal Of War
The end goal of war is to force the other guy do
something he does not want to do, e.g.
- Stop attacking you.
- Hand over his land.
- Hand over his resources.
- Convert to your religion.
The means goal of war is to create as much suffering
as you can for the other guy, per dollar you spend, while avoiding creating even
more misery for yourself.
Commerce has a different ethic. Nobody signs a deal unless both parties believe
they are better off for it, even when one party is benefitting much more than
the other.
Grim Optimism
I spent a lot of time thinking about global problems, such as global warming,
overpopulation, pollution, soil erosion, racism, sexism, species extinction,
nuclear war, biowar, globalisation, runaway corporate power, poverty, George
Bush, torture and atrocities in America, Afghanistan and Iraq… It looks
as if humanity is determined to go extinct. We humans have the motivations of a
chimpanzee wired to the genius to destroy of an Einstein. It is a combination
that is causing our species to prepare for suicide by dozens of means.
I work as hard as I can, given my limited energy, on all fronts simultaneously.
It is hard to notice any beneficial effect at all. What is so frustrating is
there are so many well-funded people working diligently against me to promote
global warming, war, pollution, cruelty, greed, exploitation, overpopulation etc.
As you might expect, I become deeply depressed over this situation.
This is how I pull myself out of it. I go down to the beach, and look out over
the water toward Port Angeles. Then I imagine what this scene will look like
when man manages to wipe himself out, and possibly much of life on earth along
with him. The lights of Port Angeles will be gone, but the stars will be there,
exactly as before. The clouds will still there. The wind will be there, perhaps
whipping a lot harder. There will still be some rain and the ocean. Once in
earth’s history, the land was completely barren, and bit by bit plant life
colonised it. No matter how scorched, poisoned or denuded the continents, plants
will eventually work their patient miracle again. Life on earth has already
survived 30 mass extinctions that wiped out more than half the life on earth.
There many not be another technological species for a long while, but that is
not such a terrible thing. We humans sadistically tormented the earth and all
its creatures. We are one of the very few creatures who leave the environment
less inviting to our offspring than we found it.
However, I can’t help but notice that I too am a human with a chimp’s
motivations. I wish I could kill those who oppose me. I am deeply ashamed of
being a human, a member of a failed and insanely self-centered species.
I see only one plausible rescue, coming from artificial intelligence, smarter
than man, capable of saving us from our own stupidity. That’s why I have
put so much effort into the Java
glossary.
It is not nearly the Hail Mary you might imagine. I wrote a FORTRAN program
myself back in the 1970s for BC Hydro to design high voltage transmission lines
called Optow, that was more intelligent than humans. One day it was laughably
stupid. The next, with just a tiny bit more tinkering, it was 10% smarter than a
person, and instantly put 50 engineers with masters degrees and PhDs out of work.
 |
recommend book⇒The Age of Spiritual Machines : When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence |
| | paperback |
|---|
| ISBN10: | 0-14-028202-5 |
|---|
| ISBN13: | 978-0-14-028202-3 |
|---|
| publisher: | Penguin |
|---|
| published: | 2000-01-01 |
|---|
| by: | Raymond Kurzweil |
|---|
| A fascinating book giving the evidence why computers exceeding human intelligence are imminent. |
|
If
computers don’t rescue us, you can console yourself with this thought.
Humans are something like goats. They leave the environment in ruins. The sooner
humans go extinct, the better for planet earth. The fewer species will be lost
and the faster earth can recover.
Abstinence Education
If you watch the Maury Show,
you will see harpies screeching at men they have slept with and men shouting
back obscenities and insults. The women demand money to support their children.
The men contest that they are indeed the fathers.
I would imagine any impressionable boy viewing this spectacle would never want
to touch a girl, much less screw her, knowing in nine months she could turn into
such a fiend from hell, and he could be tied financially to this venom-spitting
hellcat for 20 years. If I had any choice in the matter I would stick to gay sex
or sex with very low risk for pregnancy.
Yet even the best abstinence education does not work. It actually increases risk
of HIV transmission. You have to teach people safe sex. You can’t contain
hormones, just direct them.
Crop Circles
I enjoyed a magical experience. I watched a documentary called Star
Dreams about crop circles. Much of it was just irritating, flakes spouting
pseudoscientific guff about vibrations, frequencies and matrices, but the
photographs taken from airplanes of the crop circles themselves were utterly
spellbinding. These are works of art with more appeal for me than anything I
have ever seen painted on canvas. Each one was so original and so perfect
without a needless stroke. The recent British crop circles are intricate jewels,
some 700 feet across. Some might almost be described as irridescent the way they
changed as you viewed them from different angles.
Just who is/are the artist(s)? Circa 1990, a couple of men claimed to have
created over 1000 of them in three months, but never demonstrated producing even
one. For many, this closed the mystery. My partner figures the artist is a team
of talented young people working for the British military testing out secret
technology. Others believe the designers are not human. The circles are well
above the quality of graffiti or pranks. Whomever is doing them is an artist of
the highest order. Just looking at them induces a mild euphoria. According to
that documentary, the crop circles appear suddenly in the middle of the night,
apparently in as little as five minutes, yet even though there have been over
ten thousand of them, no one has managed to photograph one being formed. One
other odd feature is the stalks are not broken, but bent, and the wheat or other
grain continues to grow unharmed. There is a new religion growing around them
believing them to be messages from a benign alien species.
I don’t know who made them. I am not about to make up my mind from only
one video made by true believers. However, as artistic works, they impressed the
heck out of me. There are not your grandfather’s crop circles. This is
something you want to see on a big screen.
Turbojam Scam
Turbojam.com advertises on TV
an exercise video. The announcer proclaims if you don’t lose up to 10
pounds and 25 cm (10 in)
you can request a refund. That of course is no guarantee at all. The only people
who qualify are those that lose more than 10 pounds and more than 25 cm (10 in).
If by some fluke that happened, the customer would have no reason to request a
refund. Even if the product caused you to gain 50 pounds, the guarantee would
still not apply since losing 0 pounds still counts as losing up to 10. So there
is no guarantee at all. Yet the ad stresses the no-risk guarantee over and over
and over as if it were real. Whenever you hear the phrase up to in an
advertisement, guaranteed they are trying to deceive you.
FOX sued in the supreme court for the right to make up the news. They argued and
won that it is entertainment and need not have any connection to reality. Yet
people, out of old habits, still watch FOX news imagining they are hearing some
approximation to the truth.
There was a time when scamming was the province of door to door salesmen and con
artists. Today it is standard business practice. Royal Roads business college
teaches students how to be unethical in business. There is no longer even a
pretense of honesty.
This is not all that new. I had my first taste of corporate scamming when I was
five and saved up fifty cents (four weeks allowance) for a submarine that “dives
and plunges” The picture on the back of the Kellogg’s cornflakes box
showed it to be at least a foot long producing a prodigious wake with two
astonished children in the background for scale. When it finally arrived it was
about four inches long, and did not “plunge” at all. It would tilt
on its side and emit a bubble like a tiny fart. Undaunted, some years later I
sent a dollar to Kellogg’s for a pumped water rocket that would go 100
feet in the air. This time they kept my dollar and said “Sorry, we don’t
deliver to Canada.” even though I got the offer off a box of Canadian
Kellog’s corn flakes. I still have not forgiven them. I always buy some
other brand.
Free Will
If you watch a movie, do the characters have free will? Of course not; every
frame is fixed in celluloid. Yet this does not become obvious until you watch
the movie a second time. When you first watch a movie, the characters appear
free to choose their actions and fates. Yet the freedom was all an illusion. Yet
this illusion of freedom is completely comfortable, without any feeling of
restraint, at least the first time you watch the movie. So why are we humans so
distressed by the notion that choice may be merely calculation with a little
randomness thrown in? We humans are so puffed with vanity we demand that choice
be something unfathomable and mystical, something only humans can do.
Whenever I look back on my life, it seems to me my choices were inevitable given
what I knew at the time and what my hormones were doing.
I have a sense of confinement if somebody or something stops me from doing what
I believe would work out best. My freedom is not in the least impinged if the
correct course of action is blindingly obvious, when it is something I
definitely want to do, no matter how inevitable my choice. The word free
has too many meanings and has too many emotional connotations. It befuddles
people. When you have a free choice it really means
the right to take the option you want, not whether there was some doubt about
the choice.
My Mom used to say “if only” are the two saddest words in the
English language. The words represent a vain wishful thinking that you knew back
then what you know now. You didn’t. You couldn’t. If you went back
in time limited by the same knowledge you had back then, you would do the exact
same stupid things all over again. The purpose of regret is to remind you avoid
repeating mistakes, not to torture you endlessly for ones you already made.
What if you and a friend watched a rerun of a game show on TV. You have seen the
rerun; your friend has not. The contestant has to make a random choice, box A
gets him a car, box B gets him a cabbage. You watch him “constrained“
to pick box B. Your friend sees him making a free choice. So free will is in the
eye of the beholder. It depends on how much knowledge of the future you have.
Death
Microbes attempt to consume you all your life long, then finally at death you
surrender to them. Perhaps an analogy to dying would be the demolition of a
house. It simply is no longer there, other than in memory. Many of my friends
and relatives have died. There is not the tiniest sign any of them attempted to
communicate with the living or performed any deeds after they died. They are
simply gone, as gone as my old house that was demolished to make way for an even
bigger dwelling.
I am told people often die smiling, as though the moment of death is a pleasant
release from the pains and indignities of sickness or old age.
To me, life is like a roller coaster ride. The hypothesis that it might be never-ending
is a nightmare. I find it odd that other people like to make up the most
elaborate and fanciful stories about death where they are rewarded for every
good deed and their enemies ferociously punished for every transgression. What
is even odder is they treat these conjectures as literal truth with nothing at
all to base them on. The impenetrable wall that death creates allows wishful
speculation to have a free reign and create iron-clad certainty.
Sensory Reality
I live in a sensory universe. I don’t experience reality directly; I
experience only my sensory hallucinations of it.
When I smell tobacco smoke, for example, what actually happens is I experience
my cellular level negative opinion of tobacco. I live in a world of looks, feels
and smells, emotions, likes and dislikes, not of objects and atoms. My
experience bears the same sort of relationship to reality as does a painting.
How I experience reality is my artistic creation.
House
House is my favourite TV show. It is about an arrogant, sarcastic, overly candid
doctor who is brilliant at diagnosing obscure diseases. You might have ignored
it, since it in on FOX. The dialog is brilliant, the characters complex, the
plots surprising. Even though the show mocks its own theatrical conventions, I
find myself caring about the characters as if they were real people. It is the
event each week I most look forward to. You might call it TV for adults.
Tanking
In the 1980s I became interested in isolation tanks after having talked with Dr.
John Lilly, the dolphin researcher. I floated in warm water, laden with Epsom
salts, in the dark. I floated so high in the water, I could even fall asleep
safely. There is no light or sound or any other distraction. I became aware of
my thoughts, which seemed like some crazed AM radio blaring away with the volume
turned up to nine. I became aware of how inane and mindless most of my thoughts
were, just jabbering. I tried desperately to shut off the racket. The only thing
that I found that worked was listening. I would try to hear faint sounds coming
through the muffled walls. The internal voices would shut up for a few seconds
to let me hear. You don’t need a isolation tank to do this. Just go
somewhere quiet and listen intently to the quietest sounds.
Me In a Nutshell
My purpose is to convince people to stop doing things
that interfere with other people’s long term happiness.
Red Light Sheep
In Chicago, when drivers stop at a red light, they lean on their horns until the
light turns green. A friend asked a cab driver why he was doing this. He replied,
“Because it is a red light”. I wonder how the custom got started.
Perhaps a driver’s horn got stuck once, and lo’ the light turned
green. He discovered that by honking his horn long enough, he could make the
light turn green. He was reenacting the ancient ritual of pigeon
superstition, discovering for example that dancing would eventually make
it rain, or that praying hard enough would eventually make the seeds sprout.
Even pigeons do it in lab experiments. They peck for pellets and one time one
happens to be standing on one leg when its get some food. Thereafter it stands
on one leg to peck for pellets, like a superstitious gambler.
Sustainability
Scientists have told us what we need to do to ensure the survival of the human
race to deal with the big problems like global warming, nuclear war, destruction
of the environment, overpopulation, the end of oil, soil erosion… What
stops us from taking action?
- Corporate thinking: the next quarter profit is more important than long term
survival.
- Religious wishful thinking: imagining that if man plays helpless, God will
eventually take pity and make it all better.
- Selfishness: people are unwilling to make any sacrifices of immediate pleasure
for their children’s or even their own survival. All that matters is
immediate gratification.
- Secular wishful thinking: ignoring the best science and believing any crank or
corporate shill who will tell you there is nothing to worry about.
Man imagines he is the most intelligent of species, but he is the only one I
know of that is trapped in such fatal delusions.
We’re All Going To Die
I worry quite a bit about global problems: global warming, nuclear war,
destruction of the environment, overpopulation, religious insanity, the end of
oil, soil erosion… It seems unlikely we will manage to deal with all this
in anything like a satisfactory way. However, we are all going to die anyway.
Nobody gets out of life on earth alive. So the premature deaths of billions of
humans is not quite as tragic as it first seems. The happy part is, if nearly
everyone is killed by global stupidity, most of my enemies will die too —
the rude snot on the Internet, George Bush, the truck drivers who ran me off the
road, the people who have stolen or vandalised my bicycles, the soldiers who
tortured kids, the snotty bureaucrats, the people who leave trash at mountain
lakes… Earth will recover in a few thousand millennia, having shrugged
off humanity like an infestation of pubic lice.
The Last Lap
There is a period near the end of your life I call the last
lap where you recognise it is all downhill from here on, and that you won’t
be starting any major new projects and you will become increasingly dependent on
others. When my Dad went through this, he expressed regret he had accomplished
so little in his life, even through by the usual standards he was very
successful. My Mom, after a lifetime as a tyrant, suddenly wanted love and
affection from her family. I am like my Dad, feeling great shame I did not do
something worthy of Nobel prize. Everyone tells you, your life is over so
quickly, it seems like the blink of an eye. It is as if you are a teenager and
one day you wake up the next day and there is an old man staring back at you
from the mirror. If you plan to do something grand or even adventurous, you had
better get on with it early in life and dedicate the necessary amounts of time
and effort. Life is like a deadline. It seems you have all the time in the world,
then suddenly the deadline is upon you.
Dealing With Bullies
Bullies at school can make your life hell. They have no pity. They usually
operate in gangs. They will pursue you relentlessly for years in their sadism. I
have found only one way to deal with them. Philosophically I don’t like
this, but I found nothing else works. You must plot a surprise attack on the
ring leader. The attack must be extremely painful, and barely within the law in
terms of the violence. To cover yourself from legal reprisals, the attack must
be planned to co-incide with an attack on you first. Don’t hold back. Use
every ounce of your strength to cause maximal pain and injury. Holding something
like a roll of quarters in your hand will let you break his jaw even with a
roundhouse swing. Study the various techniques even tiny women can use to
disable a rapist. Bullies usually surround you and strike from behind. It is
fair to use subterfuge, possibly feigning weakness, to lure your target within
range. Half measures will just make things worse. I wonder if this is also the
best way to deal with international bullies who steal natural resources instead
of lunch money.
The Man-Eating Clam
I have a fantasy, to find the empty shell of one of those enormous “man-eating”
clams, and have it lined with Tempuredic foam and uplholstered in velvet. Then
when the world gets too much, I climb inside, assume the fetal position and pull
the shell almost closed.
Remembered Sex
The sexual adventures I remember most clearly are the ones that didn’t
quite make it, but that looked as if they almost could have been. Perhaps they
leave the most room for fantasy as to how wonderfully they could have turned out.
Zen
Have you noticed how Madison Avenue has embraced Zen. They use the word so sell
everything from bath salts to office furniture. Have you noticed how when
advertisers want to show a spiritually enlightened person, they pick a Buddhist
monk. Buddhism symbolise rationality, calm and beneficence. Isn’t it odd
that a culture has abandoned the symbols of virtue of its own religion.
Restaurant Theatre
Our daily interactions run in ruts. Consider breaking the pattern. Let’s
say you go for breakfast and the waitress says “How would you like your
eggs cooked?” Instead of the usual pat answer consider the following:
- Stare stunned as if you had been asked a profound philosophical question. Pause
then reply, “I don’t know… Do you?”
- Look puzzled. Reflect a second. Say “I don’t know how you cook eggs.
Ask the chef. Surely he must know.”
- Look mildly panicked and embarrassed, as if you were an alien and have just been
uncovered not understanding some facet of human culture every human should know.
Say “please enumerate some plausible possible answers”, then do a
Starman gesture and pick “boiled”, and add after a pause, “in
water, please”.
It’s Tuesday, this must be Belgium
A common question a nurse asks to determine if a patient is disoriented is “What
day of the week is it?” But how does the patient know?
98
years ago, the weekly rhythmn was punctuated with mandatory Sunday church
attendance. Today, it is puncutated by the Tuesday night House TV show. Whenever
FOX changes its schedule, or throws in an extra Monday night showing, thousands
of patients are misdiagnosed.
A New Colour
I have always wondered if technology some day will figure out a way to let me
experience a totally new colour, one I have never seen before. I don’t
mean just a slightly different shade of green, but some new colour as different
from all the colours of the rainbow as yellow is from red and green.
Imagine someone growing up in an environment where everyone protected him from
ever seeing the colour red. Then in some special ceremony, it would be presented
for the first time.
Emperors of old tried to impress their subjects that way. British royalty
forbade anyone but themselves from wearing purple. Chinese emperors forbade
anyone but themselves from wearing yellow.
Olives
Are pitted olives olives with pits or olives with pits
removed? The can states that the olives may contain pits, so even the
manufacturer is unsure.
War Grace
War is a special state of grace where all manner of crimes are excused
automatically, including murder, torture, rape, genocide, wasteful spending,
squashing civil rights and destruction of the environment. The main difference
between war and peace is our tolerance for criminal action on the part of both
ourselves and others. So when someone excuses murder “because there is a
war on”, he is merely expressing a tautology, not really telling you
anything.
Turning Women On
If you really want to turn a woman on, as opposed to turning yourself on, try
washing windows or cleaning behind the fridge, or whatever that chore is she
nags you about. And don’t forget the power of frequent hugs, foot massages
and backrubs.
Big Picture Math
The big question is why is there anything at all? matter, space, time, life.
Then you start wondering why is the universe the way it is. It seems conceivable
that the universe could have worked many other ways, but oddly, in all of them,
mathematics would be the same. The universe could work by different mathematical
rules, but the constraints on what is mathematically true would be the same.
Pythagoras’s theorem would be true in all possible universes. So
mathematics is even more fundamental than existence.
The Purpose Of Life
I once asked the cosmos “What is the purpose of life?” To my
surprise, I got an answer back, complete with impressive special effects. The
answer was “There is no purpose. You have to create one.” The
universe suddenly struck me as a forlorn place. The cosmos continued “It
has to be that way when you consider how much variety there is in the universe.
No one purpose could possibly suit everyone. Just because you get to choose it
does not mean it is not a perfectly valid purpose worth pursuing. At first this
feels frightening and empty, but if you think a little longer, it gives you
freedom. You can put your heart into a purpose you choose much more than someone
else’s purpose handed to you. It was extremely “kind” of the
universe to trust you this way. Rejoice in your cosmic freedom.
Bushmen
Let’s say you were a Bushman living in the Kalahari desert in a tribe of
20 people. If you figured out a way to scarf a hundred times as many mogongo
nuts as anyone else and at the same time contribute no labour to collecting them,
would you do it? If you did, your fellows would likely chide you for your greed
and sloth until you relented. But in North America, people aspire to do this
very sort of thing as the purpose of their lives. What is even stranger
is that North Americans who succeed in this con have the highest social status.
Screensavers
Do screensavers run when you turn off the monitor?
Dandelion Faith
“It’s the action, not the fruit of the action, that’s
important. You have to do the right thing. It may not be in your power, may not
be in your time, that there’ll be any fruit. But that doesn’t mean
you stop doing the right thing. You may never know what results come from your
action. But if you do nothing, there will be no result.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
Consider a dandelion. It creates seeds and the winds blow them away. Then
nothing happens. But come spring, some of the seeds sprout. This is very much
the way social change works. You do your lectures, essays, demonstrations,
letters to the editor, websites, blogs, newsgroup posts, TV shows, radio shows
etc. You don’t fret over the effect of any individual action. This is how
I worked on gay lib starting back in 1969. When I started, everyone was opposed
to me, even the gays at first. I knew it was utterly hopeless, but it felt right
to work for gay civil rights just the same. Magically, within three years, we
had the first gay rights legislation.
“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then
you win.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
Life
Life is like a cafeteria, where sometimes the best thing on the menu is Lo Pi
Rat.
On Kudzu
Man is the kudzu vine of the animal kingdom. We pretend not to notice out of
team loyalty.
A Riddle
You once held a Guiness Book of World Records type distinction. What was it?
Everyone on earth had their time in the sun at being the titleholder for a short
while.
Wishful Thinking
As you get older, one by one you have to accept the fact you will never climb
another mountain, have mad passionate sex with a 20 year old, or even run up a
flight of stairs. The temptation is immense to imagine some magic will let you
relive the experiences of your youth. You find yourself pondering the silliest
religious notions of heaven that have no evidence at all for them.
Similarly, it is hard not to lie to reassure a child crying over the loss of
loved relative, friend or pet.
These are not innocent lies. They rob the young of realising how precious those
short years of youth are.
Animal Cruelty
“I think; therefore I am.”
~ René Descartes, (1596-1650)
Descartes became the father of animal cruelty. The flip side of what he said is
that if you don’t think, in the rational mathematical sense, then you don’t
really exist. This provides the excuse for animal cruelty. The Christian view
was that animals (and slaves for that matter) do not reason and do have “souls”,
so they are not truly conscious, and thus they only appear to suffer. Man will
believe the silliest bullshit to salve his conscience.
“What else is it that should trace the insuperable line? Is it the faculty
of reason or perhaps the faculty of discourse? But a full-grown horse or dog is
beyond comparison a more rational, as well as more conversable animal, than an
infant of a day or a week or even a month old. But suppose they were otherwise,
what would it avail? The question is not, Can they reason?, nor Can they talk?
but, Can they suffer? Why should the law refuse its protection to any sensitive
being? The time will come when humanity will extend its mantle over everything
which breathes…”
~ Jeremy Bentham, (1748-1832) Principles of
Morals and Legislation
Of course neither of these authors were aware that crows, parrots and dolphins
could do mathematical reasoning.
Past Lives
If nearly everyone could remember events from a past life it would never occur
to us to wonder how that was possible, or whether these memories were just
imagination. Instead, we would wonder why some people did not have them.
If I Had To Live My Life Over
My life had periods of relative hell punctuated by periods of bliss.
- Preschool was reasonably pleasant, except for my Mom’s violence and
sitting at the dinner table with a strap forcing me to eat things I found
disgusting like milk, carrots and turnips, gagging them down.
- My school years were a nightmare dealing with gangs of bullies at school and my
Mom’s unpredictable violence at home. One day she smashed in all my fish
tanks with a coke bottle. I counted the days until I was old enough to leave
home.
- Age 15 to 21 I made myself miserable fretting that I was gay, and doing nothing
about it. I was head over heals with my straight friend.
- Age 21 to 27 was the golden age of my life when I came out, made tons of friends,
did my gay lib and became relatively famous. I remember thinking that my life
was perfect and I could not imagine anything better.
- The next years were hell as I pined, and pined, and pined for my lover Jimmy who
dumped me. I pined even when I was involved again. I also worried about him
because his personality had changed so drastically overnight.
- When I was 38 I had another short golden age as new love for Shannon made me
temporarily forget Jimmy.
- Then from age 39 to 60,
HIV has overshadowed my life.
So what would I do differently?
- I would have phoned the operator and asked for help with my Mom. She would have
been "mortified". At the time I was too afraid of reprisals.
- I did manage to get two bullies off my back by hurting them so badly they never
touched me again. I would plot to get each one alone and similarly hurt them.
- I would have smuggled some ordinary clothes to school to avoid the "monkey
suit" (a British boarding school uniform) that was at the root of most of
the ridicule.
- I could have tried to find other gay people my own age rather than staying so
fixed on my straight friend.
- The biggie is realizing when a lover l
