The school year is over. All of my fourth year friends have graduated. I saw a couple of them at the reception, but not many. I probably won't be seeing the rest of them again for a long time. Months, and in one person's case at least a year. The thing that bothers me is that I could have had a chance. A bunch of them were all doing a last dinner together. I could have said all of my goodbyes then rather than do it over the phone.
But I missed it. Because I had a train ticket home, and I couldn't miss the train. And I got the ticket before I found out about this dinner. If I'd have known I would have delayed my departure a day. As it is, I lost out on a very important thing to me.
When we do the 'wrong thing', sometimes it's because of a faulty judgment. But sometimes it's because we don't realize there are judgments we can make. How can you rationally choose between two options if you don't know you have the power to choose? How can you weigh the advantages and disadvantages of an action if you don't know you have to weigh them? This is why I missed the dinner. I didn't realize that they'd want a last dinner before they all parted ways. I would have stayed if I knew it was happening. Does that make me irrational for leaving? No, it's a sad reminder of how a lack of information can completely destroy our ability to make good decisions.
The rational solution to this is to ensure that you have all of the information. But the kind we are dealing with is not the known unknowns, when you are aware there are options but have yet to find them. These are the unknown unknowns. You could reason with yourself for a hundred years and never realize the options are there, simply because realizing you have gaps in your knowledge requires outside information that you do not have. But more likely you'll never reason with yourself in the first place, because you don't realize you should.
But what I think is a thousand times worse is the information that you do have, but that you don't remember is relevant. Three hours into the train ride I remembered that Amtrak doesn't have a surcharge for changing your departures dates. I could have gone to that dinner after all. But I didn't.
I can cry about unknown unknowns all I want, but that doesn't get me any closer to coping with it. And we have to find a way of coping with it, if only so we can make the "right" choice more often. Thankfully, though, this is the kind of problem that solves itself. Every time we get burned by the unknown unknowns they're no longer invisible. You know to watch out for them in the future.
This is another good reason why we should have as many experiences and encounters as possible. It makes it more likely that you'll be hit by an unknown unknown in a situation where it doesn't hurt you too badly, so you're aware of it when it's actually important to be aware. And it means that the situations come up way more often, so you more quickly learn to deal with a wide range of unknown unknowns.
Looking back, I think I know what to call the knowledge of unknown unknowns. It's wisdom.
Showing posts with label Events. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Events. Show all posts
Monday, June 11, 2012
Sunday, March 18, 2012
The External Self
The other day I was talking with a friend about something private. At one point I critiqued some of his actions, saying he was acting callous. His response was "I may act callous, but I'm not callous on the inside. That's what matters." If people can't see what he's really like on the inside, then they're badwrong. He can discard them.
It's a troubling thing to hear, especially because I realize I do it myself. One of my biggest fears is being an arrogant person. I obsess over being modest and not arrogant. I also think that if people do think I'm arrogant, then they're mistaken, because I work so hard to not be arrogant that I know I'm not. They're just seeing a face, an external part of me that doesn't reflect who I truly am.
The problem with thinking this way is that you're dropping a wall between how you think and how you act. Just because something is part of the external self does not mean it has no impact on you. It's still an external self. If you present yourself in a certain way, you can't say that it's not how you actually are. Even if it wasn't, you're acting in that form. That's going to bleed into your 'actual' self.
This is especially true since we are fallible people. Just because we think we are a certain way does not mean we are that way. There are aspects of us we are blind to, willfully or not. We have to listen to other people, and hope that they can see the things we can't.
So a question. If I think I'm not arrogant, but a lot of people say I act arrogant, am I arrogant or not?
Yes. Yes I am.
This sucks.
It's a troubling thing to hear, especially because I realize I do it myself. One of my biggest fears is being an arrogant person. I obsess over being modest and not arrogant. I also think that if people do think I'm arrogant, then they're mistaken, because I work so hard to not be arrogant that I know I'm not. They're just seeing a face, an external part of me that doesn't reflect who I truly am.
The problem with thinking this way is that you're dropping a wall between how you think and how you act. Just because something is part of the external self does not mean it has no impact on you. It's still an external self. If you present yourself in a certain way, you can't say that it's not how you actually are. Even if it wasn't, you're acting in that form. That's going to bleed into your 'actual' self.
This is especially true since we are fallible people. Just because we think we are a certain way does not mean we are that way. There are aspects of us we are blind to, willfully or not. We have to listen to other people, and hope that they can see the things we can't.
So a question. If I think I'm not arrogant, but a lot of people say I act arrogant, am I arrogant or not?
Yes. Yes I am.
This sucks.
Monday, December 26, 2011
On New Years
A couple of people asked me what my New Years Resolutions are, expecting something like "exercise more" and "procrastinate less." This year, like all of the past years, I don't. I've never been one much for NYRs. Not really a pretentious "I don't NEED the crutch" thing. Okay, maybe it is. But at least I can support it!
Trying to explain the idea behind NYRs would be just illustrating the obvious. Nonetheless, as a terrible illustrator I desperately need the practice. We see years as discrete units, 2012 separated from 2011 by a vast, insurmountable gulf. The new year is a chance to see the world in an entirely new light, turning a symbolic beginning into a new one. We see this in a lot of places- moving to college is a big one, as is the beginning of a quarter.
My issues with NYR stem from the same source. By being such a symbolic change, it ties the idea of making real changes to itself. We do not think of making resolutions on Christmas or Presidents Day or the beginning of a month. It's only New Years that has the Resolutions. Does New Years make us less likely to make other changes? I'd argue so. By so strongly associating one with the other, we lose our power to make resolutions at any time, at any place. Even if I really want to stop eating meat, I probably won't stop on a random Tuesday. This creates a time lag between having a resolution and implementing it. And lag time is the exact same as lost time.
The other problem is more pragmatic. One day a year is culturally associated with permanent change. If you can only make resolutions one day a year, what kind will you make? Big, sweeping ones, or small, specific ones? But change is not a discrete process. We can't say "I will now stop eating candy" and expect to hold it for the rest of the year. We'll be lucky to last a month. True change works best through small, manageable, and cumulative changes. These are the changes we won't make, because we don't want to "miss a change".
Most people drop their sweeping New Years Resolutions within months, if not weeks. I'd say it's better to not think about grand and sudden changes and focus on making small changes all of the time. Sure, grand changes can be useful, but they have their time and place. Giving it a specific time and a specific place just makes it artificial.
On a sidenote, I'm saying that many small changes = good. This is actually a new thing for me. I'm failing so many of the Millennium Goals (post up later) I've started exploring new structures of self improvement. We'll see how this fares. And I'll put my money where my mouth is, and start a small change right now: from now on, I will update this blog once a week. In the immortal words of Ke$ha: let’s go-o-o (Let’s go)
Trying to explain the idea behind NYRs would be just illustrating the obvious. Nonetheless, as a terrible illustrator I desperately need the practice. We see years as discrete units, 2012 separated from 2011 by a vast, insurmountable gulf. The new year is a chance to see the world in an entirely new light, turning a symbolic beginning into a new one. We see this in a lot of places- moving to college is a big one, as is the beginning of a quarter.
My issues with NYR stem from the same source. By being such a symbolic change, it ties the idea of making real changes to itself. We do not think of making resolutions on Christmas or Presidents Day or the beginning of a month. It's only New Years that has the Resolutions. Does New Years make us less likely to make other changes? I'd argue so. By so strongly associating one with the other, we lose our power to make resolutions at any time, at any place. Even if I really want to stop eating meat, I probably won't stop on a random Tuesday. This creates a time lag between having a resolution and implementing it. And lag time is the exact same as lost time.
The other problem is more pragmatic. One day a year is culturally associated with permanent change. If you can only make resolutions one day a year, what kind will you make? Big, sweeping ones, or small, specific ones? But change is not a discrete process. We can't say "I will now stop eating candy" and expect to hold it for the rest of the year. We'll be lucky to last a month. True change works best through small, manageable, and cumulative changes. These are the changes we won't make, because we don't want to "miss a change".
Most people drop their sweeping New Years Resolutions within months, if not weeks. I'd say it's better to not think about grand and sudden changes and focus on making small changes all of the time. Sure, grand changes can be useful, but they have their time and place. Giving it a specific time and a specific place just makes it artificial.
On a sidenote, I'm saying that many small changes = good. This is actually a new thing for me. I'm failing so many of the Millennium Goals (post up later) I've started exploring new structures of self improvement. We'll see how this fares. And I'll put my money where my mouth is, and start a small change right now: from now on, I will update this blog once a week. In the immortal words of Ke$ha: let’s go-o-o (Let’s go)
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Glimpses of the Past
Last week was finals week. Like everyone else around here, I had two goals. One: convince everybody I was studying really hard. Two: not study. I emailed a bunch of people I hadn't talked to in a while. I went downtown a couple of times to "clear my mind". I revised an already-submitted paper "just in case". Then, lacking anything else to do, I started Googling random things. Eventually I searched an old username of mine and, unsurprisingly, I got a hit.
Finding the old post wasn't unusual. I mean, I've been posting on forums since I was ten. I've left a data trail a mile wide. Bit what struck me was the content. 16 year-old me wrote a long self description. He detailed his incredible abilities, his intense antisocialness, and his cold logical thinking. "It is always better," he proudly wrote, "to kill one person than let ten die."
Oy.
I want to go back in time so I can meet him, and then punch him in the face. For all his bragging about his pragmatic ruthlessness, he was a pretty terrible fighter. I mean, he couldn't even do a pushup. And I'm pretty sure that his ego was even more fragile than 19 year-old me. And that guy went on a two day depression bender because nobody laughed at one of his skits.
Still, I'm incredibly glad I found that sample. I had no idea I changed that much in four years. It's one thing to constantly wax poetic about self-improvement, quite another to see it happen. Since then I've been obsessively tracking down everything else I can find. I'm constructing a timeline from old chat logs, pictures, and posts. Slowly, agonizingly, the picture emerges. My prior stupidity left gaping holes. I remember being proud of how good I was at avoiding pictures. I remember gleefully picking usernames that would be impossible to search. I remember wiping my hard disks "so nobody could learn more about my past." I was wanted to look mysterious. I was an idiot.
Even so, it's possible to see some patterns. The growth is subtle and continuous, a long chain of imperceptible changes that add up over time. Age 14 me is the same as age 15 me is the same as age 16, but the two ends are slightly different. On the other hand, upheavals can cause incredibly rapid change. Between 12 and 13 I moved to another state. The growth quickly follows. But really, did we expect anything else?
A lot of my dialogues on self-improvement are entirely philosophical. Now I have real world data. It's not much, but at least it's something. Looking at it, it seems improvement happens in one of two ways. One, it's gradual and imperceptible, something you only realized happened when you look back on your past self. Alternatively, it can be sudden, rapid, and extremely painful. It's either long and boring or agonizing. Often it's both. Not that appealing, is it?
Nobody ever said it was easy. Trying to consciously improve as a person is the most difficult thing I've ever done. I have to stare hard at my failings, dig out the ingrained bad habits, and push the limits of my comfort zones. I have to constantly question myself and never, ever, ever be satisfied with my successes. It's hard and slow and it hurts all the time. I know people who refuse to consider it, and while I find this completely incomprehensible the idea is sometimes very, very tempting. But now I can see how far I've come. I know for sure there's a light at the end of the tunnel, because I've been in tunnels before and found that light. And if it hurts, well, it hurt before. I got over it.
I wonder how much these patterns I see are influenced by my own biases. I've talked about external events breaking stagnation. Did this make me want to see the upheavals as causing growth? Or did I already know about the upheavals and unconsciously worked that into the externals? They could be the same, all externals upheavals. In that case, we are one step closer to consciously triggering periods of growth. At the same time, we have to accept that such periods will be quite an ordeal.
I head back to Michigan on the 20th. Once in my parents' home I can kick this project into high gear, scouring old photobooks and reading stories and search for diaries. If I'm really lucky I'll be able to contact people from my New Jersey days. I'm seriously regretting leaving so little behind. But I'll do my best to get it all, and I won't be making the same mistake again.
Finding the old post wasn't unusual. I mean, I've been posting on forums since I was ten. I've left a data trail a mile wide. Bit what struck me was the content. 16 year-old me wrote a long self description. He detailed his incredible abilities, his intense antisocialness, and his cold logical thinking. "It is always better," he proudly wrote, "to kill one person than let ten die."
Oy.
I want to go back in time so I can meet him, and then punch him in the face. For all his bragging about his pragmatic ruthlessness, he was a pretty terrible fighter. I mean, he couldn't even do a pushup. And I'm pretty sure that his ego was even more fragile than 19 year-old me. And that guy went on a two day depression bender because nobody laughed at one of his skits.
Still, I'm incredibly glad I found that sample. I had no idea I changed that much in four years. It's one thing to constantly wax poetic about self-improvement, quite another to see it happen. Since then I've been obsessively tracking down everything else I can find. I'm constructing a timeline from old chat logs, pictures, and posts. Slowly, agonizingly, the picture emerges. My prior stupidity left gaping holes. I remember being proud of how good I was at avoiding pictures. I remember gleefully picking usernames that would be impossible to search. I remember wiping my hard disks "so nobody could learn more about my past." I was wanted to look mysterious. I was an idiot.
Even so, it's possible to see some patterns. The growth is subtle and continuous, a long chain of imperceptible changes that add up over time. Age 14 me is the same as age 15 me is the same as age 16, but the two ends are slightly different. On the other hand, upheavals can cause incredibly rapid change. Between 12 and 13 I moved to another state. The growth quickly follows. But really, did we expect anything else?
A lot of my dialogues on self-improvement are entirely philosophical. Now I have real world data. It's not much, but at least it's something. Looking at it, it seems improvement happens in one of two ways. One, it's gradual and imperceptible, something you only realized happened when you look back on your past self. Alternatively, it can be sudden, rapid, and extremely painful. It's either long and boring or agonizing. Often it's both. Not that appealing, is it?
Nobody ever said it was easy. Trying to consciously improve as a person is the most difficult thing I've ever done. I have to stare hard at my failings, dig out the ingrained bad habits, and push the limits of my comfort zones. I have to constantly question myself and never, ever, ever be satisfied with my successes. It's hard and slow and it hurts all the time. I know people who refuse to consider it, and while I find this completely incomprehensible the idea is sometimes very, very tempting. But now I can see how far I've come. I know for sure there's a light at the end of the tunnel, because I've been in tunnels before and found that light. And if it hurts, well, it hurt before. I got over it.
I wonder how much these patterns I see are influenced by my own biases. I've talked about external events breaking stagnation. Did this make me want to see the upheavals as causing growth? Or did I already know about the upheavals and unconsciously worked that into the externals? They could be the same, all externals upheavals. In that case, we are one step closer to consciously triggering periods of growth. At the same time, we have to accept that such periods will be quite an ordeal.
I head back to Michigan on the 20th. Once in my parents' home I can kick this project into high gear, scouring old photobooks and reading stories and search for diaries. If I'm really lucky I'll be able to contact people from my New Jersey days. I'm seriously regretting leaving so little behind. But I'll do my best to get it all, and I won't be making the same mistake again.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Teeth
Those of you who knew me last year probably remember my problems spring quarter. All of my wisdom teeth got infected at once. I had four extractions and three root canals in under a month. At the peak I was going in twice a week, gutting my family's savings and my time. By the end I had developed a resistance to Novocaine. No wonder I was so depressed and assholeish that quarter.
I remember my relief at the end of the quarter, knowing that the ordeal was finally behind me. I was wrong. Yesterday I went in for a routine checkup. I left with three root canals. If I'm lucky I'll only need two more appointments. The next one is tomorrow. Already I can feel the crushing dread: it never gets better and it never ends.
Then again, I'm not the same person I was six months ago. Back then I would have curled into a ball and cried. Now... well, I still want to curl into a ball and cry, but I'm also wondering if I can benefit from this. They say that hardship makes us stronger. In order to overcome our obstacles we have to grow and develop the power to cope.
The short term hardships are:
So the big things are learning to live with the fear and not worsening my personality in the process. The fear happened because every time I came in for my last appointment they'd schedule "just two more". Nothing would be okay ever again. Every time I saw the light at the end of the tunnel, the tunnel would stretch. And even when I thought it was all over... yeah, I think I have good reason to be afraid.
There are two things I can do to deal with this. First, I've arranged both of my next appointments to be before I go home for break. If you need "just two more", too bad. I get a two week break before the next evisceration. There's a hard cap on when I last go in. Certainly not as bad as "first week to eleventh."
Number two. It might help to understand the core of the fear. I think it's all a manifestation of my feelings of powerlessness. There was no way I could have prevented my teeth problems. There's no way I can reduce the number or costs of my appointments. I don't even know when it is going to end; the goalposts shift so much I lose even that tiny bit of knowledge. I feel like I have absolutely no control over my situation. This isn't something I can just accept; the only way to deal with it is to take back my agency. Only then can I escape the omnipresent fear.
How do I do that? I dunno. I've tried to keep the pain and time loss from impacting my academic and social life. Keep at least a little bit of power over the rest of my life. That's the only thing I can do. I might be able to extend this. If I do more I will have more things in my life that I can control, which takes the edge off the dread.
This segues nicely into the personality problems. I'm sure at least a couple of you noticed how irrationally controlling and spiteful I got last quarter, and I'm feeling that start up again. The pain and stress and fear mess with my head. I know this is hard to quantify- how do we know what we have felt in different circumstances?- but it's obviously there. I used to swear pretty rarely, and only with great effort and gravity. The day I got my wisdom teeth out I started swearing like a sailor. That definitely wasn't a natural evolution of my personality.
This is the thing I worry about least and should worry about most. It's an incredibly subtle hardship that can hurt both me and others without me ever realizing why. It also emphasizes a flaw I have: I let fear/anger/pain cloud my thinking. A Better Me would be able to function at least as well as Current Me even under extreme stress. I may not necessarily be able to stop feeling the fear/anger/pain, but I should be able to cope with it. I think this can be improved by being constantly aware of how my personality is changing. So if any of you see me acting more abrasive/sociopathic/angsty than normal, give me hell about it.
Eleven hours until my next appointment. I'm not looking forward to it.
I remember my relief at the end of the quarter, knowing that the ordeal was finally behind me. I was wrong. Yesterday I went in for a routine checkup. I left with three root canals. If I'm lucky I'll only need two more appointments. The next one is tomorrow. Already I can feel the crushing dread: it never gets better and it never ends.
Then again, I'm not the same person I was six months ago. Back then I would have curled into a ball and cried. Now... well, I still want to curl into a ball and cry, but I'm also wondering if I can benefit from this. They say that hardship makes us stronger. In order to overcome our obstacles we have to grow and develop the power to cope.
The short term hardships are:
- Pain (operation)
- Pain (recovery)
- Time loss (transit, dental work)
- Fear (hopelessness, needles, pain)
- Negativity (grouchiness, anger, from other hardships)
So the big things are learning to live with the fear and not worsening my personality in the process. The fear happened because every time I came in for my last appointment they'd schedule "just two more". Nothing would be okay ever again. Every time I saw the light at the end of the tunnel, the tunnel would stretch. And even when I thought it was all over... yeah, I think I have good reason to be afraid.
There are two things I can do to deal with this. First, I've arranged both of my next appointments to be before I go home for break. If you need "just two more", too bad. I get a two week break before the next evisceration. There's a hard cap on when I last go in. Certainly not as bad as "first week to eleventh."
Number two. It might help to understand the core of the fear. I think it's all a manifestation of my feelings of powerlessness. There was no way I could have prevented my teeth problems. There's no way I can reduce the number or costs of my appointments. I don't even know when it is going to end; the goalposts shift so much I lose even that tiny bit of knowledge. I feel like I have absolutely no control over my situation. This isn't something I can just accept; the only way to deal with it is to take back my agency. Only then can I escape the omnipresent fear.
How do I do that? I dunno. I've tried to keep the pain and time loss from impacting my academic and social life. Keep at least a little bit of power over the rest of my life. That's the only thing I can do. I might be able to extend this. If I do more I will have more things in my life that I can control, which takes the edge off the dread.
This segues nicely into the personality problems. I'm sure at least a couple of you noticed how irrationally controlling and spiteful I got last quarter, and I'm feeling that start up again. The pain and stress and fear mess with my head. I know this is hard to quantify- how do we know what we have felt in different circumstances?- but it's obviously there. I used to swear pretty rarely, and only with great effort and gravity. The day I got my wisdom teeth out I started swearing like a sailor. That definitely wasn't a natural evolution of my personality.
This is the thing I worry about least and should worry about most. It's an incredibly subtle hardship that can hurt both me and others without me ever realizing why. It also emphasizes a flaw I have: I let fear/anger/pain cloud my thinking. A Better Me would be able to function at least as well as Current Me even under extreme stress. I may not necessarily be able to stop feeling the fear/anger/pain, but I should be able to cope with it. I think this can be improved by being constantly aware of how my personality is changing. So if any of you see me acting more abrasive/sociopathic/angsty than normal, give me hell about it.
Eleven hours until my next appointment. I'm not looking forward to it.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
On Elitism
Hm, haven't been here in a while. Life has a bad habit of sneaking up on you, then clubbing you with a tire iron and running off with your cell phone. I'd like to reflect on a set of ideologies I've encountered over the past few years. It's not directly related to improvement, but I think understanding how the ideals work is rather important to our growth and maturation.
Most people are unconscious. They do things without understanding why they are doing them. Other people are conscious and have developed a soul. They understand themselves and can influence the people around them. Only the conscious are really aware of what's going on.
Most people are background characters. The story of life passes them by, and they just go through the motions without understanding them. Some people have narratives. They have agency over their own lives and those of the backgrounds. Only the main characters are really aware of what's going on.
Most people are sheep. They follow the will of society without thinking about it. Other people are the shepherds. They see how the societal machine Works and can make it affect them less, or influence it. Only the shepherds are really aware of what's going on.
Seeing a pattern? The first one was something somebody I respect said last year. The second was said two years ago by somebody close to me. The third was what I believed three years ago. This is an idea that was independently developed by three very intelligent people. It made the world seem so obvious.
The overarching thema is to divide society into two groups. There's the unconscious/sheep/unwashed masses who do not have agency or influence over their own life or, as one person put it, the ability to consciously analyze reality. The other group is the conscious/shepherds/elites who have this ability to think for themselves. They are the movers and shakers of the world. Naturally, everybody who comes up with this idea automatically assumes they are part of group two.
Now this is an extremely comforting idea, the idea that you are more special than the faceless horde around you. It also has a lot of glaring problems. For example:
-Just because you don't know another person's life in depth does not mean you can make a sweeping condemnation of it. Most people have dreams, aspirations, and self-doubts just like you do. You might not be able to get in their head, but they cannot get in yours either. Can they see your eliteness glowing like a beacon? If not, maybe you can't see theirs.
-Self awareness isn't a discrete unit. You can have a measure of consciousness between "stick" and "Buddha". You can't break people into "self aware" and "not self aware", because people are things besides sticks and Buddhas. Imagine trying to break people into "babies" and "geezers" with nothing in between. That's what we're trying to do here.
-Similarly, self-awareness can't actually be maximized. Becoming one of "the conscious" implies that you have achieved the epitome of awakenedness, which would be like trying to achieve absolute mastery over lifting things. In the grand scheme of things you will never, ever, become Buddha. Additionally, self-awareness isn't a one-dimensional thing. I may understand more about what makes me angry, but you might know more about what makes you happy. Trying to compare one person's consciousness to another's is mathematically meaningless.
-The entire idea is just Objectivism with a heaping scoop of metaphysical superiority.
It's poison. It convinces you that you are Above other people and know more about them they do themselves. They will never understand you, for you are an Elite and they are just the Sheep. It's not a large step to start believing that you can ignore other people's opinions on matters and even violate the rules that keep civilization functioning. I've certainly been there. Once you start believing only the Elite posses the truth, you're no longer part of the "little people".
I can't say why this belief is so popular. I mean, all three of us came up with it, and I'm sure far more have too. I think it might be a defense mechanism. The world isn't an unimaginably complex network of connections where the aspirations of a guy in Kansas can tank the price of your morning coffee. A world where billions of people are fighting tooth and claw to achieve their dreams. Much easier to believe that only a few people affect things, and the rest are along for the ride. Easier to think that everybody's dreams and "2.5 children and a white picket fence" and only you, only you, truly hold a burning desire. It makes you special. You don't have to prove to the world that you deserve what you want. By being Elite you already deserve it, and it's only a matter of taking what should be yours.*
But you are not special. You do not hold the secret truth that ascends you as a human, the one thought that makes you a render of worlds. Everybody else has their dreams and desires, hates and revulsions, struggles with themselves, just as you do. Everybody else has gone through trials and tribulations, gained reality and revelations just as you did. Everybody is just as awake and just as conscious as you are. You do not tower above humanity. You are looking it in the eye and saying "I'm taller." But you're not. We are all the same height, and only by standing on the shoulders of others can we see further.
My thoughts do not make me Elite. If anything, my actions do. We must prove our worth, not steal it through Right of Consciousness. We all have our brilliance inside. All that matters is how we face the outside.
*A friend just suggested a third reason. We judge ourselves with respect to others. When we say "I am good," we really mean "I am better than everybody else." Believing ourselves to be Elite allows us to say "I are inherently better than others", and therefore "I am a Good Person."
Most people are unconscious. They do things without understanding why they are doing them. Other people are conscious and have developed a soul. They understand themselves and can influence the people around them. Only the conscious are really aware of what's going on.
Most people are background characters. The story of life passes them by, and they just go through the motions without understanding them. Some people have narratives. They have agency over their own lives and those of the backgrounds. Only the main characters are really aware of what's going on.
Most people are sheep. They follow the will of society without thinking about it. Other people are the shepherds. They see how the societal machine Works and can make it affect them less, or influence it. Only the shepherds are really aware of what's going on.
Seeing a pattern? The first one was something somebody I respect said last year. The second was said two years ago by somebody close to me. The third was what I believed three years ago. This is an idea that was independently developed by three very intelligent people. It made the world seem so obvious.
The overarching thema is to divide society into two groups. There's the unconscious/sheep/unwashed masses who do not have agency or influence over their own life or, as one person put it, the ability to consciously analyze reality. The other group is the conscious/shepherds/elites who have this ability to think for themselves. They are the movers and shakers of the world. Naturally, everybody who comes up with this idea automatically assumes they are part of group two.
Now this is an extremely comforting idea, the idea that you are more special than the faceless horde around you. It also has a lot of glaring problems. For example:
-Just because you don't know another person's life in depth does not mean you can make a sweeping condemnation of it. Most people have dreams, aspirations, and self-doubts just like you do. You might not be able to get in their head, but they cannot get in yours either. Can they see your eliteness glowing like a beacon? If not, maybe you can't see theirs.
-Self awareness isn't a discrete unit. You can have a measure of consciousness between "stick" and "Buddha". You can't break people into "self aware" and "not self aware", because people are things besides sticks and Buddhas. Imagine trying to break people into "babies" and "geezers" with nothing in between. That's what we're trying to do here.
-Similarly, self-awareness can't actually be maximized. Becoming one of "the conscious" implies that you have achieved the epitome of awakenedness, which would be like trying to achieve absolute mastery over lifting things. In the grand scheme of things you will never, ever, become Buddha. Additionally, self-awareness isn't a one-dimensional thing. I may understand more about what makes me angry, but you might know more about what makes you happy. Trying to compare one person's consciousness to another's is mathematically meaningless.
-The entire idea is just Objectivism with a heaping scoop of metaphysical superiority.
It's poison. It convinces you that you are Above other people and know more about them they do themselves. They will never understand you, for you are an Elite and they are just the Sheep. It's not a large step to start believing that you can ignore other people's opinions on matters and even violate the rules that keep civilization functioning. I've certainly been there. Once you start believing only the Elite posses the truth, you're no longer part of the "little people".
I can't say why this belief is so popular. I mean, all three of us came up with it, and I'm sure far more have too. I think it might be a defense mechanism. The world isn't an unimaginably complex network of connections where the aspirations of a guy in Kansas can tank the price of your morning coffee. A world where billions of people are fighting tooth and claw to achieve their dreams. Much easier to believe that only a few people affect things, and the rest are along for the ride. Easier to think that everybody's dreams and "2.5 children and a white picket fence" and only you, only you, truly hold a burning desire. It makes you special. You don't have to prove to the world that you deserve what you want. By being Elite you already deserve it, and it's only a matter of taking what should be yours.*
But you are not special. You do not hold the secret truth that ascends you as a human, the one thought that makes you a render of worlds. Everybody else has their dreams and desires, hates and revulsions, struggles with themselves, just as you do. Everybody else has gone through trials and tribulations, gained reality and revelations just as you did. Everybody is just as awake and just as conscious as you are. You do not tower above humanity. You are looking it in the eye and saying "I'm taller." But you're not. We are all the same height, and only by standing on the shoulders of others can we see further.
My thoughts do not make me Elite. If anything, my actions do. We must prove our worth, not steal it through Right of Consciousness. We all have our brilliance inside. All that matters is how we face the outside.
*A friend just suggested a third reason. We judge ourselves with respect to others. When we say "I am good," we really mean "I am better than everybody else." Believing ourselves to be Elite allows us to say "I are inherently better than others", and therefore "I am a Good Person."
Sunday, October 16, 2011
An Ignoble Experiment
When my computer died I thought I'd be more productive in class. This is technically true, in that I'm doing a lot of grading and writing in class. My attention to class hasn't improved in the slightest. I go to class out of a sense of duty; that as a student I should go through all of the motions of learning. For a long time I've wondered if this is impeding my actual learning. Maybe if I pushed myself those 16 hours I spend in class per week could be put to much better use.
So I'm going to try an experiment this week. I am only going to necessary classes- classes with either discussions or homework due. During the class hours I will only be able to work on class material, work on homework, do my jobs, and work towards Millennium Goals. At the end of the week I'll post a rundown of how things went. Cool? Cool.
So I'm going to try an experiment this week. I am only going to necessary classes- classes with either discussions or homework due. During the class hours I will only be able to work on class material, work on homework, do my jobs, and work towards Millennium Goals. At the end of the week I'll post a rundown of how things went. Cool? Cool.
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Myth of the Ultimate Person
A few days ago some of us had a conversation on facebook about the possibility of robots outcompeting humanity. Standard science fiction stuff. The one person asked "can we create an ultimate person?" I thought this was an incredibly interesting question, given my general outlook on life. If there is an ultimate person, obviously I'd want to work towards that. So it kinda sucks that there isn't.
Let's get the obvious problem out of the way. We can trivially define the UP to be "in absolute perfect physical, mental, and spiritual condition." This already causes a bit of an issue. For one, 'absolute perfect physical condition' doesn't actually exist. Every physical ability corresponds to some physical attribute, and these attributes often clash with each other. It's not just a matter of finite time and resources. Sometimes getting better at one thing actively makes you worse at another. Become the best football player in the world? Good luck doing gymnastics. Prefer to master contortion? You won't have the strength to do well in a fight. This even holds true in subfields of physical abilities, where the best marathoners make terrible sprinters. You can be the best in the world at something, sure, but for everything else you'll have to settle for merely 'good'.
Okay, this isn't a huge deal. Instead of requiring UPs be absolutely perfect we just have them maximize competence, whatever that means. Being damn good in a bunch of things is better than being the best in one if we're trying to achieve ultimacy. In which case our problem shifts to the whole 'mental and spiritual part'. What does it mean to have a good mind? A good soul? Is being a biologist better than an economist? A NeoKantian better than a hedonist? A quiet man better than a brash and outgoing one?
Ultimately, 'the best' is incredibly sensitive to cultural assumptions. Five hundred years ago racism was perfectly okay. Heck, you don't even need go back in time. Just look at the difference between the ideas of academic success between American and Chinese universities. Any conception of the ultimate person is intrinsically tied to the cultural assumptions you use to decide what is "best". There is no absolute metric, and so no absolute "ultimate". My conception of the ultimate person can be your conception of the quintessential asshole, and we'd both be right.
So where does that leave self improvement? Why do we self improve if there's no reasonable culmination? We can't just say "we'll improve to our cultural norms." Part of self improvement is avoiding misperception, which means we have to rise above our intrinsic assumptions. But while there is no 'ultimate person', there is still a 'better person'. Someone who clearly isn't above mankind or whom maximizes his cultural value, but a person who is capable of doing a little more. The person who has a little more control over his own mind and emotions, who can choose to be a pacifist or a killer depending on what he chooses. Clearly you hit problems if this control becomes absolute, because a person who could change their personality at will isn't a human anymore. But it's a goal constructed of smaller, attainable goals.
Looking back, this entire post makes very little sense. Proof that I shouldn't try updating at three in the morning.
Let's get the obvious problem out of the way. We can trivially define the UP to be "in absolute perfect physical, mental, and spiritual condition." This already causes a bit of an issue. For one, 'absolute perfect physical condition' doesn't actually exist. Every physical ability corresponds to some physical attribute, and these attributes often clash with each other. It's not just a matter of finite time and resources. Sometimes getting better at one thing actively makes you worse at another. Become the best football player in the world? Good luck doing gymnastics. Prefer to master contortion? You won't have the strength to do well in a fight. This even holds true in subfields of physical abilities, where the best marathoners make terrible sprinters. You can be the best in the world at something, sure, but for everything else you'll have to settle for merely 'good'.
Okay, this isn't a huge deal. Instead of requiring UPs be absolutely perfect we just have them maximize competence, whatever that means. Being damn good in a bunch of things is better than being the best in one if we're trying to achieve ultimacy. In which case our problem shifts to the whole 'mental and spiritual part'. What does it mean to have a good mind? A good soul? Is being a biologist better than an economist? A NeoKantian better than a hedonist? A quiet man better than a brash and outgoing one?
Ultimately, 'the best' is incredibly sensitive to cultural assumptions. Five hundred years ago racism was perfectly okay. Heck, you don't even need go back in time. Just look at the difference between the ideas of academic success between American and Chinese universities. Any conception of the ultimate person is intrinsically tied to the cultural assumptions you use to decide what is "best". There is no absolute metric, and so no absolute "ultimate". My conception of the ultimate person can be your conception of the quintessential asshole, and we'd both be right.
So where does that leave self improvement? Why do we self improve if there's no reasonable culmination? We can't just say "we'll improve to our cultural norms." Part of self improvement is avoiding misperception, which means we have to rise above our intrinsic assumptions. But while there is no 'ultimate person', there is still a 'better person'. Someone who clearly isn't above mankind or whom maximizes his cultural value, but a person who is capable of doing a little more. The person who has a little more control over his own mind and emotions, who can choose to be a pacifist or a killer depending on what he chooses. Clearly you hit problems if this control becomes absolute, because a person who could change their personality at will isn't a human anymore. But it's a goal constructed of smaller, attainable goals.
Looking back, this entire post makes very little sense. Proof that I shouldn't try updating at three in the morning.
Monday, October 3, 2011
On Activity
My computer died today.
It still works, technically, but it won't recharge. If I'm lucky I might be able to borrow somebody else's battery, use it to back up all of my important files. Otherwise it's dead. Looks like it's time to get a new computer.
I'm going to hold off as long as possible. This is going to be the first time in two years I'm not constantly wired to the internet. I'll only get small doses whenever I can get to a library or steal somebody's laptop. I think this will be good for me. Let me explain why.
We can roughly divide people's actions into high intensity and low intensity. High intensity is commonly seen as "productive". This is self improvement, working a job, doing homework. Low intensity is generally "relaxing". Meditation, watching television, playing video games, going for a walk. This is not to say that these boundaries are well-defined. Sports are high intensity relaxation, knitting is low intensity productive/relaxation, cooking can be high intensity or low depending on what you're doing, etc. Maximizing the value of your time is to walk the fine line between high intensity and low intensity activities. Too much of the former and you crash, too much of the latter and you don't burn.
But there's another side of this, a third thing you can do besides production and relaxation. That's stagnation. Time you don't spend burning or healing yourself. Time you spend eroding, slowly falling apart through complacency and lethargy. It's the dark side of relaxation. We relax to eventually work again. We stagnate to continue stagnating.
The problem is how thin the line is. A lot of things we do to relax can be easily turned into stagnation. Think about the difference between playing two games of Starcraft and playing twenty.* I definitely have a problem with this. I'm really afraid of relaxing, not because I'm some sort of working machine but because I know how easily it will turn into wasting. So I spend more time in high intensity, which leads to me crashing more often. Then I need to relax a crapton, which quickly turns into stagnation, which makes the next productive zone a little less productive... so yeah. My time schedule is completely out of whack. I need to cut my high time, boost my low time, and do away with my stagnation periods.
Where does the computer fit into all of this? Being jacked to the net makes stagnation incredibly easy. I'm sure you all know what I'm talking about. Worse, it's often high intensity. I've somehow managed to make surfing the web physically draining. Might explain why I'm so underweight. It also means that when I finally drag myself away from the internet I'm in a worse place than when I started. Surfing the web is one thing, snorting it is another. I do the latter.
That's why I think losing it will be good for me. I'm going through a detox here. Being semi-cut off from the internet should help me learn to use my time more wisely. Of course, I can't go cold turkey. There's still work and academics to worry about. But I think this will be enough.
You might call this sour grapes. I mean, I'm trying to justify why losing my computer is a good thing. I see this as optimism. If things go right I'll walk out of this a better person than I came in. I'm taking a bad situation and trying to spin it to my advantage. Isn't that what luck is? Every setback is an opportunity. Here's hoping this one pays off.
It still works, technically, but it won't recharge. If I'm lucky I might be able to borrow somebody else's battery, use it to back up all of my important files. Otherwise it's dead. Looks like it's time to get a new computer.
I'm going to hold off as long as possible. This is going to be the first time in two years I'm not constantly wired to the internet. I'll only get small doses whenever I can get to a library or steal somebody's laptop. I think this will be good for me. Let me explain why.
We can roughly divide people's actions into high intensity and low intensity. High intensity is commonly seen as "productive". This is self improvement, working a job, doing homework. Low intensity is generally "relaxing". Meditation, watching television, playing video games, going for a walk. This is not to say that these boundaries are well-defined. Sports are high intensity relaxation, knitting is low intensity productive/relaxation, cooking can be high intensity or low depending on what you're doing, etc. Maximizing the value of your time is to walk the fine line between high intensity and low intensity activities. Too much of the former and you crash, too much of the latter and you don't burn.
But there's another side of this, a third thing you can do besides production and relaxation. That's stagnation. Time you don't spend burning or healing yourself. Time you spend eroding, slowly falling apart through complacency and lethargy. It's the dark side of relaxation. We relax to eventually work again. We stagnate to continue stagnating.
The problem is how thin the line is. A lot of things we do to relax can be easily turned into stagnation. Think about the difference between playing two games of Starcraft and playing twenty.* I definitely have a problem with this. I'm really afraid of relaxing, not because I'm some sort of working machine but because I know how easily it will turn into wasting. So I spend more time in high intensity, which leads to me crashing more often. Then I need to relax a crapton, which quickly turns into stagnation, which makes the next productive zone a little less productive... so yeah. My time schedule is completely out of whack. I need to cut my high time, boost my low time, and do away with my stagnation periods.
Where does the computer fit into all of this? Being jacked to the net makes stagnation incredibly easy. I'm sure you all know what I'm talking about. Worse, it's often high intensity. I've somehow managed to make surfing the web physically draining. Might explain why I'm so underweight. It also means that when I finally drag myself away from the internet I'm in a worse place than when I started. Surfing the web is one thing, snorting it is another. I do the latter.
That's why I think losing it will be good for me. I'm going through a detox here. Being semi-cut off from the internet should help me learn to use my time more wisely. Of course, I can't go cold turkey. There's still work and academics to worry about. But I think this will be enough.
You might call this sour grapes. I mean, I'm trying to justify why losing my computer is a good thing. I see this as optimism. If things go right I'll walk out of this a better person than I came in. I'm taking a bad situation and trying to spin it to my advantage. Isn't that what luck is? Every setback is an opportunity. Here's hoping this one pays off.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)