Assuming you're intelligent enough....

Once in a while in conversations one happens to come across some pretentious arse, who with a certainty that only undigested received wisdom can generate, advances the recommendation that one should “not assume”. The first reaction of any decent person is to mentally take a step back and apologetically reconsider the statement that prompted said free advice, and credit is due for that. Why? I hear you say, when it’s only normal to open up one’s understanding of the world to someone else’s point of view. Well, I’ll tell you why: because not assuming is against the very modus-operandi of our psyche. We would be lost and forever paralyzed in the absence of the assuming mechanism. All our actions, from the trivial morning teeth brushing to the life-defining acts like getting married, having children or taking up on that offer from that less than prestigious but promising employer, all are based on assumptions. And like all assumptions they are nothing more than casting a desirable outcome on an essentially inscrutable future. It is true and most recommendable that one shouldn’t assume but stick to the ground-rooted factuality of, well, facts. Unfortunately this is not possible when it comes to dealing with decision-making that inevitably involve the future for the simple reason that the facts we should stick to haven’t occurred yet.

I am not going to take the route of saying that any claim at solid prediction is a ludicrously futile exercise for the simple reason that one, regardless of intelligence, amount of data, computational power available can’t ever make an accurate prediction about the future for the simple reason that infinity can’t be grasped. This is based on the axiomatic reasoning that the tree of variables growing from a single starting circumstance by every possible outcome engendering at least two other possible manifestations which on their turn sprout new variables, and so on and so forth, that in the end any even remotely accurate prediction becomes impossible due of the infinite variables the system leads to. That has been already  amply demonstrated and not the point of my current argument.

I will focus instead on how we are actually left with nothing else but to assume certain projected outcomes (which we can’t possibly guaranty because of the above mentioned demonstration) in order to be able to function socially and individually. So let me further lean on the power of examples: we brush our teeth in the morning assuming we’ll be alive in the evening, we marry assuming we will love and will be loved by our spouse forever, we take that mortgage assuming we’ll be able to pay it back, and the list could go on. Unfortunately ALL these assumptions are essentially FALSE and this is something any fatality by accident, any divorcee, any evicted living in a cardboard box is living proof of. So why do we still do it? Because we can’t do it otherwise! It’s a combination of wishful thinking and statistics. If we are even remotely lucid we should be aware that our life could end at any moment without notice, that we could join the ranks of those making divorce lawyers rich or those cueing for a bowl of social soup. But statistically there are more of us not dying before our life-expectancy, more clinging for whatever reasons in loveless and joyless marriages, more of us capable too keep our homes and make a living, and everybody assumes they will fall in this latter category rather than the former, despite not having any or almost any warranty for that. And this is nothing else than wishful thinking, or in other words, yes you guessed right: assuming.

So the next time that arrogant prick tells you not to assume, instead of following your most justified impulse of telling them to go fornicate themselves with an iron stick, gratefully thank them for such sound yet counterproductive advice. So is assuming the mother of all fuck-ups? It very well may be but it’s also what helps us get out of bed in the morning.

TED killed MY teddybear

Not so long ago I heard on the radio an advertisement for some entertainment service that made me reflect on the power of language to convey meaning beyond the intention and scope of the author. The scenario portrayed a listener who in their early years were engaged in something they enjoyed doing but then "life got in the way" separating them from that source of joy. From this statement, by simple deduction, one can only understand that the unspoken but generally accepted truth is that instead of being a process of fulfillment, actualisation and confirmation of potential, "life" for most of people is just a series of abdications, compromise, conformities and self-betrayal separating them from their genuine potential and true sources of pleasure and happiness. At that point my only thought was: "what a sad waste of this unique experience by so many people who succumb unreflectively to received wisdom".

Then I saw the movie TED with the trepidation and high expectations that the director's (Seth MacFarlane) work with the fantastic animated TV series Family Guy was amply justifying. What is now obvious I had failed to consider is that HIS life got in the way too. A life where keeping at something you are good at (and making loads of money in the process), is seemingly not enough until you sold out and went sucking the cock to the dumbing-down Hollywood leviathan. From the edgy, mostly uncompromising, hilarious social critique of Family Guy, what we have in the directorial debut of Mr. MacFarlane is a sad and disengaging abdication to the perversion of intellectual numbing exercised by the "dream factory"'s bland and stereotypical script recipe book. This apparently bottomless shit-pit seems to never stop churning out its giant mesh of stupidity which entraps hoards of popcorn munching, carbonated piss sipping imbeciles without ever allowing them to question the rudimentary paradigms that they are being fed into considering as their own thoughts, ideas and values. As if there were not enough "Transformers", "Indestructibles", "Expendables" and the like out there clogging the already slow synapses of the general population.

So what in essence smart, young Seth is telling his audience is: all you dudes, slow adopters, dope-heads, contrarians to the stupidity the establishment is trying to tie you down with, you all should stop being so outside the pattern other people want you to be in, and hurry at getting a nylon suit and tie, a job (that will make us rich - but we won't tell you that), a mortgage (that will do the same thing as the job does - but we won't tell you that either) and stick to the delusion that there is "one and only" love of your life (as this will help at keeping you a prisoner of the previous requirements - you got it, this is again only for us to know). All what seems to be missing form this sad reiteration of the same old Hollywood shit is the unquestionable allegiance to god and country. Wait, no, good ole' white american god peeked his almighty nose at the end in the so very original church wedding. Well done Seth!

So what is this all about? Why haven't I engaged in exposing the downright disgusting mercantile manipulation of the public psyche by the mass-media / entertainment industry before? Well, actually I did, but I'm back at it again because it pains me to see that even apparently smart people, who are rich enough not to need doing it, are still selling out for nothing more than some more cash and the questionable hubris of joining an otherwise most dubious group - rubbing elbows with the Hollywood hot-shots as the only proof of a life well spent). With a sad heart also Eddy Izzard's name comes to mind when talking about this (feeling happy in some Hollywood side-room you old lovable executive tranny?).

But to end on a positive note (aren't we all monkey-trained to love a happy ending?), although I'm not always a fan of his humour, big kudos and thumbs up to Ricky Gervais for (still) calling it as it is although and most admirably in spite of already having made his fortune.

The Internet is what WE make of it

It would be funny if it weren’t so annoying to observe how it’s the lazy, the complacent and the unreflective who most of the times turn out to be the more whining, needy and “vulnerable” members of any community.

There’s a new debate now about how the recent generation of apps introduced by the iPhone and the iPad led smart-mobile-devices that use the net only as a pipe to transfer data, are about to burry the good ole' .html based www in all it’s glorious, although not unproblematic, diversity as we got to know it over the last 15 years. If not yet aware of it, one can get a good idea about this topic here. 

The two main issues most people commenting on the matter seem to have are different in perspective: one is ethical and the other economic. The first deplores the very likely possibility of information being corrupted, if only by selection if not downright by manipulative intentions, while being delivered through these specialised apps and the latter whines about the companies providing those streamlined apps with their readily and easily applicable in day to day life information, charging for them.

Well, what in Darwin’s world do people expect? Isn’t it already painfully clear that there is NO such thing as “impartial selection” and furthermore that there is NO free lunch?! If one accepts to delegate their very choice-making and gobble on "filtered" information that one has only to be bothered to “digest”, one should also be prepared to have their menu set for them and also to be presented with a bill for this "benefit". And apparently, at least according to the values western societies are run by, there is nothing inherently wrong with this.

So it seems to me the debate is not, or shouldn’t be, about wether "apps are killing the web" but on how to help all those lazy whiners understand they are themselves responsible for complacently handing their freedom and their wallets to corporations who by their very nature will not wait to be asked twice to jump at such occasion.

You want to preserve the prerogative of making your own mind and take informed decisions based on unadulterated information (as much as there can be such a thing)? Then stop comfortably relying on all the “push” media and start to exert yourself in a bit of “pulling”. It might take a bit longer and there is also the "risk" of  exhausting yourself by doing some discerning thinking, but if not being just another witless molecule in the waves stirred by a few shrewd merchants holds any value to you, it’s well worth it!

“On-line” - a lesser reality

It is rather disconcerting to notice what a significant level of prejudice towards the new online instruments of communication people still need to overcome in terms of perception.

I have noticed that almost in every circumstance, participants engaging in online interactions fail to perceive the proceeding as “real”. Although it is very seldom, especially in British culture, that their interaction with others involves physical contact, as the only (major) aspect missing in online communication, somehow the very reality of their cyber-interlocutors is banished into the territory of fiction. They can see and hear them in real time but somehow this seems not to be enough to acknowledge the whole thing as “truthful interaction”.

I don’t know if this is because people tend to associate online communication more with entertainment, where suspension of disbelief towards its fictional nature is consciously accepted and temporarily adopted as the required condition to make it effective, or because this technology is actually still too new for it to gain a better understanding.

People don’t seem to operate the same kind of “fictionalising” process when using the telephone for example. In that case, contrary to the fact that the information about the person at the other end of the “wire” conveyed by the instrument patented by Bell, is much less substantial or detailed than the one provided by cyber-communication, they seem unproblematically convinced about it’s veracity. Maybe the overall percentage of prank calls over the last century and a half was small enough to eventually get people convinced that when they pick up the phone the voice introducing itself as Mr. Bergman is Mr. Bergman himself.

On the other hand, strangely oblivious to the significant surplus of information provided by the instruments of the internet instant messaging services, a lot of people who otherwise regularly and intensively use them, perceive their online interaction as some sort of “phantasy”.

Most peculiar and amusing and definitely worth a more consistent look into it...

The (large) community of digestive systems

What kind of deep dissatisfaction or even disconnectedness with their own thoughts and/or emotions is making so many people “back-up” (or should I say confirm?) being spectators to a show of the cinematographic or athletic persuasion, with almost incessant and seemingly irrepressible eating?

What is not enough, or unsatisfactory about the performance they choose to follow that they need to double the rewards they expect from it with the more “palpable” pleasure of gorging on what most of the times is a “snack” probably worthy of the label “poisonous”. But not “what” they eat is so bewildering - if they were to chew trough the most noble and healthy of vegetables it would make no difference to my question - for it is “why” my most daunting question.

I wonder if there are any behavioral studies on the matter and if anyone knows of such research, I would very much welcome a pointer in its direction.