Hard Determinism and Ethics
Apparently, I decided to write a single philosophical piece about a meme (The Stars and Planets Will Affect Your Life in Some Way) and it snowballed into a bunch of smaller pieces to explain certain pieces that I discussed in the aforementioned piece. For example, I discuss how planets will affect your life in many ways based on quantum mechanics. Before I get into the ethical issues for hard determinism, I figured we should go through a primer on quantum mechanics and how you have zero free will but perceive that you have free will. This is the same type of argument one would discuss if someone believed God was all knowing, all powerful, and all moral; God knows everything so nothing you do is a surprise to God, so you don’t have freewill, it is all pre-determined, but you don’t know that so you don’t realize you lack free will and instead perceive that you are free. (I got wordy, so I added a [Read More] link so you can choose to continue reading or not)
Read MoreThe Wonderful Musician
“Oh, musician,” replied the little hare, “I will obey you as a scholar obeys his master.” They went a part of the way together until they came to an open space in the forest, where stood an aspen tree. The musician tied a long string round the little hare’s neck, the other end of which he fastened to the tree.
“Now briskly, little hare, run twenty times around the tree!” cried the musician, and the little hare obeyed, and when it had run around twenty times, it had twisted the string twenty times around the trunk of the tree, and the little hare was caught, and let it pull and tug as it liked, it only made the string cut into its tender neck. “Wait there till I come back, ” said the musician and went onwards.
~Brothers Grimm
Fuck the musician. This piece of shit is a total asshole who took advantage of the woodland creatures because of his laziness. Listen to this shit: “‘Why, a hare is coming,’ said the musician, ‘I do not want him.'” Three animals appeared and wanted help (wolf, fox, and finally, the hare) learning the fiddle. Something the musician wanted to teach, but him being a bigoted asshole, he only wanted to teach humans. Now, I know I am reading this shit from the perspective of our current time, but I can only imagine that the original moral here was: don’t play with wild creatures, you have no idea what they want (since wolves and foxes probably killed kids often). But reading it now, I have gotten a whole new moral analysis. [Click “Read More” for my modern take]
Read MoreThe Stars and Planets Will Affect Your Life in Some Way
While strolling through the world wide web, I came across one of these meme thingamobobs where it listed all the zodiac signs and then their horoscope. For each zodiac, it stated: “The Stars and Planets Will not Affect Your Life in Any Way”. Now, the question you are probably asking is if Theodore is a believer. Some of you no doubt believe in horoscopes and some of you hate them and consider them a plague upon the rational enlightened mind of the homo homo sapien. Or perhaps it is something different, like that person I met who believed pink quartz had healing capabilities and was fixing their ailment; this thought had spread from their significant other. If you have to ask where I land on this topic, I highly suggest you review my marinade recipe rant: Marinade or Cancer Cure. However, I am not on the side of this meme because they failed linguistically. Blatantly put: they are wrong and their meme is a lie. You want to know how I can say that so confidently? Click [Read More] and I will take you through a philosophical journey.
Read MoreThe Man in the High Castle – Not the Book by PKD
I recently heard about a man who has locked himself in a castle (large mansion that is nicknamed the castle). He doesn’t have visitors often and is mostly there to maintain the place and enforce the rules. It is an isolation job where he doesn’t see anyone for many days throughout the week. When he does have an interaction with someone, it is usually brief and him discussing what he does.
Now, I know that I am an extrovert and introvert blend, and because of that, I need to see humans on a regular basis. I need to see the way they tick and move. All these observations go into creating mannerisms for characters, speech patterns, and all of that fun jazz that makes a character three dimensional/realistic. Obviously, I make some stuff up, but I often listen to the world around me and pull from there. This blog post is developed from this approach and a conversation with a neighbor.
So, the man in the castle confused me. His goal is to write a screen play for a movie. That’s why he took the job in the mansion – he needs the isolation to work on his product. Now, when I write I am capable of doing it in a coffee shop (only for short stints, I am actually writing this blog in a coffee shop right now) or with pure silence/instrumental music (if a neighbor is being loud). So I do understand the benefit of being in your home, by yourself, with silence, and how it makes writing easier. If I could have a pure silence chamber, I would write exclusively in there.
Yet, when I am writing, I am usually writing or creating something that comes from a semblance of reality. The concept of existing in a bubble, in a castle, and writing a screen play (unless it is about living an isolated life and the incurring psychological damage you receive) doesn’t seem possible to me. Where is the material coming from, the ideas, the human characteristics? Then again, everyone is different and I am especially adept at knowing the environments I need to be productive. Perhaps, his is isolation allows his thoughts to hammer on his brain box until something squeaks out his hands.
All I know is I couldn’t do it.
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