To those who observe Christmas, and to those who merely see it happening around them, here’s hoping you have a happy one.
To help make the day even better than it might have been, here are a few of my recommendations for The Best Christmas Albums in the History of the Universe, from the December 2011 issue of Scientist. Still holds up.
If you ever find yourself saying: “It’s all so obvious. The other side is so stupid. All we need to do is (blank),” then you’re probably wrong.
Consider instead saying: “This issue is almost certainly complex and nuanced, and there are probably no perfect solutions, only tradeoffs.”
A wiser person than I might also say: “Here are my instincts. I wonder what a smart and reasonable person from the other ‘side’ of the issue might think. Surely, they must exist.”
But before you even get to that point, there may be some more questions worth asking. Namely:
“Is this definitely an issue that falls under the scope of ‘politics’ at all? Is this something that government has done an especially great job of handling in the past, in my experience? Or is this something that I can act on, personally, instead?”
If the subject really does feel like something that is outside of your individual control, then it may be worth asking some more questions. Like:
Once you’ve run through these questions in your head, you might just realize that you’re not really having a “political” conversation at all. You might just be having a conversation.
If you’re really feeling quite certain that the conversation you’re having is a “political” one, then it may be wise to ask the two most important political questions of all:
“By what principle do I come to my view?”
And:
“Is this something that should be applied equally to all people, of all tastes and backgrounds, of all beliefs and abilities, and in all like cases?”
Far too often the answers may be: “I had never even thought of that” and “Well, of course not.”
And if that’s the case, there’s a good chance that your political conversation might just not be political at all.
All people were created equal. But nowhere is it written that they would remain that way. Nor should we expect them to.
People come from a wide variety of backgrounds, with different aptitudes, interests, values and family histories. They are satisfied with different things, pursue different goals and choose different means of getting at them.
Are we sure that on occasion, when we speak of equality, we’re not inadvertently speaking of wiping all of those things away? Of removing other people’s freedom to make choices that we personally deem unwise?
If we really do think that it’s okay to take “poor choices” off the table for sane adults, by what power do we decide that we get to make those decisions for them?
Principles aside for a moment, what if we’re wrong? If not now, what about in 5, 10, or 30 years? No one alive today could possibly deny just how fast our world can change under the force of human ingenuity. (Or how slow large institutions can be to adapt.)
The gut reaction to this kind of inquiry is often to push back, to shut it out and shut it down. We want to believe that since our intent is good, our means must be just as well.
Still, when pushed on the underlying principles, most of us will agree that we shouldn’t be in the business of telling others what they can and can’t do — So long as they’re not directly harming or taking away the inalienable rights of others.
We might all agree to limiting a person’s ability to kill, steal or pollute, since these are actions that affect the choices and freedoms of other people. But how many of us can agree on what kind of rent is reasonable to pay, how often we should go to the doctor, what kind of investment or sales strategy is wise to take, or what kind of food or music is best?
People will continue to be born equal in terms of knowledge, accomplishment and virtue. None of these comes from the womb. Our circumstances of course, will soon separate. As they do so, the question becomes: In what ways shall we remain equal?
In a just society, if we are to remain equal in the ways that matter most, we must be afforded equal treatment under the law. We must be given equal freedom to make our own choices, to work to our own ends and through our own means.
We must be given equal opportunity to succeed or fail in accordance with our own ability and our own choices. And we must be given equal opportunity to adjust or maintain our choices as we see fit, regardless of our personal outcomes, and regardless of whether others think that we’re doing a smart thing.
If, in seeing the pain, frustration, and inequality of outcome that often comes along with freedom of choice, you are moved and would like to choose to make sacrifices in order to help your fellow man, then please do so. Act. It is within your power. And it is an exceedingly noble choice to make.
But, if you care about the kind of equality that respects people and their differences, then you must respect your fellow man’s right to refuse your help. He should, and must, be allowed the same opportunity to make his own personal decisions for himself. Regardless of whether or not we think they’re the right ones.
A wiser man than I am once said: “The society that puts equality before freedom will end up with neither. The society that puts freedom before equality will end up with a great measure of both.”
There once was a brilliant, Nobel prize-winning economist who said that the world runs on greed. “Do you know of any society that doesn’t run on greed?” he’d ask.
He would often follow this up by joking: “What is greed, anyway? It’s never us who is greedy. It’s only the other guy who is ever greedy.”
He believed that there were better and worse ways to channel this natural, often unconscious, bias toward our own self-interest.
Better, he thought, to adopt systems that ask us to honestly acknowledge our own interests and those of others. Worse, he thought, to adopt ways that encourage us to hide our own self-interest in order to affect the mere outward appearance of piety.
A generation later, there was a widely celebrated billionaire, who regularly topped the lists of the richest men in the world, and became famous for his gentility and humility.
He thought the world ran on envy; that wanting of a thing merely because someone else has it. He said that so many of our booms and busts were caused, or at least worsened, by all the irrational behavior that comes along with that toxic emotion of envy.
If only people you could encourage people to think more about what things are worth to them personally, he believed, and less about what other people seem to be going crazy over. You could do a lot of good.
Another generation still, and there was an English doctor who spent a good portion of his life working hands-on with the poor, both in Africa and in his own backyard. He came to believe that one of the most dominant emotions which held so many people back from living up to their human potential, was resentment.
If you could help stop people from becoming so resentful of their peers and of unknown people, he thought, you could help them see what they could do, with their own lives and within their own community, to help them rise up out of the conditions that were handed down to them by their parents and their culture.
They were all right to some degree or another. All of their ideas were somewhat unpopular at first. And they all left out parts of the story.
One of them came from poverty, one of them came from wealth, and one of them began somewhere in-between. But they all had at least one thing in common, aside from their great achievements in their own fields: They were all reasonable, and fairly rational, optimists.
Each of them believed that the main problem was not with people, but with culture. And each of them believed that these poisonous emotions, which could never be stamped out entirely, could recognized, accounted for, controlled, and overcome.
They each believed that we are able to create constructive channels to satiate our most destructive drives. And they believed that you can give people ways of celebrating, instead of destroying, their most creative and often, competitive, impulses.
Music can help us do either or both of these things. And in this way, it can make a huge difference in people’s lives.
Or, it can do exactly the opposite. Which is, to be of very little real interest at all.
The choice is yours. You create the culture.
It’s something you earn.
Throughout most of human history, it would have been unusual to say that some someone “is” a genius. You’d have been much more likely to think of a person as “having” a genius.
This is not the way most of us understand it today. But a growing body of research suggests that the basic premise behind the historical view is as accurate as it is counter-intuitive. (This is something that happens from time to time, and you figure we’d be used to it by now.)
Over the past year, Blake Madden and I wrote a series of articles based on that growing body of evidence, exploring what talent is and how it is developed.
If you do not “have” a genius yet, perhaps 2014 is the time to find it. Or maybe more accurately, to find a basic foundation within yourself and then build it, brick by brick, until you have developed a skyscraper of skill. Then, it is your job to maintain it, to put it use, and to build in new areas. (You might try nearby lots, or in fertile areas without much competition.)
You don’t have to be the best at everything. But you should be at least as good as you want to be at those things you care about the most. Maybe better than you thought you could be.
Even if you never find what you or others would consider true genius, you might do some amazing things on the way. More than you might otherwise.
“I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to make an ass of yourself.”
-Oscar Wilde
Recently, Phil Robertson of the reality TV show Duck Dynasty was suspended for making comments that many people, myself included, would consider quite silly and ignorant. Although his words were not technically hateful or homophobic, they were certainly ridiculous in my own personal view.
His suspension and possible firing by A&E is not a first amendment issue from a legal perspective. Private companies can and should be free to hire and fire on these grounds in most contexts. This is only a first amendment issue from an ethical perspective.
In my view, it is a welcome opportunity to encourage tolerance of dissenting, or even unpleasant viewpoints, and to encourage good speech in response to what we see as bad speech. This is far preferable and more effective than going around sticking socks in people’s mouths.
Our fellow men are to be heard and to be persuaded, not brow-beaten into conformity. Conversations can be powerful, only if we let them, and only if we show basic human respect and courtesy to the people we are engaging with, regardless of their views.
Recently, video surfaced of Mr. Robertson from three years ago, in which he voiced much more extreme views than what he has expressed now. Since that time, it seems his views have softened considerably, becoming far more tolerant than they once were. Perhaps this is because the people around him have been encouraging him to become more tolerant and accepting than he once was?
Conversation really does work. But it takes time. People, especially older people, can be slow to change long-held views. We should remember that, and show them the same acceptance and kindness that we demand from them in turn.
End of the day update: If it were up to me, Duck Dynasty would do a comeback episode in which a gay free speech advocate would come on and share her views with open-hearted persuasive flair, and then ideally, they would all hug it out. It would probably be a ratings smash. And then I could go back to not caring that this is a TV show that exists. Everybody wins.
There is no such thing as an “unbiased” person.
There are only people who refuse to admit to their own biases (which allows the biases free reign to take over) and those who acknowledge their biases (which potentially offers some modicum of effortful control over them.)
Some biases are baked right into our DNA. The best we can do is to try to notice and acknowledge them.
Other biases are cultural. The best we can do with those is to notice them and ideally, try to replace them with somewhat healthier biases. But that’s pretty much the best we can do.
This sounds fatalistic and defeatist, only until you realize just how difficult and rewarding it is. Then you realize how optimistic and affirming this outlook secretly is. (That takes a while.)
The funny thing is that ultimately, either one of those conclusions, defeatist or optimistic, will be in part, the product of personal bias.
…And there are many art lovers who consider that a travesty.
Personally, I always thought one of the things that makes graffiti uniquely interesting is that it is by its nature, impermanent, and that it exists outside the law.
Are we supposed to protect graffiti by legal decree, or are we supposed to let it be what it is?
Graffiti is something that human beings do when they see a thing or a place that is ugly and uncared for, and they want to make it beautiful and interesting in the only way they know how.
It is also something that humans do when they see a space that is unclaimed, unprotected, and want to claim a piece of it for themselves in the only way they are able.
In a sense, it’s sad that 5 Pointz has been erased.
Of course, it’s also sad when our pets and grandparents and parents die before we do.
But should we be surprised? Why do we expect everything in our world to remain permanently as it is? Graffiti artists don’t. Because it never does.
Advice to anyone who wants to save something like 5 Pointz in the future: Save up. Buy it yourself.
If you like, you can leave it sitting there, sucking property tax dollars out of your bank account as you try to figure out how to make it sustainable as it is.
That’s your choice, and it’s well within your power. Take responsibility for it. Take ownership.
Until then, you don’t own 5 Pointz and neither do I. No one person or group of people will ever own that spot of land, permanently. But the graffiti artists did, in their way, for a time. (In this particular case, under agreement with the building’s owners.)
They made their own mark in the world, no matter how fleeting and impermanent. They saw a blank slate and made a change that made sense to them at the time.
The question is: How are you going to do the same in your time? Learn from the past, and then move forward. Everything fades.
There is an article in the New York Times today about how “Hipsters are Ruining Paris.” The author’s evidence for this are that there are now more bistros and fewer whorehouses, and that people are buying more vegetables and fewer cigarettes.
My official response is: “OH MY GOD SHUT UP. JUST SHUT UP ALREADY WITH THIS NONSENSE, JUST SHUT. UP.”
I’m sure that when they put up the goddamn Eiffel Tower, people complained. The world changes, people. That’s what it does. It’s about time we got used to that.
There is no external ‘hipster’ to vilify. This is us. Humans. Trying the best we know how, all of us pursuing our individual interests and doing what we like, and supporting what we want to support.
So there are a few less whorehouses now? Cry me a river.
It appears to me that although many people use the word “hipster”, no one seems to have any certainty as to what it should mean.
Whoever is using the word, it basically seems to mean: “People who are into culture but don’t dress like I do.”
Most people who call other people hipsters would almost definitely be called hipsters by someone else. So with that in mind, I feel it’s time to retire the word already. It’s useless. It has no function.
Hipster acts essentially as a non-vulgar way of calling someone “asshole”, “jerk”, “pompous” or “douche”. We already have those words, and we are much more clear on what they mean.
The word “hipster” communicates less — not more — than these alternatives. And that’s why I don’t use it anymore. Ever.
Hello, fellow Scientists of Sound! Welcome to the November issue of Trust Me, I’m A Scientist — the music magazine for people who make music.
In This Issue: