I justed finished watching Bill Burr's new special

02/01/2017 at 12:30 am


I justed finished watching Bill Burr's new special "Walk Your Way Out" with my brother. In this special he utilizes his immense imagination and engaging stage presence to tell stories that seem to be going off the rails at times but always end up on track toward a laugh. That was a lame sentence. (I'll start over.)

The first time I saw Bill Burr was in the early 2000's when he came to my tiny, backwoods, community college. I remember thinking it was amazing and that live comedy was something special. I remember being really stoned and that someone in the audience got kicked out for being a drunk asshole. Since then I have seen a lot of Bill Burr's work from my computer. From his previous special "I'm Sorry You Feel That Way" to his Netflix TV show "F is for Family". He's even in "Breaking Bad" which I'm re-watching now. I love when he is on Joe Rogan's podcast and he has his own podcast where he rants about things.

Bill Burr's special most recent special really was great. It's funny and entertaining and his characters, voices and body language are engaging and hilarious. He takes on taboos with ease and a biting humor and his observations are dark, grounded in reality, playful and maybe a little whimsical. I relate to his sensibilities minus some of the anger. I'd recommend it to anyone who isn't afraid to hear someone speak their mind.

Other than that I went to work earlier and I am becoming more self reliant. I feel like I know the people that work there better and I'm more comfortable helping customers. After work I came home and caught up with my brother about business stuff. A couple things are not going as well as we wish they would. Getting funding from one source didn't work out, a client is late on a payment, our custom e-mails aren't working. Minor things ultimately, but they are frustrating. We have a meeting tomorrow about a previous job and branding. I am excited to see what is next for the business.

Book Review: Neil Gaiman's "The Graveyard Book"

I decided to buy Neil Gaiman's book entitled "The Graveyard Book" on the recommendation of Tim Ferris, a noted author, and podcaster. I had no idea what the book was about but I thought if Tim Ferris loved it so much it must be worth reading. The book sat in a drawer for quite some time before I got to it and I'm really glad I did. It is a wonderfully written and thoroughly engaging book.

The book is about a boy that grows up in and around a graveyard in what, I surmise, is a normal, modern-day English town. It is nearly impossible to talk about the book without giving something of the magic of the book away so I will try to describe it without revealing too much. Neil Gaiman masterfully blends supernatural elements in with a grounded tale of a young boy learning about the world and where he fits into it. With his parents gone he is taken in by an unlikely duo of dead do-gooders and a rugged but fair guardian.

In each chapter we learn more and more about the world the boy finds himself and about the dangers that await him outside the graveyard as well as some that lie within its gates. He meets historical figures and mythical creatures and all the while learns about the power of friendship and how complicated growing up can be. In the end, he finds himself taking on death itself and discovering the price one pays to do the right thing.

This book is a very fun read and has many great life lessons told in a way that a wide range of readers can enjoy. It creates subtle intrigue and exudes imagination that saturates the reader in a fantasy that is both unreal and instantly familiar. Neil Gaiman takes a fresh look at how boys become men and take the reader on an adventure through all the joys and pains that go along with that transition. I highly recommend this book, especially to young readers who have the courage to discover the world on their terms.

Try it out! Click here to buy it using my affiliate link. 

My Thoughts on Sam Harris and Jordan B. Peterson's conversation on "Truth"

01/24/2017 at 12 am

Today I worked from 12:45 to 5pm at the retail job. I am becoming more comfortable there  with answering phones, getting items out of the back, helping customers with odd requests and things like that. After work I came home to my brother talking about a podcast where Sam Harris and Jordan B. Peterson have a 2 hour discussion about the meaning and application of the word truth. Sam believes that there are scientific facts that we call truths and Jordan believes that no matter the truth claim it must be put into a moral framework where it isn't "absolutely" true but merely "proximally" true. They go back and forth and I recommend listening to the entire thing if you like epistemology or semantics or you enjoy somewhat tedious philosophical conversations in general. You can watch the Youtube of it here.

My brother and I talked about what the word "true" means and how it isn't as simple as one might think. There are facts but facts can be overturned and what are the use of facts without a moral framework to guide where we search for and what we "should" do with facts. Is there an ultimate "truth" and if so how do we recognize it when we see it or can it truly be known at all? Jordan seemed to want to reserve the use of the word "truth" only for instances that can be argued that the consequence of that truth is beneficial to humans in a Darwinian or Pragmatic fashion. Sam seemed to be arguing that for the sake of conversation one has to grant a certain amount of "truth" to statements based on their scientific validity and accuracy and that it isn't necessary to look at every truth claim as a representation of a greater truth that can only be revealed by examination of the outcome toward humans. 

For example: 2 + 2 = 4. That is either true or false (or unknown) but it doesn't seem to require an examination of higher moral truths to accept and even if humans did not exist wouldn't this be true? Maybe not. Maybe it is impossible to examine any statement without presupposing that a human is involved in some stage of its conceptualization, from thinking it to communicating about it and so on.

For example: The dog is blue. This statement is either true or false (or unknown) and it does not contain any moral content at all. It isn't good or bad that the dog is or isn't blue. So if the dog is blue then a rational person should accept the statement "The dog is blue" is simply true. 

For example: It is immoral to steal. This is a moral statement and I think it is either true or false (or unknown) based on the moral framework that one uses to asses its validity. I think Sam would argue that there is a way to do this scientifically but I think he would also say that there may be holes in the scientific explanation that need to be filled in with reason, logic, and philosophy. He might also add that some subjective or "spiritual" considerations might be made in order to understand the statement's validity. What I gather from the podcast is that Jordan B. Peterson would say that the statement is either true or false based on whether or not it leads to an outcome that suits the survive-ability of the individual and the species. He might also say that this statement is void of context and therefore it is unrealistic to take it seriously as a case worth discussing. He might ask, "Who stole, why did they steal," or "what lead to them stealing" and such questions in order to assess the underlying truth of the statement and I don't think he is wrong to ask those questions. 

I think Jordan is right in not capitulating to Sam when Sam brings up thought experiments that require a lot of presuppositions and I think real world examples would probably have been more useful here but I also think Jordan knows what Sam means when Sam explains what he means by "true" in a scientific or fact based way. I also think that Jordan came into the conversation with a desire to explain his underlying basis for morality and to disabuse Sam of his "materialist" metaphysics but in getting bogged down in the analysis of one term (Truth) he was not able to fully express his arguments against materialism and the limitations of science. Especially the limitations of science to illuminate moral truths. 

I think that the word "truth" can have a few different meanings and sometimes, for the sake of conversation, we accept one meaning in order to both further the conversation and because the meaning behind the word is known by both parties. When Sam talks about smallpox he is talking about the scientific truth relating to biological facts but when Jordan hears Sam talk about smallpox he questions the truth that underlies why smallpox is being studied. Some of the confusion in the conversation, from my perspective, is the lack of consistency when Jordan agrees that some things are true but also claims that those truths may not "really" be true when one looks at the bigger picture. A picture that one may never have the opportunity to see. 

I think that they both are very intelligent and that the term they discussed for so long is actually a fairly complicated concept. I think that it would have been interesting to have them move onto another topic and see what happens when the word "true" comes up or they might have agreed to try not using the term until they can agree on it's proper use for the purpose of their current conversation. Then they would have been forced to use other terms like "scientific fact" or "empirical fact" or "evil" instead of using true. No matter what they end up talking about I hope they talk more and put it out to the world for me to listen to. I hope it starts good conversations and leads to even better arguments. 

These are not all my thoughts but they certainly are some of them.