ell, you can't ask for a bigger issue than this one, can you?

Perhaps a bit too big, since most of the updates on this page are likely to be more minor in scale, when I'm moved to talk about various aspects of philosophy and attitudes towards life, morality, and all that sort of stuff.

More recent updates are added on top.

September 9, 2003

[Doing nothing all day until late night] ...reminds me of my behavior in San Diego, though there I didn't even have the girlfriend to walk for food with, or tuck in, to partially redeem myself.  I would always wake up with so many things in mind to work on, get distracted, realize I was wasting another day but feel unmotivated to work and powerless to stop wasting time. And then eventually I'd get started on some work, or not, but all too soon it would be time for sleep and I'd have hardly scratched the surface of my required tasks.  I didn't like living like that, and I really don't like living like that here. I don't usually, I've been far more productive while with Malaya than I was alone, generally speaking, but I'm still far less productive than I want to be.

Here it's easier to do nothing while not feeling like I've just dicked off all day (Monday's events not withstanding), since I can spend time talking with Malaya, watch a movie with her, play with Dusty, go shopping with Malaya, and so on.  And those things aren't wastes of time, but it's easy to spend more time on daily necessities here, since I have a partner to accompany me.  And that stuff needs to get done, but instead of really spurring me to work until the minute we have to leave, and to get back to work the minute we return, I often find myself screwing around since it's like, "Why work when we're leaving in an hour?" and then find myself screwing around more once we're back since we'll be eating dinner in an hour, or it's easier to get up and poke at the kitty, or pay attention to what Malaya is doing rather than focusing on my own work, and so on.

Malaya and I constantly talk about how we'll be together forever, and how once I get published our combined incomes will let us do whatever we want to do, and how we'll be moving to a much bigger place within two years, and so on and so forth. And we really believe that, and really want to make it happen, and really want to be together for our entire lives.  But it's also really dependent upon me working steadily on my writing and getting some novels published, since so many of the things we want to do require money.  And we're not looking to be a damn single income household, unless some day I'm making so much money from my writing that she can quit her job and spend full time doing research for my writing needs, or investing our money, or planning our travel and new home decoration and design, and so on.

It's not as if I didn't always feel that I wanted to get going more on writing when I was living alone, and I had a lot of the same dreams/goals of money to travel and buy a nice house and all of that. But somehow being with another person, and making actual future plans together makes it all seem much more real.

I almost wish it made me feel pressured, since I always seem to work better with a deadline, but Malaya isn't a harsh bitch to be poking at me like that.  At least not unless I asked her to do so.

I feel hopeful still, and don't have worries that our dreams won't come true, and realize that we're in a very fortunate position, with her having a guaranteed good income from her job, and me having the potential for a gigantic income from my writing, and both of us doing jobs that we enjoy.  More or less.

It does make me think about how it is for other people, though.  The average blue collar workers, man and wife working full time, maybe pulling in $80k a year combined.  They can afford a cheap home, but not in a good area (at least not in California with the $300k average home prices), and they can afford to have a family and a car and eat out once in a while, but their lives are sort of dreamless.

Well, not really without dreams; they probably have tons of those, but I mean realistically, they have no prospects for major life changes or great income increases, other than if they win the lottery or something.  Life is all about making budgets, and trying to save for the kids' college funds, and saving up enough for the down on a new car before the old one dies completely, and trying to cover the medical bills for little Johnny's last pneumonia, and so on.

It's not that such people are miserable, but they can't really dream of a much better life, at least not with any realism.  They don't have any talent that they could turn into a marketable skill, they don't have the time or inclination to go back to school to get the skills and resume for a better job, they don't have rich relatives who are going to leave them millions, etc.  It's not that their lives are empty or meaningless; hell they're doing a lot more to affect change and the world than I am.  It's just that they are resigned to their fates.  And I don't mean "resigned" in any sort of miserable way; they're just dealing with reality and doing the best that they can.

I don't often stop to think about how fortunate I am to be my age and in excellent health, with no huge tuition loans to pay off, not stuck in a crappy job, not stuck with a child or three to spend every dollar on, not married to someone I haven't loved for the last five years, and on top of that, possessed of a talent that can (theoretically) earn me a very good living while doing something I enjoy. The vast majority of people in America would kill for that sort of opportunity, if I can say that without sounding horribly immodest.

And not just America, how about the world?  So many people on earth are still struggling every waking hour just to survive, struggling to plant crops or hunt food, etc.  Simply working to stay alive, with never any thought or opportunity to do anything more than they are doing.  We in the Western World are very fortunate to have the technological opportunities and ease of living that modern life gives us, and it probably says something about human nature and how it evolved over eons of struggling for mere survival, that so many people do nothing to advance or improve themselves.  Ever.  During 99.9% of human lives every lived on this planet, there was no opportunity to do anything more than struggle to survive and reproduce.  Now, most people in the modern world have free time and access to almost unlimited education and self-improvement resources. And 99% of us spend that time watching Friends or SportsCenter, or at bad movies, or whacking off, or gambling, or sleeping, or playing video games.  Or whatever; it's almost always a pointless and unredeeming activity.  And sure, people need some breaks from their toil, even if it's creative and productive toil, but how many people take advantage of even 1/100,000th of the opportunities they have to improve themselves, or really do something that would make a difference?

Not a lot.  After all, it's always easier to just fuck around and watch TV.

I wonder what the world would be like if consumption of fast food and empty entertainment dropped by 99%, and people spent that saved time and money going to night school, or learning to paint, or volunteering to teach kids, or work at a charity?  Hard to say, but is there any way this wouldn't be a far better world for everyone in it, aside from the producers and actors on those shitty TV shows that would all cease to exist?

And I'm certainly not saying it's the rest of you who are the problem and that I'm the perfect one; I'm just applying my own sloth to everyone else, and wondering how different things would be if everyone lived more how I want to live myself.  It's a purely hypothetical exercise, since we'll never find out, at least on the world wide scale.

Alas.

One of the benefits of running my own website, paying for it myself, having no co-authors, editors, etc, is that I can write any damn thing I please. And usually do.  I've covered every topic I can possibly think of, and lots I'm sure I've long since forgotten, and will at some point write again.  

At this point, there are at least a thousand people (probably more, but my stats aren't real unequivocal) reading the update every day, or at least loading the page, and in theory all/most of them/you have an opinion about what they are seeing here.  I get a mail or two every day about this or that, but very seldom do I get any mails with suggestions of things I should write about.  I get mails pointing to weird news items, and friends who read this site point stuff out to me over ICQ, but I think that in the 11 months I've been doing this, I've only gotten 3 or 4 mails actually suggesting an essay topic.

One of those came in yesterday. I quote:

Flux -

I have read many of the essays on your site as well as a great deal of your daily blogs. One topic which I have not seen addressed is your take on "the meaning of life" or if there is a posthumous/supernatural existence. I realize this would be a large topic to tackle for a blog, but I am very curious as to what you think.

It is evident that you do not believe in any sort of organized religion, but if you do not believe in an omnipotent being then I would very much like to hear what theory you do subscribe to; be it original or otherwise. 

Respectfully,

Tom 

It's an interesting suggestion, and really, what could be a bigger topic? I mean... The Meaning of Life.  You almost expect to hear the peals of trumpets, and someone, perhaps James Earl Jones, intoning the words in his heavy, bass, Luke I am your father voice.

I don't have any quick, ready comment on what I think the meaning of life is.  In fact I'm pretty sure that there is no meaning to life. It has whatever meaning we give it, and I wouldn't associate religion or any faith with the potential meaning.  It's not that I reject religion giving it meaning, it's that it wouldn't even occur to me to consider that, if not for the way Tom posed the question.

And somewhat contrary to his comment, I think that organized religion probably has more to do with the meaning of life than what the religion in question proposes as their ultimate meaning of life.

Did that make any sense?

Well, I'm not going to get into this topic today, since it's so late it's early, and I've been working on my D2 site column for the past few hours.  But briefly, to clarify, I don't believe in any of the spirituality/religious beliefs about meaning, most of which seem to be a sort of carrot on stick-enforced morality.  Meaning you are told to do good things your whole life in order to get the "heavenly reward" at the end.  Religious people often use this theme as a club with which to beat the non-religious, as they ask how a person can be moral and live a decent life without religion to guide their actions.  Given that something like 98% of US prison inmates describe themselves as deeply or somewhat religious, I don't think it's a real tough question to answer. But pointing out that most criminals and cheats and liars and adulterers and murderers describe themselves as religious doesn't answer the question as to how a non-religious person achieves morality.

I also don't think that doing what you think you should because you're afraid of being punished is really morality. You can yell at a kid and tell him to stop stealing his little brother's toys, and he won't, as long as you're there watching him.  He's not stealing, but is he not stealing out of some sort of higher power imparted morality?  Or is he not stealing since he doesn't want to be punished?  And again, that doesn't address the issue of how a non-religious person achieves a moral existence, it's just another example of how religion/fear of divine retribution isn't the same thing as morality.

I'm not going to answer that question today, since I would need to give it more thought than my sleepy brain is prepared to give right now.  But my initial point about organized religion being more meaningful than spirituality is sort of a law and order thought. People who are involved in their church, doing social events, charity work, supporting others, are adding meaning to their life.  Whether they're doing it to be nice, or to get a reward, or to fill their empty lives, or because they think they'll get 49 virgins in heaven for it is irrelevant.  You have to judge them by their actions, not what they may or may not be thinking. Compare that to a person who doesn't do anything with organized religion, but believes deeply in something supernatural, whether it's Christianity or Buddhism or aliens flying behind a comet.  If all they do is sit around and think about it, or live a boring "work/watch TV/get fat/die alone" life, while thinking about it, how has it given their live any meaning?  Maybe they were mentally fulfilled, but more likely they spent a lot of time wondering what they were doing, why they weren't happier, if they should be doing something different, etc.  True, worrying all the time could be a form of meaning in life, but it's not a very meaningful meaning.

The famous quote by Socrates (or possibly Plato) says that "The unexamined life is not worth living." I used to really embrace that concept when I was young and idealistic.  I was 19 or 20, first in college, first living on my own, and very interesting in psychology and philosophy. I didn't want to do anything without giving some thought to why I was doing it. Taking that quote too far can lead to paralysis and inaction, but if you can take it in balance and examine why you are doing what you are doing while you are doing it; live your life as a do'er, as well as an observer, it's really an interesting way to be.

Whether this is good advice for most people, for those who want meaning in their life, is open to debate.

Self evaluation is not often a pleasant experience, if you are honest and critical, since you'll usually fixate on the things you aren't doing, the things that you should be doing, and not give yourself enough credit for the things that you are doing, or at least the bad things that you could be doing but aren't. (If you're really stretching for praise-worthy material.)

This relates back to the meaningful life and religion vs. solitary spirituality.

I would say that a person could be far too into contemplation and spirituality and solitary religion, be aware of that, and still live an essentially meaningless life.  While a completely non-introspective busy person with a lot of organized religious activities may never give a thought to "why am I here" and accomplish 10x more good works, never be bored or listless, and never know to think what they are missing.

This is rather scatter shot, and I'll try to do a more coherent version in the future.  My point is that meaning in life doesn't necessarily have anything to do with religion, organized religion, or self-examination.  And how you define "meaning" is probably as big a factor as what you do with that definition.  It's easy to just think about things and never actually act on your thoughts, no matter how meaningful they might be. It's easier still to do no thinking and just act, darting from responsibility to responsibility like an ant in an ant farm.

And one man's meaning is another man's mentally dead busy life.  Or that mans' meaning is another man's boring introspective solitude.

Socrates' theory doesn't hold up for everyone, or even the majority of people.  Is it a good idea to examine your life and realize you are a fuck up and a failure?  Or would you do better to just plunge into activity and never have time/inclination to wonder what else you might be doing.  What other metaphoric altar you might have spent your years kneeling before?

Does life have any inherent meaning, or is it just something humans like to think about to make our miserably short existence more "meaningful"?  That might be the key to all of religion, organized or otherwise.  People want there to be meaning.  They want it all to make sense, or have some purpose. They want the good to be rewarded and the evil punished.  And if you examine deeply enough to conclude that those are just simple human delusions, of no more meaning than dust in the wind before the infinite blackness that is the universe, you may live to regret it.

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