Fool Me Once…

The Ancient Greek (regarded by many Roman historians as the last true Greek, that is historians which were Roman and not historians studying Rome), Philopoemen, was baffled, possibly because he was trying to understand the difference between Roman historians and Roman historians. Having, as a youth, just joined the army he was informed that, to make the soldiers the able to endure exhaustion and hunger, they were perpetually kept in a state of exhaustion and hunger. Later, when Philopoemen became a General of the army, he reversed the position. Now, if a soldier was kept, by their self, or others, in a state of perpetual exhaustion and hunger, they would be severely disciplined. Whilst I cannot speak for the thinking of Philopoemen, it seems that this was his thought pattern.

To be in a state of perpetual exhaustion and hunger was not a good state to be in:

To keep the state continued was deemed to be good behaviour, encouraged, and ergo became the default notion of ‘good behaviour’

To be in a state of relaxation (i.e. not exhausted or hungry) was deemed to be bad behaviour, punished, and ergo became the default notion of ‘bad behaviour’.

Now, we do not need to be psychiatrist to see that the former has severe damage to the body and mind and the later is a desired, ‘normal’ state to be in as the body needs the balance but, the very fact that it took a giant, such as Philopoemen, to not only see this but to also do something about it, should concern us. Why? Because the same happens in our society.

We have oft heard, or even said, the truism, ‘fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me’, meaning that if we have trusting natures and those natures are exploited then we can say that we were trusting and were wronged. However, the truism then goes on to say that if we are fooled again then we are to blame for still being trusting.

Let’s break this down. To fool a person (I’m speaking in malicious terms not just hiding shoes etc.) is an act which stems from insecurities. We know the saying that liars do not trust anyone else and to be a liar is not a good thing so to fool a person, once, is a bad thing. However, the correction to this behaviour, it seems, is for the one who was fooled, the one who was trusting, to change  their behaviour and to become not trusting, like all of those people we meet who brag about not trusting anyone.

As we have just seen, to be untrustworthy is a bad state and to trust is a good state. Yet, the solution for one being treated badly is not for the one who committed the act of bad faith to amend their behaviour and become ‘good’, rather it is for the one who was good, leading to them being fooled, to become untrusting, to go from a good state into a bad state.

This concept is not reserved only to the army and untrue truisms, it permeates every aspect of our culture. Bad behaviours are rewarded, and good behaviours are punished. Take the workplace, for example. If one gossips, one is seen as being part of the ‘in-crowd’, and gossiping is passed off as ‘something that just happens’. If one refrains from gossiping, then one is made an outcast by the ‘in-crowd’. Let’s summarise this- bad behaviour is rewarded and good behaviour is punished. Here it gets interesting as one has to ask, why? Sadly, the answer is not as interesting as the question. It comes down to education. Just as the Greeks would reward those who suffered needlessly, it took Philopoemen imposing negative reinforcement to bad behaviours to get people to change to good behaviours.

Humans as a whole are a weak species, born of insecurities and fear. Thusly, instead of trying to elevate themselves, they create a hegemony and expect all to conform or be ostracised. Whether or not what Aaron Sorkin writes in his television show, The Newsroom (to change one word- full speech in context below)

‘We aspired to [goodness], we didn’t belittle it. It didn’t make us feel inferior’

Is true, neither you nor I can say. However, it seems clear that as long as bad behaviours are aspired towards and reinforced, the truism ‘fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me’, will continue to be seen as true and the truism which should take its place, ‘fool me once, educate yourself and become a better person who doesn’t need to reply on deception to try to feel better about who they are as a person’. It’s a funny thing, but if you want to be ‘good’, if you try really, really hard to act as though you are good, then, who knows, you may just become good. Yes, it is much harder than creating a mythology to support your bad behaviour but, deep down, don’t you want your life to actually stand for something, something good?

‘till next time

———————- 

‘…We stood up for what was right. We fought for moral reason. We passed laws, struck down laws, for moral reason. We waged wars on poverty, not on poor people. We sacrificed, we cared about our neighbours, we put our money where our mouths were, and we never beat our chest. We built great, big things, made ungodly technological advances, explored the universe, cured diseases and we cultivated the world’s greatest artists AND the world’s greatest economy. We reached for the stars, acted like men. We aspired to intelligence; we didn’t belittle it. It didn’t make us feel inferior. We didn’t identify ourselves by who we voted for in the last election and we didn’t scare so easy. We were able to be all these things and do all these things because we were informed… by great men, men who were revered. First step in solving any problem is recognizing there is one.’

Aaron Sorkin

The Necessity of Sin: The Bible as a Literal/Historical Document

One issue which has caused great concertation and, to be blunt, wars, throughout history is the question as to whether the Holy Scriptures are true, the argument being; mine is true and yours is not thusly I will go to paradise and you will not, or, you are wrong to believe in a God as I do not, ergo there is no God, how do I know this, I know this as I have knowledge of all things, almost Godlike knowledge, hey, wait a second, Godlike…I’m not God like, I AM GOD, and having proven that I do not exist I cease to do so.

My own person thoughts on this are thus- the Bible is literal however it is not historical.

What do I mean by this? Well, previous readers may recall my piece on the History of God in which I show how the concept of God came about as an attempt to understand and explain the world. As all knowledge and understanding comes from conceptualisation, which is done through language, when we encounter something which we have never encountered before we cannot conceptualise it and therefore fall back on what we know. Firstly, God/s took on the form of nature- the Sun, thunder etc. then, from approximately the Ancient Egyptians, the gods started to take on a human form, all be it with animal likenesses in part, such as a jackal’s head etc. The most interesting thing about this was that the divinities were ceasing to be nature but were becoming the causes of nature- now there was a god who would make the sun rise and fall, as opposed to the sun being a god in itself. From the Greeks onwards, the gods became fully human, in manner and also in temperament. The gods were petty, spoilt, tedious, wise, powerful etc., all things that we humans either were or aspired towards. Then polytheism started to move towards monotheism and suddenly there was only one God in which all of humanity had to be embodied. This God was wise and loving, but prone to jealously and genocide if not properly adored (note: this is why the Old Testament God can send floods etc.).

Anyway, what was the point of my recapping of my previous work? Well, as you can see the notion and concept of a God came about to explain and understand the real world. The flooding of the Nile, something which caused civilisations to fall, was now the whims of the gods, gods who could be swayed by sacrifice and prayer (note: the Danish theological philosopher Soren Kierkegaard said that prayer changes not God but the one who prays and above we may glean and understanding into what he meant). But not only was the land in the hands of the gods, but also the lives of mortals. One would fall in love because of the gods, one would kill because of the gods, one would even justify killing based on the desires of the gods, such as the auguries taken at the temple of Apollo in Greece where drug ingestion would let priests interpret the, for example, flight of birds or the value of the bribe the king had given them.

With this is mind we can read the bible as a literal  document of the rise and birth, not only of civilisation, but also of the individual, the person in the movement away from pre-historic ages into the modern world (note: for the purposes of this I am defining the modern age as beginning approximately 800-400 BC with the beginning of the Golden Age of the Greeks through Homer-Pericles-Plato et al). However, as I stated before, although we can see the bible as a literal story of the internal and external development of humans, it is not historical. What I mean by that is that although these developments took place, they did not happen as the Bible states in a linear narrative full of excitement, obsessive measurements, copious begatting and intrigue. From this the bible itself can be read as a parable of the development of the human and not as a biographical account of a historical document.

However, just for fun, let us suppose that the Bible is historic, and everything happened just as it is written, including the bits which contradict each other. The aforementioned Kierkegaard, in his book on the origins of anxiety, raises an interesting point. If Adam had not eaten from the tree of life, then our history would not exist. What does he mean by this? Well, many interpretations of ‘The Fall’, even Genesis, state that once Adam and Eve had eaten from the Tree of Life, they became conscious as themselves as both Godlike and animals. They became ashamed of their nakedness as it made them animals and attempted to cover their humanity. Also, it is worth noting, that Cain and Abel we conceived after the leaving of the Garden (note: gardens seem to be the places of betrayal if the think of this example and also that of Gethsemane), and thusly, it appears, that once they had eaten of the tree they also discovered the most fundamental of animalisms- the pursuit of food (learning to toil the land to grow crops), shelter and procreation. From this, we can hypothesise that, in suggesting that our history begins with Adam and Eve committing the first sin, the eating of the fruit, we are faced with the startling conclusion that, if the Bible is a literal, historical document then sin was a necessity in order to begin a history which reaches from then to you reading these words.

‘till next time           

Immortality and Death

The other day, whilst out walking, something occurred to me. Listening to the new Dylan album, Dylan asks, ‘what would Julius Caesar do?’, possibly a play on the ‘what would JC (Jesus Christ) do?’, I found it interesting that, even though he is long dead, Caesar is still a household name, indeed has been so for many a long year, over two thousand, to be precise. It amused me to note that, even though he was long dead and gone, Caesar was, for all intents and purposes, immortal as his name, as Homer states, echoes through eternity.

I found this amusingly ironical as, it seemed, to become immortal one must first die. And then, to my astonishment, I realised that it was true. Firstly, on a name basis, real and fictional characters often become household names after they have demised. From William Blake to Van Gough, these names become known to us only after they have returned to the land of the Lamb. It has oft been said that people prefer dead saints to live ‘weirdos’ and a quick survey of society would show that those who become venerated in death often lead lives of persecution (Kierkegaard, Jesus, Plato, Socrates, Nietzsche, Beethoven, Thomas Jefferson et al) and are often treated extremely badly for the crime of ‘being different’, so for them to become palatable to the masses any threat they have to people’s sense of self must first be removed. This is often through death when the people can be repackaged for mass production. This could also explain the affection many have for fictional characters such as Kierkegaard, Jesus…I kid…Sherlock Holmes, Odysseus, people who people would, if they met in person, ostracize for being different, as they are fictional characters and do not have to be taken as complete beings (see my piece a few weeks ago on the degrees of separation).  

Yet, it is not only in death that one becomes immortal. Rather one might become immortal in life, however, to do so one must first die. To continue the theme from above, often when one becomes famous in one’s lifetime, one’s sense of self is eradicated for a media persona. The likes of Dylan fall into this trap; however, he is one of the few who, it seems, has managed to regain a sense of self, be it through becoming hyper-private and hiding in public. This, one could argue, is a death as one’s sense of self is often killed and replaced by a new ‘self’.

To wander from the theme, if one speaks of immortality one often thinks of theology. Whilst in the previous examples one becomes immortal in the eyes of people, i.e. they are known/remembered by people ergo, they are immortal, in some branches of Christianity one must die, not only in the eyes of the world but also in the eyes of God. Whilst much of theology is preparing for the afterlife, or in other words, preparing to die to become immortal (tee hee), this transition also takes place in life. Baptism, for example, is seen as the washing away of the old, sinful self to give birth to one who is cleansed of sin, well, except the sin of pride, maybe, and thus the immersion into the water is seen as the shedding of an old life and being reborn as a child of God (as though we aren’t all, already?).

 Whilst one spends a lot of time trying to create a legacy or be reborn in the afterlife, one forgets that what should matter is not the great pyramids which mark our tombs, but rather the life that we live. Whilst many of us live in fear and frustration at the failures of the world and of ourselves, in constant fear that our insecurities will be brought to the fore, we should be embracing life for what it is- the opportunity to learn, to grow, as Dylan said, ‘he not busy being born is busy dying’, or, those who aren’t learning who they are and growing are simply preparing for death. Yes, Sartre said that all has been worked out except how to live, but surely it is a better use of our lives to try to learn how to live as opposed to yearning for an immortality which can only come once we return to the dust from whence we sprang?

‘till next time  

The Art of Learning

The other day, whilst sat with my back against a tree, something hit me, quite hard I must add, on the head (pauses for sympathy to be expressed). I picked up the culprit of the escapades and noticed that it was an apple. ‘hmmm’, I said to myself, ‘where could this have come from?’. Tilting my head back I was shocked and amazed to discover that the tree I was leaning against was, in fact, an apple tree! Thusly, I deduced, ‘if this is an apple which hit me on the head (pauses for sympathy to be expressed) and above me is an apple tree then, using all of my analytical powers, I deduce that the apple must have come from the tree, to be precise, it must have FALLEN from the tree and hit me on the head! (pauses for sympathy). I looked around to see if anyone else had noticed this strange event but everyone else continued to be floating around, minding their own business. ‘Ah ha!’, I declared, with my index finger extended into the air, ‘I have just invented gravity!’ CRASH! All those floating around ceased to float and many noses were put out of joint with my new invention.

The historian Plutarch said that a sign of Archimedes’ genius was that he could take an incredibly complex issue and walk a person through it in such a clear and simple manner that by the end, those who were listening, assumed they must have known it all along. However, the German philosopher, Arthur Schopenhauer, saw the transition from ignorance to knowledge differently, as he stated:

‘All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident’.

One of the biggest problems in the world, and causes for much of the misery within, stems from people thinking that they know something. As we spoke of before, people have different levels of intellect and those on the lower levels, who cannot see the higher levels assume that they are on the highest level. This is fine, but when it comes to knowledge, it causes problems. By stipulating that they are intelligent and thusly must be able to deduce the ‘truth’, they assume that what they think is the truth and cannot be swayed (either by lack of capacity to do so or unwillingness to do so) that they may be wrong (note: if you ever meet anyone who ells you that they are intelligent, run, just run, leave your bags, keys, books etc. and just run as few people are more dangerous than one who thinks that they are intelligent).

Why do they think this? well, the assumption being made is that if they know something then they know all that there is to know of the subject. Aspects of truth, such as nuance, complexity and depth, are ignored for a fortune cookie wisdom which can easily be digested without too much thought, ‘sharing is caring’, ‘I know it’s hard, isn’t it’ etc. Whether this stems from a lack of intellectual curiosity or lack of intelligence, I do not know but it goes to highlight the biggest problem that one has when one is attempting to learn something, and that is the assumption that one already knows it, and thusly the problems are highlighted by Schopenhauer come into being.

A few years ago, the flat-earth society obtained more media coverage, and were condemned as being stupid. I have spoken of this before and will not repeat myself other than to say that we all know that tobacco and alcohol causes health problems yet those who mock the ‘flat-earthers’ for ignoring scientific proof will do the same for things, such as alcohol, which are socially acceptable. And thus, we reach the crux of this issue. One is clearly worse than the other, if you believe that the earth is flat, the worst that can happen is that, when you reach the horizon, you are disappointed, whereas, the worst that can happen from drinking and smoking is  long drawn-out suffering leading to death.  Yet, one of these is socially acceptable and the other is not. Ironically, it is the healthier one which is not socially acceptable. From this we can deduce that there is a strong likelihood that those who condemn ‘flat earthers’ would, throughout history, have burnt at the stake anyone who said that the earth was round (note: it is not round, it is spherical) when general knowledge stated that it was flat, or that it went around the sun when it was known that the sun orbited the earth or etc. etc. etc.

So, what is the art of learning? Well, it is rather simple. Firstly assume that everything you think you know on a subject is wrong and that you are starting from the beginning of the subject (note: please don’t take this to mean that if, for example, you are studying physics, that you pretend to forget what physics is or how to use mathematics etc.) and secondly, to try to find your own way into the subject- play with it, explore it, for if you approach it from a standpoint of conscious ignorance and see it as a toy to be played with then there is no limit to what you can learn whereas, if you approach it assuming that you know it all already then there is nothing that you will ever know of the subject in hand.

‘till next time

Afterword: I made up a joke I’d like to share. I find it hilarious, the one person I told said it made her head hurt (and not in a good way)

How many existentialists does it take to change a lightbulb?

It depends on the individual

(pauses for laughter)