There has been something sitting at the back of my mind, softly prodding all month as I speak to people, talk about things that are not important. So much of my life, whether I spend it blogging about things that may or may not reshape the world or even about little musings that make me feel a whole universe broad.
The truth is, I spend a great deal of my time angry, I spend a great deal of my time voicing outrage, speaking out to ridicule people with whom I don't agree. It doesn't bother me. In fact, I find a great deal of joy in voicing those opinions, but that's not what's been nagging me.
I hear people talk all of the time about unconditional love, as if it were the most elegant phenomenon they had ever come to understand. I don't agree with that assessment.
Do not look for love in everything, do not soften yourself to the world perpetually. Show it love when love is what it needs, but when there is something that you see as wrong, do not hesitate to wave a finger at it and shriek at the top of your lungs. Create satyr, voice distaste, and then, from time to time, find compassion.
Do not love unconditionally. There are plenty of things in the world worth hating. Hate poverty. Hate starvation. Hate disease. Ridicule irrationality and speak out against the people who propagate it.
At the end of all of that, find compassion for those who suffer as a result. Allow those emotions to be directed properly and to subside. I, from time to time, ridicule Creationists and people who believe in faith healing and all of these other things. Above all, though, I feel compassion for those people, because they suffer for their errors.
I feel compassion for homophobes who will never recognize the legitimacy and the elegance of those relationships. I feel compassion for the racists who will never understand genetics because they insist on differentiating between people.
Do not love unconditionally. Do not feel guilty about hate. Just find compassion.
Friday, December 26, 2008
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
In the Future
The more I have conversations with my friends about dead people, the great men and women of previous generations, the more I realize that we have a skewed view of ancestors, that we see them as iconic, and while there might be something to that, it creates a pretty unrealistic worldview.
I mean, the average high school graduate knows more about the way the world works than Aristotle. There are many great things that Aristotle said and did, but if he were alive today, talking about the theories presented in Politics, or in Physics or Metaphysics, he would be laughed out of a general education course.
No one accepts Aristotle's political morals anymore, and the modern ethicists (guys like Peter Singer) are so far beyond that it's incredible. Aristotle was a brilliant man, idolized by many, but why? Because he was at the peak of innovation, seems like the obvious reason, but that leads us to totally jump past his shortcomings.
Sitting in a seminar at Saint John's College, touring, I remember listening to students talk about Aristotle's Politics, the section on slavery. I was so sure I wanted to go to Saint John's that I was literally telling complete strangers where I was going to college next year (I had already been accepted, and was looking for a way to pay for it), but watching these students jump through hoops to make Aristotle seem like a modern ethicist was just ridiculous.
There were a lot of reasons why I decided not to go to Saint John's, or at least a lot of reasons I rationalized that decision, but this is one of the biggest.
Every classic has some value to it. Every great book has something to offer, whether fiction or nonfiction, ancient or modern. That doesn't mean it is a revelation from cover to cover. That doesn't make the author, or his philosophy, immaculate.
I like Dave Matthews' song "Where are You Going." I think it's a fantastic song with a great sound and beautiful imagery. Does that mean everything he's written is fantastic? No. I think most of his music is, but I acknowledge the songs that fall short, the couplets that don't quite work.
This isn't a stretch because we don't treat our musicians like messiahs, we don't treat them like prophets who's work is eternal, all transcending. This is how some people treat Aristotle. They love Ethics, and so they apologize for the failures of Politics. This is a mistake, and it's the same one that religious fundamentalists make.
Find the beauty in the context. Find the elegance in the time and place in which the theory was fabricated, but don't expect perfect, all consuming wisdom from individuals long gone. They were, after all, only people.
I mean, the average high school graduate knows more about the way the world works than Aristotle. There are many great things that Aristotle said and did, but if he were alive today, talking about the theories presented in Politics, or in Physics or Metaphysics, he would be laughed out of a general education course.
No one accepts Aristotle's political morals anymore, and the modern ethicists (guys like Peter Singer) are so far beyond that it's incredible. Aristotle was a brilliant man, idolized by many, but why? Because he was at the peak of innovation, seems like the obvious reason, but that leads us to totally jump past his shortcomings.
Sitting in a seminar at Saint John's College, touring, I remember listening to students talk about Aristotle's Politics, the section on slavery. I was so sure I wanted to go to Saint John's that I was literally telling complete strangers where I was going to college next year (I had already been accepted, and was looking for a way to pay for it), but watching these students jump through hoops to make Aristotle seem like a modern ethicist was just ridiculous.
There were a lot of reasons why I decided not to go to Saint John's, or at least a lot of reasons I rationalized that decision, but this is one of the biggest.
Every classic has some value to it. Every great book has something to offer, whether fiction or nonfiction, ancient or modern. That doesn't mean it is a revelation from cover to cover. That doesn't make the author, or his philosophy, immaculate.
I like Dave Matthews' song "Where are You Going." I think it's a fantastic song with a great sound and beautiful imagery. Does that mean everything he's written is fantastic? No. I think most of his music is, but I acknowledge the songs that fall short, the couplets that don't quite work.
This isn't a stretch because we don't treat our musicians like messiahs, we don't treat them like prophets who's work is eternal, all transcending. This is how some people treat Aristotle. They love Ethics, and so they apologize for the failures of Politics. This is a mistake, and it's the same one that religious fundamentalists make.
Find the beauty in the context. Find the elegance in the time and place in which the theory was fabricated, but don't expect perfect, all consuming wisdom from individuals long gone. They were, after all, only people.
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Happiness: Making It
I've downloaded a video on Daniel Gilbert from the TED Podcast, but you guys can watch it on youtube if you want.
The part that stimulates me the most is this notion of synthesized happiness, not simply on the nature of synthetic happiness, its incompatibility with choice.
We have a remarkable capacity to cope, something I always felt Seneca underestimated. We have an evolutionary need to aim high, to set goals we cannot reach so that we can at least go somewhere when we work towards them.
Whether we reach goals or not, it's nice to have them. Going forward is better than sitting around smoking a joint (though you can be happy that way too).
People ask how I motivate myself to do things, mostly when atheism comes up, and I tell them it's not because I want to make myself happy. Not that I don't like being happy, but because I already am happy and, as Gilbert points out, I could be just as happy not working as I am working.
I do it because I want to push myself and the world around me. There is something to be said for pushing the limits of human thought, and though I am not delusional enough to believe I'm at the forefront of that, joining in and doing what I can is important.
Dan Dennett talks about his soundbite for finding significance and purpose in life: Find something more important than you are and dedicate your life to it.
So find purpose. Happiness, synthetic or otherwise (I'm not a huge fan of the differentiation), will show up on its own time.
The part that stimulates me the most is this notion of synthesized happiness, not simply on the nature of synthetic happiness, its incompatibility with choice.
We have a remarkable capacity to cope, something I always felt Seneca underestimated. We have an evolutionary need to aim high, to set goals we cannot reach so that we can at least go somewhere when we work towards them.
Whether we reach goals or not, it's nice to have them. Going forward is better than sitting around smoking a joint (though you can be happy that way too).
People ask how I motivate myself to do things, mostly when atheism comes up, and I tell them it's not because I want to make myself happy. Not that I don't like being happy, but because I already am happy and, as Gilbert points out, I could be just as happy not working as I am working.
I do it because I want to push myself and the world around me. There is something to be said for pushing the limits of human thought, and though I am not delusional enough to believe I'm at the forefront of that, joining in and doing what I can is important.
Dan Dennett talks about his soundbite for finding significance and purpose in life: Find something more important than you are and dedicate your life to it.
So find purpose. Happiness, synthetic or otherwise (I'm not a huge fan of the differentiation), will show up on its own time.
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