Tuesday, June 28, 2022

Haiku Tuesday

Time for haikus now
So count your syllables now
What! You forgot how!

Time, a function of...what?
Value, a function of...that.
Take time, to value.

Behold, the theists
That occupy the SCOTUS
They are your missionaries.

Insurrection, twas
No dustup, no mere dustup
lives were at stake, Drake.

We got a kitten
It's...well... not the friendliest
Challenge: purr, purr, purr

Summer has begun
Cue the sun, cue the pool and
Count the days til school

Field of dreams, heaven
Is this heaven? That depends:
Meta...physics...man!

Aristotle, dude.
Simone De Beauvoir, lady
Category, Ouch!

Talk: evil: yeah, nay?
Nah, a debating tactic.
Evil, live, backwards!

You just think you know
But nothing is what you know
Ah, so much to learn.

Thursday, June 23, 2022

New Kitten Exposes Myth of Morality

Morality, by definition, is objective. In contrast to ethics, which admits of relativity.

If something is morally wrong (or right), it is that way NO MATTER WHAT. This is the essence (from the greek ontos) and crux of morality.

So we got a kitten. We have yet to name the little gal but my fave so far is Mojo.



When asked to research the timing of shots and spay for the kitten, I come across:


Obligate Carnivore (insert intense music).


It seems this little gal, and cats like her are obligate carnivores.

In short, cats must eat animal flesh...to survive.

So lets go down a couple of holes:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predation_problem

https://www.vox.com/2015/6/18/8802755/peter-singer

Holee Shit. Some folks want to stop owls from hunting. And cats from surviving. Some folks just sidestep and say, "oh, animals aren't moral agents. Next issue." Some talk about collective suffering. 

Because morality is a math problem.

At bottom, there is no "no matter what" moment for any moral position. It's a myth. 

Thanks Mojo.



Tuesday, June 21, 2022

Baseball And The Afterlife

I am not going to say that Ken Burns is ruining my life.

I am not going to say he's bettering my life either.

Alas, I ruin and better my life. I leave it to you dear reader to decide if I have bettered or improved.

I am going to say that the Ken Burns Baseball documentary is taking up my time. Whenever I fold laundry I take the time to catch up on the Baseball documentary. 

Now here is the reveal: the damn thing makes me emotional; often welling up tears, sometimes near sobbing. What can I say, the historical drama resonates with me. This probably has a lot to do with my mid-life crisis (now in it's tenth year or so), marriage crisis (coincidentally in it's tenth year), parenting crisis (huh, also in about the tenth year) and career crisis (too many years to count) but it also speaks to the depth and power of the documentary. The fact that my sons are smitten with baseball right now and that we are reading through the Dan Gutman Baseball Card Adventure books before bed is also playing a role.

But that it not what I want to tell you about today. I will connect the documentary to another thesis in my life however. 

The documentary covers the Black Sox and the Shoeless Joe Jackson bribe in the 1919 World Series. And Shoeless Joe Jackson is part of the backdrop for the plot of the movie Field of Dreams, which this fool decided to plop down and watch on...wait for it...Father's Day, with his baseball loving sons.

I had to fight off tears for a good portion of the movie (I know I know, get some help you stubborn idiot - something is amiss!) because there is so much of the movie that hits my heart. 

Now you know that he crux of the movie is Ray Kinsella's relationship with his father and the the denouement is his having a catch with his father at the end of the movie.

But there is a trope that runs through the movie that highlights the main thesis of my life right now: There is no afterlife; you and mammals like you, are finite. 

Really? This is in Field of Dreams? The movie about baseball? 


That's the one.

You see, when Shoeless Joe (played by the *late Ray Liotto) first appears, he asks Ray, "Is this heaven?"

To which a beaming Ray quips, "No, it's Iowa."


Upon reuniting with his father, after never getting the chance to apologize..."Son of a bitch died before I could take it back,"


his father also asks, "Is this heaven?" And Ray again says, "It's Iowa," but follows by asking his father, "Is there a heaven?"

It's where dreams come true.

And Ray looks around at his land, his wife and daughter on the swing and realizes:

There is no afterlife.




I wrote this for my Writing In the Public Interest Course:

"I can hear you now: our souls will be in eternity. Souls can’t be anywhere. But I’ll look past this and still ask, how are you going to enjoy eternity when you can’t grab anything? What’s even the point if you can’t grab a beer, hold a lover, whack a golf ball, strum a guitar..."


Or in the case of Field of Dreams, have a catch with your dad.

Heaven and the afterlife is a bad idea. It doesn't help the species. It's regressive. It's unhealthy, on the individual and public health level.

After the movie I went out and threw batting practice for my sons. I tucked my daughter in that night.




Tuesday, June 14, 2022

The Imagination - Bigger Than Me

 Atheists, like myself, can run the risk of protesting too much. It gets very Freudian, almost like a defense mechanism:

"Why all the atheism? Huh huh? Why all the mistrust of religion? Huh huh? Who hurt you? Huh huh."

Still, I do think about this stuff...and have since my late teens and my first philosophy class, back in 1990 or so.

One theme with the theists is the ole something as opposed to nothing. I won't tackle this one head on but I will morph this theme into something I consider kin:  the something bigger than me theme.

I think a fear among theists is that if there is no sense of something bigger than me, then there will be no order:


Mass hysteria will rule unless we humans accept something bigger than us. 

An interesting context here is, Alcoholics Anonymous and step 2 of the 12 steps (or traditions if you prefer):

"2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity."


So what is an atheist to do in the midst of such a, let us say, predicament/quagmire/conundrum? 


Maybe this atheist realizes something bigger than him, alone, in his closet studio every night. 

Stay with me.  

At night in my studio, I will play along to a rhythm track and solo. 

"Is this guy about to tell us he touches god with his stratocaster?"

Stay with me.

As I am playing I begin to hear things I want to play; sounds I want to realize and bring into the world, birth if you will.

"Is this guy about to have a guitar baby or some shit?"

Often times my technique will prevent the sounds from being realized - my fingers won't fly like I need them to, and the sound idea, parishes, if you will.

I tell you this because this sound idea, waiting to be born, is my imagination at work, and it is bigger than me.

This is the crux - my imagination is bigger than me - my imagination creates. From nothing - ex nihilo.

Let there be sound.

And here is the public health angle: I othered not a single person. I condemned not a single person to hell nor did I promise eternal salvation to like-minded folk. 

I simply found the head space to listen, and IMAGINE something not yet here and try to will/birth/create it. 

This is bigger than me. This is enough for me. The precludes mass hysteria and allows me to remain sane, whatever AA means by sane. 

"Is this guy actually going to try to save humanity with a pentatonic scale? Is this some bullshit fundraising in disguise for the National Endowment for the Arts?"

Of course not. I'm simply showing you that you can recognize something bigger than you without anthropomorphizing or indoctrinating or othering your fellow sapiens to hell. 

I like to think I'm offering you a public health opportunity. Because personal beliefs are a public health issue.

You're welcome. 

If you have some money burning a hole in your pocket, you can help others create something bigger than themselves.

 "I knew it, this motherfucker is after my money."

Monday, June 13, 2022

Running and Robert

My morning ten miler takes me past the Greenwich Odeum, in historic downtown East Greenwich. I've been there a few times in my stint in RI, mainly to see my ten year old perform in recitals, but also once to see my Father in-law's favorite: Dave Mason. It's a nice venue, good sight lines, good acoustics (to my untrained ears) and it's not too big and not too small. $10 a beer but what are you going to do.

Anyhoo on a run a couple weeks ago, I see a poster for Robert Cray Band! I've appreciated his playing since discovering his Strong Persuader album way back in my, ahem, probably teens or early twenties. So I quickly research tix and try to secure a sitter so my wife and I can go. Alas, the sitter didn't work out but my wife lovingly let me out of some parenting duties to attend.

The band was stellar. Robert's tone was so full and vibrant...very hard to describe...but from the first chord, the bass and volume filled the auditorium. I noticed that he derives a lot of his tone and "quack" from picking back near the bridge. Very strong player and incredibly limb independent if you will: he is able to play complex rhythm parts while singing. It doesn't make sense to this mortal - feels like he has to have two brains. I think my favorite phrasing was on Sittin' On Top Of The World, where he tastefully kept to the melody but veered off in interesting, bluesy ways. Superb. 

And my gawd his singing. Talk about soul and range. His falsetto on Phone Booth was worth the price of admission. Incredible.

Having listened to Strong Persuader earlier in the day, I was really hoping for Nothin' But A Woman and Smoking Gun but still enjoyed I Guess I Showed Her. What slayed my listening to Strong Persuader was how great the lyrics are. To me, pop music seems a much better vehicle for lyrical expression, whereas the blues (whatever this means) tends, for me anyway, to focus on instrumental expression. Counting Crows doesn't need a ripping guitar solo for me, because of the way the lyrics transport me. But check out these gems from Strong Persuader: 

I payed the clerk and moved right in
A single room with one big twin
There's a chest and mirror
Shower's down the hall
Room 16 ain't got no view
But the hot plate's brand new

[Chorus]
I guess I showed her


Maybe you want to end it
You've had your fill of my kind of fun
But you don't know how to tell me
And you know that I'm not that dumb
I put 2 and 1 together
And you know that's not an even sum
And I know just where to catch you with
That well known smokin' gun


Oh, she was right next door and I'm such a strong persuader
She was just another notch on my guitar
She's gonna lose the man that really loves her
In the silence I can hear their breaking hearts


And my fave:
You can give me an hour alone in a bank
Pay all my tickets, wipe the slate blank
You could buy me a car, fill up the tank
Tell me a boat full of lawyers just sank
But it ain't nothin' but a woman...


You can buy me a house, turn over the deed
Bring six pounds of California weed
But my weakness ain't drugs, whiskey, or greed
Only one thing that YOUNG BOB needs...


Just great stuff. So I want to thank the Odeum and The Robert Cray Band for adding to my life but also because after the show, I went home and, inspired, finished a song that had been rattling around up there too long. I'll post an acoustic version soon. Till then, enjoy Nothin But A Woman:




Wednesday, June 1, 2022

Leibniz and Uvalde

If Leibniz is correct, and this is the best of all possible worlds. (because a perfect god can only create a perfect world with perfect being [only perfection can flow from a perfect being]) then Leibniz will tell you that you should rejoice and that suffering is human error - a perspective/framing problem.

This is crucial for Leibniz and christianity.

Consider our most recent tragedy and the resultant suffering: Uvalde.

Leibniz and other christians will tell you that from a human point of view, this is tragic. But from a god's eye point of view, one will see the fuller picture, the picture with the future and how the tragic became rolled up into a change for good. Theoretically, gun laws were passed and future school children can go to school and not be gunned to death with war machines while learning their ABC's. Perspective. (This is often done with the Holocaust.)

But what if the parents don't want their children to be pawns or sacrifices for a future good? What if the parents want their kids alive? What if the parents ask why previous children, say Sandy Hook children, could not have been the critical mass in god's perfection to roll up into the change for good?

What if the Uvalde parents question god's perfection? What if they question if this is the best of all possible worlds? 

What if we as a culture, begin to question the public health consequences of christian thinking and christian doctrine? What if we begin to recognize that personal beliefs are a public health issue?


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