Consider the Lilies

Modern Racism

I want to start by saying that I think there is less racism in the world than there has ever been, more tolerance, more acceptance of diversity. I think this is continuing and will continue as people get to meet more people from different backgrounds. But I want to talk about racism and how it is evolving. I'm going to be talking about race in the USA, since that is what I am most familiar with but I think humans are humans around the world and similar circumstances produce similar results.

For a start I think the number of people who are now consciously racist, the people who think that based on their race they are superior to other races, is small in the USA. What I mean by this is if asked a direct question about race a solid majority of people in the USA will reply that they are not racist. It is now taboo in the USA to be racist.

However, there is an all-pervasive awareness of race in the USA. I remember this being perhaps the biggest culture-shock for me when I came here at 18. I had grown up in an essentially all-white culture where race as a concept was absent because race as an issue was non-existent. I was shocked to discover that in the USA there is a different culture with a different dialect, different clothing, different music based on skin color. The stereotypical stand-up comedian routine is black guys do things this way and white guys do things a different way. I think this cultural difference linked to race is now where racism is based in the USA.

What is going on now is that the majority of Americans have been taught through their cultural experiences to associate black, urban culture with crime, violence, and drug-use. A great example is the contrast between how Barak Obama and his ex-pastor, Reverend Wright are viewed by people. Barak Obama is not considered a threat because he dresses like an executive, talks like an executive, doesn't use a standard "black" dialect. He seems like an extremely tanned white guy. But his ex-pastor wears African-inspired outfits (in an African-inspired church), and has the dialect, cadence and volume to his speech more associated with urban black men. The actual words that Mr. Wright spoke are only inflammatory if you read just three of them and ignore the rest, it's the tone and the look that is frightening.

But you don't have to be black to be part of this frightening culture (although it certainly helps), there are thousands of young, white men wearing the uniform

This is where we are in the USA today. There is a culture that is associated with crime, violence and fear and that culture is also associated with black people.  This association is so well established that it operates at an unconscious level.  Black men are followed around in stores by security guards more than white men.  Ask a judge if he is racist and he will reply that he isn't, but black men are convicted of the same crime at a far higher rate than white men.  You are probably somewhat racist in this manner even though you would be outraged at the idea.  Take this test and find out, I am a bit racist even though I hate the idea that I am.  By the way, while black people also have implicit bias, these biases can be for or against black people.  This sort of racism will only disappear when the associations based on culture disappear. 

This doesn't mean that black people should pretend to be white, but rather that race shouldn't enter in the equation.  When a young, black man has the same chance of liking and dressing like Green Day as Jay Z, when there is no Black Entertainment Channel, or Ebony magazine then this implicit bias will be dramatically reduced.  This doesn't mean that the change in culture has to go one way, but I think it already often goes from being black culture to being white culture (how many white guys starting playing the blues?  How many black guys started playing heavy metal or punk?)

For me the big question is when the formal recognition of differences in race should disappear?  At the moment it is said that we should talk about race and the consequences in our society.  At some point it will become important that we don't talk about race.  At the moment there are significant differences in opportunity for different races from health care to education to business opportunities and these differences probably still require government intervention.  At some point this intervention should stop, because it differentiates based on race, it is racist.  This dissolution of recognition of differences can't wait until everything is equal.  For a start, in a capitalist society things cannot be equal.  Secondly, such a recognition at some point will do more harm in promoting a racist separation than it will do good in attempting to equalize opportunity.  I don't think that time is now, but probably parts of this should start happening soon.

I have two extra points; one being that a reduction in racism doesn't necessarily mean a reduction in discrimination, the poor are becoming a group thought of as inherently inferior in character, the other being that I have started writing a post on this topic several times over the years but have stopped before publishing.  I am so aware of the dangers of this subject that I have been loathe to take the risk of writing about it, after all, I am a white man.

Unitasking

Unitasking is the obverse of multitasking, just doing one thing at a time.  The word needs to be used now because multitasking (an acceptable word now on spell check) is so ubiquitous.  The original concept of multitasking was that you could get more done by doing multiple things at once.  The gaps between steps in one task could be filled by steps in another.  This sounds completely reasonable and the concept has spread so that it will be quite common to have someone at work interrupt an e-mail to talk on the phone while checking something on their desk..

This multitasking concept has spread beyond the office so that it seems that if we aren't sleeping many of us are multitasking most of the time.  People talking on a cell phone in a park, watching tv while surfing the internet and having a conversation.  People seem now to be bored if just a single thing is happening.  It has now reached the level that while having dinner with people I have had people texting to people.

In our news this multitasking has taken effect to such an extent that there will be a piece of the screen with actual people on it, but also a ticker moving along the bottom, a piece of news above that, and then pop-up ads or news in one corner.  While watching an interview three other things are available for your attention.

Multitasking intuitively sounds like a good idea.  We are given all sorts of tools in which to increase and improve our multitasking.  We should be able to increase our level of productivity, enjoyment, and education  we should be able to essentially live more.  The problem is that multitasking doesn't really work that well.  People who focus on what they are doing right now are happier at that moment than people with multiple foci.  A person solving a puzzle from start to finish will be happier than someone solving a puzzle with the tv on and stopping to check their e-mail.  They will also be more productive with that task.  You will get more done if you solve a puzzle, then check your e-mail, and then watch tv than trying to do them all at the same time.

Multitasking also has longer term problems, it becomes addictive, and like most addictions life without multitasking can seem bleak, as if we are missing something.  I know I feel this way quite often.

Unitasking is simply focusing on one thing.  If you are doing dishes then focus on doing dishes.  If you are planning a party focus on the planning until the planning is done.  If you are walking then notice where you are rather than thinking about something else (I am terrible at this.)  I am making a conscious effort to increase my amount of unitasking.  As with all things I will succeed to an extent, and fail to an extent.

"Texas, where optimism goes to die."

The title of this blog post is a quote from my darling wife and not a sweeping statement.  I am sure there are lots of optimistic people in Texas.  It was a quote from about two weeks ago when she did not get a job for which she was more qualified than the recipient of the job in the areas that were described in the job description.  Apparently those responsible for hiring wanted someone with a different set of qualifications than those published. While there are probably good reasons for hiring such a person and for advertizing for a particular position, this didn't prevent disappointment.

The reason for the sweeping statement is because this feels like the latest in an uninterrupted line of disappointments. When coming down to Houston we had a number of hopes for the situation, perhaps hopes isn't strong enough as they were more like expectations.  We expected to make money in Houston, my darling wife's salary is larger than the cost of living as long as nothing goes wrong.  Enough things have broken that we have actually lost money.  My darling wife was promised a position that wasn't given, and expected to rise the one level to a new, nationally marketable position (the one to which she just applied).  We expected that the work environment would be more pleasant than the office in Portland, which seemed dysfunctional and political, but entirely the reverse is true.  We thought there would be excitement and interest in what we assumed to be essentially a different country but what we have found is not excitement but largely contempt for our human environment.  We even were excited by the idea of tropical weather, to find two straight years of unusually intense heat and severe drought.

Our hopes and expectations have all been dashed.  We have now reached a situation where it seems that optimism in Texas is simply a method to produce disappointment.  We are both describing ourselves as, "Done."  Apathy has descended upon us both. I have stopped learning Spanish, mostly stopped playing music, and writing this blog has been infrequent.  I take a lot of naps, play a lot of video games, and drink a lot of beer.

On the other hand I live in a lovely house where I can sit by the pool sipping cocktails looking up at palm trees rippling in the wind.  We are not worried about imminent hunger, shelter, health care and all the other necessities.  I eat well, sleep in a comfortable bed, and have access to the most wonderful informational tool ever devised. My marriage is fantastic.  I am very hopeful and optimistic about humanity as a whole.  I think my life is overall getting better rather than worse (effective treatment for a mental illness will do that).  Taking the time to count my blessings results in a hell of a lot of blessings.

Buddhists talk about bliss being the death of the ego and the removal of all desires.  Scientific research into happiness shows that optimism makes you happier than pessimism.  Hope is the ground upon which all worthwhile activity is built.  People are complicated and happiness is complicated and the paths to it are varied.  I think a healthy way to live is to have hope and optimism, but understand that a lot of the time you will be disappointed, but that disappointment is a transitory thing that can be ameliorated by a different viewpoint. 

This is another cycle, a theme of mine, as I described here. I've been "done" before and it will go away.  I will be at peace, serene, happy again.  I will invent new and different hopes, and some of them will be dashed.  Iit would be nice if it happened in a place where optimism doesn't die.

My Greatest Regret

Like all sane people I am not a fan of regret.  The most that can be said for regret is that it can possibly teach you how to make better decisions in the future.  Particularly silly is the regret that came about through no action of your own.  Disappointment for something over which you had no control is an entirely wasteful emotion.  So naturally my greatest regret is something that was beyond my control.

"Do what you love" is almost universal advice.  There has been only one activity to which I had unstinting love, and that is playing football.  There is lots of evidence that the masters of an activity get to that point by performing the activity for 10,000 hours or more.  Between the ages of 5 and 10 the minimum amount of hours I had played football were, by my calculations, 1,300.  That's an hour a day, five days a week.  I played at every single break at school, in fact I was one of those children who would walk to school while practicing.  I would try to get to and from school without picking up the ball or letting it go into the street.  I loved playing football, it was something of which I never became tired, I just wanted to play and play and play.

I was good at it too, really good.  I played with my school team three years younger than the oldest children (a small seven playing with ten year olds), captained the team a year later and we won our division.  In my last year in primary school I was selected for a district team, a selection of the best players from schools in the area.  A fond memory I have is of playing in a school playground and being on a team that was just much better than the other side, to the point that the opposition were simply being dispirited.  I switched sides and the goals just mounted until we were winning.

I am sure that my parents didn't notice.  At the time English football was a working class pastime surrounded by the risk of violence.  Middle class families didn't spend much time with football, while in England I went to see one football much, England versus Wales at Wembley stadium.  Looking at the records I must have been nine years old (I remember the score was 0-0), but it was quite an intimidating atmosphere.  We didn't watch football on television and I think my mother came and saw one game I played (although I may be confusing that with one of the two of my rugby games she attended.)  There were four children and two full, or more than full, time jobs.  Parents in England didn't attend their child's games at the time.  For them this was just a boy playing.

When I turned ten my parents decided we would move to the countryside, and the school was a rugby playing school.  There were no football teams, no coaching, no playing it in PE.  I continued to play every day in my school uniform on asphalt during breaks and lunch.  At points I was actually not allowed to play by my fellow pupils because my team always won.  At about seventeen my peers became too cool to play during breaks and so my participation waned.  Apart from a brief revival in college, that was pretty much it for me and the game that I loved.

I am certain that with the right circumstances I could have been a professional footballer.  I am not saying that I would have been on the best teams, or even close to them, but I know with the opportunity and coaching I could have made a living playing the game I love.  Perhaps I could have actually been really good, who knows?  I know that without that change of location to a different sort of school I would have had a chance at making my living doing the one thing I have loved more than anything else.

Grief Part II

This morning I checked my e-mail and found out that my grandmother, the last of my grandparents, had died.  E-mail is fine, that's how I generally communicate with my family.  I had written a post on grief recently and it seemed appropriate to examine my feelings at this time.  A mind that attempts to be rational must evaluate its predictions with regard to its own state.

In my previous post I had written;

Personally I am bad at grief in that I just don't feel it as much as most people.  What drives me towards misery is a change in my own life, my personal pain is based on selfishness.  When my grandfathers died it didn't really bother me.  I hadn't seen them in a few years, they weren't a big part of my life anymore, they were old and old people die.  My reaction to the deaths of my friends was similarly muted, it was bad news but it didn't drive me into depression.  On the other hand, if my wife left me I would be devastated.  That's just me.  It doesn't make me look good, and I feel a little guilty about it.  So, I want to say that my understanding of grief comes largely from a distance.

However, if I am in proximity to someone experiencing grief I feel enormous sympathy for them.  It hurts me more to see someone grieve than for me to grieve.

How did I do?  Well, I didn't feel very much at all, certainly no inner pain.  I had seen my grandmother twice as an adult, half of the time with her convinced we were not related because of my accent.  At no point did either of us exhibit any sign of particular affection towards beach other.  In fact, I cannot recall either of us liking each other at any stage of our respective lives.  Furthermore, I hadn't seen her in ten years.  Our proximity approached zero.

Most of my reaction was towards the well-being of other people.  My mother has lost a parent and so this probably brings about a fundamental change in her sense of her identity.  No longer is she the daughter of anyone, now she is always the oldest in a family.  No longer is she the primary source of caring for anyone.  There is also a long and profound history of proximity, a shared existence which is no longer there.  My sisters were still involved, and having children of their own are almost certainly more connected to the idea of family.  I don't have any idea how my brother would feel in such a situation.   So, I care that my mother and sisters have lost someone in proximity to them, a family member, and so a change in who they are.

However, I have too further thoughts on the matter.  The first is that I am expected to feel more than this, that there is something wrong with me if I don't, in fact that there is something somewhat disgusting about someone who doesn't automatically care about family.  I wouldn't be surprised at all to discover that the majority feeling about this blog was that I was keeping my true feelings from myself.  I feel a bit of guilt that I don't feel grief, or at least feel the need to approximate it for other people, I don't really want to disturb people at this time.

I went for a walk to examine my feelings and found myself quite quickly thinking about other things with which I may be involved in the near future.

Chapter 10

The sun sank behind the tangled trees leaving a warm glow permeating the damp air.  The cries of dusk flooded out from the jungle, starting suddenly at some unknown signal.  The river flowed, dark and smooth, a broad ribbon of quiet power bordered by frantic, living chaos.

Three old men, surrounded by children fluttering like moths around a candle, emerged from the forest carrying boxes.  Each of the children held in their hands a wooden boat, which each had carved or whittled (according to their skill) over the previous weeks or days (according to their discipline) for this very night.  The elders walked out onto the little promontory of rock and slowly settled on the ground, their joints popping and creaking.  The children whirled around them, pleading and begging for attention, flourishing their little wooden boats.  The universal gestures asking for calm and patience were produced and the children gathered around in a restless circle.

In turn each of the children handed their carved treasure to one of the old men, who took from their box a delicate, translucent globe made of paper and attached it to the boat.  With a brief admonishment to be careful the boat was then passed back to the child who walked away towards the part of the promontory furthest into the current of the stream.  The care with which the children walked, protecting their glorious prizes, was just the sweet side of comical.

Once all of the boats had been equipped with their globes the elders closed the boxes, groaned to their feet, stretching and grimacing, and then limped over towards the children.  A transformation had come over the children as they stood silently and attentive, easing out of the way as the old men walked through them and gingerly stepped into the shallow water.  They steadied themselves against the pull of the current, the smoothness of the water hiding the power beneath its surface.  As any elder will do with a child and potential danger they gave the necessary warning about the hungry nature of the river, some of which may even have penetrated the gleaming eyes of the listeners.

It was truly dusk now, right on the cusp of night.  The sky was falling through the darker shades of blue and the first pinpricks of brightness were appearing in the heavens.  Three children passed over their boats and three men kindled slender flames in their hands and delicately lit the tiny candles within the globes.  As the boats were ever-so-gently placed onto the water both elder and child intoned, "Peace, hooloo hoo, peace."  The delicate globes of light, creating pools of light reflecting off the water and through the steamy air, drifted off downstream.

"Go little ones!  Go!  Run to your families" encouraged one of the elders to the children watching their magical boats drift off downstream.  Squealing with delight the three children ran back along the promontory and dashed down the path at the edge of the river towards their families, gathered together some distance downstream.  The elders worked efficiently, putting the light-boats into the water surely but quickly, producing a glowing flotilla drifting down the broad, black stream.  The last children were dancing with impatience for their turn to come, and when it did they sprinted off after the others so as not to miss anything.

As the last light moved away from them the old men came together, arms on each others shoulders, smiling the warm, contented smile that comes from making children happy with something that made you happy all those years ago.  They did not have the youthful legs necessary to see the next part, but they had seen it before and were glad to have played their part.  Somehow the time spent with the children and the sacrifice that came with the task made it all an honor, an added sweetness.

Downstream the rest of the village had gathered at an open spot by the side of the river.  Across from them was impenetrable jungle, at this point entirely dark.  The children dashed up to their parents, gasping for breath and trying to tell them about the events on the promontory but were hushed and told to look.  A quiet came over the villagers, all standing together in the dark as the first light of the flotilla came around a gentle curve.  It was eerie, safe, comforting, exciting, all at once.  There was a collective holding of breath as the individual bowls of light began to pass before them. 

Then, there!  Across the river, what had been total darkness now had two small green lights peering out.  They were joined quickly by other pairs of little green lights, shifting to the accompaniment of rustling leaves.  A pause as perfect stillness  came to the night, only broken by the drifting lights on the river.  Then a sound.  A deep throated vibration from across the river.  A man stepped forward and sang a single, sonorous note, "Hooooooooooo."  The night stood still again.

Among the green lights a chorus began.  Deep thrums, and higher calls, all the notes of a giant horn.  "Hoooommm  hooooloooooo hooooo."  The villagers took up the call and the river vibrated to the harmony of voices vibrating through the dark as the globes of light drifted down the great river.

As the last light passed and wended its way into the night the calls faded, and died away.  The villagers looked across at the green lights, which looked back for a moment and then vanished with the rustling of jungle leaves.  There was silence for just a moment, a chance to take in that magical moment that had gone so well.  Smiling faces and thanks for "Peace this year, hooloo hoo, peace."

The villagers held hands and walked their way back to the village for the fun of fire and feasting.

I Don't Understand...

People who like deserts, or plains.  Death, or unrelieved sameness.

Why people like free jazz.  You start with music, and then take out all the things in music that differentiate it from sounds.

People who don't like Bob Marley's music.  I can't get away from the idea that if you don't like good reggae there is something fundamentally wrong with you.

People who say that they couldn't work out what to do if they didn't work.  Really?

People who want to live their lives in one place.  Once you have done everything you can do in one place, don't you want to try all the things you could do somewhere else?

Why everyone knows that money can't buy happiness, and yet vast amounts of people act as if it does.

Why there is fashion.  Why would something being new be inherently better?

Why people are proud to be from where they are from.  They had nothing to do with it.

Why my girlfriends and wife have all had to tell me everything about their day even when they know I don't care, and don't care that I don't care.  But they really, really do, and so I listen.

Leather car seats.

Rice pudding.

Why people choose Miller Lite over actual beer.

Why some things are literature and some things are pulp, and everything in between.  It's all books.

Intelligent, interesting, vibrant people who don't like Terry Pratchett.

Package holidays/cruise ships if you don't have children.

Voluntarily listening to Stevie Nicks.

Disclaimer.  Other people do understand these things and they are only completely wrong because I have decided they are wrong without any inherent reason or justification.

Tired

I have been tired quite a lot recently.  This seems ridiculous because I have such a large amount of time to sleep.  I don't have the minimum of 45 hours of work a week for a full-time job.  45 hours?*  I have fewer and more flexible hours. 

Most of this post is redundant, written in a post on this blog before, but more than four years ago, so you probably don't remember it.  It is interesting to see that not much has changed in those four years.

Anyway, I should have enough time to get more than my fair share of sleep.  However, The Face of Evil and my wife agree that 6:30am is the correct time to get up.  Before the Face of Evil and my wife this seemed to me to be a crazy idea.  Getting up at or before dawn is simply unnatural.  While The Face of Evil and I are agreed that one should go to sleep early enough for a long nights sleep, my wife disagrees to some extent.  My wife has always needed less sleep than I do.  She goes for seven hours, I for more like nine.  The nights that I get the most sleep are when my wife is very tired and needs to go to bed early (also known as "giving up")

I am a bad sleeper.  Or at least I am bad at falling asleep.  Generally throughout my life I have done well at sleeping once asleep, I am dead to the world.  This has been changing recently.  The upshot of my love's sleeping habits and my difficulty in getting to sleep is that my basic length of sleep is confined to the hours that my wife sleeps.  So, after an uninterrupted nights sleep I start the day down two hours, and then walk the dog and eat breakfast for two hours or so.  At this point I have a choice to make, have a cup of coffee and stay awake throughout the day, or take a nap.

The cup of coffee is quite pleasant.  It is enervating and lifts my mood, particularly now with the magic blue pills.  I quite happily get through the day.  Naps are awesome.  Wonderful.  Fantastic.  Lying in a comfortable place with the dappled light of day, slipping in and out of dreams is one of my favorite things to do.  However, naps are not a good way to get the sleep you need.  They aren't a full, regular, repeating cycle that makes up a great night of sleep.  You probably know that foggy, bleary feeling upon waking.

Staying awake with coffee is fine that day, but this deprivation builds up over the days so that the next day I am more tired than I would have been.  Taking a nap generally provides the right amount of sleep, but in a divided less effective manner.  However, the rhythms of the household don't change very much except later nights on the weekend and I have one morning off a week from walking the dog, but because of my bad sleeping skills, once woken for five or ten minutes I find it hard to get back to sleep.  So, I don't get that rejuvenating long sleep many get on a weekend morning. My darling wife manages to catch up with ten hours on Sunday.

I, like many, if not most people in our society, operate on less sleep than I want or need.  A lot of the time I feel tired.  Why does this matter?  It matters because the quality of life goes down when you are tired.  We all know that when we are tired we find it harder to focus, we are less motivated to do things, we are more irritable, our ability to think and reason is reduced.  Being tired even feels unpleasant, itchy eyes, a feeling of extra weight, a greater tendency towards sadness and depression.

So what is natural sleep?  How much should I (we) be getting and how would it be different?  The answer is two sets of four hours over a continual period of ten hours, with a meditative period of two hours awake in the dark around midnight.  One of the good effects of just knowing this is that when you wake up in the middle of the night and don't go right back to sleep, that's normal, natural, and healthy.  This consistent amount is based on our having evolved around the equator where the hours of day and night don't vary.  Go to bed in the dark, give yourself ten hours of darkness, stay in bed when you wake up in the middle of the night, and wake up in the dark.  Those from the world of the electric light bulb who try this report that they realize that they have never before been truly awake.  Some day I really hope to try this for a month or so.

Natural sleep.

One of the symptoms of my bipolar disorder was that about once a month for about four consecutive days I would feel absolutely exhausted.  Lying down to sleep at any opportunity.  Stairs were hard work.  As a result, whenever I feel very tired I wonder if my illness is coming back (it isn't.)  I just assumed that I caught influenza viruses all the time without realizing what was actually going on.  Magic blue pills have removed this source of exhaustion, but they have also increased my brain's activity during the night.  I have the most amazing, long vivid dreams now.  I toss and turn more than I used to, wake up in the night more than I used to, and my mind wanders at high speed when I turn out the light.  One of the side-effects for the medication is drowsiness.

Today I realize I have a cold, a little cold, no big deal.  It just adds on a little bit to what makes me tired.  When I am tired I don't want to do the things I should and things are less fun.  I am tired.  Whoop-de-doo.  try working all day in construction.

*  One of the problems people have in calculating their work time is in including the things you must do in order to work for which you aren't paid.  I am including a half hour commute, which you have to do to work and you wouldn't do if you didn't work.  Commuting is consistently rated the most disliked regular activity, worse than chores or work.  You are not directly paid for your least liked portion of work.  This is one of the calculations we make for deciding if Christina wants a new job, an extra hour a day of commuting is more than a 10% pay cut and a substantial decrease in the quality of working conditions.

Chapter 9

Sean Chang, iNews
3/5/62

The idea of life around different stars has captured and inspired the imagination of people since it became known that those twinkling lights in the sky were suns, much like our own, instead of lights in the firmament.  These thoughts were confined to the imagination, despite the many claims of extra-terrestrials visiting our planets, until the 1960's when technology reached a point at which we could realistically start a search.  Starting with single astronomers and developing into governmental funded projects, first in the Soviet Union and then in the United States, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) began in earnest.

These efforts concentrated on the study of electromagnetic radiation, the range of radiation from microwaves to gamma rays.  It was assumed that the best chance for finding alien life was the assumption that an advanced civilization would have developed radio, and television, and satellites which all broadcast electromagnetic radiation.  Of course, stars and other astronomical phenomena also broadcast in the electromagnetic spectrum, how would we tell the difference?  The answer is in the same way that we can tell the difference between language and the sounds of nature, a complicated structure that does not appear in nature.  Perhaps other civilizations are also looking for us, broadcasting signals that they hope we will notice.

We have been listening to the skies for a hundred years now, and are still to hear anything from intelligent neighbors.  During this time we have looked for these patterns in signals from about 15,000 stars.  While this is a tiny fraction of the stars in our galaxy the sense of futility inevitably grows.  Are we alone?  Many of us have an impending sense of doom, as if humanity is on the brink of obliteration.  While this is nothing new, people have been predicting the imminent destruction of humanity for thousands of years, there are new worries and concerns.  Perhaps a super-virus will remove us from existence.  Perhaps the changing climate is beyond our control and the Earth will become a red hot or icy ball spinning in the void, empty and lifeless.

New developments in technology can remove this fear, says NASA astronomer Ahmed Levi, in his new book, Dark Life.  In this short and accessible work he puts forward a radical new idea, that upon reaching the level of technology able to use radio and other wireless communication there is a rapid movement that transforms life.  Life ceases to be biological and becomes something of silicon and electricity, life within the machine.  Levi claims not to base these ideas on flights of fancy but on hard science and technology almost within our grasp.

It is but thirteen years since Dr. Hsia mapped his brain within a computer, says Dr. Levi.  Follow up experiments over the last decade have confirmed, as much as it is possible to confirm consciousness in the brains of anyone else, that this, "mapped brain is conscious, aware, and functions as does the organic brain," but without any obvious sign of the inevitable risks and ravages of exterior life and aging.  While the disturbing results of early experiments on a conscious brain almost devoid of exterior input resulted in the rapid halt to these experiments, even without the widespread objections to scientists "playing God" and creating "soulless beings", new developments have recently occurred.

The difference between the artificial reality of gaming, claims Dr. Levi, and the reality we experience in our day-to-day lives has been narrowing over the last few decades.  While such troubling concerns as the "graying" of non-gaming experience and the health risks of "ultra-deep gaming addiction" are no doubt real, there are many serious scientists who have stated the opinion that there is no longer any substantive difference between the artificial experience of gaming, and the real experience of the exterior world.  In fact, the very problems mentioned above suggest that to those deep within the gaming culture the artificial experience is somehow more real than reality.

This suggestion was put to the test but eighteen months ago when the artificial brain of Dr. Hsia was connected directly to what is considered the most complete and immersive game at this time Land of the Gods and the results examined and compared to the flesh and blood brain of Dr. Hsia playing the same game.  Not only did the artificial brain show all the signs of a total and complete experience, even thanking researchers for the experience, but the actual decisions within game play were almost identical between the two minds.  To all those involved the conclusion, which Dr. Levi suggests is inescapable, is that artificial minds are as real as biological minds, yet free from the risk of death our bodies face every day.  After all, death in a game is but temporarily, and like Lazarus we can rise again from death.

How is this relevant to our search for extra-terrestrial intelligence?  Dr. Levi says the answer is simple.  For an intelligent life to evolve it must have a drive to live and a drive to experience new and wondrous things.  Given the possibility of a real experience, with constant variety unrestrained by the physical laws of the universe, lasting for thousands upon thousands of years, what intelligent life-form would not take that opportunity.  Dr. Levi convincingly makes the case that intelligent life forms make the transition from radio to computer existence within two centuries.  To preserve this new existence these life-forms wish to flee from the dangers of the solar system and those who might visit and immerse themselves in dark, silent ships, such as hollowed asteroids.  Launching themselves into the emptiness of interstellar space they live almost eternal lives in heavens of their own devising.

Dr. Levi maintains that the probability of intelligent life is too high to have not come into being, but it "hides within darkened rocks, in the infinite dark of space."  Hence the title of his book, Dark Life.

The final chapter provides the fascinating prediction that a nuclear fusion fueled asteroid of the sort described within the book, powering a vast computer, will be built before the end of the century, sending out a new version of humanity to exist in new ways out beyond the stars.  Furthermore, he predicts that within a couple of centuries after this initial launch, this will constitute the life of all humanity.

Obligatory Post Election Post

In a blog that is supposed to talk about thinking and ideas, and is hopeful, I pretty much have to talk about the election in the richest and most powerful country in the world.  There are going to be tens of millions of these, I hope you either like mine or at least find it interesting.

OVERVIEW

I'm going to start with my view of the general situation.  A bad but slowly recovering economy.  A very large debt with the worries of government not being able to supply present entitlement programs to an aging population at some point in the future.  A decade old war still ongoing but with an end in sight.  A fight about changes in health care.  A moral fight on gay marriage at close to the start of the legislative phase.  A moral fight on the use of marijuana for recreational purposes.

ELECTION RESULTS

President Obama won.  Handily in the Electoral College, which is what matters in an election, but with what is essentially a tie in the overall vote.  This difference demonstrates a basic problem with American politics.  Democrats did better in Senate races than expected at a very difficult time for them having to defend 16 seats and overturn just 5 seats.  Democrats still barely hold the Senate.  The Republicans hold the house with a small reduction in seats.  In summary, nothing has institutionally changed.  A President who got half of the electorate supported by a Senate that doesn't have the ability to push through legislation against much resistance, and a defiantly oppositional House.

WHAT THIS MEANS IN GOVERNMENT

While nothing has changed this can only be viewed as a substantial victory for Democrats simply in that they have a say at all.  This is an election that the Republicans "should" have won.  A terrible economy with a dysfunctional government with a moderate Republican presidential candidate, an incumbent majority in the House, and a close Senate with several times the opportunities for Republicans to overturn seats.  This is a perfect scenario for Republicans to have the super-majority necessary to push through the agenda that they wanted.  What they have is simply the ability to obstruct Democratic plans.

In summary, while the incumbent Democrats are not popular people, the Republican philosophy has been rejected.  I think this is a fundamental shift in US politics, that would have happened in 2004 if it wasn't for 9/11/2001.  At that time W. was operating on the standard Republican platform since the Reagan years, and was deeply, deeply unpopular.  His popularity was transformed by terrorists successfully attacking the USA.  Either Republicans need to alter their basic platform, or the Democrats need to screw up royally, or something catastrophic needs to happen for Republicans to get back to a position of constructive power where they can initiate change rather than just obstruct it.

However, the Democrats can't gloat too much.   There is still a major Republican lead in the House, and yet again in 2014 there are more Democrat seats in the Senate up for re-election (20-13).  While the biggest driver of elections, the economy, can only be reasonably expected to improve and bolster Democratic chances, it is still quite possible that in 2014 we could find ourselves in the uber-gridlock of a Congress/President divide.  For the next four years don't expect major change.

Growth between recessions seems to me to last between eight and ten years, we are something like a year into this stage, and so we can expect an improving economy all the way up until the 2016 elections in which Republicans are vulnerable in the Senate, eight years of Republican obstructionism may weigh on House elections, and if Hillary Clinton runs there will be an experienced, strong campaigner with a built-in election machine up against someone most of us haven't heard of at the moment.  It could be great news for Democrats and devastation for the Republicans.  Twelve years of a Democrat President, fourteen years of a Democrat(ish) Senate, and possibly a House majority.

FUTURE POLITICS

The Republicans are a divided group between scorched earth anti-government zealots with deep rooted moral objections to change, and fiscal conservatives who are worried about the debt, the expansion of government, and are slow to change their moral positions.  This division makes it very hard to win general elections, as we saw in this campaign.  A candidate has to run in the primaries as potential crazed right wing zealot (anti-evolution, anti-climate change, anti-government in all cases, private sector is always better etc..) and then switch to the moderate fiscal conservative against Democrats.  Romney actually did a superlative job of this and still lost to a vulnerable President.  How can they win big elections (Senate and President) with this problem?  They can't.  Local districts are much more concentrated in their beliefs, and so this switching becomes less necessary.

How can Republicans stay true to their ideology of small government and moral conservatism and still win elections?  I have an idea.  Run campaigns on state's rights.  A campaign to characterize the federal government as having the support of half the country but having power over the whole country as being fundamentally undemocratic, against the American ideal of liberty, and as being contrary to the wishes of the founders.  Give the power back to local authorities so communities can decide for themselves how they want to live, and what values they will hold.  I think this has very wide appeal to Americans.  The Blue states want independence from the craziness of the Red ones, and vice versa.  It will mean an even more divided country, but a less hateful one too, should this path be advanced and actually adhered to.  In the very long term this divide will lead to left-wing, wealthy, European-style coasts, and right-wing, poor, traditional middle.

I actually think there is going to be a battle between the two wings of the Republican party, between pragmatists who think there must be a change at least in image, and ideologues unwilling to shift one iota.  Hopefully this battle manifests itself with moderate Republicans making reasonable deals with Democrats and neutering the Tea Party.  I don't have much hope for that in the next two years.

If you think that money and influence to support rampant capitalism are going anywhere, I am sorry, but no.

ACTUAL FUTURE EFFECTS

Foreign policy is going to fade from the spotlight.  The US will still be a major power in the world, but will be largely non-interventionist.  There won't be big invasions, the US is tired of them (while not morally opposed), but there will still be largely covert (to the uncaring US population) action of assassination, undermining, sabotage, sanctions, and diplomatic efforts.  As democracy spreads across the world , and trade becomes more and more global, the similarities and connections between nations and regions will increase.  It's much harder to start wars if the other country looks and acts like you, and you make money together.  The path of increased freedom, peace, prosperity will continue to be followed.

Perhaps the biggest world issue is climate change.  I think the series of devastating hurricanes experienced by the US recently, and quite possibly again in the near future, will be enough to convince an adequate majority of Americans that "something must be done."  However, Americans will not want that "something" to affect their pocket book or lifestyle.  There will be change, but too slow to make a huge difference.  We will have to rely on technology to get us out of this.  Hopefully there will be enough sensible people to spend less money on R&D than it would take to reduce emissions through punitive measures, but still a lot of money.

Entitlements, social security and medicaid etc. costs will only go up.  People are living longer, and so the population is aging, and modern medicine will always cost more than older medicine as it is old medicine plus new medicine.  Changes to these programs must happen, but they will happen through minor but incremental changes.  Congress isn't going to agree to socialized medicine and increasing the starting age of social security by a decade tomorrow, but they might well have managed to plan for these steps in twelve years to happen another decade.  The alternatives are massive tax increases, bankrupting the government, or letting the old and weak die off in the streets.

I think the most underrated  effect in terms of importance to coverage is the likelihood that another supreme justice will be appointed by Obama, and possibly two.  That would mean three lifelong appointments to the highest court in the land by a single president.  Obama's influence will continue for decades after his presidency ends.

MORALITY

If you look at history, at least since the Enlightenment, there has been a consistent and steady progress towards what is now called the "liberal" side.  Increased social rights for more and more people, and bigger and bigger safety nets.  In this election the main moral questions were "do we provide health care to the poor?" "can gay people get married?" "can you smoke marijuana in the privacy of your own home for fun?"  These questions have not been settled by any means, but in all cases the movement has gone much more towards "yes" than "no."  This movement has happened almost exclusively in the Blue states, and will inevitably continue in those areas.  Fighting federal campaigns largely based on opposition to this movement is futile.  The best the Red states can do in this area over the long term is to fight for states' rights.  "If those heathens want to do disgusting things then that's up to them and God will sort it out.  But don't tell us we have to agree to your sordid ways."  I think that's a compromise that is possible and good for the country.  Hating people from a greater distance is better than hating them up close.

Unfortunately what I feel are the biggest moral questions were simply ignored.  There was no debate about whether it is morally acceptable to kill people without trial with robots in the sky.  There was no debate about whether it is morally acceptable to imprison foreign nationals indefinitely without the same rights to a fair trial guaranteed by our own constitution.  There was no debate about whether it is morally acceptable to have different rules for different countries (possession of nuclear weapons, acceptable democratically elected officials, etc.) and whether it is acceptable to fight wars or collapse economies to maintain these differences.  Iran is a perfect example.  There was no debate about whether the USA has the responsibility to lift the poorest nations out of their poverty by sacrificing a small part of our great wealth.

SUMMARY

The nation is dragging itself along towards a better future like a wounded animal.  But we heal a little bit over time.  Sometimes there are flashes of pain, but we are moving.  In twenty years most of the things that progressives want now will have been gained.  A substantial number of people calling themselves conservative will be fighting to preserve in their original form those great institutions that progressives are now fighting to get.  The different sides will still be howling their outraged indignation at each other and have spend almost none of their time looking back at where we came from.

Chapter 8

"Once upon a time there.."
"Really John?  You're going to start with 'once upon a time?'  It might have been a dark and stormy night too."
"Shut up Frank, just let me tell it, alright?"
"Fair enough John, you just go ahead and string as many cliches together as you want.  I will gather 'round the fire and hear the tale you tell."
"Right, so there was this great young wizard, a master of power and understanding but not really excited by the prospect of wandering around hurling balls of fire at anyone like a lot of those bastards.  Anyway, what this wizard.."
"What was this 'ere wizard's name John?"
"It was Hannerim, but it doesn't matter.."
"Hammerin?  Was he some kind of carpenter then?  What kind of name is 'Hammerin' anyway?  Sounds foreign."
"It was a long time ago, right?  They had different names back then."
"So he wasn't foreign then?"
"No, he was from just over the hill from here."
"What, from Bantrim?"
"Yes, around there, but before Bantrim was built.  I told you it was a long time ago.  Come on lads, just let me tell the story.  If you keep interrupting I'll never get to the end."

"Right, so once a upon a time there was this wizard, like, and he was really smart and powerful.  He didn't want to go around destroying the place because he was interested in other stuff.  What he really wanted to understand was the fundamental nature of the universe."
"The what?"
"The fundamental nature of the universe.  Like what is everything made of."
"Sounds weird.  I'm pretty sure this table is made of wood, that cup is made of tin, and Frank is made of beer!"
"Well, what is wood made from?"
"Wood's wood."
"Yes, but if you chop wood you see all these strands, right, so you have to chop with the grain.  So wood is made up of those strands.  But what are the strands made from?  Then what are the things that make up the strands made from?  And so on until you run out of things that make up other things.  And he also wanted to know why things happen, like why when you let go of a stone it falls down."
"We know that, it's 'cause stones are heavy."
"But why are stones heavy?  Why don't stones fly away into the sky?  Stuff like that."
"Wow.  That's, um, weird.  I never thought about that before."
"I'm shocked Bob, we all thought you were thinking deep thoughts when you were staring off like that.  Anyway, he was a really smart wizard and they think about stuff like that.  I'm going to ask you boys again to stop interrupting me.  We've been talking for ages and I've only got to the start of the story."

"Right.  So there was this really smart, really powerful wizard.."
"We've heard that bit John."
"..and he wanted to find out about the fundamental nature of the universe.."
"The what?"
"That's it, I'm done telling this story.  If you don't want to hear it I'll just head off home and sit around with the wife.  It can't be any worse than being around you lot."
"I'm sorry John, just a bit of banter.  No need to get all huffy.  I promise I'll keep quiet."

"One more and I'm off.  Right, really smart wizard trying to work out the fundamental nature of the universe.  He was pretty sure this wasn't something you work out on a Tuesday morning so he thought about finding some quiet place he could think about it for a long time where he wouldn't get bothered by stupid peasants asking him stupid question all the bloody time."

"He thought, 'There's a quiet place just over the hill, nobody goes there, it will be perfect.'  So he goes over the hill and using his magic he makes a hut with a warm fire, a candle to see by, and lots of paper to write down his ideas and such.  After thinking about it all afternoon he starts getting hungry and he's got no food, right?  Wizards being not very good at the practical things on account of all of this deep thinking.  No matter, he just magics himself a dinner and goes back to his thinking.  It gets late and he gets tired and he realizes he's got no bed.  So again he magics a bed for him to sleep in, all comfy like.  He goes to sleep like a little baby.  No Frank, don't say it, you know what I mean."
"He wakes up in the morning and what do you know, he's hungry again.  More than that the bloody bed's taking up most of the hut so he'll have no room to do his thinking and magic spells.  So he magics a bedroom so he can sleep, and some breakfast and goes back to his thinking.  So he goes on thinking for a couple of days and then some bloody, ignorant peasants come up and bang on his door asking him a bunch of stupid questions.  He tells them to leave him alone and bugger off, like any clever person would 'cause they are interrupting his thinking.  They go away and he decides he'll seal up the door and make it all quiet inside so he doesn't get bothered."
"A week goes by and his chamber pot gets really full, and the dishes pile up, and bats start roosting in the roof, and the fire dies out 'cause he's got no wood.  He figures that he's spending all this time fixing the things in the hut when he could be doing his thinking and such.  So he comes up with this clever idea, as wizards are wont to do, being clever and such.  He decides he'll magic up the hut into a house that knows what he wants and then magics it so it's done.  So he's got a bedroom, and a privy, and so on.  Finally he's got all the time he wants 'cause he's shut-up all cosy in his house where he can't be bothered by all those bloody peasants, and the house gets him all the things he needs."
"The thing is, and this is important lads so listen carefully, he didn't make sure that the house did stuff only for him.  Now, no wizard is powerful enough to cast a spell on the whole world, for which we are all very grateful, so the spell for the house only goes a little ways, and the further you get from the wizard the less it understands and can do.  It's a bit like shouting, the further away you go the quieter it is and the harder it is to work out what was shouted."
"Years go by and then some poor bastard is caught out in the snow, all lost like, and he sees the house.  So he goes over to get some help but there's no door or windows and no-one answers his banging on the walls.  He lies down on the ground all sure he's going to die in the snow.  He wishes he just had a little bit of shelter 'cause then he'd make it until the next day.  To his shock and surprise bits of wood and rushes and such appear out of nowhere and builds him a tiny hut, all snug.  He curls against the wall and thanks his lucky stars for this magic.  But he hasn't eaten all day and he gets hungry, and wishes he just had some warm soup 'cause we all know that warms you up on a cold day.  Poof!  There it is.  Despite him getting lost he isn't a stupid, bloody peasant and he thinks he'll just stay there and not have to work."
"More years go by and he gets married, and has some kids and the magic house gets them all what they need, but the further away the building gets the less the house understands what they need.  So you might want a gold privy and get a deep wood hole.  You might want a steak and get a stew.  Walk a quarter mile and you don't get nothing at all.  Still, it's a good deal."
"More years go by and more people find out what's going on and settle down by the house too.  It get's built out further and further until there's a bunch of rooms and stables and kitchens and of course a nice place to drink some beer.  After a while the people on the outside get all jealous and some of them decide to go steal the places right up next to the starting house.  There's a big fight and whoever wins decides they won't have that again.  So they get together and they decide that they'll make the middle bit all confusing to the people who don't live there so they all get lost and can't find them anymore and they'll be safe."
"More years go by and the word of this magic place spreads until there are two proper roads meeting at the magic house, and it gets really famous and so important people from all over stop there on the way from here to there.  And do you know what my fine fellows?"  We are sitting in that magic house right now, only now it's called The Inn. Right in the middle of it, where no-one can find him, is the wizard still thinking his deep thoughts, not knowing about anything outside the walls of his house."

"Sounds like a bunch of bollocks to me."
"Oh yeah Frank, so tell me why The Inn keeps changing its shape without anyone knowing who's doing the building, eh? "
"It was a good story anyway John, I'll buy you a pint."

Dear readers.  This is written a bit like a play, but without any of the stage directions.  Can you understand it?  Should I put in who is speaking and some stuff that isn't dialogue, like, "general laughter?"

Misconceptions I Have Heard About Music And Musicians

I am a musician only in so much as I play music.  I don't make a living playing music and never will.  I am not a proper musician in that I don't know music theory, don't play anything with the right technique, cannot read music, and my skills are rudimentary.  In many ways I am a musician in so much as I do a good job faking it.  On the other hand I have faked it pretty well on a selection of hand drums, a drum kit, the guitar, and the mandolin, and singing.  To those who are not musicians I am a musician.  To those who are musicians I am not.

Anyway, in my years faking the ability to play music I have come across a number of misconceptions about playing music from those who don't.  Here they are.

Music is simply a talent.  It isn't.  The talent necessary to play music consists of being able to recognize pitch in so much as you can tell when two notes are the same (if you can sing a nursery rhyme with someone you have this ability), enough rhythm to clap your hands with someone else, and the dexterity of someone who can type.  Now, there are people who are more talented than others.  Some people have a keener sense of pitch, sometimes as much as perfect pitch (hearing a note and being able to tell you what it is without a comparison) and other people people are more dextrous.  Being able to play music is mostly about the application of effort.  Practice, practice, practice.  Playing until your fingers are in agony, day after day after day.  Those who are genius musicians have practiced for thousands of hours and therefore have the technical skills to put emotion into their music.

If you can play one song you can play any song.  This is very, very far from true.  The most knowledgeable musician in the world can probably play just a few hundred songs out of millions.  I have played an Irish folk song and been immediately asked to play a modern pop song that I would recognize if I heard it.  This is far, far from reality.  It takes work and time to learn songs, they don't magically spring into your head.  I have heard brilliant musicians been asked to play a song, and they will play a few notes in the melody and then have to go back and think of what a note will be, make some guesses, and find it by trial and error.

If you can play music you can "jam".  Some people can do this, but only within relatively small genres, and they must know theory, have a great sense of pitch, and be very familiar with the style.  I have seen great musicians in Cajun and Irish music (music from the same roots) trying to play together and being largely baffled.  A slip jig is actually impossible music that some people can play.  If you suggest to a musician that they just go jam, when they say, "no" the chances are that they are not being humble, they simply can't do it.  The best example I have of this was a Boston Pops concert in which three woman violinists from different genres (classical, irish folk, and jazz) got together to play a concert.  These are astonishing musicians and yet they had to practice together in order not to sound bad because they couldn't find "the three".  This simply means that the different genres have very slight differences in when a note is played in a rhythm.

Music is impossibly complex.  Actually music is a combination of relatively simple concepts cobbled together in an organic way.  The basis of music is that a sound is made up of a combination of vibrations.  The next note or semi-tone or whatever is simply a different sound that matches a number of these vibrations but not all of them.  The keys on a piano and the frets on a guitar are just these pleasing combinations set out in order.  The gap between notes is where these vibrations don't match up.  A key is simply a collection of notes that evokes a particular emotion, basically leaving out notes that don't fit that feeling.  A scale is simply that collection starting in different places.  Rhythm is simply time divided into sections with an emphasis on certain times.
So, a waltz in A- is a collection of notes that fit a mood (called the minor key), starting with an A note, using the notes in the minor scale, divided up into standard sections of time where you emphasize the third note.  If you go A D E A D E you are playing a waltz in A-.  More complicated music is simply complications in time and the variety of notes used.

Music has been the same forever.  Actually music is constantly evolving.  If you look at the notes on a piano some of them are white and some of them are black.  The reason for this is that several hundred years ago songs were only played on those white notes and someone discovered the black ones.  The standardized notation for music was made up by a monk, and is not intuitive because "modern" music has discovered these notes (so that in some keys the same line is a different note), some guy made up the squiggles for different length of notes, and the treble clef is just insanely weird.  The reason this hasn't been fixed is simply cultural inertia.

Musicians are lazy.  They may be lazy in many areas of life but you cannot be lazy and be able to play music well, it just isn't possible.  On average musicians are the lowest paid profession per hour in the USA.  This is because while they might make hundreds of dollars in an hour or two, they spent hundreds of hours being able to play that hour or two.  It takes consistent, self-motivated hard work to be able to play music at any level.  Those stoned guys up on stage drinking beer in ripped jeans having a good time worked their asses off to be able to do that.  Being able to play that first three chord song on the guitar is going to take hours of practice, pain in your fingers, and lots and lots of swearing.

If you can play one instrument you can play any instrument.  No, you can't.  Put a concert violinist in behind a drum kit for the first time and they will have a good idea of what should happen, but they will be lost trying to make it happen.  A violin takes two arms and dexterity in the fingers of your left hand in a tiny space.  A drum kit requires all four limbs, no finger dexterity, all in a large area.  Even with stringed instruments there can be problems.  A mandolin has the notes on the strings upside down compared to a guitar.  The banjo is completely different.  If someone can play different instruments, they learned to play them largely independently.

I Don't Want To Live In....

...A housing association.  Where people are paid to come around so that they can tell you how you have to have your house look, and will fine you (with authority to put a lien on your house) if you don't comply.  If I want to paint my house purple and put out an art installation featuring three urinals I think I should be able to do so.  it is my house.

...A place with a neighborhood watch program.  Look, I have no problem with neighbors looking out for each other to stop crime, I've done it myself.  But I find it creepy that people would get together and roam the streets of their neighborhood looking for crime.  For a start it demonstrates an attitude that is rooted in fear.  Secondly it encourages people to go around, spy on their neighbors and disapprove of people.  You should be able to be a young man in a hoodie walking around someone else's neighborhood without being subject to organized suspicion.

...A gated community.  A place that inherently thinks it is better than the surrounding areas and so frightened of it that it puts up walls to exclude the rest of humanity from contact with them.  This is one of the problems today, wealthy people live lives entirely removed from the experiences of most people and yet have enormous power to affect the experiences of poor people.  A community based on arrogance, superiority, ignorance, disgust and fear.

...A housing estate/project.  This is an area in which all the people poor enough to be unable to pay for housing are concentrated.  Again separating out segments of society.  If you want to produce a group of people without hope, education, prospects of advancement and prone to crime, pack them all together and away from everyone else.  These places are gardens of misery, and I don't want to live in misery.

...Alabama.

Anxiety Released

For the last couple of years, like many people, I have had anxiety about money.  I am in a situation in which I have the great fortune to not work, and so our income is based on the work of my wife.  This means that if she loses her job we would have no income.  No income means that we would not be able to pay our mortgage and so would have to very rapidly sell our house.  The housing market has been extremely depressed and our house has many problems.  To successfully sell the house at a level that would not dramatically reduce the amount of money we would have we would have to put many thousands of dollars into it (water heater, furnace, electrical work, painting the whole house, etc..) 

While we have tried to save money over this time we have largely been unsuccessful because of problems with the house and our belongings.  We have had to get pool equipment fixed so that we don't have an algae filled pond in our back yard.  We have had to replace all the pipes in our house, get electrical work done, electrical work, and we just spent several thousand dollars on our cars (cheaper than buying).  It is part of my job to organize finances and work on the house.  My darling wife's entire job is to go to work.  It works well for us.

My darling wife works for a Spanish energy company linked to the Spanish government.  You may have heard of the desperate straits of the Spanish economy and government.  The company is in trouble.  Five years ago it was borrowing money to expand its holdings across the world.  With the economic crash it is having huge difficulty paying the bills.  Under these circumstances I was worried that my darling wife would be laid-off, creating the situation described in the first paragraph.  As the number of employees dwindled and the news worsened my worries increased.  My wife seemed relatively serene about the situation and the difference seemed strange.  Like most of us she hates looking for a job, and she didn't have the desperation I was expecting with an impending job loss.  I tried hard not to needle, poke, cajole and beg.

About two weeks ago my anxiety was hugely reduced for two reasons.  The first is that apparently the loan money used to buy the company for which my wife had worked had guarantees attached.  That is that if the company is closed down there is a payment necessary of hundreds of millions of some currency.  The parent company cannot afford it.  So, the company cannot afford to close down the company for which my wife works.  The company is "underwater" and intimately connected to the Spanish government.  It is too big to fail.  She is the only person in the company who does her job.  There is a hiring freeze and she makes less than average for such a position.  Essentially she cannot be laid-off.  Her job is about as secure as a job can be in this economic climate.  I did not know this.

The second reason is based on our retirement investments.  The method we are using to make investments for retirement is two fold.  We want to reduce our living expenses primary by increasing the amount of equity we have in our housing.  Ideally we would pick one house to live in for a long time and remove the mortgage.  Our costs would be utilities and property tax.  Secondarily we have what I call a "fire and forget" system.  In this system we take the maximum 401K money and just put it away.  Neither of us ever see it leave a paycheck, and I generally don't look at the reports.  We are putting money in and I don't know much about it other than we trust our financial investor and we are putting a big chunk away.  Otherwise we have an automatic payment taken from paychecks and put in an account.  Not knowing means that you don't count on it, and that strongly encourages financial discipline.  All I know is that we are putting a very good chunk of money away that I will look at in something like twenty years.  I don't know about investing other than over decades the stock market goes up a lot.  I found out two weeks ago that some of our investments are in a form that we can take out as cash with minimum penalty.  This is a large enough amount of money to solve the problems of fixing up the house if suddenly necessary.  I did not know this.

Of course, my wife knew both of these things, and I suppose I probably should have known about the second.  However, my fire and forget policy means that I try quite hard to keep us within our means.  I despise and worry about credit card debt enough to do whatever I can to pay the entire amount off each month, and it quietly eats away at me if I don't manage it.  I think of credit card debt as time that must be spent working for no reward.  Indentured servitude.  I don't want me wife to be an indentured servant.  The situation with the company I simply didn't know.  Do you ever have times where you could have sworn you told someone something but they have no idea what they are talking about?  That's what happened here.

This news reduced my anxiety.  We are not in danger of having no income, having to sell the house immediately for a huge loss, and joining the ranks of those searching for work.  We are financially safe.

I am sure that many of you reading this would consider this anxiety petty and foolish.  Even the worst case scenario here is much better than most people in the USA, and certainly better than the vast majority of people in the world.  I was worried about how many tens of thousands we would have.  Fifteen years ago I would have leaped at the chance to be in this situation, I expected to never be in this sort of financial security.  But this is my life and people adjust themselves to their new reality.  If you move from an apartment to a house, moving back to an apartment sounds terrible.  If you can regularly drink Starbucks, Folger's Crystals sounds terrible.

I know my anxiety was ridiculous, I knew it all along, but I still feel a lot better for its removal.

Training Politicians

It is relatively simple to train things.  When they do something you want them to do you give them some reward.  When you don't want something you withhold that reward.  Repeat.

Either you know about the US presidential campaigns, or you don't care.  In the first case there are plenty of places to go to get detailed analysis and news elsewhere of a higher standard than I could provide.  In the second case you just don't want to read about it.  So this isn't a rant about the campaign, or a partisan attack on one of the candidates, or a look at any promise or plan.  This is more about the electorate.

There have been two presidential debates in which almost universal opinion has Romney winning the first debate and Obama the second one.  The reasons on both occasions for the victory has been described openly as body language (active, fired-up, aggressive), basically the winner of the debate was the guy that looked the most like an alpha male, the primitive concept of a tribal leader.

However, there has also been another difference that has been rarely mentioned.  In the first debate Romney flat out lied.  Liar, liar pants on fire.  Obama wasn't a shining example of truthfulness himself.  Here's an independent fact check on that debate.  In the second debate there was a drop in dishonest claims overall.  Obama was the less truthful, (as long as you consider changing a policy position as not being dishonest) although Romney was no beacon of purity.

OK, so politicians trying to get elected lied.  This isn't news, right?  I agree, it isn't news.  What for me is illustrative is that the politician who lied the most won in popular opinion.  This illustrates that lying works, it helps to get you elected.  If you tell the truth, particularly when it is uncomfortable to your position, there is no reward (polls don't go up) but when you lie to make you sound better you are rewarded.  If you go back to the first paragraph of this post you can see what the consequences of this are, the electorate are training politicians to lie, as long as they do it in a forceful, confident manner.  Not only is the electorate training politicians to lie, but training them to be good liars.

There is a vast amount of despair about special interest groups and their money controlling government and there's more than a little to that.  But the reason that we have the government we have is that the electorate elects them.  It would seem to me a decent start to punish liars rather than reward them.  It is trivially easy in this day and age to find out who is lying.  There is an independent organization dedicated to this very task.  Why doesn't it seem to matter?

In a democracy you get the government you deserve. 

Hope Dashed

In my last post I talked about how much I wanted to move to Austin and why.  Yesterday we were informed that Christina would not even get an interview as the company decided to go with younger, local, less qualified people because it would cost less.  Christina didn't get an interview because she was qualified to do the job, and therefore would cost more money.

It's a bad day in this Binmore household.  Christina stayed home today after waking up and crying in the shower (I am on this, don't worry) and is upstairs playing a video game appropriately called, "Oblivion."  It is harder for Christina than myself.  I have more emotional resources because I don't have to go to a place I hate every weekday, Christina holds things in more than I do (that's how she keeps jobs when I get laid-off) and so problems tend to come out suddenly and painfully.  For me it is pretty much another disappointment, nothing particularly new.

I Hope We Move To Austin, Texas

A little while ago I was hopeful about something, and even though I knew intellectually that it wouldn't make any difference I didn't tell people about it for fear of "jinxing" it.  It didn't work out.  My darling wife's old boss, who had brought us down into this mess in the first place, had got a new job in Dallas.  She said she was going to get Christina out of her present job and into one in Dallas.  The job was going to be something that Christina was very interested in, and if nothing else it would be almost impossible to have a worse working environment.
Dallas?  For those who know us the idea of us being happy in Dallas must seem bizarre.  A few years ago I would have agreed.  However, in all the cities in the USA there was a period of house building that took place before the automobile became ubiquitous.  Those areas still exist, with their Sear's Craftsman wooden houses, their sidewalks, their local parks, and their high streets.  They are less than ten miles from the city center and for much of the last few decades have fallen into disrepair, poverty, and often crime. 
 However, these areas are being invaded by young, liberal professionals interested in art and community.  I think that originally in San Francisco and New York intelligent, young people wanted to live in vibrant, city communities but only had limited money and so needed cheap places to live.  The result was the invasion of these areas by young, active, liberal, artistic people with college degrees bent on changing where they were going to live.  *

This idea spread to a few cities, Austin, TX, Portland, OR, Boulder, CO and in many ways this is the dominant theme of these cities.  In Portland, OR you have to go several miles from downtown to find something different (Gresham or the West Hills).  Now having visited three cities in Texas I can tell you that in each of these cities there is such a place.  Austin, of course, Houston has the Montrose district, and Dallas has the M streets.  So, I did some research, found the M streets and walked around (being able to walk is a vital part of these communities).  It felt like Portland.  There was the finished urban renewal of NW 21st street and fifteen blocks away the last remnants of working-class hispanics scraping out a living (and about to sell their houses for a big, big profit.
This trend is like a fungus, sending out tiny spores that multiply rapidly.  I predict that some of the most vibrant, artistic communities in the USA will spring into being in the dying rust belt states cities, like Detroit and Buffalo.  Artists need to live in cheap, cheap places, in communities that inspire them.  The average house price in Detroit right now is less than $30,000.

So, the job in Dallas didn't work out because Christina's old boss is extremely optimistic, to the point where she predicts wonderful things, and never delivers.  She doesn't have the power to hire anyone, and the particular job doesn't even exist.  Still, she's looking out for Christina, and recommended her for a job in Austin.
Austin is the origin of the "Keep X Weird" phenomenon and bumper sticker.  It is sunny all year round and that is very important.  It is one of the founding areas of this fungus.  Still, it is big enough that there are still cheap enough places surrounding these areas that we can afford to live very comfortably, and yet still be able to be involved in such a community (we can bike there in fifteen minutes).  The job environment is described as casual and team oriented.  Casual and team oriented basically describes the personality of my wife.  Christina would be fantastic at the job.  There's a shower so that Christina can commute by bike, and a real biking system throughout the city.  There's a large park right next to the office.  It is just across the river from downtown, a place full of music, irish bars, and college students.  There is even talk of a relocation package in which the company pays for moving costs and will buy our house at market value if we can't sell it in three months.
We really, really, really want to move there.  This could be home.  However, the anxiety and tension is building as Christina hasn't heard back, and it's now in the fifth working day since she applied.  We keep telling ourselves that it can often take a couple of weeks before anything happens in the hiring process, but we have already gone from hope, to despair, to a little candle flame we are hoping doesn't gutter out.

*  By the way, if you ever want to make money on housing follow the gay men.  An increase of such people into an area raises property values higher than surrounding areas.  This is probably because gay couples tend not to have children and two jobs, giving them the time and money to improve their property and area.

"Because That's The Rule"

I was walking The Face of Evil in the park today, as I do, and I met a nice lady named Gretchen who was walking her miniature poodle.  It was a nice and friendly conversation, which is unusual for me, more the conversation than the nice and friendly bit.  The Face of Evil was off the leash, as he almost always is because he does what he is told and is simply not dangerous.  He has never bitten anything other than flies, even when much smaller dogs have bitten him.  To give you an idea of how he listens there was a squirrel available for killing, and although he really wanted to rend the defenseless mammal he stopped when I told him to leave it.  The Face of Evil's methods are much more subtle than mere disobedience, he works by sucking your soul through the portal of compassion.

So, I was walking the beast in the park happily with a woman and a tiny dog.  It is hard for me to think of a less threatening scene involving a dog.  A woman called from a distance necessary to yell, "Is that dog on a leash?"  To which I replied, "No."  She then yelled for me to put the dog on a leash.  I waved and wished her a nice day, while walking in the opposite direction.  She, at all times, had the opportunity to simply walk around the corner and away out of sight.  She decided to stay in place and yell at me to put the dog on a leash.

There is a rule that all dogs must be on a leash in the park.  I know this.  There are people who are afraid of dogs.  I know this too.  I have even had someone call the police to tell me to put the dog on a leash 9the only method of enforcement) and he and I both knew that this was really stupid and a waste of time.  Most of the time the park staff wave and say, "Hello."  Why is there a rule in place that those in charge of enforcing it think is stupid?  It isn't to stop dogs attacking people, dogs in parks simply don't do that.  It is to protect the parks from lawsuits.

Why was this woman yelling?  If she was afraid of dogs she could have simply walked around the corner and been completely safe.  People do very strange things, but staying in place and yelling at what you are frightened of seems so strange for me to dismiss it.  The only reason I can think of is that there was a rule and she really wanted me to follow it.

"Because it's a rule" is a remarkably common reason for someone wishing you to do something.  I generally hear it after any rational reason for someone to follow a rule has been exhausted, but the person still wants me to follow that rule.  I remember this being most common in educational establishments.  Why do people use this "argument?"  The first reason given is that if people don't follow the rules there is anarchy.  It is true that if there are no rules at all, or no-one obeys them, then there is anarchy.  But breaking one rule doesn't mean that all rules are broken, just that one rule is broken.  If the rule does no harm, then the only thing that happens is the breaking of the rule.  It seems to be that the problem is simply that a rule is broken.

Why is there a problem with rules being broken?  It is because it is perceived as an act of defiance against authority.  People are trying to have everyone behave within the strictures of authority.  There is a desire for people to obey, even when it doesn't matter.  Why do people have this desire?  I think it is built in to the human psyche from two sources, functionality of groups, and raising children.  Groups where there is no leader, and everyone simply does what they want are historically ineffective.  Anyone who has seen a meeting without a defined leader knows what I am talking about.  If you are hunting a large, dangerous animal stopping to discuss strategy is a bad plan.  Raising children is the most obvious example of, "Because that's the rule."

Children ask the best question, "Why?"  When repeated enough times this line of questioning really gets down to the nitty gritty.  At the base of all reasons why a child must follow a rule is that, while the intentions of the rule are usually for the child's own good, the child is powerless and the parent can make them do it.  We really don't like to think about it that way, but when it is time to go home and the child doesn't want to go home even after being given a sensible reason, that child is going to be physically forced to go home.  With children, "Because it's a rule" is adults trying to avoid the truth that the reason is actually, "Because I can, and will, make you."  After years of such conditioning it is not surprising that the unthinking following of rules is commonplace.

Have you ever been at a junction with stop signs in all directions and no cars or pedestrians?  Have you not come to a complete stop but rather slowed down to a very slow roll and then driven on through?  This happens every day, with most drivers.  People speed.  In fact people speed so ubiquitously that to not speed can be dangerous in some situations.  If you are going 20 miles slower than the rest of traffic you are essentially reversing down the highway at 20mph.  In many places in the USA there is a rule against jaywalking, crossing the road at places not designated for pedestrians.  Only crazy people don't jaywalk when it is safe to do so.

There are rules that everyone breaks and no-one really seems to mind.  Why is this?  It's because breaking those rules has been made part of the culture.  The cultural rule is that breaking those institutional rules is OK.  What matters is the culture rather than the legality. 

The example at the beginning of this post shows pretty clearly that there are large differences in attitudes to following rules.  Jonathon Haidt has done wonderful research into these differences in psychology.  It can be summed up by different groups (that seem to be largely genetically based) coming to moral decisions based on different criteria.  Sensibly named liberals and conservatives, he calls his theory/findings the Moral Foundations Theory.  The criteria for moral decisions can be broken down into six areas.  The more liberal you are the more you base your decisions on care/harm, and fairness/cheating.  The more conservative you are the more you base your decisions on loyalty/betrayal, authority/subversion, and sanctity/degradation.  By the way, Haidt actually says that conservatives understand the moral decisions of liberals better than the other way round.  People who think you should follow rules regardless of whether they are useful or not think this because they value loyalty to those who set the rules, respect for authority, and possibly the sanctity of obeying (the #1 subject of the Bible).  People who think you should only follow rules that are useful value whether the rule does harm or not, and whether it is fair, or not.  I don't want to suggest for a minute that almost all people care about all of these factors, just that these are trends, and strong ones at that.

I am extremely liberal morally.  I basically only care whether something does harm, is fair, or is oppressive.  If you tell me to do something harmful and unfair to stop something that the authority figure of my group thinks is disgusting I will simply not do it.  In fact, if you want me to not do something, probably the most effective way would be to tell me I must do it because you say so.  I actively dislike people who think differently, although I take some time to understand why they think that way.  The reason people are opposed to gay marriage is because they think of it as a rebellion against their group (church/nation), subversion of authority (they are destroying our America) and it is disgusting to them.  The reason I support gay marriage (in practice, I think the words don't matter) is because I think it does no harm, is fair, and allows people to have more freedom of choice.  Morally I am almost freakishly liberal.

The only way to change the morality of conservatives is to convince them that the authority of their group has decided that a particular moral position is sacred.  If you think this is impossible go find a conservative and suggest that we should start owning slaves again.  They will be outraged despite the fact that less than two hundred years ago conservatives supported slavery because the Bible said it was right.

While I get the nervous thrum of adrenaline with almost any confrontation, I also very much enjoyed the dismay of that woman trying to tell me I must do something.

Going Bald

I am going bald.  In fact I have been going bald for something like 15 years.  Contrary to what I have heard I am not going bald in the manner of my maternal grandfather, who never really went bald, but in the same pattern as my father.  I am going bald much more slowly but I expect to get there in the end.  This pattern advances from the sides of the forehead in a looping pattern to isolate an island of hair above the middle of the forehead.  This is presumably because of the extra testosterone that is produced in this area.  I'm not sure if this is a particularly bad or good way to go bald, I suppose at least I can see it well enough to not deny it is going on.  Pattern 5, stage 3.

 I think balding, like most parts of aging, happens in relatively short jumps interspersed within longer periods of stability.  All of a sudden your knees hurt, or your hangovers are terrible, or you start listening to National Public Radio (I now experience all of these).  Three years ago I was being asked for my identification when buying alcohol to ensure I was over 21.  This has now completely stopped.

My balding advance has unfortunately now become somewhat unsymmetrical, my left conquering more scalp than my right.  There isn't too much worse for human beauty than non-symmetry (other than disease and gross fatness) and so I should probably not emphasize this new development.  I have thought for some time that the most important thing about going bald is not to fight it, not to try to disguise it.  Don't cover balding areas with wisps of long, fine hair.  I used to have long hair at times until I was twenty-seven, and not since.  It is better to have a shaved head than the long but scraggly remnants of a rockers' teenage barnet.  This may well be simply because of the failed attempt to fool someone, one of the reasons I don't like make-up on women.

I don't really mind going bald.  I don't consider it a tragedy of lost youth, just one of the many signs that I am getting older.  Women say they don't really mind (but then they also say that the most attractive thing in a man is a sense of humor and that size doesn't matter, two very kind lies) and I better get used to it, signs of aging are going to happen for the same amount of time I have been alive so far.

I still get a haircut with scissors rather than buzzing the whole thing, which is the haircut that reduces the appearance of balding the most, because there is only a limited amount of time for this to not look silly.  Since my darling, and honest, wife says I look like an egg with a buzzed head and no facial hair you should get used to seeing me with this scraggly, red beard.  Unless I lose forty pounds.