25 February 2018

About The Shootings

With acknowledgement to the Chuck Gallery.
By Thomas Scarborough
About the tragic shootings in the USA, a few things are clear. Firstly, they have been possible because the weapons were accessible. Secondly, they have happened, by and large, in educational institutions. Thirdly, the shooters have targeted institutions, not individuals.
I have had the privilege of studying theology in the USA. I have studied, too, in other parts of the world. Yet what I experienced in the USA seemed unlike anything else. There was a rising feeling within me of being violated. Thankfully I never had any thoughts of harming anyone—yet the thought crossed my mind: could there be any relation to the massacres?

Beyond that sense of violation, in many cases, students may struggle to know what they are experiencing. In my own case, the situation was unusually transparent. It was not difficult to connect my feelings with the ideology which aroused them.

In theology, there has been a growing tide in the USA, which has its origins in the philosophy of Europe in the mid 20th century—more exactly, in the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein. The theologian R.L. Sturch describes it like this, in the New Dictionary of Theology: ‘In terms derived from Wittgenstein, religion may be seen as a ‘form of life’ or ‘language-game’. Debate within the ‘form of life’ is legitimate, but about the form itself there can be none; either it is adopted or it is not.’ Without so much as entering into theological niceties, we may note some strong language: a form of life ‘is adopted, or it is not’, while debate is ‘legitimate’ only within a given life form. 

Take an instance of such theology, which calls itself a Theology of Communal Practice. Theologians Nancey Murphy and Brad Kallenburg state, ‘What has to be accepted, the given, is—so one could say—forms of life ... The viability of a historical community depends on the ongoing felicity of its communications. Thus, for the society to be viable, most of this communication has to be ‘true’ most of the time.’ Again, without so much as doing any theological analysis, we may simply note the strong language: forms of life ‘have to be accepted’, they are ‘given’, and they ‘have to be true’.

While this hardly serves to prove a point, such ‘compulsive’ thinking is all-pervasive in theological seminaries in the USA—while it is its application that creates the stress.

How should one guarantee ‘felicity of communications’? How should one preserve ‘legitimate' debate? How should one press ‘acceptance’? It need not be through open confrontation—in fact it may more often than not be through the violence of silence. ‘Illegitimate’ debate is greeted with silent stares—or it is channeled, rerouted, deflected. It stacks reading lists, it sustains and manages felicitous communications, it promotes methodological exercises which skirt around the content. In short, it defeats the student. This is the violation.

Is this felt in other educational institutions in the USA? While I do not have direct experience of it, the answer is yes. The psychologist Peter Gray, in Psychology Today, surveyed the ‘seven sins’ of US education. One of the items on his list was ‘Inhibition of critical thinking.’ There is a ‘powerful force’, he wrote, ‘against honest debate’. Yet the force is not merely theoretical. There are students who feel it. Forensic psychologist Stephen Diamond puts the violence down to this: ‘We are prone to feeling hurt’—and in some cases, pathologically.

Seung Hui Cho was a killer who issued a manifesto. On page one, he wrote, ‘Ask yourself what you did to me.’ His entire manifesto, while on the one hand an inscrutable rant, on the other hand reveals a sense of being violated. ‘For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction,’ he wrote. Is this the reaction to the ‘powerful force against honest debate’?

A brief post such as this cannot hope to answer this question—yet it is surely a question which needs to be asked, and answered. As much as one needs to control access to weapons, one may equally need to overhaul the educational system—and its philosophy.

Huston Smith, a popular writer on religion, considered, ‘Our humanness flourishes to the extent that we steep ourselves in [ultimate] questions—ponder them, circle them, obsess over them, and in the end allow the obsession to consume us.’ There is little humanness in excluding or marginalising issues—in speaking the language of the ‘given’, the ‘legitimate’, and so on—whether it be in seminaries or elsewhere. One needs the marketplace of ideas—together with the freedom, transparency, bravery, and skill that its negotiation requires.

18 February 2018

Fermi's Paradox . . . But What If?


Posted by Keith Tidman

Seven decades ago, the physicist-of-atomic-bomb-fame, Enrico Fermi, pondered with his lunchtime companions at Los Alamos whether other intelligent life forms populate planets around the Milky Way, and if so, why we have no evidence of them? He purportedly asked, “Where are they?”, meaning, of course, the alien beings. Because if other complex, intelligent, technology-clever life forms have even a fraction of humankind’s proclivity toward curiosity and, let’s say, colonization, then why is there no evidence of them having acted on these instincts throughout our galaxy? From that conundrum, Fermi’s Paradox emerged.

The American astrophysicist, Frank Drake, later thought about which factors might be necessary to address Fermi’s question and, in particular, how many technological civilizations, emitting electromagnetic signals, might exist among the stars of just our galaxy alone. These became known as Drake’s Equation, and offer a way to calculate the number of civilizations in the Milky Way based on seven variables.* Although scientists can’t yet insert firm numbers for the variables, I think Drake’s effort remains a worthy first attempt at eventually quantifying an answer to Fermi’s question. Especially given that the physical laws of evolution could well differ among far-flung, unfamiliarly diverse chemical, biological, and physical conditions and constraints, yielding singularly different intelligent species.

Many ‘what if’ hypotheses exist by way of possible answers to Fermi’s deceptively simple question. For example, perhaps technology-based civilizations and species with sophisticated intelligence are too far separated by space and time, measured even in thousands of light-years to reveal any presence. Or perhaps, because of the finely grained conditions necessary for life with high intelligence to evolve (the ‘anthropic principle’), civilizations are so rare and scattered that it’s difficult to find each other. Certainly it seems that our own sending-receiving (and space-faring) technologies are too primitive to matter much yet in the sophisticated game of cosmic outreach. Or just perhaps other civilizations have potted us, but rregard humankind as too biologically and intellectually primitive a species to bother with whom to show their hand. Or perhaps they regard humankind as a prototypically warring species, never-endingly engaged in small-minded, lethal belligerence over territory, resources, and power. Perhaps all intelligent species tend toward self-isolating wariness that outweighs curiosity about ‘the other’. Perhaps Thucydides’ theis that established and rising powers are compelled to go to war applies even on the interplanetary scale.

All that said, should there eventually be confirmation of alien intelligent species that are endowed with far higher levels of consciousness and intelligence than humankind — qualities having evolved over histories hundreds of thousands or millions of years older than ours — then the consequence would be culturally tectonic shifting. As a species, perhaps lulled by so easily triumphing over so many of our Earthly competitors, we’re prone to indulging in flights of ‘exceptionalism’. We’re predisposed to looking at our reflection in life’s mirror and — more often looking down, not up — seeing only reasons to preen over our capacity for rationality, creativity, and imagination. To be unseated, with a thud, by an alien species’ cognitive prowess — and the benefits to its civilization — could prove unsettling for humankind’s indulgences in unchallenged exceptionalism.

At the very least, discovery of our sudden non-uniqueness might compel re-examination of basic principles. It might lead to fundamentally questioning religious texts, customs, tenets, rituals, codes of morality, ‘spirituality’, and dicta. If so, the result may be to rethink and rewrite the underlying explanations and descriptions, widening out the aperture of religious philosophy and theology to take into account the new realities of not being alone in the galaxy and in larger cosmos. At the heart of such teleological investigation and reinvention might be questions, which never go away, about humankind’s purpose: about why we are here.

The stunning space-time topography of this universe isn’t hubristically ours alone. I venture it’s a matter of when, not whether, the ‘code’ to Fermi’s Paradox will be cracked.



*Drake’s equation, as in our image, is typically shown as follows:

N = R* fp ne fl fi fc L,

Here N is the number of civilizations in the Milky Way whose electromagnetic emissions are detectable; R* is the rate of formation of stars suitable for the development of intelligent life; fp is the fraction of those stars with planetary systems; ne is the number of planets, per solar system, with an environment suitable for life (the habitable, ‘Goldilocks’ zones around their suns); fl is the fraction of suitable planets on which life actually appears; fi is the fraction of life-bearing planets on which intelligent life emerges; fc is the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space; and L is the length of time such civilizations release detectable signals into space.


Fermi's Paradox . . . But What If?


Posted by Keith Tidman

Seven decades ago, the physicist-of-atomic-bomb-fame, Enrico Fermi, pondered with his lunchtime companions at Los Alamos whether other intelligent life forms populate planets around the Milky Way, and if so, why we have no evidence of them? He purportedly asked, “Where are they?”, meaning, of course, the alien beings. Because if other complex, intelligent, technology-clever life forms have even a fraction of humankind’s proclivity toward curiosity and, let’s say, colonization, then why is there no evidence of them having acted on these instincts throughout our galaxy? From that conundrum, Fermi’s Paradox emerged.

The American astrophysicist, Frank Drake, later thought about which factors might be necessary to address Fermi’s question and, in particular, how many technological civilizations, emitting electromagnetic signals, might exist among the stars of just our galaxy alone. These became known as Drake’s Equation, and offer a way to calculate the number of civilizations in the Milky Way based on seven variables.* Although scientists can’t yet insert firm numbers for the variables, I think Drake’s effort remains a worthy first attempt at eventually quantifying an answer to Fermi’s question. Especially given that the physical laws of evolution could well differ among far-flung, unfamiliarly diverse chemical, biological, and physical conditions and constraints, yielding singularly different intelligent species.

Many ‘what if’ hypotheses exist by way of possible answers to Fermi’s deceptively simple question. For example, perhaps technology-based civilizations and species with sophisticated intelligence are too far separated by space and time, measured even in thousands of light-years to reveal any presence. Or perhaps, because of the finely grained conditions necessary for life with high intelligence to evolve (the ‘anthropic principle’), civilizations are so rare and scattered that it’s difficult to find each other. Certainly it seems that our own sending-receiving (and space-faring) technologies are too primitive to matter much yet in the sophisticated game of cosmic outreach. Or just perhaps other civilizations have spotted us, but regard humankind as too biologically and intellectually primitive a species to bother with whom to show their hand. Or perhaps they regard humankind as a prototypically warring species, never-endingly engaged in small-minded, lethal belligerence over territory, resources, and power. Perhaps all intelligent species tend toward self-isolating wariness that outweighs curiosity about ‘the other’. Perhaps Thucydides’ thesis that established and rising powers are compelled to go to war applies even on the interplanetary scale.

All that said, should there eventually be confirmation of alien intelligent species that are endowed with far higher levels of consciousness and intelligence than humankind — qualities having evolved over histories hundreds of thousands or millions of years older than ours — then the consequence would be culturally tectonic shifting. As a species, perhaps lulled by so easily triumphing over so many of our Earthly competitors, we’re prone to indulging in flights of ‘exceptionalism’. We’re predisposed to looking at our reflection in life’s mirror and — more often looking down, not up — seeing only reasons to preen over our capacity for rationality, creativity, and imagination. To be unseated, with a thud, by an alien species’ cognitive prowess — and the benefits to its civilization — could prove unsettling for humankind’s indulgences in unchallenged exceptionalism.

At the very least, discovery of our sudden non-uniqueness might compel reexamination of basic principles. It might lead to fundamentally questioning religious texts, customs, tenets, rituals, codes of morality, ‘spirituality’, and dicta. If so, the result may be to rethink and rewrite the underlying explanations and descriptions, widening out the aperture of religious philosophy and theology to take into account the new realities of not being alone in the galaxy and in larger cosmos. At the heart of such teleological investigation and reinvention might be questions, which never go away, about humankind’s purpose: about why we are here.

The stunning space-time topography of this universe isn’t hubristically ours alone. I venture it’s a matter of when, not whether, the ‘code’ to Fermi’s Paradox will be cracked.



*Drake’s equation, as in our image, is typically shown as follows:

N = R* fp ne fl fi fc L,

Here N is the number of civilizations in the Milky Way whose electromagnetic emissions are detectable; R* is the rate of formation of stars suitable for the development of intelligent life; fp is the fraction of those stars with planetary systems; ne is the number of planets, per solar system, with an environment suitable for life (the habitable, ‘Goldilocks’ zones around their suns); fl is the fraction of suitable planets on which life actually appears; fi is the fraction of life-bearing planets on which intelligent life emerges; fc is the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space; and L is the length of time such civilizations release detectable signals into space.


11 February 2018

Impoverished

By Tioti Timon *


In January 2018, in Kiribati, nearly 100 people, of whom 22 school children, tragically went missing on the high seas between Nonouti and Tarawa when a ferry sank. A comparable tragedy in the United States would have seen ¼-million people lost at sea. After four days, a New Zealand Defence Force Orion aircraft found seven survivors.

The Australian Broadcasting Network (ABC) reported on the tragedy—setting it in context by describing Kiribati as “a remote, impoverished nation of thirty-three atolls that is home to about 108,000 people”. Pi approached Tioti Timon of Kiribati for comment on the word “impoverished”.  He replied with free verse:
Impoverished

Impoverished
the word as presented globally
is a discriminatory term
rooted in colonial language
that has treated our people
inhumanly

Australia is a rich country
but there are poor people
begging in the street.
They are rich
but they are poor
in their culture.

Kiribati is a poor country
but we don’t have people
begging in the street.
We are poor
but we are rich
in reciprocity and family support.

What is the meaning
of impoverished,
when we have
the vast ocean around us
and our lives are not dependent
on money.

What is the meaning
of impoverished,
when we have
a material culture
of delightful sophistication
of thousands of years.

All Kiribati people
have their lands
and live subsistently
on their islands
enjoying life,
feasting, dancing, and singing.

We are living in a paradise
that we cannot experience
in an individualistic Australia.

Impoverished
I don't understand this word
applied to our country
especially
in this sad situation
where the lives of our people are lost.



* Tioti Timon has been at the forefront of raising awareness of the effects of globalisation on his people, and their precarious position in view of climate change.  He extends his sincere condolences to the families and friends of those who were lost. The ABC news report is here.

04 February 2018

Picture Post #33: Bourgeois Reminiscence








'Because things don’t appear to be the known thing; they aren’t what they seemed to be neither will they become what they might appear to become.'

Posted by Tessa den Uyl and Martin Cohen


Mercato di Sant'Ambrogio . Florence . Italy
 Picture credit: Antonio Borrani, 2017
  
Fragments of appearance are offered in the form of leftovers, sold at a market stall by the ounce. Not by the weight per square metre, as used by some manufactures, or by the linear yard. In any case, most likely these surplus fabrics, extras left over after use, could not reach those required measurements.

So instead here we find the evidence of what is left. Fragments not big enough to decorate an entire sofa, but maybe for a cushion it will do. Limited quantities for limited decoration.

The leftover fabric is a measured out merchandise until complete exhaustion. An excess to be sold anew. But this is not the defence of the poor, but rather of a poverty that, solely by its unoffending presence (when permitted) constitutes a critique of possession -- respects the form of private property.

Making such sense of self through this projection into an external referent is a form of psychosis, or to use a Lacanian term, foreclosure. The relation of the subject to the Other is one of dialectic exclusion. Is aspiring to images that offer a make-believe form of prestige a way to enhance an illusion, or to add to alienation?

For sure, we do not find cushions cut from this cloth in the iconic depiction of The Potato Eaters by Van Gogh…