Determinism And Uncertainty

 

I was recently listening to a talk about the philosopher Wittgenstein. The lady giving the presentation mentioned that in his work there are hidden verbs which control things- essentially speaking of a deterministic structure. The lady then went on to talk about uncertainties.

 

I later wrote to her (no reply) to say ‘if there are hidden verbs which dictate how things are then this is a deterministic model and if it is deterministic then how can there be uncertainty, surely what we call uncertainty must be ignorance?’

 

An example of determinism is:

 

‘Newton’s third law is: For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. The statement means that in every interaction, there is a pair of forces acting on the two interacting objects. The size of the forces on the first object equals the size of the force on the second object.’

 

 

And if we accept the premise that we live in a deterministic world where effect follows cause then how can there be uncertainty? What we call uncertainty would be, surely, ignorance. For example, if a person falls over we can determine that a force acted upon the person to make them fall even if we do not know what the force was- were they pushed? Was it just clumsiness? Here we cannot know what the cause was but, given the laws of physics, we can state that there was a cause and that the effect of the cause was that they fell is due to gravity.

 

One of the most bizarre traits in people in the seeming reluctance or inability to say ‘I don’t know’. Why this is I don’t know (tee hee) but many problems can stem from this. People are too concerned with how they appear as to being how they wish to seem. Experts will speak on subject matters which they know nothing about to appear intelligent and, even worse, will pass up the opportunity to learn out of a conceit.

 

We live in an age of global uncertainty and two of the nominal leaders in the world refuse to admit that they do not know. When asked about something he does not know Trump will say ‘it’s great, it’s stuff’ and May, with Brexit, spouts out empty platitudes without any real meaning. We look to our leaders to lead and if they do not know something we are uncomfortable. This is because we need certainty, we presuppose that there are hidden verbs and reasons that create a deterministic model which will be great and we won’t have to worry. However, if a leader stood up and said this is unprecedented however, I have a team of experts who, from history, can held to determine the best course of action then would we be reassured?

 

Even human behaviour can be predicted by the use of probability and it seems certain that the majority of, if not all existence is, to a certain extent, deterministic however, the model in which it operates is beyond our ability to comprehend yet we still have what we call uncertainty which essentially is ignorance. We cannot know how the future will unfurl and even if it is determined that has little or no real effect on us here, right now.

 

So we should take what we know and move on into the future attempting to do the best that we can and remember, to paraphrase Socrates, the wisest man is the man who knows that he knows nothing so asks for help.

 

‘till next time

 

 

#MeToo

At the recent Golden Globes, Natalie Portman, when announcing the nominees for Best Director, said ‘And here are all the male nominees’. Obviously, the room, full of celebrities, cheered and praised Ms Portman for her biting comment oblivious, it seems, to the irony of their and her actions.

 

Hollywood is an industry which has come under fire, rightly so, recently for the rampant sexual harassment which has gone on since the beginning of Hollywood. Now women feel that they can stand up and say that this is bad. Please note that it is only women who are given centre stage despite some of the biggest names to get the proverbial ball rolling being men speaking about other men sexually abusing them. This is part of the wider problem.

 

The Women’s March and so forth are counter intuitive and are only going to widen or make more apparent the divide between men and women in society. If the march had been called ‘Rational, Sane People Marching Against Sexual Abuse Regardless Of The Gender Of The Victims And/Or Perpetrators’ (the RSPMASAROTGOTVAOP) then it would be rather long winded but would be more to the point. Sexual harassment and inequality happens to men and women of all ages, carried out by men and women. Statistically more men have been accused but a) men usually occupy the roles of ‘power’ and b) a woman coming forward to complain of sexual harassment will be treated less badly than a man. If you’ve seen aptly named Horrible Bosses you will know that when one of the male leads complains about being sexually harassed by his boss (Jenifer Aniston) his friend replies

 

‘Why don’t you just, you know, **** her?’

 

This inequality is cultural and is a bigger topic but what I wish to focus on now is role of Hollywood in sexual harassment.

 

On the latest Public Enemy album Chuck D wrote ‘Some wanna be a spectacle/Instead of spectacular’ and five minutes on Instagram will prove him correct. Hollywood is built around the abstract notion of fame. To be seen to succeed in Hollywood is to have your name known, not only in the industry but, by the wider public as Hollywood is an industry about making money. In order to get your foot in the door you must have a quality which people think is able to make money. Quite often that quality, especially for Hollywood Blockbusters, is the face and the body of both the males and females. What is a leading man? What is a leading woman? Usually someone whom the audience would like to sleep with. Some transcend and are booked on their merits i.e. acting ability but these are usually exceptional actors/actresses. More often than not to acting is bad but the person appears attractive so, hey, it makes money. How did Titanic make so much money? Leonardo Di Cappuccino which then made him a bankable actor and giving him more key roles. Ironically his least acclaimed films are the one where he gives his best acting performances but in which he plays a bisexual poet (Rimbaud) or a person with a learning disability.

 

The most shocking part of all of this is that it has been going on for years and has been just accepted. Einstein said that you cannot solve a problem with the same thinking which caused the problem and yet people are now looking to Hollywood to solve this problem (Oprah 2020?).

 

In 1982 J.G Ballard published his Zodiac for the year 2000 and in it each sign was about cameras, computers, missiles etc as though Ballard knew that by the year 2000 our lives would be guided by exhibitionism, nihilism and pseudo celebrity  and as we sit watching our TV screens, browsing our social media waiting for Hollywood and a TV President to clear up the mess whilst specialists of all genders sit at home being ignored because they don’t look like Natalie Portman we cannot help but think, you think that, Mr Ballard? Well #MeToo.

 

 

‘till next time

 

Reconsidering Socrates

 

 

For many Socrates is great but for almost as many he is ultimately a failure. Upon the completion of his album Various Positions the boss at Columbia Records listened to the first track and told Leonard Cohen that they knew he was great but they didn’t know if he was any good. The album was rejected. The same is applicable for Socrates, many know he was great but no one knows if he was any good. When reading the Platonic dialogues it is often hard to distinguish between Socrates and Plato so here’s a crude synopsis. If it offers answers it is Plato and if it is only asking questions it is Socrates.

 

The Socratic method is deeply studied but the results are often erroneous. He gets patted on the back for his attempts and Plato and others get the reverence. In Tractatus Logico-philosophicus Wittgenstein says that what is in his book is all you need to know about anything, case closed and even one of my most esteemed fellows Spinoza explains how things are, especially in relation to emotions. This emotion and this context equals this emotion and yet one of the great problems in philosophy, physics, literature, psychology, sociology and so forth is that the work is ultimately superficial. Theories and explanations are given of how things are, as in how they appear. However, how things appear and what they truly are is often very different.

 

The Socratic method is almost scientific in its nature. Socrates essentially proposes a hypothesis and then attempts to test it from one angle. When that angle fails to show the true nature of whatever he is hypothesising he then approaches it from a different angle and so on and so forth, ultimately showing that what the thing truly is is not how it appears as is shown from many different angles each with a different interpretation. Plato, it seems, found this approach limiting and attempted to go further by offering theories which went beyond what is perceived but explained some of how it was perceived as it is. The most famous example is of the world of forms where there is the perfect, for example, cow which explains why all cows look similar and yet are not identical.

 

For this one must go into the realms of thing which cannot be known and is still built upon a model based in the finite world. There are three cows, they look similar, why? Also it is important to note that Plato was a poet and playwright until his 27^th birthday when he met Socrates and burnt his works to go off and become a philosopher and he is often disparaging of poets and artists, however, his work and some of his theories, such as the world of forms/ideas are clearly those of a poet/playwright  and so can be seen as a poetic attempt to explain the finite world and what is known. Socrates, however, with his ‘the wisest man is the man who knows that he knows nothing’ approach to philosophy can be seen as one of the few thinkers who actually was a success. One thing many crave is certainty not realising that certainty is simply ignorance of ignorance for to say you are certain is to show that you are unaware of your own ignorance. This is something which Socrates avoids by concluding either there is something there or there isn’t, however, how things appear is rarely, if ever, how they truly are.

 

This is a lesson we can all learn from and is evidence that Socrates was both great and a great (sigh) success.

 

 

‘till next time

New Yeaouuu-ah-eee-oooo

Take a look at Madelaine True;
Her eyes slanted. Her eyes were green;
Heavy-lidded; pouched: obscene.
Eyes like a snake’s:
Like a stagnant pool
Filled with slime.
Her mouth was cruel:
A scar
In red,
That had recently opened and bled.
Her body was marvellous:
A miracle had fused it:
The whole world had seen it—
And a good part had used it.
People bought their seats in advance
For fifteen dollars,
Glad of the chance
To see her dance.

Joseph Moncure March- The Wild Party

The Wild Party is a narrative poem which, if anything, shows the superficial nature of society. The poem came out in the Jazz Age and was published and banned in 1928.

The Roman novel The Satyricon and Ovid’s poem The Art Of Love (and its sequel The Cure For Love) contain the same elements almost 1500 years before, as do the Greek poets etc. Complicit to what C. S. Lewis calls ‘chronological snobbery’ we assume that we have made leaps forward since those fellows in history with their simplicity and superstition not realising that in the future physics and philosophy etc may be seen the same way by our future ancestors (aren’t we quaint?) especially the myth of all of this matter of some sort all being together and then, for no reason, exploding with a big bang and monkeys start playing with iPads, yeah, ok.

I recently had a job interview for a marketing job and during the interview I decided that it was not for me (I’m too attached to my soul…) and realising this the interviewer tried his sales techniques on me to belittle me and make me agree with him. We both ended the session frustrated but for different reasons.

Something I have spoken of before on here is embodied in the delightfully named Miss True of the aforementioned poem. Sartre had a concept called bad faith in which people act out roles (life?) without being the role themselves, something we are all guilty off.

Our attempts to seduce are the same. The recent outbreak of sexual harassment claims show one thing a) such things are given a gender bias, yes there are more female claims but that is because there are more men in said positions of power. If you were a young man at the Old Vic theatre in the 2000s then you would be more likely to be sexually harassed by the director, Kevin Spacey. Also b) I see comments from men about female reporters having their bodies complemented by the men they are interviewing and saying that this is ok, it is not harassment they should be flattered. The whole notion of private and personal gone as is the notion of professionalism.

As had been noted by some readers, I am, essentially, to paraphrase, an overgrown two year old walking around saying ‘why? Why?’. Personally I think this insults two year olds, but never mind.

Newton, a weird, possibly homosexual, virgin a*****e, according to many biographers, shows that non of these superficial things matter, all that matters is who you really are, not how you come across, not how you are interpreted but who you are. And who was Newton? Well, let’s ask him

I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.
Which might seem quite an odd thing to say but, personally, I’m trying to find the seashore.

Thank you again for your readership into the new year. If you have any comments or topics you want discussed or clarified then please feel free to comment or email me ( thegreaterfool2016@yahoo.com ). Remember, I am pretty dumb so if I cannot do your topic justice I won’t try (although I will personally reply so please leave contact details) and remember in the words of Jack Kerouac

‘I have nothing to offer anybody, except my own confusion.’

‘till next time!

 

 

Magic & Loss

 

When you pass through humble, when you pass through sickly

When you pass through anger and self-deprecation

And have the strength to acknowledge it all

When the past makes you laugh and you can savour the magic

That let you survive your own war

You find that that fire is passion

And there’s a door up ahead not a wall

 

In 1992 Lou Reed released an album called Magic & Loss. The album dealt with the deaths of two of Lou’s closest friends (including the seminal 50’s pop songwriter Doc Pomus whose name may be unfamiliar but his work surely isn’t). I listened to the album and a couple of songs leapt out but then it sat on the shelf once more. A few years later my health started to deteriorate and my Grandfather became terminally ill and, by coincidence, I happened to find myself listening to the album

 

It seems every thing’s done that must be done

From over here though things don’t seem fair

But there are things that we can’t know

Maybe there’s something over there

Some other world that we don’t know about

I know you hate that mystic s***

It’s just another way of seeing

The sword of Damocles above your head

 

And I finally understood it. Now, even more years later racked with self-doubt and the impending death of my Grandmother, I found myself listening to the album once more.

The album is a meditation on life and death from the perspective of one dying but the most striking aspect of the album is how much it highlights the worst part of grief, that is the selfishness of grief. Whilst the person dying

 

I saw a great man turn into a little child

The cancer reduce him to dust

His voice growing weak as he fought for his life

With a bravery stronger than lust

I saw isotopes introduced into his lungs

Trying to stop the cancerous spread

And it made me think of “Leda And The Swan”

And gold being made from lead

The same power that burned Hiroshima

Causing three legged babies and death

Shrunk to the size of a nickel

To help him regain his breath

 

All that seems to matter is a self-reflection of the other’s demise, not only the search for reason

 

We spewed out questions waiting for answers

Creating legends, religions and myths

Books, stories, movies and plays

All trying to explain this

 

But also a reflection of who we are, where we are and who we will be, as seen in the brilliantly entitled Harry’s Circumcision – Reverie Gone Astray (listen to the song if you can)

 

Looking in the mirror Harry didn’t like what he saw

The cheeks of his mother the eyes of his father

As each day crashed around him the future stood revealed

He was turning into his parents

The final disappointment

…thinking of Vincent Van Gogh…lopped off his nose

And happy with that he made a slice where his chin was

He’d always wanted a dimple

Harry thought of the range of possibilities

A new face a new life no memories of the past

And slit his throat from ear to ear

Harry woke up with a cough, the stitches made him wince

A doctor smiled at him from somewhere across the room

Son, we saved your life but you’ll never look the same

And when he heard that, Harry had to laugh

The final disappointment

 

You can see how the reverie went astray, eh? Death is a time of change and in all times of change we are forced to evaluate ourselves and our values. Buddhism teaches that one should not be attached but Buddhism is a contradiction for to be a true Buddhist one must be attached to the sanctity of goodness, of love and above all, to life and life is, ultimately, balance. My nephew is two, my Grandmother (at time of writing) soon to be no more. As the blossom falls to its death so new life grows from the death of the blossom.

 

As you pass through fire

You cannot remain the same

And if the building’s burning move towards that door

But don’t put the flames out

There’s a bit of magic in everything

And then some loss to even things out 

 

‘till next time