All Along The Watchtower

Hello again. Excuse the extremely long absence: I've always been a fairly flighty character, and as a result I've taken what could be considered an 'extended unannounced leave of absence' from blogging. All of that said, a comment by a friend at a party has caused me to get back into the whole thing, and so the few of you still paying any attention to it will get the dubious pleasure of reading my craziness once again.

Let's launch straight into it: what is it about internet communities that are so appealing to people? I'd love to say that I've been pondering this issue for days, but frankly, it has only recently occurred to me as a question thanks to Shamus Young at Twenty Sided. That said, after watching the long video (embedded at the end), it had raised some very important questions.

It has always been an important part of my 'knowledge' regarding self that Human Beings are inherently social creatures. This is not to say that we are collectivist, like ants, but that we rely on our social support structures. We are not truly Human Beings without the important and complicated frameworks of modern society. Humanity is more than simply a body. Don't assume that I subscribe to some notion of the 'soul': instead, I refer to the Terry Pratchett idea of human beings requiring stories to remain human. In his words, Humanity is where "the falling angel meets the rising ape", and he has something of a point.

The problem increasingly comes in a modern society with so much interconnectedness that the individual is increasingly being eroded. Simply using Google allows you to potentially find out an awful lot about a single person, and the more skilled you are at using it, the more you can find out. In a world like this, what does the word 'privacy' mean? After all, using what you find out on the internet, you could quite conceivably find out more that isn't strictly within the public domain.

On the other hand, the internet community provides a different kind of privacy: privacy by numbers. While a person isn't strictly anonymous, it is a challenge to pick one person out of a crowd. And the internet is the biggest crowd ever gathered: hundreds of millions of people all using the same tools, for different ends. This presents one of the greatest defenses against intrusion into your privacy: probability. It's impossible to watch everyone, so you may not be being watched.

Anyway, my task for you, readers is simple. I want you to watch the video, and I want you to decide what you think, both of YouTube, and of online communities in general. And then I want you to hit the comment button, and tell me.

Enjoy,

Lukasa

George Carlin

Why does everyone I like die? Seriously?

RIP George Carlin

Carl Sagan: Pale Blue Dot

Not much from me, just a video. Possibly my favourite video of all time. RIP Carl Sagan. RIP.

Never Is Enough

I find that I'm always at my most thoughtful (some would say soppy) late at night, when everyone around me is asleep and I appear to have the world to myself. Of course, when I'm at home, this is a lot earlier than when I'm at uni, but that's beside the point. What's important is that in these quiet times, when the only noise around me is the whirr of a computer fan and the silent noise of trees, I'm able to think with a degree of clarity, and perhaps melancholy, that I'm not really able to access at any other time.

I was always a dramatic person, in all senses of the word: I enjoyed (and still enjoy) acting, and was also careful to surround myself with drama. In this way, secondary school was very good for me, as there is no way to guarantee drama like shoving a thousand hormonal teenagers into half a square kilometre. I spent about 6 years in various different places, but all of them had the same vibe, and in that 6 years I learnt a lot that interests me, and a bit that's important to me. Now, if you don't mind me preaching for a little while, I'd like to elaborate a little on one of the second.

I am, and always have been, a geek. By all possible standards of the word, I was a major, major geek. Computer literate before anyone my age that I knew, my primary school called upon me to solve tech problems, before the called upon a staff member. I was academically sound, particularly strong in mathematics and science, and I wasn't particularly interested in sport. Jesus, I had a bloody telescope.

This didn't change as I grew up (the geekiness, not the telescope). However, it reached a point where I realised that there was something about my geekiness that was not necessarily an asset, socially speaking. I discovered that many people did not, in fact, enjoy science that much, and particularly did not take kindly to my science test scores. In essence, it occured to me that maybe, in order to get people to like me, it would be a sensible idea to dumb down.

So I adapted. I adapted and I learnt. I learnt how to hide the scientific interest, how to hide my enjoyment of videogames, how to hide the fact that I could while away several hours by absorbing myself in Lord of the Rings or 1984 or whatever book came my way. I also learnt that, in the absence of being good-looking, I had to rely on other traits: I fell back on sarcasm and sympathy.

The more astute among you will have realised where I'm going about this, but I'll be clear about the matter anyway: I'm referring specifically to the phenomenon of 'labelling'. Also known as stereotyping, this particular phenomenon is well known, and is best illustrated in the highly shallow world of secondary school. Now, before you quickly hit the 'home' button in an attempt to escape, let me clarify. I'm not going to preach about how labelling is some horrible thing that we should all avoid. This is not my high horse, and I'm not going to pretend that this little blog will fix the ills of the world; and furthermore, I'm not trying to get revenge on anyone I feel may have victimised me in the past. All I want to do is point out the few things I've learnt about labels:

1) They will define you.

People don't like this one much. People prefer to gloss over the issue, prefer to say "Oh no, I would never be so rash as to stereotype someone". Despite this, it happens every day. Consider the panicky white woman who crosses the road when the black kid is walking down the street. She may not actually be racist, frankly, but the stereotype of troublemakers has a depressingly black label attached to it. So she sees a black kid walking towards her, and makes a cognitive leap.

It happens when you let people know a little about yourself. "I play Dungeons and Dragons". In their head, a whole set of conclusions are leapt to from this point: he's shy, he's reclusive, he's good with numbers, he's a virgin, girls never talk to him, etc. "I like going out": he's a drunk, he's promiscuous (a great word, by the way), he's an idiot, he's talkative and he's not a hard worker. Whenever you have a form that includes the big box with the title "Tell us a bit about yourself", what it's really saying is 'Please help us put you in a box'.


2) You can choose them.

Strangely, this one is not hit upon so often. But in reality, there is very little preventing the vast majority of people being able to pick any of the labels they want. I went for sarcastic and nice because I was those things anyway, but if I wanted to become the popular, loud guy, I could have done that too. In some ways, this mitigates the affect of number 1: at least you can choose what conclusion others will jump to.


3) They don't matter.

They don't. Not a jot. It took me way too long to realise that, actually, it didn't matter whether people thought of me as 'the nice guy' or 'the geeky guy'. The only people who were going to rely on those labels were those who didn't know me very well, and frankly, those people are not very high up on my list of "People whose opinions I give a shit about". Anyone I spent any iota of time with will know that there is more to me than that, and that perhaps I shouldn't be judged on what I immediately appear to be. What's worse is that I only realised that in year 12. What a fool I am!

But for those of you still in education, let me add this conciliatory note: anyone who doesn't care about you, will be gone. I am currently in touch with 7 people from my secondary school (I counted my phonebook), and I don't feel like I should be in contact with more. These 7 people were not necessarily my closest friends in school, either, but in hindsight, they were probably my best ones: after all, they're the only ones still making an effort, a year later, to put up with my bullshit. And what more can I ask for than that?

Do schools kill creativity?

Imperial Creed linked a video in his comment on my previous post. It's an excellent video, and I thought that, rather than let it languish on the sidelines, I should make it easier to see. Thus, here it is:

Gifted

For quite a while now I've been wondering what exactly it is people mean when they say someone is gifted. I think the main reason I've wondered about this is because I've spent most of my life being put in that category.

I know this sounds conceited, but really, it's simply an observation. When I was in Melbourne, I was more or less the only white middle-class person in my year group, which was only 30 strong anyway. I knew more about computers than my teachers, and I was (depressingly) on excellent terms with the vast majority of the teaching staff. All in all, I was more or less a model student.

This theme was broadly repeated throughout my life. What is more weird is that I always suspect that people thought I did better than I actually did. I remember scoring good, but not amazing, GCSE results, and having everyone be really surprised. At the time, all I could think was: "I told you I wasn't that good."

I think the reason I find this strange is that I was always told I was good at something. People would say, "You're so good at Maths", or physics, or whatever. But from my perspective, I don't think that's quite true. What I was good at was learning.

I realised this in year 13. For some reason, anything that was put in front of my I would soak up. I'd write it down, do a couple of exercises, and then it'd be there. And I spent a long period of time confused by the fact that people didn't seem to catch on as quickly as I did. This also meant that I failed to develop a work ethic, and really, this is true amongst all gifted students. The question is: how gifted are you?

I ask this for one simple reason. When I got into highschool, I became friends with another of those 'gifted' types, who've had that label thrown at them all their life. And there's no denying, he was bright. And, like me, he had an awful work ethic. Chatty and easily distracted, we were horrible for most teachers, even though they barely had to teach us.

The difference is, come A-levels, I still did well. I walked into the exam having under-prepared, and came out of it having done far better than I had any right to do. He walked in, and came out with a D.

I was truly staggered. Here was someone who had performed amazingly well at every moment up until the actual test, and then he tanked. I was truly, truly shocked. And it put a lot in perspective for me. As it turns out, there eventually comes a time when raw talent won't carry you through any more. This differs from person to person, but eventually one has to realise that you simply aren't good enough to do this without help any more.

The problem, of course, lies in the treatment of 'gifted' children. It is incredibly difficult to integrate them into the standard strata of education, because if you do they will become bored and lazy due the fact that they will never be challenged. Conversely, remove them from the usual education system and they will lose their ability to reconcile their talents with those who lack them. The number of times I've seen 'gifted' students berate their colleagues for failing to recognise something ("It's so obvious, how can you not see that?") is almost uncountable, and it more or less boils down to a failure to understand that other people's minds may not work in the same fashion to yours.

Sadly, it's a tricky balance. What are your opinions of the 'gifted'? And, for that matter, of the 'entitled'? Let me know.

On Morality

Yesterday was a strange, strange day. I can leave most of it out, but the relevant part of it is that I spent a decent proportion of time reading Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, which is all well and good, but I should have been reading An Enquiry Into Human Understanding. Anyway, long story short, a member of my philosophy class noticed, and we ended up having a pretty in depth discussion about both the text, and about morality in general. As I suspect you're sick of my ranting and raving by this point, rather than complain about something specific in the world, I'll simply have a one-sided discussion regarding morality and moral theory.


Before we begin, a few quick caveats. This is primarily a discussion about moral theory. I will not sit here and preach at you, if only because I'm hardly in a position to dispense wisdom. In addition, I will mostly talk about 'established' moral theories. Sadly, my philosophical education is not particularly deep, and so I know a little about quite a few theories. Thus, if there is any member of my readership who has more detailed knowledge about any of the matters I touch upon, please, speak up in the comments. Finally, let me point out that discussion of morality has been going on for thousands of years. Do not expect my post to add anything new to the discussion. All I hope to do is open it up for you guys to think about it, and hopefully comment constructively beneath the post.

Also, a final warning: this post could take a very, very long time to read. (Portal, anyone?)

Morality is, and has almost always been, a major point of contention in society. The reason for this is simple: very few people agree. As a result, a great number of the 'famous' philosophers have at least dipped into the area of morality. This tends to mean that the area is a convoluted mess of hundreds of different people each expounding a different view, or at least a variation on the same view, which tends to mean that people bicker a lot. This also explains the Daily Mail.

The problem most moral theories suffer from is that they are, by necessity, extreme. A moral theory which says 'um, well, it depends, actually' tends not to get very far (with the exclusion of Virtue Theory, more of which later). As a result most theories tend to be a little...radical. Consider Kant's deontology. This will quite literally proscribe that lying is wrong in absolutely all circumstances. I'm sure you can think of quite a few examples off the top of your head where this feels a little ridiculous.

Of course, on the other hand, Kant's categorical impreative is actually a rather sensible peice of guidance, albeit one that is difficult to apply 'on the fly'. The second formulation of the imperative is best, which more or less runs as follows: "Act in such a fashion that you never treat a human being simply as a means, but always also as an end." In this particular context, treating someone as an 'end' means respecting their freedom as a moral and logical agent; namely, respecting their right to make choices. Thus, it is ok to treat someone as a means (hell, you do this with shopkeepers all the time) so long as you are still allowing them freedom to make choices.

On the other side of the map, we have Utilitarian theory, originally proposed by Jeremy Bentham, but then later refined by J.S Mill. Utilitarian theory, in its barebones state, says that you should act in such a fashion as to ensure 'the greatest good for the greatest number'. In this particular case, good refers to 'pleasure' or 'enjoyment'. Thus, so long as everyone feels good about things, you are acting in a moral fashion. Once again, however, criticism is fairly easy: after all, this theory allows murder in quite a few cases.

Mill, in what I consider to be his greatest faux pas actually made this theory worse (once again, my opinion) by implementing a distinction between the 'higher' and 'lower' pleasures, with higher pleasures (such as studying philosophy) being worth more 'pleasure points' than lower ones, such as eating a tasty burger.

Rather than continue to elaborate on various different moral theories, I'll instead talk briefly about the one that appeals to me most: Aristotle's Virtue Theory. Broadly, Aristotle says that the moral thing to do depends on the situation, and the person involved. Virtue theory is so called because Aristotle suggests that only the virtuous person knows how to act morally in a situation, and the only way to be a virtuous person is to cultivate the virtues. So, what Aristotle has said is that the moral thing for any person is different, depending on the circumstances and the type of person they are. Furthermore, if someone is a virtuous person, they will instictively do the morally correct action, and what's more, they will enjoy doing it.

This feels like an unhelpful guide, but Aristotle has happily indicated how it is that one becomes virtuous: namely, through practice. From the base point, it will be difficult to be virtuous; but the longer you try, the easier it becomes, and the more enjoyment you get from it, to the point where you will naturally be courageous, and generous, and kind, and fair.

There is one very simple reason that Aristotle's theory appeals to me, and that's because it's relativistic. Namely, it doesn't say that the virtues need to be the same, and it downright says that different people have a different 'moral act' in the same circumstance. Now, not everyone is a moral relativist, but I've always thought that the only way to avoid being a relativist is to be religious. After all, an atheist is forced to conclude that morality is a purely human societal construct, and as human society is not the same everywhere, morality must therefore not be the same everywhere.

Anyway, what are your thoughts? Could you guide the world in morality? Let me know.