Rebuttal

A recent comment to an old post reads:

The problem I see in leading a life based on impacting the life of another is this: our impact on another can never fully be gauged as positive or negative. In my experience (which I fear is the only lens I can see fully through) the positive impact I thought I was having on others was guided largely by false beliefs I held at the time, and I may, in hindsight, have done more harm than good. I shudder to think of the way my life has weaved through the lives of others. Makes me never want to leave my house.

Unfortunately, life is never so clear cut. In my fantasy world, the pieces of the puzzle come together in the last moments before death and we see what our true impact on our life and the lives of others has been. In the meantime, we are all stumbling in the dark, paving the road to Hell with our good intentions.

But hey, that's just me. Can't say this view makes me happy but I can afford no further delusions.

Here's my rebuttal:

First, this person would need to immediately stop blogging as this person (and from here we'll say "he") cannot possibly know what kind of effect his words have had or are having on those that read them. If he shudders to think how his life has weaved through the lives of others, then stop blogging now as you can see, your words have already had an affect on me.

Second, let's discern from "intentional" impact on other's lives and "unintentional".

Here's an earlier comment on the same blog entry:

<why life? because we have the ability to make an impact on another- that's what I believe...>

And my response:

<I agree, it's all about impact on the world around you, however far out the ripples roll. I thought originally about linking to this book; The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker. In the end, he writes:

"Who knows what form the forward momentum of life will take in the time ahead or what use it will make of our anguished searching. The most that any one of us can seem to do is fashion something--an object or ourselves--and drop it into the confusion, make an offering of it, so to speak, to the life force.">

We have the ability to impact the lives around us both intentionally and unintentionally. None of us is an island unto himself no matter how hard we try...we are biologically a social species; even alone, we are with a group as we cannot think of ourselves without thinking in terms of others. Thus, we cannot possibly know or control nor be responsible for our unintended impacts.

Now, our commenter, feels that he was making impacts based on false beliefs. Ok, to err is human. I certainly do not hold the same beliefs now as I did at age 20, that's called growing older and maturing. It's also called being human. Nor are impacts a one way street. Whatever impact I may have had on someone, I'm sure they had some impact on me as well. What if they held false beliefs? Does that put us both into a cesspool of hellish impacts? No, otherwise every human would be in our cesspool with us and so...if the road to hell is paved with good intentions, then the road to null void is paved with those who opt out and do nothing, afraid they may cause damage. I'll take hell, at least I'd know I'd lived--right or wrong. Malice is the only form of intentional negative impact and I think we can agree our commenter does not appear malicious. Our commenter thinks, in hindsight (and we all know the value of hindsight), he may have done more harm than good.

Thinks he may have done more harm than good. Well, without any empirical data to support that, our commenter is living a delusion. What if he has done more good than harm and has now stopped?

Of course, our commenter wrote, "Makes me want to never leave the house." But I bet he does leave the house....not just for needs either. He wants to be "in" the world, be a part of it. Our commenter says he cannot afford further delusions, but he's living in one...thinking he can avoid having any kind of impact on others. To interact is to have impact. Otherwise the only solution is to live as a hermit, a true hermit, cut off all physical and non-physical communication with the human race, the only problem with that is there will be an impact, probably both positive and negative.

If we feel like a bull in a china shop and that everyone would be better of without my actions, well, that seems self-nihilistic and the only forgone conclusion to that would be suicide, but of course, this would also have an impact, positive and negative.

Damn, it seems there's no way out of impacting others--that's because there's no way out of being human. Your only decision is to act or sit on the sidelines, both having impacts.

Now, what about those impacts? Well, most people I know more than casually interact with me of their own free will and don't mind being impacted by me (as for those who don't want to but "have" to--co-workers mostly and ultimately, they have a choice--there are other jobs out there). They can take my actions/words, etc... and decide to be impacted or not, at least to some degree because, just as we cannot control our subconscious from seeing everything, we cannot control our "selves" from being completely impacted. And vice versa, I have some control over the impact of others and I can make a conscious decision to be impacted or not. Of course, I could be under false beliefs, but in this life, I can keep looking for the truth or, in my personal case, I now believe that I make it what I want it to be.

Yes, life is never so clear cut, nor will it ever be, nor will any religion or philosophy make it so. Even my making it what I choose to make it will make it clear cut. It's not supposed to be clear cut. Of course love hurts, it wouldn't be what it is if it didn't.

In the end, this all smacks of cop-out. I haven't liked the results or I haven't found the "right" way to act so I'm not going to. I'm going to sit around and contemplate what it all means.

We are human, we have no choice but to make an offering, of some sort, to the life force. Attitude is everything, we must choose the positive and let the world take care of itself from there.

But Wait, there's a Catch...

Like many philosophies, Existentialism came before we knew what we know about genes and the way the brain works.

Let me see if I can tie in a few things around the web site into Existentialism. I already mentioned how it ties into Ernest Becker's The Denial of Death. Let's tie this into Julian Jaynes' theory of consciousness (did not possess an introspective mind-space) very simply--existentialism would not exist unless man became conscious.

Another area of research not available or widely available until the 50s (but seemingly forgotten) is social psychology. Now, here's where we tie in Judith Rich Harris' The Nurture Assumption and Group Socialization Theory.

So, what does all this mean? Well, we are subject more to our biological makeup than the early philosophers every could have understood. The decisions we make are much more subject to genes and our social behavior because we are more social than unto ourselves then we ever thought...even when we are alone, we relate to the group. So, without taking into consideration the effects genes have and group socialization, we cannot properly assess how a philosophical theory applies to us.

Flavors of Existentialism

According to Wikipedia:

Atheistic

Atheistic existentialism is the form of existentialism most commonly encountered in today's society. What sets it apart from theistic existentialism is that it rejects the notion of a god and his transcendent will that should in some way dictate how we should live. It rejects the notion that there is any "created" meaning of life and the world, and that a leap of faith is required of man in order for him to live an authentic life. In this kind of existentialism, belief in a god is often considered a form of Bad Faith.

In this kind of existentialism, the way to face the absurdity of the world is to create a meaning for yourself. This creation of meaning ex nihilo doesn't degrade your meaning as such, as all meaning would be created meaning. In other words, creating a meaning of your own life is completely legitimate, as long as you do not base it in "objective" existence, or let it be the main "pillar" of your life. According to Kierkegaard, one would be in a perpetual state of despair (although it would be an unrealised despair that one would flee from whenever it showed itself) if one had some meaning (It doesn't necessarily have to be one single meaning; even a multitude of meanings is fragile) as the main pillar of one's life.

Two leading 20th century figures among atheist existentialists were Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus.

[edit]Theistic

Theistic existentialism is, for the most part, Christian in its outlook, because the way traced by Kierkegaard, Gabriel Marcel, Karl Barth, Paul Tillich and others is even nowadays quite strong. But there have been existentialists of other theological persuasions, like Islam (see Transcendent theosophy) and Judaism. Unlike atheistic existentialists, they posit the existence of God, and that God is the source of our being. It is generally held that God has designed the world in such a way that we must define our own lives, and each individual is held accountable for his own self-definition.

I think it fair to add Agnostic Existentialism here...for those who, well, are agnostic and not sure one way or the other

Got a Hunch

New interesting web site that hasn't completely launched yet but will let you give it a whirl..http://www.hunch.com/

Who Am I and Why Am I Here?

http://www.kareyperkins.com/percy/percy.html

"Who am I, and why am I here?"

(Will Barrett asks this question in Walker Percy's second novel, The Last Gentleman.) In other words, what is the meaning of life, the purpose for living? Some things that his characters discover the purpose for living is NOT:

Social conformity or approbation in any form:

Social approval or group acceptance

Social status or class

Material success: making money

Career success

Fame, fortune or stardom

Scientific progress, advancement of knowledge

Appreciation or creation of art, music, literature

Entertainment

Athletic prowess, such as, a good golf game, football-hero-status, running a marathon

Physical health

Physical comfort, pleasure or escape, such as:

Sex

Food

Alcohol or drugs

Religious belief

Traditional religion, ritual

Feel-good religion: born-again Christianity, Pentacostals

Religious unbelief: atheism

Charitable good works: helping others

Creating or living in the Perfect Society

Country or society

Home and family

Friends

Psychological health

Self actualization

Enjoying nature, the "wonders of the universe"

For Percy, the above are meaningless reasons to continue our existence. A hard and fast existentialist would point us to the most prominent explanation for this stance: We're all going to die anyway. The one inevitable, inescapable truth of life is that we will die eventually. What we do on this earth until our only certain and inevitable fate (death) catches up with us is only, and merely, a temporary distraction, an arbitrary social construction we've adopted as our purpose, that we're temporarily deluded has lasting import and meaning, but does not... since everything we do will end with our death.

You may be thinking: "What's left?" What's left after you take away the above reasons for living? Good question, and you're onto something, because the answer is: Not much. In fact, the above illusions as reasons for living give us a framework for acting, enable us to act. Take them away, as happens often to Percy's protagonists, and you are left with TIME: empty time to fill up until your death, and no idea what to do with it.

Percy's characters often wander aimlessly as a result, or exhibit apathy or strange detachment to the events that do occur -- whether daily rituals or chance occurrences. All of Percy's progagonists are once-removed from their experiences, often gazing with curious detachment at the events that occur to them, as though they are standing outside themselves. They are, to a greater or lesser degree, "out of touch" with the "real" world, which Percy sometimes literally draws as amnesia or "fugue states" bedeviling his protagonists.

Sometimes these wanderers have a quest, often a quirky or odd quest, sometimes they do not, and instead, wander about directionless. Of those that have a quest, Lancelot was on the quest for the "unholy grail," and Will Barrett in The Second Coming quests for a sign of God's existence.

While they may seem lost to the rest of the world, and to themselves, for Percy, they are closer to the truth, meaning, and purpose of life than those who march determinedly through the world, quite certain of their next step, their goals, and their desires. Because in the midst of this void of meaning, on the other side of this chasm of emptiness, is real and lasting purpose and meaning. Percy's protagonists exist in the midst of Kierkegaard's "Leap of Faith," suspended over the chasm, having abandoned one side of the cliff, the physical world and all that is in it, and having not yet reached the other side. Percy's characters exhibit various stages of spiritual development so that while they may seem lost, in reality they are really "onto something" and closer to truth, or a ultimate and lasting answer (as Percy sees it), than the rest of their world.

One of Percy's themes was "knowing what you want to do" and what you want others to do, and the effect that has on others. (Usually, they'll just do what you say, so impressed are they that someone knows what he wants.) Closely aligned with this is a feeling of immobilization some of his characters experience, and the reverse side of the same coin, the realization of the "freedom to act" once the character has shirked off all socially given expectations for behavior and being.

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The above fits hand in glove with Ernest Becker's The Denial Of Death quoted at the top of this blog...and I'm pretty sure, now, that falls in line with my own personal view of life and is reflected in my own writing.

Face Booked

Facebook has been around a while now and I have to say I've never seen any point to it nor any reason why I would actually even visit the site.

I got on because my wife had found many contacts from high school and elsewhere after being on for just a little while. So, I thought, let me see who's there...and it appears that Facebook is what Classmates.com should have become but didn't.

Now, I've reconnected with all kinds of people I probably wouldn't have in any other way...high school mates, co-workers, ex-co-workers, (possibly future co-workers), friends of friends, friends of siblings, childhood friends, et al...

And I find myself spending more time than normal on the site...partly grooming myself to look the best I can to everyone else and partly "spying" into the lives of everyone else.

But there are some things about Facebook behavior I'm not sure I understand and I apologize to anyone I may offend with these comments...It's not you, it's me...I have the problem...

First, some people spend A LOT of time on Facebook doing all kinds of things (quizzes, sending things to other people, etc...).

Second, that function of slapping out there what a person is doing right at that moment...first, what anyone is really doing is spending time on Facebook, duh...second, does anyone really care what I'm doing at that moment (or any other moment)?

Lastly, and admittedly, this is my own personal problem....having reconnected with some people...my life seems to be somewhat less than others....now, I'm no fool, per say, and I certainly don't need an "It's A Wonderful Life" moment to understand my life isn't useless...but there's that little nagging voice in the back of my head that, rightfully, echoes the fact that I haven't lived up to expectations (whose I don't know) or perhaps more accurately to full potential.

I'm sure there's more to explain but...I...need...to...get...on.........Facebook. Bye!

This is what it's all about...

...and it's sad to say, as many have, that it takes Comedy Central to call out Cramer and the entire system when mainstream journalism can't seem or won't do it themselves because we all know who owns mainstream media: corporate America.

Borrowed from Matt Ruff

This link to a cool short SF film....very enjoyable....

Re-assessment

Ok, so I go get my CPAP machine next week. Apparently, my sleep apnea was bad enough where my blood oxygen was at 83% when it should be 95 or above.

As I read all the things that sleep apnea can cause, including damage to the brain, I figured it this way....I've suffered from apnea for probably over 20 yrs, never really knowing anything about it.

Well, now, with my CPAP, my brain will get all the oxygen it is supposed to get...so, maybe, just maybe...I might be smart. And it's just been oxygen deprivation causing my stupidity.

But we shall see...

Malcolm Gladwell

If you've read Blink or The Turning Point (you should if you haven't), then you should really hit the New Yorker Archives of Malcolm Gladwell's web site. It is choc full of articles along the same lines as his book and never cease to capture interest; from his earliest article on risk homeostatis back in 1996 up through his latest book Outliers.

Hell Is...

...being stuck in Victoria's Secret with only fat and ugly women.

Shopping in Texas

The Snuggy

Help. My son actually wants...a Snuggy.

Confirmed

Yes. I suffer from sleep apnea...didn't even make it half way through the sleep study before the attendent came in and put me on the cpap machine....at least I know where I'm going from here....