Work In Progress

I was recently surfing the web (what a wonderfully mixed metaphor that is!) when I came across a page about someone with the same name as a friend of mine. What made this interesting is that the name was spelled in the same unusual manner which my friend had selected in part to make her name — which she considered too common — unique. I felt, of course, the usually wry surprise one feels at seeing a person frustrated in their silly attempts at (what at least can seem like) pride. Greek tragedy was full of that sort of humor, but it wasn't what really caught my attention. I started thinking about the whole idea of liking or disliking a name because of its commonality.

At first glance, it seems like just another manifestation of the human affliction of not being able to enjoy something because we've enjoyed it before — that we never experience anything good if we already know it. This was beautifully described by Chesterton:

Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do it again"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every evening, "Do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.

But this isn't it. Of course the explanation generally given is that by a person having a common name, they feel boxed in, like they're expected to be according to some mold which really doesn't fit them. There is something to be said for this view. But more interesting is the obvious question that it raises: why are we content to reuse names? Even in cultures without a set of names used only for people, they reuse names normally used for things. Calling somebody snowflake may be unusual among people — though it probably won't be — but it's not at all unusual among the universe. Every year there are billions of things in the world with that name.

Undoubtedly there is some linguistic explanation — there are a relatively finite number of phoneme combinations which we can comfortably string together and remember, relatively few phonetic combinations sound pleasant, etc. Still, as a rule humanity doesn't really try.

William Shakespeare is in no danger of being confused for any one of his fellow creatures — he's in no danger of being lost in a wash of homogeneity — yet he has a name as common as dirt. Edgar Allen Poe didn't have an unusual individual name, and neither did Samuel Clemens. But that last example is the most interesting, because if 'Samuel' is not an exotic name, when he wanted to write he took up the name 'Mark', which is even more unremarkable. Indeed, the very phenomenon of pen names (and stage names) shows this enigma plainly: when people want their name to be common among their peers, they choose a name which is already common among their peers.

It would be too fanciful to say that when a man wants to be marked out for special distinction, he specially humbles himself, but certainly he chooses a name which will not bring him any distinction. Now, there is of course in all humanity the animal tendency to like that which is like us, and to dislike that which is different, and this goes a long way toward explaining pen names. Still, though, it is interesting to think that when a person wants to become unusually famous, he sets about first becoming usual. When a man wants to be well know, he starts by emphasizing to his peers what he has in common with them.

Well, I had another conversation with warmhandsovenman. This is the same guy, I presume, who previously tried to give me a survey. Here's the transcript:

Every now and then you're reading something, and you really wonder what the guy who wrote it was thinking. To wit, Josh Marshall recently wrote:

Kerry needs a catch phrase or catch question about the Iraq war, one that provides offense against President Bush's oft-stated, extremely lame, but also somewhat effective line that the world is safer with Saddam Hussein out of power.

In political rhetoric, coherence and clarity almost always trumps substance.

(I would like to leave the political angle of what Marshall was saying out of account, and just look at the point he was trying to make in his last sentence. Therefore please do not try to find a political point in this post; I just found this sentence interesting and want to talk about it, not prove or disprove anything else that Marshall said or may have meant.)

This falls, I think, into the category of statements where the most natural reaction is, "Um, yeah." followed, perhaps, by "there is a reason for that, you know."

It's not so much odd that Marshall is saying it — since it's correct — it's odd that he's saying it as if it's unfortunate. Given the construction he's using (which is a fairly standard method of implicit comparison in English), we can flesh out what he said (adding some punctuation to indicate semantic grouping) to be, more fully:

In political rhetoric, coherence and clarity with or without substance almost always trumps incoherent and confusing substance.

(There are other things implied by it which are true but uninteresting.)

I would hope it's obvious why this is the case: incoherence cannot seem substantial. Suppose the following statement is true: "Dog cat heart the on on on dog. Wag. Plantation. Narwhal fog pug cough all none not a bleat boot bam ram rom rum Lola rum."

Now suppose that the following statement is false: "Saving money makes you happier in the long run than spending it on things that you don't need. Therefore we should impose a 500% Luxury tax on all sales of fine art."

(I know that the second hypothetical is stretch, but work with me...)

Now suppose that there are two men, the first saying the first statement, and the second saying the second statement. Suppose that one of them must be chosen to implement what he's saying.

QED

Finally, suppose that whenever the first guy said that, left-wing bloggers across the country called it 'nuance'.

Even though spam costs the US economy $1.37E29 (or whatever the made up number most experts agree on), and even though nearly everyone can agree that spam is more morally wrong than baby mulching, and that spammers should be executed via cruse missile (etc), every now and then a spam is really entertaining. Today's fun spam was (of course) about penis enlargement:

"My girlfriend loves the results, but she doesn't know what I do. She thinks it's natural" -Thomas, CA

"I've been using your product for 4 months now. I've increased my length from 2" to nearly 6" . Your product has saved my sex life." -Matt, FL

Pleasure your partner every time with a bigger, longer, stronger Unit Realistic gains quickly

[1]to be a stud press here

(Random quotes to fool the Bayesian filter omitted.) Taking them in reverse order:

1. A "stronger" unit? The penis isn't a muscle, not even in spam, and so I presume that they're referring to increasing its tensile strength, rather than its lifting power (let's not consider compressive strength). Is one's penis snapping off really a common problem? You'd figure that if it was, one would also see spams for "penis supports", "penis braces", and of course "prosthetic penises". I don't read every spam, but I haven't seen any of these yet. Well, I guess that they're trying to get the first mover advantage in this virgin market.
2. I must say, I'm really impressed with tripling the size of his penis in only 4 months. However, you have to wonder how much of a sex life a man with a 2" penis could have had. (I presume that he measured while erect, since the size of a flacid penis isn't very relevant to anything.) Even assuming that he and his partner were especially flexible, human bodies can only get so close together. Even with his partner on a table, his pelvis would still be at least an inch from her's. Assuming a (very short) 1" total thrusting distance, you'd still expect him to frequently unintentionally disengage and begin poking his partner in uncomfortable ways. Hm. Maybe that's where compressive strengthening might come in handy... In any event, it's rather dubious that a man with a 2" penis could have sex, let alone a sex life. And a sex life is required for it to be saved.

   And finally, if Thomas's girlfriend really thinks that penis enlargement in an adult male is natural, she really needs to do something that will cause her gullibility muscle to atrophy. I mean, "Wow, Tom, your penis has really grown quite a lot lately! It sure is amazing that unlike every other part of the body, the penis never stops growing! No wonder they call it the trouser snake!"

I have no idea why, but for some reason every now and then (around once a month or so), I'll get some random person IMing me on my AIM account. Of course, since this seems to me to be on the same level as telephone spam telemarketing calls, but with less stringent quick-thinking requirements, I decided to have some fun.

So, here's a transcript of my most recent one:

warmhandsovenman: Have you ever read The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas?
Me: no
warmhandsovenman: Why not?
Me: insufficient time
warmhandsovenman: What type of books do you like?
Me: good ones
Me: of course, there have to be other incidentals
warmhandsovenman: Like Sci-Fi?
Me: e.g. the background and foreground colors have to be different
Me: a book can be the best book in the world, but if it's white type on a white page, I won't like it
Me: also, it should be made out of paper
Me: beaten copper looks nice, but it's too cumbersome to actually read
warmhandsovenman: I see.
Me: and engraved stone is right out
warmhandsovenman: How many books per month would you say you read?
Me: incidentally, why are your hands warm?
Me: do you keep them in gloves all the time?
warmhandsovenman: No, it's an inside joke with my friend.
warmhandsovenman: How many books would you say you read per month?
Me: lifetime average?
warmhandsovenman: Yeah.
Me: including the years where I was pre-literate (e.g. 0-3)?
warmhandsovenman: I see.
warmhandsovenman: Who's your favorite author?
Me: favorite in what sense?
warmhandsovenman: The author who you think writes your most enjoyable nooks.
warmhandsovenman: books*
Me: G.K. Chesterton
warmhandsovenman: Cool.
warmhandsovenman: What's the farthest you've ever ran non stop in your life?
Me: how picky are you about the definition of "run"?
warmhandsovenman: I mean what's the farthest you've ever ran/jogged in your life?
Me: how picky are you about the definition of "non stop" (and shouldn't that by hyphenated, i.e. 'non-stop'?)?
warmhandsovenman: Yeah, but I don't type in correct puncuation online. I mean non-stop like the farthest without walking.
Me: so would it count to run, stop (without walking), then start running again?
warmhandsovenman: No.
warmhandsovenman: Now can you answer it?
warmhandsovenman: How far?
Me: Not yet
Me: Are you defining 'life' in the secular sense of one time from fetus to corpse
Me: or do you allow for 'past lives', as in the hindu, budhist, or certain ancient greek conceptions?
warmhandsovenman: I ment life as in since you were born out of your mom in the hospital.
Me: if you look carefully at my question, you'll notice that within reincarnation schemes, that can be arbitrarily far ago
Me: but I presume that you mean the 1 fetus-to-corpse cycle
Me: counting any jogs one's mother took as being her runs, not your own
Me: correct?
warmhandsovenman: No.
warmhandsovenman: I mean how far have you ran non-stop in your life, the beginning being your way out of your mother's vagina.
Me: bear in mind that if you allow for reincarnation, the passage through one's mother's vagina (incidentally, this question doesn't apply to me outside of any reincarnative possibilities since I was born by C-section) arbitrarily many times, once per future life, so you're not asking a well-defined question (in the mathematical sense of the phrase "well-defined").
warmhandsovenman: GOD
warmhandsovenman: JUST F---ING ANSWER THE QUESTION.
warmhandsovenman: ROUGHLY.
warmhandsovenman: I DON'T CARE ABOUT ANY OF THIS WELL DEFINED S--T.
Me: I'm curious. Why do you think that being rude to me is going to persuade me to do you any favors, such as answering your questions?
warmhandsovenman: Because with all of your previous contradictions, I view you as a person that isen't normal and is an insecure nerd.
Me: How on earth does that lead you to the conclusion that being rude will induce me to do you favors?
Me: And, incidentally, what contradictions are you referring to?
warmhandsovenman: I asked you a question of how far you've ran. A NORMAL person would say "Oh, about so-so many miles..." and insted you contradict everything saying all this s--t that no one cares about and you haven't answered the question yet.
warmhandsovenman: So how many miles?
Me: Are you familiar with the definition of "contradict"?
warmhandsovenman: Here we go again.
Me: Allow me to be of service:
warmhandsovenman: You're a nerd with no life.
Me: Contradict \Con`tra*dict"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Contradicted};
p. pr. & vb. n. {Contradicting}.] [L. contradictus, p. p. of
contradicere to speak against; contra + dicere to speak. See
{Diction}.]
1. To assert the contrary of; to oppose in words; to take
issue with; to gainsay; to deny the truth of, as of a
statement or a speaker; to impugn.
[1913 Webster]

Dear Duff, I prithee, contradict thyself,
And say it is not so. --Shak.
[1913 Webster]

The future can not contradict the past.
--Wordsworth.
[1913 Webster]

2. To be contrary to; to oppose; to resist. [Obs.]
[1913 Webster]

No truth can contradict another truth. --Hooker.
[1913 Webster]

A greater power than we can contradict
Hath thwarted our intents. --Shak.
[1913 Webster]

Me: Dude, I'm not the one IMing random people on a wednesday night
warmhandsovenman: How are you random?
Me: Well, you don't know me
Me: And, not knowing me, it seems far-fetched that you could have carefully selected me for this series of questions of highly dubious relevance to anything you might have learned about me prior to IMing me.
warmhandsovenman: Okay.
warmhandsovenman: You're cool.
warmhandsovenman: I'm sorry.

And when I next said something to him, he was gone.

(In the interests of full disclosure, I corrected a typo in my last sentence from "serious" to "series" in the interests of readability. Also, I redacted the profanity of my unknown conversational partner.)

(In the interests of defending myself, that definition was copy-and-pasted from the unix program dict. As for the charges made against me in this conversation, I am most certainly not a nerd with no life. I'm a nerd with a beautiful girlfriend.)

Eugene Volokh has discussed another of Slate's Kerryisms. The original quote, in response to the question, "Is abortion a great moral issue to you?", is:

Sure it is. Absolutely. And I think it's far more complicated than public life allows the discussion for. I mean, being for choice does not mean you are for abortion. Neither Teresa nor I are for abortion. Abortion should be rare, but safe and legal, as President Clinton said so often, and I think appropriately.

I think that it's really a question of who should make this decision, and how do arrive at it. But there is morality. Of course there's morality involved. And we should be talking to people in America about responsibility, about adoption, about other choices. And I want to have a better conversation than I think we've had on it. But it doesn't change my position on who chooses. And I will protect that right of choice.

Which Slate summarized, in their Kerryism fashion as, "Sure it is. Absolutely." (with the rest of the quote following as footnotes.)

Eugene then says:

If Kerry had said that, he would have been seen either as a fool (someone who thought the question called for a yes-or-no answer) or as evasive (someone who knew the question called for an explanation of his moral stand, but who chose to duck it by pretending that the interviewer was looking for a yes-or-no answer).

The problem is that I believe that Slate actually has a point here, though their format doesn't allow them to accurately summarize Kerry's quote. If one is not bound to use only his words, saying what he said more simply, it was, "Like so many Americans, I straddle this issue."

How, he said it like an idiot, but I suspect that this is primarily due to it having been in a live interview (with Larry King), and most people sound like idiots when you're reading a transcription of a live interview with them. However, to show my point, let's look at this:

Sure it is. Absolutely. And I think it's far more complicated than public life allows the discussion for.

Unfortunately, abortion is a very simple moral issue. Whether one is for it or against it, no one produces complicated arguments for their position. Indeed, relatively few people even hold their position on abortion as the result of a chain of reasoning, but rather hold it as a first principle. The arguments really do run the gamut from, "It's a human life, therefore terminating it is subject to the same constraints as terminating any other human life. QED." to "It's not, therefore it's not. QED." to "It doesn't really affect me and life is complicated enough, so I really don't want to discuss it. QED." That last one is usually phrased more like "Abortion should be safe, legal, and rare.", though it's sometimes phrased, "I believe that the morality of abortion should be left up to each person to decide for themselves."

(Incidentally, while there are pro-abortion and pro-infanticide positions which I could support (e.g. the Roman pro-infanticide position which essentially boils down to "I brought you into this world so I can take you out again if I want to") — though I don't — I find the personal choice statement of the apathetic route absolutely fascinating. People very rarely say things this stupid in other venues. E.g. "I think that the morality of beating a woman to death should be left up to each person to decide for themselves" or "I believe that the morality of stealing cars is decision which should be left between a man and his priest". "I think that securities fraud is a serious moral transgression but I believe that each inside trader should decide this for himself." Indeed, one rarely hears calls for car theft to be "safe, legal, and rare" despite there being a fair number of people who are apparently in favor of it, seeing as how many of them do it.

I can understand that people really don't want to deal with divisive issues which don't affect them personally, but it really would be better if they just admitted their apathy instead of dressing it up as some sort of principled position. If the state is to be put in charge of any matters of morality — that is, if there is to be a state — the only principle under which it can operate is that all matters of morality which can be accurately judged by the state should be. There are many matters which can't — for example there's no good way (in general) to find out when people are lying (that wouldn't drag society to a halt), and even less of a good way to determine how severe their lie is and how it should be punished fairly. We must get on with the business of living, and give up the state making people tell the truth in all but very exceptional circumstances because it's not feasible to do otherwise. Even Soviet Russia, with its networks of spies, informants, and secret police, never aimed that high — they stopped short at the far more achievable goal of punishing all speech against the state — and they never did a very good job even at that.

Abortion is comparatively easy to determine, and admits of no greater variation in severity — if the thing is immoral at all — than murder does. And we all agree that the state is competent to prosecute murder.

No, these understandable people want to leave abortion to individual aborters not because the state can't deal with it, but because they don't want to have to figure out whether the state should.)

Continuing:

I mean, being for choice does not mean you are for abortion.

Being in favor of something never means that you want the accidentally certain results of it — people in favor of choice don't want abortion, people in favor of war don't want death, people in favor of property don't want poverty, people in favor of nations don't want war, people in favor of guns don't want people being shot, people in favor of cars don't want automotive fatalities (accidents). However, at some point we all do have to admit that we're comfortable accepting these results, and that in some sense we therefore don't think that they're so bad.

Being in favor of using the atomic bomb on Hiroshima does not mean that one is in favor of anything dying there, but it would be stupid to maintain that this somehow absolves you of enabling the foreseeable consequences. That Senator Kerry does not want abortions to happen does not remove whatever moral weight (if any) that hangs on him for all of the abortions that he has worked so hard to make possible (he has an extremely pro-choice record). In short, it's wonderful that he's only in favor of sweetness and light, but so am I, so is every man. The question is what comes when he tries to produce it.

I think that it's really a question of who should make this decision, and how do arrive at it.

Can he name any other issue of morality on which he believes this? Child pornography? Theft? Murder? Traffic violations? Parking Tickets? Could he name any other moral issue — grave or trivial — which the state could feasibly handle which should be left to individual judgement?

Oh, sure, there are all sorts of things which we don't consider immoral that we'll happily leave up to people who do to choose for themselves — sodomy and sexual promiscuity and eating pork and the use of modern medicines and so forth. Can he name something he thinks universally wrong, that the state could reasonably interfere with, that he wants the state to keep out of? Can anyone?

But there is morality.

Does this really mean anything at all? Even in context, this doesn't appear to be anything more than a general affirmation of the existence of morality.

Of course there's morality involved.

Now, this might mean something if it weren't followed by this sentence:

And we should be talking to people in America about responsibility, about adoption, about other choices.

A beautifully wishy-washy concept, whatever morality it is that's involved. Whatever it is, it's appeased by talking to people about other choices. What other importantly held moral beliefs does the senator hold which impose obligations which can be discharged merely by talking to people?

And I want to have a better conversation than I think we've had on it.

Imagine that! He's in favor of sweetness and light and cute puppies and apple pie! Who'd have thought?

But it doesn't change my position on who chooses. And I will protect that right of choice.

So, morality is involved, but not enough to matter.

Frankly, I think that Slate was doing him a favor by abbreviating his response so much. It would have been a bigger favor to leave the entire back-and-forth out entirely. I think that the fervently apathetic people on this issue can just safely assume that Kerry is safely non-committal and not need to be assured by him speaking out of both sides of his mouth that he doesn't intend to actually wake that sleeping dog.

Really, there's nothing more disgusting than strongly held moderation. Even evil is preferable to disdain for finding out whether a thing is good or evil. It's almost like finding a rock which is militant about its non-sentience. That a rock cannot find the truth because it cannot find anything is natural to a rock, but still a reason to pity the rock — or at least to be glad that one isn't the rock. When a man cannot find the truth, how on earth could he possibly be proud of this position?

Update: Yes, I was not in a happy mood when I wrote the above. I haven't read it again, but it's not in very temperate language. Anyhow, Frank J. said it better (and shorter) a while ago:

There is now a Centrist Coalition blog. I hate moderates... much more than even liberals. I bet Satan is a moderate; the best way to get evil accepted is to package it with some good. That's what moderates do; they're always like, "Oh! I'm so special because I don't take a firm stance on issues, and I see value in everyone's viewpoints." I bet right now a moderate is reading this and partially agreeing with it. Damn you!

Something just occurred to me in while I was in the shower:

The most important thing in philosophy is for a man to have the impudence to think himself an expert, or — better by far — the good sense to realize that all men are amateurs.

Stuart Buck cites an interesting Chesterton quote. To quote a portion of what he quotes:

The nature of my supposed slavery I need not name and do not propose specially to discuss. It is shared by every sane man when he looks up a train in Bradshaw. That is, it consists in thinking a certain authority reliable; wich is entirely reasonable.

We live in what is supposed to be a fairly skeptical age, one where people think for themselves and do not just accept what they are told. It should not be surprising, then, that the result is that people often just accept what they are not told.

Rejection of authority does not mean rejection of all authority — it is impossible to live in this world for more than a few days without trusting any authority — what it means is rejecting all authority which is not overmastering. Put in somewhat less kindly language, it means being as foolish as possible without getting oneself killed.

The problem with this approach to life is that it is not really an approach to life. At best it is an approach from death, and really it is not as systematic even as that sort of pessimism. Avoiding all authorities which one can at the moment is simply the attempt to live as much like a beast as possible. Perhaps it is appropriate that pets have never been more popular nor more anthropomorphised.

This is something which I've really been trying to figure out recently. Why is it that we live in so irrational an age?

It has generally struck me that popular culture rarely gives anything older than my father a fair hearing. I don't really understand why this should be the case, but I do think that it's related to our age's desperate desire to not understand anything.

The example which brought this to mind is the old phrase, "kill them all and let God sort them out." It is generally supposed to be said by bloodthirsty generals who care nothing for human life. And perhaps in modern times it has been said by one. Ours is an age which is fond of saying what it likes without regard to what words it uses to do it. Yet the fact remains that it is a particular bad way to express that particular sentiment.

Perhaps, rather, it is because the phrase requires a little imagination. Maybe it is because we live in an age where we even have labor-saving devices to keep us from exerting effort at imagining, but i have noticed that a great many people do not seem to have much ability to imagine.

The very first thing that one should notice in the phrase "Kill them all and let God sort them out" is that there's an assumption that some sorting must be done, the only question is who will do it. The very idea of punting the job to God presupposes most of the concepts in just war theory — that there are innocent and guilty people, that they deserve different treatment, and that it matters if they receive it.

Next, the phrase contains a rather direct admission of human fallibility as a judge of men. If men could easily and correctly sort "them" out, no one would ever suggest leaving off doing it. That anyone's brought in the subject of outsourcing means that they think that it's non-trivial.

The phrase also contains an appeal to philosophical resignation to death. It points out, if subtly, that we're all going to die. It is not introducing something new, it is merely rearranging the order of when certain events will happen.

Now, wanton slaughter is certainly evil, even when justified as indicated above, but it's not a simple case (excepting one takes it by axiom, as most moderns are inclined to do, but any case is easy to make if you assume your conclusion). For a supposedly skeptical age, ours is a remarkably thoughtless one.

Some people find it difficult to write. Some people find it difficult not to write. I really wish that I knew which I was.

My problem is that when I'm not writing, I desperately want to and think of all sorts of things that I would like to write. Whenever I sit down to the keyboard, they all seem to disappear on me. It would be really convenient if whichever part of me was responsible for conscious thought could make up its mind on the subject.