Small

I had a moment of clarity this morning. I realised how absolutely small my own mind was. Now, I'm not a moron and at times I've even been considered intelligent. So what was it that made me realise how small my mind is? For the past 18 months I've been living in Sydney, a city of four and half million people. I can't conceive of that many of anything. That number is simply beyond my comprehension, I can't understand the implication of 4.5 million. To me it's a pointless number since it just goes into the realms of big.

Now in the scheme of things, 4.5 million is small, tiny even. And I can't imagine that number in anything except as a number.


As a secondary part of this realisation, it started to become apparent to me how big God's mind is. While I don't understand 4.5 million, there are 6888 million people on the planet (6.9 billion) at the time of writing. And from what we are told, this number is also meaningless. Not because it is beyond comprehension due to it's massive nature. Instead of that, it's because it's such a small number that it doesn't even really register. Just think about that for a moment.
The population of the earth is such a small number that it doesn't really matter. It barely rates as a statistic.

OK, stop thinking about that now. Blow your mind on this little chestnut now. God knows every person on the earth individually. Every single one. With room to spare. Physically, emotionally, psychologically, everything.
To write out the genetic sequence of a single human being would apparently take the entirety of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. To put that into context, if you stack the full set, it comes in at roughly 2 metres thick, almost 6 foot and 7 inches. Multiply that by 6.9 billion.
I won't go into number of cells in the human body because that really is meaningless numbers with ten trillion.
The human brain itself is still considered the greatest computer built due to it's incredible processing power and the level of it's contextual separation. If there has been one goal of software advancement, it has been to achieve this. God not only can do it (look at the human brain for example) but knows each different one individually and completely.
and I can't comprehend the number 4.5 million.

Optimism

Frank Fenner died on November the 22nd. His first expected time of death was during the mid 50's when he knowingly injected himself with a virus in order to prove it's safety. In 1980, he announced to the world that smallpox no longer existed outside of laboratories. Earlier this year, he announced to the world that we would be extinct within 100 years. To come to this conclusion marks a drastic change in the way he thought thirty years ago.

And there in lies one of the problems. Optimism is only short lived. Almost by definition (at least in my experience as a pessimistic realist).
Humanity can't cope with positivity. We see it in the news. Only one day in three gives us a positive news story and these are usually shunted to the end of the paper or the report as a 'human interest' story.

For Frank Fenner to inject himself with Myxomatosis, a virus which he had studied strictly for it's fatal capabilities took optimism. He did it for the express purpose of proving its safety for humans. And his gamble paid off. Myxomatosis was used for 40 years to keep the rabbit population controlled in Australia.

For Frank Fenner to announce that smallpox no longer existed took optimism. Everyone knows about carriers. His announcement marked the point at which vaccines were made. If there was even one carrier who managed to pass on the disease, there could have been monumental casualties before the vaccine was distributed again. Now smallpox only exists in two places, a vault in Atlanta, and a vault in Koltsovo. Here it is used to study virology and to develop vaccines for other diseases.

For Frank Fenner to announce that the Human race was doomed, all he had to do was look around. He gives a few reasons. Overpopulation (he is quoted as saying "If you want to protect children from the vast number of infectious diseases, vaccination is by far the best way to do it. If on the other hand, you wish to act against overpopulation, don't vaccinate anyone, including your own children.") key among them. Other reasons include Global Warming or Climate Change and a lack of food (causing wars as a result of the distribution).

I don't particularly want to answer any of these as I think I've discussed most of his concerns in some way or another during my time here. However, what I want to do is consider briefly the difference between his optimism and his pessimism.

For his optimism he risked death at his own hands.
For his optimism, he worked day and night for something that would statistically never affect him.
For his optimism he was rewarded with a literally changed world.
For his optimism, he achieved something that had never previously and has never since been done (the eradication of a infectious disease in humans).

For his pessimism, he gave up.

three fathom analysis

So here is why I got irritated at the pub the other day. [click here to see what I'm talking about].

Apart from what I mentioned before (ie, you're a douche), the answer comes essentially down to something that might surprise people who only know me through this page. I am basically an egalitarian; that is, I am mostly of the opinion that people in general are equal. However like the pigs in Animal Farm, I am also of the opinion that some are more equal than others.

Before you say something along the lines of "Alphonse, Animal Farm was intended as a critique of communist Russia. The political struggle of the working class over the bourgeois and upper class has nothing to do with your encounter with this previously mentioned douche. Also, that statement was considered the fault of the pigs and so should not be taken as a personal motto of any kind," this is true and so I'll clarify. I am not strictly of the opinion that some are more equal, my views are closer to some can become less equal over time. This can be through a series of poor personal choices in most areas, but it can, such as in this case, be as a result of one very poor showing of your own personality. None of the players in this piece besides the daughter made a very good showing of themselves and thus they fall several equalnesses in my eyes.

Firstly the mother. What are you doing taking your daughter to the pub every afternoon; she's 9. Also, once you make this preliminary bad decision, why do you question how well things are going? I would have thought this was fairly obvious.

Nextly, the douche-man. The argument that you decided to make the afternoons discussion into shouldn't have been an argument. Your associate didn't want to argue, she made that clear early on in the piece. Instead, she wanted confirmation that she wasn't doing a bad job. She didn't want to have you telling her how wrong she obviously was and listing off reasons to that effect.
Also, you're a douche. I saw him a few days later at work again. As the band was playing, he was quite effusive in his strangely positive heckling. Happily singing along out of tune making it hard for the actual talent to not hate him. In the end, despite not actually doing anything wrong and simply because he was being annoying as a result of his imbibing of alcohol, he was asked to leave and escorted from the premises. Conclusion: You're a douche.

Finally, and semi relatedly, the girl. Despite the situation, the girl was happy. She was the bright candle that illuminated the flaws of the surrounds. My worry is that alcohol, being a liquid, will put the flame out. It may not be now, it may not be soon, but one day I worry that her light will be put out and she will end up taking her 9 year old daughter to the pub every afternoon in imitation of what she knows.

So that's the three fathom analysis of the behaviour that I saw and why it irritated me.
To explain why it's three fathoms (3.48m), that depth initially looks deep and the above may well (probably not however). However, fathoms measure depth of water for sailing and you can't sail a ship in that depth.

So on the whole, today was a day of mixed things.
On one hand (the more positive one), I finished uni for this term, meaning I only have 7 months left. I was also paid for the first time in roughly 18 months.
On the other hand, there were a couple of things that really got my pissed off, which I should add, I don't do all that often. My comment at one of them was "It's this sort of thing that makes me wish knifing someone was legal." Shortly after that while this was still happening, I had my knife out and ready in case I really needed to do something rash. Don't worry, it's a small (3 inch) knife that's attached to my multitool and therefore is completely legal. The other was less bad for my blood pressure and thus I will not talk about it.

While preparing for work in the pub, sitting behind me enjoying their drinks were two middle aged people (one male and one female) and a mid twenties guy. Occasionally with them was the woman's daughter. It was only occasional because sometimes she was dancing on the carpeted area slightly downstairs. She was probably about 9 or 10. That's the start of what got me riled. There is no real reason that you should have a child of that age at a pub unless she's there for a meal or something (as pub meals are awesome and should be enjoyed by all). These people were not there to enjoy a meal, they were there to have their afternoon drinks at around 4:00. I have no problem with having a drink at 4:00; I myself have enjoyed drinks at that time after work. What I do have a problem with is subjecting your nine year old child to that.

These people come there most afternoons and follow the same sort of schedule. Arrive at around 3, drink for a while and head home at 5. During this time, points for discussion will generally be of an unsavoury nature. The woman will talk about her boyfriends (one for every new night from the sounds of it), the older guy will talk about how good he is, and the younger guy will smile and nod. Again, this isn't the right environment for any nine year old child.
Today the talking headed in a slightly different direction to what I'd heard previously. The mother was concerned that her daughter wasn't going all that well in school and that she therefore wouldn't be able to exceed her own life (in which case, don't bring her to the pub every other day). The older guy in an apparently arrogant way was saying "She'll be good at maths, she'll be good at science and you know why?..." and so on. When the mother kept saying that she wasn't sure, he piped up again and told her to, in internet terms, STFU, from which he progressed forward. At this point, mum told daughter not to listen and I started playing with my multitool. Mum went on at this point to say that daughter should "never let a man talk to her like that", at which point I thought "and don't get into a situation where your daughter can be talked to like that"
From here things spiralled downwards. Yep, from that high point, the conversation got worse. Mum tried to ban the older guy from talking to her daughter, and "for the record, I didn't touch her or say a single word to her" etc, and then they all left.

Next time I'm on, I'll respond to this with a three fathom analysis of why this got me particularly annoyed. For now, I'm going to leave it at that.

Christian Music

There was a long time during which I refused to listen to any music by anyone who called themselves a Christian musician that wasn't hymns and such - I still find it hard. As far as I could tell, there were only three kinds of Christian song - the incredibly distorted guitar song where you couldn't understand the vocals (which were usually the best by way of lyrics), the generic soft rock song (with lyrics that could be sung by anyone about how awesome 'he' was but never saying who he actually was) and the unfortunate, but all to common, dross that appears in all music (which was by and large the kind that you heard the most). My refusal got to the point where there were a few cases of me getting rid of music that I had liked as soon as I found out that the musicians called themselves Christians. Bands like Kutless, Anberlin and Skillet never stood a chance once I learnt their origins.

Since then, my situation has changed. I am still incredibly wary of so-called Christian Music. However, as I am living with aficionados of certain Christian bands, I have been forced to rethink and explain my policy. Many Christian bands are indeed good musically and as they can now gain credibility and a wider audience while still actually singing Christian lyrics, they in many cases do. Many still disguise their words under a layer of symbols or hidden meanings but it is getting better.

The default setting for many Christians is to automatically assume that since the band calls themselves Christian, their music will therefore be quality and their lyrics worth hearing. It may be that we decide that it is important that we support the industry, but this doesn't seem to be the main reasoning. So it is interesting that even without the demand for improvement or any real skill a growing number of Christian bands have a high quality of both musical proficiency and performance ability, making them worth listening to for the music and worth going to see as well.

So the question arises, What is it that is making Christian music good? There are two things I think that are doing this. The first is industry and audience related, and the second is deeper.

Firstly, with a large number of mediocre bands that achieve the qualifier of good by some means unknown to me, it is harder for bands that are actually good to gain any notice. For this to happen, they either need to be or do something incredibly controversial (which won't really work in the semi-conservative Christian market) or be really properly good. This has driven bands who want to achieve things with their music to greater heights seeing as they have to be quite good in order to be noticed by either the publishing companies (who would rather keep on squeezing proven bands until they are dry) or the audience (who already have favourites and aren't overly willing to change)

The second comes down to the nature of music. Music in its purist form is about emotion and passion. The greatest albums ever came out of a deep emotional connection to the music and the band or the artist; look at Face Value by Phil Collins of Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd, both of them came out of massive emotions held by the bands in question. As the return to Grace-based Christianity continues, people are returning to the passion that is, or should be inherent in Christianity. Since this passion is becoming more and more real, bands are funnelling it into their music and performances. This is what is driving the music to be better and the lyrics to be truer.

Post Modern Amusement

One of the most common responses that I have ever had to cold evangelism (eg door knocking) is "I'm not interested," followed by the quick closing of the door and a phone call to everyone else in the street warning them to not answer the door. The second most common response essentially boils down to "Sure that might be right to you, but it isn't right for me." In some cases, everything you say might be agreed with, and the response will still be one of apathy. This is almost directly due to the post-modernist movement which says that "what's right for me is right for me and what's right for you is right for you"

This line of thinking is a real problem when it comes to something like evangelism of any sort because it denies logic of any sort. Now some of you might be saying that when it comes to religious evangelism you don't want logic to be the major factor in what you are saying. However without some level of logical background in what is being said, all sorts of stupidities can come out in arguments or discussions. For example everyone accepts the logical assumption that you get older as time goes on. If you find someone who denies this assumption at your birthday, you will have a hard time explaining to them the reason that you haven't already enjoyed your 50th birthday and why you won't be turning 15 again. When you deny basic logic, all sorts of things fly out the window. Which is why this line of thinking is a real problem for evangelism.

You say, "If you don't accept Jesus, you will go to hell; but if you do, then you will go with him to heaven" (which is a basic explanation of the gospel - there are better ones but this covers the bare essentials). The response comes back, "That might be right for you, but I don't believe it", close door and never hear from them again. Your line does not depend on whether it is believed or not, similar to "If you don't get out of the way of the bus, it will hit you and you will die; but if you do get out of the way, it will not hit you and you will not die". One person's denial of the existence of the bus doesn't mean that they can't be hit by it and die, on the contrary, it makes them more likely to get hit by the bus because they won't get out of it's way.
If you take the logic that an effect follows a cause, then you know that to avoid the effect, you need to avoid the cause.

Which is why this argument is so annoying. The fact that they won't accept it doesn't make it any less true, but it means that they won't accept anything that you say in regards to it and so you can't take any line of reason to get to the point where the simple assumption is accepted.
It is an obvious fallacy that people can't accept is a fallacy.

But the good news is that there is a fairly simple counter to it. It takes the form of a second line. The conversation so far has followed the basic form from above but as the door is about to be closed, you have to tell them that they don't actually believe that. Here is where it can be tricky as you've just told them that they are flat out Wrong and people are always Right. From here you need to point out the logical fallacy in their thinking gently since aggression in this form of evangelism almost never goes down well. However if they don't mind doing a bit of thinking about their thinking, you at least have them listening.

The Sun Is Burning: Part 2

So here is part two of the other day's post, correctly titled this time since you know what the song is now.

Read the first three verses again.

The sun is burning in the sky
Strands of clouds go slowly drifting by
In the park the lazy bees
Are joining in the flowers, among the trees
And the sun burns in the sky

Now the sun is in the West
Little kids go home to take their rest
And the couples in the park
Are holdin' hands and waitin' for the dark
And the sun is in the West

Now the sun is sinking low
Children playin' know it's time to go
High above a spot appears
A little blossom blooms and then draws near
And the sun is sinking low


Now, without knowing what happens in the next part of the song it appears to be a nice, sappy song about everyone having a nice time. They're all going to get up in the morning and go back to school or work and then enjoy the afternoon sun again. So what does happen next? Warning this part isn't the nicest thing you will hear in a song.

Now the sun has come to Earth
Shrouded in a mushroom cloud of death
Death comes in a blinding flash
Of hellish heat and leaves a smear of ash
And the sun has come to Earth

Now the sun has disappeared
All is darkness, anger, pain and fear
Twisted, sightless wrecks of men
Go groping on their knees and cry in pain
And the sun has disappeared


So to answer yesterday's question, the people were Japanese. And no, they didn't get up in the morning.

So what's my point with this section?
I suppose all I really want to say is that the framing or context of something that is said is possibly the most important part of what is said. When we take it out of context we read our own meaning into what ever it is. This is something that all people have to be careful of. I've complained about it many times when other people take my words out of context and misinterpret them.

Now in this case, you are forgiven. It was intended to be like that.

The other thing that I wanted to say was not that humanities ability to inflict cruelty on itself is one of our defining characteristics.

What I wanted to say was that it is amazing how we can change things so quickly. A simple line like "the sun is sinking low" is just that, a simple line that only gives a time frame. In the next verse however "now the sun has come to earth" does that and then almost pours on the irony - yes, life is going on.
It went from happy sappy music to everyone is dying in pain in the space of three words. The last verses wouldn't be out of place in a Death Metal song. This comes back to the last part where I said that fear comes from the unknown. In this case we reverse engineer again. We don't know the outcome and so we make it something that we don't fear. While it is a logical assumption that the song won't go in this direction, it is an assumption nonetheless.

?: Part 1

The title is because I don't want to play all my cards at once. You will get the actual title later.

This being part one, it needs to introduce what part two will talk about and then discuss it's own stuff.

These are the first three verses of a song by Simon and Garfunkel. Picture it in your head as you read. Pay special attention to everything that you see as there will be a test afterwards.

"The sun is burning in the sky
Strands of clouds go slowly drifting by
In the park the lazy bees
Are joining in the flowers, among the trees
And the sun burns in the sky

Now the sun is in the West
Little kids go home to take their rest
And the couples in the park
Are holdin' hands and waitin' for the dark
And the sun is in the West

Now the sun is sinking low
Children playin' know it's time to go
High above a spot appears
A little blossom blooms and then draws near
And the sun is sinking low"

So what was all that about? (That was a Rhetorical Question - don't answer it).
I have one question. It's only for people who don't already know the song and therefore the answer.
What racial background did the people come from? Simple question. For me, they were almost all caucasian, a couple of others in there as well.

So what was the point of that. This question tells you how deeply ingrained racism is.
In 95% of cases, the people that you saw were of the same ethnic background as you. In 4% of the remaining cases, they were of the dominant ethnic background of the place you grew up or reside in. The remaining 1% of people are lying.

Fear comes from the unknown. From that we can reverse engineer and find that the known is what we prefer to associate with. This is why we imagine people (unless told otherwise) to be the same as us. In a Science Fiction book I once read, the front page said "In most cases of Science Fiction, all humans are white unless told otherwise. In this book, all humans are black unless told otherwise." Think about it - in the original StarWars trilogy, there is only one black person in the entire universe. In the more recent they included more - most notably all of the un-named clones (who were all wearing white...).

The real problem with racial barriers is that they can't not exist. Even saying "I'm not racist, some of my best friends are [insert descriptor here]" means that you've defined those people by that descriptor. It is inherent in Human nature.

For any one who was wondering, the Song is called "The Sun is Burning".
The next post will be about the next verses.

The Monster von Frankenstein

I apologise in advance as this will be somewhat a train of thought post and therefore I am likely to get even myself lost during moments here.

Frankenstein is a book by Mary Shelley where a scientist, Victor Frankenstein, manages to piece together a human body from a collection of parts. This body is initially bereft of life but through a series of experiments manages to imbue the body with the vital spark and both its heart and brain, and subsequently the rest of it, start working. Being of essentially human origins, besides being initially a collection of dead bodies, it becomes self aware and its education begins. However, its (for the sake of clarity the monster will hereinafter be referred to as David - He was never called Frankenstein, that was simply the name of David's creator and that name has begun to encompass both David and his creator) education is somewhat different to the way that you or I are educated.
David's education starts with Victor being utterly repulsed by his appearance that he runs away. David is released and is left without guidance. He decides that he needs to meet with other humans to learn from. With this in mind he watches a family for a year. When he approaches them, they get scared and drive him away. He realises that his appearance is not what people are accepting decides to approach a child, reasoning that a child won't care as much about appearance. By chance this child is the young brother of Victor and insults David. David, attempting to keep him quiet by covering his mouth. This kills him and is David's first act of revenge for Victor making him and then abandoning him. However, it is accidental.
David and Victor meet by accident and David explains to Victor the situation. He says that because he is a living thing, he has a right to happiness and that Victor, as his creator, should provide him with a companion that will accept him. Victor can see the logic and so they leave for Scotland together to make a female companion for David.
While in the process of this, Victor starts thinking that two are probably worse than one, especially a breeding pair. He decides to destroy Davina (the female companion to be) before she is finished. David witness this and vows to destroy Victor's chance of happiness on his upcoming wedding night and kills Victor's somewhat more human partner.
On the wedding night, Victor prepares himself for a fight to the death. Telling his wife to wait upstairs for him he waits for David's arrival. Unfortunately for Victor (and his wife) David's revenge was not Victor's death, but the death of those closest to him so that he can feel the same isolation as David does. He sneaks in to the bedroom and kills Victor's wife.
Victor then vows vengeance upon David and they end up chasing each other for a few months until they find themselves in the Arctic Circle.
Victor dies of exposure. David finds him dead. Grief-stricken and filled with remorse he decides that so that no one else will be hurt, he will go up to the North Pole and burn himself to death rather than let anyone else know of his existence.
Thus ends the sad tale of Baron Victor von Frankenstein and his creation, David the Monster.

Ok, so that was a fairly quick recap on the story in case anyone has either not read it or has forgotten the salient points. In saying that, I have not read it either and so I might be wrong on a few points.

So there are a few things that come out of it. Firstly and quite quickly, something comes back to this post in which I discuss the difference between humans and animals. Mary Shelley seems to agree with my points here. David argues for his human-like rights; something I proposed should be the deciding point of whether an animal should be afforded the same rights. Secondly he defeats his instincts (survival) for something that he deems is more important than himself - in this case, the fact than his vengeance has cost the lives of four people and one like him for the gain of nothing and also the fact that his difference is obviously the cause of this. He decides that this is reason enough that he should not be allowed to continue his existence. Self sacrifice was one of my differences between humanity and animals. David put a value on his own life and determined that it was not higher than his revenge.

Secondly, it seems that a crucial point of his self awareness was the fact that he desired companionship. He grew to full self awareness as his desire for friendship grew. As this grew, he also gained more 'human' characteristics. It is the result of many studies that children of any age crave association with others. This is a critical part of their growth - the association with others teaches them social skills and aids in their development in a way that can not be taught in any other way.
It is also a result of similar studies that at the formative stages, a child's mind is more plastic, but that what is taught is remembered for longer (Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it). In the formative time for David, he was firstly abandoned. As a consequence of his abandonment linked with his desire for companionship, he sought out others. As he watched this, his mind formed the deeper desire to gain friends and a bona fide family. When this was taken from him by the second rejection, he learnt that no one liked him and no human would ever like him. Whether this was true or not, it was what his experiences taught him.
Looking at this, it is no surprise the direction that he decided to go. It has been seen many times before - usually in the lives of psycho killers. Repeated (shall we say it?) inhumanities teach inhumanity. David was taught that he was not worthy of what others had simply because he didn't look like them. Logic dictated to him that this was a lie and that he was worthy of the same as everyone else. And so he decided that if he wasn't worthy of it, no one else was - simple logic especially in the mind of a child.

Thirdly, he showed remorse. This is interesting of itself - he was never taught this because no one ever showed it to him in their dealings with him, and so either he learnt it as an aside somewhere or it is inherent in the human mind (which by now I have decided that he has). But even in the case of the latter, the path that he has taken, which we have seen in the lives of serial killers worldwide, this is a rarity. In fact it is generally considered more than just a symptom in these cases and is often more of a partial cause - if you don't care about the results for others then it doesn't matter what you do as long as you come out it positively. Which means that he was not in the same category as such luminaries as Richard Kuklinski, the infamous 'Ice Man' who despite initially feeling remorse, started to feel that killing gave him a sense of power.
Which means that he was simply a normal human who had been taken in a direction that he could not escape from and in which killing was the only way to continue. His thinking was that if he could kill the one that had made him unacceptable then he would feel some closure and would be able to live alone for the term of his natural life. When this was proved to be not apparent, by his remorse and grief, he decided that not only would he be not able to ever live with others, but that he could not live alone with himself, which is one of the most common excuses for suicide - the inability to be a part of yourself.

The next part is a question. Why is it that people assume from the outset that the worst possible thing that could happen is that they die? That was the conclusion that Victor made - if David was going to have revenge and it was going to be really really bad, than of course it would be his death. Interesting that an 18 year old, upper middle class girl who had not had any experience at all similar to this would decide that this wasn't the worst revenge that could be had - that it was in fact the death of someone close to you. Interesting also that this is one of the two reasons that vengeance is decided, the other being the slow destruction of the life of the other nemesis.

Something else; all of the people born human (rather than David who was made a human) indulge in the classic human pastime of prejudice. As soon as Victor sees David alive, he flees; when he tries to talk to the kid, he gets insulted; as soon as he reveals himself to the family that he watched for a year, they attack him - I will admit that is creepy, if someone came up to me and said "I've been watching you for about a year. Can we be friends?" I would probably attack them to. Basically the only person in this tale that doesn't, is David himself.
It occurs to me that the only people who don't indulge in prejudice are those who are considered outcasts. Although that isn't completely true - they still indulge, just with people who are close or similarly outcast to them. Since David never got the chance to meet anyone that was similar to him, he never got to show proper prejudice.

The last thing that I want to say here.
I'll come at it sideways.
The reason that recruiting child soldiers is such a brutally efficient way of getting loyal people fast is that once they've killed, they know that there is no coming back - murder is the only taboo that we are born with. When you show them that they are still accepted then they come into the life that accepts them willingly. If this is a life where cruelty and killing outsiders is the norm, then that is the life that they will live, no matter the consequences, until they are accepted into another life where their previous sins are not accepted but not a cardinal sin.
David experiences the first part of this. He kills someone by accident, but he already knows that no one will accept him and therefore there is no life that he can take. His only recourse is to continue in the path that he is already on because he doesn't see an alternative, although he continues to try and get out of it. His desire for a companion is now a desire for a counterpart who will accept him even after his sins more than it is a desire for association with others - he only wants one because in his mind only one will possibly accept him, classic romantic thinking.
When this falls through, he defaults to the original path and kills again, these times as a willing participant. He sees through the jaded eyes of the betrayed that without a literally custom built companion, no one will ever accept him. Whether he is right or not, I can't comment on; but his logic is flawless.

Here is the major difference between David and Victor (despite the obvious physical difference) - David rules himself through a logic that, while impeccable, doesn't have the advantage of secondary, wiser eyes and also hasn't been taught right or wrong besides what is inherent in him already. Victor jumps to conclusions and his logic is ruled by preconceived notions of what is right, being a non human (David) putting himself on the same level as a human (for example Victor).

The power of Belief 2

So the Westboro Baptist C(ult)urch.
What can we say?

Not much, so I'll just go straight into the negativity of their beliefs.
While a lot (roughly 103%) of what they do is negative, there is only one facet that I want to cover here.

A large portion of their reasoning goes somewhat like this.
"We are followers of Christ. Followers of Christ are called to be of one heart and mind. Therefore anyone who disagrees with us can not be called a follower of Christ."

The next part of their reasoning goes something like this.
"Christ said that his followers (us) would be hated for following him. We are hated for doing his work. Therefore we must be followers of Christ. Since everyone hates us, no one else can be legitimately called followers of Christ"

The next part of their reasoning goes something like this.
"Since God hates sinners, being everyone that doesn't follow Christ, which is everyone that isn't us, God hates everyone that isn't us. Since God isn't subtle about his methods (Look at the Old Testament where he would kill nations for the sin of one man) and he calls us to tell all about him, we must tell everyone that they are going to go to hell."

The final part of their reasoning goes a little something like this.
"People don't like us because we're telling them the truth that they are going to hell. Therefore they are going to hell"

In an interview with one of the members of this small group, it came out that she didn't actually want people to listen to their message in case people repented because if they did that, they wouldn't be punished for their sins. While this may not be the view shared by all of the members, it shows the type of hatred that is a definite part of the teachings.

Any hoo, back to the point. The reasoning is circular and lead the thoughts essentially in this way.
"People who dislike or hate us are going to hell and we should tell them that. People don't like us for telling them that they are going to hell, therefore they are going to hell and we should let them know."

So what is the negative power of belief in this case?
Here they refuse to take accepted belief over dogma. This is one that is especially good in small doses - it leads to questioning the accepted order, which may yet be wrong.

But why is this bad when it leads to questioning? Because in its extreme case (which we see with the WBC) it doesn't allow questioning. Everything becomes black or white, and there is no way that any shade of grey can be anything other than the darkest of blacks. It once again prohibits growth, but it also disallows anything else to be even considered. In this case, they refuse to believe that there are more than 15 or 20 actual followers of Christ in the world because, in their words "They'd be doing the same as we do and we'd have heard about it"


The real problem in this case is that they've warped their views so much that every time they do anything that someone dislikes they re-validate everything that they do once again.

The power of Belief 1

There are two things that I want to talk about in terms of the negative power of belief and therefore there will be two separate discussions. It is important that I say that both of these aspects can also be positive in the right dosage (very mild).

They both take different forms and affect different people. Thus, I will focus on possibly the most notable incidences in each case. In this discussion, I will look at the Nazi party nearing the end of WWII. In the next discussion I will look at one facet of the Westboro Baptist C(ult)hurch. (as an aside, written that way you can almost trick yourself into thinking it says Cthulhu)

So firstly, the Nazi party. What did they most notably believe in? The Motherland and the divine strength of the same. Everything else was secondary, which isn't to underplay it, but everything else came from this one core belief. The hatred of the Jewish race, the gypsies and homosexuality came from the belief that this was what was making Germany weak. The love of the aryan 'race' came partly from Neitzche's theory of the Übermensch and partly from the view that this was the purist and therefore strongest race; and so the propagation of this bloodline meant that Germany would strengthen itself through its people.

And how did this play out?
Towards the end of the second world war possibly the most common reaction among the Nazi high command was disbelief - there was no way that they could lose the war and so therefore there was no justification to the claims that they were. Documentation of Hitler's last weeks show that he couldn't accept that there wasn't a way that his men weren't simply lulling the Russians into a false sense of security before crushing them close to Berlin. When they entered Berlin and it became clear that Germany had lost the war, Hitler committed suicide with his wife Eva Braun. Following this the rest of the high command gave up hope - after all, how could they win when their leader had abandoned them and Germany.

So what was the negative power of belief in this case?
Refusing to accept fact over belief. What they 'knew' to be true had lost out to what was actually true but there was no acceptance of this because their belief overrode the facts.

We've seen this in many other cases as well. Possibly the other most well known one was Galileo's fight with the Catholic church over the shape of the earth leading to his conviction for heresy and subsequent house arrest.

So then the question is how negative is this power of belief.
It blinds you to the reality of what is actually happening. This in itself is bad enough, it disallows growth from your accepted beliefs, and as I've stated previously, if you're not growing, you're regressing.
It forces you to lie to yourself by discounting, belittling or misinterpreting data that is true.

Negative indeed.

The big difference

Yes there is a difference between animals and humans. Even the fact that we split ourselves into these two groups shows that. There is one difference that I keep coming back to almost no matter the end. It has something to do with the scientific name for our species, Homo Sapiens - Humans, the Wise. That's right we decided from the beginning that we were the only intelligent species on the face of the planet. But past that there is another thing that this brings up. What is wisdom? If we alone have it, how does that make us different to every other species on this earth?

It has been defined as the ability to know what to do with knowledge and while this is true, I would like to propose an addendum to this. It's also the ability to synthesise information, which leads me to the point that I wanted to make. The difference between humans and animals is that instinct doesn't rule us.

This is a fairly easy thing to see. If an animal is hungry it will find something to eat, no matter what it was doing immediately before that. If a human is hungry and was doing something, that will finish first. We set priorities that can override our own survival requirements temporarily. No animal will go on a hunger strike. But it also has some deeper consequences.
A human can protect others over themselves.
A human can fight and kill other humans for little or no reason (ie with out the need for protection or to satisfy a need for survival).
But also a human can literally put a value on a life - it isn't just something to fill in time with or a collection of health-some proteins.

And so this is what I come back to, this is my reason for doing a lot of things. Instinct would tell me to do all sorts of stuff that would get me into trouble - instinct is bad for me. Doesn't mean that I shouldn't eat when I'm hungry, but when instinct tells me to be angry or what ever, then I should ignore it and try to find something new. This is why I dislike painkillers - the instinct is to try and prevent or relieve pain. Pain is a teaching method that the body uses to try and keep us safe, relief of this stops the lesson. It also limits the things that we can do as part of anything (and you know how much I hate limitations). They work by slowing the nerve receptors in the brain and therefore slowing the brain. If the brain is what separates us from animals, why would we want that?

The other thing that this difference means is that animals sharing human rights, at least to me, makes no sense. I would argue that if they are to get human or human like rights, they have to first be able to argue for them on their own.

Stereotypes

The interesting thing about stereotypes is that almost universally we are told that they are lies or misconceptions, but in most cases, they are close to being truth. This is no fault of their own however, it is simply that they exist that this happens. Take the stereotype of blondes; blondes are ditzy airheads who barely think about anything, and if they do, it's on the lowest level that is humanly capable. I know highly intelligent blonde girls who have changed their thinking to reflect this; they don't get jokes even after they've been explained, they are incredibly gullible, but they know more about fashion and make-up than I will ever know about anything. This is the problem, they change their thinking and start believing what they are told. This self perpetuation is one of the biggest problems with any form of discrimination, be it racism, sexism, ageism, beardism or anything.

For example, there are very few male nurses, despite the fact that much of the work of a nurse is better suited to males - lifting, holding etc. This has given the conception of nursing is that it is a woman's job, so no man will do it, so it is a woman's job. This is a self perpetuating cycle that firstly limits nurses - they get the jobs that 'men' shouldn't be doing, and secondly of men - they shouldn't be nurses. Did you know that in order to get trained medical professionals to care for the wounded in the marines they had to change what they called nurses, they are now known as medics.
Or, again with the medical theme, there are very few female doctors, despite the fact that in most cases, men lack either the necessary rationality to be able to treat the sick and injured and the humanness to be have a real bedside manner.

In Australia, Black Aboriginal people are often treated as lower people because they have a reputation. There are a larger proportion of the Aboriginal community that get caught in alcoholism, narcotics, petty crime and violence than other groups. This has meant the acquisition of their reputation. This reputation now precedes every one of them every time they do anything. What it has also meant is that large amounts now also believe it for themselves. Which means that they have no hope but to get caught in alcoholism, narcotics, petty crime and violence, for no greater reason than that is what happens to all of them.
This particular case really gets to me because it has caused a large part of a generation and much, not all but much, of a race to get caught in self destruction.

The same thing is seen in every minority group - Including interestingly those who deserve it, but that's for another time.

I'm not saying that all stereotypes are bad and should be exterminated with the greatest of non-prejudicial judgement just that we have to be careful how and why we use them.

On God and happiness

There is possibly no variation of Christian Doctrine that has been more damaging than the so-called Prosperity Gospel. This is the one that says that God wants you to be happy and that he will achieve this by giving you health, prestige and most importantly, wealth. It is most damaging not just because it takes something that was never anywhere in the bible and adds it for no reason, but also because it diminishes every other part. It makes Jesus out to be nothing more than a great cosmic Santa who wants you to be good and talk to him every so often.

You can see the damage that it causes in two places. Firstly in the place that most of us will see more clearly, the early morning televangelists. These people have massive followings and all of them say that Jesus wants to make us better or to give us more than what we have. These people get a following of themselves rather than a following for Christ and this is where the damage comes in. There are thousands of people calling themselves Christian because they follow the teachings of a televangelist. Because of this they won't listen to actual teachings and have left themselves out of the truth.
The second place that you see it is in third world countries. Missionaries who go over to poor communities and tell people that Jesus wants them to have education and hospitals and food. This is an effective way to build up a congregation quickly since the only way that you can get these blessings is to confess your sins, come along to church every week and be good. There is a word for these people in India - Rice Christians, people who follow the teachings of Rice. The damage here comes because firstly these people do not have a relationship with God, but with their now satiated gut. If and when this fails then God is a sick joker who lies to people in order to play some twisted power game. This response is one that is contagious and that is where the next damage is found.

However there is some side truth to this statement. Not in the way that might be initially expected, but there is some surprising truth there. When you read the Old Testament there are many repeated moments when God allows people to try happiness. The biggest example went down something like this
"Are you absolutely sure you want compete Self-Autonomy? Are you sure that you want everyone forever to be the final say on what is wrong or right? Will that make you Happy?"
"Yes it will"
"Fine; there it is. And you will suffer for it."

I am of course referring to the Garden of Eden.

This approach is not dissimilar to what is being called experiential parenting, where you teach your kids through experiences rather than through lessons. For example in order to teach your kid not to stick his finger in the power socket, you let him stick his finger in there and then let him learn what will happen when he does that. However it is also similar to the other approach where you tell your kid that sticking her hand in a ceiling fan will hurt or that knives are sharp. You tell them that if they do that, it will be bad.


The third thing that is a part of this is that if the outcome of Christianity is an eternity in heaven, literally, then why would you want to taint it with the second-rate crap that makes up physicality?

Weakness of modernity

My theory, that I have held for a long time, is that Civilisation makes us weak. In particular, modern civilisation and being civilised. This in part comes back to this post but is also a separate issue. It was once said of humanity that the difference between humans and animals was that animals adapt themselves to their environment and humans adapt the environment to us. The weakness in this is that once we adapt things to us, we then adapt to only working within that framework - if most people today were to go for a 'camping' trip, they would take a caravan with power, would not go anywhere a great distance from the shops so they can buy food when they need it, and would still only be out for a weekend. If the same people were to go camping and had to carry their tent, food, clothing and everything else for a week, they would likely die (except that they wouldn't try it without someone who knows what's happening dragging them along and showing them what to do).

The mark of any civilised society is half measures. Things like life sentences; exactly the same as the death sentence, but it takes a lot longer and costs a lot more.
Lets even look at the death sentence; In places that are regarded as civilised that have the death sentence, it is done by lethal injection, a cocktail of toxins that anaesthetise the body and then paralyse the heart and lungs, supposedly ensuring a painless death. Now this person has been deemed too harmful to remain alive anywhere and for the sake of a few pain-free milliseconds incredible research and expense has gone into a nice easy death.

One of my pet hates is political correctness. Now before you say, 'Alphonse, you censor nigh on everything you say, that's being politically correct', no that isn't being politically correct, that's not being a bastard and toning down your more extreme outlooks. How does this fit in? The next mark of civilisation is tolerance; we have to let everyone have equal time and opportunity on everything that they want and we can't say anything negative about it, which frankly to me is sheer stupidity. It means that you can't say anything that may insult someone even out of context of by mistake, you can't be seen to favour someone that you can't offer a reason for and you have to allow equal correctness for everything. The part that I find most annoying besides the stupidness of it all is the people claiming that Christians need to be tolerant of other religious viewpoints, and then being intolerant of Christianity itself.
Political correctness is another half measure. With it, you are allowed to think things like 'All people who take up a career in politics are half-witted morons incapable of a single cogent or logical thought', but you will never be allowed to voice this opinion for fear that someone who either has or would like to take up a career in politics feels that your information is not only incorrect but insulting. We pride ourselves on our freedom of speech (which was only implied in a 1950 odd supreme court decision limiting government censorship of news media) and yet we disallow it for ourselves - that is stupidness.

Our inability to cope with death comes in as well. Recently the Australian Military has suffered massive losses in the war in Afghanistan, more people have died in the past few weeks then for most of the rest of the decade. So lets bring everyone back and leave the job unfinished. This would be a logical response if there were a large amount of deaths. 5 people and a dog do not constitute a large amount of deaths in a war. And yet due to our civilised society we forget that the Army is a place where you expect to get in life threatening situations; you don't join if you think that getting shot is the biggest worry you personally will have. But people can't cope with the idea that anyone would be willing to be injured or killed for something greater than what they conceive themselves to be. And then the biggest folly of this is that we hold up those who have made a great sacrifice in a time of war - look at the VC, something like 90% of the people who have received the greatest military honour have done so post mortem.

And the final weakness is Darwinian. No I don't accept evolution. Natural selection is completely different. And natural selection is what is being limited by civilisation. Now we know that genetic diseases get passed on and in some cases we can cure them. However in most cases all we can do is treat the symptoms and prolong life. The prolonging of life means that the genetic disease can be passed on to another person who again has the symptoms treated. The right to healthcare is something that has never come out of a non-civilised society and it has made us weak. We expect to be able to not die. When we hear that it's terminal, we either give up there and then, or we flail wildly about and expect that someone will be able to cure it. It firstly makes humanity weak and then makes us expect that our weakness will be rewarded with strength.

That's the modern condition.

Whispered Words - Part 5 - Neither Of These Can Be Trusted

Part the Last. In which Alphonse tries to tell you everything he has said is wrong. Read Parts 1,2,3 and 4 if you previously have not.

That isn't quite true. What I am going to try to do is to explain why not all of what I've said is gospel truth (beyond the fact that I am an imperfect demimortal).

We already know that Fear is not to be trusted on all occasions. Now we need to know that Truth can't always be trusted. Remember assumption 4, "Both Truth and Fear are impartial." If this holds then they can be trusted equally. If we can't trust Fear at all times them we also can't trust Truth at all times. Right?

True, but we also need to show it in a different way. In part 3 I explained the filters that fear lacks. What I didn't say is that Truth does have filters. Truth is filtered in the same way as you. If we wanted to put this another way we would say that Truth is the rational part of you and Fear is the Irrational part of you.
And we can't always trust rationality.
Because it lies.

Yes that's right. I just said that Truth can lie. Irrationality lacks this ability, but rationality can always lie. I would almost argue that the test of a rational being is the ability to either lie or to withhold the truth.

But back to the filters. If you miss something, it means that Truth won't see it unless you pick it up subconsciously. If you don't, then it won't come to light. Which means that truth can't tell you anything that you can't tell yourself - an unfortunate side effect of sharing your filters. And can you always trust yourself? Then can you trust Truth? Do you know when to trust either party?
If you answered no to any of these, then you have a problem. It you can't rationally trust your rationality then there's not much you can trust.

Just a bit of mind screw to finish the week.

Whispered Words - Part 4 - Truth and Fears Overlap

Instalment the D-th. Read the previous posts first if you haven't already. In this post we look at something that may seem to contradict what has come before. Yesterday we looked at Fear not being Truth - Today, I'd like to tell you that Truth can be Fear.

This again is one of my assumptions; in this case number 2.5 which states that "[Truth and Fear] will also sometimes come into line with each other. Truth is neutral, that's accepted almost universally. So we can assume that at times Truth and Fear will say the same thing." and again as part of corollary b "Truth will at times agree with Fear"

In practicality, this means that some if not all of the first generation of your fears are real. However the rest of corollary b says that "[when] there is agreement, Fear will always be able to go further, something that Truth will never do; this is called the worst case scenario. Because Fear is Irrational, he will always take the opportunity." It is only the first generation that is trustworthy after that we get back to Fear and Truth being different.

Remember how Fear is irrational and therefore lacks certain filters. What Fear doesn't lack is the ability to sometimes speak the truth. This will do three things. First of all, at some times fear will seem to be speaking even louder. When this happens, it means that Truth is saying the same thing - so Very loud fears can't be ignored. However don't mistake very loud for very irrational - they are very different.

The second thing it will do is add plausibility to everything else that Fear says. The justification for this is that if you can trust something of what someone says, the rest is more likely to be true. The Third thing that it does is take plausibility from Truth. The reason for this is that if a truth is echoed by an implausible witness, then the veracity of the statement is put into jeopardy.

In the short term, these will make very little difference, but over time it will either become a lot easier to trust Fear, or it will be a lot easier to doubt Truth. So the trouble that comes up is that either you can grow complacent or gullible, or you can grow to be untrusting of anything you hear.

Stay tuned for the season finale tomorrow.

Whispered Words - Part 3 - Your Fears Aren't Truth

This is the Third part in my discussion of the consequences of the some song lyrics that I found interesting. Click here to recap on the introduction and Click here for Yesterday's discussion. Today we move on to a second seemingly obvious consequence of these words - Your Fears Are Not A Definite Truth.

Like Yesterday, this comes fairly easily from the song. In fact, it was so clearly, I mentioned it in the first part. Assumption 2 states "[Truth and Fear] will sometimes conflict. Otherwise only one would be required." Fair enough, but what is the consequence of this assumption. There are a couple.

Firstly, DON'T LISTEN TO YOUR FEARS. They may well not be truth. I wouldn't go so far as to say that they are in this case lies, merely misdirections, possibly unrealised.
The side assumption that we made for corollary b was that Fear is irrational (yes this will still be discussed later, maybe in about a week). Do you trust everything that is told to you be anyone in hysterics? Do you trust anything that is told to you by a lunatic? Before you answer, remember that a person in hysterics will do two things; 1, they will lower their inhibitions - that's almost what the definition of hysterics is - and so they are more likely to be saying everything that they think, truth or not. Secondly, because of this, they are more likely to tell the truth, or what they perceive the truth to be. Now how do you answer. Perceptions can be right, but they can also be wrong and so you have to take it with a grain of salt.
What about loonies? Before you answer this one, remember that lunatics (even though I dislike the word I'm going to keep using it) have less filters on the way that they see. This gives them a less polarised view on what they see compared to you. Yes that's right, walnuts are saner than you and even almonds, the nuttiest of nuts, can make a fairly good play. And remember that the filters that they lack may be the ones that cancel paranoia so they may be extra paranoid, or it may be the complete opposite.
With this side assumption we can say that Fear will just say what ever pops into his head, whether he is right or wrong and he will either lack the intelligence to decide which is which or the willpower to shut up when he knows he is wrong.

Secondly, if Fear has the loudest voice (corollary a) then he will be the one who is easier to listen to. Again obvious (he is 3dB louder) but this means that what I just said is harder. It isn't impossible, it's just more difficult. We know this, in a loud room it's harder to hear a quiet voice, even if it's right in front of you and it's easier to just sit and catch snatches of all of the conversation that's happening.

Thirdly, we have a problem. We can't use a polygraph test to test Fear, because he thinks he is telling the truth.
Yes this is a real problem, because even though your fears aren't truth they are at some level plausible. Which makes your job harder again (in case it wasn't hard enough yet)

Once again I don't have any hard and fast rules for this, and in this case I don't even have any real guide lines that you can apply. Really all I can say is to feel out the situation before you believe what's happening.

Watch this space again tomorrow.

Whispered Words - Part 2 - These Are Just For You

Yesterday, we started looking at a couple of lines from a song in terms of what consequences of the lyrics can be drawn. Today we start looking at one in particular - These voices, Truth and Fear, are just for you.

Now this part comes fairly clearly. The song states "They whisper words into my ears", not 'ears in general', not 'ears not mine', not even just 'they sit next to me and chat about things'. This is a private conversation that does not get overheard by anyone bar you (and presumably Fear and Truth). So why did this get mentioned if it's right there in front of us. It wasn't for the lazy trip into very basic logic, instead it was for the consequences of this. The consequence is fairly simple - It's you that has to follow up on what is told to you. You and no one else can make whatever decision follows.

Assumption 5 (and corollary c) state that Fear and Truth are available for any and every circumstance. If these hold then we can also say that in any and every circumstance there is something that can be told to you from either your fears or the impartial neutrality of Truth. If we then add that the information comes only to you, then It is up to you to make every decision that comes to you based on the foreseeable options and outcomes.

From this comes something else as well. A smart man will tell people what he knows, but an intelligent man will never reveal what he knows. You have a couple of things that have been revealed to you that may not have been revealed to others. It may be that all that you have extra is a fear, but that is something that no one else has and will give you an extra insight. If it happens that you do want assistance in the decision making process, then you have to decide how much of this added insight you may or may not have and how much you are willing to give out. There will be some times when you can gain an advantage from not revealing information. But there are other times when you will be disadvantaged by holding things back. Unfortunately I can't give you any rules that apply in all situations. The best that I can give you is to learn through observation, feel out the situation. Often, unless the person you ask looks at things in a very different way, asking them will provide you with no advantage anyway.

Back to the main point though. No one will get the exact same things given to them. Listening to the same voices in different ways will give you enough of a noticeable difference. I think it's also fair to say that everyone will get these voices in a similar capacity to you and the writer of the song. This means that everyone will be getting their own set of 'instructions' to do with as they will. But it's up to you which of your revelations will be revealed to any other parties.
And remember, if everyone else is getting similar styles of things, how many people are telling you about them.

Back again Tomorrow

Whispered Words - Part 1 - Introduction and Assumptions

They whisper words
into my ears,
One speaks of truth
and one speaks of my fears.
- VAST from the song Three Doors

Which leads to some interesting discussion points which will take a while to fully explore. Thus, I have decided in my less than infinite wisdom to take a week and touch on all of them.

Firstly: There's some assumptions that need to be made.
Secondly: These Are Just For You
Thirdly: Your Fears Aren't Truth
Fourthly: Truth And Fears Overlap
and Finally: Neither Of These Can Be Trusted


So to Begin, Lets make some assumptions. These must all stand on their own or not at all.

1) There are Two Points of View. For Simplicities sake picture the cartoon angel and demon sitting on your shoulder, only make them both voices and don't imbue them with either a sense of divine goodness or infernal evil. Name one Truth and the other one Fear. Now, at this stage, you don't know which is which.

2) These will sometimes conflict. Otherwise only one would be required. This seems logical, but we need to put it down so that it can be disputed or agreed to.

2.5) These will also sometimes come into line with each other. Truth is neutral, that's accepted almost universally. So we can assume that at times Truth and Fear will say the same thing.

3) These can at times be blocked out. They're only whispering, you can ignore that.

3.5) You will still know that they are there and you can't always ignore them. It's happening in your ear - that can get very annoying and you will notice it.

4) Both Truth and Fear are impartial. Logically Truth is impartial, but why does Fear get this status? This is a necessity. If Fear wasn't impartial, he wouldn't be speaking of MY fears, he would be simply speaking of fears. This is a subtle but important distinction.

5) This is the last assumption. They may not always speak, but they will always be ready to speak. At all times there will be at least one foreseeable 'pessim' (a word of my own creation. n, a single pessimistic view) or a potential downside to any action that you do or don't make. And at all times there will be truths that are clear. Therefore there is no occasion when neither of them can vocalise their viewpoint.


There follow some corollaries that also can be made from these.

a) Fear will seem to have the louder voice. I'm going to move into audio nerd speak here because it's the way I understand things, but it can be applied anywhere. Fear is speaking of my fears and nothing else (point 4) therefore what he is saying will come into line with what I am thinking. This doubles an identical signal which raises the output noticeably (by 3dB, but that's irrelevant).

b) Truth will at times agree with Fear, but Fear will not agree with Truth. (to make this point, we have to make an assumption about the nature of Fear outside of this discussion. Fear is Irrational. I'll discuss this some other time maybe.) Truth is completely impartial and so at times when Fear comes into line with Truth, Truth will echo this (point 2.5). At this point though, because there is agreement, Fear will always be able to go further, something that Truth will never do; this is called the worst case scenario. Because Fear is Irrational, he will always take the opportunity.

c) They are always there. If they are always ready to speak (point 5) then they will have to have been there to gather the available data. This requires their presence at all times.

d) You have some measure of power over them. You can chose not to listen to them (point 3) and if they are impartial (point 4) then they can't provide their views. All they can do is make more noise until you decide to listen.

Come back Tomorrow for the first consequence.

Idealism

Last time, I said that despite most teenagers having little more on their list of 'things I want' than a good looking counterpart who's willing to spend large amounts of time naked, they are also more likely to be idealists than others. Why? Lets start by looking at a timeline of human ages.

Child -> Strong sense of Justice based on equality (as long as I am more equal than others). However, a child seldom sees more than what is in the backyard at home
Teenager -> Strong sense of Justice based on equality. Now however, they can see more, they have been exposed to things beyond their immediate location.
Adult -> Strong sense of Justice based on how much you've done to deserve it. At this stage the person has decided that they have to attempt to get what they can. This may be in order to set a better life for their offspring (so you don't think that I'm saying that all adults are bastards) but it's still a protection of their own self as it were rather than a sense of giving to others. You may give to charities or sponsor a child in order to 'do the right thing'.
Elderly -> You have realised that it's too late to do anything now. You may give to charities in order to leave at least a bit of a legacy.

Yes I have over simplified it. No I don't think it's particularly wrong.

Teenagers are simply at the stage when they want things to be equal but can't make a huge difference on their own. As they develop the ability to do things on their own, they become caught up in thinking that 'I can't do anything big enough'. This means two things. One, that they recognise that the problems are big. Two that they underestimate the power of little people doing little things.

Micah Sifry put it this way, "Nobody feels your pain, Nobody wants to give peace a chance, Nobody will stand up for what is right, Nobody will tell the truth. Nobody, but you, that is Never forget a small group of people an change the world. Nobody else ever has."

Teenagers can see that the world is screwed up, usually by looking first at themselves, and then looking at other people and seeing massive inequalities. However the perception of teenagers is that they are small people incapable of tidying their room, let alone doing anything properly good or major. And this perception is carried on by teenagers. And so they can't do anything.


P.S: over the next week I'll be doing something a bit different. 5 posts on a subject. Stay tuned

On the whole human beings want to be good, but not too good, and not quite all the time. - George Orwell.

Really? Are you absolutely sure on that one?
If I were to ask almost any young person on the street what their long term goal was, it would probably be something like: "I want to be rich, royalty or a ninja." When you ask the average teenager their goals,you get something decidedly more short term, possibly something like this: "To get me a girl." Admittedly teenagers are also more likely to be idealists than other people and I'll talk about that another time. And when you get older you are even less likely to want to be 'good'. You're more likely to just want to just be nice and quiet in a little place somewhere until you can retire. And once you've retired then you just want to spend the rest of your life either with your family or as far away from them as possible.

I know that we can argue all night about our conception of what we laughingly to as 'good', but in all of these there is not much that isn't self-serving.
Call me a sceptic, but on the whole the best that people will do is to buy something for charity. Why do you think that so many charities have raffles? It's because they know that many people will pay to have a chance to get something, and it's cheaper than buying lots of things and selling them at a profit. Some people may have a weekly or monthly donation thing worked out with some charity, but that's a non event; on the whole that is a small part of a disposable income that goes out on a direct debit system so that you never actually see it.
I was talking to a friend about a similar issue, the issue of beggars. He said that it was so sad that no one ever gave them anything, to which I replied, how much do you give them?

Everyone seems to have an abstract concept of what good is, just like everyone claims to have an abstract concept of what bad is (or more precisely a strongly formed concept that essentially comes out as what I think isn't good), but then everyone settles for second best or neutral. Sure, we can justify it; justifying what we do is one of the easiest things possible - prison is full of innocents who committed a crime. But justification is a cop out. Our justifications always come short. Things like "I'll help later", or "I can't afford it at the moment" don't hold much water because we won't help later, and we can afford it now.

But anyway... Yeah.

In saying that, George Orwell has struck upon something. We don't want to be bad (which points to a natural law sort of thing). Our definition of bad tends to be (to steal a word from Orwell) Un-good. So we can claim that we want to be good in general. It's just that we manage to fail sometimes and we want a bit of leeway so that we can do other things without feeling too bad about it.

Playing a Mark

This is generally a phrase used in terms of a long con act, the mark being the target and playing being the con. Over the last few months I've noticed again that the last half of my life has essentially been one long con played to different marks and for no real prize; kind of adds a new level to the amount of stupidity that one person can do. But that was an aside. [Editors note: Just in case you hadn't noticed yet, Alphonse has problems staying on a point]. But that out of the way, how often do you play a mark? And I'm actually curious; how often to you act as someone that you aren't for whichever purpose? Do you act differently at work than you would like to be acting? Are you an actual confidence trickster who makes his living out of being whoever you need to be?

Psychologically there's a couple of reasons that people do this. It's either out of the desire to gain an advantage, or out of the need to allay a threat, perceived or real. You see this easily in the school yard: Kids lie to get out of trouble, or they lie to gain an advantage over others (ie, cheating).
It's interesting that one of these is often considered to be a positive thing - no one complains when a kid says that his dad will beat you up if you take his lunch [Editor's note: It has obviously been a while since Alphonse was that age] - but everyone will complain if you cheat on an exam. The same action has two completely different responses.

This wasn't the point that I was wanting to get to, but it's where we are now [Editors note: Told you he couldn't stay on a point]. No move made out of weakness is viewed negatively. As a clear and obvious example, a valid defence for homicide is that it was in self defence, and I think there are now precedents that would allow pre-emptive defence in the case of good evidence for a threat. Which would mean that you can take a pre-meditated action and essentially claim that it was an instant response to information that may or may not have been true. I'm not sure if this is the actual case as I don't have to keep track of legal precedents in homicide law any more.

Anyway, the point of that part is that a move made out of weakness is applauded when the same movement made out of strength, even to prevent weakness from occurring, is frowned upon. Even against the normal fairness of the world, that don't seem right.
Just something that struck me as interesting as I started to write about something completely different.

Wise Words from the Train Journey

A couple of days ago on my way home, I happened to listen in on parts of a conversation between two elderly people behind me. I say conversation, it was mostly the older man sharing some of his observations on life. There were three main conclusions that he had come to that I heard. There was his theory on a long marriage, his theory on a reason for life (or not death) and one that is fairly hard to simplify.

His theory on a long marriage is that after about 40 years, you and your wife or husband are the same person; you love her/him the same as you love yourself. This is why he says that after a long marriage, you very rarely see a divorce.
His reason for not being dead is that he still has dreams. Without dreams, he says, you're dead. There has to be something that keeps you wanting to be alive, and that thing is positive hopes for the future, no matter how good or bad it is now.
These are both moderately interesting and to some they may be profound thoughts. The next one is even better.

Following on from his dreams, he says that if he were to experience one moment of perfect joy, one moment of profound happiness (my paraphrase, his words were closer to a moment that he wanted to have extended infinitely), that he would like to be destroyed at that moment. As an interesting aside, this is close to the deal made to Faust by Mephistopheles in the poem by Goethe, the difference is that Faust at that moment gave his soul to the devil. Now as far as I can read it there are two major reasons that you would want this.

Firstly and most simply, you want to go out on a high point. What he wants is to do is die at the highest point of his life; a bit of a downer some might say, but what could be better than having the last thing that you know being perfection (or as close as you can perceive it). This is something that many people don't think about in their interpretation of death. If death is an end, then the moments leading up to it don't really matter. But enough of that semi-morbidity.

The second reason is slightly different, but definitely related. If you have a moment of perfect happiness, then everything after that will be less than second best: the best meals will taste like tofu, the most awesome music will sound like a three year old on the violin, the best literature will read like a Hansard and the greatest joy will feel like a pale imitation of sadness. If nothing can match it, then what is the point of anything else?

Multiply/Fracture

Some recent thought has led me to an interesting point. Decartes theorised that the body and the mind or spirit are separate or different parts. By way of a proof, he offers this
1. The body is tangible, therefore, both finite and divisible.
2. The spirit is intangible, therefore, both infinite and indivisible.
Therefore, they can not be the same part of a person. As a secondary point, if the body is merely the vessel of the spirit then they share the same relationship as a house does to the people living inside it or a bag does to its contents; the inner is what is of interest and the outer, while we may grow to be attached to it, doesn't actually have any use beyond containment.

Now the first part leads to an interesting question. There is a condition known commonly as Multiple Personalities and more scientifically as Dissociative Identity Disorder. Where it could get interesting is when you look at in in terms of Decartes' theory. If the mind and body are separate, then this is definitely possible. However it leads me to one of two conclusions. Either there is more than one mind in the body, or, there is only one mind, but it is fractured. You either have to look at either Multiple or Split (fractured) personalities.

When you look at documented case histories, most diagnosable cases fall under multiple; you have two (or more) different but fully recognised people bumping around in your head. Which is where my thinking took an interesting turning. Everyone acts different around different people or in different situations. How do you talk when your girlfriend is around? Is it the same as when you're with a bunch of mates? How about when you're at work or class or which ever? Is it the same as when you're at the pub? No. You have different personalities for different circumstances. You may only change some things, like your choice of language, but there are recognisable changes that separate different parts of your character.
It follows then that everyone has somewhat fractured personalities. What that means, I don't really know, but it is an interesting point.

Deadness

Now last time, I said that I would discuss the preconception that suffering (and for the purposes of this post also death) are innately bad or evil. I should make it clear from the outset that I do no agree with this. I would put forth that in and of itself, death and suffering are not bad. Death is at most neutral and suffering depends on the outcome. Before I explain this I should say two things. Firstly that this is somewhere where agree to disagree is a very valid answer and if you don't agree, possibly the best answer. Secondly, I came to this conclusion through means that out of context (which is where they are sitting) can be easily ignored; please don't if you want to understand where this comes from.

I'm going to begin with suffering. Yes, suffering can be, and often is, bad. However, this is not because suffering is an end, or rather because it somehow has been imbued somehow with the metaphysical properties of bad. It is often bad because no good comes of it. Yes, suffering caused deliberately is disgusting. However, often medicine is disgusting and that has a good outcome. If suffering has a positive outcome, I believe that it can in hindsight be called a good thing. The problem is that suffering is called bad before people have the chance to get out of it, and that label sticks.
It will always hurt, but hurt isn't always a bad thing. The simplest example is that the body uses hurt to tell you to stop putting your hand on the hotplate. If you don't do it again in the future, then that (very minor) suffering was a good thing.
So in the context of the last post, the Suffering of Christ was a good thing because it had a good end

This second part is going to be harder to put down.

William Drischler proposes this viewpoint that I agree with. "Death is neither good nor evil and that is why people have so much trouble accepting it." I think that this is the way that lots of things work. I will use the example here of money because I can take a very will known quote and make my point. Timothy 6:10 'For the love of money is the root of all evil.' Too often people interpret this as 'For money is Evil' when it never says that. It says that a devotion to money or greed is what causes most if not all evils. Money in and of itself is not bad, neither is it good. What it is, is neutral. But if the end of a neutral thing is bad, then humanity tends to put neutral things in the bad pile.
The song 'Thoughts of a Dying Atheist' by Muse features this line. "[Death] Scares the hell out of me and the end is all I can see". The end that is seen is nothing, so it isn't a positive, so by extension it is bad, and therefore, or so the argument goes, death itself must be bad. This relies on the argument that the end justifies the means - the method of something takes the qualities of the end of it. Not many people actually like this argument any more though, so why is it still the viewpoint in this case. I don't know and so I won't answer.

Death in and of itself is merely a change from one state to another - a change from a state of life to a state of not life. And so I can't see how it in and of itself is a bad thing. Especially when it is one of the three ultimate guarantees (birth and taxes being the other two). State changes are bu definition not bad, they just are.

Easter

Someone commented today that saying Happy Easter is a contradiction in terms - since Easter literally means suffering, how can that be happy? This leads me onto my next post, but before I discuss that particular one, I will answer the primary assumption.

The context of this was saying that since Easter was the death of Christ, we shouldn't be celebrating it - It isn't a happy occasion. Now, from my understanding, the death of Christ should be the happiest day of the Christian calendar. If Easter is indeed the day that Christ rose from the dead (I don't intend to make this an argument so just run with it if you don't agree) for the purpose of taking the sins of his chosen on himself, then it is the most unbelievably amazing thing that has ever happened, not a cause for mourning. At the time, I can understand that response. In retrospect however (which is what we've got the advantage of) it should be a cause for dancing in the streets (if you feel liberated enough to take advantage of this possibility).

And if that isn't enough reason for celebration, there's small, almost elliptical balls of chocolate to eat. What more could you ask for?

Recent Developments in the world of the brain

The World Psychiatry Association has recently decided that the list of drug-treatable mental illnesses isn't quite long enough. Not really, they've just decided that there needs to be an increase in the diagnosable illnesses and so they have put forward a list that they think should be added. Below I've got a list of some of my favorites. Some of these haven't made it into medical journals and so are still basically under wraps (I know a few people in the Psychology Business, in fact most of my counsellors are in this industry)

Pre-Adolescent Psychosis - Actually defined as "A teenager who is a bit odd". Brilliant, because we need a few more of them.
Associative Identity Disorder - Similar to Dissociative Identity Disorder (Multiple Personalities) except it covers people who act different ways in the presence of different people or in different circumstances.
Atypical Paranoia - This is an interesting one; it covers people that are worried that they aren't worried about things.
Monopolar Disorder - Covers people who don't have major changes in their emotional response.
Pre-Echolalia - Covers people who manage to know what is going to be said before it is said (thought to be related to an overdeveloped Temporal Cerebellum)
Daymare Disorder - Similar to Nightmare Disorder but covers the time spent day dreaming (This one is a bit controversial as it is still unclear whether it is a self-imposed illness or one born out of some trauma)
Anti-Defiance Disorder (Jones' Syndrome) - This one is probably a teachers best friend. It covers kids who show a higher than average propensity for following orders.
Attention Surplus Syndrome - Roughly the opposite of Attention Deficit Disorder where people have an attention span greater than the average. It is unclear whether this is an Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Cognitive Tourette's - Similar to both Standard and Somatic Tourette's Syndromes (where someone is incapable of controlling some of their speech or actions). In this variation, a person is unable to control their thought patterns. Characteristically they consistently change the topic of a conversation or are incapable of following a continual argument.
Boanthropy - A disorder where the sufferer thinks he is a cow (Don't believe me, look it up)

Almost Obligitory Healthcare Discussion Post

In the midst of all of the fallout over Obama's healthcare reform package I've been somewhat confused over the incredible backlash. Admittedly, I do not and have never lived in America and I also don't know all of the details, but as far as it seems to me this is a good move. Something like another 300 million people who were previously unable to will now gain healthcare. While I'm not sure about all of the arguments, from where I stand they appear to boil down to these 300 million people not being worth the same as everyone else. I may be mistaken, but the Declaration of Independence which America is built upon says point blank that all men are created equal. As far as I can figure out, this argument is backing down on that.
Where I have been most confused about this particular development is the backlash in Christian circles. When you look at the Early Christian church, they looked after one another. Example, Acts 4: 34-35 "There were no needy persons among then. From time to time those who owned lands or fields sold then, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need' The early church was built upon the same principle that is being generally hated among America - a country where 79% call themselves Christian and 58% say that religion plays an important role in their lives.

Additionally, there are an estimated 45,000 deaths every year that were linked to not having health insurance. 45,000, some quick maths lets me know that this is a number roughly 1 and a 1/2 times the population of my home town. So every 2 years, my home town is completely replaced 3 times. Now for a country that prides itself on being in the forefront of medical technology that is moderately un-good.

Some more numbers then. The US already spends a higher percentage of GDP and more money per capita on health care and yet, the world health organisation still places the US health system 37th in the world. The infant mortality rate is behind all of western Europe (which all has public or socialised health care). The Life expectancy is also a year shorter than the European figure. Additionally over the last 20 odd years, the US has fallen from 11th to 42nd on the list of life expectancy.
Final number then. The US is the only developed country that doesn't have universal health care.

The only almost legitimate argument that I can think of is the argument that says that this is a foot in the door for a socialist take over of the US. I don't know why, but the US seems to see itself as the last bastion against the evils of 'non-capitalism'. To achieve this end, anything that is remotely publicly funded must be hated, abandoned and destroyed. (A bit of a disclaimer, this is just the way that I read it, I could well be very wrong). The problem with this is two fold. Firstly, this is not the way it works. Australia (which does have universal health care) is as much capitalist as the US. Secondly, there are greater evils than socialism.



Just a note, the next post will be an April Fools thing - enjoy it.

Bemusement

It is an interesting sensation to be trusted or praised. As an example, one of my lecturers recently told me quite genuinely that he would be happy to give me a professional reference now if he thought it would help me get a job, less than a year into study. A long term reader of this will possibly know that I don't often consider myself deserving of this sort of thing and so I was quite bemused - especially since the subject that I had him for was the one that I rushed most at the end. When someone gives you something positive that is undeserved because they think you deserve it, something doesn't quite seem to gel in your mind. Nagging in the back is the thought that somehow this person is deluded "What if they find out? I'm basically just a fraud." comes to the front. Either that, or you get a sense of embarrassment related to modesty.

It's interesting that in a day and age when we are told that not only do we have to put ourselves out there for any kind of exterior improvement, but that we also deserve every positive thing that swings our way, many of us don't feel comfortable with this approach. It's even more interesting that there is a clinical term for this sort of thing - Narcissism - and it is considered a mental problem (albeit an untreatable one and therefore one that goes mostly ignored).
Which isn't to say that a good self esteem is a bad thing or that extroversion is a bad thing, just that people can get carried away in it.

Just something that made me curious last week.

Follow-up

Ok, I said that I would talk about people who want to know only about their chosen field and nothing else, so here it is. I'll get my initial thought out of the way now - this approach is stupid. There, I've said it. It limits and restricts you, it seeks to define you in a way that you shouldn't necessarily be defined, it ruins you and it can in some cases destroy esteem (not the best word, but the only one that I can think of). The best ideas come from people who for some reason have to change their field - they don't know what is possible yet. But people seek to know nothing about anything else. I'll discuss these issues first and then get to the other thing that irritates me later.
Before I begin, you don't have to know everything - just be well rounded in your knowledge.

Seeking to know only a specific area limits you: with the sum of human knowledge doubling every couple of years, it now seems that to be able to learn about everything is a futile effort, and on both hands it is. Let's consider though the three approaches that can be made to learning.
1) It is Futile and therefore I won't bother. I don't think that I need to point out the idiocy of this statement, and so I won't.
2) It is Futile and so I will learn about only one thing. As the sum of knowledge expands, so does the areas in which knowledge is acquired. As an example, 200 years ago, you were called a scientist and you knew about science. Now, you can't be called just a scientist, you must be a Physicist, or a Chemical Biologist or a MetaQuantum NanoTechnologist and all of these fields are continually narrowing. As you seek to know more about your subject, you have to keep narrowing your gaze to be able to keep up. You become blinded to anything else.
3) It is Futile and so I will seek to Specialise. While this may seem the same, there is a difference. A specialist is an expert in one area, but they must also understand the things around their area. It is no point being a Gastrologist if you don't want to know anything about the rest of the anatomy and so you learn about other things. While you might not want your gut surgeon operating on your brain or vice versa, you expect that they will both know something about their counterparts.

It seeks to Define you: This one is fairly simple. An expert is someone who knows everything in a certain field. And so they are defined by their field. I've discussed this before, you shouldn't be defined by what you do. Where their field goes is where they have to go.

It can destroy esteem: This can be a fairly extreme case, but I feel that it's worth mentioning. If expertise defines you, then what happens when you can't quite make expert? You fail. Which means that you aren't good enough any more. Yes, I said it was an extreme case, but still plausible.


The second reason that I don't like it is because despite people not knowing or caring to know about areas outside their ever shrinking interests, they will always have an opinion. And it will be wrong, almost inevitably, but people will never seek to be corrected and will want to correct those who actually know what their doing.
GAH, Idiots.
But anyway, this is just my opinion based on the observations of an occasional lunatic. If I'm wrong, sue me.