Justice is defined in terms of ideals, which change little, but whose interpretation evolves. Citizens may not grasp the ideals, but would know their neighbours' interpretation of these ideals. Trial by jury accommodates geographic and temporal interpretations, while the common ideals enable jurisdictions to learn from each other.
Rationalism is suitable for all ages. Empiricism requires engagement, leading to responsibilities and risks. One can learn to deny inferences, but not facts. In order to learn to withstand facts, one ought to be exposed to empiricism from an early age, notwithstanding the risks.
11 February 2012
6 February 2012
"Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid" by Douglas R. Hofstadter (1979)
By means of reason alone, hunger can be traced to a simple source. Complex emotions cannot be. Instead, one must vary a multitude of actions in order to identify each action's impact on the one-dimensional measure of one's well-being. When a simple reason for action is hard to articulate, one tends to favour inaction. This bias can be resisted by developing the habit of indulging into new experiences without a clear rationale.
Zen embraces the paradox as a means for preventing one from drawing conclusions from insufficient data. The circularity of a paradox tires one's mind, and nudges one to stop brooding and to start acting, collecting data. Some data are acknowledged and processed only subconsciously. (Sleep, exposure to beauty, nature, and art generate such data.) Zen reminds one not to overlook the tacit behind the articulable, and highlights the absurdity of the dichotomy between the mind and the body.
Even though sometimes knowledge can be gained by holding hands, holding hands is an inefficient way to transmit that knowledge to future generations. One should interpret and codify, thus preserving---the memories of---civilization.
Zen embraces the paradox as a means for preventing one from drawing conclusions from insufficient data. The circularity of a paradox tires one's mind, and nudges one to stop brooding and to start acting, collecting data. Some data are acknowledged and processed only subconsciously. (Sleep, exposure to beauty, nature, and art generate such data.) Zen reminds one not to overlook the tacit behind the articulable, and highlights the absurdity of the dichotomy between the mind and the body.
Even though sometimes knowledge can be gained by holding hands, holding hands is an inefficient way to transmit that knowledge to future generations. One should interpret and codify, thus preserving---the memories of---civilization.
3 February 2012
Campus Starbucks
The music is sourced from someone in touch with the right kind of reality. Students commune with MacBooks or each other. The flux of avocational baristas promises structures of inviting complexity.
The patrons are selected on taste or parental income, conducive to indulging one's taste. Those whose indulgences displease are amended by the décor and generally have a point to make.
Some recurring characters look twenty-first-century scholarly, multitasking and consuming ambient noise. Others are refugees from all scholarly.
The queuing customers converse orally with each other or tactilely with iPhones. One wonders how, in a few years, one shall distinguish a wired customer from an alert one. Perhaps, the wired shall be alert, queues shall parish, and entire campuses shall have the ambiance of a Starbucks.
Wounded when engaged at half capacity; enveloped into the ether of potentiality when nearly empty. A self-effacing host bringing out the best in his guests.
The patrons are selected on taste or parental income, conducive to indulging one's taste. Those whose indulgences displease are amended by the décor and generally have a point to make.
Some recurring characters look twenty-first-century scholarly, multitasking and consuming ambient noise. Others are refugees from all scholarly.
The queuing customers converse orally with each other or tactilely with iPhones. One wonders how, in a few years, one shall distinguish a wired customer from an alert one. Perhaps, the wired shall be alert, queues shall parish, and entire campuses shall have the ambiance of a Starbucks.
Wounded when engaged at half capacity; enveloped into the ether of potentiality when nearly empty. A self-effacing host bringing out the best in his guests.
29 January 2012
The Artist (2011)
European fascination with Hollywood's confidence that the attitude loads the dice, that one is an audience, and that handsomeness never lies pictures two silent lives threatened by idleness, salvaged by smiles.
22 January 2012
"The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine" by Michael Lewis (2010)
Virtuous behaviour is shaped by circumstances as much as by personal integrity. The economic regime and corporate cultures determine which personal qualities thrive. Even if the economic regime exalts personal wealth, the diversity of corporate cultures enables one to choose whether to amass this wealth by improving the world or by seeking rents. Rent-seeking carries a pecuniary compensating differential. Indeed, the downside of a hired trader's risk seems lower than that of an entrepreneur, and the upside seems higher; yet entrepreneurs persist.
An ideal salesman increases his customer's valuation for the product. An artful salesman deceives. In order to deceive the rich, a salesman will benefit from being bred among the rich. Hence the rents in sales.
The thesis that prices of securities would or should reflect the fundamentals is not immediate. Securities can serve as fiat money. Market participants' agreement on the price of a security is more stabilising than proximity to any particular price of that security.
An ideal salesman increases his customer's valuation for the product. An artful salesman deceives. In order to deceive the rich, a salesman will benefit from being bred among the rich. Hence the rents in sales.
The thesis that prices of securities would or should reflect the fundamentals is not immediate. Securities can serve as fiat money. Market participants' agreement on the price of a security is more stabilising than proximity to any particular price of that security.
9 January 2012
The Art Institute of Chicago
(8 January 2012)
A painter can be intense bordering on madness, without seeming grotesque, by being true not to the images of the physical world, but to the images of dreams and nightmares. In contrast to a flickering display, visual memories retain what is essential about an object, without corrupting arbitrarily. Visual memories are the images of emotions. What is remembered is a mood, a reflex, not the stimulant.
A painter specialises by developing the vocabulary of the physical world (Edward Hopper in "Nighthawks"), of memories and dreams (Gerhard Richter in "Christa and Wolfi", "Mrs Wolleh with Children," and "Woman Descending the Staircase"), or of an invented world (Vincent van Gogh in "Bedroom in Arles").
A painter can be intense bordering on madness, without seeming grotesque, by being true not to the images of the physical world, but to the images of dreams and nightmares. In contrast to a flickering display, visual memories retain what is essential about an object, without corrupting arbitrarily. Visual memories are the images of emotions. What is remembered is a mood, a reflex, not the stimulant.
A painter specialises by developing the vocabulary of the physical world (Edward Hopper in "Nighthawks"), of memories and dreams (Gerhard Richter in "Christa and Wolfi", "Mrs Wolleh with Children," and "Woman Descending the Staircase"), or of an invented world (Vincent van Gogh in "Bedroom in Arles").
31 December 2011
"Lady in the Lake" by Raymond Chandler (1943)
A work of art is a message, from a stranger, that makes one feel not alone. In order to achieve this effect of shared humanity, art must project a personality. Personalities do not aggregate well. A crowd is an example. The challenges of aggregation is the reason why novels are typically written single-handedly, whereas science and engineering are practised in groups.
Aggregation is more likely to be successful when dominated by a strong leader projecting his own vision of humanity. Film directors create this way. Steve Jobs produced this way. Whether a gadget is art depends on whether a user when granted exclusive access to this gadget feels less lonely---without feeling less conscious. (The exclusive access rules out the effect of belonging to a community of users.)
Nature is not an artist. Art is permeated by a concern for humanity. Nature is uninterested.
Art---like pure mathematics---is a product of irrational obsession with perfection. The irrationality is in the inputs' incommensurability with the artist's rewards and, perhaps, even with the benefit to his contemporaries. The insufficiency of rewards can stem from the artist's stubborn neglect of public demands or from superior vision. (In this sense, Jobs's creative process was artistic.)
A novel approaches perfection when the novelist lives through it, instead of suspending living in order to write. Such a novelist invests his work with as much creativity as he would apply to his living. One writes instead of living when one is constrained in circumstances or time, when one wants to see actions' consequences without the fog of responsibility, when one has no audience for one's living, or when one craves for a linear narrative.
Art is a message from a stranger. So solitary living is not art (even when the messages are sent to one's future selves). Public living can be.
Aggregation is more likely to be successful when dominated by a strong leader projecting his own vision of humanity. Film directors create this way. Steve Jobs produced this way. Whether a gadget is art depends on whether a user when granted exclusive access to this gadget feels less lonely---without feeling less conscious. (The exclusive access rules out the effect of belonging to a community of users.)
Nature is not an artist. Art is permeated by a concern for humanity. Nature is uninterested.
Art---like pure mathematics---is a product of irrational obsession with perfection. The irrationality is in the inputs' incommensurability with the artist's rewards and, perhaps, even with the benefit to his contemporaries. The insufficiency of rewards can stem from the artist's stubborn neglect of public demands or from superior vision. (In this sense, Jobs's creative process was artistic.)
A novel approaches perfection when the novelist lives through it, instead of suspending living in order to write. Such a novelist invests his work with as much creativity as he would apply to his living. One writes instead of living when one is constrained in circumstances or time, when one wants to see actions' consequences without the fog of responsibility, when one has no audience for one's living, or when one craves for a linear narrative.
Art is a message from a stranger. So solitary living is not art (even when the messages are sent to one's future selves). Public living can be.
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