9.16.2005

The Devil made me do it

My father and I agree on a lot more things now than we did twenty years ago, but sometimes we still disagree. Since he and my Mom currently live only a half-mile or so away from me I get to talk with him at least once a week. Our main topics of discussion always seem to center on computers or religion. Even though we are both atheists we have a strong difference of opinion as to the current role religion plays in peoples' lives, in politics, and in the world in general.

Dad doesn't participate in discussion forums online as far as I know, or even lurk in them. I suppose my take on the world around me is colored by these forums, particularly Internet Infidels, a website which caters to non-believers of every stripe, but which also welcomes people of faith and does so with such a catholic generosity that a very good percentage of veteran members there, and even at least one moderator I know of, are theists. I believe this is a good thing and speaks well of the secular humanist mindset which, in general, is much more tolerant than the religious or fundamentalist mindset to which it stands in opposition, and whose own discussion forums, while ostensibly allowing non-theists to participate, will only tolerate a modicum of dissent and are prone to delete posts or ban certain members at the drop of a hat, or a gauntlet, as it happens.

My father is of the opinion that religious faith is dying out and nothing any religious fruitcake says or does bothers him to any great extent. It isn't that the sheer stupidity doesn't irritate him, he just doesn't think it's anything to worry about in the long run. I don't imagine he thinks that there are any less people percentage-wise who claim to be believers, because clearly that isn't the case; what he thinks perhaps is that among people who claim to believe there is an ever-larger portion of those who, deep down, really don't believe at all. While I'm sure it's true that a good deal of people who claim to believe actually don't, I fear that this number is actually decreasing, at least nationwide. One of the reasons for this is clearly the silly holy war we're currently involved in and the even sillier crusader who currently presides in the White House; but another reason, and a much more dangerous reason in fact, is because of the increasing unwillingness on the part of those who defend reason and good sense to speak with any kind of conviction at all.

I understand the necessity of being disciplined and cautious in regard to what we regard as certain knowledge, and I understand the need for a healthy distinction between theory and fact, particularly in regard to complex philosophical and scientific issues, but if the people at Internet Infidels are fairly representative of the current secular/humanist worldview in general, I would venture to say that an imprudent infatuation with doubt and uncertainty is the most obvious aspect of that worldview, and that what is intended to come across as an educated respect for reason and rational thought is actually coming across as precisely the opposite, and especially to people who are desperately looking for ways to avoid having to come to terms with that worldview. If intelligent, educated people insist on claiming that the only thing they know is that they don't know anything, which seems more than ever to be the fashionable position to hold, then this gives the average person all the more reason to join with the religious fundies in denouncing science and skepticism altogether, which apparently offers nothing but a wishy-washy and groundless ambivalence in regard to just about everything.

When it comes to skeptics, it's usually easy to see what they are speaking against but often very difficult to determine why they even bother to do so, since some of them don't seem to believe in much of anything at all. For instance, most of the non-theists at Internet Infidels are determinists, and are as rabidly opposed to the notion of free-will as they are to any religious notions. These people will talk of human behavior with constant references to "synapses" and "neurons firing", as if a human being were little more than a machine with virtually no control over its own actions. In my opinion there is nothing more appealing or convincing in this view than in the idea of Original Sin. In fact, I believe that the two views amount to the same thing: that a human being is not truly an active agent but a passive entity who merely reacts to forces and influences beyond his control.

Oddly enough, the skeptical determinist and the bible-thumping fundamentalist both believe that people are to be held morally accountable for their actions despite their similar belief that people do not make free choices or act freely. The fundies actually reconcile the concept of free will with Original Sin, which is ludicrous but which is done as a way of keeping their god-figment blameless for all the evil in the world. Exactly why the determinists should hold a person morally accountable for his actions when he has almost no real control of his actions is a bit of a mystery, but I suspect it's because they know that no alternative to holding individuals accountable for their actions is possible in any civil society.

I think that sometimes people oppose the idea of free-will because they don't really understand what it means. I have seen more than one person at Internet Infidels, for example, claim that free will cannot be possible because if it were then that would mean people could do whatever the hell they wished: that they would be able to fly or sleep with Salma Hayek, for example. Obviously that's not what free will means. Free-will doesn't mean a will that transcends ordinary boundaries or natural limitations, it just means one which is governed autonomously, one which acts on the ability to distinguish between various options and in light of the variety of consequences that such actions might incur, and under the wildly unpredictable auspices of human whims and desires.

There seems to be a major disagreement as far as the distinction between an action being influenced and an action being determined. No free-willer believes that his actions are uncaused, or uninfluenced, either from without or from within. No free-willer believes that his actions or decisions come about in a vacuum; but because our actions are caused by prior states of affairs, and influenced by them, this doesn't mean that our actions are therefore "determined".

Determinism seems credible to some mainly because of 20-20 hindsight. At any point in time we can look back and see a chain of events, a causal chain wherein each action is caused by the one prior to it, and decide that the chain of events that did take place is the only one that could have taken place, or that it somehow had to take place; but at any point in time the state of affairs that exists is only one of a multitude of states-of-affairs that were possible at some prior point in time. The fact that the world is as it is currently is no reason to believe that it had to be so. At various points in the past, any number of possibilities and potentialities were in play, and if different people had chosen different actions, we might now have a drastically different state of affairs than that which we actually have.

What I'm getting at is that our political freedom is what is at stake here. The fundamentalist strain of American religious belief is dead set on wiping out the very idea of political freedom itself. Talk to a fundy and ask him his opinion on the concepts of freedom and autonomy. These are essentially evil concepts to the mind of a fundy, particularly one of the Calvinistic variety who firmly believes that our eternal fate was decided by God eons before we were even born. There are some fundies who believe that our concepts of freedom and autonomy apply only to man and his relationship to his fellow man, that God wills us to grant these things to our brothers but with the understanding that He is under no obligation to do the same. With these people I have no quarrel whatsoever. I'm only concerned with those who wish to undermine my political freedom, not with those who would merely advise me to fear God's judgment but prefer to leave that judgment to God.

There are people active in the world today who believe that it is their responsibility to establish "God's kingdom on earth". In other words, they do not believe that the eventual torment of sinners in Hell is adequate. They want to make sure that these sinners suffer accordingly in this life as well as in the one that is to come. They refuse to acknowledge any ideas of political freedom or autonomy in regard to civil relationships among men. It isn't enough for them that a homosexual will endure an eternity of punishment for his offense to God. These particular fanatics want a hand in causing some pain and torment themselves, and are not content in their belief that God will eventually get around to it.

It's these people who need to be confronted in no uncertain terms whatsoever. We cannot afford to remain infatuated with the blithe Socratic notion that the only thing we know is that we know nothing. Now isn't the time to play semantic games or to treat philosophical issues as if they were relevant only in the austere and antiseptic halls of the Ivory Tower. This allergy to convictions of any kind is fine and dandy in the abstract world of academic debate, where intellectual integrity is measured according to how noncommittal a person can be while still presumably supporting a position; but unless we hold the conviction that human liberty is something worth fighting for we will lose our liberty by default. And how the concept of liberty can be shown to be something worth fighting for in the context of a human mind being a mechanical mass of "synapses" and "firing neurons" is beyond me.

It seems to me that if determinism is true, the concept of political freedom becomes irrelevant. In fact, I can't even imagine how freedom would be possible given the absence of free will.

I got more than a little side-tracked with that free-will versus determinism thing, but I think it's an extremely relevant argument in today's world. The bottom line is, if the radical right sees that the secular/humanist left is by and large a group of people who aren't sure of anything, have no sound epistemological foundation for their ideas, and can't even grant to their fellow man that he is an active, self-motivated, self-reliant, autonomous free agent who is competely responsible and therefore completely accountable for his actions, these crusading mystics will gain more confidence, will be more aggressive and cocksure than they already are, and will increase in number. I think it's already happening.

9.15.2005

William Henry and Karl Wilhelm Baurle












I love this picture of my father's father (photo on the right), taken just before going off to fight for Germany, the country of his birth, in 1915. He was all of fifteen himself, and yet he looks much older to me in the photograph. He was fourty-three when my father was born in January of 1944.

My latest memories of my grandfather are of him telling stories of his experiences in the war. Like when he arrived somewhere in Europe by train and immediately had to jump underneath it with his mates because as soon as they had disembarked they fell under fire. I remember Grandpa laughing when he described the sound of bullets whizzing by and the sound they made against the side of the train. When he got home after his service in the war his mother wouldn't let him in the house because he had lice.

I have only the most pleasant memories of my grandfather. We used to go and visit him and my grandmother on Long Island where they owned a tiny house and a small piece of property. The grass was always neatly kept. There were several fruit trees in front, and a few tall spruce trees as well. In the back was a garden where they both spent a good deal of their time. My grandfather also spent a good deal of time working on his paintings, some of which now grace the halls of several Baurle-family homes. My grandpa died in 1980.

I also like this picture of my Dad (photo on the left), William Henry Baurle, taken when he was a strapping young lad in the United States Air Force. He's 61 now.

What I can't understand is: how in the hell did I wind up so damn ugly?

9.01.2005

The checks are in the mail

A few days ago a friend of mine from PFFA informed me that there was a poll going on which was intended to determine the better-known internet poets: or, people who are better known because of their presence on the net rather than in print (or web) publications. Of course, there are scads of people posting poems online, people who have poetry blogs, or personal web-pages. I suppose there must be something on the order of several thousand. Colin Ward, from firesides.net, initiated the poll. 133 people voted, and nominated 162 candidates.

I don't think there were any restrictions as far as who could be nominated, but I presumed it to be implied that anyone with a considerable degree of publishing success ought to be excluded. Still, there were some notables who made the list. Robert Sward and Frank Bidart were there, probably as someone's idea of a joke. Both are very widely published and famous in the poetry-world. Oswald LeWinter was on the list, who is also very widely published and acclaimed. Someone apparently nominated A.E. Stallings under the moniker A.R. Stallings. Also appearing was David Anthony, who is beginning to attain some serious stature outside the electric fantasyland of the net.

To my astonishment, I turned up 75th, with three votes. If my name was William Zaurle instead of Baurle, I would have been 96th. Someone with a big heart must have nominated me, and I have a pretty good idea who it was. As for the other two votes, I have no idea, but bless their kind souls. Naturally, I know that polls like this don't amount to much more than a popularity contest. The prominent poetry boards did well:
Gazebo, Eratosphere, PFFA, QED, as did Usenet, and a few other boards made a showing. There are hundreds of boards across the net, and most likely only a small percentage of these boards knew of the poll; but in fairness, the far greater majority of these boards are completely useless as far as critique or any serious dedication to craft. They function as showcases for people in dire need of ego gratification and ill-deserved boosts of self-esteem.

Due to the vast number of people who post poems for review, in the serious poetry forums alone, obviously the key to making a showing in such a poll is simply being thought of at just the right time. There are many poets at PFFA, for instance, which is where I post, who are much better at writing poetry than I am but who didn't make the list. The reason is just that their names weren't called to mind at precisely the right moment. As an example of what I mean: I nominated two people from PFFA who were not on the list when I first checked. I just happened to notice their absence because they have been more active on the board recently than others I might have thought of. After making my two nominations, I went and used the rest of my ten votes on people who were already on the list, mostly PFFAers but also a few others, notably Richard Epstein, who posts prolifically at QED. I voted for him not only because I think he's a good poet, but because I had a brief email exchange with him a while back and shocked him out of his shoes by recalling that he had published a few poems in some journals back in the late eightees/early ninetees: journals where I had also placed some poems, which, as it happens, is the only reason I remembered his name. I also voted for Mike Farmer because I think his poem "Brownseed", which was panned in short order when he posted it at PFFA, really kicks ass.

Later on I realized that there were a few people who I would have voted for over the ones I actually did vote for if only their names had been there already or if I had remembered them at the time and nominated them. These people are all fine poets and quite significantly better than me, some ridiculously better than me: James Flick, Nanphi, Debi Zathan (who recently passed away and who will eventually be very well known for her excellent work), Rob Yateman, Monique, Howard Miller, Donner, Toklas......

And here's where my memory fails me again. These are people who either haven't posted in a long while, post very rarely, or are known more by their user names, which apparently presented a problem in the nomination process. Luckily for me I have been very active at PFFA recently, though I've posted only one poem there in the last two to three years; but that one poem happened to go on the boards only last month. I am lucky also that the kind soul who nominated me knew my real name. This person also included my username, which is Urizen.

I'm not just trying to be humble. I know that my nomination was an act of kindness, and that even appearing on such a poll is due to my long association and sometimes ubiquitous involvement with a popular (though frequently maligned) and highly trafficked board, not to mention good old fashioned luck. I do believe, though, that for the people who garnered a significantly larger number of votes it's probably a fair indication that their work is of finer quality than that of the average bear. And I do hope people were by and large honest enough to keep some personal prejudices out of the picture. I voted for someone I don't like all that much on a personal level but whose work is definitely quite a few notches above average. By the same token, even though I have been frequenting poetry boards for upwards of four years, most of the names on the list are complete strangers to me. That has to mean something.

Still, as silly as it all is, you gotta take what you can get. Especially when you're a numbnuts.