Free Will, part 2

crimson

The next version of free will that Alfred Mele suggests is a bit peculiar. At least, I think it is peculiar. It suggests that the extra element free will possesses beyond what determinism suggests, is akin to randomness. That is to say, after all information has been accounted for leading up to a particular person’s exercising of their free will, a probability matrix is established regarding the likelihood of that person making specific choices. To continue my example in the ice cream shop, perhaps I am likely to select chocolate, but there is a lesser probability that I might choose vanilla. Perhaps it could be described as a 75% chance of me selecting chocolate, and a 25% chance of selecting vanilla. Given the circumstances, my final decision may not be predicable in an exact sense, but there is a better chance I will be selecting chocolate than vanilla.

This sort of reasoning seems supported by scientific studies of the very small: Quantum Physics. The current models of the atom suggest not that the electron is orbiting the nucleus, as the moon orbits the Earth, or the Earth orbits the sun. Instead, it is suggested that where the electron could be found at any given moment is a function of probability, with certain energy levels being much more likely for the electron to be found. I admit, my understanding of Quantum Physics is in its infancy, so here is an article to better describe this theory.

In other words, when the time comes for a choice to be made, while we will be unable to know what decision will be made, we can at least have an idea of the likelihood of certain decisions being made. As Mele suggests, if after the decision is made, we were able to rewind time and allow the decision to be made again, the same sort of probabilistic process happens again, allowing another possible outcome to occur. If we were to repeat the event over and over, theoretically, we should observe that about 75% of the time, I would have chosen chocolate, while about 25% of the time I would have chosen vanilla.

Of course we don’t have the ability to rewind time to witness events repeatedly occurring, and so we are unable to confirm this sort of process. As far as we know, time only moves in one direction. However, there is another variation on this idea that has become quite popular recently, especially in the Marvel Cinematic Universe: the idea that ALL choices are made simultaneously, with each choice producing its own unique timeline or universe as a result.

This would be to suggest that when faced with the choice of ice cream I would like to get, I actually chose both chocolate and vanilla. In this timeline or universe, I happened to pick chocolate, but there is another extremely similar universe out there where I had chosen vanilla. The timelines are identical in every way up to this event, but after the event, two timelines emerged. This is very humorously presented in the television series Community, in the episode entitled “Remedial Chaos Theory.” Each possible outcome from rolling a six sided die produces its own unique timeline, where each of the characters becomes an independent entity from the version in the “canonical timeline.”

A theory of free will like this, while possibly accurate, produces an extremely uncomfortable side-effect. With each passing moment of each day, hundreds, thousands, even millions of individuals exercise their free will in making decisions, choosing from often more than simply two possible outcomes. In this theory of free will, multitudes of parallel universes would be produced every moment, and the production of these branching timelines would be exponential, as each independent timeline would itself produce a multitude of additional timelines. The multiverse would be well populated in mere moments, and at this time, one should expect there to be a virtually infinite number of them. There would be billions upon billions of slightly different versions of me passing time in the countless universes that exist.

A way to deal with this insanity might be to suggest that we don’t exercise our free will each and every time a choice must be made. Perhaps we only actually exercise free will occasionally, even rarely, for very important events. The rest of the time, simply following the deterministic chains of cause and effect as we go about our everyday lives. It is this idea that I think Marvel has decided to follow in their latest television series Loki.

In Loki, it is suggested that there is a “sacred timeline,” a timeline or universe that is considered to be the main or proper universe. Occasionally, certain special events occur, referred to as “nexus events,” where suddenly another timeline begins to branch off of this main timeline. If this new branched timeline is left unchecked for long enough, it will become its own independent timeline. In order to prevent this from happening, the Time Variance Authority (TVA) uses their advanced technology to go to the event, shortly after it has occurred, specifically to the branched timeline, in order to “prune” it back. By pruning, the story suggests that the TVA arrests the culprit of the nexus event (the individual who has exercised their free will, but made the choice the TVA considers to be inappropriate), and then somehow eliminates the branched timeline. This whole process is a logistical nightmare when considered at length, as I will of course do.

Firstly, the individual who exercised their free will is the same in both timelines, simply that the one in the branch happened to be on the wrong side of probability. To select the individual who happened to be on the wrong side of a decision seems a bit biased; that is, whomever has decided what constitutes the “sacred timeline,” does so arbitrarily, and so punishing individuals from alternate universes seems incredibly unethical. Furthermore, why would one abduct the individual from the alternative timeline before eliminating any traces of that branched timeline. All other individuals who are not removed from the new timeline before it is eliminated are themselves eliminated. To put this another way, the individual who has now been abducted for some unspecified crime of being a part of a now none-existent timeline would have had no way to produce further problems had they been eliminated with the rogue timeline. Abducting them, it seems to me, simply provides further opportunity for such a criminal to perpetrate further crimes.

Furthermore, as the character Loki himself suggests in the first episode, it seems like the TVA is selectively removing free will in the process they are following. That is, when an individual exercises free will, the TVA removes all other possible outcomes/choices from the menu, leaving the “correct” choice which is for the individual to have done precisely what the TVA deemed the correct action. This all amounts to a strong desire to remove free will entirely, at least from those within the “sacred timeline.”

Loki is a very interesting series, which some very thought provoking themes and ideas, so I do recommend watching it when you have a chance. However, the point that I think is most interesting is the idea that only these infrequent “nexus events” will produce the branching timelines. It seems to suggest that free will, on the whole, is not exercised that much, if at all. That is, considering there are nearly nine billion humans on Earth at this time, and considering that each of those humans has a free will, and then considering that in the Marvel Cinematic Universe there are billions of other worlds like Earth, each with their own billions of beings who themselves also have a free will, it seems incredibly strange that these “nexus events” don’t occur much, much more frequently. During the course of the series, it seems like the TVA is spending most of their time waiting for these events to occur. The largest surge of such events that causes the TVA to have to send virtually all of its agents away to “repair” the “sacred timeline” is actually orchestrated by one single individual, not by a group or larger number of individuals. I will not go into any further detail regarding this, for fear of generating more spoilers than I have already done.

Ultimately, what I’m suggesting by this observation is that in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, what is likely being suggested is that either: there are a whole lot of beings with free will in the universe, but free will is not exercised except in extremely rare circumstances; or that beings that actually have free will is itself extremely rare. I have not finished watching the series, as it is still airing, but I am beginning to think they may be suggesting that Loki is unique in the universe as one of the very rare beings with an actual free will. Alternatively, perhaps the entire TVA was created exclusively for him, and the “sacred timeline” is simple the best possible timeline to “harvest” as many free will Lokis as one might like, in order to create a community of beings with free wills. Suggestion for the Big Bang anyone?

I hope all this discussion has made one thing very clear regarding this version of free will: it seems unlikely to be how it works. While I have no solid evidence to make such a claim, as we just don’t have sufficient technology nor scientific knowledge to test such things, were this to be how free will worked, the consequences and outcomes produced would be exponentially nauseating. Perhaps this is the source of Dark Matter and Dark Energy in the universe? But it might also be unsatisfying to think that our free will is simply a random chance as well.

In my next post, I will discuss a third option for how free will might be viewed. It is by far the hardest to grasp, but is also the version I believe most people have in mind when they utter the term “free will.”

Free Will, part 1

crimson

I make no promises regarding the frequency or reliability of the following posts. But I need to say something, and this is what is on my mind.

I’ve been having a lot of discussions regarding free will recently. These discussions are challenging most of the time because, I think, what all participants think of when they utter “free will” is slightly different. Sometimes, not so slightly.

Alfred Mele, in his book A Dialogue on Free Will and Science, suggests several ways to interpret free will. The simplest, as I think most would agree, is the view of free will known as Compatibilism. In this view, free will is not some mystical, spiritual thing that is unmeasurable or unknowable. As I will describe it, it is simply the suggestion that individuals have more than one live option.

A live option, on my account, is the idea that when faced with a choice or decision, there is an option that is feasible or available that one could select. For example, if I am at the counter in an ice cream shop about to tell the proprietor which flavour of ice cream I would like to be served, my live options would include those flavours of ice cream the proprietor has available. If vanilla is available for me to select, then vanilla is a live option. However, if he happens to be out of a particular flavour, say chocolate, then selecting chocolate is not a live option. Even if I were to tell the proprietor that I would like to select chocolate, he would be unable to satisfy that request. No amount of coersion or brute force will suddenly produce the desired flavour of ice cream.

The significance of a live option is simple: if I could reasonably expect to make the choice and produce the desired outcome, then it is a live option. In cases where I am unable to produce the desired outcome, there is no live option. There is also no live option when I am unable to select that option either. For example, if in the above example my friend stands beside me and is telling the proprietor what flavour of ice cream I will receive, and if that friend has decided I shall have vanilla, regardless of anything I might say to change his mind, then I am left with no choice regarding the flavour of ice cream I will receive. My friend has removed my choice, which leaves me with virtually no live options. It could be argued that the vanilla my friend selects is a live option, despite there being no other obvious options, however, then my only real other option would be to decline the ice cream altogether. And if I really want ice cream, perhaps the declining of ice cream isn’t really an option for me.

In the above example, it may seem a bit silly to speak of things in this way. After all, ice cream and whether I can consume it or not is pretty trivial. However, it is simply an example. In my life, there are many situations I encounter where others make decisions for me, removing my options and taking this version of my free will away from me. This version of free will is not considering other aspects that many might want to include in the idea of free will, such as the idea of predictability.

For most of the people I talk to, this idea of predictability is very important to them. They want to tell me that free will is unpredictable. However, Compatibilism does not take predictability into account. In fact, because Compatibilism is compatible with determinism (the idea that everything is related through cause-effect relationships), determinism will suggest to us that this version of free will is predictable. That is, as all things are related by causes and effects, then which flavour of ice cream I select will be related to an incredibly complex matrix of my personal history, past experiences, genetics, and the environment. If I had vanilla ice cream last time I had ice cream, I may want something different this time. If I have a craving for chocolate, I may lean toward chocolate. If I am allergic to strawberries, I may not select strawberry ice cream.

It may not be easy or even feasible for me to acquire all the knowledge and information required for me to determine your selection, however, I argue that if I somehow were able to acquire sufficient information, I could predict the choice you will make. In fact, this is precisely what modern advertising tries to do, through the use of various artificial intelligences that we have generated in this modern world of ours. It is true, there is also a significant amount of advertising that works to make choices for us as well, influencing our decision making process, however, the influencing of decisions is also a part of the prediction process. Many large companies are banking on the idea that this version of free will is what we possess, and nothing more.

I think many people (outside these large companies), would prefer to believe that we humans possess something more. A free will of an unpredictable nature. This is what many around me try to argue. That no matter how much information I acquire about them, I will still be unable to predict their decisions. For this to be true, there would need to be something more to free will, something incompatible with determinism. After all, if determinism is all that exists in our world, then everything that happens is caused by preceding events, including our very decisions. In my next post, I will discuss alternative views of free will.

Hiatus

crimson

It has been a while since my last post. I am still alive. Life has been challenging. Priorities continue to change. I still intend to write, but how well my writing will be is debatable.

There are so many things I still want to talk about. Memory and the past. Clowns and gender inequity. Patriotism and insanity. All topics are dubious. I’m not sure where I want to start, or where it will end.

For this post, I will remain brief. I am still here. I will write more later. Stay safe out there.

Apologies and Regrets

crimson

Today’s post is a bit different. It will still have a strong philosophical aspect to it, however, it will also be much more personal at the same time. Today I want to discuss how to apologize to someone for deeds of the past.

In some cases, apologizing to someone for harm done is an easy choice. If the person who has been harmed continues to experience the effects of the harm, then it is fundamentally critical that the person who initiated the harm should apologize and do what they can to alleviate the ongoing effects of the harm. I do not believe there would be many people out there who would argue against this. Put more simply, if you harm another person, you should apologize to that person for doing them harm, and then you should do what you can to undo the effects of the harm.

But what if the effects are long passed? Or perhaps the effects of the harm have become integrated deeply into the person’s psyche? It may have become an integral part of their current personality, and the manner in which they coped with the harm may have become simply another aspect of them now. In some cases, this could include when a person has suppressed the effects in order to cope. Should you apologize in this case?

The concern I am raising is the situation whereby apologizing to someone for harm from the past may dredge up old buried memories and pain. If my intention is to sincerely apologize for past harm, I ought not generate new current harm in the process. In some cases, the past is the past, and it may be prudent to let the past remain the past.

In order to clarify what my concern is and how this may play out, consider a hydroelectric dam. While many seem to believe that a dam is an extremely environmentally friendly form of generating electricity, I would like to point out simply how wrong those people are. Take a body of water, such as a flowing river or stream. That environment exists in its form, and all the life that exists around it is accustomed to the body of water as it is: as a flowing river or stream. Those creatures who are “fit,” in Darwin’s idea of fitness, under those circumstances, with a flowing river or stream, will flourish, while those who are not “fit” will not flourish. The environment exists as it does, with a flowing river or stream.

Now add the hydroelectric dam to the equation. The flowing water becomes something else. The river becomes a lake. The water is no longer moving but has become static. Those creatures who flourished in the previous environment may not be as “fit” in the new environment. Furthermore, other creatures who did not flourish in the previous environment may be more “fit” and start to flourish. The environment changes. Some creatures die out and go extinct, while other creatures become the new dominant species in the area. Irreparable damage has taken place. Irreparable harm.

It may be argued that one can simply remove the hydroelectric dam and allow the previous environment to reassert itself, however, if a particular species really has gone extinct, then there will be no way for that species to return. Furthermore, now that the new environment has been created, is it really justified or appropriate to take a new thriving species and kill it in the name of the past?

I do not have an answer to the hydroelectric dam dilemma. Once an environment has been changed, it has been changed. There is no “going back.” And it might even be argued that “going back” is undesirable anyway. This I compare to harm done between people.

When I was young, I was bullied a lot. When I was young, I was considered a nerd and a geek. When I was young, being a nerd or geeky was the furthest thing from popular. Times have changed. My childhood was quite challenging for me. But I do not regret my own childhood. The bullying I experienced gave me the skills and tools needed to deal with bullying in my adult life. Admittedly, I still learn more skills and tools even today to deal with such situations, but the bulk of my abilities come from my youth. I know how to stand my ground, and I know how to not be taken in by the bully. I can “turn the other cheek” as some might call it. I can diffuse the bully.

But. Sometimes I also was the bully. There have been times in my life where I abused my power over others as well. I have inflicted harm upon others. The worst part was that I had no idea I was doing it at the time in most cases. And even when I did realize I was doing harm, the methods I used to try and undo the effects often created even more harm than the original harm. It is for all my actions that I wish to apologize.

It may be true that I am as much a victim of the systemic structures of society (such as patriarchy and consumerism) as anybody else. But I don’t feel like that is a good excuse. In the past, I thought I was a “nice guy,” much like I referred to in my last post. I thought I was doing what I ought to do with regard to women. I know now how wrong I was. I regret my behavior and I want to apologize for it.

However, I cannot apologize. At least not in the normal sense. To seek out those I harmed and try to apologize to them amounts to reintroducing the harm, or introducing new harm. Seeking those people out is itself a harm. Like the hydroelectric dam, those individuals I am thinking about have become who and what they are today and it is certainly not my place to interfere in their lives. I ought not approach them at all.

I’ve thought a lot about all of this, for many, many years. I understand that a large part of my desire to apologize is for my own relief from pain. To apologize can also be a selfish act. For me, this may be part of the story as well. So I believe I have come up with a sort of way to deal with this situation. If I cannot approach those people, perhaps I can make known my apology, and leave it in a place where they can find it. And then, if they go looking for it, they can find it and know that I regret my actions. In that way, they have control of the situation and can decide for themselves if they wish to seek me out. They can have the power, instead of me.

This solution is far from perfect. Posting a mostly anonymous blog in the void of the information superhighway is certainly not going to make things easy for them. However, I do know that those people are connected to others that I know, and so they will be able to find me if they desire to do so. It is possible for them to find this blog and my messages. And so, this is what I will do now.

To M, who said I was a monster, and who suggested she only dated me to protect other women in the world from me, I apologize. I know our relationship was so strange and innocent at the time we had it. I clearly did not know what I was doing, nor the harm I was causing you. I feel like you may have been in the same situation, though I realize I do not know your mind in these matters. I thank you for enduring me, as the lessons you taught me have endured all this time as well. However, I am sorry for being the monster. And I am sorry for causing you harm.

To L, who suggested I did not want to date her, but that I was only interested in what she could do for me. You were right, of course. Your assessment of me was accurate, as your maturity likely showed you. I often think about your past history, the history you refused to share with me, and I find the possibilities simply make me regret even more how I treated you. I was clearly too young and immature to understand the nature of our relationship. It was you who suggested I go out and explore myself in the world, and I have. But I am still sorry for how I treated you. I am sorry for causing you harm.

To M, who revealed to me that the drugs were taking something from me. I was in a bad place when you met me, and the drugs were simply an escape from a reality I needed to feel. I was supposed to be the mature one, but I did not handle my position as I ought to have. I am sorry for causing you harm.

And to all the others who I have not mentioned, I am sorry as well. Part of my writing this blog has been to come to terms with the reality of this world, and part of that coming to terms is the realization of precisely how bad people are toward each other. The prejudice and the sexism is so thick, it almost seems like it exists as a thing in itself. But I know that it does not. Or, to be more accurate, it doesn’t have to be. As my philosophy instructors would often phrase it, “it could be otherwise.”

There is absolutely no good reason that men ought to treat women as they do. Nor is there any good reason for treating anyone else as anything less than human. Or, perhaps to be more accurate, to treat any other living being as anything less than a living being, for even humans ought not be privileged. My pet rabbit ought not be my pet, and be allowed to simply be himself, as a rabbit.

I believe in Simone de Beauvoir and her suggestion that revolution is the only real answer. That we cannot change the system from within the system. Only from outside can we even hope to gain a proper understanding of the state of affairs we have created for ourselves. And only from the outside could we even hope to find an appropriate course of action to follow to make the world a better place.

I apologize to everyone for my part in being a man in patriarchy. I apologize for my sexism, my racism, and all my other -isms. I’d like to tell you all that I am no longer those things, but the truth is I am still. I don’t think I can escape it, just as I believe that everyone else is just as sexist and racist as I am. The difference is not whether we are an -ism, it is what we choose to do with that knowledge. To check myself and not allow my prejudices to unduly affect my decision making and other choices. I may be sexist, but I don’t have to allow that sexism to inform my decisions.

It is like the issue of staying at home during a pandemic. Just because the government doesn’t tell me I must stay at home full time doesn’t mean I ought to look for every little loophole in order to leave my house. As my father suggested about laws, it is more important to recognize the spirit of the law instead of the word of the law. To understand the intention behind. To understand that I ought to do my best to stay at home, as that will help others stay safe during this pandemic. To understand that thinking of others helps me be better toward everyone else. And to recognize that others are not really others at all, but simply another part of me.

The Arrogant Eye

crimson

Before I begin, I wish to acknowledge that the term I have used as my title today is not my own creation. I’ve borrowed it from Marilyn Frye, specifically from the book “The Politics of Realty, Essays in Feminist Theory.” My discussion today is heavily influenced by Frye’s ideas and words, as well as the ideas of Simone de Beauvoir and others. Of women.

I recently watched the 2020 film “Promising Young Woman.” This is an amazing and impressive work whose underlying critical thoughts are likely missed by most of its viewers, especially the male viewers. I would strongly urge you to watch this film, if you have not already done so. Do not read any synopsis of the film ahead of time; the synopsis I found and read actually took away from the charm of the story (the synopsis had spoilers in it). Instead, I offer this description of the film:

A troubled young woman goes around luring men to take her home under the guise of being blackout drunk. In truth, she is stone cold sober every time, and uses the opportunity to confront the men who are simply trying to take advantage of her for their own pleasure. As the story unfolds, it becomes clear that she may not be as troubled as is initially assumed.

I was not raised a woman or a girl. I do not have the experience nor conditioning that accompany such an upbringing. Instead, I was raised a man. Much of my conditioning and experience was focused on presenting the world to me in such a way that “the world is my oyster.” I was raised to oppress and control. I was raised to seek ownership and possession of all that is in my purview. I always had troubles with these ideas, seeing the inconsistencies and flaws in such a world-view. Unfortunately for me, being aware has not always been enough to stop be from doing the things I ought not do. But I try to this day to be more than I was raised to be.

Today, I must speak from my perspective on this topic, because that is the perspective I have. I cannot speak for women, as I am not a woman. I did not have those experiences. I do not fully understand where my insight came from, but it is here nonetheless. I hope I can do justice to and properly convey the idea I have planned to convey.

In my last year at university, I had an ongoing discussion with a friend of a friend of mine. A young man who considered himself “woke.” A young man who believed he treated women well. A “nice guy,” to borrow a term used in the film mentioned above. We discussed a number of topics, but one of them recurred frequently. The idea of approaching a woman in order to pursue a relationship with her. He would come to me suggesting the best and most appropriate manner in approaching a desirable woman; a manner that he considered to be properly acknowledging the woman’s autonomy and status as a free conscious being. Every time, I had to tell him that I believed he was mistaken. His approaching a desirable woman (for any reason really) is already flawed before he begins. This is what I will explain, and I hope to make it clear why I am correct.

I will first break down the process that leads him to approach the woman. His method of approach matters little, as you will see. First, he sees the woman. Then he decides she is attractive. In finding her attractive, he desires to pursue a relationship with her, which leads to the question of how best to approach her in order to realize this relationship. Presented more susinctly:

[1] Man sees woman (this is discovery: he comes to understand that the woman exists)

[2] Man judges woman (from [1] and using his world-view, he assesses the qualities of the woman)

[3] Man finds woman attractive (from [2], man determines that woman’s qualities are desirable)

[4] Man desires to possess woman (from [3], man wishes to exercise his desire by possessing the desirable thing)

[5] Man tries to determine best course of action to achieve [4]

Of course it is always possible that after [2] the man determines that the qualities of the woman are not desirable, and then [3], [4], and [5] do not come about, but this simply exacerbates the situation and emphasizes my point further. I will return to this later. For now, I will address the situation where the man does find the woman attractive.

Step [1] above is the ONLY step that is not wrought with sexism or other negative ideas. It is basic discovery in the world. To be clear, the sort of thing I have in mind here is the most basic, primitive form of seeing. Before this step, the man is not aware that the woman exists at all in any way. After this step, he is aware of her existence, simply at the most basic level. Enough so for him to proceed to step [2]. One cannot begin to judge a thing until one is aware that there is a thing to be judged. Basic awareness of existence.

Step [2] begins the first, and in my opinion most insidious, problem with the situation. We all judge. It is part of our nature as free conscious beings to do so. We assess our world, deciding the value of everything around us. It is possible that I might borrow a valuation offered to me by others, such as the systems in place in society, but it is still me who applies and exercises that valuation. In the case of the woman, the man assess her qualities (whatever qualities he is able to glean by seeing her). If her qualities measure up to the valuation he has established (a.k.a if he thinks she is beautiful based on his pre-established valuation of beauty standards, which are often given to him through his upbringing in a patriarchal society), then he finds her attractive. This is the first problem, and one could stop here if one wanted to.

Step [3] follows from step [2]. If the woman’s qualities are such that she is valuable, she is then desired. He desires her, for she has value to him. It isn’t any more complicated than this. He sees her as a commodity with value. He has objectified her. One might argue the objectification occurred at step [2], and I would not really argue against that. However, I would point out that when I judge, I do so to everything in my world, indiscriminately. I cannot see my world without judging ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING I see. On some level, I have decided the value in everything around me, and a woman is no different than a stone in this regard. Even my own body is subject to this judgement. This is what it means to be embodied, as Beauvoir might agree with me; simply having a body subjects me to judgement and assessment. To have a body is to, even if just in part, be objectified. The trick is to not allow this objectification to overwhelm the other possible interactions I might have with a particular body, such as an acknowledgement that the body is more than a mere body, and may also include a free conscious being with its own desires and projects.

Therefore, it is at step [3] that the majority of problems occur. Sexism rears its ugly head and establishes the nature of the relationship between the man and the woman even before the woman knows what is happening. Specifically, the man decides the woman’s value is merely in her embodiment. The man has reduced the woman to a mere object, without regard to any other aspect she may possess, including her own desires. Ironically, if he decides she is unattractive, the same is still true, as he has reduced her to a valuation which has made her undesirable as well. He has still disregarded any other possible aspect to her as a free conscious being when he dismisses her.

This is why we do not even need to proceed to step [4] or beyond. Step [4] is simply the man deciding to pursue the woman in order to possess her as a valuable object, or to dismiss her as an object with little or no value. In other words, If the man decides he wishes to pursue this woman at this point, he does so simply in virtue of her objectivity. Any attempt he makes to approach this woman is tainted by a stain of desired oppression. And, as I was reminded by my partner, her desire to be or not be approached is also being dismissed.

Put another way, his reason to approach the woman is flawed at the outset. There is no determining the best way to approach the woman because the simple desire to approach the woman is the problem. It is all about the “why.” Why does he want to approach the woman? If he does so because he is attracted to her, then he is already at fault of expressing sexism. If he wants to pursue a relationship with her, then he is objectifying her. He has chosen a course of action rooted in his valuation of her. One might even argue that what he desires is not the woman at all, but his perception of value that he believes the woman possesses. That is, what he desires is the abstract qualities he believes have value, and he has subconsciously assigned to the woman. He desires the idea of the woman. Either way, he has disregarded her as a free conscious being, having her own desires and projects.

This is, as I see it, one of the major issues women face in our world. The thing is, this analysis can be just as easily applied to racism and other forms of prejudism. It’s in the name itself. To judge before one gets to know the other parts or aspects of the entity in question. To base one’s opinions, and especially valuation, upon simple visual qualities. To judge a book by its cover, as the saying goes. To establish that the value of a person is somehow based on what they look like, or other features of their appearance. And to dismiss even the possibility that they may possess other features that one cannot see. Or, if you prefer, to dismiss the significance of those other features, giving inappropriate weight to those features that are seen through the arrogant eye.

Silence

crimson

It is not like me to have nothing to say. Talk to anyone who knows me; I am notorious for talking at length about almost anything. The fact that it has been nearly three weeks since my last post seems strange, at least to me.

This blog is for me. It is for me to write what is on my mind, when I wish to write. Perhaps I simply do not wish to write? I don’t think that is the issue. Honestly, I think it is a question of priorities. Many of my priorities have changed over the past few months, even the past few years. Those things I considered particularly important have now become much less so. Last year, I graduated secondary school, earning my first degree. This blog was, for me, a way to continue practicing and exercising my logic and reason. A way to continue writing. However, since graduating, I have slowly been sliding back into other areas of interest.

From a very young age, computers have been an integral part of my existence. I started programming at about five years old on a Texas Instruments TI99/4A. I learned to program in BASIC back then, a very slow and clunky language intended to make programming easy for people like me to learn. BASIC is very basic.

Among the reasons I think programming appealed to me was the fact that I could control something. In my life, I have observed that there is very little I have actual control over. My parents were a bit overbearing, and definitely overprotective. I had very few opportunities to express a freedom, assuming such a thing even exists. I am not surprised that I doubt the existence of free will when I consider my upbringing. I find it strange when my parents disagree with me on the topic of freedom; I guess they were on the other side of that equation.

I find myself frequently thinking about oppression and slavery. About situations where people are in some way forced to make certain sorts of decisions and choices. When I think about this long enough, I realize that everyone is a slave to determinism. That is, all the choices I make are influenced (heavily) by all the things that have come before. The insidious chain of cause and effect plays its part on all the choices I make, as much as I try to avoid it. Like an adversity to touch hot stoves, my upbringing led me directly to the point I am today. Not only was this situation I find myself in inevitable, but I really could not have done otherwise.

This is the point of contention I expect most people to dispute. This is the point my own mother argued against vehemently. As she suggested, if fate ruled then I ought to walk into the street in front of a moving bus; her reasoning was that if fate truly ruled, I’d somehow not be hit. Unfortunately, it is my belief that my mother did not truly understand what I was saying. Of course I would get hit by a moving bus were I to jump in front of one. It is just silly to suggest otherwise. After all, cause and effect is just as valid in that situation as any other.

However, I try to understand her point of view in this. I think she was trying to suggest that I don’t have to jump in front of a bus. After all, I understand the consequences of such actions, and therefore I can choose to do otherwise. That is what I think she was trying to suggest. Unfortunately, this simply reaffirms my side of the argument: I would never step in front of a moving bus because I KNOW that I would be hit by it. It is really no different than the hot stove at all, and my knowledge of how cause and effect works has already made my decision before I am aware of it. Like when the Oracle tells Neo that he has already made his choice, he only now must understand why he has made the choice. “Know thy self.”

This is why I am so passionate regarding recognition of the structures of society. This is why I fear patriarchy and consumerism. I KNOW that their influence has a hold on me, and on all those around me. I KNOW that when I feel the urge to control another person, especially a woman, it is patriarchy that has deemed that I do so. I KNOW that when I feel the motivation to make lots of money and buy lots of things, consumerism is behind it. I am smart enough to understand that control over other people is pointless, as is the accumulation of stuff.

It is at this point that I always remember what my professors told me during my education: if you don’t agree with the way something is, you need to be able to provide an alternative if you plan to argue it coherently. I can suggest that patriarchy and consumerism are the worst inventions that have ever been, but unless I can suggest an alternative system to exist under, my point is mute. What would life be without patriarchy or consumerism?

I hurt people, unintentionally, when I work my way down this rabbit hole. When I tell my wife that it is not her appearance that impresses me, but her empathy, she seems both happy and sad at my statements. I think she is happy because I see her, in the way Marilyn Frye suggests women should be seen. She is not a stage hand, she is the star of my show. However, I also think she wishes I looked at her as being the most attractive woman in the world, in the way that she exemplifies the eternal woman of patriarchy. She seems often depressed at her inability to attain the perfect hourglass shape and incomprehensible weight, the statistics fed to her through all the mass media we are exposed to. So when I indirectly suggest her appearance is not important to me, I think she might interpret it to mean that she is unattractive. Like how people, when trying to be polite about an ugly person, they suggest that the person’s personality is what is important. It is a veiled insult. I swear that is not what I intend at all, but we are all part of that same system, and so those sorts of interpretations are common.

What is the alternative? I cannot say. I don’t know. When I consider myself, all these systems and structures stripped away, it seems to me I would be nothing. That is, every aspect of my being is infused with these structures. One way or another, I am a victim of my conditioning. I am a slave. I see no escape from it. Only one thing ever remains in my deep thought: my raw consciousness.

To be clear, it is not the consciousness most people would think about. When René Descartes strips away everything he can doubt in his meditations, he suggests the only thing that remains is his existence: “I think, I am.” There is debate as to whether this actually works, but I will give him this. What comes next as he travels back to the world is where I find myself disputing. Because he follows a path brought about through his conditioning, conditioning brought about through his lived experience. He would not consider such things if he had not first lived and experienced the world, in some fashion. The very idea of God comes from lived experience.

For me, what I mean by raw consciousness is that there is this thing I have, or I am, that I cannot really describe or explain. The other term I often use is my “first person,” a term to denote that it is my perspective on the world. I recognize that this raw consciousness is fed information through the incredibly flawed interfaces that have been provided: my eyes, my ears, etc. I know that even those interfaces could have been hijacked, through something akin to simulation theory. In fact, unlike Descartes, I don’t even agree that my exercising a thought is sufficient to suggest I exist, as a particularly good simulation might be doing the work of thinking for me.

The best I can sort of suggest is that I am like a passive observer, receiving all this information from somewhere. And due to the causal nature of everything, even my choices and decisions could have been (likely are) also hijacked. I feel like the “job” of my formal consciousness (the consciousness that most people think of) is to tell stories. That is, stuff happens and I make choices (which are predetermined by causality), and my conscious mind finds a way to justify and explain what happened and why I chose as I did. My mind tells a story to explain the occurrences in the world, and the occurrences in my mind as well. That I am simply a story telling machine.

The story goes something like this: I am a raw consciousness, a passive observer of experience. I, in some fashion, inhabit this body and this mind, both which provide for me experiences to observe. But this body and this mind both are subject to a deterministic universe, where causal relationships have been playing out for some time. I have no control of this mind nor this body, I am simply a passive observer. It is sort of like watching a very long film.

It is even possible that what I think is my body, and what I think is the world, both do not exist as I think they do at all. It is possible that the experience information I receive is fabricated by some massive system, as in simulation theory. However, if this is true, it matters little. A fabricated reality is still a reality. The rules and laws of one universe don’t need to resemble the rules and laws of another, so long as there is at least some consistency. To be honest, even the question of consistency is irrelevant.

The purpose of my mind is to tell a story. Using the faculties of reason and memory, my mind tells a story about how things have come about and why, when it is able to consider a why. When a why is unavailable, magic often suffices. This is definitely why I can do something without good reasons; it simply means my mind is failing me at telling a good story, or perhaps even a bad one. If the story is unconvincing to me, then I am a hypocrite and a liar. If it is, I am honorable and trustworthy. As a person, I am really only as good as the stories I can tell.

In the end, I am always left with one thing that could possibly be me: this raw consciousness, this first person passive observer. Strip away patriarchy and consumerism, and the countless other systems and structures that exist, and I am nothing more than a remote feeling. A slave with absolutely no control over anything at all.

The Dead of Winter

crimson

It has been more than two weeks since my last post. As I’ve said in the past, I do not wish to write unless I have something to say. These past two weeks haven’t entirely fallen into this situation. Not that I did not have something to say, but perhaps more that I didn’t want to blindly rant with no focus or end goal to my post. Honestly, this post may still be similarly unfocused and random, but I feel like writing at least.

So much has happened in the past two weeks. Probably the most noteworthy item is the acquittal of Donald Trump from his impeachment trial. This particular item has been quite taxing on me personally. It is very difficult for me to resolve what I “know” about the situation and the results of the situation. To be very specific, it seemed to me that the impeachment was unquestionable; there was no doubt in my mind that Donald Trump was guilty of inciting violence against his own government. What’s more, I also agree that his choices and actions are not restricted to the events of January 6, but to his choices and actions for several months previous. I would even agree that his actions and choices from as far back as four years ago also played their part, and even beyond that.

To be quite frank, I find Donald Trump to be a very disreputable individual. If I had to describe what sort of person he was, I would begin by suggesting he was a textbook narcissist and egoist. That is, his world view is focused like a laser on his own life and immediate environment. Not necessarily that he is choosing to harm other individuals in the world, but that he is mostly unconcerned with other individuals in the world. Given the opportunity to speak with him in person, I would not be surprised if I found him to be a solipsist. If I am correct, it would certainly go a long way to explaining his choices and actions throughout the time that I’ve been aware of his existence.

So why might all this be important to you? It certainly is important to me, mostly because I choose to value this situation in and among all the circumstances I find myself in. But you are not me, I’m pretty sure. So you might not decide this is as important to you as it seems to be for me. I do not believe I am a solipsist. In fact, as per Simone de Beauvoir’s Ethics of Ambiguity, I would not only like to believe that you exist as your own conscious entity with similar freedoms and projects to my own, but I would like to cooperate with you in realizing your freedoms and projects. If I didn’t, I do not think I would have much reason to write this post at all.

When I was younger, I did sometimes think and feel as though I was the only being in the universe. Like Rene Decartes, I would look out the window and see hats and coats moving about like strange automations without an internal “soul.” Even to this day, I cannot find a significant amount of compelling evidence to justify a belief in other consciousnesses, as I am unable to access those consciousnesses directly. And, as I find more disturbing, I cannot share my consciousness with others either. For a period of time in my youth, I actively sought out a telepathic individual, simply so that they could hear my thoughts and could then validate my own existence. I have since realized that it might be best if I never find such a telepath, as I’d be dooming them with the exposure to my inner world, a punishment that I believe might be an incredible harm.

It was my choice to believe in a world outside myself. It was faith, in the truest sense of the word. I need to believe that others exist in this world. For others not to exist, for me to be truly alone, would suggest that I should kill myself right at this moment. I have absolutely no reason for being if I am to exist entirely alone. I serve absolutely no purpose in the grand scheme of the universe. At least, that is how I feel. I know of a great many people out there who would passionately argue otherwise.

Thus, even without sufficient evidence, I choose to believe that there are other consciousnesses in the world beyond my own. They may not be precisely or exactly the same as mine, but they are similar enough that I ought to treat them as their own, with freedom and projects of their own. For me, it is this very fact that has overshadowed all my choices and decisions in my life. It is very much the reason that virtually every job I have accepted has been one where I support or assist others in realizing their projects. I am at my most comfortable when helping others, even sometimes at my own expense.

It has gotten to the point that I don’t really have my own projects. Not really. All my projects are extensions of other people’s projects. Those things I try to accomplish are really just parts and pieces of other people’s projects. I don’t mind this fact at all; I even cherish it. For I see no reason to quibble over the things in my own life. Would I like to live a life of luxury and ease? Perhaps, but I’m just as happy not to. I don’t need excessive things. At this very moment, I am actually rather cold and uncomfortable. My home is a bit drafty and old. Where I lived before this was much nicer and so much warmer. I admit, there are days (like today) where I regret having moved.

However, I moved with a purpose. My wife. My partner. She is the most important person to me. I love her, as is my choice to do so. And so I moved with her so that she might pursue a project that she had. To help her realize a dream she once had. I do everything I do for her. Ultimately I do. Because anything I do for myself serves no real purpose. Sometimes, I wonder if there is something that is the reverse of solipsism; a situation where perhaps I am the only being that does NOT exist in this world.

This idea of reverse solipsism is not new to me. After reading Immanuel Kant’s first critique, when he suggests that time and space may simply be forms of our intuitions, I took some time to consider whether the world itself might exist without such things. That is, could space and time be simply descriptive concepts, where they themselves do not exist in themselves. Of course, to truly make any headway with such things, it is best to consider the alternative. What would a world without space or time be like?

As you may already realize, I’ve been pursuing the question of whether time exists as a thing in itself since I began this blog. I even ran across another incredible YouTube video that further pursues this question: “When Is Now?” by “It’s Okay To Be Smart” (https://youtu.be/3WRgikuVZpQ). To be fair, the video is focused more on the existence of “now” than of time, but his analysis is still quite compelling and I enjoyed watching it very much. Time is still very much up in the air for me, but what about space?

For an essay I wrote about Kant, I realized that there existed a world that used space as a descriptive element, but that space was not a fundamental feature of that world. I admit, when I brought this to the attention of my professor, it became the point of a heated debate, but I believe I am correct in this. Consider the idea of simulated reality, similar to the world that existed inside the Matrix (from the movie series of the same name). That simulated reality is described using space, but itself does not exist in space. Sure, we might argue that the memory storage devices that “contain” the information regarding the Matrix themselves necessarily exist in space, but the information itself does not exist in space. Or, to look at it in another way, the information that describes the world of the Matrix is not itself organized spatially. As the films are very fond of expressing, the Matrix “code” looks like this:

source “How to build The Matrix”, TechCrunch (https://techcrunch.com/2019/03/18/how-to-build-the-matrix/)

As you can see, putting aside how this “code” is presented to the viewer, the code itself that is describing the Matrix is itself not spatially organized. If anything, it might possibly be more closely related to time, in that there will be code that comes before, and code that comes after, but otherwise the code does not subsist next to itself. Like a typical computer program, a fact that is often obfuscated by many people fond of discussing Object Oriented Programming.

To clarify my last point, in the case of most popular programming languages presently, where you generate a window and a bunch of widgets that each cause something to happen, the program is still running linearly. There is the main loop, a routine who’s purpose is to simply repeatedly watch for events to take place. Did the user press that button just now? How about now? No? I will then check again in a moment. Over and over and over again. It is still a linear program, it’s true nature hidden from us by libraries and other bits of code that we use, so we don’t have to “reinvent the wheel” each time.

As I am fond of reminding people on a regular basis, computers are simply machines that are very, very good at doing very, very simple computations (such as addition and subtraction), very, very fast, and that is all. It is tempting to think that a computer is much more than this when, by performing millions upon millions of these computations each second, it appears that the computer has generated a beautiful piece of art or shown us a complicated video of a film, or even by generating that magnificent 3D video game environment which we enjoy playing in. In the end, by doing a tremendous amount of calculations on simply numbers, the computers have shown the result. It is not that dissimilar to how Deep Thought, Douglas Adams famous super computer, determined that “the answer to life, the universe, and everything,” was simply 42.

It is tempting to apply meaning and value to things simply because they are complicated, especially when that complexity reached a level that we are unable to explain. Like modern neural networks, using thousandth order polynomials with thousands of coefficients in order to seemingly interpret handwritten numbers into their equivalently intended numerals, we humans do not actually understand what those polynomials are “doing” in order to accomplish the task. In the case of neural networks, does our lack of understanding suggest that the polynomial has gained sentience, and will soon start expressing a freedom and pursuing its own projects?

This finally brings us back to my original point. There is no more evidence to suggest that humans actually have freedom or free will than the case of the neural network I present above. For all we know, we are simply the most complicated machines that we have encountered, performing incredible amounts of computations and other operations each second, giving us the illusory appearance of consciousness and sentience. We want to believe in souls, the unmeasurable part of the human being, likely responsible for the free will we “must” possess that provides for us an escape from the hard deterministic structures that our science not only suggests is the only thing that exists, but cannot do otherwise.

If I bow down to the actual evidence, I must conclude that I am the only being in existence, for it is only my own consciousness that I have access to. Mine is the only consciousness that I can “feel” or “know.” I have no access to any others. For all I can determine, all other seemingly free beings are simply incredibly complicated, deterministically following organic machines going about their preprogrammed tasks each and everyday. I can “inject” something out of the deterministic order, or so I want to believe, but the evidence does not support this. My choice to write this blog and share this with you was predetermined in my youth when my father purchased a Texas Instruments TI99/4A for me. And, to be fair, even his decision to do that was further predetermined by events from his past as well.

My only real recourse in this situation is to have faith that others exist. That, despite my not feeling or experiencing other consciousnesses, I will choose to believe they still exist. I choose to believe my wife has a consciousness similar to my own, with the same sorts of freedom and projects I have. And it is beholden to me to cooperate with her in the pursuit of those projects. It is beholden to me to do this for everyone around me, as much as I am able to. For that at least is something like a purpose. That is something like a value.

Reflections on the Pandemic

crimson

Progress has been made with the pandemic. Both progress by humans in attempts to defeat the virus, and by the virus in finding ways not to be defeated. Humans have generated several vaccines to combat the spread of the original virus, having been brought to the public with “unprecedented” speed. However, many mutations of the original strain have been identified as well, and those vaccines have been effective only partially in dealing with the mutations. The war rages on.

With all that has been going on, I have continued to be on lockdown. I’ve been cooped up at home for approximately 10 months now. That’s a long time to be told you need to stay at home. My wife and I have been suffering the effects of staying at home for so long, with depression and melancholy topping the list of side effects. It’s hard to know what to do in this situation. Should we continue to be the good citizens we have been, listening to the authority figures and remaining at home? Or should we revolt and return to how things were before the pandemic, going out and enjoying our lives again? This debate reminds me of the first post I made to this blog, and so I have read it again. Link here.

In that post, I presented my opinion regarding the pandemic. That what ought to be recognized was not a health crisis but a systemic crisis. That humans have been ignoring the significant problems and issues of society for a long time, and the pandemic has simply thrust those problems and issues into the spotlight. There were definitely sparks of promise out there over the past 10 months. Black Lives Matter protests. Hope for climate change issues with the clearing of waters in places like Venice, Italy. And even more recently, economic turmoil as hedge fund managers, having been manipulating the markets for years, have been highlighted by large numbers of Reddit users who have cooperated as amateur investors to beat those managers at their own game. It seems to me that it is clear as day what is going on; what has been going on for decades and even centuries. And others must have seen what I see too, as they have clearly taken action.

I hold onto hope that things will change. But there is a lot of evidence that things will not change as well. Particularly with regard to many countries’ approaches to the corona virus. Specifically, their banking on vaccines to solve the problem. It seems to me that many countries have simply spent their time focused on stop-gap or band-aid solutions for now—such as lockdowns, mask wearing, and social distancing—instead of working on long term systemic changes to attend to their populations—such as considering things like universal basic income, or even simply forcing the hyper wealthy to provide support to the world’s people in this time of great need. This last point is one I feel rather strongly about.

According to traditional capitalism, it is important to allow everyone their freedom to pursue their projects. Those who’s projects are good projects, and who are able to do a good job in pursuing those projects, will receive the benefits of their choices, amassing great wealth and power. Unfortunately, those who’s projects are not good projects, or who are unable to do a good job in pursuing good projects, will suffer. Technically, those who suffer are unfit for their world as such, and as per Darwinian Evolutionary Theory, will eventually die out, their genetics lost to time. This is the idea, at any rate. And during a pandemic, this formula still holds as true. Simply look at how much more wealth the hyper wealthy have amassed on the shoulders of the world’s people, who suffer and die as they are instructed to remain at home without the supports or resources to do so effectively.

I think upon what I learned about ancient Greek and Roman societies. Especially Roman. Where the name of the game was patron-client relations. It was fairly simple actually: those who were wealthy and powerful were the patrons, while those who were not as wealthy or powerful were the clients. The job of the clients was to do what the patrons wanted, often through labor. But the patrons also had a job too, to support their clients. No one was off the hook. It was the patrons who funded and organized the celebrations, set about the construction of buildings, and handled the politics and military. In other words, those who were wealthy spent their time not on the accumulation of more wealth (though increasing wealth did occur as a result of their actions), but instead spent their wealth on attracting followers and pleasing the people, their clients.

In ancient Greece, when it wasn’t yet called Greece, warlords and generals didn’t simply command obedient and loyal troops. They had to persuade those soldiers to follow them through the offering of benefits. As one without wealth, I might only be able to offer my service and labour, but I still could decide who to offer those things to. If a particular warlord wasn’t offering much in the way of benefits, my loyalty would likely wane as I pursued other avenues toward my own benefits.

It could be argued that these things still exist today. A large company with no loyal customers will not be a large company for long. However, as has been demonstrated time and again over the past couple decades at least, when a large company is large enough, they can receive a “bail out” when they may be in trouble. The “bail out” is assembled through the use of taxpayer money, which ultimately means that the large company has acquired the funds from the people whether the people liked it or not. In other words, the people, who’s service and labour should be up to them to decide where and how it is utilized, has been stripped of their freedom to choose. The large company has simply usurped the wealth from those who have no wealth. Sounds much like some tales of the Sheriff of Knottingham.

I have ranted on long enough for today. I hope my point is clear. Not much has changed since my first post. The pandemic is still a problem and is still revealing the cracks in the systems of our societies. We still have the opportunity to address those issues, however challenging such changes may be. It is unclear to me whether changes are actually coming or not, but I still have hope. And I’m not banking on a vaccine to bail me out.

What’s in a Name

crimson

Today’s post may be obvious to many people out there, but it certainly was never obvious to me. In fact, I’m still pretty confused about the whole thing. But I think, recently, I’ve made some progress in clarifying what it might be all about.

To borrow an idea from linguistics studies, a name “picks out something in the world.” That is, a named object is directly associated with a very specific entity that exists in the world. For example, Donald Trump, the 45th President of the United States, refers directly to one, and only one, individual who currently exists in the world. There has never been any other entity that can occupy this role, and likely never will in the future either. In fact, for this name to be a good name, it must not refer to any other entity. It is a direct reference to exactly one entity.

The first rebuttal to this sort of suggestion is to raise fictional entities. For example, Santa Claus is a name that refers directly to exactly one entity, but that entity does not exist (as far as I know). Thus, the name is still referring to precisely one entity, but the entity in question may or may not actually exist. The name, however, does conjure up an image or idea of who or what the named entity is in my mind upon its usage. So perhaps that is an important feature of a name; the ability of the name to conjure in my mind an idea about a very specific entity that may or may not exist.

There is plenty of study and debate about names and what exactly they are and what they are used for, but I would like to raise another issue that I recently realized about names. I was considering aristocracy and how it works. It seemed to me that aristocracy is deeply rooted in names, and in inter-generational cooperation. This is what I want to discuss today.

First I need to make clear what I understand to be aristocracy. Definitions given in various dictionaries will make reference to an upper class of people in society, and perhaps that might be true, but I don’t think this tells us the whole story. I don’t think society has classes, and aristocracy is simply what we use to refer to the group that composes the upper class. I actually think it might work in reverse; that those who become aristocrats generate an upper class in society by the nature of their aristocracy. That is, this idea of an upper class, a group of people in society that are in some way above others, is not some natural state of groups of people, but an interpretation of how the groups are subdivided. That is, all those who are aristocrats in a group will generate the upper class. This is a fine distinction, and likely still confusing, so I will continue and try to clarify as I go.

What I think makes an individual an aristocrat is their name. In particular, their family name. In the part of the world where I exist, individuals have at least two names: their given name or names, and their family name. If we again talk about Donald Trump, Donald is the individual’s given name, likely picked out and assigned by their parents at birth. Trump, on the other hand, is the family name, a name that has been passed down through several generations and is assigned to this new generation of individual. Thus, the name Donald Trump describes a number of features of this individual. In part, this individual can be identified by the name Donald, perhaps used to get his attention across a crowded room. In part, this individual is part of a cooperative group of multi-generational individuals collectively known as Trumps. The name, in this case, is providing a lot more information than may have been clear at first glance.

This is where the potential for aristocracy enters into the discussion. The given names are important in identifying the individual in day-to-day life, but it is this family name that provides some indication of class or importance. To be a Trump, for example, suggests you have money, and may command some respect (though perhaps not as much now due to recent events, but I’m getting ahead of myself). To be a Trump is to be a part of an inter-generational group of individuals who have, over time, acquired property and wealth, power and recognition. But what I think is the most important feature that accompanies this family name is reputation.

I believe that reputation is the key feature of a name, especially a family name. It is the reputation that allows for the ease of acquisition of assets, the commanding of respect, and even the possible safety of walking down the street. Furthermore, it is the recognition of that name that provides all these benefits. If everyone knows that this particular individual is a Trump, then they will treat that individual with all the benefits they believe a Trump is due.

Of course, this can also work against the individual, what we might call notoriety. While a family name might suggest the individual ought to be regarded in a positive fashion, it can just as easily suggest the opposite. A name like Hitler often evokes great negativity from people, and so it is a poor choice of a name for any child (at least in this part of the world). Here we have an example of a name that is frequently associated with evil, making the individual possessing such a name likely finding themselves very unsafe while walking the street.

I find it quite interesting how much weight a name seems to have on directing the path individuals end up on. To try and make this very clear, my name is significant not because I have any say in how I am treated, but because of everyone around me and how they decide to treat me. My fate, it seems, is in the hands of everyone around me.

My parents are individuals who have names and reputations. They decide upon giving me a name when I am born, and I also inherit their name as a part of my name. In that I inherit their name, I inherit their reputation. During the course of my life, my available options are a direct reflection of the reputation I have inherited. Some options are available to me due to my name, while other options are not available to me for the same reason.

There is one other piece of this puzzle I must now discuss. I begin with my parents’ reputation, but as I live my life, I acquire my own reputation as well. Perhaps through my deeds and actions, I might improve (or diminish) my reputation among those around me. With great deeds and actions, I may gain trust and respect of my community. Perhaps due to hard work, I acquire wealth and allies to make my life more luxurious. If I am successful in doing these things, improving my reputation, then perhaps by the time I am ready to produce my own offspring, I can impart to them a better reputation than what was given to me. This, I believe, is where aristocracy comes from.

Through inter-generational cooperation, whereby each individual of each generation (frequently referred to as a bloodline) conduct themselves in such a manner that they can continue to increase their collective wealth and power, commanding increasing amounts of respect, eventually an individual will be born with the accumulated efforts of their ancestors to become a very powerful individual, even before they learn to walk. This is an aristocrat.

Unfortunately, this all works in reverse as well. If the inter-generational cooperation is lacking, or worse yet, each generation continues to make choices and follow a path of notoriety, the obstacles presented to the resultant individual will most definitely challenge them to accomplish anything in the world. In fact, such an individual is likely to be scorned and mistreated, again before they even learn to walk.

I think this paints a pretty important picture about our world and how power exists. It suggests that no individual rises or falls entirely alone. Even if you isolate yourself from all of society, trying desperately to escape all this reputation stuff, you will still have had parents, who themselves had parents, and so on. You will always be influenced by your own ancestors, on some level. It may not be through some mystical energy or ritualistic psionic power necessarily, but the choices of your ancestors reflects upon you and creates your opportunities in the world.

The hardest part of all this for me is the recognition that I cannot become an aristocrat. I have to be born into aristocracy. As I was not born into aristocracy, I can never become an aristocrat. No matter how hard I work, no matter how many good deeds I do, I will never be. The best I could possibly hope to do is increase my own reputation as much as I can, with the sincere hope to impart aristocracy to my own children.

Home Economics

crimson

I had a very productive conversation with a friend last night, and thought I would post today on a part of what we were talking about. Specifically, on how to get by in our world financially. While I recognize that the sorts of advice and tools I am about to share are not necessarily going to work for everyone, these are the strategies I have used in my life that allow me to maintain financial stability and even some degree of financial freedom. This is what has worked for me, so maybe you might find it helpful for yourself too.

When I was much younger, and still in high school, I believed that in order to do as I wanted at any time that I wanted, I would need to make over $500,000 per year for every year in my life. I came to this number by suggesting that for $1000 per day, I could freely do anything I wished. For example, perhaps I might like to fly to Paris, France to have lunch on a particular day. With the income I described, I could have lunch in Paris every day without worrying that I would run out of money.

That is a lot of money to be making by any individual, even in today’s standards. I would suggest it might even be an unreasonable goal, considering what one might have to do in their lives to earn such an amount of money. It was in part due to this belief that I attended university the first time trying to become a Mechanical Engineer. Such a profession would have put me on a path that could, at least potentially, lead to the achieving of such a goal. As I believe I have mentioned in other posts, this didn’t work out for me. Attending university with my aim being to gain employment that produced such large sums of money was ultimately a disaster for me.

What I’ve learned since then is that in order to actually do the things I want in this world, when I want to do them, actually only requires me to make about $30,000 per year, which amounts to making approximately $15 per hour at a full time job. And as many of you likely already know, $15 per hour is just above minimum wage in the area of the world I currently live. This is far more reasonable and attainable than the original goal of $500,000 per year.

Admittedly, such a discovery has a number of conditions attached. Firstly, this is how much I would need to make if I lived alone, with no dependents nor a companion. Also, it would assume I have no other debts (for example, my mortgages would all need to be paid off completely). While my current situation does not meet these requirements, the additional funding I require to fulfill my goals in my current circumstances is not drastically more than this. I have not actually worked out the numbers for my present circumstances, but if I suggested I needed about $60,000 per year now, I’m sure that would be enough. It may be double my previous estimate, but it is certainly far less than my original estimate of $500,000.

With this groundwork laid out, I will now reveal some of my strategies that allow for the achieving of this goal. While discussing these strategies, it is important to keep in mind these findings I have established. The goals above are intimately tied to the strategies below, and if you adjust your life to the strategies below, you will likely find that the goals above need to be adjusted as a result. This will become clearer as I proceed, so please bear with me.

The first, and possibly most important, observation that I learned to make is with regard to how I spend my time. Literally. How much does it cost for me to take part in various activities over time. This was not my discovery, but actually was advice offered to me by my father at a rather young age. To understand this idea better, I will present a few examples:

If I decide to go to the theater to watch a movie, how much does that cost me (these numbers are from about 2010 or so)? The movie tickets, in addition to the popcorn and drink that I often purchase, typically end up costing me about $20. The time I spend watching this movie will often take up about 2 hours of my life. As a result, doing the math, watching a movie in the theater costs me about $10 per hour to do.

If I decide to play Pokemon on my Gameboy, how much does that cost me (these numbers are from about 2000 or so)? The Gameboy cost me about $100 to purchase, and the Pokemon game cost me about $50. The playing of the game itself does not cost me any money, just time. So the question is how much time do I (or did I) spend playing that game? In this particular case, the Pokemon cartridge happened to track the time I played it, so I could see precisely how much time I had been playing the game by the time I decided to work out this math. It turned out I had played well over 100 hours in the game, and I was still continuing to play the game (I was far from completing the game). If I suggest that I spend 150 hours playing that game (a conservative estimate), then I find that it costs me about $1 per hour to play Pokemon on my Gameboy. Of further interest in this particular situation, the more I play the game, the less it costs. For example, if I continue playing this game and eventually accumulate 300 hours of play, the math will reveal that at that point it cost me $0.50 per hour to play. In other words, the more I play, the less money I seem to be spending per hour.

If I decide to write programs in Python on my computer, an activity I actually rather enjoy, how much does that cost me (these numbers are from this current time, as this is one of my present hobbies). The computer I use to program on was salvage, and so literally cost me no money. Furthermore, the computer I use is utilized for many, many other purposes than simply programming, so any number I suggest is already technically much more than it ought to be for this example. Having said all of this, I will pretend for a moment I purchased the computer ($1500), and that I spend approximately one sixth (about 17%) of my time writing Python programs on it. The operating system (linux) and the Python interpreter did not cost me any money as they are freely available online. Thus, very approximately, I might suggest that I have spent about $250 in order to program in Python. The act of programming itself does not cost me any money, just time. I have likely spent over 100 hours programming so far, and I continue to do so, as it is a current hobby of mine. Thus, programming in Python costs me (presently) about $2.50 per hour, but like the video game, continues to become cheaper and cheaper as I keep doing it. Knowing that I actually did not spend money on the computer, and the actual number is $0 per hour. This is (so far) the least expensive activity for me to engage in.

This is already quite telling. Between the above activities, I ought to preference Python programming, as I spend the least amount of money doing it. I don’t think it is an accident that this activity can also be quite productive, as the programs I write can be used for other purposes, such as increasing automation in other chores and activities I engage in. This raises a couple more examples I think it is worth presenting:

If I decide to work a job, how much does that cost me? The answer to this one should already be obvious. It costs me nothing to work a job. In fact, I actually make money when I work a job. If I used the example at the beginning of this post, I might earn $15 per hour while working a job. This activity is now even more desirable than Python programming, assuming I actually enjoy working. Thus, it is certainly of great benefit to me to work a job I enjoy, as it won’t feel like work, and I will be earning money from the activity.

If I decide to do absolutely nothing, how much does that cost me? Believe it or not, this ends up costing me something financially. For example, I am sitting in a rental property, sitting on a couch. The rental property costs me about $1500 per month to live in, and the couch cost me about $1000 to purchase. So even if I sit here doing nothing, there is some cost involved. Furthermore, I typically do many activities in this home and on this couch, which will affect the math. However, for the sake of argument, I will suggest I am purposely doing nothing just to see what kind of numbers I end up with. There are 720 hours in a month of 30 days. Thus, the rental costs me about $2 per hour, even when I do absolutely nothing else.

If I decide to stay in a hotel for a night, how much does that cost me? This gets a lot more complicated again, as I would be staying in the hotel often toward some other purpose. But again, just to see some numbers, I will again assume I do absolutely nothing except sit in the hotel, perhaps watching television. If the hotel room costs me $200 per night, and there are 24 hours in a day, then staying in the hotel costs me about $8 per hour to stay there. Clearly my rental is less expensive than the hotel.

This all may sound very pedantic, but it all has a point. If I am able to break down the cost of all my activities into a common time slice (in my case by the hour), then I can start to see how those activities compare to each other. In some cases I spend money, and in a few cases I make money. And in some cases, an activity becomes less expensive the more I engage in that activity. When I started to see all these things, I started to consciously decide to pursue more activities that cost me less money. Furthermore, I preferenced activities where the cost of the activity dropped as I engaged with the activity more. For those who know me, I do/did play a lot of video games, especially Pokemon. In all honesty, playing Pokemon might be the least expensive activity I perform at this point, putting aside using salvaged computers to program on.

By behaving as I have, despite having generated less income than most of my friends, I have also tended to save far more money than those same friends. Furthermore, I have been able to “splurge” more than those friends at times I may want to spend a bit more money as well, because of my having my savings. During this pandemic, when we are all expected to lockdown and remain at home, I have endured better than many of the people around me as a result of my life choices.

There is, of course, a drawback to much of what I’ve described, as my friend pointed out last night. If I really want to engage in the more costly activities, I will require a much higher income than I presently have. Activities like scuba diving, sky diving, or even playing golf or tennis generally cost a very substantial amount of money. I have heard from those people who do engage in those activities that they consider the rewards they receive from those activities to be quite spectacular. If it makes them happy, then who am I to criticize? However, in order to engage in those activities, those individuals will obviously need to sacrifice more in order to generate the larger incomes they require, possibly taking jobs they do not actually enjoy.

It can be hard to find enjoyment in certain mundane activities. Our society, constructed on structures of consumerism, can even seek to shame individuals who do take enjoyment in such activities. My friend last night told me he enjoys sweeping floors and cleaning, but seemed incredibly ashamed to admit such a thing. Personally, I am a bit envious that he has found such a productive and important activity enjoyable. I wish I found doing those activities more enjoyable myself. However, he indicated to me that among his circle of friends, doing such mundane activities is considered “beneath” them as well, suggesting that people around him are even discouraged from performing those activities, despite any enjoyment they may receive.

There is much more I could say about all of this, but I think I have rambled on long enough for the moment. And I believe my reader should by now see my point. I believe that living a life of financial stability, and possibly freedom, is not as far-fetched as we are often led to believe. I believe that structures such as consumerism seem to motivate people to desire the more expensive activities, leading people away from potential happiness. My friend likes to sweep floors, an activity that potentially earns him money while at the same time fulfilling a happiness for him, much as my hobby of writing Python programs does for me. By embracing these sorts of choices and activities, and by recognizing the significance of finding a job we enjoy rather than a job that pays well, I believe we have a much greater potential for happiness in our lives. And it won’t require making ridiculous sums of money in the process.