Chaos

Concerning Heady Spirits

2006-03-18T08:07:00.000-05:00

Another subject which ought to be touched upon here is that of alcoholic drinks. Myself, I have never liked them, not even the ones that people who don't like alcohol are supposed to like anyway. I think (for instance) that grape juice happens to be one of the most delicious drinks in the world, and that to let it ferment in a jar until bacteria have destroyed most of the delectability is not the best way to drink it. I know full well that all of this is simply because I haven't acquired the proper taste for alcohol yet.

However, the amazing thing is that many people my age consume alcohol despite this intrinsic barrier. Actually, this is not quite so amazing, as alcohol has many things going for it, including its attraction as a frowned-upon and forbidden beverage. Particularly amusing can be the ways in which it lowers one's natural inhibitions, leading people to consume it to the point that it removes the stomach's natural inhibitions about jumping through one's esophagus and spilling its contents on the floor.

More to the point, there are certainly inhibitions that I'd like to lose, but there are also ones worth keeping. Drinking alcohol is, more or less, like chopping down a rainforest in order to get rid of all the sickly and dying trees. There have to be better solutions.

And, in fact, why shouldn't there be? Why do people think that it is so hard to change their own inhibitions, and permanently so? It is precisely because the timing of pleasure and pain is reversed from that of drinking: with the latter, pleasure comes before pain; with the former, pain comes before pleasure. Some philosophers would, after arguing as I have up to this point, condemn drinking as laziness---an unwillingness of people to change their own inhibitions because of the barrier of pain involved, versus the comparative ease of drinking in moderation.

However, I would disagree. Particularly in college, the opportunities to drink in moderation are few and far between. Since one cup lowers one's inhibitions to drink further, and the peer pressure to drink is already very high (especially considering the popularity of Beirut), the natural result when someone brings a keg to a party is general intoxication that night, and general splitting headaches the next morning.

I would argue instead that drinking is a form of false laziness. Proper laziness is a virtue, namely, the virtue of spending the least amount of work required to accomplish projects to your satisfaction, so that you can therefore satisfactorily accomplish many more projects with the same amount of work. In fact, if you add up the total amount of pain which results from drinking in college, spending the time to remove your own inhibitions in another way suddenly seems much more appealing, especially because they will be gone all the time instead of just when you drink.

To put things more bluntly, I would argue that removing your inhibitions permanently is not nearly as bad as getting 50-100 splitting headaches and being occasionally covered in your own vomit. Once you get out of college, of course, this line of reasoning no longer applies, since by then you've most likely learned to drink in moderation. However, for those still at that stage in their lives, I'll elucidate this point more clearly in the next post.

On Relationships

2006-03-05T14:20:00.000-05:00

Some few minutes ago, an anonymous commenter suggested that my time would be well-spent chasing after the opposite sex. Realizing that it was high time to update this page, and that this was indeed a topic barely touched upon prior to this date, it seemed natural to discuss the issue of relationships.

I must confess that, prior to last summer, I had firm plans to be a bachelor. This was more or less a decision I had reached in high school; since none of the other students really shared or understood my love for certain topics (philosophy, for instance), I never felt the type of connection to them that is prerequisite to any solid relationship. In college, where this was no longer a problem, I still held out on account of a conviction that romantic entanglements would degrade not only my will to embark on astonishing, ridiculous projects, but also because I did not feel the need to share my life with anyone else.

However, last summer was the first time that I had actually lived in something approaching isolation; by chance, a cousin of mine (who happened to be not-yet-married) was going overseas during the summer, and he agreed to let me stay in his apartment while I was working in a summer internship. The experience quite shattered my expectations: rather than accomplishing a huge list of things I had set out to do, the loneliness of the place quite killed any desire that I had to do work. I discovered that, as surprising as it might seem, that society in moderation actively helped the creative process. I also missed a great many people and felt for some of them, at last, the first breath of love.

One of the most magical things about love is that when you first come across it, you completely fail to understand it. This is both good, as the real thing would be terrifying to behold for one previously unaccustomed to it, and bad, as there is the danger of vastly overestimating the strength of your feelings when they first appear. At some point, however, one realizes that it makes no sense to be afraid of love if it will actually help you out in the long run. In my particular case, the people to whom I feel attracted are exactly those who it would make perfect sense to eventually live with---they have universally been well-educated, personable people who are fine musicians and have a serious interest in the sciences, philosphy, and artistic creation.

At the same time, I can well imagine that there are people who are attracted by attributes which are, shall we say, less than practicable. Hence, the adage, "Love is blind." Now, here comes the useful point of this entire post: it is in general very easy to figure out what attracts you to other people. So much so that you can actually make a list in advance, before you get involved in a relationship, and decide if it's in fact possible for an individual to indeed possess all of these characteristics and yet be a stable, reasonable partner. And, if it's not possible, you can start crossing off items on your list, until you reach a point where you discover that there exists someone that you'll still love a great deal, but who won't have horrible personality problems or disappear with someone else at a moment's notice. That way, you can more efficiently seek out people who might be worth living with, and, at the very least, you'll know in advance that you'll have a life of unhappiness when Cupid smacks you straight in the face along with a struggling quadriplegic Latvian alcolholic...

As a footnote for the anonymous poster, and for my parents should they (Heavens!) be reading this, there is no need to worry about that, as I am currently single, thank you very much.

The Nature of Genius, Part II

2005-08-25T02:55:00.000-04:00

Who is a genius? That's the question at the end of the previous post (which I suggest you go read before looking at this one). There, I outlined a definition for how one can tell who is a genius after the fact. But what, one wonders, about before the great, mind-boggling discovery? How can one tell who is a genius before they actually accomplish something?

I've already argued that the ability to absorb knowledge is a wildly inaccurate indicator of genius. Actually, any sort of early ability at all is only a rough predictor, because idiot-savants exist who can do cube roots to twenty decimal places in their head but can't handle simple abstractions like imaginary numbers. As a matter of fact, I don't know what the real answer is.

I would like to consider instead an interesting possibility (which could be quite wrong). Namely, that the question is irrelevant because people don't actually become geniuses until they've taken the time to learn something thoroughly well, by which time their insight follows nearly immediately.

In particular, I'm challenging the assumption that certain people's brains have a sort of "latent" genius implanted in them from birth. Genius, when it happens, no doubt occurs because someone's neural network was configured in just the right way to spot the insight that everyone else missed. It makes little sense (to me at least) to assume that the network was configured this way from conception---that would be as if the baby Einstein had a little piece of his brain marked with the tag "This spot reserved for general insightfulness about relativity."

Rather, it would seem more likely that people have networks which are each quirky in their own special way, so that rather than the solution being always a product of the genius, the problem floats around until someone with quirkiness in just the right spot comes along and says "Aha!" To put it another way, it's not that a particular genius searches very rapidly through all avenues for a solution, but rather that the problem searches through all possible experts at all possible times during their cranial development until it finds one that can solve it, who we then label a "genius."

Naturally, some people are more susceptible than others to acts of genius, but that may be because many problems depend on finding a certain type of quirkiness. In fact, genius demands a certain type of quirkiness, which is one that asks questions where others do not. The key to genius is to ask those questions at the right point, instead of wasting lots of time asking questions fruitlessly.

The Nature of Genius

2005-08-25T01:19:00.000-04:00

It's taken many years, but I've finally come to the conclusion that genius and knowledge are not the same thing. When said that way, this seems really obvious, but the real sticking point for most people is that they often fail to recognize when one is masquerading for the other. In particular, they often pin the label of "genius" on someone who is capable of accumulating knowledge very quickly, when a genius is in reality someone capable of quite different things. The most egregious example of this happens in schools. "Ah," people will say, "Billy is a genius. He skipped a grade and took number theory in high school and cleaned up on the SAT and was doing ridiculous research projects before he went off to college, etc., etc. I haven't a chance of doing anything intellectual as well as he."

No doubt Billy is brighter than the average bulb in the socket, but is he a genius? I think not necessarily so; indeed, what being a genius entails is a matter deserving of an entry by itself. However, I think that the defining characteristic is that a genius, presented with roughly the same information as an expert in the field, can demolish existing conceptions of what is possible. It is with this sort of genius that one may feel properly astonished, as the genius is capable of things which are simply beyond the imagination of experts and laymen alike. It does not matter when the genius acquires whatever background knowledge is requisite for the discovery. An expert may learn all of it in a day, and the genius might struggle though it over several years, but no-one will stop to ask questions about that when the genius wins the Nobel Prize.

I have not yet made it clear, however, how weakly knowledge acquisition and genius are correlated. Rather than the usual anecdotes about Einstein in college (he was a terrible student) or Feynman's IQ (which was 120), I'll make an attempt at some more convincing statistics. The Westinghouse Science Talent Search was historically the best-known and most prestigious science competition in the United States. It is geared toward precociously bright high-school seniors who have happened to engage in research projects (usually with some faculty mentor). Of all the submissions, perhaps 15% are marked as semi-finalists, totalling roughly 10,000 individuals in the period from 1942 (the start of the program) to 1982. Exactly six of those individuals are now Nobel Laureates.

Six, no more, no less. The number of Nobel Laureates in the sciences who were born recently enough in the US to have been eligible for the Westinghouse competition is thirty-six (data collected from the Nobel Prize Internet Archive). Namely, 83% of the best minds in recent history either did not hear about the competition, submitted a paper which got rejected, or simply had no research worth speaking of at that time. Due to the massive publicity associated with the competition, the first option probably covers no more than 10% of the missing Laureates. Thus, we are left with at least three-quarters of the Laureates who were apparently not among the 10,000 best and brightest students in high school over those four decades.

What is even more illuminating is a glance over the submitted papers in that time period. Yes, the papers are advanced for high school students, but the overwhelming majority of them would be considered ordinary college theses instead of ground-breaking research. Namely, almost everyone who appears to be a "genius" in high school or college will go on to become an expert in something, but will rarely become a genius. The experts will certainly do good work in their areas of interest, but their contributions are more closely aligned: certainly some experts will be better than others, but they will only be distinguishable by those already very, very advanced in the field.

This is both heartening and disappointing. Heartening for the "almost-geniuses" because it means that most of those who we thought to be out-of-reach in college will turn out to be not quite so clever when they run out of new things to learn. Disappointing for the "geniuses-elect" because those who we consider far-behind-us will most likely catch up eventually. The real question, therefore is, "How do we tell who is a genius and who is not before they actually accomplish something?"

I will answer that in the next entry.

A Bear With Very Little Brain

2005-08-02T00:44:00.000-04:00

When I pointed out the inconsistencies of all philosophies based on moral systems, I carefully neglected to explain my own philosophy on life. I spent a long time trying to figure out some complicated scheme, and then (immediately after attending an absolutely fabulous orchestra concert) I had a bit of an epiphany. Deep down, I am not a complicated person. My philosophy on life is simply to enjoy it and help others do the same, which is more-or-less the very same philosophy of Winnie-the-Pooh.

The real thing to understand about this is that we do not act according to a system of rigorous laws. We act on a system of ideals, some of which we value more than others. What these ideals embody is really an arbitrary product of our social history. Truth and beauty, for instance, are often considered virtues. What does beauty entail, however? What was thought to be marvelously handsome in the seventies and eighties is now never seen in public. What music captivated people five hundred years ago is now thought to be at best quaint and at worst an assault upon the ears. And, concerning truth, would we really prefer to live in a world where everyone knew everything about everyone else?

Certain forms of beauty and certain forms of truth do inspire great emotions. Yet, in the creations of animals, which they themselves see to be beautiful, we can see only complexity. The Bauer Bird is the perfect example of this: the male's vast constructions of twigs, rare shells, and curiosities are to us no more than random piles of refuse (rare refuse though it might be), whereas to the female Bauer Bird, they inspire feelings of love and companionship. No doubt the Bauer Birds view our art with much the same whimsical eye, seeing us fussing over intricacies that it has no hope of ever understanding. Who is to be the universal judge in these matters?

In the end, after much thought, the remains only a grand sense of arbitrariness, which suggests to me that different philosophical systems are simply different and not necessarily better than one another. I happen to be the type of person who is just suited to Winnie-the-Pooh's philosophy. I like helping other people; I like doing silly and crazy things in my spare time; society tends to look with fond bemusement on both, so all involved are better off. Other people are more suited to rigidly upholding their ideas of Truth (must... not... lie... to... axe-murderers) and Beauty (cannot... go... out... without... makeup).

Am I missing something by being this way? Is there some grand cosmological principle which dictates how life should be lived? I don't think so. Not even the religions of the world have any clear answer on what, for instance, is the best occupation to have in life. Most of them do have some guidelines, acquired from long experience with what leads to pain and suffering, but those are most often already integrated into the society in which the religion persists. As such, I am most likely already following them unconsciously. Would I get any enjoyment out of piercing my ears? No. I've been conditioned to think that men wearing earrings look stupid. Does it actually look stupid? That depends on who you ask. Does the fact that women wear earrings make them more beautiful? Society says, of course, "Oh yes, that's just the perfect spot for a bit of jewelry." If there is some universal principal buried in this madness, it quite escapes the Little Brain to imagine what it might be.

On Mendicants...

2005-07-23T15:49:00.000-04:00

I was lying in bed last night, realizing that I hadn't done any good philosophizing in a while, so I thought for some time about the question of beggars. So far, whenever I've passed them on the street, I've rarely given them any money, using the excuse that I've not properly considered the question of whether it's useful to give them money or not. The question turns out to be exceptionally subtle.

The arguments for giving them money are simple, so I won't mince words: a) they will benefit substantially more from the money than you will, b) altruism always gives metaphysical satisfaction, and c) they are less likely to use illegal or violent means to obtain subsistence. The arguments against giving them money are more complicated. Firstly, there are no guarantees that the recipient will use the money as intended. Five years or so ago, I was traveling in Boston and came across a beggar calling out, "Give me money, money for drugs and a gun;" another time, I noticed an apparently blind man on the street wearing high-end Grado SR-80 headphones. Secondly, even if the recipient uses it for food, it will almost certainly be used inefficiently; since storage spaces are limited, bulk savings are impossible, and, furthermore, it's less likely that they will travel long distances to get better deals. Thirdly, there's the question of being deserving: how does one know that the beggar in question is not a criminal? How does one know that the beggar has tried to get jobs elsewhere? Why does any one person deserve any more than one's bank account divided by the population of the earth?

I'll answer the last two questions first, since they are comparatively easy. We all have hierarchical loyalties, probably first to our family and friends, then to our city or state, then to the country, and perhaps only then to all fellow human beings. If you value your city more than others, then you must remember that your city also includes beggars, who consequently have more claim on your support than those in other places. Secondly, I happen to believe that it doesn't matter whether a beggar is lazy or not. This is really a question of human kindness: if we kick and scream whenever something like the dodo goes extinct, we ought to care a just a little bit about the less mentally willing members of our own society. If, on the other hand, you are a cold, cruel bastard with a heart of steel, consider point (c) above the next time you get your wallet stolen.

But the rest of the questions are real sticklers. Every time you give money to a beggar, you're also potentially lining the coffers of drug dealers, pimps, casinos, and giant capitalist corporations. What is to be done about this delicate situation? It'd be nice if one could just reach into a pocket and pull out a loaf of bread or something useful but non-convertible.

Fortunately, there is a mostly reasonable way out of the difficulties. One cannot judge character well without being around a person for some time, but that is exactly what happens with the people managing homeless shelters and food kitchens. Coincidentally, these places also have modern inventions like refrigerators and voluminous cabinets as well as trucks in which large quantities of food may be transported. So, the real thing to do is to count up the number of homeless people that you pass each month and donate a dollar for each of them every once in a while to the local homeless shelter. If you miss the feeling of handing goods directly to the masses, don't forget that the shelters also accept volunteers.

Intelligent Design and Science

2005-04-06T09:37:00.000-04:00

I just read an article about Intelligent Design in which the author defends it as a scientific theory. To do so, he makes three points:

(1) The truth of an idea is not decided by popular vote.
(2) The truth of an idea is independent of its political, religious, and philosophical implications.
(3) The truth of an idea is independent of whatever propaganda may be associated with it.

All three are excellent points, with which I completely agree. However, as with every single other article on Intelligent Design that I've ever read, the argument is incomplete. Not all truths are science, and not all science is (absolutely) true; specifically:

(4) A scientific model must be a tool to predict the outcome of future events.
(5) The predictions of a scientific model must reasonably approximate the truth.

For instance, the statement "I did laundry today" might be a truth, but true statements which do not involve predictions are not science; they are at most history.

That is why Intelligent Design is not science: one cannot predict from it either the frequency or the nature of new creatures appearing on the Earth. In contrast, Evolution is widely accepted as a scientific theory because it has been remarkably successful at describing changes in microorganisms (such as drug resistance); its consistency with the fossil record of larger animals suggests its applicability for them as well, but the time scales are such that no-one expects to be able to test that aspect of the theory within our lifetimes. This is not to say that Evolution is absolutely true, but only that it is the best available model at the present time to describe future events.

Furthermore, (as it is not science) Intelligent Design has no place in science classrooms. Science classes are useful precisely because they give students tools with which to predict reasonable outcomes. Future investors, for instance, learn to avoid perpetual motion machines and people claiming to be able to transmute metals. Future parents learn why genetic diversity helps reduce the likelyhood of children with horrible birth defects. Intelligent Design, bereft of the ability to make predictions, is at best a discussion topic for students of history.

Larry Summers and The Middle East

2005-02-20T14:43:00.000-05:00

In the past few weeks there's been a great deal of hoopla over remarks Larry Summers (the President of Harvard) made about the innate differences between women and men. In essence, he put forth that one of the reasons why women aren't represented as well in academia is because men have a higher natural variance of abilities; that is, because men are over-represented among the very smartest and very stupidest extremes of the poupulation.

Lots of people got very, very angry over this, and at first I could not understand why. Among other things, it is actually plausible that the current spread in abilities is higher among men than women. A number of other areas exhibit this strange duality; for instance, women in Britain file more insurance claims than men, but men pay higher premiums because they have more serious accidents.

Then, I came across the following quote, courtesy of the conservative blog EuroPundits:

If, in court, everyone is innocent until proven otherwise, in international politics, particularly when it comes to the Middle East, the usual suspects are, unless proven innocent, the actual culprits.

And it made me feel very, very angry, too. The common theme between this quote and the one that Summers made is that they are both plausible descriptions of the world. However, they are both incredibly insidious because the average listener is unprepared to distinguish between correlation and causation.

Though it may be true at the moment that major governments in the Middle East are responsible for much of the terror and chaos that occurs there, this condition need not hold universally. For instance, the more likely it is for Syria to be blamed for terrorist attacks, the more likely it is for another terror group to commit a crime with the knowledge that Syria will take the brunt of the international outrage. But the more important underlying fallacy is the assumption that Muslim nations cannot achieve internal peace when left to their own devices. So high is the correlation between terror attacks and Muslim nations that many assume terrorism to be a natural result of the religion itself.

However, one of the many lessons of history is that rules do not matter if people are bent on breaking them. Despite the shared commandment that "Thou shalt not kill," we have had thousands of needless wars between Christians, Jews, and Muslims alike. Despite the shared commandment that "Thou shalt not covet anything that belongs to your neighbor," this exact covetousness is what drives many a nation's market economy. In more recent events, death threats from right-wing nationalists have Israelis worried that a repeat of the shooting of Yitzhak Rabin will occur and prevent the peace accords with Palestine from being carried out. Regardless of whether Islam forbid anything, there would be Islamic terrorists simply because of poverty, misery, and anger in the slums of Middle Eastern cities.

I won't say that Islam has nothing to do with terrorism, but I think it has more to do with who terrorists attack as compared to whether they attack. In the Middle East, a cultural feeling of Anti-Americanism (possibly fueled by an inferiority complex, but definitely supported by propaganda from many Middle-Eastern governments) gives the United States status as a desireable target; the fact that we have a Christian majority makes us only more attractive. Try saying the word "infidels," or better yet "Philistines" out loud some time; they both have a satisfying ring to them as they invoke feelings of intellectual and moral superiority (which have no basis in reality). Surprise, we have gangs and hoodlums and murderers (even in the Bible Belt) too; I'm being a little facetious, but just think of all the horrible things that they would do, too, if they weren't incapacitated by drug abuse!

As for women, a Harvard Professor (Howard Georgi) put it best when he said that we encourage women to be average but that we encourage men to be adventurous. Three days ago, I heard a girl say that she didn't want to do math in grad school because the work scared her. I have never heard a guy say that, even though it's obvious that some of them are also frightened. With the girl, it was a severe impediment; with the guys, it was simply something that had to be overcome. The human spirit was meant to be adventurous whether it belongs to a man or a woman. Period.

I only wish that my parents had told me that.

Sometimes....

2005-01-30T13:21:00.000-05:00

You just have to wonder if this conversation ever happened:

God: Now listen up closely, guys: the Universe is 15 billion years old.
Bible-writer 1: (to Bible-writer 2) What did he say?
Bible-writer 2: Ummm...the Universe is 15 something years old.
BW 1: We can't put that down like that!
BW 2: Well...
BW 1: What's the biggest number you can think of?
BW 2: Ummm...three thousand?
BW 1: Perfect.

Mirrors

2005-01-27T01:15:00.000-05:00

There was a crazy episode of NOVA on PBS Tuesday night which discussed (among other things) empathy and where it comes from.* Turns out, humans are ridiculously good at empathizing with other people, to the extent that (for instance) sports fans often feel the same degree of dejection, anger, and exuberance as the actual players on the field. But that's not the crazy part, since it's been known for a while. The crazy part is that researchers actually went out and found the part of the brain that's responsible for making this happen.

In this newly-discovered region of the brain, neurons fire in exactly the same way whenever a certain event happens---irregardless of whether you are doing them or someone else is. If you smile, it fires in a "happy" pattern. If you look at a bunch of happy, smiling kids, it also fires in a "happy" pattern. If you look at a bunch of dirty, miserable refugees, it fires in exactly the same way as it would if you were a dirty, miserable refugee yourself. Neurons in this region turn what happens in the outside world into experiences that feel like your very own, and so are called "mirror neurons."

But mirror neurons wouldn't be very useful if they just hung out in some random corner of the brain. As a matter of fact, they're directly hardwired into your emotional cortex, meaning that you feel genuinely happy when looking at smiling people, and genuinely terrible when looking at suffering people. Even though a tiny voice inside your head might be telling you that the actors on the screen are actually a) just fine, and b) getting paid millions, they can still make you cry if something really bad appears to happen to them.

What's really fascinating about this part of the brain is that it's the most basic social construct within us. Not only does it not make sense for hermits, but it also actively encourages social groups by counterbalancing the aggressiveness and competitiveness that we have acquired through natural selection. In other words, it results in us helping each other out, because other people having good things happen to them makes us feel good, too.

And that's really mind-boggling. Before morals, before language, before the Stone Age (monkeys have a similar, weaker region in their brains) people still helped each other out because it made them feel good. How awesome is that?

*http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sciencenow/3204/01.html

Morals

2005-01-22T23:26:00.000-05:00

The fly in the soup of many a good moral philosophy is that we humans aren't perfect enough for things to all work out. Of those I haven't yet really discussed, Libertarianism fails because some people are crafty and selfish. Utilitarianism breaks apart because people cannot know the full future impact of their actions. Rawls' Theory of Justice doesn't work because people aren't completely risk-averse. In essence, every time a new psychological insight is realized, another theory of morals comes crashing down. One wonders, then, if there even exists a moral system that humans are capable of following.

However, as countless tragedies have proved, torture can remove any illusion of rationality that we possess. If there is always a choice between a morally right thing to do and a morally wrong one, we can always be coerced into choosing the wrong one. Similarly, we can be forced to choose between two (apparently) morally wrong options; if there are infinitely many scenarios which are morally wrong, then in most cases, a consistent moral system must be infinitely large in order to describe the right thing to do when forced to choose between two sets of otherwise morally wrong scenarios.

The reason why these are not pathological objections is that the world is not perfect either. It is perfectly capable of starving, sickening, drowning, biting, burning, and crushing us in the most hideous ways. It forces mothers to give food to only one child when there isn't enough. It casually murders a hundred thousand people in Indonesia just by shrugging its shoulders. By random accidents, we are regularly forced to choose between bad outcomes, which is why we look to moral systems for easy answers to hard questions.

Unfortunate as it is, a practical moral system cannot hope to deal with every situation thrown its way. To put it less verbosely, there are no practical moral systems. None at all, simply because we are incapable of holding onto any given logical structure in every conceivable situation.

This will come as a shock to most people. However, you have to ask yourself: is there anything which you would not do under any circumstance purely because it is morally wrong? For instance, most people consider killing children to be one of the most horrible offenses in existence. Except most people would have to qualify that statement with the condition that the child should be innocent and not about to destroy the world (as in the Hitler's Office Dilemma). Be that way if you must, but consider the following scenario (stolen from the Arabian Nights):

The Sultan of Persia marries his childhood sweetheart, but finds out after five years that she's been sleeping with another man for the duration of their marriage. Enraged, he has her beheaded, and declares that as a reminder to all faithless women, he will marry a new wife every day and have her beheaded in the morning. You are upset and terrified about his declaration; sure enough, a letter arrives by courier telling you that the Sultan has taken a fancy to your daughter. If you allow him to have her, he'll give you a thousand talents of gold. If you don't let her go, he'll order his guards to kill you and everyone else of adult age in a ten-mile radius from your house. Furthermore, he'll shut your daughter in a tiny cell in his darkest, moldiest dungeon, and put trace amounts of strychnine in her food, so that she'll spend the rest of her days with only painful spasms to keep her company.

Now, if you have any morals at all, it shouldn't be a hard choice. You simply consign your daughter to a life of suffering, allow the Sultan to kill you and all of your friends, and leave your entire village orphaned, right? Well, perhaps not. But then, perhaps what you call "morals" are actually riddled with so many exceptions that they are actually nothing of the kind.

That's something to think about.

Existentialism and Privacy

2005-01-16T19:46:00.000-05:00

Until recent times, the classical way of approaching moral philosophy was to begin with a set of universal truths, apply some logical analysis, and arrive at a set of moral principles valid for all people, times, and places. After a few millennia of constant squabbling over what those universal truths might be, a few bright people decided to truck the whole business and start afresh. Consequently, Existentialism was born.

The main principle of Existentialism is that people have no a priori purpose in the world, so they are essentially left to make something of themselves without any real directions on how to do so. This is a subtle point, so it's worth emphasizing. The classic example of something that has an implicit purpose is a knife: someone designed it to cut things, so there's a decent argument for using it that way. On the other hand, marble doesn't appear to have any implicit reason for existence, so it's really up to Nature what happens to it, whether it ends up in a cliff face or a statue of David.

One could point out that man appears to be designed (by analogy with every other living thing) to hang around for a few decades and possibly make a few children in the process. But, to put it honestly, there's no accompanying sheet of instructions that explains to people what they should be doing when not procreating. Hence, according to Existentialism, it really doesn't matter whether you become a doctor or a lawyer or a bum.

The real trouble with Existentialism is that the people who came up with it didn't stop here. They realized that they wouldn't actually have a moral philosophy unless they invented some system of accountability, which materialized in the form of Existential Angst. That is to say, there should be an angst that people feel when deciding how to act because, in the absence of universal truths, one's actions serve as examples to others.

But on further examination, the "angst" is largely a fictional entity. People have Brains in order to think for themselves, which in fact happens with some regularity. If I wanted to have spinach and root beer for lunch every day, I would do so without a care in the world that other people might be tempted to try the same. This is the delicious luxury of not being famous or powerful: also known under the names of "privacy" and "lack of responsibility."

In fact, we value these things precisely because they strip us of the feelings of angst that Existentialism argues we ought to have all the time. It's not only that people have things to hide (we all make mistakes), but the constant thought that someone is watching you is debilitating for many people. Performers call it "nervousness" and speakers call it "stage fright," but the very fact that people only discover it once they appear in front of a large group suggests that it is a particular and unusual emotion, not something that's a part of everyone.

Thus, one is bound to disregard Existentialism (as it stands) as a workable moral philosophy for everyone. But can it be fixed?

Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion next week.

Shostakovich and Stalin

2005-01-10T19:05:00.000-05:00

It's impossible to listen to Shostakovich without feeling some of his overwhelming sense of pain and despair. The formative years of his life were scarred by Stalinism, which he feared and hated; the government constantly sought to restrain his music with criticism and forced public apologies, not to mention the threats of Siberia and death. Reportedly, he slept on a cot outside his apartment with a packed suitcase next to him---in case the authorities came for him in the middle of the night, he didn't want his children to see.

His music became steeped in bitterness, cynicism, and irony. Sarcastic figures floated around at will, dissonances appeared in every motive, and angry outbursts were commonplace. Especially in his string quartets, the colors he used evoke scenes of decaying, filthy cities suffocating in clouds of ash and smog, of vast expanses of rotting tree stumps and sawdust, and of calm, beautiful lakes filled with poisoned fish. Who could blame him?

Yet, as the preeminent composer of the time, he set the direction of classical music for a quarter-century after his death. When Ravel, Rachmaninov, Mahler, and Respighi had passed on, there was literally no-one left to follow except Shostakovich. Except no-one understood suffering like Shostakovich did, and no new genius dared to break the trend, so people could not help but produce atonal drivel.

Only a new generation of Chinese, Latino, and African composers has rescued classical music from the stake---to start making it interesting again to the public by reintroducing themes and tonality from their own distinct cultures. Curiously, that's one of the directions Ravel was trying to take classical music back in the 20's. His Rhapsodie Espagnole naturally relies heavily on Spanish themes; his Tzigane is a masterful summary of gypsy music; the third movement of his Piano Trio sounds like an old Chinese man playing the flute. This exploration might have continued, and classical music might have enjoyed a substantial place next to jazz in record collections. Instead, the meddlesome interference of one man resulted in a half-century of artistic casualties.

I wish Stalin had never been born.

A Crash Course in Kant

2005-01-03T23:41:00.000-05:00

As I was going to sleep yesterday night, I started to think about a few random books, one of which happened to be Immanuel Kant's Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals. I concluded then, as now, that I didn't like it. After some more thought, I decided that I didn't like it because it was a tottering pile of witless, fraudulent bumblings that should have been sent straight to the dustbin and never spoken of again. You will have to allow me to explain.

Kant's work is essentially a reaction to utilitarianism, the philosophy which directs one to maximize collective happiness at the expense of everything else. Kant reasoned, and rightly so, that this philosophy asked horribly repugnant things of people. For instance, if a random stranger loses both eyes in an accident, then utilitarianism dictates that you'd have to give up one of your own if a transplant is possible: the stranger benefits much more from gaining an eye than you suffer by losing one.

However, instead of tackling the fundamental flaw in utilitarianism (namely that it's impossible to compare peoples' happiness levels in a non-arbitrary manner), Kant went cuckoo with the idea that humans have an intrinsic dignity that must be respected at all costs. This (sort of) solves the problem of requiring people to give up their eyes, but it drags in a whole raft of other difficulties. Here's how he goes about constructing his argument:

In the beginning of the book, he decides---actually, to be more precise, he simply announces---that "good will" is the single characteristic of which it's impossible to have too much. Alas, had Amelia Bedelia been written a few centuries earlier, we might have been spared this tidbit of wisdom. Why, there's even a phrase for people who possess good will untainted by good sense: "perfect asses." Of late, there's been slew of more fashionable (and more printable) names, like "Al Qaeda operatives," "Islamic fundamentalists," and "terrorists." No doubt these people believe they are doing great things for their countries; no doubt their good will to protect their faith against infidels is boundless; but there's also no doubt that they come off looking like brainless prats.

To be fair, the original German could have been mangled by a translator. Lots of good will and good sense make a more palatable character. However, Kant suddenly pulls out of his hat the idea that real-world consequences don't matter, and only the intentions behind them do. For instance, if being altruistic gives you pleasure, then Kant says your altruism is morally worthless: you will always be guilty of hedonism. On the other hand, if altruism pains you indescribably and you give a penny to a beggar, then according to Kant you're a hero. The "reason" for this leap is that natural accidents prevent full human control of real-world outcomes, but you cannot be held accountable for what you cannot control. But this is also rubbish: Kant simply replaces natural accidents after birth with natural accidents before birth---you cannot control whether or not you find altruism to be pleasing!

Anyways, having decided that only good intentions matter, Kant finally reaches the apex of his work, where he decides that the universal moral is the respect of "human dignity." This is essentially reached by a process of elimination: once you ignore all aspects of someone except his intentions, there's nothing left to preserve except his right to have those intentions, whatever they might be. That's exactly what Kant's "human dignity" boils down to, and it happens to be an incredibly stupid thing to respect.

Most people at this stage will bring up the "Axe Murderer" story: what happens if some crazy guy wielding an axe shows up at your house and demands to know if your brother is in? If you have any respect for his dignity, then (according to Kant) you cannot lie to him---you would limit the scope of his intentions by giving him a false picture of the world. But what dignity are you respecting? You would be respecting the dignity of a man who's out to trample over the dignity of another.

Better yet is the "Hitler's Office" story. Suppose there's a doomsday device in Hitler's office. You're a sniper sitting in a tree outside Hitler's office, and you suddenly notice a baby crawling around on Hitler's desk. Of course, since the doomsday device is bright red and pulsating, the baby is attracted to the pushbutton detonator. It moves relentlessly forward, until one hand is resting on the dread object. Do you shoot the baby or do you let it vaporize the planet? Kant's doctrine of respecting human dignity consciously forbids pulling the trigger, and thereby has consequences even more monstrous than those of utilitarianism.

That is why I dislike Kant.

Snow

2004-12-26T22:23:00.000-05:00

I flew home on the 22nd, expecting to be back with my family some time that afternoon. Alas, I made the mistake of getting a connection in Cincinnati---just upon my arrival, a gigantic cloud blotted out the sky and unleashed a stinging pestilence of ice and snow upon the city. To make things a little more exciting, the airport had the foresight to run out of de-icing fluid, and the hotels had thoughtfully filled themselves to the brim with, well, people not including me.

So I had to sleep in the airport. Not so bad, one might think; people have been known to sleep in worse places. The temperature was comfortable, there was a carpet on the floor; there were no wild Bengal tigers prowling about---I should have been happy. Instead, I was miserable. I had to sleep on my violin, so roughly half my back hurt like the Dickens in the morning. However, that was only a minor trouble. As soon as the bloody PA system stopped blaring out "Attention! So-and-so should contact airport police immediately for an important message!" (which it did into the wee hours of the night), it lapsed into blissful, lighthearted Christmas music. By the end of that night, it was a good thing there were no Bengal tigers within reach---I swear I would have throttled each and every one of them.

As if that weren't bad enough, I woke the next morning to a series of interminable rebooking lines. Five separate times, my flight out of the place was cancelled, which necessitated standing patiently in five queues of angry sleepless lunatics for two hours each. Each followed by a few chipper moments with a bumbling sleepless flight attendant, then a few minutes of hope, then a fuzzy proclamation of catastrophe on the departure screens. When I finally landed a flight out of there that evening, it had been 30 hours since I was scheduled to arrive home.

When I grow up, I'll either be poor enough not to care about visiting other people or be rich enough to afford a private jet.

Math

2004-11-28T23:16:00.000-05:00

Sometimes, you run into a math problem that is so amazingly beautiful that it knocks your socks off. Consider the following problem:

You and 99 brave Polish soldiers are captured by a mad hatter in Baghdad. He is about to turn everyone over to Iraqi militants, when he suddenly spots you wearing a pair of telltale white earbuds. "Hrrmmm," he says in a thick accent, "Bring the iPod to papa." "Not so fast," you counter, "You have to let us free in exchange." "Humph," he says, "I have a better idea."

He lines you all up single file going down a staircase outside his house and chains everyone to the hand rail so tightly that nobody can turn around; at least everyone can see the heads of people below them. The hatter grins smugly and says, "I'll return shortly and place randomly either a red or green turban on your head. Guess the color correctly and I'll set you free; say anything else and your life is mine." As he passes you on the bottom step, he swipes the iPod from your back pocket, pokes you in the ribs, and says, "Ho, I think I'll start at the top and ask you last."

You think you're doomed, until your fairy godmother appears in a flash of light. "Quick," you say, "Get me out of this!" "Sorry, sweetie," she tells you, "I bent the magic wand, and I'm also colorblind, so I can't even tell you which turban you'll be wearing." "But," she says comfortingly, "I can translate anything you like into Polish."

What should you say to the rest of the soldiers so that as many people as possible (including yourself) will go free?

I'll post the solution as a comment in a week.

A Culture of Life

2004-11-27T16:58:00.000-05:00

President Bush is famous for saying that he supports "a Culture of Life." What he means is, "I'm against abortion and stem cell research because I think they are morally wrong," which is a mouthful to be sure, but also a perfectly defensible thing to say. Not that I agree with him about the research bit, but that's not the point.

The point is that's not what a culture of life means. Suppose it were an ultimatum from God: "Tomorrow you folks had better have a culture of life or else I'll turn you into amoebas!" Well, that would be a fine sight: we'd have to ax the death penalty straight away, we'd have to kiss goodbye all this trifling war business (whoops, no more nuclear arsenals!), we'd have to institute universal health care, and maybe even more comprehensive welfare systems if we're concerned about people starving and freezing to death. And if we care about our children's lives, then maybe we should do something about pollution as well.

Unless I misinterpreted the President's record with the death penalty in Texas, or the war in Iraq, or his comments about "rationing health care" and "losing jobs" in reference to universal health care and the Kyoto treaty, I think it's fair to say that he does not support a culture of life.

Election 2004

2004-10-31T01:27:00.000-05:00

Donald Rumsfeld said it best:

"As we know,
there are known knowns.
There are things we know we know.
We also know
there are known unknowns.
That is to say
we know there are some things
we do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns,
the ones we don't know
we don't know."

I propose a toast for the unknown unknowns, for the election is in their hands.

Government-Sponsored Terrorism

2004-10-24T14:53:00.000-04:00

I promised roughly a month ago to answer the question of when government-sponsored terrorism justifies a violent revolt in my next post. Alas, the promise was foolishly made, for I have realized in the interim that several major philosophers have already answered this question with several conflicting books about morality and justice. As a mathematician, I conclude that there is no precise universal answer to the question and no specific sequence of events after which one can declare, "Ho ho! Violent revolt is now justified, whereas it wasn't a moment ago!"

However, it is at least as interesting to discuss whether a particular set of popular issues is likely to result in a violent revolt. In fact, the questions are very similar, because governments have an implicit contract to raise the aggregate well-being of citizens above what they would experience in a state of anarchy. Generally, a violent revolt not only declares that citizens are experiencing extreme hardships, but also means that many of them will meet a terrible end, greatly decreasing the aggregate well-being (at least for most definitions of aggregate).

The benefit of considering things in this roundabout way is that we have a much better understanding of human violence than we do of universal moral truths. Violence is chiefly an instinctive, non-rational response to external troubles. For a number of excellent reasons, most societies view violence as something that endangers civilization, and as something that should be repressed rather than encouraged. As a consequence, the majority of people will attempt to find rational solutions to their problems rather than resort to violence.

There are always exceptions to this rule: suicides, gangs, etc.; these represent people that are unhappy under the current government, but whose unhappiness stems chiefly from society and not from government, so they would probably not be better off in an anarchy. As long as these people mostly form the fringes of society, their combined forces would amount to more of a violent riot than a violent revolt.*

As such, a violent revolt must include large numbers of otherwise mainstream members of society, which, as we noted, resort to violence only when rational solutions are exhausted. This means that a government can only avoid violent revolts if it provides the general population a way to alter its policies, if it adjusts itself to conform to the ideas of the general population, or if it adjusts the general population to conform to its ideas. When a government does none of these things, it will sooner or later alienate its citizens as it drifts further away from acting in their best interests, and will eventually become intolerable to a significant fraction of the population.

At this point, I hope it's clear that one can never "justify" a violent revolt. I've argued that a violent revolt comes about precisely because of non-rational causes, so the best we can do is to explain that a revolt must happen because there were no satisfactory rational counterarguments. Not even the argument that a government is breaking its implicit contract is a rational one: there is no corresponding clause in the implicit contract that specifies the damages that must be awarded in case of a breach. This is the "argument" most often used: in the Declaration of Independence, in the French Revolution, in the Southern Secession, and in most of the modern cries for relief from imperialism.

In short, I agree with Machiavelli that a government which ignores the opinions of its population is an unstable one, which must resort to fear to retain its power. Violent revolts are never justified by the actions of a government, but instead are inevitable if a government acts in a certain way.

*There are of course exceptions to this statement, the most notable being the Satsuma Rebellion of Japan, where the samurai were angry at their disenfranchisement by the Emperor. In previous years, samurai were allowed to do unspeakable things to those in less respectable classes, which may happen only when a society develops a distinct callousness towards certain types of violence.

The Beslan Massacre

2004-09-18T19:07:00.000-04:00

I am furious.

I am furious that I was right.

I am furious that I was right that terrorists are wily and evil because they think of unexpected and clever ways to kill people.

I am furious that they decided to murder hundreds of defenseless children in a middle school in Russia just to demonstrate this fact.

I am furious that the scope of the monstrosity was such that words can provide but a pale shade of the disaster. The New York Times, in an article published on the 5th entitled "Wrecked Russian School Is Opened to Public," tried its best to do it justice:

"One woman in a blue-print dress and head scarf wandered the first-floor hallways, wailing, screaming, past the ghastly streaks of flesh made by the suicide bombers, searching the place on her own. The townspeople who watched her pass, weeping as well, said she was looking for a son who had not come home.

She entered the nearly empty cafeteria and passed through it, and proceeded even to the kitchen and pantries, to the last unlit and darkened corner, screaming and sobbing, pulling herself up over the rubble to look for him behind a refrigerator that had been knocked on its side. She found nothing, and helplessly wandered out, filling the room with piercing, incomprehensible cries."

Considering the woman's feelings, the words are as a venetian blind; such a veil clouds her emotion that only a dim flickering of her terrible loss leaks through.

Yet, something equally terrifying that strikes at all of us is the thought that children all over the world are in danger. Putin was wise enough to refuse political negotiation with the terrorists; had he not done so, the suffering of the children in Beslan would have been in vain, as thousands more all over the country would be subject to new attacks as a result. However, if nothing else, the intense reactions of world populations over the tragedy puts Putin in a tight spot. What kind of security can protect children from such attacks in the future?

There's at least one interesting semi-practical solution to the problem. That would be to get rid of large concentrations of students (i.e., abolish schools) and instead to keep them at home, attached to the computer. If virtual reality technology develops quickly enough, then it might not be such a radical idea to have virtual classrooms; it would also save the parents from all kinds of bother that they endure today. It would allow students to attend schools that best fit their academic abilities; it would remove the problems of violence among students themselves; in short, it would be a great equalizer of student attributes other than intelligence.

Will it actually happen? Probably.

Will I live to see it? Probably not.

North Korea and Nukes

2004-09-12T21:32:00.000-04:00

So there was a big mushroom cloud over North Korea, and the U.S. administration denies anything happened. Of course, there's a good chance it was a really big conventional explosion (or a forest fire* or a volcanic explosion), but the following scenario is deliciously amusing:

(Transcript of top-secret US-North Korea communications)
(Warning: Strong British Language.)
NK: Hallo there, we just tested a nuke.
US: No, you haven't.
NK: We bloody well have!!! All our scientists just died of cancer!!!
US: Right. Probably a bean-eatin' contest out of control.
NK: Was not! There's a bleedin' radioactive crater!
US: We'll tell that to the FDA.

(A day passes, and another mushroom cloud erupts, this one ten times larger)
NK: Now you can't deny it.
US: What, the forest fire?
NK: Look you stupid bastards, we fried one of your satellites with the gamma ray burst!
US: Oh really? We thought it was just a programming error.
NK: The flames were purple, for chrissakes!
US: Oooh, those semicolons can be contrary, can't they? We'll see if the Hubble guys can't get a good shot of it for the NASA page.

(Another mushroom cloud erupts, this time in the Sea of Japan)
NK: Right, explain that one to us.
US: Another forest fire?
NK: In the bloody Sea of Japan???!!??
US: Well, all right, it might have been a nuke.
NK: That's more like it.
US: Oh, by the way, the CIA says that was your last nuke.
US: You also have no more scientists.
NK: (Long pause).
NK: Crap.

---------------------------
(Original kernel of an idea shamelessly plundered from a slashdot post).
(*Apparently forest fires do make mushroom clouds. See, for instance, the picture of a forest fire on this site.)
(Note: A commentary on Beslan is coming soon)

Comments & Chaos

2004-09-08T18:31:00.000-04:00

Ever been wanting to respond to one of the chaotic posts on this page and to contribute to the eventual heat death of the Universe?

Now you can. I will respond to posts that need responding to, if I have the time.

I will remind you that, as perverse as it sounds, starting flamewars will actually decrease the overall Chaotic Coefficient of this site. Flamewars tend to drive people away, not make them addicted to posting informed and insightful comments. Your comments, if sufficiently inflammatory, may also come back to haunt you at a later time, instead of supporting the fact that you are a tremendously intelligent and creatively brilliant person.

2004-08-23T02:49:00.000-04:00

This is going to be long. Now is a good time to stop letting that bother you.

First, the good news: the WinkyBlog has returned from Bosnia/Herzegovina. I'm afraid that there are no pictures, however; the WinkyBlog is too incorporeal to hold a camera.

Second, the bad news: it would have come back a week earlier had it not been held up by nosy freaks at the TSA. Never mind that it passed perfectly through the X-ray machine, that it wasn't carrying any sharp-edged mustache-trimmers (or anything else, for that matter), that it wasn't named Senator John Lewis, but it got held up all the same. Well, at least they tried to hold it up, but it was too incorporeal for handcuffs, too, so they just grounded the flight. For a week.

As for what the TSA was doing in Bosnia/Herzegovina, I'll never know. "Aha!" says the semi-astute reader, "They were protecting America from the evil, wily terrorists. Even if you let little kids through without checking them, then the terrorists will recruit little kids."

I beg to differ. They are protecting America from people who want to use a commercial airplane as a weapon, i.e., murderers. Terrorists are wily and evil because they think of unexpected and clever ways to kill people. This, in turn, induces fear.

However, using an airplane is now no longer unexpected, thanks to some jerks who tried that on 9/11. It is now no longer clever, thanks to the TSA, who will kindly strip you of all vaguely threatening objects before you enter a plane. Or at least pretend to, so passengers assume that a) hijackers will lie about carrying dangerous things, and consequently b) they are safe targets for pummeling. It suddenly becomes a far less attractive option to a terrorist, even for a semi-astute one.

"Aha!" breaks in the reader again, "What a hypocrite! Winky now supports the TSA!" Yes, I do, in fact. I never said I didn't. All I said is that they are not actively protecting America from terrorists. The terrorists, having brains, no doubt realize that one of the myriad vectors of fear has now been fenced off and surrounded by guard dogs. Even if the fence might have holes, there are ten thousand easier ways to cause fear.

Remember anthrax in the mail? Remember remote-controlled explosives? Remember nuclear power plants? What happens if you string all three together? Lots of headlines and a new agency. Oh, and what's that new fad about poisoning drinking water? More new headlines, more new agencies. It's like playing whack-a-mole: every time you hit one of the creeps on the head, another one pops up in some other spot.

So, what's the point of all this? Modern terrorists may have already come to the conclusion that the best effect may be had by using preventable means to accomplish the terror. Suddenly, a new agency has to spring up to deal with the problem. Suddenly, taxpayers have a new burden. Suddenly, the administration has an excuse to sneak in nasty laws (yes, the "PATRIOT" act counts as a nasty law) while everyone else is looking the other way. Result: the economy gets a nice kick in the shin, the population gets a nice initial dosage of fear, and the government takes care of the rest of the work.

"Aha!" announces the reader, "So you support the war in Afghanistan! And in Iraq! And Bush!" Quoting Tolkien, I say, "Don't be hasty." To digress a moment, I often wonder why we as humans have the insatiable desire to fear the unknown. Terrorism in 2001 killed some 3,000 people. That same year, just as many drowned themselves accidentally. (Source: National Center for Health Statistics) Just as many died from "peptic ulcers;" just as many died from medical complications. Ten times that many just killed themselves in 2001. That many people (more than 30,000) died every single year between '95 and '99 due to causes directly related to second-hand smoke. Second-hand smoke, for God's sake! (Source: Center for Disease Control). What is this world coming to if we have to start multiple wars every time 0.1% of the deaths every year are due to terrorists?

But, as I have no hope of changing human nature, I must content myself with offering ideas on how to stop terrorists from playing with our emotions like puppeteers. Like it or not, Al Qaeda is still alive and kicking. So are Hezbollah, Hamas, the KKK, and neo-Nazis. What does one do with these people?

One way, which is probably already in effect, is to plant agents within the groups to alert authorities about attacks before they happen. Most likely, this is why we haven't seen another large-scale terror attempt on the States in the past few years.

Yet, at some point, this way will fail, and catastrophically so, for it is weak against new terrorist groups, secret split-offs of old ones, and also ones with closed memberships. It cannot defend against improvisational attacks, like the ones that currently plague the army in Iraq. It fails because terrorist groups are the symptoms of a disease, and will quickly metastasize to friendlier corners of the Earth even if they are driven out of their old haunts.

What is this disease? It has no name, and but two key ingredients: a loathing of different people, and a moral code that allows for murder as vengeance. That means we either have to make other countries hate us less or convince them to change their moral code. Which of the two do you think is harder?

My guess is that the first is actually less likely to happen. Once hatred puts down its roots, it doesn't stop growing. Consider the South, or the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, or the fine friendly massacres in Africa that, quite honestly, are committed by people who have no idea how shallow and ignorant their beliefs really are and thus stubbornly refuse to change them. It is a fool's hope, but what happens if we attempt to adjust their morals instead?

Specifically, for Islamic terror groups, that means that we attempt to persuade the religious leaders of the various sects to issue edicts banning murder without government sanction. The beauty of the scheme is that it sounds like a reasonable thing to ask, and could indeed be supported by passages in the Koran (which does indeed allow for killing "in defense of Islam"). Then we can flip the trap with the announcement that, as all Islamic groups must therefore operate with the blessing of a government, that any terrorist group that attacks the States will be treated as a declaration of war from the host country.

Suddenly, governments will have to scramble to squash any remaining terrorist groups not put out by the religious edict. If luck holds out, they might be significantly reduced in number with the removal of one key reason for their existence. Will they still stick around? Almost certainly. Will they become a fear of the past? I give it a one percent chance.

But that's more chance than I have of dying from a terrorist attack.

2004-07-17T00:24:00.000-04:00

If you hadn't noticed, the WinkyBlog has been off vacationing of late, and just returned to say that it would be leaving again for Bosnia/Herzegovina in the morning. Perhaps it muses best on philosophy when surrounded by savagely mutilated countryside, or perhaps it just wanted to see if the travel agent could spell 'Herzegovina' in a pinch. Who can tell, really? At any rate, it sends its love and its assurances that it will return straightaway as soon as it's finished experiencing whatever people experience there. At the very least, it swears to return by September for weekly updates.

2004-06-16T21:16:00.000-04:00

Nothing too exciting happened during my vacation. Nothing, that is, except that a terrifying incident of domestic terrorism shook the country...

Or at least left it speechless...

Or actually was entirely forgotten or ignored by everyone who doesn't live in Granby, CO.

In particular, I speak of the recent incident involving Marvin Heemeyer, the man who decided to weld half-inch steel plates onto a D9-class bulldozer and smash the living daylights out of a blissfully unsuspecting municipality.*

Now, I don't live in Granby, but I was struck by the story for the reason that the town completely failed to realize the danger that it was in. To be honest, not everyone who walks around town saying, "I'm gonna bulldoze this place," actually ends up doing so, but the fact that he also had a stolen bulldozer knocking around in his garage seems a little out of the ordinary. According to his private papers, several people had come into the garage, where the bulldozer was clearly visible, and yet none of them thought to ask, "Hey Marv, where'ja get that big yallow thing in th' corner?" Nor did anyone run screaming to the police about some nasty man with a grudge and fifty-three tons of steel with which to prove it.

All of this points to the issue that relying upon the citizenry is not sufficient to prevent terrorism. However, one does wonder how much better the government could have done. As he worked in secret and had snuck the bulldozer in under cover of darkness, police would have had to invade his house to find evidence of the unfolding plans. We are so confronted by the perpetual question; which is more desirable: terrorism by the populace or terrorism by the government? Moreover, how many lives is our collective privacy worth? Shall we enclose everyone behind bars to prevent murder, rape, and property damage?

As we trace the history of government and peoples through the ages, we find that both have sinned in unspeakable ways. Witch hunts, tyrants, guerillas, lynch mobs, anarchy, slavery; these were terrible words to those who lived in less enlightened times, and several retain a shade of their former power. Yet, if they have lost any of their potency, it is because their reasons for existence have slowly vanished and not because of tougher laws or better education. Slaves were replaced by machines; tyrants and anarchy faded in favor of more stable forms of government; lynch mobs became less popular after police became less corrupt.

So, if I were to draw a moral from the story, I would suggest that one does not protect a population by attacking it and muzzling it, but rather by removing the reasons why it should wish to destroy itself. Until we become a society in which every citizen can wreak justice in a personally satisfying yet physically ineffectual manner, we will suffer in the clutches of crime and darkness.

Perhaps voodoo dolls weren't such a bad idea after all.

*Actually, that's not the entire truth. He welded on half-inch steel plates, poured on a half-foot or so of concrete, and welded on another set of half-inch steel plates for good measure. Oh, and he also mounted 50-caliber machine guns and such on the front, just in case anyone failed to catch his drift. As for the poor police, after they couldn't shoot him out, they attempted to blast him out (three times, no less), and then said "the Hell with it" before dusting off the cutting torch. See here for a complete story.

2004-05-22T02:21:00.000-04:00

When will certain (nameless) modern poets get the message that poetry is more than just prose with extra linebreaks? That it is more than just taking raw, cold, wriggling thoughts and gluing them to a piece of paper? That it is more than just avoiding words that rhyme?

In its very essence, poetry is about condensing an emotion or a story into as few words as possible.* The great poems may give a stronger picture more succinctly, and they may use rhymes or tricky meters or other bits of cleverness to enhance the effect, but at their core they all share this same quality. The genius of the great poems is in their ability to bring words to life in the mind of the reader; in this respect, a great poem is worth a thousand pictures.

Poetry is not about breaking free from restrictions, and it is not about opposing tradition.** To imagine otherwise is to lie to yourself.

I conclude with an example:

Twilight falls,
A nightingale sings,
The trees softly whisper,
An angel spreads her wings.

The light slowly fades,
A cricket rubs its eye,
The angel pulls a string,
And the moon slides through the sky.

*If you don't believe me, look in a dictionary. For instance, Merriam-Webster's 10th Collegiate Edition states that it is "writing that formulates a concentrated imaginative awareness of experience in language chosen and arranged to create a specific emotional response through meaning, sound, and rhythm." One may safely overlook the fact that the author of the entry was clearly not a poet.

**One can argue that most epic poets missed the point, however. Because of the level of concentration, only a little bit can be enjoyed at a time, which makes it unsuitable for protracted odyssies. That is, unless it isn't concentrated, in which case it isn't really poetry, and is most likely rhyming prose in poetry's guise.

2004-05-15T03:40:00.000-04:00

I grew up using a beautiful red dictionary made in the '70s. It had everything I needed, words like "superheterodyne" and "linsey-woolsey," lovely stippled pictures just in case you forget what exactly a corbel was, incomprehensible pronunciation guides, and full etymologies that traced "spastic" to its Latin root "spasticus." It also had tabs that led directly to giant half-page sized letters, accompanied by their squiggly ancestors.

I'm now using a shiny 10th edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, which has all of the above, except for one small thing. Not a single one of the blasted thumb-tabs leads to the beginning of the section that it's supposed to represent. For instance, the tab that says "PQR" leads to "prevenient" and the tab that says "LM" leads to "magistracy."

Now, some would defend this infamy by asserting that the midway indexing is faster. On average, one expects to be closer to the desired word, but this is in fact a fallacy brought on by the assumption that humans exclusively use a binary search algorithm. This is ludicrous: when looking for Zerfinkel in the telephone book, no-one starts by opening the book to the middle page. Likewise, when looking for a word in the dictionary, we make an educated guess at where the word should be based on the surrounding reference points. When the thumb tabs open directly to letters, they can be used as reference points; when they open up to some random place in the middle, they're essentially worthless.

Why oh why did they have to change a perfectly good system and replace it with something so shamefully deficient?

2004-05-10T03:03:00.000-04:00

I just went to hear a concert yesterday night, and was moved to write about why I like classical music.

To most people, classical music seems to lack a certain ... something. When pressed, the best answers most people can think up is that there are a) often no lyrics, and b) a remarkable absence of anything genuinely exciting.

I have to admit that the same is true, for instance, of watching a river. If left undisturbed, I can spend hours at a bridge just watching the currents of water play underneath, curling and flowing around the obstacles in their paths. There is something absolutely magical about how the sun scatters off the thousands of ripples on the surface and casts images forever evolving on nearby objects. The river cannot speak any language within my comprehension, yet I feel connected to it all the same, for the emotions swimming behind its waving skin transcend the common word. While looking at a river, I feel as a child again, filled by curiosity and imagination, until at last I forget the troubles of life for a time and enjoy the profound sense of happiness that remains.

Why this happens, I cannot say. Any knowledge I have of the mechanics that guide the waves up and down merely increases my astonishment that they would all behave in so aesthetically pleasing a manner. All I know is that probably due to some extraordinarily clever wiring buried in my cortex, the swirling patterns excite a part of me which normally lies dormant, and they allow me to experience something that I consider to be truly extraordinary.

It is in the same manner that I listen to classical music. The genre as a whole cannot be confined to river music, and in fact presents much of the unspoiled expanse of Nature to the listener, but I will take the specific extreme of Bach's Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello to illustrate my point. If you have experienced the pieces before, you will be familiar with the facts that none of them has a melody and that each one instead consists of repeating sequences that change subtly every time they reappear. If you listen to them expecting to find something to hum or whistle after you leave the concert hall, they will laugh in your face and leave you miserable---who ever heard of trying to whistle like a river? Instead, if you close your eyes and let them wash over you, their beauty suddenly becomes transparent, and the jumbling rhythms become as natural as whirls and vortices in a stream. The most exciting and precious moments are not spent in the rapids, where the loudest and most dangerous notes appear, but in the unexpected quiet places, where one is sailing along in a noisy tributary that suddenly ends in a wide bay extending as smoothly as silk far beyond what the eye can see.

So, the next time that someone hooks you into going to a concert featuring classical music, remember that it is not meant to be a source of constant entertainment, but rather to provide an environment conducive to happiness. It does require a certain willingness to allow this transformation to happen, but once it does, you will receive an experience that will not readily be forgotten.

That said, I would caution that some classical music sucks horribly, and people who can play it well are very few. Even Bach has been known to write real stinkers, so if you've sworn off classical music because of that reason, or because your town doesn't have a decent orchestra, I extend my heartfelt apologies. But I encourage you to check out the collection at a library some time; avoid the "popular" music picks, as those are often selected for their "exciting" qualities as opposed to any really enjoyable ones. If you're not sure about which ones to pick out, try any of the following:

Bach's Unaccompanied Cello Suites
Beethoven's String Quartet, Op. 59 No. 1
Borodin's String Quartet No. 2
Brahms' Cello Sonata No. 1
Bruch's Violin Concerto
Chopin's Twelve Etudes (Op. 10 or Op. 25)
Debussy's Piano Trio, Op. 3
Dvorak's Piano Trio in F minor, Op. 65
Grieg's Cello Sonata, Op. 36
Haydn's Piano Sonata in F major
Mendelssohn's Piano Trio No. 2
Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No. 3 (for something a little different)
Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 2
Ravel's String Quartet in F major
Schubert's Impromptu in B-flat Major
Schumann's Cello Concerto
Shostakovich's String Quartet No. 4 (also a little different)
Sibelius' String Quartet, Op. 4
Smetana's The Moldau
Stravinsky's Firebird (also also a little different)
Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto

That's most of the important people with a little sample from each.

2004-05-03T01:28:00.000-04:00

So, this is a place where I'll leave random thoughts:

I'll start with the following:

Unicycles are difficult beasts. No, really, they're twenty thousand times more difficult to ride than they seem. If you've only ever seen a guy at the circus juggling on top of a unicycle, you won't believe me, but rest assured that he spent the better part of his youth in bandages because of it.

They present a fine array of practical difficulties for those considering the art:

1) Absolutely no-one knows how to ride them well, especially people who have been to circuses. They'll give you great volumes of advice which you can safely forget. However, this means that you have to figure it out for yourself. Don't even bother searching for others' experiences either, as they will either soundly depress you or enlighten you with obvious facts. Such as 'wear a helmet.'

2) Actually getting on top of a unicycle is a feat in itself worthy of celebration, especially because you will immediately fall off unless you have something solid within arm's reach. If you are learning to unicycle, the Ground is a good place for celebrations, as it is a place that you will visit frequently.

3) In the brief moments when you are not falling blissfully, an insane desire to pedal forward will flit into your mind, catching your better judgement unprepared. If you follow this path of Doom, you will at least not fall sideways. However, with each thrust to the pedals, the cycle wobbles in an increasingly sinister manner; what previously might have been a quiver pregnant with foreshadowing suddenly becomes the harsh reality of the sidewalk.

4) The unicycle will gradually become filled with wrath as a result of your witless bumblings. Its favorite way of displaying its wrath is by exploding in a shower of greasy parts when it hits the pavement, akin to the Japanese strategy of committing suicide to display contempt for someone else. In extreme cases, you also run the risk of exploding in a shower of greasy parts, which is something to think about before attempting to ride down stairs.

5) Last, but not least, you will be an endless source of amusement for all around you. Especially small children who have just learned to bicycle. As they laugh and compare your intelligence to that of a small pebble, you will inexplicably remember the old Taoist saying that children are the masters of wisdom and unfettered insight.

So, until I actually learn to ride mine, I'd gauge the difficulty as harder than trying to shake hands with a porpoise, but perhaps slightly easier than trying to teach one to play the piano.