Do U know who U R and where U stand?

Do you know who you are and where you stand?

I think I already wrote something that touched the theme laid out in the heading of this essay, but I am too lazy to look it up. Besides, it would be fun to compare later what I wrote and what I am going to write here in order to ascertain how I think and express myself over time about a subject that's near and dear to my heart.

At an early age, I was conscious that I was different from others. I was thin and lanky and suffering from two severe speech impediments: stuttering and mispronouncing certain sounds. So, my sense of alienation and estrangement took root early in childhood. Then as I grew older, especially during and right after college, I realized that my feelings, belief systems, and values were markedly different from and definitely better than most of the  "humans" with whom I came into contact. I am more rational in thinking, more sublime and artistic in feeling, and more ethical in conduct than them. I came to a realization that I am more human in terms of evolutionary development than them, although I  am far from being perfect. My shortcomings are minor although plentiful, at least from my point of view: I am hot-tempered, undiplomatic, naive, gullible, and vengeful. But I am glad to report that I am no longer stupid and trusting with regard to women. My heart has turned to stone, after knowing greedy and lying bitches like Mad, Lund, Denise, Yvette, and Laurence. My mind has taken on a deep contempt and hatred after knowing vain and sick butches like Nympho and Darkie  Midget. 

My participation in various Internet forums has convinced me that I am in the top 5% in terms of knowledge and reasoning. The stupidity, ignorance, and viciousness displayed by the posters are staggering. So I am at peace as to who I am and where I stand in relation to the human animals in this world. 

Of course, I am not resting on my laurels. I hit the books almost on a daily basis in order to improve my mind. I am also working on my character and sensibilities. I don't want to be an animal like so many assholes and scumbags I see around me. I sometimes wonder if I would have any cathartic relief if I personally with my bare hands and feet could put an end to the miserable existence of certain human animals that have nauseated me. I have tried to view them with a sublime and supreme indifference, but a vicarious thrill of Schadenfruede keeps breaching my walls of ethics and morality. I thus admit I have a long, long way to go before I am canonized and board certified as a saint. 

Everyday on the way to work, my heart sinks as I walk by a phalanx of homeless folks sitting in an overpass bridge, begging for chump change so they could live. Seeing them triggers in me a nagging irrational fear that one day I might lose all my sense of self-respect and self-pride and I would be like one of them. However, I doubt that would really happen because I am so fucking proud of myself and arrogant and contemptuous of most of the human race that I would rather kill myself than to degrade and demean myself so I could live a few more years through the kindness of strangers. I am one of those humans who give primacy to quality over quantity. 

I wrote the preceding paragraph while the DVD of pre-1975 Vietnamese music was played in the background. My whole being was crushed by the onslaught of memories. I was truly blessed of not being forced to be in actual combats  during the long and absurd civil war instigated by the Communist North, but I lived under the specter of death and destruction and absurdity that my psyche was deeply affected by them. They and stupid ventures in the affairs of the heart and cruel, harsh world of business have shaped me into who I am. Reading, writing, and the recently acquired taste for singing have shielded and sheltered me against insanity and madness. I have seen several individuals crack under the strain and go raving mad. They kept talking about the same thing over and over again. They could not block from their minds things that bothered them. Madness occurs when the mind cannot control a thought. A thought takes over and drives the mind. Obsession is a precursor of madness. The mind is not able to take a break. Eventually it breaks down from "over-heating". Certain irrational acts such as suicide, premeditated murder, and rapes are the manifestations of the mind trying to take a break. In a way, to go mad is a sign of mental weakness. A strong mind can control what it wants to think about and blocks out the unwelcome thoughts. Shakespeare had many insights about the human mind. In the play King Lear, one character said, "shun it, it's where madness lies." There are certain things a human mind should not dwell on for too long a period of time. Excess brings excess. Things that exceeds beyond the normal range allowed by nature cannot be good. Fluctuations within normal range should be the order of the nature, and of the mind as well, since mind comes from nature. Nothing exceeds like excess. Moderation is the key to health and longevity. The same thing applies in politics. Dictatorships and tyrannies don't last long. Humans are the only animals that realize they have choices in life. When pushed to the limit, they will fight back to death as humans, ultimately, treasure dignity over meaningless existence. 

March 31, 2014

Public Opinion and Truths

Public Opinion and Truths

Assholes and cowards never care for facts and truths. They care for conventional wisdom and social etiquette and political correctness. In short, they care for common sense and survival at all costs. 

I am a different bird. I don't give much import to, and neither do I ascribe much significance to conventional wisdom and social acceptance. At an early age, I had deep suspicions about rules and figures of authority and the "truths" they espoused. I am forever proud to say ad nauseam that all by myself at the age of eleven, I discovered that there was no God that took an interest in me. A few years later, I realized, also all by myself, that God didn't make Man in his own image, but the other way around. Then as my reading increased, I learned that I was not the only human who had these insights, but I was perhaps very rare among humans to have those at an early age. 

When I entered the workforce after college, I realized that earning daily bread was a boring chore that any moron could do, and that life was more than living by daily bread alone. I then hungered to do things that only a very few could do while preparing myself to die at any given time. In time I guarded myself against smugness, complacency, and cheap gloating. 

I have made many mistakes along my chosen journey, but I didn't really have regrets. My mistakes showed who I was and where I needed improvement. I have been lucky that none of the mistakes was fatal, so far. Yes, I was also guilty of Schadenfreude, and I was not proud of having that attitude. Schadenfreude cheapened me, and I am working to get rid of it. 

My wife recently said something that shook me, "you, perhaps, are like so many other Vietnamese that I have seen. If the VC government offers you a bone, you would gladly jump for it. You like power and fame, like everybody else." I didn't say anything to her after she made that stunning remark, but it has been over three months since the remark was made and I have been thinking about the veracity of the remark. I have taken pride in valuing honesty and truthfulness. That was why I didn't at once protest her remark. Today, I am going on record to say if I ever am offered a position by the VC government, I would never gladly to "jump for the bone." My pride and self-respect would never allow me to do so. I have criticized others for engaging in ass-kissing VC officials in order to curry favors and gather left-over bones. I will not behave like those whom I have harshly criticized. I am no hypocrite. 

By the way, if a Jewish businessman engages in nefarious ways to enrich himself, I would tell him that what he's doing would earn him the sobriquet "Dirty Jew". And what I say would be correct. Facts are facts. No amount of whitewashing would take away facts. No amount of anti-Semitism leveled at me would take away the truthfulness of my statement.

I value facts and truths. That's why, in my current estimation, I think those who believe in the existence of a Personal God delude themselves.

Miller, Mailer, and Me

Henry Miller, Norman Mailer, and Me.

For many years I didn't know if discovering Henry Miller before I turned eighteen was good or bad for me as a person and, much later, as a "writer". However, I was very clear about two things : he cured me of sexual hang-ups and whetted my appetite for "big "words. 

While Miller was an overt and loud and hilarious destroyer of sexual primness and social inhibitions (his description of his having sex with his female hirsute piano teacher always cheers me up whenever melancholia threatens to take over my psyche) I am a silent, susurrous, assassin (saying the words out loud and the magic of sibilant words would come to you) of words. I am fond of going around deconstructing social etiquette regarding language usage. After I was publicly rebuked and reprimanded by a stupid, supercilious, VC ass-kissing, self-important and self-appointed moderator of a forum for putting a f-word in a character's (a soldier, no less, not a nun or the reigning Pope) mouth in a short story of mine, while he himself hypocritically posted a stupid sex joke in which he referred to a man's penis as his "third leg", I wrote to him saying that " you are a fat, frivolous fairy full of flatulence. Is that enough f words for you, fuckhead?"

I have hated the motherfucker ever since. Every night before I go to bed, I get down on my knees and pray for the day when I am able to give free rein and expression to my wrath. I hate assholes who dye their hair anyway. I despise men who exhibit vanity and lack of confidence about their appearance. By the way, I am no longer part of the stinking, petty forum which is full of cowardly, self-satisfied, but ignorant members. No where else have I ever seen such a pathetic gathering and display of intellectual cowardice and ignorance, not to mention risible, grade-school level of English despite the fact that all of the members got their university education in an English-speaking country.

Anyway, Miller is always an inspiration for me when my confidence ebbs and courage takes a plunge. If he could survive amidst self-imposed poverty and near starvation while pursuing his quest for art and self-fulfillment, I should be able to do likewise. I once heard a woman, my not-so-secret fan and aficionada, beseech me for not losing so much weight because she didn't want a man whom she cared for skinnier than she was. She added, "Roberto, you've got to realize something. The size of a man's dick is not a big thing for most women. Penile size has no correlation with sexual performance. We know that and you know that (good for me to know as mine is only of average size!). But a man's ass is a big turn on for us women. We don't want men with skinny, tiny ass. We want men with meat on him and a big, firm butt." But why this non sequitur about Man's derrière? Beat me, I don't know. Like last night, as I was walking through Bellagio to my car in ungodly hours,  and busy writing this "inspiration" that you are reading, a young Hispanic chick quite far along in the state of intoxication, came out of no where and accosted me. She insisted that I talk to her instead of punching into my iPhone outrageous bons mots. I politely declined. She was persistent. She touched my arms, held me tight while pleading with me in the slurring mélange of English and Spanish. I got to tell you, her skin was silky smooth and she was no slouch in the Beauty Department. I didn't think she was a hooker. To my trained eyes, she was just a drunk, lonely, lost young woman who was delighted that I could speak a little bit of her mother tongue and she wanted to talk. She kept saying, "Hombre, you and I are real. You need to live in the real world, not the Facebook world. What are you writing anyway? It can't be more real than me! " To keep her away from me, I asked for her phone number and promised to call her. Her parting words were, "call me, no lo olvida, guapo." I was tested and I came out as a coward, albeit a "winner". At my age, writing is more important than women. I don't believe in Love anymore. No sir, I do not. As I told you before, quite a number of women told me that they loved me, but it turned out that most of them loved my body and my money, not my mind nor my heart. 

(To be continued) 

Sense and Nonsense Redux

Sense and Nonsense Redux

Stupid people are much better off to keep their opinions to themselves. Nobody would then know that they're stupid. I know I am stupid and ignorant and thus don't mind to be lectured so I can broaden my mind and knowledge. The sea of knowledge is vast. And intelligence is multi-dimensional. Unlike every asshoIe and ignoramus that I know, I am very comfortable of who I am and of my limitations. Thus, I don't defend myself when I am shown to be stupid and/or stupid. I am grateful instead, for the learning experience. Fuck, a real human is only as good as how he handles his ignorance and stupidity. There is nothing more pathetic than for a stupid ignoramus loudly and obstinately defends his stupidity and ignorance. But in reality, such a scenario is very commonplace. Unintelligent assholes have no self-awareness and yet plenty of unwarranted pride. They think they are misunderstood! I wonder what so hard to understand about stupidity and ignorance. They are as clear as day. 

I have personally known quite a number of untalented and mediocre folks. Strangely enough, these poor people are unjustifiably proud of themselves. That makes me hit the books harder and become less outspoken. Pride is different from Ego, I repeat. 

After much reflection, I have come to terms why certain women don't love me. I just have to work harder on myself. There is no point to run away from realities. 

What do you talk about when you talk about love?

What do you talk about when you talk about love?

Yes, the title is something from Raymond Carver's famous story. I read it a long time ago. I should read it again, soon. Maybe tomorrow. I will go check it out from the library. Anyway, what I'm going to narrate has something to do with love, but nothing about the story.

As I've said time and time again, women have told me they like me, even love me. And they have asked me if I love them, too. I have rhetorically replied, ah, love, what did you mean when you said you loved me?

-But you knew what I meant!

-No, I didn't. Tell me.

-You're shitting me, right?

-No, I'm not. 

-I meant I miss you when you're not around. You turn me on and I care about your well-being.

-But are you totally unselfish in your dealings with me? Would you help me in whatever way you can, to the utmost of your abilities? Are you going to forgive me over and over again? Would you die for me?

-No, you're asking too much!

-Not really! Freud was wrong in many points and was influenced by the hysteria and sexual repression exhibited by the over-refined Viennese women at the turn of the 20th century, but in my audaciously insane view, I think he hit on the mark when he espoused an opinion that death wish was the flip side of life force, and, more relevant to what we are talking here, the Oedipal complex. You see, in a romantic relationship, there are strong remnants and overtones of parent-child relationships. To really love somebody, one must either love that person as our parent or our own child. To do differently is just to engage in stylized mutually beneficial relationship. True Love is either involving pleasant childhood memories or concerned with transcendental offspring protection. I suspect that Freud hit on unspoken/unacknowledged practice as represented in terms of endearment which have incestuous overtones between husband and wife. Love is always a tension between self love and love for others. The tension melts away if the beloved is now shrouded and vested with either parental or offspring dimensions. Love is about survival and covert propagation of genes. It's stronger and more sublime than sex. 

I'm an authority on love. I know what I am talking about when I talk about love. When you still think too much of yourself and not enough of your beloved, you don't know shit about love. When you are not willing to die for your beloved, that means you are still consumed by self-love and self-preservation and mercantilism, and not fired and blown away by romanticism. A mother is always willing to sacrifice her life for her child. Conversely, a child always loves and protect his parent(s) as much as he can. In a word, love is sacrifice, is giving of oneself. Unless you know something about that, don't come around here and preach to me about love and the flutterings of the heart. 

Thus spoke Wissai

March 20, 2014

Yesterday

Yesterday (a take-off from a Beatles' song)

Yesterday all my sorrows seemed so far, far away

But now they all rushed back to stay

What could I say?

Memory is a beast that refused to die

Making me wonder if I should wryly smile or cry

All throughout this lovely but lonely night

Where are you now in this moment in time?

Do you hear my heart's persistent chimes?

You were the winds that passed through my heart a long, long time ago

I thought what I had was a puppy's love, but little did I know

That what I have is a little sweet sorrow

Whenever I hear certain songs played on the radio. 

March 19, 2014

Idealism, Materialism, and Uncommon Sense

Idealism and Materialism and Uncommon Sense

For years, I just rejected outright idealism because I thought it was an affront to common sense and "logic". But luckily for me, I always take pride in being intellectually honest---as opposed to some cockeyed guys and gals who fancy that they are "educated" and in the "know" and don't hesitate to let the world know that they are "intellectuals" and widely knowledgeable about many subjects, but when they are confronted about their meager knowledge about a specific area, say, ethology, for instance, they hem and haw and then cope out and run for the hills instead of having an honest, intellectual discussion (I call these guys and gals "intellectual pygmies and cowards". Our words and actions have a way to tell the world our true nature)---and defer to a possibility that my thinking could be off-base or at least needs refinement. I thus don't always possess a confirmation bias. So when I came across a book by Andrew Pessin about Uncommon Sense (Philosophy: Uncommon Sense, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2012), I took the time to really understand what Berkeley, a proponent of idealism, had to offer. After wading through the ingenious arguments that Berkeley put forth, I would have to say that I am now looking at idealism, though belatedly, with more respect. And I no longer look at theists as a bunch of deluded idiots. That does not mean I have renounced atheism. Atheism still makes more sense to me in the scheme of things, even though it has not been of much help to me to understand the mysteries in this universe as we know it. The following is taken verbatim from a chapter on Berkeley in Pessin's book. I am not smart enough to paraphrase the chapter, although I did change a word here and there. 

Idealism: Esse est percipi: to be is to be perceived. Everything that exists does so only insofar as it is perceived by some mind. This doctrine, that all that exists are minds and their perceptions---more commonly known as ideas, is called idealism. 

Materialism: This thinking orientation espouses that in addition to no physical minds, the universe contains mind-independent, spatially extended physical objects that are perceived indirectly by means of ideas, some of which resemble those objects (such as our perceptions of size, shape, and motion, the primary qualities), and some of which do not (such as our perceptions of color, flavor, and other secondary qualities). What we mean by "indirectly, by means of ideas" is that when we look at a tree, for example, what we perceive isn't the physical tree itself but some mental representation or image (or "idea") of the tree. 

The difference between idealism and materialism is that the former stops at a position that there are only minds and ideas while the latter adds the claim that there are also mind-independent physical objects out there causing those ideas. 

Berkeley thinks that materialism is wrong in almost every way, and he offers three argument to show why. 

Argument 1: Materialism Engenders Skepticism 

Berkeley argues that materialism leaves at least two important things unknowable: the sensible qualities of physical bodies and whether those bodies even exist outside the mind at all. 

To see why Berkeley thinks the existence of physical bodies is unknowable, we must look at the arguments that materialists such as Descartes and Locke make to prove that physical bodies do exist

(1) First, they observe, when we call up mental images from our memories or imagination, they are always faint and occur involuntarily. But when we open our eyes, we involuntarily experience vivid sensory perceptions. The best explanation of this difference is that the former are purely in our minds and that external physical bodies, independent of our minds, cause the latter---in which case they must exist.

(2) Second, they note, it surely seems to us that our preceptions come from external bodies, and God would be deceiving us if in fact they didn't. But God, a perfectly good being, could be no deceiver. So our perceptions must come from external bodies, just as they seem to, and bodies must therefore exist. 

Berkeley objects to these arguments.

The first merely suggests something exists externally to our minds, causing our perceptions, but it doesn't show that these must be physical bodies. The cause of our perceptions could just as well be other no physical minds and/or God himself. So the argument doesn't prove that there's an external physical world, as materialism claims. 

The second argument assumes that our perceptions come from external bodies. But all we ever experience are the perceptions, the ideas, not the bodies themselves. 

Argument 2: Contra the Distinction between Primary and Secondary Qualities 

Berkeley challenges the distinction in two steps.

(1) First he emphasizes what he shares with the materialists about the view that the secondary qualities are really only in the mind of the perceived and not in the bodies. But then he adds some new arguments. For example, everybody agrees that pain and pleasure exist only as sensations in the perceiver's mind and that they are not properties in bodies themselves. 

(2) Next, Berkeley argues that similar arguments apply to materialism's primary qualities. The arguments have the following general forms:

A perceived quality varies.
The object itself does not vary. 

Consider size. A dust mite appears small to our eyes and its feet even smaller. But the mite's feet would appear to the mite itself as being of moderate size and would appear as even larger to any creatures smaller than the mite. While the perceived quality (size) is varying between perceivers, the alleged body itself, the mite's feet, is not varying. So the "primary quality" of size is, after all, in the mind of the perceiver.

Argument 3: The Inconceivability Argument

Berkeley maintains that materialism is not merely false, it's logically contradictory. To say that something is "logically possible" is to say that it may be conceived without contradiction. But, according to Berkeley, the act of conceiving some tree, for example, ensures that it is in some mind, namely yours. To say that you are conceiving of some object existing outside of all minds is to say that you have in your mind an object outside all minds: a clear contradiction.

In the following Berkeley provides an additional argument in support of idealism. The argument has four steps. 

(1) Sensible Qualities Are by Their Nature Perceived 

Sodium chloride has its molecular structure even when no minds are around but that salty flavor or structure exists only when some sentient being, preferably human, is tasting it. 

(2) Thus, Sensible Qualities Are Perceived Directly

Perceiving "directly" contrasts with "inferring": we hear a sound directly but only infer that there is a car out there causing the sound. But now, if sensible qualities were perceived indirectly---that is, only inferred to exist and not directly perceived---then they would in fact exist while being themselves unperceived. But then by step 1 above, it has been argued that sensible qualities only exist when being perceived. It therefore follows that we cannot perceive them indirectly, in which case we must conclude that they are perceived directly.

(3) Bodies Are Just Bundles of Sensible Qualities

There are, in philosophy, two major competing views about the relationship between a given object (say, an apple) and its properties. On the first, an apple is just its bundle of properties: roundness, sweetness, moistness, and so on. On the second view, held at least by the materialist Locke, an apple is something distinct from its properties. It is the "thing" that has those properties. This "thing" is called a substratum (something lying beneath). It is what "lies beneath" the roundness, sweetness, and so on.

Bradley endorses the first view. He offers various arguments, but the most important is perhaps the skeptical concern Argument 1. Properties such as "roundness, sweetness," and so on, we can observe with our senses, but once you insist that the substratum is distinct from those sensible qualities, then it becomes something we are incapable of sensing. Thus we can never confirm its reality: it becomes unknowable.

It's better, therefore, to reject the substratum view and hold instead that a given body is nothing more than a bundle of sensible properties. 

(4) Thus, Bodies Are by Their Nature Perceived, and Perceived Directly

This conclusion follows directly from the previous steps. To say that is to say everything that exists does so only insofar as it is being perceived, that is, insofar as it exists within a mind. So there is no mind-independent physical world after all. What we previously took to be "bodies" are just bundles of perceptions, existing within minds---and minds and their perceptions are all that really exists. 

Uncommon Sense?

We've got our idealism. But for many people, idealism crosses the line of believability when it denies the existence of the physical universe and claims that everything exists in our minds. It appears that idealism violates common sense too violently to be accepted. Instead of insisting that sometimes good arguments must override common sense, Berkeley suggests that in comparison to materialism, idealism itself better fits common sense. 

Here's how:

If you ask precisely what common sense actually believes about certain relevant things, you may want to do a quick survey and ask various normal people (no philosophers, no psychotics, no idiots) the following questions:

Do you perceive bodies directly?
Do you believe the world is fundamentally unknowable?
Is fire hot?

Most will likely answer yes, no, and yes.

Then think about how materialism answers these questions.

Materialism's physical bodies are perceived only indirectly. 
The substratum "lying beneath" a body's properties can never be perceived and is thus unknowable. 
And, finally, according to materialism, fire is some physical object "out there"' while "heat" is a secondary quality existing only in the mind. So, strictly speaking, the fire is not itself hot but merely causes heat sensations in us.

In other words, the answers supplied by materialism are no, yes, and no. Not much of a fit with common sense.

How would idealism fare here?

A body, according to idealism, is just a bundle of sensory perceptions and is therefore perceived directly.

Since all that exists is what is perceivable, there is nothing left over to the world that could be unknowable in any way.

And since the object "fire" is itself just a bundle of sensory perceptions, including heat, then the fire itself is indeed hot.

So, the answers are yes, no, and yes, respectively. 

Note:

I showed the above to Omar Sabat, my best friend who is also an assassin par excellence cum poker player cum fiction writer and poet. I was expecting some acknowledgement from him for my search for "realities". Instead, he laughed his head off after quickly reading it. 

-Tell me, Roberto, what were you trying to do with these notes?
-Come on, man, I thought you knew why.
-No, I didn't. Tell me.
-Point number one: you see, I am a person torn between fantasies and realities. I indulge in fantasies when I write poems and short stories, although they have basis on factualities. The notes serve a direct connection to realities. I want to have my beliefs and thinking based on sound intellectual foundation, not wishful thinking, not hackneyed and cockeyed propaganda trash and relentless indoctrination. I am a man, not a parrot. I want to live in facts, truths, and "logic". I may occasionally take excursions in the land of fantasies, but those trips strictly are for entertainment. They are not the end all and be all of my existence, like what I see they serve to human monkeys and chimps. A real human must respect realities, not only of the world but also of himself. Denial is for cowards. I have seen so many so-called college graduates resort to cheap tactics and cheap ad hominem attacks and vulgar language just to irritate the opponents in a debate after they failed to demolish the arguments put forth by their interlocutors. These cowards couldn't admit they were losers in a debate. They had ego, not pride. Yes, I despise them from the core of my being. I consider them half-baked humans and full-fledged animals. You see, I am different from them. If you point out to me I am factually wrong or logically deficient in my argument(s), I would gladly thank you because I have learned something from you. I post what I have written on the Internet because primarily I issue a challenge and a dare. I welcome legitimate attacks and comments. I don't really look for agreements and praise because I learn nothing from agreements and praise. 

Point number two: a linguistically impaired dude once mocked me publicly for writing love poetry even though I am in my 60's. How stupid the dude was! Love has no age limitations. Just because the dude is hideously ugly and no woman in her right mind would want to go out with him, that does not mean other men would suffer the same fate as he does. I am a handsome and fit and charming and funny man. I attract women. And I like women. Given my looks, romantic disposition, poetic sensibilities, and linguistic endowment, naturally I find that writing love poetry is a matter of course. Doesn't the dude know that being found attractive by the opposite sex is one of the nicest, most peaceful and most life-affirming feelings a man can have? You see, that cheap shot at me by the dude made me realize that he, like so many others, can't think straight. The notes I just showed you indicated that real thinking is hard work. I had to give Berkeley credit for being clever. I sensed that there were some elements of sophistry somewhere in his arguments, but I am not smart enough to spot them. I was hoping you would point them out to me. Instead, you laughed like a hyena. You really disappointed me.

-Roberto, before you conclude that Berkeley's arguments are full of sophistry, you need to look into the writings of Thomas Nagel and David Chalmers. These two individuals rejected emergentism. Reality can be stranger than you think, if you are willing to dig deeper. At any rate, didn't you tell me at one time that you love words, ideas, truth and justice, and women in the ascending order? You may want to reexamine the order. I have no problem with the beliefs of any person, no matter how misguided and stupid they are, as long as the beliefs are passionate and sincere and based on well thought-out reasoning, and not a result of unquestioning parrot learning and relentless propaganda and indoctrination. Too often, a Vietnamese Catholic or a Buddhist fails to give me cogent, credible, logical, "scientific" (i.e., verifiable) reasons for his faith. That failure, to me, smacks and smells of infantilism and intellectual slavery and lack of independent, adult thinking. There is nothing more tragic for a functioning human to willingly enter into a prison of ignorance and stupidity and yet ironically "thinks" there is nothing wrong with such a choice. 

Wissai
March 15, 2014

Asshole's Complaint

Where is Portnoy when I need him? I need him to show the ignorant, linguistically impaired and stupid and self-righteous asshole how to lodge a complaint. In a way, I feel sorry for the asshole as he is imprisoned, unwittingly of course, by ignorance and stupidity. He's purely a human chimp, but deludedly thinks he is genuinely human. He does not know he's not human enough. He is not the only asshole suffering from the delusion. All assholes have the same fate. That's why they're adsholes to begin with. Human chimps are not smart or sensitive enough. They think they are, but actually they are not. That lack of self-awareness is their tragedy. 

Wittgenstein and No Private Language

Wittgenstein and no Private Language (from Andrew Pessin's book, Uncommon Sense, Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Ltd, 2012)

Definition of Private Language:

One that contains words referring to "immediate private sensations" (or more generally, private mental states), and insofar as these sensations and states are "private" to the individual experiencing them, no one else could be said, strictly speaking, to understand those words. 

To appreciate Wittgenstein's rejection of the possibility of such a language, then, we need some background on the nature of me gal states and sensations and of the ordinary language terms that concern them. 

Two Extreme Views about Mental States and Mental Language

Cartesianism: an individual's mind is like a private inner space to which only that individual has access. If I believe I am in pain, then I am in pain. As for mental language, a word such as "pain" gets its meaning by referring to that private inner sensation. So described, Cartesianism is perhaps not far removed from common sense.

In contrast, according to behaviorism, the words we use for our mental states refer not to our private inner sensation but instead refer, indirectly, to our publicly observable behaviors. To say that Fred is in "pain" is to refer not to what is occurring privately inside him but indirectly to the observable fact, say, that he has just stepped on a nail and is screaming. 

Wittgenstein Rejects Both Extremes

In ordinary circumstance, there's no problem for us to understand and know others when they say they are in pain. If Cartesianism suggests otherwise, so much the worse for Cartesianism. More important, if Cartesianism were right, then we could never learn to understand and speak mental language. 

While behaviorism may avoid these problems---if mental language refers to observable behaviors---it suffers from others. 

(i) It seems that we know clearly what we mean when we say Fred is in pain even when we cannot state explicitly all the possible behaviors that would be deemed "painful behaving." This suggests that "Fred is in pain" means more than merely that Fred is exhibiting some such behaviors 

(Ii) While Cartesianism wrongly suggested that knowledge of other people's mental states should be impossible, behaviorism seems wrongly to go the opposite extreme: if your behaviors are as accessible to anyone else as to you, there should be no difference between your access to your mental states and that enjoyed by others. Yet, sure there is. Wittgenstein states that, " other people very often know when I am in pain---, Yes, but all the same not with the certainty with which I know myself (#246 Philosophical Investigations).

So neither Cartesianism nor behaviorism gives an adequate amount of mental states and mental language. It's in the quest for some alternative view, that Wittgenstein enters into the private language argument. 

The First Premise: Words, Meanings, and Rules

As noted earlier, it's not possible to "point out" one's inner mental states to someone else nor to "point" at someone else's. But that raises the question of whether we can "point out" our own inner states to ourselves, and so develop a private language. 

Cool and Uncool

Cool and Uncool

"Cosmic speculation is asphyxiated if existence came into being ex nihilo." (Norman Mailer)

There are so many reasons why I aspire to be like Omar Sabat, my best friend, because he's the embodiment of cool while I am just the opposite. I am the antithesis of cool. Opposites do attract or is it the case he's just being kind and tolerant? 

The man has bamboo for his sex, irony on his mind, and cynicism in his heart. He's impervious to suffering and has a nose to detect evil and fraud in seeming-looking angels, and angels in fools. He called me an "angelic fool" (sic!). He laughs at my preoccupation of suicide. He said to me more than once, "Roberto, you're uncool. You must find life beautiful and irresistible. Only fools and weaklings would think of killing themselves. Go kill some big dangerous animal, say, a thug or a bully in your neighborhood. Go after him with your bare hands and feet and teeth and nails. If you think you cannot do that, go after him with a club or a knife, but never with a gun. Guns are for professionals like me. If you succeed in killing him up close and personal, all by yourself, if you get his warm, dark red blood on your hands and clothes, if you see life draining out of him and his face turn pale and ashen gray, then perhaps you will value life, yours in particular, and you will get the stupid, splenetic idea of suicide out of your mind. Don't be a barbarian. Be a samurai poet. Live your life not as a fiction, but as a testament to toughness and endurance. You must behave as if you were indestructible and unbreakable. In short, be cool, man. Be cool. You must show both class and taste. You must show that class and taste are not beyond your grasp. You start by paying attention to how you dress, then how you speak. Clothes and speech reflect what and how you think. Then, finally, mind how you act. Act like a samurai, and not like a bumbling fool. Act with the silence and sincerity and dignity of saints, even when you are down and out, and nobody is taking you seriously and giving you any respect. You must learn to really respect yourself.

Good, I'm seeing you write down what I'm saying. Good for you! Spoken words fly away, but written words stay behind. Write my words down carefully. No mis-quotations. No twisting of what I have to say. A man is just as good as his words. Know what I mean? One more thing before I forget. You must travel light on the road of life, unencumbered by unnecessary material possessions and obnoxious, small, petty, ugly brutes. Didn't Buddha himself say something to the effect that if you cannot find a good companion, be prepared to walk by yourself? That would be better than having an asshole for a "fellow" traveller....

Anyway, I've talked too much already, as usual. I don't want to sound preachy. Bad for me. Bad for you. A man must know his place in the world and be honest with himself, besides leaning to open his mouth only absolutely necessary. Be self-sufficient. I am leaving you with a Buddhist song.

By ourselves is evil done.

By ourselves we pain endure.

By ourselves we cease from wrong.

By ourselves become we pure.

No one saves us but ourselves.

No one can and no one may.

We ourselves must walk the path.

Buddhas merely show the way.

(To be continued)