"RATIONAL" SELF-INTEREST

As I've mentioned before, I have a bunch of Objectivist buddies that I often get in debates with.  One of objectivists favorite mantras is:  I believe in RATIONAL SELF-INTEREST.  They say that rational self interest is the objectively most moral way that a person can act.  My question is: why the qualifier?  why the adjective "rational"?  To me all self-interest is already "rational" because it is always rational to do what is in one's self interest.  Even when it doesn't seem that way.

Let me give an example:  a person trying heroin for the first time.  An objectivist would say that that person shouldn't do heroin because it isn't in that person's rational self-interest to try heroin because it could lead to addiction, loss of friendship and family, loss of career or education, etc.  But their could be many different rational reasons why a person would want to try heroin -- acceptance from peers, escapism, wants to feel good, experimentation, etc. -- and all of these reasons could be a more rational reason for trying heroin than not.  In fact, I would say that when someone is acting out of self-interest it is ALWAYS the most rational way to act.

It is the Objectivist that asserts what is rational and what is not.  That is why they add the qualifier -- so that they can make the judgments of what is rational and what is not, so that they can point to whoever they disagree with and say, "They may be acting out of self-interest, but it is not rational."  Objectivism is a cult and they want to be able to define what is rational because, ultimately, they want control over their believers.

Now for my beliefs.  I did admit earlier that acting out of self-interest is always the most rational way to act.  This is true.  But that doesn't mean that it is the best or most moral way to act.  The most moral way to act is to realize that you have a future self and that your actions right now -- no matter how selfish and hedonistic you would like to be at any present moment -- affect your future self.  I say this because self-interest doesn't deal with your future self (no matter how much Objectivists would say it does).  To live most morally we would all be looking to the future, in order to secure a better life for our later selves (and consequently those people that follow us).  That is the most moral way we could act.

A Poem

Here's a poem I wrote a couple years ago for a poetry class I took.

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The Capital of Antarctica

I've become obsessed with something that won't exist:
the future,
more specifically, three-hundred-billion years from now
after the mountains have folded in on themselves
and all the world's oceans and lakes don't amount to spit.

People talk about Karma like it's a thing,
like it's important, like it's something I can chew on or squeeze.
But the only philosophy worth subscribing to is inevitability
in all its downtroddenness.

If no one wants it I'll take Antarctica
and build a capital there on the pivot of the Earth's axis.
I'll declare the next renaissance
and hire artists and prodigies to write a book
titled, "Keys to Producing Truly Original Works of Art".
It'll be written in a completely original language
and in a completely original form.
And when it's finished I'll put it behind glass
for the sake of our burgeoning tourist economy.

I can't be bothered until the first piano makes it to the moon
with a world-class pianist at its keys.
the pianist will play Beethoven or Mozart or some other bullshit.
And when the footage of the concert relays back to Earth
to be broadcast on television,
They'll have to play recorded music over the video to cover the silence.
And no one will know the difference.
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Even though there is a lot of anger and frustration in this poem I still really love it.  I think it is extremely important for me and has helped me to begin to formulate my beliefs just after leaving religion.

I know I haven't posted anything for a while.  But I want to start posting my beliefs about art, philosophy, government and religion once more.  I have been in many debates since leaving my former religion, and in that time I've noticed one thing:  that no ones beliefs/philosophy/outlook/worldview has as large or grand a perspective as I  have.  I really am proud of what I believe because I've worked hard for my beliefs and have tried extremely hard to be open-minded and honest with myself about what I believe.

This poem contains a lot of these beliefs.  The key line for me is "the only philosophy worth subscribing to is inevitability."  I would like to, with most of my forthcoming posts, describe what I mean by this line.  I want to explain my Philosophy of Inevitability.

Capitalism:  Less than the Best.  Part 0

As you can see I'm starting a series with the title above and every once in awhile I would like to expose a flaw or some kind of evil or contradiction of capitalism and hone in on it.  This post is the introduction to this series.  I chose this title very specifically to show that I'm not like many left-wingers who believe that nothing good has ever come from the free market.  I am not like that at all.  I believe that a lot of good has stemmed from capitalism -- not as much good as the right believes and not as little good as the left believes, like Baby Bear, just right.

Capitalism is like a mirage in many ways.  Conservatives feel as if we haven't really given capitalism a fair shot, that this perfect image of this ideal was never truly explored.  They believe we can look back and see that over time government intervention has spoiled the purity of this experiment -- as if  FDR and all the other commies, with there intervention, slowed down innovation so much that if they never existed we'd have hover-cars and and nearly everyone (except for the lazy bums) would be a millionaires, peace and prosperity for all.  Many liberals on the other hand -- I'm talking about the crazy ones -- can't accept the fact that the freedom and prosperity many of us enjoy is due in large part to the free market.  They haven't even given capitalism a fair look to see if it was actually a mirage at all.  They could care less about the validity of it's production.  They have blinded themselves because they haven't even opened their eyes.

Truth is, human nature will always turn a free market system into a system that isn't purely capitalistic and that will never truly satisfy either group.  Here's how a free market system devolves (or evolves):  lax or no government regulations ==> increase greed and power of industry leaders (human nature) ==> exploitation of the everyone who isn't an industry leader or manager (the 90%) ==> growing dissatisfaction by the 90% who feel exploited (because of long work hours, little pay, high price of goods, child labor, environmental damage, etc.) ==> failed strikes by the 90% because they need to feed, cloth and shelter their families and they hold almost no cards ==> the 90% turning to the government for intervention ==> the government stepping in to check industry on behalf of the powerless people.  That's it, a free market system in a democracy will become what we have right now:  a socialistic capitalism.

If there was one thing to take out of it is that a corporation is concerned with one thing:  profit.  They are not concerned with the welfare of their workers or the public, the planet's environment, the limited resources of the planet, expanding creativity and intelligence of the general public or anything else.  They only care about whether there is a plus or minus sign at the bottom of their quarterly spreadsheets and that's it.  It's not even really the greed of the 1% that would do America in if it were in a laissez-faire system.  It is the pointless minutia of scoring that little extra stock point for one's company for a competitive advantage.  It is a game -- a game that has huge consequences for the earth's entire population and for earth itself.

A capitalist might say that the invisible hand will work all of this out, that the unseen forces of the market will make sure that competition will provide for good wages and low prices.  They'll say that the economy will be balanced and fair and the environment will be looked after because, after all, the consumer will be voting with his or her wallet or pocketbook.  I stopped believing in invisible and unseen things once I became an atheist.  I say that you just can't say this for sure.  I mean, pure capitalism was an experiment that failed because it wasn't compatible with human nature.  The mixed economic system we have now naturally stemmed from capitalism's inability to make good on its promises of a good life for hard workers, the industrious and creative people.

Those on the right use capitalism as a double-edged sword.  They want to point out all the great things that capitalism, with it's government intervention, has brought about and at the same time they want to claim that this exact same capitalism, with it's government intervention, has held us back.   Honestly, they can't do this because they can't say for sure that a pure, laissez-faire style capitalism would have brought us as far as our current mixed style has.  Only a laissez-faire style capitalistic system mixed with human nature in a real-world experiment would show if it would or not.

My point is that I think capitalism WAS a great economic system.  It was a system we needed at a certain time.  It brought a measure of prosperity and freedom.  But it's overdue to be overhauled.  Humanity needs to be moving to the next step.  This series will expose the weaknesses of this economic system that should have been abandoned forty or fifty years ago for a new and better system that should push humanity even further and on to something else.

What Is It, That Thing We Call Art?

I was listening to a podcast recently (probably a good sixth of my life is spent listening to those things) and they were discussing art.  Most of the times I really enjoy listening to podcasts and can find at least some good to extract from them - even the one's that aren't very good - but this one was especially bad because their discussion was aimless.  One guy would ask, "Do you think this is art?" and everyone had to throw out an opinion.  Then the next guy asked if something else was art and everyone again gave their opinion.  They had exactly no set standard for what art is or isn't.  They didn't set a bare minimum or even try to define what art is.

I want to give the bare minimum of what I believe art is.  This standard does not judge whether a piece of art is good or not, it can only be used to judge if something is a piece of art or not.  There are three basic elements that any work needs to be considered art.

First, for something to be considered art it must be a human creation.  (I covered this idea in a previous post).  I know there is a lot of people out there that would love to claim that an ocean is a work of art or a mountain or a forest or a newborn baby or the stars.  However, they are not because they are not human inventions.  They are a product of nature, God, evolution, space aliens or whatever you believe they came from.  They may be astoundingly beautiful, breathtaking, life changing, awe inspiring, intellectually stimulating.  They may have elements of what you believe good art should have, they may be detailed, they may look as if they were painted by the perfect hand using the perfect brush.  But they are not created by humans and therefore cannot be considered works of art.  They are entirely another category.

Secondly, for something to be considered a work of art, it has to be made with the intent of it becoming a work of art.  I know, this one's a bit murky and sometimes we may not always have the details of the artist's - or non-artist's - intentions.  But let's explore this a little more.  So if I went to my backyard and began mowing the lawn only to discover that after I was done, the way that I mowed my lawn produced an image even more wonderful than the Mona Lisa, could I consider that a work of art?  No.  We can say that this picture in my lawn may tell us something about chance or coincidence or randomness, or that it tells us something about the subconscious and its abilities, but we cannot consider it a piece of art because it wasn't intended to be so at the time I was creating it.

But there are other interesting applications to this implication.

I am a big fan of film.  However, Hollywood pumps out millions of dollars worth of shitty movies each year, and probably many of those movies have directors, producers, actors, set designers, etc. that don't consider what they are doing to be in anyway artful.  Many, I would guess, are producing these movies to make money, to entertain or to move their careers forward.  But these films cannot, no matter how arty they may appear, be considered works of art if they do not have that intention in mind.

Here's another interesting thing (and this is where things get a little murky).  Consider a painter who, as she is painting a picture, intends what she is painting to be a work of art, but at the same time has no idea about the elements of art or has never thought about art in depth in anyway.  Is that painting a work of art?  I really want to say no but I would have to say yes.  By the barest minimum of standards, what she is creating is a work of art (provided it follows the other two steps as well).  Why I would hesitate to say no is because I believe that a sufficient lack of understanding of art is akin to not even using the word correctly, or even knowing what it means, and therefore she, the painter, would have the intent but not a true intent of creating real art.  But then this begs the question that there are very real and in depth standards of what art is (fine art) and is not (kitsch) and that my understanding of art is superior than hers.  However, since I am only setting up a bare minimum, I will grant it that, at the lowest setting, the painter, having an glimmer of an idea about what art is, is producing a piece of art when she intends to do so.

The third criteria for what can be considered art, is that the artist must make a real attempt at finding an audience for that work.  A poem sitting in a drawer at home, no matter how beautiful, cannot be a work of art if it doesn't have a larger audience.  This is because there is no difference between something invisible and something unseen; there is no difference between silence and something unheard.  I could tell you that I have written the greatest novel but that I burnt it in a fire and you would never know whether it was or not, nor would you really care.  These unseen, unheard, not experienced works are uninteresting because they do not exist outside of the person who created them and therefore cannot be considered works of art.  But I believe that just the real attempt of someone trying to share their creation with other humans can make that creation a piece of art.

This also brings up another interesting thing..  If some intended work of art is too cryptic to be decoded by even the most dedicated audience, and therefore that audience really can't experience that piece of art, is it then a work of art?  Is there any difference between the unseen creation and the one that cannot be decoded?  I'll leave these questions, for now, unanswered.  (I also want to give credit to Joyce for supplying some of these ideas).

Just My Objective Opinion

Sorry I haven't posted anything on a couple weeks. I've been reading and listening to a lot about Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism lately. I really have tried to keep an open mind but the stuff is pretty laughable. They claim to have an objective morality, however, without a God (and Objectivists are nearly all atheists), it becomes impossible to have an objective morality.  In fact, just grouping the words "atheistic," "objective," "morality," makes me scratch my head.  Morality has to be completely subjective because it has to be conceived in a mind.  It cannot exist independent of a mind.  There is no rule book floating out there in space that says how we should live our lives (and if you say the Bible I'm going to slap you).  If Objectivists spent anytime looking at the word objective they would realize that their philosophy doesn't actually make any sense.

You might say, well Dedalus, you are writing about objectivity and how to find it.  What you are saying isn't that much different from their claims.  I would entirely disagree.  My claim is that there exists, out of the hundreds of millions of ways to live, one best way to live and we can consider that way of living an objective truth - because it is the best way and because that way might produce something eternal.  But it cannot simply be just thought up, because that would be subjective.  We would have to discover it.  And how do we discover it? Using the scientific method.  If we look at the past two hundred plus years and all the advancements that have been made in our world we can attribute it wholly to science.  And my claim is that if we can concentrate on science and if we can focus our time and resources to becoming a more scientific people we will surely see even greater and more rapid advancements in the human race which would eventually uncover a best way of living.  Objectivity, for me, is more of an end than a means - or more correctly it is an end that makes the means meaningful.

The ridiculous thing about Objectivists are that they are much more interested in philosophy in trying to understand the universe than science.  But philosophy is never adequate, it is never going to push humanity forward in any significant way because many things about our existence cannot be figured out using logic or reason.  I've noticed this trend lately that Christians and other cults (yes, most fundamentalist religions are cultish in behavior) have put a lot more emphasis on philosophy.  It is because they lost the science debate.  Science has shown that the earth is more than six thousand years old, science has shown that we have evolved and are evolving, science has shown - quantum mechanics more specifically - that the reality we are experiencing might be subjective, science has shown that homosexuals and any other types of persons are born the way they are, science has shown hundreds of other things that completely fly in the face of archaic religious claims that people continue to cling on to.  So what else do religions and cults do:  they rely heavily on philosophy.  Because anyone can have a philosophy.  All it takes is having a somewhat reasonable and a somewhat defensible opinion.

I've been listening to a couple of Objectivist podcasts lately.  There was one particularly egregiousness one in which they were discussing, in depth, their problems with Postmodernism.  Now, I'll grant it, as much as I love a lot of Postmodern art there is a lot of problems with it.  There is also a lot of problems with Postmodernism as a philosophy.  However, this podcast - and Objectivism in general - seems to love to paint this caricature of Postmodernism only to try and tear it down.  One particular argument I heard on this podcast (and I hear variations of this argument very often) is that Postmodernists love to profess how subjective our existence, reality and morality is but at the same time love to believe so strongly in things like feminism, collectivism and environmentalism, almost in an objective-like way.  This might be one of the more ridiculous statements made by folks on the far right.  So what they are saying essentially is that if people believe that our reality/morality is subjective then they have to forfeit their opinions.  That is absurd.  They have to know that opinions are completely subjective because opinions are pure formations of the mind.  (That reminds me, I've got to post something soon about environmentalism).

There's one last thing I wanted to share about Objectivism, a kind of summing up of what I think they are all about, a thesis statement if you will:  Objectivism is apologetics defending the wealthy against intellectuals.  Objectivists don't really care about the undeducated because uneducated people generally share their opinion that wealth is a virtue and that wealth is a reflection of hard work and ingenuity because they have been indoctrinated to believe this.  It is the educated people that have a problem with the wealthy because they can break away from their indoctrination to find the problems asscoiated with wealth (especially the disparity between the rich and poor) and Objectivism tries to deal with that problem.

But if there is one word I'd like to use to describe Objectivists that would shock people into seeing what they really are, that word would be "cult."  The uniformity of their opinion is astoundingly disgusting and their claims of absolute truth rival that of even the most fundamental religions.  Check it out if you don't believe me.

A Quick Aesthetic Quip

I just had a though.  Is art a manifestation of human's general detest for exposition?

I don't know if everyone hates long drawn out explanations - people who love and only read non-fiction are a good example.  However, I believe that most people hate having points made directly at them.  ("Don't lecture me," or "You think you know everything")  Humans love figuring things out for themselves and art gives people an opportunity to do that.  Especially, Modern and Postmodern art, which is why I feel that these tend to be the better artistic movements in history.

Yet there is definitely a fine line between too much exposition and too little exposition and I believe that the true artist can walk this line and everyone else is either making schlock or being pretentious.

Arty Pants

A few days ago I bought The Critical Writings of James Joyce at a local bookstore.  I wanted it specifically for the short chapter on aesthetics and Joyce's comments on the philosophy of art.  While most of what he says is spot on and very thought provoking, I had one big question with his definition of art.

Joyce writes that "art is the human disposition of sensible or intelligible matter for an aesthetic end."  (Of course he makes a similar - if not exact - claim like this in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man).  This definition is very interesting and can take a while to dissect but I would like to hone in on the word "human" and what it means to the definition of art.

It makes only sense to say that "human" involvement in a creation is essential to the definition of what art is.  A tree in the woods is not art because it sprang up from the ground and was  formed due to its inhuman surroundings (air, sun, soil, nutrients, etc.).  It may be beautiful and sensible but it did not come about from "human disposition."   So it can not be considered art.  But that begs the question:  what about a tree planted in a garden?

A gardener who plants a tree in a garden has control over the spot it is planted in and therefore has a modest control over how much sun it receives;  the gardener has control over how much nutrients it gets due to the soil in which the tree is planted; the gardener can prune the tree or bind its branches to determine its general shape; the gardener can spray pesticides on it to help determine its lifespan, and many, many more things.  So is a tree in a garden a work of art if it has been raised by a human being for an aesthetic purpose?

I think Joyce would say, "no."  Joyce's implications for what he consider's "human" is strange and I think his definition of "human disposition" is somewhat vague.  Here is what I mean.  Joyce posed to himself the question, "Can photography be a work of art?"  He answered it saying, "A photograph is a disposition of sensible matter and may be so disposed for an aesthetic end but it is not a human disposition of sensible matter.  Therefore it is not a work of art."

I actually hear this same thing being talked about all the time, that photography or filmmaking is not a work of art.  Somehow these critics have it in their heads that because people use cameras they are taking too much of the human element out of their craft and therefore it is not art.  But there is no real difference between a camera and a paintbrush/paint.  Both have their limitations and both are instruments used by humans in their aesthetic endeavors - just as a gardener uses instruments to form a tree for aesthetic purposes.  So because of this argument, a photograph or a film or tree grown in a garden can be works of art.

But I don't think it is entirely that simple, nor do I think that Joyce was completely wrong when he stated that photography isn't an art form.  And this is where the really interesting question begins:  Are there different degrees of art (high or low) depending on certain elements employed in that art form - including just how involved humans are in the art's creation?  Certainly there is.

A painter has more control over his or her craft than a photographer and therefore a painting is a more "human disposition" than a photograph.  Let me show that this is true.  If  a photographer wanted to shoot a building he would be limited in many more ways than an painter would be in painting the building.  The painter could, in his painting, change the shape of the building, its color, texture, the shadows falling on it, what is surrounding the building and many other elements of the building.  The photographer is limited because he or she cannot do many of these things.  (You might be tempted to say something about Photoshop, but I want to work with the more traditional definition of photography that Joyce used).  Therefore, a painting is a higher form of art because of the greater control the artist has over his or her craft - or in other words it is more of a "human disposition." The same applies to the gardener.  Photography is a higher art form than gardening because the gardener has even less control over what the tree in his or her garden will become than a photographer has over his or her photographs.

But what would be the highest form of art?  That is simple, it would be the oral or written verse and prose.  There is no more human artistic endeavor than verse or prose for it is really only humans that can use language and understand language (especially in its written form).  Also humans have more control over this form because the instruments used in the creation of prose and verse (namely a pencil and paper or sound emanating from vocal cords) have the least amount of limitations.  In fact there almost is no limitation in the art form of verse and prose except for the inability for one to express oneself or a concept.  But that is not the limitation of the instrument but a limitation of the human.  And this itself is beautiful because it reveals human nature with all its flaws to its fullest degree.

As always, let me know what you think.

Conservatives, Gosh!

Being conservative in America means one of two things:

1.  You are a white, wealthy, male actively seeking out your own self-interest.

2.  You are not a white, wealthy, male actively going against your own self-interest.

It's incredible to think that the majority falls under the second definition.

I know many of you probably know this already.  It just feels good to type it out.

Thanks.

Game On 

I was thinking today of how maddening it is that nearly everything important we do – job, politics, religion, etc. - seems to be a part of some game and how wonderful it would be if we had a complete choice in what games we want to involved ourselves – board games, sports, video games etc.

Let me break it down a little.

I just put out a post/rant about capitalism but let me continue the discussion in the context of it being a game.  Capitalism is an elaborate game where the people with the proper skill-set get to win – namely the skill-set of ambition.  If I set up an economy where a person’s monetary value was based on looks then the gorgeous people of that society would be the wealthy.  You might say to me:  “Well, Dedalus, being ambitious is not the same as being gorgeous because a person is born with looks, it is a genetic attribute, while ambition is something that one has to acquire.”  I would completely disagree.  I believe that it is just as difficult for me to become ambitious for money – because I am not at all - as it is for someone hideous looking to become beautiful.  Ambition seems to be just as much a genetic and cultural part of someone as looks are.  But I’m going off track. 

What I wanted to point out is that capitalism is a game and that nearly anyone born in the West is thrown into the game with really no other options but to play it or starve.  If I don’t like its rules I can’t change it.  If I don’t like how the “winners” are playing it, too bad, I can’t do much of anything about that either.

But let’s move on to something else:  academics.

Largely, academics are a game.  I am  a career student because I enjoy going to school and learning new things.  However, every one of my close and extended family members, my neighbors and friends ask me when I will be finished with school (earn another degree) instead of asking me what I learned in school.  Honestly, I could care less about the degree I have because I only really go to learn more.  When I graduated I still felt the same amount of intelligent than just before graduating.  But we have largely turned university into a game with the goal of, not acquiring knowledge, but a degree.

Also, schooling, especially testing and writing papers, is very much a game.  I’ve written many “A” papers about books or subjects that I never read or knew very little about.  Getting an “A” on a paper or a test is more about understanding your professors, their quirks and expectations and then writing to those, rather than researching and using critical thinking.

Religion and the idea of a God and an afterlife is a huge game.  Anyone who is familiar with religion knows that appearing to be a good person is so much more important than actually being.  (I believe Plato wrote a little bit about this – the better a person actually is the more ostracized that person will be in his social group).  Religion is a game because you have to pretend to be something you are not, or care about things that you don’t really care about.  Being successful in religion means being good with rhetoric and appearance than following the doctrine of that religion.

Now many of you might say:  “Dedalus, you are wrong again.  God will know what is really in your heart.  He will judge you by your actions and thoughts and so it is, in an eternal perspective, better for your soul to be a good person rather than to just appear to be good.”  I would agree, but only to add that God is actually the biggest game-maker of all.  The earth is his board and we are his pawns.  The rules were set out by him and so were the obstacles.  He controls who is good at the game and who is not.  He sets the times that we are allowed to play and the number of years we can play - sometimes only days or hours.  And he can be as unfair as he wants.  God controls every aspect of the game, and some people would say that he is the game himself. 

I guess my point is that every important aspect of our lives seems to be a large game, which, for the most part, seems to be governed by some pretty arbitrary rules.  Wouldn’t it be nice to be a part of something that doesn’t make you feel like you are just a pawn bowing down to the pressure of game-makers like God, professors, politicians and religious leaders?  Wouldn’t it be a much better existence to live and enjoy life for living and enjoying life’s sake?

I think we can come up with a better way of living.

A Cool Million

I've just finished reading Nathanael West's novella, A Cool Million. The book is a mixture of Voltaire's Candide, in which the main character for which the title is named is systematically brutalized throughout his journeys, and a satire of any number of Horatio Alger novels depicting characters successfully living out the American dream of achieving wealth and power by the means of their industry.  I've read Candide but never any of Alger's novels but I doubt that it matters since most of us, from even the earliest of our schooling, know the basic tenets of achieving the American dream:  work really hard, be somewhat inventive and after some patience you will earn your fortune. As A Cool Million's hyper-capitalist character, Shagpoke Whipple puts it to the young, poor but aspiring capitalist Lemuel Pitkin, "the world is an oyster that but waits for hands to open it."

What I was most impressed with in this book is West's understanding of just how people acquire great deals of money in a capitalist society.  Surely, because this is a satire, West doesn't agree that the world is an oyster and that anyone can make a fortune just by trying hard enough.  This is a boring myth that most of us can dismiss just by looking around ourselves.  We all know people who hold down two or three jobs hoping to make a lot of money; we know people who talk about how they will make it big with their creativity or by being noticed by their superiors for their superb work ethic; we know people who have started their own businesses hoping to catch a lucky break or people who spend thousand going to school, convincing themselves that they will stand out from the pack.  Some of these people make the money they hoped for and some of them don't.  But hard work is just not enough to become rich.  I work hard - going to school, raising a child, married, job, writing, etc. - and you probably work hard.  In fact, I would guess most of us work very hard.  But most of us are not rich.

Working hard does not mean becoming rich.

No, no, there are really only two ways to make a "cool million" in a capitalist society and West's novella deals with both.  First is through luck - being born into money, winning the lottery, striking rich off a trend, hitting it right on the stock market, etc.  Secondly, is by desiring money so completely that one would use nearly any means necessary to obtain it.

People don't seem to be impressed with the first way - through luck.  There doesn't have to be any hard work when luck is involved.  It's more by accident than anything.  West shows this in Million but in the opposite way by first informing Lemuel Pitkin  that he can obtain a great fortune by traveling to New York - of course, what other city? - and by working hard.  However, through very unlucky circumstance Pitkin runs out of hope of ever obtaining his fortune.  The message is:  some of us are lucky and some aren't.

Doesn't that sound exactly like real life?

The second way of obtaining money is the "respectable" way of doing it:  wanting it.  But why is this supposed to be respectable.  "The love of money" is supposed to be "the root of all evil."  This is one of the most quoted phrases that Christians have.  Does no one actually believe this?  No, nearly every Christian I know has huge amounts of respect for people with a lot of money.  But what they don't realize is that people who don't get lucky, earn their money through the dubious way of stomping on the rest of humanity in order to obtain their fortune. West shows this as well through the character of Shagpoke Whipple.  Whipple spends the entire novella promising to help young Pitkin only to take advantage of his friendship by rising to power and fortune largely through Pitkin's martyrdom.

This is how "respectable" people make money:  off the backs of those "beneath" them.

Let's stop giving respect to the rich.  They were either lucky or selfish assholes that don't mind exploiting everyone else.

Truth With a Dash of Pessimism

I am not a philosopher by any stretch of the imagination.  However, I have an idea I would like to put out there.

First of all, what makes something objective?  It exists from outside our minds.  In short, it seems to me that objectivity is what best describes the actuality of reality.  One of the characteristics of objectivity that I would like to point out is that their seems to be a timeless sort of quality about it.  I'm sure that philosophers could argue about this one, but let me just have this for a minute.

So, we could say that 2+2=4 is an objective truth because it seems that this logic would follow in any part of the universe and at any time (of course, besides the arbitrary symbols we use for numbers and the functions of mathematics).  If I take two hydrogen atoms and bring them together with two other hydrogen atoms, I will have four of hydrogen atoms.  Mathematics seems to have a very real objective quality to it, and a lot of it has to do with it being timeless.  (Think of prime numbers in that scene from the movie Contact)

I will change the subject now.

Being an atheist and often wondering to myself about the purpose of life I am often forced to accept that there probably is no purpose.  I don't mean to be a drag, but if I think about it, if there is no actual purpose of living, I should ditch the dull responsibilities of my life - ie. being a parent, being a husband, holding a job, etc. - (not that I actually think that any of these are dull, but they can be frustrating and challenging) and live life as hedonistic a life as possible.  In short, it seem like the most rational thing I could do, when confronted with the meaninglessness of life, is to try and maximize my pleasure and happiness and anything that tries to challenge me or increase my responsibility should be pushed to the wayside.

Here is the next problem I am confronted with as an atheist:  the slow and eternal death of the universe.  Scientist believe that the universe will end with a whimper, spreading out farther and farther and becoming colder and colder until everything is dead and at near absolute zero degrees in temperature.  So, if I decide to return someones wallet that I have found loaded with cash, it will not effect the the fact that the universe will eventually die.  If I forgive someone who has done me a serious injustice, there will ultimately be no effect on the final destination of my existence a trillion years from now because I'll be dead along with everyone else.  On the other hand, if I decide to steal the money from the wallet or kill that someone who has done me injustice it also won't effect death of the universe and all humanity either. The most rational thing I could do would be to steal the money and kill the person (assuming that I am very confident I won't get caught).

This is where I think it gets interesting - combining these two subjects.

Here is my thesis:  the only way to make life meaningful - in the absence of any god or afterlife - is found in the attempt and success of extending humanity (or what evolves from humanity) into the eternities.  In essence, by making humanity timeless we have created - or more correctly, discovered - the objective truth of how to best live our lives as humans.  In short what I am saying is that there might be a best way of living that would directly result in an "eternal humanity."  Barring this eternal humanity though, life as we know it really is pointless in an eternal perspective.

You're probably asking the questions now:  Is this even possible?  And doesn't this sound like science fiction?  And what does it mean "eternal humanity?"  My answer would be that I have no idea about how possible it would be to extend humanity into the eternal but if it were possible it wouldn't be science fiction.  It would be reality.  The last question is also pretty simple to answer because "eternal humanity" could mean only one of two things:  First, that eventually we find a way to eradicate death and every individual gets to live forever.  Second, death isn't eradicated because it can't be, but we, as a collective of humans, find a way to escape the death of the universe and continue to propagate into eternity.  (I see the second option as much more probable).

I could go on and on about this but I don't want to make this too long.  There are a few problems with this thought that I will address in later posts.  But for now let me say a few more things.

If humanity, right now accepted what I just said as truth, (oh, how it would be to be dictator of the world) then it would drastically change the way everyone lived.  Our focus would shift almost entirely.  Instead of raising generation after generation of scientifically ignorant children, the main focus of schooling would be science and the scientific method.  Instead, of wasting our planet's natural resources on shit we'll throw away soon after we purchase it, we would be much more selective in the things that we actually need.  And many many more things would change.

All in all, I think I've come up with a pretty good moral system.  Actions that would be detrimental to humanity existing forever would be considered evil.  Actions that contributed to humanity existing forever would be considered good.  And actions that have no ultimate consequence (probably the majority of our actions) would be considered morally neutral.

Well that's it for now.  I will be coming back to this subject.  Maybe even in my next post.  Let me know what you think.

Please to Meet You, Hope You Guess my Name.

I want this first post to be an introduction.  For reasons that I might later share I would like to remain fairly anonymous so I will be going by the moniker, Dedalus, named from a character from my favorite book, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, by James Joyce.  In the book Stephen Dedalus, the young protagonist, searches for truth and honesty in religion, art and government.  The book and Dedalus' journey (and consequently Joyce's boyhood) so mimic my own that I instantly latched onto it and have gained a lot of wisdom and comfort from Joyce's words.

But enough about Joyce.  And now on to some harsher stuff.

I find much of what most people say and write to be complete shit.  (I am not sorry for the language.  But I will try to restrain my swearing to only the times when I want to make my point direct and honest).  Most of what we say, myself somewhat included, is full of thoughtless pleasantries, shallow gossip and opinions handed to us by our traditions, societal upbringing and parents.  All in all, conversation is mostly meaningless and for self-gratification.

Some of you, by now - if you have cared to read this far -are probably saying to yourself, "well, I have meaningful conversations with my friends and family."  That is great if you do.  I hope you do.  However, I live in a very conservative state, surrounded by very close-minded individuals and, despite my efforts, have very few meaningful conversations.  I want this blog to be an expression of my thoughts and opinions that I more often than not keep tucked away inside the confines of my skull.

But enough self pity.  What is this all about.

I came from a very religious upbringing and as of two years ago was heavily invested in my religion.  If I'm honest with myself, I can say that my former religion did me a lot of damage but it also fueled me with a curiosity and a different way of thinking from most.  My religion gave me a quest for truth. (Many of you might be able to guess my religion from view that I will shortly share that reflect my previous beliefs).

I am an atheist now.  But I feel that I am not a normal atheist.  While I don't believe in anything supernatural, superstitious or any of that like, I do believe that there is a best way of living and that we can achieve that and that this best way of living could possible be called an objective truth - a truth that lies independently from ourselves.  (I know crazy, huh?)

That's what this blog is about.  It's about finding truth.  Truth in art, politics, family, religion (here's a hint: there is very few truths in religion) and living.  The questions I want to ask and try to answer are question like:  "What makes some art good and some bad?" and "What is the best way to run an economy" (It is definitely not capitalism) and "How good of a moral teacher was Jesus Christ?"  and "What can I do here and now to make a difference for a definite good in the lives of people around me?"  (I'll be using the word "definite" a lot).  This a just a few of hundreds of important questions.

Please leave comments or email me if you find any mistakes or if you disagree.  Although many people might not like it and might find it hypocritical or confusing, I have been known to change my mind on many things.  And I hope to change my mind on many things with your helpful comments and through this blog.