As of tonight, I have an interesting claim to fame. I'm the only person I'm aware of who's been fobbed off by Daniel Dennett.
The scene: a packed lecture hall. Prof. Dennett is here to give a talk on his latest book, "Breaking the spell", which advocates for more detailed study of religion. This isn't something that many people (even those who, like me, believe it to be a worth cause) are willing to explicitly stand up for, due to the copious claims of blasphemy that tend to result, so he gets serious respect.
One of the things he mentions near the end is a way to push forward the study of religion, in a way that even the seriously religious would have trouble taking offence at. He suggests making study of world religions a mandatory part of education. In the UK we already have this, but apparently in the US this suggestion results in some serious shock on the part of his audiences. His stated reason for wanting this is that any religion that could survive the inevitable comparisons would have to be beneficial - that the selective pressure would result in only the nicest religions surviving.
I agree with the conclusion, but I disagree with the argument. It seems logical to me that this selective pressure would instead result in only the most virulent religions - those that make it very very hard to escape - surviving. These would be the ones that managed to completely stall people's rational thinking on the subject - for example, Roman Catholicism, with its threats of eternal damnation for anyone who even for a moment doubts the power of the Holy Spirit, or Islam, with its death threats against apostates, or pretty much any other form of fundamentalism.
The rest would tend to swirl down the plughole towards a sort of creedless humanism, which would sweep the field clear for these extremist religions. In short, we would be strongly selecting religions for increased "cultishness" rather than for increased benevolence.
I called Dennett on this (if anyone else was present: the tall guy in the bottom-right was me!) and his answer was interesting. He could obviously see the point of my question, but he spent his response completely sidestepping the issue and reiterating how not even fundamentalists would really have grounds to complain. That wasn't the point.
I think that teaching of world religions is a wonderful idea, for the slightly less pure reason that it knocks one of the major struts out from under religious beliefs. It's hard to believe that, for example, Christianity is in any way special when you see how much of it appears to have been ripped wholesale from Hinduism. I consider this de-strutting a good thing because it means that, for example, people might actually have to sit and think up a good reason for being anti-gay rather than just parroting Leviticus. From there, they might even be able to find their way through to joining the reality-based community*.
However, I don't think that it would necessarily achieve Dennett's stated goal of benevolent religion. And I think it's interested that Dennett so blatantly evaded the question - he seemed rather uncomfortable at having his pet idea challenged. Is it possible that the master of memes has himself become mildly infected?
(Reality Check Disclaimer: it's entirely possible that I completely misinterpreted his comments, or that he merely didn't have time to go into depth or something)
* More on this phrase later
Read the full post
Friday, March 17, 2006
Quality of Mind: Get Up And Go
(A one-off post)
Reading list: "The Luck Factor" by Prof. Richard Wiseman
A couple of days ago I was going through a period of being extremely motivated and getting lots of good stuff done. For the first time that I can recall, I was able to sit down and think through the patterns of thought that lead my mind to be this productive. I came to the conclusion that it's part of a running philosophical theme that I've completely failed to notice up til now.
That theme: When in doubt, just keep moving.
It sounds like a daft truism but, on closer reflection, it seems to encapsulate an attitude that distinguishes the successful from the unsuccessful, and the lazy (such as myself) from the motivated.
The reason why I'm blogging about it out of sequence (the rest of the personal philosophy stuff will come after the discussion of science) is because, by its very nature, it's a hard philosophy to sit down and write about. The only thing that's keeping me from following my own damn advice at the moment is a massive hangover, and that's wearing off so I'll keep this brief.
If you're just staring at the screen, browsing random websites, marking time til the next task comes along, this post is for you. Get off your butt, turn off the monitor and move. Find something to do, somewhere to go, someone to talk to, whatever. Just keep moving.
...
...
And if you've read down to this line then obviously you're not paying attention. I said MOVE!
Read the full post
Reading list: "The Luck Factor" by Prof. Richard Wiseman
A couple of days ago I was going through a period of being extremely motivated and getting lots of good stuff done. For the first time that I can recall, I was able to sit down and think through the patterns of thought that lead my mind to be this productive. I came to the conclusion that it's part of a running philosophical theme that I've completely failed to notice up til now.
That theme: When in doubt, just keep moving.
It sounds like a daft truism but, on closer reflection, it seems to encapsulate an attitude that distinguishes the successful from the unsuccessful, and the lazy (such as myself) from the motivated.
The reason why I'm blogging about it out of sequence (the rest of the personal philosophy stuff will come after the discussion of science) is because, by its very nature, it's a hard philosophy to sit down and write about. The only thing that's keeping me from following my own damn advice at the moment is a massive hangover, and that's wearing off so I'll keep this brief.
If you're just staring at the screen, browsing random websites, marking time til the next task comes along, this post is for you. Get off your butt, turn off the monitor and move. Find something to do, somewhere to go, someone to talk to, whatever. Just keep moving.
...
...
And if you've read down to this line then obviously you're not paying attention. I said MOVE!
Read the full post
Quality of mind: Science
There are several components to quality of thought, but they all basically boil down to understanding how the world works and acting on that understanding.
Now, as previously mentioned, understanding the world can be a good deal trickier than one might think. Apart from anything else, a decent chunk of such understanding is always going to be very very subjective, especially where other people are involved. However, for a given subset of the world - which I'll hitherto refer to as "consensual reality" - the scientific approach has demonstrated itself to be extremely effective.
The scientific approach consists of three main components:
1) Ways to ensure that your data and conclusions are accurate
2) Ways to ensure that someone else's data and conclusions are accurate
3) Ways to ensure that a community's data and conclusions are accurate
Some aspects of the scientific approach don't fit nicely into any of these categories, but I'll do my best to sort them out over the next few posts and explain why they give rise to such a powerful method of understanding the world.
Read the full post
Now, as previously mentioned, understanding the world can be a good deal trickier than one might think. Apart from anything else, a decent chunk of such understanding is always going to be very very subjective, especially where other people are involved. However, for a given subset of the world - which I'll hitherto refer to as "consensual reality" - the scientific approach has demonstrated itself to be extremely effective.
The scientific approach consists of three main components:
1) Ways to ensure that your data and conclusions are accurate
2) Ways to ensure that someone else's data and conclusions are accurate
3) Ways to ensure that a community's data and conclusions are accurate
Some aspects of the scientific approach don't fit nicely into any of these categories, but I'll do my best to sort them out over the next few posts and explain why they give rise to such a powerful method of understanding the world.
Read the full post
Sunday, January 08, 2006
Objective analysis
Note: this isn't strictly speaking a Quality-related post, but it lays some groundwork for what I'm going to talk about next.
Reading list:
"The Globe: Science of Discworld #2" - Terry Pratchett, Ian Stewart, Jack Cohen
One interesting thing about this life is it's never easy to get a straight answer. People by and large think in curves, and any answer they give you is likely to be a hyperbolic (apologies for pun) attempt to get you to do the same. Figuring out what is actually true based on the deeply biased information sources around you is about as easy as figuring which way is "up" when you've just been knocked off your surfboard and under the water by a 6ft wave.
This is why it's vitally important to figure out, as early as possible, what motivates the people around you. And nowhere is this more important than when figuring out what you should do.
For starters, any information that you get on morality from those around you is, in my experience, likely to be complete crap, the reason being that there's actually no such thing. It's a social construct and, like all social constructs, it attempts to imprint itself in the minds of those in the vicinity of its hosts.
How, then, to figure out what parts of the information you've been forcefed from an early age are remotely useful? How many of even the useful bits are any more than lies-to-children - approximations to the truth that are an effective way to keep you on the straight and narrow but that bear no resemblance to underlying reality?
Basically, there's no way. You're stuffed. By the point that you're able to actually read what I'm saying here (age 10 or so), you'll have been completely ruined as far as truly objective thought is concerned. The message of morality will have been beaten into you so strongly that you'll almost certainly be able to pass it on to the next generation with a straight face. Therefore the only way to build a better view of the world is to construct it logically and then hope like hell you can live according to it, regardless of how it clashes with your preconceived notions.
In my next post I'll start talking about the importance of critical thinking in building a truly high-Quality understanding of the world. It's quite a big topic so deserves its own post.
But wait, I hear you cry. If Lifewish is biased (which he almost certainly is) why should we trust him any more than we trust anyone else?
That's where the bit about bias comes in. Firstly, I'm writing this almost entirely for my own benefit - strike one against any deliberate bias. Secondly, I'm explicitly dealing with the issue of bias in my own thoughts, and when bias is dragged into the light it tends to die* - strike two. Thirdly, to the extent that I'm writing this blog for everyone else, my motives are very basic and thus easy to compensate for. Basically I find it a major ego-boost to think of you lot sitting down and actually stopping to think about my words. A motive that's pure as the driven yellow snow (to quote Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer). Strike three and out.
* This is the point of the scientific community. But that's another post.
Read the full post
Reading list:
"The Globe: Science of Discworld #2" - Terry Pratchett, Ian Stewart, Jack Cohen
One interesting thing about this life is it's never easy to get a straight answer. People by and large think in curves, and any answer they give you is likely to be a hyperbolic (apologies for pun) attempt to get you to do the same. Figuring out what is actually true based on the deeply biased information sources around you is about as easy as figuring which way is "up" when you've just been knocked off your surfboard and under the water by a 6ft wave.
This is why it's vitally important to figure out, as early as possible, what motivates the people around you. And nowhere is this more important than when figuring out what you should do.
For starters, any information that you get on morality from those around you is, in my experience, likely to be complete crap, the reason being that there's actually no such thing. It's a social construct and, like all social constructs, it attempts to imprint itself in the minds of those in the vicinity of its hosts.
How, then, to figure out what parts of the information you've been forcefed from an early age are remotely useful? How many of even the useful bits are any more than lies-to-children - approximations to the truth that are an effective way to keep you on the straight and narrow but that bear no resemblance to underlying reality?
Basically, there's no way. You're stuffed. By the point that you're able to actually read what I'm saying here (age 10 or so), you'll have been completely ruined as far as truly objective thought is concerned. The message of morality will have been beaten into you so strongly that you'll almost certainly be able to pass it on to the next generation with a straight face. Therefore the only way to build a better view of the world is to construct it logically and then hope like hell you can live according to it, regardless of how it clashes with your preconceived notions.
In my next post I'll start talking about the importance of critical thinking in building a truly high-Quality understanding of the world. It's quite a big topic so deserves its own post.
But wait, I hear you cry. If Lifewish is biased (which he almost certainly is) why should we trust him any more than we trust anyone else?
That's where the bit about bias comes in. Firstly, I'm writing this almost entirely for my own benefit - strike one against any deliberate bias. Secondly, I'm explicitly dealing with the issue of bias in my own thoughts, and when bias is dragged into the light it tends to die* - strike two. Thirdly, to the extent that I'm writing this blog for everyone else, my motives are very basic and thus easy to compensate for. Basically I find it a major ego-boost to think of you lot sitting down and actually stopping to think about my words. A motive that's pure as the driven yellow snow (to quote Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer). Strike three and out.
* This is the point of the scientific community. But that's another post.
Read the full post
Excellence from top to bottom
The basis of the philosophy of areté is the idea that, if you "improve" yourself enough, the world's your oyster. The interesting thing about this philosophy is that, as you read it, you're probably muttering to yourself "well that's bloody obvious, isn't it". But how many of you actually believe it? How many of you act as if it were true? I know at least one person who's convinced that "networking" is far more important than true quality will ever be, despite the fact that in the Quality schema of life networking is a comparatively small part. So is it really that obvious to you? Or have you just been told that Quality is a good thing long enough that you've started parroting it back? Think about that.
On to detail. The way I view my interactions with the world is as a sort of network stack (if you're not geeky enough to know what I'm talking about, see here, and if you still don't understand give me a yell). The application of areté here is to work on improving each level, attempting to improve each in turn. In the coming posts, I'll be talking about the work I've been doing on each level of the Quality stack. If there's anything you'd particularly like me to talk about, do mention it - it might conceivably be something I hadn't thought to work on.
A basic overview of the Quality stack would look something like:
The reason that they're arranged in that order is that each is a small, yet abnormally important, subset of the one above. Mind is dependent on brain, but despite the fact that it's effectively just a chunk of the body it demands special effort. Social behaviour is probably the single most important element of the mind*, and demands an entirely new paradigm to handle it fully. Each acts to some extent as a driving force for the previous one.
I'll be covering these areas in absolutely no particular order. Maybe after I've done a complete braindump of all my thoughts I'll be able to go back over them and figure out how the pieces fit together.
* In fact there's an hypothesis that the reason we evolved big brains is so we could lie more effectively to each other. Go figure.
Read the full post
On to detail. The way I view my interactions with the world is as a sort of network stack (if you're not geeky enough to know what I'm talking about, see here, and if you still don't understand give me a yell). The application of areté here is to work on improving each level, attempting to improve each in turn. In the coming posts, I'll be talking about the work I've been doing on each level of the Quality stack. If there's anything you'd particularly like me to talk about, do mention it - it might conceivably be something I hadn't thought to work on.
A basic overview of the Quality stack would look something like:
- Body
- Mind
- Social interactions
The reason that they're arranged in that order is that each is a small, yet abnormally important, subset of the one above. Mind is dependent on brain, but despite the fact that it's effectively just a chunk of the body it demands special effort. Social behaviour is probably the single most important element of the mind*, and demands an entirely new paradigm to handle it fully. Each acts to some extent as a driving force for the previous one.
I'll be covering these areas in absolutely no particular order. Maybe after I've done a complete braindump of all my thoughts I'll be able to go back over them and figure out how the pieces fit together.
* In fact there's an hypothesis that the reason we evolved big brains is so we could lie more effectively to each other. Go figure.
Read the full post
So what's with this "excellence" thing?
Book list for today:
"Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" - Robert M Pirsig
"Gates of Fire" - Steven Pressfield
"The Socratic Dialogues" - Plato
As a mathematics obsessive, I've always had a very analytical view of the world. I'm extremely good at breaking it up into chunks and finding out how it works. I'm very good at debating, at science, at figuring out what lies behind the curtain. All useful skills, but lately I've come to see that there's something missing.
That something is the "should" that drives life. A lot of people, particularly religious folk, get this handed to them on a platter. But I've never felt like I had a strong driving force, and to some extent that's resulted in a life of drifting. Fairly successful drifting, but drifting all the same.
I know how things work, but I don't know what I should be making them do next. I can see the various ways that my life could go in the future, but I barely have the motivation to choose. And that's having damaging effects, not least being the need to unburden myself and think stuff through on a blog :P
There is, however, a philosophy of life that provides the "should". It fits in very well with my current view of the world. Even if it turns out to be inaccurate, it will ensure that the time I spend following it isn't wasted. That philosophy is called areté, and it originates, as most of philosophy seems to, with the ancient Greeks.
My knowledge of philosophical history is extremely dodgy, so I'll skip the detail and just say that Socrates had some cool ideas. One of his key ones was a concept of Quality as being fundamental to an effective life. Quality is intrinsically a bugger to define cos it's goal-oriented. Quality is, at some level, "what you like". It's an attribute of one's interaction with surroundings that indicates that things are going well.
Slightly surprisingly, this can in fact be expanded into a full philosophy of life that's not in the slightest bit hedonistic (what a shame :P). The expanded version basically states that you should work at increasing this quality of interaction with the world around you. Attempting to structure my worldview around this idea has had some... interesting consequences.
Read the full post
"Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" - Robert M Pirsig
"Gates of Fire" - Steven Pressfield
"The Socratic Dialogues" - Plato
As a mathematics obsessive, I've always had a very analytical view of the world. I'm extremely good at breaking it up into chunks and finding out how it works. I'm very good at debating, at science, at figuring out what lies behind the curtain. All useful skills, but lately I've come to see that there's something missing.
That something is the "should" that drives life. A lot of people, particularly religious folk, get this handed to them on a platter. But I've never felt like I had a strong driving force, and to some extent that's resulted in a life of drifting. Fairly successful drifting, but drifting all the same.
I know how things work, but I don't know what I should be making them do next. I can see the various ways that my life could go in the future, but I barely have the motivation to choose. And that's having damaging effects, not least being the need to unburden myself and think stuff through on a blog :P
There is, however, a philosophy of life that provides the "should". It fits in very well with my current view of the world. Even if it turns out to be inaccurate, it will ensure that the time I spend following it isn't wasted. That philosophy is called areté, and it originates, as most of philosophy seems to, with the ancient Greeks.
My knowledge of philosophical history is extremely dodgy, so I'll skip the detail and just say that Socrates had some cool ideas. One of his key ones was a concept of Quality as being fundamental to an effective life. Quality is intrinsically a bugger to define cos it's goal-oriented. Quality is, at some level, "what you like". It's an attribute of one's interaction with surroundings that indicates that things are going well.
Slightly surprisingly, this can in fact be expanded into a full philosophy of life that's not in the slightest bit hedonistic (what a shame :P). The expanded version basically states that you should work at increasing this quality of interaction with the world around you. Attempting to structure my worldview around this idea has had some... interesting consequences.
Read the full post
New day, new ideas, new blog
So over the past couple of years I've been playing around with a philosophical concept - areté, the ancient greek word for "excellence". Areté seems to be the key to a lot of life, so I'm planning to turn this otherwise-useless blog into a discussion of my views on it.
I probably won't be posting terribly regularly due to the limitations of work. I also plan to keep this blog fairly anonymous. This may prove problematic since, due to minor idiocy on my part, I've managed to link it to my real identity. If you have seen me in enough forums to be aware of this link then you're probably entitled to know about it, but I'd ask that people not go actively hunting for it and in fact do their best to take this blog at face value without reference to Real Life [tm].
Read the full post
I probably won't be posting terribly regularly due to the limitations of work. I also plan to keep this blog fairly anonymous. This may prove problematic since, due to minor idiocy on my part, I've managed to link it to my real identity. If you have seen me in enough forums to be aware of this link then you're probably entitled to know about it, but I'd ask that people not go actively hunting for it and in fact do their best to take this blog at face value without reference to Real Life [tm].
Read the full post
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
The lowdown
OK, I confess, I'm only signed onto this system cos someone has a bloggers-only blog that I'd like to comment on.
Bonus is that I get to create a new online identity - you can never have too many of those. Anyway, metasyntactic is a cool word - almost worth creating the blog for in and of itself.
Read the full post
Bonus is that I get to create a new online identity - you can never have too many of those. Anyway, metasyntactic is a cool word - almost worth creating the blog for in and of itself.
Read the full post
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
