#294

To continue on a bit from yesterday: a wholly disproportionate percentage of our lives are made up of and/or reliant on pure anecdote. The human being has been raised that way, yes, for lack of many better options. We are memetic animals and that's just how it is. However, there is a difference between a demonstrative meme (which can be concrete or metaphorical) and the other kinds, which can be divided roughly into three groups: theoretical (like hypotheses), recreational (tall tales, jokes, and the like), and bullshit. 

Bullshit's alright in sane measure. Fertilizer, y'know. Problem is, as I said, in the proportion. The huge difference between a demonstrative meme--for example: the sun rises in a direction which is one of four cardinal directions and sets in a second, from which the remaining pair can be derived--and bullshit--for example: masturbating will make you go blind.

Well, see, the sun rises in the east. It might not always do so forever into an infinite future, but it's demonstrable for the present, day in and day out. And while you might masturbate, and go blind, no one can prove that there exists a correlation there, meaning that, for the present, to assert causation is to propagate bullshit. 

Because bullshit can sound so much like a theoretical meme, and theoretical memes can sometimes become demonstrated, or seem to be demonstrated, and therefore concrete enough for honest use, bullshit often passes for the truth. Individuals can build whole worldviews based on anecdotal bullshit and believe they are operating on rational grounds, when they are really being manipulated by tricksters, officers of a nation-state, or sacerdotal entities.

There's nothing wrong with that--as I say, governments bank on this to form order from chaos, and it seems tolerable within certain limits--but it can be frustrating, and get out of control fast, because once you believe a little too much bullshit, it's hard to determine where bullshit-eating has to stop. What is persuasive becomes more real than what is true. The truth has no real sales pitch; bullshit has infinity of them and they almost always sound better. Sophistry.

Anyway. All this is to say that we would do well to instill in ourselves a rigorous metric of verification before incorporating any new information into our thinking, and be engaged in a dispassionate vetting process of what we think we believe. Thus, our Socratic thinking, praise God. 

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Don't know why I feel compelled to try to squeeze these things out on such a crunch time--after waking up, exercising, and making coffee, before breakfast and getting ready to leave for work. But the hours are quite busy after work these days, what with moving books and painting walls/ceilings and whatnot, so I guess they wouldn't get typed otherwise.

Truth is, while I detest working on a deadline, and won't really do it even if I set it myself for some inane reason, I enjoy the challenge of a time trial. Even if I fail, or generate totally idiotic drivel, it's more of a fun time.

Ok, peace the fuck out

--JL

#245

Native Son is so fucking good, Richard Wright is such a fucking genius. My mind is fucking blown. I had a lot of questions concerning Richard Wright's interpretation of American life when I first read Black Boy and Native Son, but living in America this whole time since then has made me understand: this dude knew the psychology of it all cold, and he fucking told it straight, simple, and true. Genius. James Baldwin style. Oh! That's it. I read James Baldwin, and now I understand Richard Wright better. But could I have understood James Baldwin, felt him and reveled in his brilliance as I did, if I had not first read, and been troubled by, Richard Wright? Who knows! All I know is I am damn glad I have both their books around. The most basic fact and most important takeaway is that they are two of the most talented craftsmen in their field, ever, period. Those mothers knew how to fucking write. 

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If you have read Crime and Punishment and not Native Son, I challenge you in no uncertain terms: you oughta catch up.

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I think--almost sure--that I will read Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain now. Could go a different way but that is what is currently in my mind.

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People who pretend to read, people who pretend to watch--see--and people who pretend to think, are capable of believing themselves brilliant, astute, correct, qualified, any number of fine adjectives that suit their vanity and ease their consciences. 

In truth, these nonentities merely serve as nodes on a memetic string they dance upon and propagate but do not comprehend. 

There is no stopping a meme--their power is too great, the willing nodes too numerous--but you don't have to believe them. You, personally, the brain that thinks. How memes might force you to respond to them is another matter, but your mind is always free to understand more deeply than a meme, to think and doubt and believe more freely than you are free to act--if you are able to muster the courage, the humility, and the faith in your own selfhood that this freedom requires.

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SMOKE WEED EVERY DAAAAAAAAY

--JL

#151

Number one hundred and fifty-one is just as special as one hundred and fifty, for very similar reasons to the ones sketched in brief yesterday. 

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I wonder if one could translate something like, say, a Socratic dialogue into a brief series of memes, and lose no overall textual payload. Memes might have sufficient explicative power to carry it off.

More accessible by far than something like a condensation or a "cliff's" "note".

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Had the thought that the universe is just an incomprehensible equation working itself out.

We have managed to piece together so little of the math involved. Gonna have to evolve so hard just to understand more math.

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Cool. Yet another robust and worthy post, ornately accomplishing nothing. I just pulled a band-aid off my forearm and tore off quite a bit of hair. Positively hilarious.


--JL