Mind Myopia

Commuting to and from work on a daily basis for the past few years has acquainted me, as with most of us, how people communicate using their vehicles. Major signals, such as a driver’s tendency to tailgate is obvious, yet slighter signals exist that many appear to react rather quickly to. This tendency to quickly react even to minute signals is what brought me to consider a broader understanding of a systemic tendency in us all. The observation is simple (under the assumption that I’m fairly attuned to the language used by most drivers); nearly every time I happen to barely hesitate within as small as a quarter of a second for whatever reason on a busy road, the driver immediately behind me will attempt to get around me whatever way he / she can. This occasionally annoys me a little bit because this person is making a needless move on their part; I’m usually a very steady driver who keeps the flow of traffic, so why can’t this person understand that even though I accidentally slowed down more than I should for a microsecond (literally) that I’m not likely to do it again. The answer of course is obvious, and lies in the other driver’s inability to know who I am and how I typically drive. To them I’m simply a human with no perceivable history of good merit. And so for their survival (since we’re dealing with metal on metal at 50 MPH), my slight abnormalities must be interpreted as potential systemic flaws, and thereby causing endangerment.

My annoyance with this reactionary behavior of course is quite irrational. It comes from an experience and childhood which promoted the subjectivity of humanity; that each person cannot be reduced to a number or variable within an equation. Furthermore, it is even worse if humans find themselves given over to that system, dehumanized in the process and simply acting as variables with little subjectivity once in. That upbringing and history of thought naturally made me consider if there were other areas of life where these kinds of observations were valid; places where it seems humanity does act too far in a direction that ignores history, and the subjectivity of each person.

Through intuition, I came across the oft-observed but never voiced observation that the home out of all places can tend to exist as a location ruled by these ways of thinking. The home has long been an environment of rather focused social engagement. For most in the United States, the social group within a home is almost always one’s immediate family. And despite these factors which lend themselves to history and subjectivity, it seems that certain families still suffer from an inability to take historic considerations into account as they act around one another (as a side note: to be honest, this usually affects boomers and conservative circles, and I do think this is becoming less and less common, but I think it is still prevalent enough to be a worthwhile observation). Observations like the tendency in a conversation to strongly interpret every nuance that a person uses; every slight variation as a completely intentional action that can be applied quite well in understanding a person, even though the person has never shown signs of thinking that way, or is tired, or recently has been having a difficult time sleeping. Despite recent and long historical evidence to the contrary, I’ve found that people will still judge individuals by this harsh criteria. And so like vehicles on a highway, every slight misstep is made into a judgement of epic proportions.

Now I know, from time to time we’ve all been caught up in our little worlds that make us evaluate things without a wider view; a rough day at the office tends to cause one to carry the office’s ways of thinking home, or preparations for a major family dinner gets the hostess carried away with extracting every ounce of time into preparing, but these realities for some families are beyond a temporal bout here or there and they permeate the culture of the household.

Thinking about this blog post while I was writing it, I realized that I didn’t really have much to say beyond identifying the problem. Usually it isn't hard for me to come up with a few examples to solve an issue, but for a reason or not (and probably because it is nearly 2 AM), this is about all I've got. Feel free to leave some thoughts. I'll probably be providing some references in the future that exemplify this issue.

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Update:
Here's a couple of references that discuss the issue more:

• Asymmetry Insight
• Twin Peaks (TV Show). I know...I know, a TV show can't be read online, but it does do a great job at portraying related concepts.

Moon and Institutionalization

Last night I decided to watch Moon. I'm posting about this because in the course of doing so, the film began to seem oddly similar to a contemporary computer game, Portal. When I played Portal, I never understood why so many thought it was something of a revolutionary game. Moon changed this because even though I noted the similarities, somehow the film portrayed the notion that there was symbolism to be had more clearly.

Seeing the symbols in Moon revealed those in Portal, and through processing the possible meanings brought to light perhaps why I had missed the ideas in the first place. Four essential ideas exist in each:

• Humans are born into a world where protocol has defined the environment.
  
• Centralized control exists, which imposes upon inhabitants duties or tests.
  
• Nonhuman entities exist to facilitate duties and are given empathetic qualities.
  
• Escape from this world is only possible due to an oversight in the protocol.

The first idea, that protocol has defined the environment, is evident from the aesthetics and location of both works. Stark white in definition, paneled, and buffed, both worlds give the impression that nothing beyond what one can see exists. The location also plays into this idea, by either being located on the moon during a communication blackout, or in a compound artificially lit that begins a plastic cell, from which travel is controlled by an external computer. The second idea, of centralized control through duties or tests, is easily recognizable, but significant in that it reinforces the impression of the highly controlled world. The existence of nonhuman entities in each bearing empathetic qualities is one of the most striking similarities. In Moon, this is represented by GERTY, who exists to keep the station's occupant on their task. In Portal, I believe this is represented by the Companion Cube, with which the player completes tests. The empathetic quality in each is from their similar aesthetic qualities: GERTY has a face reflecting its current emotion, and the Companion Cube has a pink heart printed on each of its sides. The third idea, concerning escape, occurs in Moon only because the clone resuscitation process is tied to when the system thinks the previous clone has died. Somehow the system in error believes this, and so the new clone ends up retrieving the first, who is not dead, eventually allowing for the clones to realize that they are clones thereby cause a break in the system. In Portal, this more or less exists due to the software in the centralized computer allowing the player to leave their cell even though the world the player is released into needs maintenance.

After seeing these ideas in both works, it isn't hard to see the reasons why Portal was popular and perceived to be innovative. I'm willing to make the wager that people enjoyed the game because it aligned with experience in secondary education. From people trying to understand Generation Y, there has been much talk about how Y's life has been defined more than previous generations by institutionalized practices. This impression comes from the increased prominence of standardized testing, over-medication, over-scheduled lives, and growing up digital. If correct, my own lack of understanding makes sense. My life up to college was rural; I went to a school having on average less than 80 people per class; an anomaly compared to my peers in college. From understanding Moon more, I'd say that the film is important culturally, and hopefully further excursions into art which discusses these ideas will round my understanding of why segments of Generation Y hold these ideas.

Interpreting "Modernism"

Although this realization is rather elementary, recently the answer to a question often asked: "what is modernism, doesn't that just mean, current?", become obvious. This realization came mostly from some readings which eloquently defined the idea. "Modern," meaning "now" or "current" isn't a reference to our time or to a period; doing so is the primarily incorrect way of approaching the term. Rather, since this is a philosophic term, one needs to interpret just the word in how it defines a philosophical outlook. Thereby, the idea becomes more obvious: modernism is the philosophy of the present, the ideal of living in a timeless current or "now" of non-linear experience.

Given this method of interpretation, the term postmodern becomes more clear in its definition and, given more understanding of the philosophy, a humorous label. The term meaning that, first, postmodernism is a reaction to modernism, but that it is historic, or backwards looking. Where modernism defined itself by its timeless objectification of reality, postmodernism defines itself from a more linear experiential stance, where less in life can be quantified, universalized, and objectified.

Last Night's Insomnia

I'm a postmodernist working through a modernist lifestyle. No contradictions seem apparent while doing modernist work and I'm pragmatically superior to my peers for my modernistic disciplines and focus while I work. The answer to this lies in truly understanding postmodernism as seeing life full of a multitude of philosophies that can be all embraced effectively, choosing one or the other merely based on the context appropriate. Extension, and perhaps less trustworthy, is the idea that according to the postmodernist, these philosophic systems generated not out of universalized natural law which is a modernist idea, but from a context. For example, information systems are an inherently modernistic practice and thereby cause modernistic philosophic systems to by used by those who engage in said practice.

A Sense of Placelessness: Modernistic and Postmodernistic Alienation

Recently, I have been reading through a book on globalization, and an aspect of the author's analysis of cultural globalization stood out to me largely because it seemed very similar to modernistic alienation, a concept I often think about. Yet, it seems that since this is in the setting of a more globalized world, that the alienation is akin to postmodernism. Additionally, one can look at this aspect and draw out the common principles shared by both modernistic alienation and this supposed, postmodernistic alienation.

The contemporary experience of living and acting across cultural borders means both the loss of traditional meanings and the creation of new symbolic expressions. Reconstructed feelings of belonging coexist in uneasy tension with a sense of placelessness. [...] it appears that the old structures of modernity are slowly giving way to a new 'postmodern' framework characterized by a less stable sense of identity and knowledge.

Manfred Steger

According to what I've learned so far, modernistic alienation had its roots in the industrial revolution, which resulted in alienation largely in workers becoming more alienated towards what they produced and what they used to produce it due to the dehumanization by the mechanization process involved. Additionally, the traditional family structure was changed by an increased disconnect between a family's father due to a greater displacement by industrial jobs that kept him farther and longer from the home.

The proposed postmodern alienation seems tied to today's information society, where people are more alienated towards information in general. Examples of problems birthed from this can be seen in the struggles of knowing what is true without acquiescing to relativism, a greater simplification in appearances of daily life due as a response to a sense of information overload, the prominence of diversity dialog in television shows such as The Office. So, it seems that modernistic and postmodernistic alienation differs greatest in the aspect of information and material. Of course, this is not to say that postmodernism is against materialism, for that can be one of the ways to experience information as well as to conveniently simplify its presentation.

Considering the details of each kind of alienation, it seems that each have commonality in the sense of placelessness, that the author mentions. In modernistic alienation, this likely was produced out of having no way to distinguish one place to another due to the increase in material homogeneity of products. Placelessness for modernity could also be seen in how the individualistic / emotional tendencies, that in the workplace established a sense of place, were repressed in men due to the use of Scientific Management. For the postmodern, placelessness is produced by the challenge of distinguishing one informational / cultural sphere from another as being that which one chooses to identify with. Since identity in the Western mindset is tied to ideas, when one is faced with a multitude of seemingly endless right choices, one is unable to provide distinction by choosing one because they all seem largely valid. Hence, postmodern man can cognitively choose to agree with the cultures he experiences in travels (on foot or through the Internet), but cannot, on an emotional level, identify with any of them.

Postmodern Ties to the Western Messianic Ideal

In observing the thematics that seem to arise in personality types in America, one type that I keep coming back to is that of the Western world's man of power. That's a vague definition, but it is linked to the Western idea of the singular hero, which I blogged about earlier. The cultural value in this type of character is likely founded historically in religious traditions; the Christ, a Messiah; a singular hero.

This value in the singular hero has likely caused people to connect with that ideal and gain a sort of personality type with strengths in individual, heroic-like ability. This has been particularly interesting as of late, because it seems that the accepted form of this singular hero has shifted. The contrast I see, has been from a type that was highly valued since probably around the late 19th century, to another type that began emerging at the turn of the 21st. This has been intriguing to watch because it seems that there is great conflict within the culture as to whether this new hero model is right or not; some even claiming that the old ideal was wrong and the new ideal, though still a hero, is right.

The singular hero of Western culture that existed from at least the late 19th century, was a man of knowledge and understanding. Most people attribute this to modernity, and they are mostly right. The more the man understood, knew, and sought to know by reason, the more the man was seen as powerful and right. Using the technology of the time to understand his world, man would delve long hours and time into books of great intellectual depth and abstractions. A common family expression of this value was that the evening hours, a time set apart for reading, was the most valued period of the day.

Turning to more contemporary times, since around the turn of the 21st century, there has been much debate in the culture about whether the reason and knowledge-based system is really something to continue. Much of this is subversive; people don't even realize it is happening. The essential argument of the new type of singular hero, is that he is not primarily a man of infinite knowledge and truth, but of infinite relational connections. Now, not everyone accepts this model; it is still an expression of the singular hero ideal that is in contention against the older, all-knowing ideal. In any case, it has risen to greater prominence and the signs have been around the culture everywhere, mostly in the avant-garde groups of the culture: the youth and emerging adult. Expressions of this can be seen ranging from the greater desire to be all-connected through Internet portals such as Facebook, Instant Messaging, Cell Phones, to the largely meaningless (except the communal aspect) of Online-orchestrated Flash Mobs. Again, be sure to note this: much of the community that young groups are seeking, have little to no value in discerning the reason they are coming together, they seek community first, and from that usually truth emerges, but not as consciously at the older heroic model.

To me, both expressions indicate each a differing set of values; one on knowledge and one on relationships. However, they are commonly fueled in their beliefs that this is done by individuals striving to pursue the same ideal of heroic-esque glory. So when someone criticizes the older way of doing things, of seeking to be all-knowing, it is difficult to see reason for that criticism when they hold up a new ideal to strive for: relationships. Both seek the infinite, both seek to be God in a new way; whether that is a good or bad thing.

American Pragmatism: Historical Foundations

This article will be the start of a series I am attempting to do that seeks to analyze recent history's generational / socio-historic categories under the topic of American pragmatism. The reason for this is due to wanting to know better whether the emerging postmodern movement is truly set on a path away from the traditional American pragmatic view on life; whether they truly believe and have an identity based on being and not on doing.

The first article will bring to focus the origins and therefore definition of American pragmatism. Since the definition is historically-based, this will mostly be a historically-reflective analysis. American culture began placing roots as soon as the first Europeans attempted to colonize what would be the United States. Historically, this arrival to colonize North America was a novel event; the rest of the globe had been reached by civilized and / or European men in the past. From this new situation, then came the need to explore and understand that which was mysterious; a very European ethic. For the time, we are completely ignoring the existing Native American populations, culture, and civilizations, since the culture present now is largely devoid of their influences. This drive to understand what was unknown spurred a people of pioneers and homesteaders.

As the pioneers explored the unseen lands before them, the homesteaders and town crafters attempted to wrangle with the yet untamed land about them in order to create order out of what was viewed as disorder. This grafting of human order upon that which had little before, spurred forth inventive scientific and inventive social minds; finding ways to create novel human order and novel social structures, the novelty coming out of it being a historically novel event. Evidences are present from the early beginnings of American scientificism and the early attempts at creating social utopias.

After many years of creating order by exploring the mysterious wilderness and by establishing human environs out of untamed land, the American pragmatic ethic had been established. In this analysis, three pragmatic beliefs have been identified: exploratory progressiveness, scientific-inventive progressiveness, and societal progressiveness. These beliefs, once established, created cultural values that everyone agreed upon; that the American people should always be progressing as a society in the following ways together and individually: exploring the mysterious unknown and uncharted, creating and determining by science new ways to create human order out of unordered nature, and exploring better ways to organize and define human society. Together, these formed the American-pragmatic cultural norm of the past and present.

Abstractions and Learning

The Enigma of the Hour
- Giorgio de Chirico, 1910/11

Thinking about how irritating it is to acquire various abstracted perspectives on reality due to our alienating society because of its roots in modernistic-industrial beliefs.

Emerging Video Game Trends, Culture, and the End of the Hero

Since I've been on the topic of how society reacts to modernistic alienation, I came to think of some emerging trends in the medium of video games to be of interest to this discussion. An old model that has been used in video games for the past many years; likely since it became popular, has been to place an individual hero type against impossible odds. Most games, especially action games, tend to use this model where the power to save humanity is found in the one, singular hero.

With the coming rejection of modernity and its alienation therein, as well as with the events of 9/11 which arguably humbled the nation and changed its culture to seeing the real relevance of the dangers of a service-based economy that relied upon other cultures and nations, people have had to struggle with the structures that modernity has left. So, even though the postmodernists largely reject the previous culture for those reasons and the modernist choices that created the service economy, they still must confront the structures that have been left in their wake.

Confronting these alienating and proven dangerous structures (ala 9/11), video games merge into this with some of the emerging trends we're seeing now. As stated, the modernistic video game structure tended to focus on the power of the individual. A more postmodern view then tends to put more focus on the power of society, for the reasons just stated. An example of this is the game, Left 4 Dead. The game isn't quite the postmodern social game ideal in that it confronts these problems, but it is a step in the right direction. The game can be described as a zombie horror multi-player game. The relevance is that the symbols of human civilization; the unaffected humans themselves, are fighting a human, but unhuman force that is both confusing to understand and powerful. Both of these can be applied to having to confront a force that one is alienated towards because of a lack of understanding, and hence deals with the current cultural discussion.

Now, Left 4 Dead could be an important and used piece of media to discuss these cultural issues, and it may do it better than zombie multi-player attempts of the past. I'm not saying that past attempts were invalid, its just that Left 4 Dead may be getting significantly closer to the goal. The reason for this is that the opposing force, that which the players are alienated against, can be controlled not by humans, but by a computer. This is important because a computer can follow pre-described purposes and action relentlessly; just the way that these forces genuinely appear to do so in our current society. Human-based opposition is much less powerful because it can be seen that humans, even in the MMORPG world, have little sense of purpose and duty; they are listless and cannot focus strongly enough on much of anything enough to resemble something close to actual purposed pursuits.

And so, the emerging trend in the medium of interactive media (video games), seems to be that of putting together a group of players communally and pit them against a force that they are alienated against and that is relentless in its pursuit to destroy them. If you can't wait for Left 4 Dead, a game that may work similarly, is the Half-Life 2 mod, Synergy, where one can play as a team through the entire Half-Life 2 game, where of course, there is also a zombie-like force present; the Combine.

Historical and Symbolic Thinking, with Deconstructionism

After going through a week of difficulty due to my old apartment catching on fire, I was able to return to where I left off in my thinking. Recently, I've reading through a book which looks at the Western mindset and society in regards to its views on history. It has been one of the most interesting pieces of work I've read lately, though I'm not done with it, so I'm not sure if I would recommend it yet to anyone. Anyways, reading and thinking, I came to see an association between the physical nature of man and the necessity of being able to think historically and symbolically. Recently, I have tied to this modern history's views on deconstructionism and how that has had implications on modern man's ability to think in these ways.

First off, history is relevant to man because on a physical level, man cannot escape his memory, past experiences, and past knowledge. By the very way his brain is wired, man tends to think in these manners. As such, having an ability to think historically is valuable for it builds upon the physical nature of man.

Second, symbolism is relevant to man because if man is to know any sizable number of things and will be able to retrieve these things quickly, the brain must build cross-idea associations which create symbolic intuition.

The opposite of this; a perspective that eliminates one's ability to think historically and symbolically has repercussions that one must be aware of. As a note, since we're speaking of the ability to think based on physical reality, I'm assuming that man is able to have a brain constructed in such a way that limits it to be used in ways highly contrary to its construction. Taken this way, a way of thinking that doesn't allow historical and symbolic processing tends to cause man to be unable to progress in building tendencies. Non-historical thinking means that man has built his mind such that he is a stateless machine; he can process pieces of data at any time regardless of context. Non-symbolic thinking means that man has built his mind such that data is stored in his brain so that either there are repetitive data (ideas, even though they share sub-concepts, must be compartmentalized / isolated) or retrieval of isolated ideas takes a long time because one must filter off associated ideas that don't belong to the idea being sought after. Assuming that the brain has a limited capacity by its limited number of neurons, both a-historical and a-symbolic ways of thinking may cause man to be unable to delve deeply into ideas without foregoing being able to go deeply into other ideas; historical and symbolic thinking are more efficient in storing ideas, but they do not hold the benefits of being able to think more freely.

Deconstructionism comes into this because it is a way of thinking that seeks to eliminate historical and symbolic thinking for the sake of freedom from tendencies. Since this is freedom from tendencies, any attempt at making assumptions is fought against. As such, if a society stays in deconstructionism, it and his mankind will not progress, but will only continue to spin on its shallow mess of assumptionless thinking. To anyone who knows of deconstructionism, it is a historical movement that began some time in the mid 20th century as an attempt by Western society to free itself of what it saw as mass injustices it was predisposed towards. Since as we've seen, a-historical and a-symbolic thinking keep man from building tendencies and foundations of sorts, it seems to be a way of thinking that accomplishes this, and could arguably be one of the reasons Western society has been in the process of deconstructing itself for the past few decades.

So if man is to build any foundation, he must at least approach thinking more historically and symbolically; to not do so continues a cycle of deconstruction and arguably antifoundationalism. Emerging thought seems to be that this past of deconstructionism shouldn't be continued much longer; that reconstruction should begin. Why this change has occurred is for another article, but the fact of its existence is the reason this article is relevant.

A Culture of Essentials

Considering our place in history the other day, I came to realize further that today's current generation (and by that, I mean the generation that is around adulthood: 20 - 30), and possibly upcoming generations, sees what is important in life out a perspective I'd like to call, essentialism. I believe essentialism has its root in what can be labeled since the early 20th century and now, as a crisis of culture of sorts. This "crisis of culture" can be seen as the wearing down of cultural-historic norms to put in its place ahistorical norms. An expression of this could be seen in how value has been lessened towards relationships of one's heritage while value has been increased towards the concept of money. Money in comparison, is very fluid, temporal in nature, and not stable. A better comparison could be between money and wealth, where wealth clearly has enduring qualities to its worth.

Now, some argue that one can stave off this cultural erosion, by putting considerable bulwarks in one's home that stand in contrast to these norms. This indeed, may be possible. However, the children will likely reveal the true effectiveness of this effort. I argue that because the majority of children, even children coming from these types of homes, have adopted essentialism, that these efforts are not as effective as the parents think. Further, the parents themselves involved in these efforts likely don't even believe strongly what they're making efforts to stand for.

The way that essentialism reveals how ill these efforts are, and how parents may not be properly handling their stances, is due to how the children view these factors growing up. If children saw that these norms to fight off the "crisis of culture" were good, then they would follow them themselves. However, essentialism doesn't contain much of the norms held by these stances, but more of the norms that make up the "crisis of culture." Essentialism is defined to be a way of seeing reality such that only essentials are valued. What then are these essentials? Based on my observations, I've been able to pin down at least the following:

Tenants of Essentialism

• Community
  
• Identity in Oneself
  
• Survival of Oneself
  
• Material Practicality above Immaterial Idea-ism
  
• Emotions above Reason

Another good way to phrase Essentialism is by calling it "Survivalism," valuing only what it takes to survive, which the above list describes. The truth is, most of the expressions of these values listed above I have seen, have been less in the area of durable actions, but temporal, ahistoric nature. Sure, community could be something that builds up culture, but the way the value is expressed is typically in how a group of people can cohesively, in the moment, have times of gratifying emotion. Typically this involves discussion that builds towards how absurd life is, rather than building towards an enduring purpose. This then causes community to be used in a way that is not cultural-historic, but ahistorical and acultural.

Now, the way I see that people have adopted this essentialism mentality, is because in their childhood homes that have stood against the "crisis of culture," the parents didn't hold strong enough value in their stances. The result is not that the children intellectualized about whether their parents really believed in what they said, but that they simply saw that the people weren't following much of anything (remember, degradation of values is part of the crisis), and so gravitated towards whatever was consistent and gravitated away from what was spoken of, but not practiced, thereby forming the values of essentialism. The problem with this, is that by the process of forming these values, the children had to adopt acultural and ahistorical views, which are exactly what the parents were striving to fight against; the values found in the "crisis of culture." This cycle is very ironic.

If the current generation is to truly stand against the crisis, it must stand against its current expressions of values, values which only in appearances resemble something better, and must take up cultural-historical views towards the values it professes, so as to express them in ways beneficial to the purpose.

Difficulties in Objectivity

So, the other night, I had a hankering for looking further into a series of related topics that I tend to find interesting: globalization, and whether the United States' use of labor from other countries could be modern-day slavery (globalization of labor). This topic seems of paramount importance, simply because the majority of items that the majority of the citizens from the U.S. buy, are from other countries. The scale on which this is done today is likely greater than in any other time in history due to the United States having cheap enough technology and oil to ship imports at low cost. This novelty in history is important, for it bodes the potential to reshape the paradigm of international economics as the United States moves from being an industrial nation, to one that relies on other nations to provide services (a service-based economy). This does not mean that what is occurring is bad, but as in all things novel, care should be taken to watch out for misuse, and potential problems.

However good my intentions were, they did not prevail in bringing a comfortable new level of understanding to the topics. This inability to produce a new level of understanding is very important; for I came to realize two things. The first is of the need at times, to re-adjust one's source of authority; one's source of discernment about the happenings in the world. The second is of modernistic alienation.

When researching online, I generally am able to make new ground in topics because I believe I know how to discern good material from bad material (that which has a good foundation in the pursuit of objectivity; a method I attempt to employ often). This method of research often involves taking what someone is arguing, and to detach the person from the argument they are making, which then results in having an idea that can be taken and applied to more situations other than that which it was originally presented in; the person's original statements of argument. If someone has not presented their material in a objective, academic style, then I am not likely to even consider their idea.

That's enough of my method of research. What I learned from my experience in looking into globalization, is that I lacked greater understanding of globalization to such a degree that I couldn't read through content online and find myself able to understand the depths of what the people were saying. Based on my experience, it takes a very long time to develop an understanding if a layman attempts to read high-level material. One can realize this in practice: take a topic one is not an expert in, say politics. Even in reading a common newspaper article, if one does not have a decent basis of understanding, one will not be able to conclude the importance of why something is written. For example, if I don't understand the history of two countries, then news of them beginning a new trade agreement will not seem important to me because I lack the knowledge to know why it is important. These deeper threads can only be discerned the more one is aware of a topic.

And so, my traditional pursuit of facts can not proceed; I can't thresh out what I want because I don't have a basis to work from to gain the facts that I want. Perhaps that seems impatient, and perhaps it is, but what this has caused, is to realize that in order to, by my practical measures, to come to knowledge, I must change my source authority in my research. I can't seek to go through further mountains of information; it is arguably much more worth it to find a faster way. The change in authority that I found myself moving towards, was that of an existing expert that was willing to provide ample information so that a layman can come to understand the topic well.

Of course, any objective-style-loving person will observe that such a turn to another source of authority allows one to be impregnated with volatile opinion. This is true in many ways; one cannot easily separate the wheat from the weeds until one can see the weeds for what they are. However, such is the necessity of human life. What one can do is two things: observe how much the author submits to writing in an objective style, and then through that assume that what minor opinion exists, will not become too great a future inhibition to seeing the truth behind the opinion. Second, trust standards of authority; there really is no choice here if knowledge is to be gained in a timely manner. I have found myself leaning towards finding an author of a detailed, simplistic, and likely somewhat opinionated work. Essentially, this means a necessity in the greater trust of fellow humans; not something easy for an objectivist pursuit. Yet, I find myself turning this way more and more often. Whether this is is for good, or due to the winds of the culture, it is hard to say.

The second realization that I came to in attempting to research about globalization and labor, was the inherent feeling of an unnaturally high obstacle in trying to understand the nature of the problem. This feeling can be attributed to the concept of modernistic alienation, and it applies here well. The nature of an outsourcing market as the U.S. is having, produces alienation because more and more, the items being constructed are more and more often not coming from local sources, but far away countries. Understanding the validity of this economic system is far more hairy than talking directly to the salesman. One has no easy way to speak to someone who has complete understanding of that which was involved in the trade that resulted in bringing something as simple as a plastic doll over from China. The number of hands involved in its construction and the number of business agreements made to bring such a simple item across the sea is enumerable in appearance, nearly mind-boggling. And so, completely understanding the topic is woefully impossible in today's age of the U.S. being a consumer of global sources.

This causes great inhibition to even beginning to look into the topic; no doubt it stops dead multitudes more simply by its appearance. This causes me to bring to question a few ways to resolve this issue of alienation: begin relying upon something one hasn't before (assume something / rely upon something new as a truth) so that understanding can be grasped, spend much greater time learning the intricacies of the process so that complete understanding might be gained, conclude that the system is bad by its very nature. These three responses likely don't encompass everything, but they seem the most realistic to me.

Interestingly, but perhaps as a side-note for future topics, is that in college, many people seemed to claim apathy towards politics for how woefully complex and alienating the system was. Whether this really means that the system is too complex or that these were immature responses to problems that require time and discipline to solve, is another topic, but important to relate, for its relevancy.

Anyways, the complexities of pursuing a topic that is new as well as massively imposing by the nature of its function, is intriguing to me, and provides important insight into the nature of understanding things of novelty and complex nature.

Origins of Genuine Emotion

Last night, my brain was very busy pondering the nature of emotion and what differentiates artificial emotion from real emotion. This thinking has come up before out of my impression from seeing fellow men who fake their emotions and are fine with it. Looking at such an act, I used to be comfortable with it, as it used to be the way that I saw that emotions could be expressed; by forcing what wasn't there and so to somehow create an emotional base out of nothing. But it seems according to my recent thoughts and impressions from seeing so many other people do it, that it doesn't work and that over the long term, it is still not genuine.

To try and communicate the impression I've been receiving, I'll give some examples. Usually when I'm in a crowd of people that are younger than me and who are engaged in something most of them attribute to high emotion, this impression is received. The only situation I've seen much of this occur in has been in faith settings, where fellow believers are trying with all their emotional heart to reach to God. In some congregations, the people seem genuine in their emotions, in many others; particularly Gen-Y groups, the people seem to be trying to force something that doesn't exist. In those settings, the impression is strongest.

Anyways, not to dwell on impressions that much; there's plenty of rational arguments as to nature of the problem I've described other than my personal experiential impression (but that is important). One idea that I'm becoming more convinced in, is the idea that emotions attributed to certain actions / places / people are created after having long-term experience with those actions / places / people. If this is true, then genuine emotions cannot come from experiences that are temporal. This of course seems incorrect because dramatic experiences clearly emotionally imprint everyone, but to me that seems because dramatic experiences are typically dwelt upon. Another supporting reason to this concept of emotion is that for the most part, emotions have their biological origins in being little more than strong neural pathways in the brain. Positive and negative emotions come from either going with or going against these hardened paths to some degrees. Other expressions that have mixed emotions could be a combination of going both with and against (or having some other kind of way of associating good and bad value to the emotions; I'm not sure, I'm not a cognitive scientist).

And so, the less experience one has with certain actions / places / people, but with a variety of actions / places / people, the less that person is likely to have genuine emotions. The more that one focuses one's time, thoughts, and energy into these actions / places / people, the more one will gain emotional attribution to them, and hence emotion will come forth while putting further time, thoughts, and energy into these actions / places / people (now, I've only defined emotions that are experiential; its quite possible there are other forms, but they are the ones I've been able to identify most easily).

So, in order to facilitate the creation of emotions, one must not look to take action in "being emotional;" that is, to say to oneself: "It is time to act in the emotion of happiness, so as to practice it, so that it will be genuine some day." To believe that emotions can be done, just like tasks can accomplished, is a misunderstanding of the very nature of emotions. To be emotional, one must put time, experience, and energy into what one desires to grow emotional in; and then emotions will grow from that. Again, emotions cannot be the focus of one's actions, otherwise they will not truly grow (if anything, the artificial concept of what one thinks emotions are will grow, but not truly the emotions themselves).

So, in order to promote the creation of emotion, one must give experience, time, and energy to certain pursuits over other. Neither a jack of all trades, nor a task-centric perspective will bring about the change desired.

Cheapened Notions of Relationship

Modern technology and its use in society often fascinates me. Its use, like other technologies of the past that have gained acceptance, has transformed our culture in ways we couldn't easily predict. I also think a lot about relationships and group dynamics; those also fascinate me.

One issue of the current generation that often strikes me but I forget to write down, is the lack of personal accountability. Now, the fact that its personal, likely makes it an issue that has existed for a while now, since the United States has a strong leaning toward individualism. So perhaps it is more the reshaping, or new image, that this issue has taken in the current generation, but somehow I think it has worsened, and mostly because of the misuse of modern technology.

It seems to me that upon entering the adult world, the value of engaging in relational activity that involves detailed personal information exchange, belief sharing, and other facets that we'd like to believe help each other become better people, has been cheapened through our society's misuse of technology. I believe that I can say just about anything to anybody in our current age, and the action in response will not be a challenge, but an avoidance of direct conflict. Now, this ties strongly into the well-known fact that people-pleasing and conflict-avoidance behavior has been an accepted aspect of interpersonal relationships for a while now (starting sometime in the 90s I think). I believe that fact is tied in to some degree to the misuse of technology, but today's issue seems more than mutually accepted Politically Correctness; it seems to occur even among anti-Politically Correct crowds.

The essential nature of the issue that involves this misuse of technology, centers on the convenience that technology affords us. Now, technology by its own nature, causes mankind to separate; to distance himself from his fellow man. The written word has done it, electricity has done it, even clothing has done it if you take this idea to extremes. In another way of saying it, technology causes man to become less dependent upon man, but more upon the technology. I'm not arguing the goods or evils of such a fact, I only seek to lay that bare for primary issue: that aspects that made relationships worthwhile have been cheapened through use of technology by the current generation.

Going back to the point, technology gives us great opportunities for conveniences. One convenience that is related to its nature, is that of the distancing affect it has between humans. The primary issue then is that humans in avoiding personal accountability from each other, have misused technology to keep themselves isolated and safe with none of the accountability woes. What this means, is that the current generation is so used to the distancing aspect and use of this aspect in technology, that it almost unconsciously uses it in these cases in order to avoid uncomfortable situations. It has become so automatic that indeed, I can say anything to anyone and experience no consequences, for they as well as I follow the credo that we can both distance ourselves from one another before these very real words can do anything significant.

Now, this is a very important trait of our society to recognize, for it allows one to interpret what I think is an age-old idea only given a new image. However, I'd like to extend this principle to see where then people consider to be off-limits, or highly protected: that which is never talked about or rarely because of its results being so fast that it could warrant actual danger. If anything, according to what has just been discussed, the source that causes such non-accountability would be such an idea. Technology, physical existence, and mobility, if take deeply in the right vein, can produce startling results in thought. These factors don't directly confront about the avoidance of accountability (those are respectable pursuits too, but a different topic), but they are important for they not only may cause change, but more importantly, genuine thought about what is currently fundamental forces in many people's lives they don't even realize.

Another approach, like mentioned, would be to directly confront people with how they lack and run away from being personally accountable to others. However, while both parties would likely come to accept this as an issue with themselves, they would have no intuition on how to put an end to it, which is more found in the unseen, unconsciously-aware actions they take in misusing technology to do that very thing.