Sometimes the media shows really know what news is important in the world:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4537744
This game is ridiculously popular. I mean numerous people in the
building where I work play. I keep finding more almost daily.
It’s scary but in a good way. I don’t buy the writer’s ultimate
conclusion, but it is a good game.
And then there’s this too:
http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/2005/Mar/hour2_031105.html
I love it. Press can be good.
We keep getting enraged when we hear about people using drugs to
improve their physical prowess. We hate it. We think it totally unfair
and wrong and yet we still watch it and don’t mind paying a lot of
money provided we can at least pretend it doesn’t exist and not look
too closely at the world.
That’s not to say that we should blame ourselves entirely, or the
business that should know better or the players that should know
better, or the advertisers or the drug dealers or those who invented
the new wave of increasingly effective performance enhancers. There’s
plenty of blame to go around, that’s for sure and who you think is most
responsible is largely a matter of preference.
Here’s the thing though. If we are worried about a little matter of
performance enhancement drugs we’re in for a heck of a lot of trouble
when before long we’re going to face ethical questions that make the
current issues seem like pathetic whining over nothing.
Really. Either through genetics or some other form of robotic or
nano-technology it is likely that we will develop the means to perform
feats of physical prowess that far exceed what human beings are capable
of now. And that will be over and above drug enhancements that are all
the more sophisticated than the ones we use now and might even be safe
and/or legal. When all of that happens what will we do with regards to
sports and record keeping?
Now the instinct we all have is to just say NO to all of it. If you
have any unfair advantage you just can’t use it at all. And if you
can’t turn it off, then you just can’t play or at least if you do play
you won’t be considered for any records or glories at all.
The problem with that is that it starts to sound an awful lot like
descrimination. We certainly don’t allow for anyone to be excluded from
such things on the basis of any orther characteristic that a person
can’t help. Why would being genetically physically superior be much
different. Especially being as in many cases the person will have not
had any choice in what their parents decided them to be.
The second instinct is to create separate standards, separate
competitions, and separate leagues. This works ok except that it can
lead to all the more vicious descrimination and rivalry between the
various leagues. It will also split the fan base of various sports
making a lot less money for everyone. Lastly it just makes things a lot
more boring. Whereas an era of augmentation could provide the ability
to create a whole new world of stories of triumph and failure between
people born with different capacities and how they deal with these
differences, we’d instead be advocating a world of separation that only
allows the same old stories to exist each within their own little
world.
Of course the fear is that if you don’t separate them, then the whole
sport becomes dominated by the augmented. Those who are not no longer
have a place in the game and will be descriminated against. Plus some
people will just perform watching normal feats of strength and normal
accomplishments and they will have the very games that they enjoy to
watch taken away from them. Who would want that?
There is a better way but it requires a heck of a lot more work.
Statistics. There’s no reason whatsoever that a record has to be a
concrete thing. There’s no reason why we have to say that the one who
holds the Home Run Record is the person who actually physically hit the
most home runs. We could take into account additional variables such as
a measure of a person’s genetic capacity for physical strength. We
could similarly adjust for the kinds of bats the players use and the
size of the stadiums and the height of the walls. Why not? Wouldn’t
that really level the playing field and create really fair honors and
prizes. And why not? Soon we may have the means to take everything into
account and why shouldn’t we? And then, if we do take everything into
account when determining the awards that we give out and how we rank
players, so as to provide an equality of judgement that transcends
differences of birth, why then should we do anything different for
differences between players that are based on choice. Obviously we
should ban any enhancement that exceeds a certain reasonable limit on
the danger it poses to the athletes. But besides that I don’t see why
we can’t just have anything at all go.
Then of course teams will decide on their own policies and what their
best strategy for winning will be. Should they pick all exceptional
non-augmented athletes or all augmented-athletes? Should they pick
athletes who are augmented through nano-technology or genetics or
drugs? The decision may be based on appealing to your fan base or based
on what you think will provide you the best chance of winning. Yes
watching games will be a lot weirder. When certain players come to
the plate, you’ll expect them to hit a home run almost every time
but you’ll be looking to see if they miss. When they miss it will be a
really big deal. As it will decrease the teams adjusted score. In
contrast when another non-augmented player comes to the plate and hits a home run it
will be a really big deal as it will increase the teams adjusted score
a great deal.
I know it sounds crazy but this is really the way I think it should
work. Of course it will require a lot more thought to think up a way to
make this really work, and whatever scoring and ranking system is used
would have to be subject to constant scrutiny through the rigors of
peer review.
It is complicated though and I’m open to hearing of alternatives that
will work if you can come up with them. But we certainly need something
that will work better than the mindless idea of excluding all that is
new and villanizing anyone who uses the new technology of the future
whether they chose to use it or were just born using it. That strategy
really can only go so far.
Lately there has been a lot of news about death and dying parading
through the media. Water Cooler conversations seem to involve nothing
else these days. Well that and Baseball. But sports and weather will
never be pushed out of the national consciousness.
We have a court that decided that 17 was too young to die. We have
newly publicized body counts from Iraq. We have a sad case of a single
person having her feeding tube removed. We have yet another school
massacre. These things add up. Soon there seems to be nothing anywhere
you look but death death death. If it can distort a person’s view of
reality then it can certainly distort a nation’s view.
It is intriguing that Death should be the primary concern of a
nation just before a Holiday that is all about Resurrection. If I were
a religious person I might think that this is a subtle nod to a greater
plan.
But I am not a religious person and much of the talk just ticks me off.
The truth is we don’t have a consistent model for dealing with death in
a nation built up of so many different traditions on the subject. So
that there is a lot of confusion, uncertainty, and fear about the
subject shouldn’t be surprising at all. Even to those with the most
optimistic faiths death is a terrifying thing. Logically we should
respect each other’s uncertainty on the subject and not make a natural
divide between public issues related to death and personal issues
related to death. Public issues meaning issues that can be rationally
analyzed. We can see the numbers, compute the percentages, determine
the just course of action as that which will prevent the most deaths
and provide to those who live the greatest standard of living. It’s
utilitarian and thus sometimes disturbing, but better by far than the
alternative of having a few people making decisions with regards to the
personal morality of death based on their own personal decisions and
nothing more. This is, in effect, forcing your beliefs upon others and
is as insidious and dangerous as mandatory school prayer would be.
But THAT isn’t what ticks me off. What I really hate. What I really
despise is false sentiment. I hate the social environment that requires
it and demands it of the populace at a whole. I find it hard to swallow
whenever I hear it on the news or in public. Many people believe that
it is a symbol of how good a person you are how much you show sentiment
for the suffering of others. This inspires people to pronounce their
deep deep sadness over various things that have no direct impact on
them. This in turn causes the political persons who represent them to
announce ringing condemnation of the causes of the suffering and their
own, always very personal, feelings of disgust, sadness, and anger.
It’s so often an elaborate farce.
Nearly every person I’ve heard advocating the acceptance of the courts
position in the case of Terry Schiavo has prefaced their arguments
against the opposing view with something along the lines of “Believe
me, It’s not like I don’t care whether Terry Schiavo lives or dies.
I’ll be very sad to see Terry go. I don’t take any pleasure in watching
her die. However…” This is in large part because many of the
opposition has posed the discussion in terms of a mysterious group of
“evil” people who want to see Terry Schiavo die a horrible painful
death being deprived of food and water and will laugh and dance about
the room when it happens. Miraculous how you’ll never meet a member of
this mysterious “Evil” people group but that doesn’t stop the
accusations.
But… I’ve got to disagree with part of these statements. Althought
it’s true that I won’t take pleasure in seeing her go. You’d have to be
a monster to revel in the death of fellow human being, right? Well
maybe not necessarily but that is a discussion for another day…
Anyway, it is certainly the case that in this case I have no reason
whatsoever to take pleasure in her death. However, I can’t say honestly
that I care so much about whether she lives or dies. I just can’t find
it in me to be deeply moved by the situation. Now, no doubt if I saw
more pictures of her on life support surrounded by loving family
members my natural reaction would be more sympathetic, but I don’t
watch tv very much so that hasn’t happened. All I have is dry radio
accounts to go on and they don’t push me very much.
Indeed I think it would be somewhat hypocritical of me if I were
to care. I’d obviously be lying right? How could I all of a suddenly be
wailing and weeping about a person in roughly the same predicament she
was in ten years. I certainly didn’t care enough to write or send my
condolences to her loved ones ever during that long period of
suffering. I didn’t send money, I didn’t offer my support. Indeed I
just lead my life as normal, and so did nearly everyone in the entire
country up until a few weeks ago.
Oh but there’s a reason for that right. I didn’t know about this case
ten years ago. That’s right. I didn’t know. I still don’t really know.
I don’t know her, her family or any of her friends and loved ones. Just
as I don’t know any number of thousands of people who are
suffering right now at this very instance and suffering in a very
real and certain way. And I didn’t know the many people who died in the
Tsunami, though I was awed and amazed at the event. And I didn’t know
the many people who dies on 9/11, though I was repulsed and surpirsed
by the event. I don’t know any of the people who are dying daily in
Iraq, though I am deeply disturbed and annoyed at its
continuance. And I don’t express my deep sympathies and
sadness for any of these people either. I don’t wail and weep for them.
I never will until I know them. I don’t believe in false sentiment. I
don’t believe in pretending to care. I believe in really caring. And in
those cases where you do care, you care enough to help and that matters.
Now I’m a strange case because often I don’t express my sympathies even
when I do care, even when I care a great deal. That’s more likely a
psychological disorder I have or something of the kind because I don’t
particularly know how to express sentiment in a manner that is
befitting of the circumstances. What’s more, I so often think that
there is nothing that I could say that will really help. It seems a
waste of time to say and not do, to help without actions. What good is
that really? Almost seems like lying too.
Ok so here’s a connection an astute observer might observe using myself
as a logical test subject. Person, this scholar might argue that the
tendency to present sympathy however “unreal” in a society is exactly
how the society preserves the ability to express sympathy in cases
where it is real. A sort of a practice makes perfect kind of argument.
If you so often refuse to develop any sadness over the plight of
strangers, no surprise really when you become so callous as to
not be able to express sadness at the plight of non-strangers.
Of course I’d argue the precise opposite. When a society encourages the
expressions of sentiment over those cases that aren’t real to a person
then it in fact condones the use of false sentiment in all cases. It
weakens the substance of real sentiment makes it ordinary and cheap and
just like what everyone else is doing. If it is a show put on by all
the peoples in the world then no surprise really when you are judged
not by the veracity of your feelings but by the skill of your
performance.
Now I do believe in what I might call rational sentiment.
Rational sentiment is the belief in behaving in a manner that balance
the scales of the universe because it will provide a better state for
the nation and world as a whole. The things done on the order of
rational sentiment often seem the same as those things done because of
the deep emotional connection that provides real sentiment. That
is you might send cards to someone who is hurting offering your
willingness to help them. You might provide money and aid to the
suffering who are suffering through not fault of their own. You might
provide money to charity or directly to the victims of Tsunami’s and
School shootings and acts of terrorism. You might lobby for
humanitarian aid in countries that need it or to stop wars that you
don’t believe in. These acts are rational. They are born not of
some pretense of caring about people you don’t know but because the
world is better if we all think of this cosmic endeavor as one in which
we are all in it together. We are all looking to help one another
because we understand that we all need a little help from time to time.
The opposing view that comes about from not behaving rationally in this
matter will result in a world where everyone’s life is a crap shoot.
You just accept whatever fate is passed upon you. And no matter the
cause or consequences you’ve just got to deal with it. If you don’t.
Death and suffering. It’s as simple as that. And of course this kind of
world view has other even more dangerous consequences as circumstances
will stack the deck in favor of some who are able to minimize their
risks. The result is a suppression of contrary ideas and opinions and
different ways of thinking that ultimately results in humanity as a
whole not progressing as far and as fast as it could. So of
course behaving in a manner that helps others is just the rational
thing to do even if you don’t know the person and even if the actions
you make are not necessarily in your own best interest.
Now someone might say to me, “Yeah yeah that’s all well and good, but
when you say you don’t care that much about Terry Schiavo, I just don’t
believe you! Either you do care or you just really haven’t though about
it very much. Imagine yourself in that situation. Surely you would then
see what a terrible thing is happening here. Surely you can see how
hard it would be on your family and friends?”
It’s a good point. It might mean then that we are wired to have real
sentiment about every other human being. But I don’t find the argument
via imagination for this point of view particularly convincing.
For one thing, in this particular case it isn’t even an exercise that
one is capable of engaging in. I can’t possible imagine being in Terry
Schiavo’s condition because by all accounts nobody knows what it is
like to be in her condition. It is exactly as mysterious as
death. Uknown and unknowable by modern science at least. But if I make
absurd hypotheticals then I might be able to do it. None of those
conclusions will mean anything but let’s try anyway for the heck of it.
First of all let’s suppose that I really do have no consciousness at
all. No brain waves. Nothing zilch. So of course the conclusion there
is obvious. I won’t care what happens to me as I won’t be caring at
all. I just won’t exist anymore. That’s the most disturbing possibiltiy
of all. Now suppose I do have a consciousness; that I am at least
marginally aware. What then do I think of my plight. Well surely
assuming I am still human in mind a part of me wants to live. The
instinct to live is rarely dwindled by mere suffering. However, I can’t
honestly say for certain that I wouldn’t want to die too. It certainly
might be rather annoying to be stuck in that situation unable to do
anything. Trapped. It might seem better to face a complete unkown of
death. Of course thati s assuming that death still is unknown to me.
Another hypothetical situation might be to assume that I only have
consciousness by virtue of already being partially dead and thus I know
kind of what awaits me. Then of course whether I want to live or die is
going to depend in large part on what I know to be awaiting. If it is a
nether world of unending torture and suffering well I think it likely
I’d prefer living, but if it is a paradise that I can’t quite reach
because of the connection by all means sever the connection ASAP. But
there’s a little more to it too. What if I feel an obligation to my
fellow human beings to tell them of the great paradise that awaits
them, or what if by contrast I feel an equal urge to warn people of the
dangers of death. No doubt those things might well change my decision.
As you can see that entire exercise was a total waste of time and
certainly proved no additional evidence of the kind of sentiment I hear
everyone expressing in our oh so honest media. Imagining what I
would think or want if I were in that situation is absurd on many
levels and can provide no enlightment whatsoever. However, what if I
were to instead think not about what I would think, but what do I think
now. That is, something like, what if I had certain knowledge that this
was going to happen to me and that I would be stuck in that situation
what would I want? What would I choose? Or what would I not choose?
Well the last question is pretty obvious to me. I know exactly what I
would absolutely positively NOT choose and that is to have exactly what
has been happening to Terry Schiavo’s family happen to my family. I
certainly would not want my family living with this mess for fourteen
years or even fourteen minutes if I can help it. I wouldn’t want the
sadness or suffering to continue for so long. I wouldn’t want it to be
a media circus reverbating the plight and extending the suffering of my
family. I wouldn’t want anyone to be spending an extra money on my life
that could be used for something better to help those who need it. I
certainly wouldn’t want to see the legislature and courts fighting like
rabid dogs over an issue of such overwhelming triviality, as I would
perceive it, of my own sorry state. I wouldn’t want a nation to
mourn my death. Bad enough to have anyone waste time mourning when they
could be living, when they could be finding ways to make themselves
happy or to provide for the future of humanity. It would certainly
repulse me to no ends to even imagine that anyone would even conceive
of using my death as a means to push some disturbing political
agenda.If your agenda cannot stand up on its own merits without the
need of my death as the bludgeoning rod to push it forward chances are
good either the agenda is flawed or the people are not ready for it. In
either case it should not come to pass.
So if I had such certain knowledge I would of course codify these
beliefs in a living will specifying exactly that. I would want to be
let to die as quickly as is reasonable once medical science has
rationally concluded that the chances of my revival are too slim for
logical people to gamble upon or even sooner if the price of providing
for me enough care to make my chances better would provide even the
slightest hardship upon others. And likewise I would want my burial and
services to be cheap or non-existent really. Or rather, I would want
just enough of a services as would allow those family and friends to
accept my passing and move on. Not a second more. Not a cent more
money should be put into. And of course all of the money spent should
be mine whenver possible.
But that’s just me. Let’s talk about other death issues because
this one is depressing me. OK, raising the minimal death sentence
age I think is a very very good thing. A society must progress to a
level of lesser internal contradiction and preventing the killing of
children is a step in that direction. More importantly it is a step in
the direction of the elimination of the death penalty which has got to
go. Societies cannot continue to speak out one side of hteir mouths
saying that they are about the sanctity and protection of life while
condemning people to die out the other side of their mouths. It’s
absurd.
That’s not to say that I would be repulsed by a society that went the
other way. A society that wholly embraced the death penalty, that build
rituals around it and accepted it and integrated it into the
consciousness of all of its citizens might be reasonable to. You just
need to have your culture as a whole have a mutual understanding that
this killing is for everyone. That it is everyone’s fault and the
failure of society and we accept that and regret it but we are doing
what we must. A person killed by the death penalty shouldn’t be alone
and suffering a miserable shame of a death. Everyone, save the victims
of course, should be around them, supporting them helping them to die.
Yes this is an example of rational sentiment for surely it is hard to
develop real sentiment for serial killers and worse. But culturally a
civilization if it is to call itself civilized should be consistent in
its prescriptions about life and death and should treat all of its
peoples as its peoples. Again. No exiles. Either we support killing our
own or we don’t. Together as a group we decide. Conclusively. We’re all
in this together. Get it?
But anyways, I’m glad the courts made their decision. However, I’m not
particularly happy about their arguments. Arguable national concensus
and the example of other countries does not a solid argument make. But,
that’s why I like the courts. The arguments were just and all are open
explained and can be studied and understood. And the decisions
made will serve well for our nation even if we don’t agree with them by
raising our understanding and improving the national dialogue.
Legislatures and executors don’t have to explain the reasoning behind
their decisions, they only have to meet the expectations of those who
elect them. Courts do. That’s what makes them cool.
Now since I’ve heard a lot of stuff lately about what age children
should be allowed to do this and that, this seems like a good place to
discuss that as well. Consider. People argue that children should not
be allowed to drive until 18 or should be allowed to vote under 18 or
for chaging the age expectations of alcohol or going to war and all
kinds of stuff. Always the arguments are the same. Kids aren’t mature
enough. Kids are mature enough. Blah blah blah.
Of course the obvious thing not discussed that must be discussed is
what exactly constitutes maturity. Where does it come from? How can we
develop it rather than simply assigning it to people when the clock
ticks a certain number of times. To be totally honest it is really
ridiculous to make any solid barriers based at all on age.
The world isn’t split into children and adults. We’re all people. Some
of us are dumb, some of us are immature, and some of us are smart and
others are mature. It has very little to do with age except that
knowledge and awareness develop over time… through experience.
Sooo, the obvious way to have children be mature enough to make
rational thoughtful decisions about various things is to expose them to
experience with regards to those things sooner and more often. The
result would be a society of where children are experience tiers of
exposures to aspects of reality that are every bit as real as those
challenges that adults face. Success in the early challenges qualifies
you for higher ones and failures drop you down to lower experiences.
But of course such a system would entail a full elimination of the idea
of sheltering children from the world at large until they are “ready”
to face it, something that should just happen at the flip of a switch
at some arbitrary age. No more life divided between the fully care free
years of childhood and the wholly responsible years of adult hood. We
need to have adults thatare more carefree and children that learn more
responsibility. That’s the way to progress our society. Then children
will feel that their lives matter and adults won’t feel burned out and
frustrated. Works right?
And then, maybe when children grow up in a society that is consistent
in its treatment of people of all sorts we’ll get a world where the
worse thing we really do have to worry about is whether brain
death and death are really the same thing.
