Photo Journal 5/23/2018

Powell Butte, Oregon

No Editing, Canon with 14-24mm and Kenko Extension Tubes

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Munk Debate about Political Correctness and Podcast Link

On May 18th the organization known as Munk Debates held a debate with the premise: be it resolved, what you call political correctness, I call progress. On the pro side were Michelle Goldberg and Michael Dyson and on the con side were Jordan Peterson and Stephen Fry. Unfortunately, the premise was a bit vague and neither side gave great definitions or examples of how political correctness is either a force for good or bad in the world or how people call progress political correctness in an effort to limit progress.

On the pro side, Michelle Goldberg was the only participant to attempt to argue for progress as she explained that it is important for marginalized groups to voice their concerns and that while it may be uncomfortable for others it is an important aspect of progressing rights to those who may not have had them in the past. Michael Dyson made little to no effort to talk about censorship, free speech or political correctness and instead hijacked the debate to talk about historical racial oppression as if he were giving a sermon to inner city black kids in an attempt to incite hatred and blame toward all white people in America. He personally attacked Jordan Peterson as being a "mean mad white man" which seemed to come from his insistence to make the conversation about white supremacy, targetting Peterson, who at no point was particularly mean, mad or white.

On the con side, Jordan Peterson lectured about the negative consequences to collectivist theories and identity politics. He discussed the potential for hierarchies to become corrupt and the how treating each other as individuals is the best way to organize social interactions and society. Stephen Fry eloquently talked about the failure of the left to accomplish the goal of championing progressive values and that the left's insistence on political correctness has led to a resurgence of the right. He called for fighting for rights using civility and decency as opposed to attempting to control words and shaming those who think differently. My favorite quote from Fry was, on the left, "they are somehow undiverse in their call for diversity, you can be diverse but not in your opinions, language, and your behavior".

I think that the con side would have been better off introducing examples of how the left has gone too far with political correctness such as Antifa at Berkely rioting, along with other riots, and how staff members were taken hostage at Evergreen College. Or examples of people being shamed or compelled speech in Canada. The pro side could have brought up examples of how the certain words or phrases should be made taboo or how speech can incite violence. Michael Dyson could have brought up examples of modern racism and how language allows for a lack of consequence for those who perpetrate racist behavior.

Ultimately the debate was a success but not in addressing political correctness. I think it was a good example of how conversations about controversial things can go wrong and how hard it is for two opposing sides the get on the same page and actually discuss solutions. By the end, the two who were supposed to be pro political correctness essentially denied that political correctness is a force for good which is a failure of the organizers of the debate to come up with a good premise and to find people who can argue each side of that premise.

This is a short synopsis but if you want to hear more about my thoughts I posted a three-part podcast where I listen to and commentate on the entire debate. Check that out here:

Part 1: http://fleetingthoughts.libsyn.com/episode-131a-munk-debate…
Part 2: http://fleetingthoughts.libsyn.com/episode-131b-munk-debate…
Part 3: http://fleetingthoughts.libsyn.com/episode-131c-munk-debate…

A sentence about free will.

My consciousness is my rudder and my will is my strength to guide myself to a better tomorrow.

In the Shadow of a Beast: A trip to the beach

A Trip to the Beach

I grew up in the shadow of a beast. I felt powerless and thus, drew in on myself, hiding in places where the beast could not find me. I stayed out of the living room. I spent time at friend's houses. Fortunately for me, hiding was easy, seeing as the beast I hid from rarely looked for me. But when he did I could not flee.

I remember one such occasion where I was trapped by the beast. It was visitation day and the beast decided that it would be a good idea to take me to the beach, a normally calming and tranquil place, but on that day it was just a backdrop to tyranny. The drive there was only 20 minutes or so but it felt like a blurry lifetime. I was about thirteen that day and I had been honing my selective attention skills for some time by then. This skill came in handy anytime my beast of a father decided it was time to tell me "how it is". He would rant about how evil the world is, how my mother was a liar who was stealing his children and how all of our hatred of him was the result of brainwashing.

I sat, trapped in the car, on the way to a remote part of the Oregon coastline, with a knot in my stomach and words passing through my head like a dark fog. The full content was lost but the message was clear. His hate and malice for my mother, himself and life drove through my selective attention filter and I knew that either he was evil or I was. How else could such poison exist to warrant such verbal anger?

We made it to the beach and there was at least something more to distract me from the incessant diatribe of a man with only frustration and hate in his heart. It wasn't much but I remember walking down the trail to the beach and feeling a slight sense of relief in seeing the ocean but mostly it is a blurred memory. I retreated inside myself and bottled up my anger and resentment for the beast and knew that there was little I could do. He had a "right" to my presence and attention so I did what I could to ignore the words and emotions.

Later in my life, when in conversation I would find that my attention had wondered and that I was not listening I tried to understand this instinct to ignore someone even when looking right at them. I realized that this selective attention mechanism was a defensive operation developed over a decade of being trapped by my beast of a father and forced to listen to his vitriolic rhetoric. If I didn't want this mechanism to ruin future relationships I had to understand what caused it and to recognize that it was no longer needed. I had to consciously recognize when my mind would wander while in mid-conversation and then bring my attention back to the person talking in order to engage in the conversation. I realized that I really enjoy a good conversation where I am an active participant and that comes from listening.

I still get a little nervous when speaking my mind and engaging in a meaningful conversation. Just asserting an opinion can be exhilarating for me know which is a sign of the lack of power I had growing up. It is important that people are not taken for granted or treated as dumping troughs for other's negative emotions. It is important to be present and allows your needs to be expressed in a conversation. If you are not part of the conversation then you become a ghost and not sticking up for yourself can lead to resenting yourself and those around you. Sometimes it is important to say, "Hey, I'm not in the mood for your depressing, angry words right now."

Another outcome of being in the shadow of a beast is that in withholding my expression, for good reason when I was younger, is the creation of imaginary conflicts in my head. Now, if I predict a potential conflict I will reliably have a continuous debate in my head with those that I might need to convince of my argument. I will try to predict all possible sides and argue them relentlessly in my head assuming that I need to prepare for a verbal battle. The sad part is that it creates stress and detracts from life because my predictions are almost always wrong. Almost all of my adult interactions have been pleasant and reasonable but because of my early life, I imagine otherwise. I take a defensive position and ready myself for a battle that I can now choose to not have.

Photo Journal 5/11/2018

Eugene, Oregon

Visiting Joey Edwards and his Cryptodermia Art Show

No Editing, Canon 50mm 1.4 and Kit 18-55mm 

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Shrooms: A Good Trip and a Bad Trip

This is the story about the first and the last time I ate magic mushrooms.

It was Halloween, some time ago when I tasted my first magic mushroom. A friend of mine had invited me to a party at his friend's house nestled in the forested hills somewhere near North Bend, Oregon. As the sun was coming down the five of us made our way to the back room where we each took hold of a piece of pizza on top of which lay two or so grayish, dried mushrooms. We ate our slices, some in silence and some with childish glee. My nerves were peaked but I was committed to the experience and I ate my slice with all its foul flavors. As it hit my tongue I was compelled not to continue but I forced it down, the pizza barely masking its rotten impression.

It took a little while for the shroom's effects to manifest itself but as it did I felt my stomach churning and eyes widening. I stood up from the couch and ran into the bathroom. I puked a couple of times in the toilet and again tasted the nasty dirt-rotten mushrooms. As I recovered I was taken aback by two consecutive thoughts. The first was that there was now a slight green filter to everything and the man in the mirror was a version of myself that I recognized but in a new and fascinating way. The next thought was that I felt much better and a wave of euphoria and calm washed over me. I smiled at the tinted green version of myself and made my way back to the living room.

The rest of the evening I only remember in bits and pieces of sensory information. I remember the delicious maple syrup smell of the fog machine that would fill the room highlighting the three-dimensional space, the smoke undulating around faux spider webs, pumpkins, and skeletons. I remember laughing with friends and watching the carpet moving under my feet. At one point an old Christmas movie came on and I remember it being very interesting which I'm sure is only due to the significance inducing properties of the shrooms. One of my favorite activities was being outside where we reveled in the splendor of a bonfire celebrating our primal humanity and lighting fireworks. The place, activities and especially the people helped create an experience worth having.

Sometime later, I was with a completely different set of friends, a different place, and ate a different type of mushroom. This time a few work friends and I decided to eat mushrooms and hang out. The only activity that somehow we all agreed upon was watching the movie The Labyrinth. After eating the mushrooms, which were equally disgusting to the first ones, we sat in the living room a started watching the movie. My stomach churned again but I do not remember puking or anything turning green. The entire experience went by in a slow motion hell of David Bowie and Jim Henson muppets flashing in and out of my mind. As I watched the movie my mind would wander back and forth through past memories of watching the movie, predicting the next scene and then remembering past scenes in a time-bending nonsensical rollercoaster I could not escape.

As time went on my mind began attempting to make sense of what was occurring but as my rationality was impaired I couldn't continue a thought long enough to work out what was happening or what to do while watching random clips of an insanely abstract movie. I wasn't in control and as my panic grew worse I decided to simply close my eyes and try to sleep. This did not help much as the visuals did not stop behind my closed eyes. Clips of The Labyrinth continued to play in my head as a consuming inner voice continued to attempt to rationalize the experience. Eventually, I remembered that I had taken shrooms, that I would be alright and that the only way out was to ride the rollercoaster. I let my mind meander and soon the whirring thoughts turned into a bound up mess in a feeling I can only describe as grilling. It felt like my brain had been placed on a bbq grill to slow cook until crispy.

I am glad for the experiences and I learned more about what it is that magic mushrooms can do. I am skeptical of those that have only good things to say about mushrooms and those who blame the user for their bad experiences. I do agree that the way I experienced the shrooms in each situation played a role in the positive and negative outcomes and that mindset, setting and activities are important factors. I also agree that these things should not be done glibly or thought of as party drugs as the results are variable and the chemicals are unregulated. Ingesting organic psychedelics is not for everyone and the outcomes are unpredictable.

Ultimately I did not come to any realizations or epiphanies about my life or the universe. Maybe I was in a "bad place" when I took the shrooms the second time or maybe I took too much or had a bad reaction chemically. Either way, I learned something about how the mind can change when introduced to outside chemicals and how you can really only understand something by doing it.

My Thoughts On: Free Will Revisited: A Conversation with Daniel Dennett

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFa7vFkVy4g


After listening to the conversation between Daniel Dennett and Sam Harris about free will was instructive and scintillating and I can not contain my thoughts and must put them down. I would like to offer a thought on a potential mechanism that acts as the bridge between determinism and free will.

During the conversation, you addressed the divergence in talking points which was an important distinction to make. There is a practical side to the implications of a free will concept on society and justice systems and then there is a scientific and physical reality to the mechanisms that influence and govern physical phenomenon. Dennett didn't seem to be convinced of the "all the way down" argument and instead talked about specific cases where behavior and randomness effects how we talk about and hold people responsible. While you both agreed that people have some control it wasn't clear from either person where this comes from or how it works.

I do not believe that free will is some kind of complete control over my thoughts and actions. I can see why people subjectively think this is the case when they observe themselves acting in a way they intended or taking credit for actions that turn out favorable. I think that free will is a skill that must be fostered and exercised and that most people are on the less than free side of the spectrum of potential free will. Now if authorship exists and free will can be attained I believe it is through the mechanism of observation and conscious conditioning. A kind of top-down feedback system that is where agency and free will come into play.

If all actions come from the bottom up then there doesn't seem to be an agent doing anything. It seems that people offer a special case where the conscious observer can take actions to affect subconscious processing. For example, breathing is automatic but if one were so inclined they can consciously control their breathing and effect their physiology. This requires observation and conscious effort and certainly involves an agent. One can permanently change their automatic responses by training their subconscious. One example occurs with immersion therapy for people with phobias.