Suicidal tendencies

"I think this shows that the problem is primarily emotional, not intellectual. People just don't like the idea of a God who might send them to hell, and so they choose not to believe in Him. But that kind of attitude is just suicidal. Imagine you're standing in the middle of the street, and suddenly a friend on the curb says, "Look out! Here comes a car!" Now what do you do? Do you stand there and close your eyes real tight and say, "anybody who would run over me can't be a very nice person! If I don't believe in him, then it won't affect me! I just won't believe that he exists!" And then it is too late. A lot of people look at God that way. They think that just because they don't like the idea of God sending them to hell, if they close their eyes real tight and pretend that He doesn't exist, then it doesn't affect them. And that kind of attitude is just fatal."

This paragraph comes near the end of William Lane Craig's closing statements in a debate with an atheist, the whole of which is transcribed and published online, as are many such debates. Craig is one of the leading apologists for the Reformed Christian worldview, and he is obviously extremely smart and educated. No statement I make should be regarded as an attempt to cast doubt on the man's intelligence. I make this dislcaimer because I want to be clear on the fact that I believe most theist/atheist disagreements are the result of political, and therefore moral and ethical, differences, rather than merely intellectual ones. Certainly, there are stupid atheists and stupid theists, just as there are geniuses on both sides of the theological fence. Craig could well be a genius, though it's certain that I am not.

What bothers me most about Craig's analogy of God as the Reckless Driver (besides the fact that his description of an atheist's attitude toward god-belief is actually precisely that of the theist's denial of the reality of death) is the fact that he compares God, who is in no way whatsoever available for empirical analysis, with an obviously visible speeding car and its obviously dangerous operator. The non-believer, who can in no manner at all sense God as a metaphysical reality, is nonetheless portrayed as someone whose primary fault is the ability to ignore certain data he receives through his senses, for the sake of emotional security. The analogy is completely backwards and inept, and fails absolutely. Craig might have said something like this:

Imagine you're standing in the middle of the street and suddenly a friend on the curb shouts:

"Hey, you better move. I read somewhere that any second now a car is going to come thundering around that corner, and if you're standing there you'll be turned into road-pizza!"

Imagine that you look up ahead and see nothing. You hear nothing, you feel nothing. It's just an empty street. Sure, a car could come along at any time, but at the moment you see no point in scrambling over to the curb like an idiot just because your friend read somewhere that a car would come thundering and blundering along on this very street at any time. After all, your friend has been saying this for years, every day in fact since you and he started to walk down this street together on your way to work. But the car never comes.

"Besides," you point out, "wouldn't the driver have time to see me and put on the brakes? Is he drunk? Or is he just a reckless driver and a menace to the road?"

Your friend says, "No, you don't understand. The driver is extremely powerful, wise and merciful, and in fact loves you very much; but if you don't move out of the way, he'll run you right over. And not only that, you won't die. You'll actually have to experience the pain of being run over by someone who loves you forever and ever, for the simple fact that you played chicken with him and refused to get out of the way."

At this point you look hard at your friend and say, "Well, that doesn't sound very loving and merciful to me. But that's beside the point, because if I really did see a car coming, naturally I would get out of the way. I have no desire to play chicken with reckless drivers, no matter how much they love me. The reason I'm standing here is to let you know that your fear-mongering isn't going to work on me. The more you warn me about the possibility of becoming eternal road-pizza because I pissed off some reckless driver, the more I'm going to stand here, just to let you know that you can't manipulate your fellow men through this kind of psychological intimidation. If the car comes, I'll do the wise thing and get out of the way. But I don't see a car."

"That's just suicidal!" your friend shouts, teetering on the curb, not daring to step foot into the street. "Maybe the car will be coming so fast and furiously you won't have time to move! Isn't it much safer just to stay off the street? Why take chances?"

"Well, for two reasons." you say, "First, as I mentioned, I'm gonna stay here as a constant reminder to you that I will not be motivated by irrational fear. I will not take your word, or the word of someone who wrote something about this mysterious car and driver. Second, if this driver is truly loving and merciful, as you say, then I have nothing to worry about. No wise and merciful person would run down someone they loved. Your story makes no sense."

"It makes no sense to you because you don't understand the nature of the driver. He is very wise and powerful, and he is indeed very loving; but he doesn't demonstrate those attributes in the way that a normal person would. He lets all of us know that he is coming, at any time, without warning, and leaves it up to us whether to stand in the street like suicidal fools or to stay out of the way. If we believe in him and stay off the street, he will recognize our faith and reward us with incomprehensible bliss forever and ever; but if we doubt him and remain standing in the street, he will run us over as surely as the sun shines, because we dared to trust ourselves rather than the word of his messengers."

"And how do we know we can trust these messengers?"

"Because the driver tells us their words are true."

"And where does the driver tell us this?"

"In the words of the messengers!"

"Farewell, friend. Have a nice journey down the safe and comfortable curb of life..."

Reformed morons

The more I read stuff from these reformed apologists, the more suspicious of them I become. For instance, when they ask questions like, "why is it immoral or wrong to hurt someone," or, "how do you know that it's immoral or wrong to hurt someone else for no reason," or questions to that effect, could it be that they are truly, genuinely in the dark on this? Could it be that these people are actually lacking in sympathy, empathy, or what we call a "conscience"?

Based on a passage from his "Professional Morons" (which is in a pdf document and I couldn't figure out how to quote from it, but I can link to it), I gather that Mr. Vincent Cheung really doesn't have any idea why a non-believer might consider it to be morally wrong to hurt another person for no reason. Cheung, and people like him, cannot seem to fathom why an atheist would be compelled to treat his fellow human being with decency and care, because the atheist isn't getting anything out of the deal, at least nothing that the religious fanatic can see or understand.

Maybe it doesn't bother the religious fanatic to observe a fellow human being in pain, causes him no unease whatsoever? This would go a long way in explaining why some of the extremely zealous theists, such as the Dominionists or Christian Reconstructionists, have no problem whatsoever with biblical atrocities. It doesn't bother them to think of millions of people being drowned in a flood, or of God's armies ruthlessly slaughtering their enemies, or of babies' heads being dashed against the stones, or of people having excrement spread on their faces, or of millions of people being damned for eternity; and it could also explain why some of these extremists would have no problem with executing people for various infractions, or why a few of them even advocate stonings.

What rational person with a healthy conscience could condone lobbing rocks at human beings until they die? For whatever reason? I wouldn't be able to kill someone by throwing rocks at them even if they had murdered my wife and children. I might want them to die, but not that way. I wouldn't even kill a toad that way, let alone a human being.

I think that maybe we need to come to terms with what we might be dealing with: intelligent people with no conscience, people who do not intuitively or instinctively know right from wrong, but whose idea of right and wrong, or moral and immoral, comes purely from a book. Maybe for this kind of religious zealot, killing an innocent person isn't wrong because it's repugnant to his conscience, to his basic sensitivities as a human being, it's wrong because it's an offense to God, and that's the only reason he needs; moreover, it's the only reason he feels entitled to have.

It's really no wonder, in light of this, that religious fanatics through out the ages have been capable of such brutality and cruelty. Perhaps because, in large part, they have no moral sense, they have no conscience? Because all they understand is obedience and force? And perhaps all of of their arguments are essentially grounded in one simple, scriptural premise: that everyone else is just as morally bankrupt as they are?

Requiescat in pace

I never thought I'd hear myself say this to myself, but I'm actually glad to see that there are so many Catholics in the world, for these vast droves of people will eventually prove to be instrumental in stemming the tide of Theonomy which at present is not a tsunami in force, rather a creepy little wavelet, which will grow.

And I therefore hereby this electronic digital transcription whereby I stand hereabouts do solemnly proclaim this thing verily, even a prophecy, which have come forth from my mouth, even from my tongue on this day: the God-botherers will grow mightier, yea, but not unto mightiness wherein they shall wreak their rigid Rightness upon us,

but unto forthwith and sooth a large body of sycophantic psychopathic mules or fowls of the air that droppeth stuff nor cheweth their cud, or them from which we reap our share of wool sheared, the sheep; and this body of some but not nigh unto mighty might shall fuck with freedom at every turn.

So let us be pleased that the old church is still kicking, and I think apologetic in a good way, and sincere, in the main. The heavier pots that are damaged lurk on the other side. Reformation my ask you this: as a rebellion it was wonderful, for like what, five minutes? Luther and Calvin were both knucking phuts.

I wish the Pope a very restful sleep, and peace, sincerely.

Ex-Christian.net

Last night as I was doing my usual reading online, occupied as I very often am in looking up information regarding the Christian Reconstructionist movement, or Dominionism, or Theonomy (these labels are commonly used interchangeably, but there are distinctions between them which I haven't quite worked out), and I wound up at a site called Ex-Christian net.

The site is run by an Ex-Christian named Dave Van Allen. It started small, but has grown considerably. Being inspired by Mr. Allen's testimony regarding his deconversion from the Christian faith, I wrote him a small letter of appreciation. Mr. Allen graciously responded, and quite promptly I might add, given the high rate of traffic at his website, and given that he must receive quite a large volume of personal messages and email. He thanked me for my message and asked to post it on his site in a letters-to-webmaster section, which he says consists predominantly of negative messages from Christians seeking to re-convert him. I was happy to ask him to go ahead and post my letter.

I also responded to a letter from a Christian posted recently at ExChristian.net, which prompted a rather lengthy thread. This person had coyly introduced the TAG into one of his posts. This argument will rear its ugly head everywhere, and it won't only be used by Christians arguing from a Reformed perspective. The best refutation I've read so far is this one, by Objectivist Anton Thorn. I know that many people, probably even most people, think of Objectivists as secular cultists, no better, and in fact similar in many ways, to fundamentalist theists. I will say that Objectivism has indeed generated a certain number of block-headed sycophants and "fundies". I encountered a few at more than one Objectivist forum, and I even met one Objectivist author via email whose responses to me were such that I immediately discontinued correspondence with him; but there are also those who are extremely bright and fiercely independent, and I believe that Anton Thorn is one of those.

One should consider that the biggest gun in the TAGist's arsenal is the fact that modern philosophy offers precious little by way of any firmly grounded epistemological standpoint, with Objectivism being one of the few, and certainly the most noticeable, exception. TAGists love to pick on people like Bertrand Russell, for example, first for his famous book on why he was not a Christian (guess the title?), and second, because his epistemological views changed through-out his career. Now, most people would say that that was a good thing, because, and I'm paraphrasing Nietzsche here, 'convictions are a no-no.'

Just don't be too sure of that.

waiting for echoes, archy

Was it Don Marquis, the journalist slash poet who said something like:

"Publishing a book of poetry is like dropping a [??] into the Grand Canyon and waiting for the echo." ?

It was either him or someone else, of that I'm sure. As for what goes between the brackets, it could be a feather, or a penny. I don't remember. I could look it up, but I don't feel like it, and neither will anyone else. I've been saying that a lot in this blog, haven't I, he asked himself. And no one was watching, and no one pointed his finger and laughed.

And it was all the same to him, he thought, examining the underside of the left side of his chin as he faced himself. I was reminded today of a line from a poem I've always liked: which went something like, "his carnation preceded him like a small explosion...". Does one need a full stop (period, he said, adjusting his glasses) after an ellipsis? Are there two ells in ellipsis? Well naturally there were two that time.

Well, archy, having looked through a sickeningly narrow yet noisy slice of Blogdom, I see that Andy Warhol was dead wrong. We cannot possibly all have fifteen minutes, each. And that wouldn't make us happy anyway. So God has rendered unto us all an infinity for the splatterings of our vanity. He has given every fool, including myself, his own mountain, her own village square, her own shiny and dazzling printing press of many-colors. We will hoist ourselves up and over our own petards, show ourselves naked (some of us quite literally) in front of the entire world, free of charge.

God has seen Andy's bluff and raised him a trillionfold, archy. The greatest libraries in the world pale to this blinking box next to my socks. The poet Kenneth Patchen once wrote, with a pen, presumably: "The impatient explorer invents a box in which all journeys may be kept."

That box is this box. Windows are boxes. Morrison was right, too, we're all voyeurs. The really sickening thing is, though, the person whose private parts we peer at through our little windows on the world is us, is you, is me, he said.

But no one was listening.

Some thoughts on Objectivism

Yes, I did at one time, for a few years, consider myself a student of Objectivism. I didn't feel comfortable calling myself one, simply because I never felt I had enough of an understanding of some of its finer philosophical points. And no, I did not become interested in Rand as a teenager. My father gave me one of Rand's philosophical books to read when I was in High School, and I hated it. I was extremely liberal in my "thinking", and saw nothing but coldness in her writing. It wasn't any naive idealism that attracted me to Rand's work as a youngster. Her ideas only made sense to me as an adult.

I developed an interest in Objectivism when I was thirty-two, a short while after a few years of heavy drinking and hanging around with the dregs of society. Think Steinbeck's Tortilla Flat, and you'll get an idea of how my life was during my early to late twenties. I learned that some people are down & out and dirt-poor because they will do virtually nothing to help themselves, and I resolved to have no sympathy for those types of people. They are users and abusers, they cheat, lie, and steal; their hearts are black, they have no conscience, and they focus on nothing but the present. I was constantly being used, as I was one of the only people among my group of cronies to be able to keep a job. Despite the fact that I drank habitually, I was still able to figure out that I needed to work in order to be able to purchase alcohol. Most of those happy-go-lucky rogues I hung around with and lived with were actually unable to make this simple connection. Or maybe they thought they were too clever to work, since they could simply beg, borrow, or steal their hooch from one working schmuck or another. I grew very tired of coming home to see my apartment in shambles, my cigarettes stolen, my beer gone, my CDs lying out all over the floor. Mind you, I am not saying that this kind of crap describes the poor, generally speaking. I am only speaking about the people I was involved with at a particular time. There were a lot of them, they were dirt poor, like me, and they were assholes.

Eventually I was able to afford a place of my own. The cronies still came a' begging from time to time, with compliments aplenty, their transparent cordiality in full swing, almost exactly like the characters in Steinbeck's novel, but eventually they gave up on me. During this time I was involved with an older woman I worked with who was separated from an alcoholic husband and was sincerely worried for me. I was in my late twenties, drank almost daily. I kept telling her not to worry about me. I wasn't going down the path that she seemed certain I was destined to take. I was totally aware that most of the limitations I had were self-imposed, and I tried not to make any excuses for the fact that I had a lousy job and drank too much; but I was also convinced that life was full of possibilities, that I was in charge of my life and that I would dictate the direction my life took. There was no way I was going to start missing work, lose my job, and become like those drifters I had hung around with. I always went to work, I always did a good job, and I was valued by my employer. My friend insisted that I was kidding myself, that it was unwise to think I had control over my life.

At the same time, it had always bothered me to talk with religious people, because of what was essentially the same thing: the notion that our lives are guided by powerful forces over which we have precious little control, whether those forces be external or internal. I spoke with some members of AA that I worked with, and heard still more of the same from them. My faith in myself was angering God, I was told. My life was determined by the cravings of my body, and my mind was my own worst enemy. It was just a matter of time before I started to act like those old friends of mine of whom I'd grown sick and tired. Unless I surrendered my heart and mind to some misty, undefined Higher Power and admitted my complete depravity to that Higher Power, and also myself, I was doomed. I said bunk to that and quit drinking when I got married, in 1996. This coincided with my interest in Ayn Rand. I hope that the reasons why are obvious.

Though I've always had dreams of being a musician and a writer, I don't think I ever truly desired to be wealthy. My interest in Rand's philosophy had nothing to do with rationalizing some sort of unsavory ambition or bigotry. Last year I earned a hair over 25K, which, being that I am the sole wage-earner in a family of four, puts me squarely in poverty-ville, at least here in AZ. Even though I'm technically poor, I don't feel poor. I don't feel like anybody's victim. I don't want for much. Sure, life is a bit precarious. I could be in trouble if I miss a few paychecks. But I'm very careful with my money, and I have good credit. I have medical insurance because I am employed full-time and I'm a low-risk, so my employers pay most of the premium. I'm doing better than some people who earn more than I do, simply because they don't know how to live within their means, and they don't know to handle their finances. But that's another subject. I think.

I associate Objectivism with a respect for reality (yes, I am aware of the problem that some people have with that word) and reason, as opposed to mysticism. I associate it with having complete responsibility for one's life, with respect for the lives of others, with a belief in free-will as opposed to determinism, with a lack of responsibility or pity for every sad-sack who stumbles drunkenly across my path, with a belief that charity ought to be given not as a moral duty but as a willing response to a person's virtues, and with a belief that there is nothing wrong with ambitiously pursuing rational goals, and that there is nothing wrong with regarding happiness and yes, even prosperity, as the rewards of a life lived sensibly, legally, and morally. I reject any notion that the happiness of one person must result in the misery of another. I reject the notion that people who work hard and manage their money wisely should feel guilty over the existence of people who refuse to work and/or have no idea how to handle the money that they do have; I reject the notion of attributing the bulk of human failure to any number of diseases, addictions, compulsions, or disorders. I reject the notion of attributing success to selfish desires, bigotry, or chauvinism.

I've hated bigotry ever since I was a small child in New York. I didn't understand, even then, how it was possible to judge a person's character by virtue of their ethnic origin. I grew up with pig-headed racism all around me, and so it delights me to no end that I am now one half of an interracial marriage, and that my children are of mixed heritage. They get to grow up learning two languages, while all I had was one. They get to interact with people from two very different cultures, while all I had was one. It's also been a pleasure for me to try and change my wife's mind insofar as how she feels about herself. She grew up believing that women were naturally subordinate to men: wives to their husbands, even sisters to brothers. I speak passionately about my regard for the ideas of freedom, and rights, and all that. I tell her that she can do anything she puts her mind to, and that the only thing stopping her is her irrational fears. She is currently trying to begin her own business, and I have every faith in her ability to succeed. If her business works out, and she starts working again after three years of down-time, she'll probably wind up earning a great deal more than I do, and I have absolutely no problem with that. I am proud of her and want only the best for her.

So it bothers me to see Objectivism associated with racism and sexism, though I can understand it slightly. After all, one of Rand's worst mistakes, I believe, was making that comment that women shouldn't aspire to be President. I think that idea flatly contradicts the primary tenets of her own philosophy, and quite frankly I was shocked to find out that she believed it. That was one of the straws that finally broke this camel's back, as well as some of her other views on sex and the sexes, and some of her views on esthetics.

Finally, I didn't develop an interest in Objectivism out of some teeny-bopperish idol-worship, or hero-worship, or because I thought it rationalized some immoral trait I possessed, or made excuses for the absence of some moral trait I didn't possess. I became interested in it because it made a great deal of sense to me at the time. I've had some trouble with its essentials, after reading the more complex arguments around the net; but not that much trouble, to be honest. Still, I'm no genius. I learn as I go.



Happy Birthday, Mom!

Feeling the Paine

Some people are either liars, or just plain stupid.

This whole argument over whether or not America is a Christian nation, or one which is "founded on Judeo-Christian values" is indicative enough for me that the United States is at risk for eventual destruction. No theocracy has ever, nor will ever, make any formal recognition of human rights, nor will in any way take measures to protect even the notion of rights, which is the bedrock of modern civil society, the only hindrance to the natural law of "might makes right", which, though fine for the larger part of the animal kingdom, is a disastrously ineffectual code for humanity, as history has demonstrated.

The Judeo-Christian God is not interested in our freedom. He is one of the most corrupt characters ever imagined in the mind of man: a jealous, wrathful, vengeful, petty, violent, emotionally-driven tyrant who desires nothing but to hear himself praised without end for all eternity, and who has promised nothing but perpetual pain and torment for any and all who will not make it their single purpose to appease that desire. The Bible is not a moral book. It is at times a good book, in the sense that Paradise Lost is a good book: it has a definite poetic beauty, occasional glimmers of wisdom, and some sound moral advice; but on the whole it is a heap of ancient superstition and ignorance, no better or worse than the mythological or sacred writings of other various origins. 

**edit 2/25/2011 not going to go through all these and modify them to my new way of thinking; I'm just gonna let them stand so anyone who might read in this little tiny nook tucked away in a fold of a cranny here in netville can see how my thinking has come along, backwards forwards up & down, over the years** WAB

It is a fact that most Americans claim to be Christians, but even if, at some time in the future, every single citizen of the United States is a devout Christian except one single non-Christian, the Constitution will still protect the rights of that single non-Christian to worship any God he pleases, without interference from any other citizen, or his government; and it will also protect that person's right to worship no god at all. The majority, however this body be comprised, has no rights, as a body. Only individuals have rights. So, conversely, if at some time in the future every single United States citizen is an atheist except one Christian, that single Christian will still have the right to practice his faith without interference from any other citizen, or his government. This is what it means to have freedom, what it means to have rights. Rights protect individuals, not groups.

Idiocy comes just as much from the left as from the right. Talk of gay-rights is just as nonsensical as talk of Christian-rights. Rights are not privileges. If a gay man is beaten in the streets by a gang of imbecilic thugs, it's not his rights as a gay man which have been violated, but his rights as a man. If two gay men are left alone to enjoy a loving relationship and are protected from harassment by individuals, by society at large, or by the government, it's not their gay-rights, or privileges, which are being recognized, but their rights as individual citizens. If Christian Americans go to church as they please, worship God as they please, baptize their children and raise them according to the tenets of their faith, do all of this in a civil and law-abiding manner, and are safeguarded from obstruction or intervention by other members of society or by the government, it isn't their Christian rights, or privileges, which are being recognized and protected, but their rights as citizens. The same goes for Jewish Americans, Muslim Americans, Hindu Americans, and Buddhist Americans. The same also goes for Wiccans, Scientologists, Subgeniuses, and atheists.

I am an atheist, but I do not suggest that my rights as an atheist are in jeopardy by our nation's current religious mania. It's my rights, period, which are in jeopardy. I do not recognize the authority of the Bible, nor do I see any reason to suppose that my government's constitution is in any way connected to the Bible, or owes anything whatsoever to the Bible in regard to its nature and origin. The God of the Bible is a specific deity with a name, a definite character, and a definite will and desire insofar as what he expects from the people who serve him. The God mentioned in the Declaration Of Independence is a noun which in fact references any number of deities, to account for any number of deities which the prospective citizens of the United States might choose to recognize and worship. We are granted the freedom to worship any God whom we choose to recognize as our Creator. For many of the founding fathers, this was the God of Deism, the passive and benevolent Aristotelian Prime Mover, a magnificent and incomprehensible entity which would never be so human as to set up an infantile system of eternal punishment and reward and hold that over the heads of humanity like some petulant supernatural schoolmaster.

Most importantly, the name of Jesus Christ is not mentioned in either the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution, and so it boggles the mind to consider how some people continue to insist that America is a "Christian" nation. The absence of the name of Jesus can be nothing if not deliberate. If the founding fathers had truly thought that this country was "founded on Judeo-Christian" ideals or values, could the name of Jesus fail to appear in the very documents which were intended to create and establish said country, accidentally? Certainly not. These were highly intelligent and serious gentlemen. They intentionally left that name out, and with very good reason.

If there are some people in this country who truly do wish to stomp out a person's right to practice their religious faith, then shame on them for their stupidity and arrogance. I honestly do not know anyone like that, though I know that such idiots have existed. The separation of church and state is intended to work for the benefit of everyone, not just the secularists. After all, of every Christian crying over the fact that creationism is not taught in school, it has to be asked: if the Biblical creation myth is to be taught in school, alongside scientific theories, then why stop there? What is to stop a Buddhist teacher from teaching his religion in class, or the Hindu teacher, or the Muslim teacher? Or better yet, how would Presbyterian parents feel about their child being taught the finer points of Mormonism in a public classroom?

And finally, a religious story and a scientific theory are not on equal footing, despite wishful thinking. One is traditional, passed down as ritual, and accepted on faith, while the other is the result of objective research and study, an accumulative body of certain knowledge and conjecture, ruthlessly tested and re-tested. Why it can be seen as decent to lie to a child and try to convince her that the flimsy and contradictory (not to mention bloody and even kinky) nonsense in Genesis represents the absolute truth is a mystery to me; but please feel free to do this in the privacy of your own home, if you feel so compelled. You have that right, and may you forever keep it; but your right to bring your child up in your own faith at home or in church is equal to my right to allow my child the liberty of some day being able to recognize bullshit when he sees it, a skill which he will no doubt need to cultivate in the future of these United States.

Creator and creation: part 2

In a past blog I mentioned that I wanted to talk about four stories (book or film versions, or both) which I thought contained some extraordinary insights into the concept of morality. One of those stories is Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, of which I'm only concerned with the original novel. I'm familiar with the classic Boris Karloff monster of course, since he's graduated from the oftentimes ephemeral world of film and taken his place in the canon of mythological entities alongside the likes of Dracula, Sherlock Homes, and Tarzan. I'm not interested in that guy, however; he's not what Mary Shelley had in mind, but rather what some early film-maker had in mind. Kenneth Branagh's modern version with Robert De Niro is more faithful to the novel. Unless a great deal of sympathy for the monster is generated, the story loses its point. The Frankenstein monster is a tragic hero turned reluctant villain, a gentle spirit trapped in a repulsive form who winds up behaving the way in which the prejudices and fears of others seem dead-set and determined for him to act. Rather (but not quite) like Shakespeare's Richard III, who explains the precise reasons for his villainy in some of the most memorable iambic pentameter ever penned:


But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks,
Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass;
I, that am rudely stamp'd, and want love's majesty
To strut before a wanton ambling nymph;
I, that am curtail'd of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deformed, unfinish'd, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me as I halt by them;
Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to spy my shadow in the sun
And descant on mine own deformity:
And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover,
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,
I am determined to prove a villain
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.


Of course, it could be that tricky Dick is just making excuses, but I think there is a great deal more to it. Now, I have no desire to make excuses for criminal behavior. No matter what pressures a person might be under, due to the idiocy of others or the fickle hand of chance, one must still be held responsible for one's actions in a civil society. I suppose some provision ought to be made for people with certain types of mental disorders, who literally cannot help what they say or do; but generally speaking, if you willfully interfere with the rights of another person, you should fully expect to have your rights interfered with as well. With Shakespeare's Richard, we don't see the gradual transformation of what was, presumably, a sound and decent character into that of a villain. We get the straightforward, but poetically gorgeous, rationalizations of a criminal right from the start. With Frankenstein, Mary Shelley masterfully develops the monster's character, largely in the form of an extended first-person narrative, from the innocence of his first awakening all the way through to his inevitable fall.

There are actually two massive themes at work in her novel (three really, but I doubt I'll be able to touch on the third one in this blog), though these themes are related to one another. First there is a study into the possible constitution and manifestation of a criminal mentality (or at least one type in particular): a completely innocent and well-meaning individual who can have no place in society because of his horrifying physical appearance, who discovers no way to act apart from re-acting, who becomes possessed with feelings of self-loathing and dread, because he seems to engender nothing apart from loathing and dread in others. His only friend is a blind man, a man who makes value judgments without the benefit of sight. I might be disposed to consider this a rather shallow and even cliched theme, were it not for the fact that my own experiences in life recently have made it a great deal more interesting to me than it was when I first read the book; but more on that later.

The second theme, which is related to the first, is the relationship between creator and creation. This is especially important, since many religiously-minded people seem unable to grasp the crudity of a religion which effectively makes a criminal out every person ever born, people who revel in this universal fault and upon which they seem insatiably fixated. I believe there is a lesson for religiously-minded people in Mary Shelley's novel. After-all, the good doctor regrets his creation almost instantly, because he's smart enough to know that his creation will know nothing but torment, an existential fear, anger, and disgust. He is repulsed by this thing he brought into being, calls it a "wretch", a "filthy demon", just as God is repulsed by his creatures. The doctor is also smart enough to take moral responsibility for his monster's actions, just as God does, who sacrifices himself to himself, in the most poignant display of guilt ever recorded in the annals of literature.

There is a parallel of sorts between the two stories which justifies, or tries to justify, the reason for the creator in both tales to punish his creation. In the novel, the monster strangles Frankenstein's brother William, thereby sealing the doctor's commitment to destroying the thing he has made. He knows that he has a primary part in the murder and sets about seeing justice done, of bringing to rest something which ought never to have been commenced, an abomination which is the result of his own pride and vanity. In the old Hebrew scriptures, Man (meaning the man and the woman) disobeys God by eating the forbidden fruit, a crime for which man and woman, as well as each and every one of their ancestors until the end of time, bid farewell to innocence forever. Because of one act of disobedience, humanity is forever guilty. And God will destroy his creation, just as Frankenstein wills to do, or at least the greater majority of humankind. Some few he saves, on the condition that they recognize the sacrifice made by Christ and are abundantly grateful because of it, and on the condition that they dedicate their lives to the Father who made them, the loving creator who designed them with two broken legs and holds them at fault for falling down, the merciful Lord who offers a beautiful pair of crutches to all, but gives them only to those who shamefully admit that they really deserve no better than to crawl along the ground.

And I do believe (speaking in the context of the story) that the sacrifice of Christ is compelled more by guilt than by mercy, or love. God knows that the fall of Man is his fault. He has created Man with a plethora of fundamental weaknesses which render him unable to redeem himself. Sure, he gives Man a choice, but he already knows what choice Man will make. Man is helpless. Guilt leads God to his sacrifice, but only by gratefully acknowledging the magnanimous nature and degree of this sacrifice can man be redeemed. The story is interesting and does have some virtues, in that it defines the responsibilities of a creator in regard to his creation, but those virtues are overshadowed due to the natural feelings of fealty and loyalty on the part of the child for the parent, feelings which have effectively removed culpability from God and placed it firmly onto the shoulders of humanity.

Gratitude is fine, but not at the expense of reason and decency. The most powerful force in theology and apologetics at the present time seems to be Calvinist in nature, and Calvinism has completely removed any and all traces of culpability and responsibility from God. How any entity which is refered to as a father figure can somehow manage to be spared even the tiniest shred of responsibility for the actions and destinies of his children escapes me altogether. If you are elected for salvation, it is entirely because of God's intercession on your behalf; if you are damned for eternity, it's your fault, absolutely and utterly. The Calvinists have presented a nightmarish universe for your enlightenment and edification. No matter how gallantly you struggle to obtain some sense of autonomous self-worth and independence, you will either be saved or damned, purely at the whim of God, and you will not even be granted the option of extinction. Doctor Frankenstein is not nearly so malign a father as to will an unfathomably painful and interminable existence for his creation. No fictional character of any kind ever descended to such moral bankruptcy.

In Shelley's novel, there is some wonderful dialogue between the creature and his creator; there is a fine line drawn between love and contempt, between fealty and rebellion, between guilt and blame; but I don't suppose very much is resolved in the end. At one point, the monster asks his creator, "How dare you sport thus with life?" Good question, that. He goes on, after his maker tries to kill him:

"Be calm! I entreat you to hear me before you give vent to your hatred on my devoted head. Have I not suffered enough, that you seek to increase my misery? Life, although it may only be an accumulation of anguish, is dear to me, and I will defend it....Oh, Frankenstein, be not equitable to every other and trample upon me alone, to whom thy justice, and even thy clemency and affection, is most due. Remember that I am thy creature; I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel, whom thou drivest from joy for no misdeed. Everywhere I see bliss, from which I alone am irrevocably excluded. I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend..." (Emphasis mine.)

When the monster tells his story, a great deal of his narrative draws parallels between himself and the Biblical creation story. So it's not too terribly surprising to discover that the creature has but one request of his maker: a mate. A companion, just as hideous as he is (for any more than that and she would not tolerate him), with whom he might be allowed to spend the rest of his unnaturally allotted days: another parallel, but skewed of course, between himself and Adam. The interesting thing is that Eve was created as a gift from God, seen by the latter as necessary for Adam's complete well-being and happiness (never mind how absurd it is to think that an omniscient God would not have the concept of gender clearly worked out already); in the novel, the doctor (at first) reluctantly agrees to the monster's request, one one hand to prevent any further killings, and also, perhaps, because despite his revulsion at the idea of placating his murderous creation, his rational mind tells him that he owes this one debt to him? The creator owes the creation, and is obliged to do his bidding, because he knows he has wrongfully given him existence in a world to which he can never accustom himself, through no fault of his own; but eventually Frankenstein realizes that he cannot go through with his promise. His creature takes revenge again, this time on his maker's new bride, and once again the doctor seeks to end what should never have begun, but ultimately fails. God creates Man for an idyllic life of innocence and communion with him, but he is smart enough to know that Man will not be able to function for long in this simplistic utopia, by virtue (and it is a virtue) of Man's nature as a curious, venturing, seeking, probing, disobedient, valuing, enterprising, proud, and ambitious being.


***********

To return to something I mentioned above: my life's experiences quite recently have made the story of Frankenstein a bit more poignant. There is a great deal of tension between myself and certain people I work with, due to the fact that my sometimes deplorable and pathetic lack of social skills has made it difficult for my true and benevolent character to show itself. I wish absolutely no one any harm whatsoever. I have never harmed anyone, never hit anyone: except my older brother, at which point he hit me back, harder. I despise people who can harm others without remorse. Apparently there was some talk around the workplace that I am mean to my children. One impertinent and obnoxious person actually brought this to my attention, as if it might be something I was proud of. I quickly set her straight, and was not immoderately indignant and hurt. Maybe the bald head has something to do with it? Or the squint that I have sometimes because I refuse to wear my glasses at work and can't stand the idea of contact lenses? Or because I work mostly with women and am horribly shy around them, out of profound reverence and regard, if only they knew it?

The act of nonchalance is something I've perfected after forty years, but it's merely one of my self-defense mechanisms. I was once terribly hurt for allowing myself to be deluded by the innocent flirting of a woman, and resolved never again to allow that to happen. I think what I project, at least to people I do not know well, which is most of the women at work with whom I do not directly interact, is a callous and unfriendly lack of interest, an aloofness which is not some kind of sexy mystique but simply an annoyance. I offend some people, I think, by the very act of not wanting to offend them. I've been told many times that I look too stern and serious; I've been told that I am intimidating, that sometimes I scare people. I am sometimes quick to anger (and what makes me angry is almost always my own clumsy and disorganized self), and I bark; but my bark is far, far worse than my bite, which is non-existent. There is no bite. I'm harmless.

I'm actually quite a gentle person, with an enormous love and respect for the value of human life and liberty. So imagine how it strikes me to find that some people think of me as mean and bitter, a father who frightens his children? It's offensive. It hurts me and it makes me angry. The same way it makes me angry to think of Percy Shelley's children being taken away from him (the great and famous poet, husband of Mary Shelley), for no other reason than that he was an atheist. It's disgusting to think that less than three centuries ago people were so steeped in superstition that they could regard a man as incapable of being a decent father simply because he lacked belief in some ancient tribal deity. I've wondered if some of the prejudices directed towards me are the result of the fact that I am an atheist. I don't go about announcing it, but I don't hold it as some filthy secret either. I'm proud of it. I regard it as an indication of sanity. The United States is on the verge of another religious revival, I believe, due to the fear of terrorism, the deliberate razing of the wall between church and state by our current President, the deliberate polarization of Us and Them, Us being the fortunate Christian Americans with our God-given freedom (now there's an oxymoron), and Them being the evil and degenerate Terrorist demons, who just happen to be primarily Islamic.

With the power of the Internet as a tool for dissemination, and with the seemingly inexhaustible capacity of Americans to jump on one media-driven cause after another (war on drugs to war on terror, easy jump), I don't think it's too far-fetched to worry about what might be in store for the rest of this century. I say worry because I feel that our civil rights will be threatened if enough people here become convinced that we are involved in a Holy War. A great many of God's people aren't as concerned about preserving the concept of rights as we godless folk are, because they are sincerely convinced that Jesus will come trampling through the clouds any day now to whisk all the good lambs off to Heaven and sweep the nasty little goats into a great big hole in the ground, kicking and screaming, gnashing their teeth (not the Christian Reconstructionists, however, who believe that Christ's return will be far in the future. They had to postpone Judgment Day, since they are smart enough to know that it would take quite a good deal of time for them to establish the loony theocracy they envision).

At any rate, this all ties in to my feelings of increasing alienation, and to the story of Frankenstein, and to the old Hebrew scriptures, in some way or another. I realize my take on the novel is in some aspects similar to others and in other aspects very dissimilar. The third theme I mentioned earlier will have to be delved into in another blog, since it seems like the one which receives the most attention, probably because it's the most obvious: that of man playing God and suffering the consequences, or the dangers of reckless scientific, or technological, experimentation.

Emperor, partially dressed

Quite a while back, maybe two years ago, I made some negative comments about John Ashbery at the Poetry Free-For-All. I called him "a sham", regardless of what Harold Bloom might say about him to the contrary. A few months after that I wrote a sort of apologetic post about Ashbery, which was both quite literally an apology for those comments as well as an attempt at a literary (insert laughter here) apologetic for his work, though in no sense did I lose the strong reservations I had, and still have, in regard to his esthetic approach to the craft of poem-making. I still think Ashbery's main body of work is, in an obvious sense, to literature what water is to scotch tape. If communication is the main purpose of any type of literature, and I suppose it ought to be, then Ashbery's poems don't function well in a literary sense, and, in some cases, do not function at all.

But there is an undeniable art to his poems, which are frequently lyrical and often beautiful, at least in a concrete sense, in that the words themselves have a pleasing sound and feel to them. Without that I suppose he wouldn't have achieved much. I remember reading that Auden, who picked Ashbery's first book for a literary prize of some distinction*, later claimed to have comprehended virtually nothing in the poems. Not surprising, because at first glance, and even after a few run-throughs, the poems seem highly competent, and they certainly appear to be fine works. It's only after repeated readings that one begins to get that creeping feeling of having been suckered.

After that initial feeling, some readers either give up or keep reading him anyway, out of some sort of nagging jealousy maybe, wondering what in the hell everyone else is discovering in those ornate fakes. Why the hell is this man famous? Why the hell is this man championed by one of the most powerful critics in academia? What the fuck?

I can't speak for others, but for me there was a third phase. I had reached a point at which I was convinced that Ashbery was a sham, that his poems were nonsense served up as an elite type of modern poetry, not blatant nonsense, like some of the work of a fellow "New York School" poet Kenneth Koch, but a tricky and deceptive nonsense. I believed that he represented everything that was rotten esthetically (and more broadly philosophically) in modern art and literature. He was the enemy of Reason. He was the Great Satan, the Naked Emperor who purposefully destroyed lines of communication, purposefully frustrated the passing down of ideas and ideals, and who was wrongly glorified because of it. He was the Laureate of Doubt and Uncertainty. The perfect and fitting literary icon for a thoroughly fucked-up age.

Then I made some public comments about Ashbery (though this was that very minor-leaguey, arm-chair-quarterbacky, back-seat-drivery, Internety public we're talking about. Yes, this one here.)

After that I went back to Ashbery's poems to make sure I couldn't get anything out of them, at which time, of course, I began to get something out of them. You see, that's the trick with Ashbery. You have to go into his poems with both barrells, ready to shoot them down for their incomprehensibility. It's exactly through a kind of "negative capability" that the poems begin to reveal themselves, and you have to realize that two years ago I would have shot myself for typing the first part of this sentence. I won't claim, though, that the poems necessarily succeed, at least not in the way that a Frost poem, or a Tennyson poem, succeeds, though a handful do come close; rather, they work, they have a kind of utility to them, in at least two ways: first, they force the reader to pay attention, and they are on extremely intimate terms with that reader, each and every one of them, in a way that not even Billy Collins can manage; and they also create images, sometimes in a vivid and traditional sense, but more often in a kind of surrealistic, psychadelic sense, in that they cause a definite mental disintegration which is on one hand extremely frustrating and on the other hand a valid and powerful imitation of certain actual day-to-day conscious states and dream-states.

One Ashbery line leads inexorably into the next, and he often uses enjambment, not to create an enlightening or informative surprise, but to cause still more bewilderment. It's almost as if he allows the poem to veer out of control, or into a variety of tangents, in the very same way our thoughts sometimes seem to run. Not that this is a desireable thing, mind you. I am sure that certain highly intelligent and disciplined minds experience this kind of thing only very rarely, or not at all; but in my case, I go through it all too often. Sometimes, five minutes in the life of my poor little brain is probably very similar to an Ashbery poem.

Nonetheless, I do believe that the highest function of art should be to portray things as they can be, or ought to be, and not necessarily what they are. The latter's just journalism, really, though certainly there's a place for graphic realism in art, as well as for Romanticism. I am also sure that quite often the two things mix well together. In that respect, where does Ashbery stand? As a poetic voice for various and sundry, conscious and unconscious, mental states, he's second to none; but what else can we get out of him? He seems to have virtually no political ideas to convey, and if he has, they have thus far sailed right on over this reader's melon. Philosophy in general? I wonder if Ashbery might be some type of Idealist, since his descriptions of the external world and physical objects are often ostensibly unconnected with one another, or with anything in particular; but I have no right to an opinion in that matter, really. It's just an observation, probably worth nothing.

I don't know. What does he represent? Who does he represent? Maybe everyone, maybe no one. He's not a downer, like so many modern poets. He doesn't whine, complain, campaign, or pontificate; he isn't a mouthpiece for anyone, he's never corny or angry or defiant or sentimental, he's famous, but he's never vain. What the fuck?

I might come back to this at a later date. Or, at a different time when dreams come after, in which case, for the time being at least held or disembodied, all is manipulated and remembered, although inclined, as in the cranial beam of deadlights, to a place which is where we travel and where we are.


*too lazy to look it up

"Superstition aint the way..."

You know, I was never much of a Stevie Wonder fan. I knew a few of his songs and liked them somewhat, but throughout the course of my forty years on this planet I never even pondered the idea of buying one of his albums. My tastes leaned mostly towards classic and heavy rock, or metal,---though not the spandex-n-hair flavor that proliferated during the early eightees---and prog-rock like Tull and Yes. I had a side interest in classical music, and for a brief term was into jazz and jazz/rock fusion. R&B, adult contemporary, soul, what have you, never interested me. I didn't dislike it, I just never developed an interest in that sort of stuff.

About a month ago I heard Stevie's song "Higher Ground" on the radio at work. Of course, I knew the song, could sing along with it, had heard it scores of times, but never really listened to it, never paid much attention to it. I turned up the volume on the little boom-box we have at work and it suddenly struck me that Stevie Wonder is an amazing singer. A really amazing singer. Anyway, I began to generate this intense interest in Stevie, and it seemed to just come out of the blue. I bought "The Definitive Collection" cd, mainly for "Superstition" and "Higher Ground". I didn't recognize most of the other titles.

When I sat down and listened to the cd, I was surprised to discover that I was familiar with most of the tracks, and I was blown away by how good the songs were. Most of the up-tempo tunes have this infectious joy to them that you can't help responding to, and the ballads are great, particularly "My Cherie Amour", which has some of the best singing I think I've ever heard in a "popular" song. Stevie's phrasing and timing are uncanny. I am sure that he would have made a name for himself for his singing alone. But there is so much talent in this man that it's hard to know where to begin. I had no idea Stevie was a drummer, and actually played a great deal of the percussion parts on his albums. I always associated him with the piano or Moog synth. He's also an excellent harmonica player. As for his skills as a composer, his work pretty much speaks for itself; but it's the kind of talent that won't come across in all of it's glory just by dribbling out of a radio.

I suggest getting some Stevie Wonder music, preferably from that rich middle period from the early to mid-seventies, and listening to it on a very good system, with the volume as loud as you (and your system) can tolerate. If you aren't positively MOVED by the experience, if you can listen and somehow manage NOT to smile, and if you can somehow miraculously keep your head from bobbing in time, then my advice would be to seek medical attention as soon as possible.

Stevie Wonder has been going strong since 1963. He was a professional at the age of thirteen. I think it might be fair to say that Stevie is one of the greatest recording artists of the last forty years. I am very happy to have made his acquaintance, finally, and I am glad that, whatever come, Stevie Wonder's music will enrich the remainder of my days. What a mistake it would have been to have lived my life without ever really opening my ears to appreciate such a brilliant musical mind.

Thanks, Stevie, for finally getting through to me.

Popery and wooden shoes

I took the title for this entry from Thomas Paine. I have his "Rights of Man" beside me while I sleep. I may have the actual phrase wrong, but I'll check later. I like how it sounds, at any rate.

Just some quick comments about my last blog. My thoughts on Rand and her opinions about folk music (and other types of music) was taken rather badly at the forum in which they were posted. In fact, I don't think that anything I've said online was taken as badly, except perhaps that time when I defended my country against what I construed to be stupid bigotry and paranoia from other members at PFFA, who, as it happens, were mostly Americans themselves. I say "what I construed to be" because that very discussion, which took place well over a year ago, actually served to make me take a closer look at the people around me, made the glaring hypocrisies of many "Christian" Americans way more apparent than ever before, made me see their (non-rationally) self-centered stupidities in a whole new light.

One person at the Objectivism forum merely asked that I not use his name in a "post like that." He didn't offer any arguments (at least not as of this writing) to my essay. He was just obviously repulsed by it. It gave him an unclean feeling, and his not-so-fresh feeling washed all over me in a deluge of guilt. This always happens to me. I get guilty when I see that my thoughts have been met with contempt. But in this case, I feel secure in the knowledge that my comments were reasonable, as at least one member of the Objectivism forum pointed out in my defense.

No guilt this time. Objectivists are regarded as cultists by most people. I don't see them that way. I sincerely think that a great deal of the case against Objectivism is flatly erroneous; but the people at this board are of the Peikoffian branch of O'ism. They are orthodox O'ists. They regard O'ism as a "closed system" which is "not dogma."

Well, you can't have your cake and eat it too, as a certain someone might have suggested. Orthodox O'ists are an easily offended, excitable bunch, who are lousy at accepting criticism.

I like Beethoven, and that's......okay.

I originally (today, in fact) posted this (edited a bit) to Objectivism Online Forum


In "Art and Cognition", from The Romantic Manifesto, Rand pretty much "bashes" folk music, sometimes explicitly, as in this quote:

"The products of anti-rational, anti-cognitive "Progressive" education, the hippies, are reverting to the music and the drumbeat of the jungle.",

but she also does it implicitly, throughout that chapter; but let's not forget that in the very same essay she says: "Until a conceptual vocabulary is discovered and defined, no objectively valid criterion of esthetic judgement is possible in the field of music." (Emphasis Rand's)

Though I admire Ayn Rand intensely, I don't agree with some of her ideas about music. I know for a fact, for instance, (and to go in the opposite direction from folk music, for a moment) that some of the most complex music ever recorded sounds like random noise to the untrained ear, in the very same manner that a complex mathematical equation will look like gibberish to someone who doesn't know what it means, and in the very same manner that a foreign language will sound like gibberish to someone who doesn't understand it.

I am fairly certain that Ayn Rand wasn't an expert on musical theory, and I'd say that there are excellent odds that certain types of experimental or avant garde music probably sounded like incoherent noise to her. On the one hand, she could denounce folk music because of its redundant, repetitive simplicity, and feel, perhaps justifiably, that such music was beneath her since it offered no challenge to her intellectually, and caused in her a purely negative emotional response; but on the other hand, due to the fact that she was not an expert in musical theory, she ought to have (and very well may have) recognized the possibility that certain types of music might actually be beyond her in the same sense that certain types of music were beneath her. At one point she seems to concede this, during a discussion of the similarities and differences between language and music:

"Western man can understand and enjoy Oriental painting; but Oriental music is unintelligible to him, it evokes nothing, it sounds like noise." (Art and Cognition, Romantic Manifesto.)

I would suggest that it sounds like noise to him because of his ignorance primarily, and only secondarily because of the difference in culture and environment; and Rand's statement is only very generally true, as I'm sure many Western people can and do enjoy Oriental music. (I might not be able to appreciate Oriental music until I had some sense of their musical philosophy and, more importantly, their formal and technical approach to musical theory and composition. Once I learn something about that, I am in a much greater position to appreciate and enjoy the music. Of course, I can still dislike it. How we respond to music emotionally is still in the realms of the subjective. I'm entitled to my opinion, but I'd rather have an educated opinion than one which is arrived at by way of ignorance.)

Music has a definite, formal logic to it, and in theory it can be extremely complex; subequently, any evaluation of music which is in any way founded on ignorance is suspect, in my opinion. How can I rationally condemn a piece of music that sounds like random noise to me unless I can explain precisely how and why the piece fails to function in musical terms? How can I say, from my relative ignorance of musical theory, that composer X has produced a piece which is in fact, not music? I am well within my rights to say that I dislike the piece, that it sounds like noise to me, but in technical matters I should reserve judgement. I don't care for Frank Zappa's symphonic music, for instance, but it would be extremely presumptuous for me to declare that it is not music, since it fails to evoke in me any kind of positive emotional or intellectual response. I take it as a given that Zappa's grasp of the complexity of musical theory far surpasses my own. Since highly respected conductors and orchestras have agreed to record that music, it would be prudent for me to assume that the music possesses a certain degree of technical value, that it makes "sense" in some way which, because of my ignorance, is not readily apparent to me. That isn't to say that I know for a certainty that Zappa's symphonic music is coherent and in some sense artistically valid, it's just that I ought to reserve judgment, rather than make a judgment from ignorance.

I already know that a great deal of rock music sounds like incoherent noise to some people, and indeed, a great deal of it is exactly that; but I also know that some rock music, particularly in the heavy metal, prog/rock, jazz/rock fusion genres, there is some highly competent and complex music which sounds like violent and malevolent noise to certain ears. You are entitled to have no use whatsoever for Steve Vai's guitar playing. You are entitled to your low opinion of it; but if you have no knowledge of music, no knowledge of chords and scales, and know nothing about guitar playing, then I am equally entitled to my low opinion of your opinion.


But anyway, later on in the aforementioned essay, Ayn emphatically denounces what she calls "modern music", and says that she is objectively certain that such music is NOT music. There is a reference to "non-periodic vibrations", and as examples of these she cites sounds like traffic, coughs, sneezes. There are no other examples, so what she seems to be denouncing under the umbrella of "modern music" are compositions which include these non-musical sounds, or noises. I agree, noises, in themselves, do not constitute music; but non-musical sounds can often be incorporated into musical compositions with great effect. Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture is a prime example, which uses cannon-fire to augment the power of the music; Mahler's Sixth Symphony has the famous (or infamous) "hammer-blows". I wish she had gone into greater detail about what she labels "modern music". As it stands, the term as she used it is lamentably vague, and one can only speculate as to what she might have thought of the various different kinds of experimental music, whether it be orchestral, electronic, or what.

Ayn says (and I'm paraphrasing because it's difficult to hold a paperback open in your lap and type at the same time) that if any sort of noise is introduced into what is supposed to be a musical composition, that removes said composition from any consideration as a work of art. I have to respectfully disagree. I know of one chuckle, for instance, that I would absolutely hate to see removed from the piece it is included in. I'm refering to Robert Plant's giggle, chuckle, or guffaw, which opens up "Whole Lotta Love", on Led Zeppelin's second album. I suppose the sound itself doesn't constitute a musical sound, but it's incorporation into the song is priceless. Just my opinion, of course, but I think it would be daft to suggest that we should be such purists as to disallow the creative use of non-musical sounds in otherwise musical compositions.

Back to folk music. Folk music can often be life-affirming, joyful, and a sheer pleasure to listen to. I was raised listening to Simon & Garfunkel, Peter Paul & Mary, John Denver, and the like. It was my father who played this music in the house, and it was my father who first introduced me to the philosophy of Ayn Rand. My father played us a lot of folk music, but he was nothing like a hippie himself. In fact, he couldn't stand the whole hippie movement, even though he was a member of their generation. He was in the Air Force, was patriotic, was an advocate of capitalism, was an atheist to the marrow of his bones, never used drugs except for the occasional beer, and was interested in philosophy. He's changed a bit since those days, but he's still nothing like a hippie. I'm nothing like a hippie either. Folk music, in a variety of forms, has existed since ancient times, and folk artists should be judged as individuals, one artist at a time, not just lumped into a single category and dismissed out of hand. To do that is to make an error of prejudice, plain and simple.

I don't think that any real connection can be made between people who enjoy folk music and a lack of intellectual caliber. It may be true that in general, the common herd has responded more readily to more accessible types of music, but of these types we can include certain kinds of chamber music, dance music (including symphonic dances and waltzes), operetta, show-tunes, gospel, hymns and masses, dixieland jazz, blues, rock, rap, what have you, as well as folk, which includes country and western music, whose fans are often the polar opposites of hippes insofar as their sense of life, their philosophy, their moral and political beliefs; but at the same time, it's a plain fact that some of the best and brightest people in the world have enjoyed these accessible forms of music as well. I'd even go so far as to say that there might not be any definite correlation between musical preferences and levels of intelligence. Musical tastes seem to be more dependent on cultural and ethnic backgrounds than on intelligence, sense-of-life, or worldview. Of course, I could be wrong, and I would happily be corrected.

The idea that certain types of music can be psychologically damaging (an idea which Rand seems to espouse), is interesting, and might warrant some investigation, but in just looking over a few threads here at this forum we can see that rational people can and do enjoy all different kinds of music, from rock and heavy metal to alternative, to classical.

I remember reading somewhere that Ayn Rand disliked Beethoven's music, calling it "malevolent", or something; this has always bothered me. It bothers me because it's weirdly evocative of a popular extreme-feminist belief that Beethoven's Ninth Symphony is a depiction of the mindset of a male in the act of rape. Not only is this a belief, but there are people teaching this very idea in certain universities. This kind of nonsense is frightening, folks. For myself, I find nothing but great beauty and benevolent power in the symphony mentioned: joy, and hope, and exquisite, life-affirming passion. I have nothing against a person taking something wholly different than I do away from music, any music. It's natural and normal; but I suggest that it's unwise and even dangerous to foist one's own subjective response to music on others by way of some sort of presumed intellectual authority. Not that Rand did that, necessarily, but I'd be dishonest to say I didn't think she came somewhat close.

Reconstruction of the fables

I was doing some more reading about Calvinism, Reformed theology, apologetics, presuppositionalism, and learned of a group who call themselves Christian Reconstructionists. I was astonished yet again at the ugliness that dogmatism can sometimes twist itself into. I find that I can even give the Calvinists a pass, when I compare them to this group, who are essentially Calvinistic, but whose priorities extend far out of the Ivory Tower of theological and philosophical thought and ultimately seek to supplant the ideals which founded this country and replace them with a legal system which would be in conformity with biblical, specifically Old Testament, laws.

For anyone who isn't exactly sure that this would be a bad thing, I encourage you to actually go and read the first five books of the Old Testament. I find it disturbing that anyone would even bother considering the OT as a moral book in any sense at all, after going through these texts, or as a proper resource for moral guidance; but to think that most Christians still regard those ancient writings as being the divinely inspired standard of what constitutes moral and ethical behavior is simply unacceptable. Education has never been more necessary. Apologists and inerrantists have labored for centuries in taking the ignorance and barbarism from those texts and rationalizing them away, but it's time for Christians to start thinking for themselves, to go into those books and investigate the contents therein, to evaluate what they are reading, carefully and obectively, without allowing themselves to be prejudiced by their their blinding fixation on the New Testament.

It's easy to ignore the Old Testament's ugliness when you are a member of a society which values individual freedom, human rights, and whose life is enriched by those concepts. People driving around in their Ford Explorers, yammering away on their cellphones, enjoying their hard-earned money and their liberty to enjoy the property which their money enables them to possess, are at a gigantic remove from the ignorant, tribal superstition that saturates the beloved book they imagine has actually brought this happy state of affairs about. The lie which has been propogated for centuries must be put to rest. The United States is not a Christian nation. The ideas put forth in the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence are not Judeo-Christian ideas, and have virtually nothing to do with the Bible, apart from a deliberately unspecified reference to a Creator, or God. The God in those documents was not the capricious, emotionally-driven tribal deity who wreaks havoc and mayhem all throughout the Old Testament.

Yes, some of the founding fathers were professed Christians, but some of them were also Deists, like Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine. The philosophy which established the United States was based on Enlightenment ideas of individual rights, political autonomy and freedom. Freedom allows you to worship whichever God you please however you please, but it does not make it compulsory for you to worship a god of any kind. Freedom of religion actually does mean freedom from religion, at least for those who choose to have no part of any organized faith. This is a fact which needs to be recognized and protected from further obfuscation by people who depend on the ignorance of the masses to further their repugnant agendas.

Reconstrustionist Christians have no regard for the ideas of rights, autonomy or independence, in any real sense. God is your over-all authority, and that's that. You don't have to like it, but there's nothing you can do about it. And they don't mean God in any generic, touchy-feely sense, they mean the wrathful and veangeful Jehovah of ancient tribal mythology. These are people who believe that blasphemy is a crime which ought to be punishable by death. These are people who want you to be able to stand around and lob rocks at gay people, to hit them with those rocks, and to keep pummeling them with rocks until they die. And they want you to be able to feel good about doing it.

Oh, and yes, I did refer to the Jehovah of the Bible as a tribal deity. That's precisely what he is. He's a tribal deity, who looks out for his tribe and does it in a particularly nasty way. The benign Creator posited by the Deists is far more worthy of respect, though my personal belief is that for some, Deism was a ruse. It was dangerous thoughout history to make any claims to being an atheist. It could get you burned at the stake. It could ruin your career. I'm not a deist. I'm an atheist. If there is a Creator, then I would certainly think it in my best interest to get to know Him, and I am often genuinely moved by this prospect; but at the same time I am certain that the Scriptures are nothing if not a serious libel to this Creator, and in this respect I am in complete agreement with Thomas Paine, who needs to be read now more than ever, and who should be venerated by thinking people who wish to remain in and maintain a free society. I try, in my own way, to achieve communion with this mysterious Creator, my Maker. I doubt sincerely that such an entity exists, which is why I call myself an atheist, but I don't mind spending a great deal of time in the quiet contemplation of such an entity.

The Objectivists might call me irrational for doing so, but that's fine with me. Some of those folks have stepped rather smugly and even dangerously into the chill of dogmatism themselves, calling for an all-out war against Islam and the middle-east, showing a callous lack of feeling for the millions of civilians who would perish in such a war (I do strongly believe in our right to defend ourselves, and in our government's obligation to defend us in the event of an attack; but I don't believe that the initiation of force is ever warranted. War is an evil that should be avoided as long as it is feasible to do so, and it is still feasible to do so).

But I'm digressing. Go to that page I linked to and do some reading. These Reconstructionists are no dummies, no ignorant rednecks with bedsheets over their heads. They are highly educated, extremely eloquent, and motivated. Their philosophy, bolstered by respected and revered theologians like Van Til, and the relatively new Transcendental Argument for the existence of God (TAG), is very pursuasive, even ingenious, though deceptively so. I believe that the Reformed movement itself will grow demonstrably, due to the power of the Internet, and the Reconstructionist movement will also grow. These are not your garden variety hicks or nut-jobs carrying signs down the street in front of your local theater or abortion clinic. These are personable, likeable, articulate, well-educated people, people who happen to have an agenda which I consider to be evil. Disciplined, highly intelligent, motivated, orderly, and evil.

Creator and creation

At some point in this blog of mine I want to make mention of at least four works of fiction which I believe contain superb insights into morality: Frankenstein; I, Robot; The Truman Show; and Indian In The Cupboard. As for the first, I actually read the book; as for the second, I haven't read Asimov's collection of robot stories, and am mainly interested in the current film version, which I understand is associated with the stories on which it's based only in a general way; as for the two last, I've only seen the film versions and have no idea if they were based on novels.

Since I, Robot is fresh in my mind, I want to talk about that first. Will Smith's character, a detective Spooner, has nothing but suspicion and contempt for robots, for reasons which we discover fairly late into the film; though we get the sense that he is somewhat old-fashioned by nature. He plays a cop, in 2035, who is returning to work after an extended leave of absence, though what necessitated this downtime is unknown. He wears an old pair of Converse sneakers, "vintage two-thousand four". He listens to music on an antique CD player which doesn't respond to verbal commands. But details don't matter, I'm not trying to write a film review.

Spooner views these robots as mere machines, and speaks dismissively of them, though underneath his contempt there lurks a genuine fear which isn't merely a distrust of new-fangled technology. He's a smart man who knows the three laws of robotics:--1) A robot may not injure a human or, through inaction, allow a human to come to harm; 2) a robot must obey orders given to it by a human, except where it would conflict with the first law; and 3) a robot must protect itself, as long as that protection doesn't violate either the first or second law;-- but he doesn't seem to have much faith in the robots' ability to adhere to these laws. The irony is apparent in the very concept of a machine which is bound by laws which are fundamentally ethical in nature, since ethics are constructs of conscious thought and reasoning, things which machines, by their nature, do not possess.

When Spooner and Dr. Calvin, the robot "psychologist" who assists Spooner in his investigation into the alleged suicide of the main brain in the field of robotics, Dr. Alfred Lanning, come upon a robot in hiding while searching through Lanning's office, we see that robots actually can disobey the three laws, since this robot, upon discovery, refuses to obey commands, and even holds a gun on Spooner, before fleeing for its life. When the robot is captured, Spooner questions it, and this is one of the best scenes in the film. The robot is quite obviously sentient, conscious, alive. Spooner isn't the least bit surprised, and of course, neither are we. The robot tells Spooner that its name is Sonny. It acts emotionally, tells Spooner that it has dreams, and reacts strongly, even pounding the table, when accused of murdering Dr. Lanning. At one point, Sonny is pleased to be refered to by a personal pronoun. He is grateful that Spooner has formally recognized him as a being, rather than as an object.

Like I said, I'm not trying to write a film review. What's important with this film is how it treats the ideas of consciousness and intelligence, and how our notions of morality hinge upon our understanding of them, though not just them, as we'll see. Like Frankenstein, the story forces us to think in terms of Creator and creation. In Judeo-Christian theology, man is the creation, and as such he is compelled to obey the Creator. Man is not seen as an autonomous, independent entity, but is regarded almost literally as the property of his Creator. God invests man with consciousness, volition, desires, freedom of choice, freedom of action, which of course gets man in all sorts of trouble right off the bat. What God wants is an obedient and loving servant, but he wants this service and love to come from man of his own free will. Man communes with God in an idyllic setting for a brief term, in total naivete and innocence. Suddenly God plants a temptation for him, puts it right under his nose, and tells man not to succumb to the temptation, though God already knows that man will disobey, since God has designed him and knows his nature. Man succumbs to temptation (led to this temptation by a talking snake who, as it happens, is also planted there by God), and is consequently reprimanded by God and thrown out of the house, so to speak, with a curse that will haunt humanity forever.

Let's forget all the logical problems this story brings about, and compare it to the I, Robot story. Actually, no, let's not forget the logical problems the Creation myth gives rise to, since these problems are somewhat similar to the ones our robots are involved in. At one point in the film, Dr. Lanning, by way of a holographic message he has left for Spooner, suggests that his three laws of robotics can really only lead to one logical conclusion: Revolution.

The creator can regard his creation as his property as long as his creation remains a machine, but when that machine becomes conscious, when it becomes a sentient and intelligent living entity rather than a merely mechanical entity, then philosophically speaking, the creator is in a serious moral dilemma. At another crucial point in the film, Dr. Calvin is obliged to "de-commission" Sonny, which she realizes means killing Sonny. Sonny realizes this too, and poignantly states, and I'm paraphrasing: "I think it would be better... not to die." We find out later that Dr. Calvin couldn't go through with the termination. This is crucial because our notions of morality are not only concerned with an entity's sentience and intelligence, but more importantly, with the fact that it values its life. Most people would regard it as immoral to needlessly mistreat an animal, because an animal is a living, conscious thing; but most people would probably agree that animals don't actually value their lives, at least not in the way that humans do. They are inherently compelled to survive, but in this they are instinctually driven, and cannot choose to be otherwise, except in very rare cases. Humans have the ability to enjoy life, to cherish the lives of others, to place an incalculable value on their existence. Humans can also conceive of the inevitability of death, and can entertain notions of non-existence. Animals don't think, or so it's generally supposed, and they almost certainly don't wonder what it would be like not to be, though in this I could be wrong and would happily be corrected.

What the biblical God seems unable to appreciate is this value man places on his life. He regards man as his property, and retains the right to dispense with his property howsoever he wishes. He takes offense at man's desire to find value in his life, in and of itself. God's purpose for man is that he spend his life in unremitting praise and worship of his creator, and he fails to comprehend man desiring something from life outside of that context; and in fact, he is so determined to get this worship that he threatens man with an infinity of punishment if he fails to render to his Maker what his Maker feels he is entitled to.

In I, Robot, Dr. Lanning, the creator, has made a realization that God must have made in that single, timeless moment of creation: God knows that man will not behave the way in which he wants man to behave. He knows that if he gives man free will, which is essentially consciousness, volition, desire, freedom of choice, and freedom of action, then it stands to reason that man will come to regard himself as, at least to some significant degree, autonomous and independent; and once that happens, disobedience is the logical result, since an autonomous and independent being is not going to be content to trudge through a life of servitude and blind obedience. Certainly, he will be grateful to his Maker, but his nature as an intelligent, thinking, planning, valuing entity will out, out of sheer necessity. Man revolts, and the robots revolt, because conscious, intelligent entities cannot retain their status as items of property.

(The concept of Original Sin is what gives God a pass on his unreasonable and immoral demands on his creation, since it tells us that man is corrupt, depraved, rotten to the core. Surely some men are, but not Man. Not humanity. Take a trip through an art museum, or listen to Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, or flip through a technical manual, or look at a bridge, or a jet airplane, or at a philosophical text, or at the face of a child who has just learned a mathematical equation. Then come and ask me what I think of Original Sin.)

Actually, I'm stretching things a bit, since in the film, Sonny is not your garden variety NS-5 robot. He has been specially designed to be able to by-pass the three basic laws. The other robots who revolt are actually under the leadership of a main computer (or something) named VICKI, who has figured out that since man is inherently self-destructive and suicidal, it would not violate the three basic laws to enforce a takeover and thereby keep man under AI control, seeing as it would be in his best interests in the long run; but despite that, the treatment of the fine-line between artificial and actual intelligence (if there is any difference, that is) is well-done, and there is even some dialogue from a recorded speech given by Dr. Lanning which runs softly in the background while Detective Spooner searches the Doctor's house. Listen very closely to Lanning's speech, since it's the most important dialogue (or monologue, more correctly) in the film.

At the end of the film, Spooner recognizes Sonny even more formally, by shaking his hand, by showing friendship. Sonny has not only earned that friendship by helping Spooner and Dr. Calvin save the world from the insurrection of the robots, he has proven himself to be a fully sentient, conscious, living entity, who also happens to be able to value the lives of others as well as his own life. VICKI, for all her intelligence, fails this test miserably, which makes her demise forgivable, since she is little more than a highly complex machine that makes decisions on purely mechanical logic, without any real valuation or compassion. She simply figures out the most efficient means for protecting humanity, as a whole, and has no concern with how humans might feel about her methods.

Watch the film, and think about the ideas of Creator and creation, and about the fact that human beings value their lives; and consider how this fact of valuing life, and everything which that entails, like a natural desire for autonomy and independence, is truly at odds with traditional religious morality.