I Am A Chinese Room

I am a Chinese room. Or, if you prefer more accuracy, an English room. Because, although not a single cell of my body understands the English language, somehow enough of them together in meaningful complexity can comprise a system that DOES understand the English language. My mouth and vocal cords call this system "me;" my fingers assert that it is "me" that types while my eyes watch letters appear on a screen. Not a single cell in my body understands English, understand. When I scraped cheek cells for middle school science class microscope labs, I did not accidentally murder poets and journalists. They're just cells. They're not very smart. And before cells even, they're just chains of molecules that describe the creation of the cell and the patterns they form in congregate. No ability to comprehend the difference between "hermetic" and "hermeneutic." But somehow, those cells and the patterns they form in congregate -- me -- does. My hands appear to understand English as they move across the keyboard, hastily backspacing over irrelevant digression; remove them from the system (i.e., chop them off) and suddenly they are useless.

I am a Chinese room. I have no idea where my thoughts come from. From my perspective they just... come to me. After they have come I can look back and sort of see where they came from, or guess where they come from, but when they come they come unannounced. Some thoughts I can hold on to and manipulate a little, some thoughts I shove away as swiftly as I can; but this is the description of someone experiencing thoughts, not thinking them. I have never seen my brain. I am only accepting as the most likely model that what I have been told is correct; that there is a brain inside my skull that thinks these thoughts that come to me. But I have never seen my brain. I have never seen my skull either but I can feel it. Never seen my brain. If it turned out that I was literally a Chinese room, that there was a tiny homunculus with a huge book and a filing cabinet and a pen and paper in my skull, and the sensory inputs from the outside world come to him to compute and process a response to, that would only be slightly weirder than the model I'm supposed to accept, the model I more or less do accept.

I am a Chinese room, and if you're not one too, you might just be a p-zombie.

Conservatives In America: A Continuing Exercise In Contradiction

Conservatives in America: It's completely unthinkable that any human activity could in, any way shape or form, impact the Earth's environment; but allowing same-sex couples to marry will have a direct, deep and negative impact on the lives of everyone.

Conservatives in America: Easy access to real guns and their ubiquity in public places in NO WAY increases the likelihood of gun violence, but easy access to virtual guns and their ubiquity in video games GREATLY increases the likelihood of gun violence.

Music Box

I just remembered this music box I used to have. I had it from the time of childhood that memory is mythic and symbolic and not literal and factual memory, so I have no idea how I came about this music box or when. And it was this small wooden box with a long extended handle, and it had a crank, and when you cranked it, it played the theme from Love Story. Which seems kind of random for a childrens toy, in retrospect. But the coolest thing was, it had a clear plastic window covering the machinery on the inside, so as you turned the crank you could see the gears turn. There was a little cylinder with little braille bumps around it enmeshed with this rake-like instrument with many tines, and as the cylinder revolved the bumps plucked the tines and made music, note by note. I would crank it slowly and watch the cylinder painstakingly move around, how the bumps on it would gently lift the keys of the instrument up, up, up, and then continue to turn away and the key would plink back down and make a distinctive tone. A moment later another one gets hooked. And then spin it faster and hear the individual plinks blend into a melodious lullaby, the cylinder spinning around the keys and making them move like a player piano in a cinematic saloon. I had it for years and I loved it. Even into early adulthood I held on to it as a rare and precious talisman of my childhood. Until today I haven't thought about it in years, years, and I have no idea where it is now. I have no idea of how I lost it.

backlash

It seems to me that humanity is self-correcting, after a fashion. The pendulum has swung pretty far in the direction where a small handful of people own almost everything in the world and everyone else struggles and strives; it is absurd to imagine it can go in that direction indefinitely. Sooner or later the pendulum has to swing back, and when it does, it will swing almost as far in the opposite direction. At least if the pendulum metaphor is valid, it will. Regardless. The further it goes in this direction, the stronger the eventual backlash will be, because it's impossible that it goes this direction forever.

The Memory Hole: Some random post 9-11-13 thoughts

Remember that time in the 1990s when the face of terrorism in America wasn't Muslim Arabs, it was white right-wing Christian Americans? Of course not, because the Oklahoma City Bombing has disappeared down the same memory hole as every other unfortunate fact that does not fit our constant mythologizing. Did you know that  the World Trade Center would have only been forty years old now if it had stayed standing? People talk about it like it was some timeless and long-standing Wonder Of The World, like the Great Wall or Colossus Of Rhodes except American, so better. Less than thirty when it came down. At thirty-five, I have now had a longer life-span than the World Trade Center. Just saying. I'm getting distracted. The point is the memory hole that American history disappears into before being replaced by American myth. People can get on television now and imply that all Muslims are terrorists and that all terrorists are Muslim, when it wasn't that long ago at all (still less than 20 years!) that the most grievous, despicable act of terrorism on U.S. soil came not from some turbaned jihadists dead-set on their seventy-two virgin reward, but from some crew-cutted Caucasian conservative Christians who "wanted their country back." This has been forgotten to the point where in the 2008 election, people could bandy about that "Obama" sounded like "Osama" but no one pointed out how similar "McCain" and "McVeigh" were as well. So: terrorism is once again embodied by scary foreigners with a different religion and a different language, calling to mind the "all immigrants are bomb-throwing anarchists" crap of the 1920s. And who was it that was responsible for shifting the dialogue, for changing the public's perception of terrorist away from right-wing Christians? Right-wing Christians. Just saying.

Racism In America, Still

There's basically three reasons why someone would deny the existence and/or extent of racism in America:

1. They're a racist and they don't want to give the game up.
2. They're not a racist but it makes them so uncomfortable realizing how racist everything still is that they ignore it or downplay it.
3. They're just a fucking idiot.

The Value Of Words

We've been using words now for so long that I think we've kind of forgotten that they're just some shit we made up. Words are not inherent in nature, nor do they have any existence independent of our minds and this world we have made for ourselves. There's no such thing as good words or bad words. They're just words, sounds, wavelengths of vibrating air and symbols in our brains. I used to play this game with my dog, where I would scold him horribly in a melodious "good dog" tone: "You're such a bad dog, Max, I hate you." His tail would wag and he would get all happy. Then I would praise him in a "bad dog" tone of anger: "You're a GOOD DOG, Max! Such a GOOD DOG!" and he would shrink up in shame.  He didn't give a shit what words I used. The TONE and FEELING of the words was what he derived meaning from. Words have no inherent value.

The Spiritual Function Of Technology (Another Swipe From My Twitter)

Sometimes I think the real primary function of technology is to give us better metaphors to understand ourselves with. How can you appreciate the Great Wheel of Life until you've invented the wheel? How can you comprehend the Great Chain of Being till you've forged a chain? How can you think "I wonder if this is just a computer simulation" without first creating a computer? Technology is not necessarily a false merkaba, it is just applied incorrectly in a spiritual sense. Technology is still valid.

Spying vs whistleblowing: a quick breakdown

The government on spying: If you haven't done anything wrong, you have nothing to worry about.

The government on whistleblowing: It is of the utmost importance that none of our secrets come to light.

Morality Without Religion

When someone says "you can't have morality without religion," that says more about them than it does morality or religion. Specifically, it says "I only do good because I'm afraid someone is watching and judging me." That's not being a good and moral person. That's an asshole trying to hide what they are. Good people do good because they know its right, not because some book says they'll be punished forever if they don't. Relying on a supernatural carrot-and-stick isn't actually a good foundation for morality. Only the ethically disabled need to rely on a series of threats and rewards to do the right thing. Real people never did and never will.

Ben & Jerry's Cotton Candy Ice Cream Misses The Point Of Being Cotton Candy Ice Cream

This Ben & Jerry's cotton candy ice cream is like cotton candy ice cream for people who feel ashamed about eating cotton candy ice cream. It's all muted and understated, and a nice reserved white color, and like, I'm already eating cotton candy ice cream, you may as well make it loud and colorful. This isn't ice cream for a serious occasion. This is not ice cream that is served at a funeral or at the selection of a new pope. This is not ice cream that will be presented to some fancy debutante on the occasion of her coming-out party. It's cotton. Candy. Ice cream. For fuck's sake. There's a time for restraint and moderation, and there's a time for cotton candy ice cream. To every season, turn, turn, turn. Leave it to the tree-hugging hippies at Ben & Jerrys to miss the point. Probably want me to wear a bike helmet while I eat it too.

All that said, though, it's pretty good and I can't stop eating it. No restraint or moderation here.