Instant rage-ette

If you look up "time" with a search engine, you find many over 100 million results.  "What time is it?" is an important question throughout the developed world.  

I am interested in time accuracy and learned from "Faster" by James Gleick.  I found that some people are much stricter about time accuracy than I am.  My computer as well as my cable tv box allow me to get accurate time, as does my cell phone.  The computer and the cellphone, the only ones I've checked, seem to agree with each other pretty well.  

Until I got a Casio watch, I was unable to synchronize the seconds with time sources.  But the Casio watches have a function that allows nearly perfect syncing with a source.  However, the watch has four buttons and each has several functions.  I use the stopwatch fairly often since it works as a timer.  But the watch is accurate enough that I don't have to set it or change it very often.  So, I forget what does what.  

I noticed that my watch was about three minutes off and I tried yesterday and today to reset it.  I must have tried at least a dozen times, maybe a dozen and a half.  Despite my interest in taking life as it comes, I found that each time I failed to reset it right, my anger shot up.  I haven't told anybody that and you could do me a favor and not tell anybody, too, if you would.  

I was surprised that such a simple and basic operation could raise my ire so high so quickly.  The seconds can be set each time the model time shows h:m:00, that is, each time the second hand touches the 12 o'clock point.  But if the reset is off, I have to try again but I must wait for the second hand to circle completely in the next minute.  Then, another try. No!  That is not the right button either!  Grrrrr!

I have no Chinese, Indian or other Oriental blood.  Despite my advanced age, I am emotionally immature.  Damn it!  Double damn DAMNIT !  Of course, my Zen conscience is trying to be soothing.  My meditative mind is emphasizing the smallness of the task and the unnecessary heights of my temper.  Luckily, I found and managed to remember the right steps before hurting myself, the watch or people I love.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Extrovert, introvert, omnivert

In "Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can't Stop Talking" by Susan Cain, I read this:

Indeed, excessive stimulation seems to impede learning: a recent study found that people learn better after a quiet stroll through the woods than after a noisy walk down a city street. Another study, of 38,000 knowledge workers across different sectors, found that the simple act of being interrupted is one of the biggest barriers to productivity. Even multitasking, that prized feat of modern-day office warriors, turns out to be a myth. Scientists now know that the brain is incapable of paying attention to two things at the same time. What looks like multitasking is really switching back and forth between multiple tasks, which reduces productivity and increases mistakes by up to 50 percent. Many introverts seem to know these things instinctively, and resist being herded together.

Cain, Susan (2012-01-24). Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking (p. 85). Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition.

Reading this, I feel I have to protest.  Most indicators add up to my being on the border between extrovert and introvert, so maybe I have credentials to appreciate both sides.  

My experience has been that most people resist being herded together.  I think there is a big difference between joining together in good spirits by choice and being herdED in any way.  Listening to "The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry", I think of many members of my family who resist being herded, resist any inauthentic cheerleading, or emotional urging that bears impure motives, or commercialized labeling.  

It seems to me mature and intelligent recognition of the complexity of people and the breadth of their lives and feelings requires a certain respect.  Regardless of our impulses for sharing or personal revelation or securing solitude, we grow to grasp that each of us lives far more in each day than can be told or witnessed in a day.  We come to appreciate both the surprises and twists as well as some satisfying confirmations of our expectations.  We want to share our stories and to hear about those of others.  We want to live our lives to the fullest and also to partake as deeply as we can manage of the lives of others.

I guess it is something like a potluck to which we bring a truly well-made and delicious dish.  We know like it and we definitely want some but we would be silly to limit ourselves to just our own offering.  We try everything that looks good and some of the things that seem popular that don't look all that inviting, knowing as we do, that others are no dummies and learning about their take on things and their favorite recipes has increased our pleasure in the past.
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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Weights and muscles

We both lift weights.  Lynn has been attending a free weight class and I go to a room of weight machines. She is especially enthusiastic about her class.  I find going to mine and working through my schedule of lifts quite valuable, too.  I think my body tells me I am a good person as well as a stronger one, after lifting.  

I never thought of lifting weights until I was about 22.  Once in high school, a classmate asked if I lifted and I wasn't sure what he was talking about.  He invited me to visit his weight club and I did.  He told me that if I hadn't been lifting, it was clear from looking at me that I had "natural shit".  He meant I had a well-shaped body naturally, even though in those days that expression was much rarer and stood a better chance to shock or offend that it does today.  

At about 22, I read an article in Reader's Digest explaining the strength benefits of stressing one's muscles.  I didn't own any weights until about 10 years later.  I find that any interest can probably be assisted by reading and I did read some about weight lifting.  I was never interested in being a bodybuilder and just wanted good strength.  I knew from wrestling that strength was only one factor.  Speed, courage, knowledge and spirit matter as much or more, not to mention aerobic capacity.  High school wrestlers competed in 3 part matches that last a total of nine minutes.  College wrestlers had matches of 15 minutes.  You can get very tired in 9 minutes, even though you started fresh, well-rested and in good shape.

Kenneth Cooper's books on aerobics came out when I started graduate school.  I had slacked off from all exercise programs by then and I realized it would be better to do something regularly.  Many wrestlers jogged to increase their endurance but I spent all my time practicing holds and moves.  I read a short book on conditioning and found strength, endurance and flexibility were all important.  I had never worried much about flexibility but in one's older years, yoga or other such bending and stretching gets to matter very much.  

In high school and college, the usual view was that lifting weights would decrease flexibility and was not a good idea for those not after prizes and poses.  Now, it seems that all athletes make use of weights or other muscle-stressing methods.  Various body work and calisthenics, sometimes supplemented with hand-held weights of 1 to 10 pounds seem to be very popular in the college exercise room I attend.  There are student coaches overseen by professors so I take what I see to be indicative of the latest thinking.

I read in a magazine once that using a weight that I can manage comfortably for 8 lifts but not many more is about right to start.  Skip a day and do 9 lifts.  Skip and do 10.  Next week, do 11 and follow the same procedure until I reach 15.  Then, use a slightly heavier weight.  I have been following that approach for more than 30 years.  When I get as high a weight as seems safe, I stop for a few weeks or months and then begin again.  

The book "Total Fitness in 30 Minutes a Week" by Morehouse and Gross has been helpful and inspiring.  It takes a laid-back approach to being fit, asking what fitness is for and how to get the essentials out of the way with little disruption and stress.  The book "Age-Defying Fitness" by Marilyn Moffat and Carole B. Lewis, both experienced physical therapists and officials of the American Physical Therapy Association is the best I have seen for fitness ideas and goals for older people.  Too many fitness books have nothing to say about being 70, 80, or 90 years old, but this one does.  You can stay in pretty good shape with 20 minutes a day two or three times a week and a nice walk.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Guiding and changing oneself

Believe you can or believe you must.  Or, know that you fully want to, even if you are not totally sure you can.

Get so tired or stressed you don't have anything on your mind, as the work, the heat and the marital stress did for the heroine and hero of the film "The Painted Veil", or days and days of steady walking did for Harold Fry in "The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry", an unforgettable book by Rachel Joyce.

Bandler says that many of his clients who undertake an effort to change do so because they get fed up with having the problem and are really ready to work on changing.

My go-to guy in the realm of psychology, especially counseling psychology, told me about the work of Prochaska, Norcross and DiClemente as explained in their book Changing for Good.  That book surprised me with how much stress it laid on "precontemplation" of change and on "contemplation of change" before any actual steps in eating fewer sweets, more vegetables, exercising more or whatever change is held to be important. The book makes clear that the consideration and preparation for change is as important as actually working on the project.

Listening to Cheri Huber's excellent interview conducted by Tami Simon, I was struck by the part where this very experienced teacher/coach gives examples of her encouragement of those she is working with.  That part of the work was basically repetitions of "you're ok", "you're doing fine", "good", etc.  I was trying to think of an example of how such a repetitious stream of syllables could be very helpful.  I remembered a few times when Lynn described driving in snow that was deep enough that she couldn't tell the road from the fields beside it, all of it being just white, white, white.  She sure would have been happy to have someone above her or on some sort of electronic screen somewhere who could see the roadbed and guide her with such talk: yes, yes, still on the road, you're ok, yes, keep going.

Huber says she likes to take the position of someone who feels "I love you exactly as you are and I will help you be any way you want to be."

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Don't bother reading this

Don't bother reading this, you already have all you need.  Whether you are facing drought or worrying about politics or trying to cheer someone who is down, you know what you can do and what you can't.  You simply do what you can for each need, including your own needs.  

Generally, your own needs should have a high priority and come first on some days.  You know, in case of loss of cabin pressure, an oxygen mask will appear.  If accompanying a small child, get your own mask on first and then attend the child.  (It won't be good if you black out while trying to help the child.)

Several Eastern wisdom traditions use tales of a beggar trying to scrape together enough food to live, all the while carrying a jewel of immense value in the hem of a garment, sewn there by his mother just before she died.  Yes, we do already bear within ourselves the strengths, abilities, insights and motivations we need for many of our purposes.  We just have to realize that we have what we need and to make use of what we have.

Note: our society is so taken with drive and rah-rah, mustering energy and reaching the mountaintop, preferably after a harrowing but ultimately successful struggle, that actually facing all one's current riches and contentments can feel very wrong.  Besides, most of us just are not built to sit contentedly and do nothing else.  True, I have what I need but I am still jiggly, still antsy, still in need of activity, challenge and feelings of attainment.  

I have always loved this quote from the 2nd president of the U.S.:

I must study politics and war, that our sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. Our sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry and porcelain.

At some age, we may have the time and money, the strength and health needed to study painting, poetry, music, and blogging.  At such times, it can feel wrong not to be engaged in increasing our bank accounts.  It can feel that one is lackadaisical and superficial.

Don't bother feeling that way.

Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Fantasy and the miracles of this life

It seems to me that some people are so engaged with their imaginations that they let themselves be too unaware of life as it is.  It is more difficult and more challenging to see the magic in our bodies, our friendships, our failures and successes, our achievements and losses, than it is to see magic and charm in being shrunken to the size of a thimble (for moderns who don't sew, shorter than an iPod Shuffle) or expanded to being larger than a skyscraper (the Empire State building is about the height of a American football field standing on end, if you don't count the antenna on top of the building).  

It would be surprising to be small enough to ride a mouse or a pigeon or large enough to step over all of downtown Manhattan.  We are wired to notice things that seem out of place or odd.  Since we have no experience of such little or big people, the very thought is arresting.  The human eye, the functioning of the muscles, lungs, heart, liver, kidneys and brain happen all the time and so do not trip our astonishment trigger.  

I don't think it is true that everything that is very improbable but still happens is wonderful or positive.  Earthquakes or tsunamis that kill hundreds at a time might be said to be nasty but perhaps are so unexpected that they might be considered miracles in some sense.  I feel pretty sure that if such a calamity falls on group or tribe A that if group or tribe Z hates the A's, they may well consider the event to be a miracle.

Since money and other wealth is important in our lives, I like my brother-in-law's perspective.  He is the one who, experiencing the creation and birth of his children, opined that if he were told how the process worked from a business perspective, he would not believe it possible enough to invest in it.  "Markets in everything" such as the Iowa Electronic Markets and some procedures in Bayesian statistical analysis involve similar questions, that boil down to the question "Do you think the event likely enough to bet on it?".  One can use money too to bet against something that seems impossible or very highly unlikely to happen.  

A term sometimes used these days for an unlikely but very damaging event is a "black swan", popularized by the book of that name.

The chapter of "Orthodoxy" by Chesterton, titled, "The Logic of Elfland" attempts to defend fairy tales as aids to seeing the world as it is in all its surprising fullness.  I imagine for a few people, hearing that golden pears grow on fairy trees does help to focus attention on the real and edible pears that actually grown on our trees.  But I bet most kids and most people put down golden pears as the desirable ones and look down on the real thing that takes a long time to ripen and then rots.  

But you could give it a try.  Ask a hypnotist to give you new eyes that are not so used to your family and friends.  Leave your place for a week and live elsewhere.  Try a slum of Calcutta or Nairobi or Milwaukee and then check out your usual place again.  Do one of those experiments that some high school or college students do, where you live with a blindfold or in a wheelchair for a while.  When you return to your normality, you may be amazed at what you have, how loved you are, what a wonderful world you live in.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

How relevant is politics to my life?

Many of my friends are astute, energetic people.  They seem to be helped to feel that they are contributing to the good life for all by trying to persuade everyone to vote for their choice of the good guys and not to fall for the half-truths and innuendos marketed by the others.  

My friend tries to get me involved, to show me the error of my ways.  "Do you think it would have made a difference to the country if McClain and Palin had been elected?", he asked.  I try to avoid speculation, especially about what could have happened in the past.  They were not elected, and if a person approves of the democratic process, they shouldn't be if the other candidates were more promising in the eyes of the voters.

I feel as though I understand the value of staying alert to corruption, misdirection of funds and energies, to narrow views that are not in the best interest of all.  I have felt like that since I was a graduate student reading research articles while more concerned and involved people chanted their view in mass gatherings just outside.  It seems to me that most of the time, when people are very highly energized for or against political subjects, they basically lack information.  

I wrote my dissertation on applications of decision theory to education.  I think it is clear that people do all sorts of things unconsciously and semi-consciously but also make some decisions as deliberately as they know how.  The mathematical theory of decision making is overly abstract and cannot deal with the nuances and multiple constituent groups and opposed audiences for whom big, national decisions are made.  Deciding who to support and who to vote for is a very murky business.  I imagine that political scientists, computer scientists and historians are just some of the groups who have studied executive and legislative decisions in detail.  I have not done so.  I am much more highly motivated to think about my own life and the lives of ordinary people I know than to study all the ins and outs of either national politics or the several important levels below or above the nation.

Not long ago, I listened to "How to Think Like an Economist", a Great Course by Prof. Randall Bartlett.  He mentioned "An Economic Theory of Democracy", published in 1957 by Anthony Downs.  Downs concludes that it is efficient to ignore politics in a democracy, I heard, on the grounds that the information needed is unavailable and the result of each vote is negligible.  I was heartened by the idea, although I do intend to continue to vote and to put some limited energy into deciding who to vote for.

I have served on several recruiting committees and in other sorts of bodies, much smaller of course than the body of voters just in my town, not to mention larger bodies and divisions.  I concluded from my experience that I could not predict the decision of a committee that I had met with and studied the possibilities with.  So far, I am content to live with the decisions of the voters, even when I feel they have made a mistake.  

We used to say in my family that money, religion and politics were fertile subjects for strong disagreement.  It doesn't surprise me that I am not very tempted or moved by all the marketing and explanation.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

What do you do in retirement?

Of course, typical retirement takes place after many years of working so when you retire, you are different from what you were at twenty.  You have less muscle mass, less energy, less stamina and less hearing ability.  Your vision won't be the same.  Those changes are usually gradual and there is plenty of time to get used to them.  They do, however, make resting and lower levels of activity both appealing and necessary.  

That means that picturing yourself during your best holidays during your high school or college days is not a very accurate way to imagine how retirement time will be spent.  Believe it or not, in retirement you may have arrived at a stage where alcohol is of limited interest or usefulness.  A good sized meal will be smaller than it used to be.  You will still have to shop for groceries, pay the utility bill, visit the doctor, probably more often than when you were younger.

You will still spend time reading and watching movies and tv.  But, if you are lucky, you will host grandkids, or greatgrandkids.  You may be in the fortunate position to have intelligent, lively neighbors as we do and walk very pleasantly around your neighborhood together.  Then, after an engaging walk (part of the very important exercise that you will definitely want to do, keeping up what strength, flexibility and endurance you still have), you will be invited in for a glass of ice water, to extend the conversation.

I have attended school or worked since I was five years old.  It has been rather pleasant but I was not able to grasp how narrow such aims kept my perspective.  It was probably possible for a Roman general who retired to his villa in the year AD 100 to travel, to draw, to learn music (vocal or instrumental or both), to learn or extend language ability in other than one's native tongue.  However, our world today offers far more in the way of opportunities and invitations.  In fact, for me and some of my friends, monitoring one's obligations and commitments is an important aspect of my retirement.  Many organizations and programs could use a hand and it makes sense in several ways to help them.  However, our communications and media, assisted by much greater understanding of offering chances and advertising possibilities, makes it very easy to overbook oneself.  When I knew I would be occupied every weekday from 8 to 5, I had no temptation to say "yes" to this and "yes" to that.  When each day is my own to shape as I want, doing so is a more complex and variable job.

You can become a better and more adventurous cook.  You can write your history or that of your family.  You can put a blog on the internet and have people all over the world read your comments on whatever you want to write.  Be prepared to find other peoples' stories of growth, challenges and bodily advances and declines very, very interesting.

Whatever you do, after a little confusion and maybe fear, after a small amount of disorientation, you will get a grasp of your opportunities and you will have a very good time.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Too many or smart acquisitions?

Helen Smith is a young mother who lives in London.  She is the author of several successful books and a blog that I follow on my own blog page.  She has commented more than once that having a Kindle seems to have encouraged her to buy books.  She thinks she has already bought more than she will ever read.  I have, too, and I have several weak excuses/explanations.

Just a few minutes ago, I bought "I'm Ok, You're Ok" by Thomas Harris.  I read that book years ago so why buy it now?  I like having a copy at hand.  In eform, it is at hand wherever I go.  That book and the 850 others I have are at hand all the time, whether I think to pack them or not.

It seems that only a few of my friends have Kindles and that seems a pity to me.  When someone familiar with the device seems in need of a given book, either for entertainment or a pick-me-up for mood, it is very easy to get a copy into their hands for a price that is much less than a bouquet of flowers, especially if the recipient is on the other side of the continent.

I have two Kindles, a Touch with 3G/Wireless and a Fire.  The Fire is considered the top of the line but I like the Touch quite a bit more.  It is lighter in weight, thinner.  It holds a charge for weeks while being used and it holds around 1400 books. I can view movies on the Fire and it does download books a bit more quickly than the Touch but it needs constant recharging.  I like the fact that there is a file in the Touch I can get to that contains the highlights of any book I mark up electronically.  Although in truth, I go to my computer and find the same passage in the book on the computer in the free Kindle software and copy it if I am going to quote it.  

I purposely bought the Touch with ads.  I wanted the feature of being able to download books out of the atmosphere, called "shop in the Kindle store" without being near a wifi signal so I want 3G as well as the ability to search out and connect to nearby wifi setups.  I was a little reluctant to do without a physical keyboard but I have found the electronic image keyboard to work quite well.  I bought the Touch with ads.  I found before purchase that I could dispense with the ads after buying for $40 but I think it refreshing that different scenes and items appear on the deadscreen instead of the always the same few photos.  The ads have not been a bother at all, so far.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Religious and intellectual loneliness

One of the nice things about being a relatively thick-skinned male with strong desires is that one doesn't seem to be very bound by one's parents' desires and examples.  I had such strong reactions to reading, whether gripping stories or mind-opening non-fiction, that the fact that my family was not as interested in ideas or books was something I noted but simply felt as a fact.  No one put me down or laughed at my nose in a book, which I imagine helped very much.

I enjoyed the public library from the 3rd grade on and was lucky enough to have my path to and from school conveniently go right by the front door of the library for three years.  Meanwhile, a new husband for my mother meant a new church, a new type of church, Unitarian instead of Baptist.  It took me a while to mature into grasping the difference but as I did, I saw big differences between the ideas and practices of the two.  

At college, I met and fell in love with a wonderful person.  I wanted her body and her mouth and she seemed to want mine.  The fact that she was Lutheran was quite peripheral in my mind.  Later, she worried about our children's religious life, maybe their eternal souls as well as their tools for life.  She was clearly more comfortable attending the church she knew and having them do so.  I vaguely followed along but I knew what I believed, which mostly boiled down to large sets of questions I could sense no one anywhere could answer.

Getting a PhD helped me don a cloak of questioning, of doubt but also of interest in all views and experiences, fanciful or factual.  I became aware of what can be called the "Main Street" problem, after the novel by Sinclair Lewis depicting a woman who moves to a small town where the mental climate is much different from what she is used to and needs.  I read "The Conquest of Happiness" by the philosopher Bertrand Russell, where he comments on his sympathy for a young person in a small town where there is a uniform state of acceptance of ideas and practices if that young person starts to think for himself, ask questions, and examine ideas for their logical consistency and probable rightness.

Yesterday, a young undergraduate whose energy and outlook I admire told me that her studies and exploration of the world are getting her in trouble with some of the people she loves.  Since Lynn and I are reading the purifying and cleansing language an intelligent man, son of Christian missionaries, uses to describe the logic and structure of Hinduism in Huston Smith's "The World's Religions", I thought that someone studying philosophy and religion would like to read it.  Modern technology and cooperation made it possible for me to have that book in her Kindle virtually instantaneously.  

Meanwhile, a retired PhD wrote yesterday that the same section of the same book helped her in the small Southern town where she was questioning and wondering feel clearer about her mind and ideas, decades ago.

I suppose many religions and other intellectual, political and spiritual practices include admonitions to stick to them for safety and rightness.  However, as long as we fear for our children and loved ones unless they stay closed to our ideas and practices, we make it difficult for them to think and grow, even though we may not see eye-to-eye with their conclusions and directions.

The world is expanding.
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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Faith and meditation

I don't mean the 'faith' in the title as a reference to a religion although many people find basic faith there.  I mean a faith that things will work out, that even if we are on a wrong track, we will be able to correct ourselves or find a right track or learn how to make this wrong one right.

Just a few minutes ago, I read another essay in "This Will Make You Smarter" by John Brockman.  The sections come from contributions to his website, Edge.org, sometimes called "the smartest web site in the world".  The essay was from a Danish author and scientist, Tor Norretranders.  I was looking for an email address I could use to urge him and his publishers to get his books (in English) out in Kindle format.  I saw the current feature in the ongoing conversation there, by Nicholas Christakakis.  "NICHOLAS A. CHRISTAKIS is an internationally recognized physician and social scientist. He is a Professor at Harvard University with joint appointments in the Departments of Sociology, Medicine, and Health Care Policy, and he was formerly a Professor at the University of Chicago."  I never heard of the man but I saw that he considers both the newest technology and the emerging state of humanity ripe for terrific improvements in human understanding of individual people and of groups of them during the next 100 years.

I saw a comment by Howard Gardner, a good candidate for the currently best known professor of education in the US, that it really doesn't matter whether a young person in the Kindergarten to 12th grade years studies physics, chemistry, biology or geology.  I would throw in humanities and arts, as possible candidates.  It only matters that the study is in some depth, that the studies engage the student in some depth.

The latest meditation news from Google came in today.  It can be found at the bottom of this linked page.  Meditation is still a valuable tool for knowing what you think, what you feel and what you are trying to tell yourself, even if some of the message isn't right.  During these times of great change, it helps to give yourself 10 minutes of quiet and stillness, sitting or lying down each day.  The link in this paragraph can lead to examples of children, senior citizens and everybody in between, on every continent we have, finding the value in quiet concentration of a sight or sound and pausing thought for that long.  Doing so helps anyone see that we will continue to face obstacles and to suffer losses but we and our children and later generations will not only overcome them but will find ways of enjoying doing so.


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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Urges, conscious thought and responsibility

As I think, read, write and talk about the mind, I find I am increasingly aware of what I have been reading about the unconscious.  Several books and papers discuss the current status and the history of the concept.  I am surprised to find that many sources see the concept as murky, ill-defined, maybe even controversial.

I have listed most of the authors I have read on the subject in the 6/21/12 post.  I got good additional understanding from each.  For my own thinking, the source of words that I write or type, the words that I speak and clear-cut examples of actions that are habitual with me are good examples of the unconscious at work.  So are some rapid thought/action combinations, as in sports, where I might not be exercising a habit but I am clearly reacting faster than I can consciously think.  Nobel prize winner Daniel Kahneman and Timothy Gallwey, the author of The Inner Game of Tennis, are both good sources on the idea of our heads working for us but not in a conscious, deliberate, explicit choice way.  Cordelia Fine is a good source on the lower and more basic parts of our minds that always see ourselves as fine people and the world as revolving around us, even when our conscious adult minds know this is a big fiction.  

Many different authors and thinkers emphasize that all our sense data is a fiction that our minds create as perceptions of the world but are actually only abstract models.  They tend to work pretty well for us but are not complete and accurate truths.

I noticed a while back that Michael Gazzaniga, a noted brain and mind researcher, has a book called "Who's In Charge?"  I guess that as we find more detail and develop more understanding, it becomes easier to say that what I do may come from unconscious sources and not my deliberate choice.  In an interview, Gazzaniga said that science and medicine are closer to being able to treat criminal behavior and tendencies, for example, and may get to the point where the treatment is highly effective.  That book and "Free Will" by Sam Harris, as well as other sources, bring up the question of how much responsibility for, and how much control we really have over, our thoughts and actions.
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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Best choice at the time

I was surprised to hear in one of the Great Courses that in ancient times, people sometimes sought and applied for the position of slave.  There were circumstances when being a slave was the best choice for shelter, food, etc.  I was reminded of that idea the other day when we toured the traveling exhibit from the National Geographic Society about pirates.  The displays and texts referred to pirates in the Caribbean and nearby areas in the early days of our country.

Several of the exhibits emphasized that serving in the navy of Britain, France, Spain, Portugal and other colonizing nations was a very difficult life.  Severe discipline and punishment, poor food and bedding, and often not getting paid made the occupation less than ideal.  Successfully joining a pirate band could be quite different.  Every person's voice and opinion tended to carry more weight, captured money and goods were split evenly, and in general the life was often actually better, all things considered.  True, if captured by the troops or navies of the various nations, one might be executed.  However, sometimes one nation lent support and encouragement to particular pirates to prey on the ships of a rival country.  

We learned that there were some women pirates and some of them were skilled and deadly fighters, adapt at the toughest job, the landing on the victim ship and subduing it.  One of the women was quoted that the fear of being hung for crime was a good deterrent that kept the riff-raff out of the business of being pirates.

Pirate bands needed some skilled members, especially carpenters to keep the ship in good shape.  So, carpenters were sometimes press-ganged, which was also the way some navies and armies met their manpower needs.  Especially in the situation of a ship out on the ocean, to find that one had been knocked unconscious or drugged and hauled aboard ship, where one's duties and life were to be carried out according to the desires and needs of the officers and the ship, was to find oneself in a tough place indeed.

Sometimes pirate ships were used in the slave trade, bringing Africans to the New World.  Slaves to the Caribbean, sugar to the colonies for processing, rum from the process could all be profitable cargoes.  We saw slave bindings that were sobering.  One type was a bar with places on it for the wrists of two men, who would be coupled together side by side for the entire voyage of months.  Between 12% and ⅓ of the slaves on a ship tended to die en route from unsanitary conditions.
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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Sale on Kindle books for 99¢

You can read Kindle books on any computer, either through a browser or the free Kindle software from Amazon.com.  There is a big sale on them at 99¢ and there are many different sorts of books included.

http://www.kindlepost.com/2012/08/one-big-deal-for-a-limited-time-.html

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Why?

Many little kids go through a stage of asking "Why?" Of the famous reporter's questions of

What?

When?

Where?

Why?

How?

that fourth one, "Why?", is the richest one, the most powerful tool, in a way.  If I ask "What happened?  and you tell me that the sheep got out of the pen, that answer pretty well satisfies that question.  If I again ask "What?", you might assume I didn't hear clearly or didn't understand or am simply expressing surprise.  You might repeat what you said but the question simply repeats itself.

But "Why?" has special potency.  I remember the force of a paragraph in Edward Boring's A History of Experimental Psychology in answer to the question "Why is the tree growing there?"  One set of answers can be confined to human choices such as because my father liked this farm and bought it and my mother wanted an apple tree there and planted one.  Another set is about processes of nature, such as the planted seed was fertile and lucky, not being eaten or destroyed and the rain and sun and soil richness were right for apple tree growth.  Of course there are many other possible avenues for answers such as people like apple trees and protect them and no elephants fought above it and trampled it.

The real fascination with "Why?" comes from its power to naturally chain.  Without understanding the grammar or semantics, a little kid can stumble on the 2nd or the 3rd Why having a focus on a new target.  "The tree grows here because here there is good sunlight".  Why?  Because there are no cliffs - why? and we are into geology and earth's processes.  Because no elephants trampled it - why? and we are into biology and the distribution and needs and drives of pachyderms.  One why leads to another and there seems to be no end.  Further, the whys leap in a fascinating and educational way through knowledge and the world.

I am making steady use of Seligman's exercise of writing three good things that happened each day.  That part is easy.  But, the attempt to say Why they happened is much more difficult, endless really.  That part, trying to say why something happened, brings to mind American life, online communication, shipping and delivery methods, my personality and its strengths and faults, who I love, etc., etc.  I confess that I have moved to listing the goods, which I get better and better at recognizing.  But I list reasons for them happening less often, although I do that part less often.  When the reason is positive about me (I have strength, imagination, etc.), I don't shy away from recognizing that truth fully but calmly.  But WHY is always vague and complex, murky and twisty.


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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Miscellaneous half dozen

71 blogs a day from 71 friends: might actually be doable  - as you may know, I found my motivation to write a blog surged when some friends accepted it into their mailboxes daily and sometimes responded.  I was indebted to them for sharing their attention, a valuable and much sought resource these days.  I realized I was writing and they were receiving.  Was I receiving?  I imagined all 71 getting the writing bug, expecting me to receive and digest each nugget.  Then, I thought," I have handled classes of about 200 students online.  Surely, I can handle 71 blogs."  So, write away!

social network of automobiles - it pays to keep your eyes open for new areas of our lives that are becoming successfully computerized.  Writing, filing, calculating have been done for 30 years.  Then, photography.  Many other areas I can't think of or don't know about but I do know about driving.  Driver-less cars, cars that are communicating with other cars.

the internet of things that is emerging - Ok, my car is in touch with my refrigerator and the two of them realize I am nearly out of milk, bread and eggs.  As I approach my favorite grocery, the fridge tells the car to remind me to pick those items up before coming home.

the value of indifference - a weak place in American life is the opposite of gung-ho.  Ho-gung, quietude, serenity, calm appreciation of ourselves, our lives, our good luck.  We tend to salute rah-rah, energy, charging up the hill, fighting our way through, on and on.  I may start supplying reminders for a small fee to slow down, to practice indifference and an attitude of Who cares?  Just writing that feels traitorous, unAmerican but I am convinced that much good comes from genuinely not caring, knowing that in 100 years it won't matter

how to create a filler chorus for an opera - I really like lots of music that was written for operas.  Most of them are not in English and I tend to listen without paying attention to the words, the meaning.  Robert Greenberg of The Great Courses company can fix that with his fiery, animated delivery and full knowledge of music history and practice.  I do have "The Elixir of Love" in English and I listen to it often.  Recently, I found a libretto of the opera for Kindle.  It includes a short synopsis that helped me understand the details of the plot better.  

Along the way, I find an interesting clue as to how 2nd rate operas
fill-in choruses are created.  I learned from Greenberg that opera has had various sorts of rules and formats.  The libretto said that these fill-in choruses are sometimes recognized by containing a group of people with the same occupation singing about the delights of their work.  Thus, we have happy farmers tickled with their lot, smiley fishermen signing about the joys of their lives, etc.  

Finally, two fun, light books at low prices are "Cloaks and Veils" ($2.99 in Kindle format on Amazon) by J.C. Carleson (a novel by an ex-CIA operative in real life) and "Our Husband" by Stephanie Bond (99¢ in Kindle format on Amazon), a novel of a married man who goes ahead and marries two more women, none of whom are at all happy with his action. I read Carleson and we are halfway through the wives' problems.


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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety

Step by step

First, I ran into Martin Seligman's newest book, "Flourish".  From my studies as a psychology graduate student, I developed a strong appreciation of Seligman's approach.  As the president of the American Psychological Association, he called for research, development, theory and education in the area now called "positive psychology", basically the study of what makes people happy and successful at living a full and satisfying life.  

Then, I saw a statement in the blog "Barking Up The Wrong Tree" by Eric Barker, that Seligman and his students had done repeated on a simple but valuable procedure that seemed very popular with people and also effective at helping them get into the habit of noticing the nearly uncountable good and positive events in their lives.  Us animals are evolved to be alert to dangers which our human minds can recognize in psychological events and in abstractions as well in charging, drooling, nasty beasts.  So, we don't tend to note the zillions of things that are going right, going well, going nicely.

Then, I found out about "The Power of Habit" by Charles Duhigg.  The Buddha (= the awakened one) taught 500 years before Christ that everything changes, that nothing lasts.  Of course, physical aging and decay is responsible but in the human mind, what can be called "habituation" or "accommodation" accomplishes much the same thing for us.  As the gorgeous drum majorette told me in high school, "no one is a knockout after you get to know them".  However, beautiful your date or partner or new car or new house or its vista, you will get used to them and the thrill from them will lessen, maybe even cease, eventually.  The thrill or the shock of anything will lessen, wear out.

Finally, I listened to that interview of Cheri Huber I posted about the other day.  She has recently found that similarly to Seligman's 3 good things a day and reasons why they happened', participants in her workshops, retreats and online classes have reported gripping results from a practice she developed.  The Huber practice involves using a portable tape recorder.  She only explains her procedure roughly in the interview but gives more information in "What You Practice Is What You Have", only available in paper format but being mailed to me.

I do know that her way includes noting in the tape recorder things that happen that upset the user during the day.  Then, later, the same person speaks into the recorder to comfort someone who has had those troubles noted earlier.  Huber was surprised to find how enthusiastic people have been about the practice.  She reports that they report hearing amazing wisdom, calm and insight coming from their own mouths, ideas and words they wouldn't have thought they had in them.  

She states that she hopes she herself is able to maintain the practice every day of her life since it is so much fun and so helpful.  She also reports that her daughter, the mother of Huber's grandchildren, likes her mom but "doesn't read every book she writes".  However, during recent challenging times, the mother advised the daughter to give the procedure a try.  Soon, thereafter, Huber received a rare text message from the daughter expressing amazement at the value and effectiveness of what she has to say to herself.

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Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety