Letters to Abid
Nobody takes the time to write letters anymore. Quick e-mails, instant messaging, tweets and status updates. Followed by short comments – in less than 140 characters of course. You ask me to write letters. You tell me you won’t have a phone. You moved to the west coast. Letters seems like a magnificent idea and I would love to send letters crafted by my own hand. But, I wonder, what would the letters say? Would they tell you about my lack of grammatical skills? Would they tell you that I struggle with the spelling of many words? Spellings that I once knew but now escape me. Or would they tell you something much worse? Would each sealed envelope be a testimonial to my reliance on machines? Machines that I detest and love in the same breath. Machines that are slowly breaking my grasp on controlling them and strengthening their grasp on me.
You share the same fear as I. Being forgotten by the world because you can no longer be reached by text on a screen. You say to me, “people don’t’ think I exist once they loose the ability to text me.” I have no reply for you because you are right. I want to believe that I will remember your existence but wonder if I will. Am I so indoctrinated in constant communication that as much as I may try thoughts of you will still disappear among status updates? We are constantly connected, that much is true. But, are 140 characters enough? Are we so afraid of each other, so afraid of ourselves, that anything more will reveal some unspeakable truths? Maybe those small texts boxes that say so little also say so much. Maybe by choosing to know so little about so many that we fail to know a lot about a few. We fail to know the intimate details of each other and in loosing that we loose the intimate details about ourselves. We consciously choose to loose ourselves to tiny text boxes.
Every thought is reduced to an acronym or abbreviation. Most which are lies. Seldom does a laugh truly leave my lips. I just do it through a screen at first, but I wonder if I am habituating myself to think the same way. Do people converse with me and my façade is one of deception? My face becomes a screen telling lies that hides an indifferent mind. Kilometers of electrical lines separate us even when we are standing beside each other. Experience is never for the sake of experience. It is just another album on another page. Another lie. Did I pose for the experience? Or did I pose so others could perceive me to be experiencing? Sometimes I see photographs with one person in them. Wait, that is a lie, there is no one in them. Just another text box screaming for an entry, screaming to give the photograph the life it so desperately pains for. I pity those empty photographs but I also fear them. Sometimes I catch myself peering into other’s lives. I know I shouldn’t but they want me to. They need me to. There will be to many empty photographs if I or someone else doesn’t.
The subtle glow of small screens is eerily calming. I know someone has just gotten a small acknowledgment of his or her existence. Sometimes it seems more than acknowledgment… it seems like justification. This scares me. How can a justification of a person’s existence be sent with such few letters? Will my life be summed by a simple text or update? My tombstone will declare an expired username and out-of-service phone number. Hopefully someone will take a photograph of it and tag me in it.
Everyday I turn myself into 1’s and 0’s and spread about all over the globe. I visit everywhere but see no one. I became an expert in everything and nothing. This is when I forget there was a reason that a book was several hundred pages and not just notes. This is when I forget people are more than just a statistic. This is when I forget the sublime beauty of the Earth. This is when I remember that knowledge is power. This is when I fool myself into believing that I am gaining some.
You ask me to write you letters so I wont forget you. But, what will I say?
Nihilism
Nihilism, it is a truly scary account of reality that shouldn’t be taken lightly. It is so daunting and truly frightening that many are unwilling to push it to its limits. Awhile back I attempted to truly place myself in a place without meaning. Several thoughts have emerged from that experiment. Much of those thoughts, which are in this post, are relatively unpolished and there is definite room for expansion, correction and acknowledgment of out right poor ideas.
Possible arguments I would like to put forward are based on examining the foundations of nihilism. It is centered on the idea that the universe lacks any underlying meaning and that there is no moral truth, or any truth for that matter. To me this is problematic for two reasons. The first reason is that it assumes to know there is no truth because a truth cannot be confirmed. It takes the same faith (for lack of a better word) to assume that there is no truth as it does to assume there is. Secondly, it may be wrong to assume that the opposite value of meaning is no meaning. I am aware that this second argument is tough to maintain because it is outside binary logic. But, it is a possibility. We as humans build our arguments using logic, something either is or it isn’t. Yet, there is no way to confirm that this logic is a universal truth.
The next area that is problematic for me is hard to explain. I’ll try my best. Suppose at the start of the universe all that existed was in one giant mass. For whatever reason at some point this mass broke into two, then three, and so on. Before the first break ‘two’ did not exist, at least in actuality. After the split it did. So the question for me is does ‘two’ exist as an abstract concept? Aristotle talks about this in his meta-physics under the headings of potentiality and actuality. ‘Two’ seems to exist as a potential outside of the physical realm. So in this universe at one point was human life just a potential? If must be on some level or another. Then is it such a stretch to assume there is potential for ‘Good’?
I know it’s a hurried and compact post. Truthfully, I am stuck on how to expand these arguments into a more complete and coherent narrative, or if it is even worth doing at all. I just needed to write them down. If anyone has some suggestions of readings or wishes to converse on these ideas let me know.
The Divided Soul
We often pride ourselves on our species being self aware to a degree that no other known life form has achieved. Without a question, this has allowed humanity to achieve many great things. But, I can’t help but wonder if being self-consciousness and undergoing self-examination is done so at the expense of experience.
There is a point where self-awareness becomes crippling. It stagnates action and gets lost in itself. I am sure we have all experienced these moments in our life. Sometimes they are very short and at other times they are long, far too long. My sister and her classmates recently read St. Augustine’s confessions, a man who was very self aware. At times, reading his thoughts can be excruciating. He was so involved in examining his being, trying to find purpose to his life, and trying to will himself to a higher power, that he seemed incapable of making progress. It was only when he let this go did he find resolution. Another example, possibly the best I have ever encountered, is Dostoevsky’s underground man. Here is a man so aware of his own existence that he ceases from existing. He fails to experience by over acknowledging experience. What a strange paradox.
Why is this the case though? Why does it appear the more self-examination we do the less we experience? I think it has to do with what is required by us to be self-aware. We have to distance our self from ourselves. Moreover, we are dividing our own being into two. One goes through the motions, lives the human life, while the other stands backs and observes. At the same time, the spectating half can’t help but get drawn into the human life. It knows the affects of emotions like happiness, love, joy, hatred, unhappiness, and pain. It knows the vast spectrum of human emotion. So what does the divided mind do? It over analyzes. It calculates and computes, it gets stuck in endless loops of thought. It cannot translate thought into action. It ultimately removes itself from experience. What I find most interesting here is the calculation often involves trying to minimize pain. For if experience was always good and full of happiness it is hard to perceive why this division of mind and will would occur. In many instances it seems we will sacrifice the potential of happiness to save ourselves from the potential of pain. We choose no experience or a limited experience so we don’t realize full experience.
The conflict in existence that I am describing can be found in all of us or any self-aware creature. It seems like an escapable truth. I have observed myself being crippled by thought many times. But, there is an interesting property of self-awareness, and that is, it can be aware of its own awareness. For better or worse, if our will and soul is strong enough, we can push through the prospect of pain and act. We might just experience the pain we were afraid of. But, we also might experience joy. Joy that can’t be grasped by choosing limited experience over full experience. This is the realm where true happiness lies. This is the realm of complete and true human experience. The only question that remains is if one is strong enough to face potential pain for the sake of happiness.
Waking Life
Last night, on recommendation, I watched the movie Waking life. It is very artistically done using a special production technique called rotoscoping.the plot is about a young man who is having a seemingly surreal experience as he converses with many different characters. These conversations are immensely interesting as they are very philosophical in nature. Moreover, they discuss topics such as waking reality, lucid dreaming, free will, determinism, the meaning of life etc.
If you are philosophically inclined the topics will be familiar but still enjoyable. If your not, I still recommend it as it is presented in a way that touches on all the topics and does not require the viewer to be super familiar with the topics, yet, gives the viewer a lot to think about.
I would provide more details on the plot but there is not much to go into other than dissecting each unique conversation. So if you have a free night pick the movie up, you won't be disappointed.
Thoughts on Logic
The problem with atheists is that they take delight in their leap of faith being more ‘logical’ than theists and yet fail to admit that they are making the exact same leap.
It is interesting that the German who questioned the foundation of logical thought built his entire argument with it.
Contemporary thought is similar to Mercator projections. They are absolutely brilliant for drawing constant course. However, they over-empathize all things furthest from the heart.
Reasonable thought can only take one so far. It can provide little comfort for death, does little to remedy heartbreak, and gives no courage in the face of a first kiss.
Hope
The media has covered the tragedy in Haiti and many people’s responses this last week. It has showcased both the highs and lows of humanity. For reasons unknown to me, after viewing the coverage on the news channel, I desired to pick up a book I had read a few years ago, A Long Way Gone, by Ishmael Beah. I thumbed through the pages and read the first passage I stopped on.
We were so angry with the prisoners that we didn’t shoot them but, rather, decided to punish them severely. “It will be a waste of bullets to shoot them,” the lieutenant said. So we gave them shovels and demanded, at gunpoint, that they dig their own graves. We sat under the huts smoking marijuana and watched them dig in the rain. Each time they slowed down, we would shoot around them and they would resume digging faster. When they were done digging, we tied them and stabbed their legs with bayonets. Some of them screamed, and we laughed and kicked them to shutup. We then rolled each man into his hole and covered him with wet mud. All of them were frightened, and they tried to get up and out of the hole as we pushed the dirt back on them, but when they saw the tips of our guns pointed into the hole, they lay back and watched us with pale sad eyes. They fought under the soil with all their might. I heard them groan underneath as they fought for air. Gradually, they gave up and we walked away.
Ishmael is describing his personal experience as a thirteen-year-old boy solider in Sierra Leone, a truly heart breaking story. At first I had forgotten the context of the passage and was horrified by what was being described. But, as I reflected back on the words I remembered Ishmael’s full story. I remember seeing him standing at the Port Theatre here in Nanaimo giving a reading. I remember how warm, full of life, and peaceful he was. Ishmael is a testimony to the good that can come from tragedy. So while some may find it in themselves to ignore this past weeks events, or worse, openly describe them as deserving and not the rest of the world's concern, the overall response has been uplifting. The record shattering donations to red cross, the amount of support for the Haitian people being spoken out of the mouths of people that rarely pay attention to world events, and people taking time to simply discuss the events are truly inspiring. So while this earthquake has been a tragedy, the response so far has been one of hope. A response, as Ishmael is also a testament of, showcases the goodness that can be found in human life in the worst of times.
The Death of Two Boys And A Brief Goodbye
This will most likely be my last post for several months. Writing my thoughts here has been a greatly rewarding experience and led to much personal growth. This year in fact has been one of great personal growth for me. Philosophically, I have examined places in my own being that I never thought I could reach. Sometimes I enjoyed what I saw there. Other times, what I did see in myself, or didn’t see, was truly frightening. From these experiences and thought experiments I have been rewarded with the beginnings of a worldview that appears to be built on stable foundations.
One of the most valuable lessons I think I have learned over this past year and the years previous is that as humans, we can shape who we are as individuals. We have choice in the type of person we can be. It may be a slow process. It may be a painful one. But, the outcome can be magnificent. In a relatively unremarkable moment of my life late last winter what I believed to be true was taken from me. That moment showed me how far I had departed from the person I once was and led me down a road where everything, and I mean everything, was questionable. My whole life was examinable, from long ago memories to my present state. One thing quickly became apparent; I had not been truly happy in a very long time but had never bothered to figure out why. The worst part was that I never even noticed the decay from a happy person to an unhappy one. It was so incremental that I was blind to it. This last year has also shown me that I don’t think I am the only one who has or is experiencing this decay. It is a condition that I think inflicts many. It is such a tragedy that we are unaware of our unhappiness and we live in a society that perpetuates the growth of unhappiness. But, just as this decay is incremental, so is its restoration. Everyday, slowly, I have been habituating practices that are bringing me closer to a person I want to be. It is a slow and hard journey, to unlearn bad habits, but even now in a mere eight months, the results are observable. Personally, I have a long way to go but there is beauty to be appreciated in what can be accomplished.
When I stopped accepting defeat, when I started believing individual action can be significant, when I started seeing the good in things again, I began to appreciate the beauty in the world again. Not everyday do I see it. However, the days that I do are becoming more and more frequent. The point of all this, and the temporary hiatus from posting my thoughts here is that I can see that more than words on page, or in a classroom, or in a church, or in a late night discussion over wine are needed to push myself and others to where we can be. There comes a time when tangible action is required. St. Francis said it best when he stated to his followers to preach the gospel at all times, and only when necessary use words. Words do have their place, but actions are what ripple through time. Words are only words when not accompanied by practice. There is so much hypocrisy in the world because so many believe that merely reading or uttering words are enough to get by on. To read the writings of the great thinkers and do nothing does no one a service. To attend church for one hour one day a week and ignore the teachings the rest of the week is shameful. What kind if message do hollow words contain? They contain the worst kind. They destroy the hope and dreams of those young enough to have faith in the world. They attempt to make everyone the same in hypocrisy and complacency. But, another thing this past year has taught me is there are those that practice what they preach. Their words are accompanied by everyday action. Yes they may stumble and yes they may falter. But, they are trying. They are trying to be better than what they are. These people are those who gave and still give me hope.
So my journey in life has taken me this far and hopefully it is far from over. It is time for me to start aggressively turning words into action. This is what I will now do for several months. I will continue writing but it will be personal for now. Just as those who practiced what they preached gave me hope, it is my hope I can do the same for others. When I feel I have effectively balanced words on a page with tangible action, then I will begin to post once again. To end this post I will finish with a story of two boys from my youth that I now hardly know.
When I was younger I was fortunate enough to know two boys. These boys were best friends for many years and their bond was seemingly unbreakable. The relationship they shared with each other was magnificent for they truly viewed the world in an incredible way. To them nothing was ever as it seemed. To them the world was over flowing with potential. Within every object there was something exciting, something so extraordinary they couldn’t understand why most others couldn’t see it. With in every person they saw even a greater potentiality. This was especially true when they looked at themselves. They weren’t just two boys; they were two boys with an endless array possibilities streaming from their soul. The only limit for them was the limits of their imagination.
These two boys didn’t see themselves as the school system did, as two students almost failing French class, not passing Mathematics repeatedly, and having to attempt Social Studies more than once. They also didn’t view themselves the same way most teachers did, as slackers, probably marijuana users, and lacking any sense of motivation to amount to anything. These two boys also didn’t see themselves as coming from reasonably wealthy households with caring parents who shared the same concerns as their teachers. All the two boys could see was a world limited by their imagination. French class, popularity among peers, teacher’s beliefs and many more things did not concern them. They believed in themselves. They believed in a beautiful world and they were happy.
Slowly, but very surely, the beautiful world they believed in began to crumble. The words of others began to penetrate their minds, telling them to grow up, and this resulted in the numbing of their imagination. They began to loose grasp of the beautiful word they saw. As their imaginations withered so did the potential in everything. At first it was the potential of objects. Next it was the potential of others. Finally, it was the potential they once saw in themselves. For one of the two, this change happened rapidly. He was consumed by the unimaginative world. The very education that should have been helping him to achieve his dreams killed them. A slow poison that told him possibilities were impossibilities and his dreams could never happen. For the other boy, well, he was able to hold on to the potential he saw in everything a little longer. He was able to shield his imagination from the onslaught the forces in his life threw at it that tried to dismantle the beauty he saw. But, he was not strong enough and definitely not prepared at all to shield his idealism from unconstrained life that confronted him after his basic education was completed. To survive in a world where atrocities and heart break was acceptable.
The relationship the boys shared was based on the beauty they saw. Neither saw beauty in the world anymore, at least to the extent they once did. Sure, every once in awhile, when they were lucky, life would allow the good to creep back in, but it would be short lived and reality quickly forced it back into the dungeons of their minds. As the worlds they saw crumbled so did their friendship. Eventually the once magnificent bond they shared was no more and the only thing the two boys had in common was the constraints of reality as it is, not what it could have been. The two boys went there separate ways and would run into each other from time to time. When they did they would reminisce about the things they once did, but never the things they once saw. They simply couldn’t. Those visions are foreign to their minds, just as it was to their parents and teachers. The dreams, the good, the happiness, that they saw and experienced had been reduced to nothing but a vague, yet painful, memory lying in ruins.
I was reminded of these two boys one night a few weeks ago. I happened to run into one of them who told me, “I am not as gone as you think…I am just buried under the rubble.”
It’s time to pick up a shovel.
When There Was No Gifts Left In Who-ville
Reader be warned, this is a completely unedited post.
Earlier this year I made it very clear to those close to me that I would not be giving gifts to anyone for Christmas. Moreover, I stressed that I did not want any gifts either. As the big day has approached and people have discovered my intentions, or in the case of those close to me, my desire to carry through with the no gift holiday season, I have been called everything from a Grinch to a Scrooge. This raises a red flag, for at no time has it been my intention not to enjoy the holidays. As a matter of fact, I have attended more festive get togethers this year than any other year in recent memory. Yet, strangely not exchanging gifts has been viewed as turning my back to the holiday season. I think there is something to be said here. However, this is not the intended direction of this post.
Recently in a conversation I was giving my justifications for not wanting to exchange gifts with anyone and the person I was conversing with stated that sometimes gifts let people know you care or are thinking about them. She made a very valid point and there is a lot of truth in her sentiments. But, when I reflect on past Christmases it is never a gift that comes to memory. It is always a fun gathering, a great dinner with my family, walking through the snow with a loved one, caroling and sipping hot chocolate with friends from my childhood, the list goes on and on. All the memories share one thing in common - they are comprised of people. My memories are enough to tell me that people are what make the best Christmases and the best memories.
A gift can tell someone you care. It is not the gift itself though. It is the person behind the gift and these gifts do seem to come because the holiday is there to remind us to give them. So wouldn’t it be nice if holidays weren’t needed for someone to show that they care? Wouldn’t it be nice to celebrate a holiday free from the consumer culture now attached to it? Especially a holiday that symbolizes the very opposite of consumerism? Wouldn’t it be nice if we lived every year, from start to finish, giving to others and letting them know we care? The role of a holiday such as Christmas is to remind us of the importance of caring. It is not to create a single day month where we show that we care.
So here is a list of things people do all year that show me they care and which I am grateful beyond belief for.
- The way my friend Courtney will give me a hug when we have not seen each other in awhile.
- My ex boss who says, “I was just thinking about you, we got a new espresso, come have a taste.”
- The messages from friends around the globe that just want to check in.
- The birthday wishes from ex girlfriends or long ago friends who I seldom talk to.
- My grandmother who slips me money because she thinks my long hair is a result of me not having the money to pay for a hair cut.
- My mother who wants to know every detail of my life – every single day – even when I haven’t left the house.
- My father who always makes sure I have transportation to the places I need to be and insists it’s on his way when it is clearly not.
- My co-worker Angie, who always asks me how I have been and then takes the time to listen to the response.
The list could go on to fill books and this is what I believe Christmas is supposed to remind us of. So from this year onwards I will be celebrating Christmas this way. The way I believe Jesus (whether he was real or not) would have us do.
Master Sun Said...
Ultimate excellence lies
Not in winning
Every Battle
But in defeating the enemy
Without ever fighting.
- Sun-Tzu
Is Eating Meat Ethical?
Quick note: I have had to disable comments on this pages as it is receiving far to much spam.
Usually I try to avoid being a preachy vegetarian. While this may be considered preachy it is not intended to be. Often, people ask why I have chosen to be a vegetarian and I rattle off the fairly standard vegetarian drabble. Recently, I finished reading through Angus Taylor’s Animals and Ethics, which, other than from a religious perspective, covers the entire ethical debate concerning the treatment of animals. I have been a vegetarian for about five years now and while I did have my surface level beliefs of why I chose vegetarianism Animals and Ethics forced me to critically examine my beliefs and spend a considerable amount of time re-formulating them. A practice that I think is healthy to undergo from time to time with all personal beliefs. As a result I have surfaced with more conviction in my belief of vegetarianism as a correct life choice.
So here is several of the main reasons I am choosing to stick with my vegetarian diet.
1) Marginal Cases
Whether using the criteria of rationality or sentience it has become very hard for me to draw a line in the sand to divide what is appropriate to eat and what is not. Using rationality as a criterion it becomes problematic because many humans due to mental handicap or accident are less rational than many animals. Using sentience as a criterion it is very apparent that animals do feel pain and can communicate that pain, just as humans do. To hold the Cartesian view that animals are essentially machines is ridiculously ignorant. So I ask myself, should animals be subjected to pain if it is not required? The answer for me is simply no. If I wish to kill an animal for my own pleasure, or societies pleasure, then is it appropriate to kill a human being if many will receive pleasure?
2) Self-autonomy
Lately my views of self-autonomy have become very internalized. My being understands the importance of its own freedom. Therefore, I attempt to avoid limiting anyone else’s freedom, even if they do not return this view (my definition of this freedom may differ than your, but that’s a different debate). This is because I feel it makes me less free to make another not free. How can I be free if on some level, whether I take pleasure in it or not, I am aware of another’s lack of freedom? I am aware of their lack of freedom, and through imagination or what Adam Smith refers to as sympathies, project myself into their situation. So, even if they are not self-aware, for the sake of my own freedom, I feel it appropriate to extend my morale community to those that have a desire to continue in existence, and feel the pain when that existence is threatened.
3) The Human Element
The cultivation of meat for consumption is an extremely inefficient process. It takes a lot of vegetables to feed animals and ‘create meat’. The same vegetables that could be used to effectively feed much of the world’s hungry. The essentially wasted land is also an environmental burden and the meat industry is one of the worst climate change culprits. Thus, the consumption of meat is damaging to future generations of humans.
There are many counter-arguments for these three points, the main one being I am anthropomorphizing animals or having an unnecessary duty to them. However, I do believe the consumption of animals is detrimental to my own freedom and I also feel that having a duty to respecting life is not limited to my own species. The debate is to complex to continue going further, but if you have chosen to eat meat I am curious to know why? Alternatively, if you have decided not to eat meat please let me know why?
Regardless of whether you do or don’t, a read through Animals and Ethics is enlightening and forces you to think philosophically about a choice traditionally taken for granted.
- "It's a good year for murder."
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