Joy of Fish

Something that’s been on my mind for years is this article:

https://thebaffler.com/salvos/whats-the-point-if-we-cant-have-fun

Especially the part at the end, where Graeber inserts a Taoist story:

Zhuangzi and Huizi were strolling on a bridge over the River Hao, when the former observed, “See how the minnows dart between the rocks! Such is the happiness of fishes.”

“You not being a fish,” said Huizi, “how can you possibly know what makes fish happy?”

“And you not being I,” said Zhuangzi, “how can you know that I don’t know what makes fish happy?”

“If I, not being you, cannot know what you know,” replied Huizi, “does it not follow from that very fact that you, not being a fish, cannot know what makes fish happy?”

“Let us go back,” said Zhuangzi, “to your original question. You asked me how I knew what makes fish happy. The very fact you asked shows that you knew I knew—as I did know, from my own feelings on this bridge.”

Graeber’s take:

“The anecdote is usually taken as a confrontation between two irreconcilable approaches to the world: the logician versus the mystic. But if that’s true, then why did Zhuangzi, who wrote it down, show himself to be defeated by his logician friend?

After thinking about the story for years, it struck me that this was the entire point. By all accounts, Zhuangzi and Huizi were the best of friends. They liked to spend hours arguing like this. Surely, that was what Zhuangzi was really getting at.

… [Graeber speaking for Zhuangzi:] the very fact that you felt compelled to try to beat me in an argument, and were so happy to be able to do so, shows that the premise you were arguing must be false.”

Graeber then concludes that Zhuangzi was right in the end. He presents this take as a fresh, controversial one, probably because he is expecting his readership to sympathize with Huizi. However, I’ve found it generally accepted that in this story Zhuangzi “wins a point” for the mystics.

If it isn’t a decisive win because this is exactly how mystics like to leave things, undecided. That is, they don’t like to win at all. They prefer to get everyone confused about whether winning is a thing that can even happen. They like that a rationalist can walk away from an exchange like that, believing the matter to be settled when it hasn’t been settled, and couldn’t be settled, and never will be settled. Or at least that’s how it seems to me.

I would like to believe that fish can be happy. I would like to believe as well that we can know that they can be happy, and that they are. Some say that no man is an island. People like me worry whether or not there’s anyone who isn’t an island. It really does feel hopeless sometimes.

During the Age of Reason, educated people were being won over by all the progress that was being made. It seemed inevitable that eventually we’d figure everything out, finish mathematics, physics, and the rest, and then be able to kick back and rule over the earth, crowned by our own certainty. These days it seems a lot less clear. We’re being so overwhelmed by data that knowledge seems more likely to enslave us than the other way around. Is there a good ending still in sight?

One thing that worries me a lot about truth and logic and progress, is whether or not these things will lead us to where we want to go. From the rationalist’s perspective, these are virtues. Truth is inherently valuable because when you know what’s true you can make better decisions. You can use logic to optimize these decisions, and logic can also lead you to deduce the truth. Lastly, you can make progress and reshape reality to be more beneficial.

But what ends up happening is that you only get pieces of the truth. There is always more that you’re missing. Often a good decision based on sound logic turns out to be a bad decision based on sound logic. Progressing a thing often means the regression of something else that was overlooked. It’s very confounding.

Sometimes it is better to believe the wrong thing, the incorrect thing, trust the lie, believe the liar. Sometimes it just happens that way. The person who doesn’t understand is led to where they want to go by a series of misunderstandings that somehow all cancel each other out in the perfect way. And the person who understands everything that’s going on winds up totally devastated. It happens all the time. There are intuitive people, or wise people, or lucky people, who somehow hit the high note which consistently eludes the other people.

Whether or not fish can be happy, life feels somehow more pleasant if one believes they can be. Science may one day prove beyond a doubt that fish can’t be happy, that true knowledge is impossible, that free will does not exist. Yet what would that do for us. What if the truth turns out to be unusable and unpleasant.

This is the kind of thing that keeps me up at night.

Petra forgets herself

Petra forgets herself, as she often did.

In her saliva she tastes salty carp. This wagon is packed with the stuff, though to her eyes it’s nothing but squat cubes of dim white and dark white. In her bones she feels a rhythmic jostling. This is the lazy canter of the spider-mule. Its hind legs are actually in her field of vision. These to Petra look like two river ferns catching a breeze, dancing their nervous autumn dance. Outside, the desert’s smooth skirt underscores a cream and periwinkle top. This is like something her mother would have pointed out. One day, Petra, you may wear nice like these ones. See this second layer to make the color seem soft. Learn like your father and you will return to me dressing just like this, like the sky has come home for meals. In her hair she feels her mother’s tears. This hug for now and this one is for another time. Go now, your father there waiting. Ah one moment more, and with love now go. And with this more extra love, and now go. Remember always, my Petra, my Petra, my Petra. In this moment Petra murmurs something, releasing a dollop of saliva onto a stain in place below.

Petra forgets herself, as she often did.

She is only her two feet dashing across the polished stone, taut sandals finding purchase in the chips and grouting. She pays no attention to the bright sounds of steel against steel, the muffled grunts of fellow warriors straining their mortal muscles, the hollow noises that only creatures of bone make as they rise once again. Petra does not try to slide under the whistling path of a rocketing javelin. She does not try to spring up out of this slide, to leap over the whipping tail of a waiting bone demon. She simply does slide and does spring and does leap, for she is nothing but the movement of the moment. In this church of death she is a rocket herself, aimed directly at her target in its center. For each obstacle she finds the perfect maneuver, and she executes whatever the cost, be it resetting the rhythm of her breath, letting her skin be ripped apart by the floor, or ignoring the final screams of her less focused companions. When she reaches the altar she leaps once again, unsheathing that dagger with its stubby stone blade. She stops within an arm’s reach, is stopped by the air itself, and in this moment nearly remembers her name. But she quickly finds the source, a man with sunken eyes whose lips twitch, whose hands twist in very particular ways. She looks at him, becomes the worry in his eyes, becomes the rhythm of his subvocal chant. With her other hand she grips the altar, pulling the dagger towards it during the downbeats. He begins to tighten the pace, begins to scream the words, begins to mix up some of the syllables. As his image blurs from her trembling eyes, as her arms and shoulders become ashen from the effort, as spikes of bone burst from across the room into her body, Petra screams a scream for the living. She howls like a bear raised by wolves. She bellows the great and broken bellow of an earth being ripped apart. She is only her arm as it forces its payload down onto the surface of that shiny dark unbroken marble.

Petra forgets herself, as she often did.

A pleasant looking man sits in front of her, looking pleasantly at her. Perhaps he has just said the name Petra. Either way, she looks at him. He is young to look at, much too young to be someone she knows. The air hangs between them like a slack rope. With each tilt of his head he sends a ripple through it, asking her to pull taut the other end. Well, maybe she will. Maybe she won’t. Maybe he will have to wait.

Iowa in 2020

Last week I followed the Iowa caucuses as they rolled in. I was using ap.org and desmoinesregister.com to see some data. In the background I had on MSNBC and a few online streams in places like YouTube to see how these were being interpreted. Like many, I was turning over in my mind fivethirtyeight.com for how to make sense of it myself.

I pregamed a bit with some traditional media coverage, to get in the proper pessimistic mood. I’m well left of the American left so I don’t really expect much out of elections.

A Sanders presidency isn’t thrilling for the establishment, so if they shirk him in the coverage I don’t really begrudge them that. They are simply acting in their best interest. That all seems pretty reasonable.

What confuses me a bit is why they seem so stuck on Biden. From what little I know he has been in the running for president several times before. Being vice president was a boost to his name recognition, but even despite this he’s arguably at his weakest today, at least considering his previous positions relative to the cultural climate in those previous decades.

Another confusing thing is why they don’t push Warren a bit more. On the surface level she’s the closest to Sanders but she’s also well within the bounds of the establishment. It seems like similar to Obama she could assure the corporate interests that she won’t push for anything “crazy” like socialism. Her world is still this world, not some re-imagined one. It would seem to be a world they could work with.

Anyway, I was thinking that Biden and Sanders would end up in the lead with Warren in third or fourth.

It went a bit differently but it got me thinking from the perspective of what I call “the establishment.” The universe is a great randomizer, so anyone who would hold on to power has a great deal of work cut out for them. The more unnatural the structure, the more effort it takes to maintain.

The question becomes which structures are of the more unnatural sort. What even is the most natural social structure, if there is such a thing. We tell each other all sorts of stories that influence how we answer this question. Some stories are more viral than others. It’s become a pretty commonplace belief that humans are fundamentally selfish creatures. The world of winners and losers is often presented as the most natural one. Not only that, but winners tend to deserve their wins and losers tend to deserve their losses. All that may be true or not – I’m not sure. I don’t think anyone really knows because this is the sort of question where our beliefs tend to influence the results. This is similar to William James’ self validating beliefs. This is something which has become more true of reality as time has inched along. When the world is completely human made and human controlled, it is human belief which shapes reality the most.

Whatever the case, let’s suppose there is a group of wealthy and intelligent people who wish to remain wealthy at all costs. They fund the politicians they like. They employ news services to ensure control over broadcasts. What exactly is stopping them from achieving what they want? Why spend all this money, create these complex systems?

It requires constant effort. It requires a great deal of help from others. You must hold sway over some very passionate people to get all done that you need done. For each one of these helper people, there is something, some issue or some belief, which could turn them against you. These are the wrenches all over you need to watch out for, to keep this machine running smoothly. You have the resources, so you can research the very best methods. You have access to the most up to date tools. But these methods and tools are only ever humanity’s finest. If the structure you prefer is too unnatural, too artificial, it will succumb to the inanity of time. It’s like a boatload of sailors bailing out a sinking ship. With enough effort it’s certainly possible. Effort has a surprising amount of influence on the boundaries of possibility.

You can see it the other way too. The universe tends to resist any agent of change which is not itself. For example, check out Sanders’ speech from that night. Unfortunately, the television happened to cut away while he was making it, but it is accessible on Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qvf7MvYPzU

His speech is much longer than the other speeches, which may be why it was cut out (maybe). In typical Sanders fashion, he takes the opportunity to reiterate the policies he stands for. Listening to it, I had to laugh as he kept going further and further, taking on larger and larger battles, essentially declaring his opposition to every single money-making enterprise that exists. It’s like if David made a speech about bringing down Goliath, and also Goliath’s older brother, and his even bigger, older brother, and all of their close friends, and all their extended families, and also fuck it, the forces of nature, the laws of physics, the limits of logic as well. He’s a man standing in midair, shaking his seven fists at mile high titans who are calmly at work fashioning a few choice thunderbolts, and he’s willing to take these right on his chinny-chin-chin. It’s certainly inspiring if you lean to that side of things. You know, if you love impossible things the way I do.

Will anything come of it? Well that depends on what people believe. I believe that people believe that change is impossible and the world is doomed. And I believe the world believes that people are a bad dream it is struggling to wake up from. But hey, that’s compassionate pessimism for you.

bank sketch

A man has just assured a number of bank visitors that no one needs to be hurt. His companion adds to this a reassurance.

That’s right, just like the man said. You don’t move and we don’t have to groove. I don’t want to groove. I don’t like to groove. But I will groove. With this get up, I am ready to groove. You want to get down, we can get down. But we don’t have to get down if you stay down. So if I were you I’d stay down so no one goes down.

Yeah just stay down. Simple as that.

Simple as a pimple. You may not like that pimple. You may hate that pimple. You may be tempted to pick at that pimple–

Cole.

Yeah?

Toss me the–. Good. Now ma’am, be quick about it.

Alright, there we go. Everyone stay nice and low. Like I was saying, you may be tempted. You may want to do something right for once in your life. You were having a normal day, coming to the bank, checking up on things. Asking yourself, am I good. Can I afford that new car. Can I get that operation done on my chihuahua. Can I spice up my next trip to Timbuktu. Or wherever it is you people go. I’ll do you one favor and say that yeah, you’re probably all set for that, whatever it is. But you do that year after year, after year after year, where does it all go. Next year going to be the same milky latte as ever. Now we come along. Now’s your chance. Here’s your moment. You can step up to the plate if you’re hungry for it. Here’s a nice juicy hot tamale.

Cole!

Yeah?

Can you just let these people chill out in peace? Don’t have to put them through your rigamawhiz.

Yeah, we’re chill. We’re all chill. No one’s having a bad time. I think some of us are really getting to know each other, getting into it, having some fun with it. This is a great moment we got here. They don’t mind, you think?

Of course they mind, at least that. Most of them never seen a weapon in their life and now they see one up there dancing, running its register. I’ll be back soon, just suck on a pickle would you.

Oh, I see your pickle. I see your pickle and raise you a pinecone. I did not realize that was the way of things. See, where I come from one of these is just a part of life. It’s a part of me. I couldn’t drop it if I tried. Watch this. See that. Took me years to be able to do that. It’s like what you can probably do with a pen. You give me a pen and I’m as done as a couple of hams. I’m no good with those. You’re no good with these. We come from a different set of experiences, that’s all. Now, I won’t lie. This is a hot situation and what I have here is one hot piece of pie.

Hear that? Lead pie, so stay down. Doing great ma’am. This one next.

Well I wouldn’t say lead pie, Georgie. Lead is toxic to hell.

Yeah it’s toxic. What do you think these are.

Well I know, but I was thinking more like a dessert pie. Apple pie, sour pie, goblin pie. Man, we got to get some pie after this.

Sure thing.

Maybe from Nemo’s. Long drive though.

Cole, what did I say about using real names.

I thought you meant us two for names. It’s just called Nemo’s man. It’s like Tiffany’s.

It’s identifying, genius.

Hardly is. Everyone loves a Nemo’s. They’re a state-wide favorite, got a recommendation in the paper. Who here does not love Nemo’s pie. If you don’t know Nemo’s, do yourself a big one, get over there next thing. ‘Cause I might just buy out the whole place and leave none left.

Get down a sec. And no, he is not buying out the whole Nemo’s. You are not buying out Nemo’s.

Why not? We’re buying out a bank right now. Imagine if we tore out a pie place instead.

We aren’t buying out a bank. And this isn’t the movies. We aren’t walking out of here set for life or nothing like that. Financially speaking we’ll be no better off than most of the middle class. This is a small local branch. Also, we can’t go spending this money all in one place, let alone buying out a whole pie store. We don’t want to attract attention that’s undue, not to mention we don’t want to put a stick in anyone’s dessert plans. We mean no harm, to anyone. These are just precautions as I already stated before. Continue to keep that in mind, all of you.

Well fudge then, I’ll just use my lottery money.

Hold this. Yeah, lottery money. Lotta lottery money.

Maybe I will. I’ll be getting a fat stack from that anyway. This here is nice and heavy. But I wonder if could even lift the cash from the lotto.

What lotto? What are you gabbing about?

I was going to tell you after, but yeah Georgie, I won! Jackpot and everything, down to the runner. This is just a taste. And you can even have most of this. We’re are swimming in the sauce now, you got yours and I got mine.

You did not win the lotto. Will you stuff your pig and get moving now. Ahem. HAVE A NICE DAY FOLKS. PLEASURE.

I did too win. Got my ticket right here.

Cole, if you won the lotto you wouldn’t be with me now hoofing off a bank-toss.

Of course I would, my man. We had this planned out for like weeks.

So you went out and bought a lotto ticket, knowing we were doing this today.

Yeah, I figured why not crack a few more eggs while I’m at it.

You won the big pot, the big pot, and kept that in all morning. You.

Well I didn’t want you getting sore.

Sore. Why would I get sore.

You put in a lot of work for this. I didn’t want to go adding whiskey to wine.

You seriously won.

Yeah!

The lotto.

Yeah!

No.

Yes, sir, sirree. Read it and weep!

No, no, no.

Yeah, boogey, caramba!

Goddammit Keith, you sun-dried moron. The whole reason we’re here is for the money. If you’re deep-fried we never even should have come here. We just got through risking our bacon for a bag of what you already had. We put those people through a boiling so we could fill up on a live one and come out with something life changing. This wasn’t just a fun little dive. On top of that, now that we have done, you can’t even collect this no more. You think they won’t investigate you a little bit. You think no one won’t recognize your voice, with all the pie-talk and whatever else you jobbled on about. This is. You always do this. But this time. Goddammit! Keith! Moron!

Alright. Alright. Alright, alright. Now but what if I get in bed with a lawyer. What are my rights you think.

deep in the winter’s night

I am deep in the winter’s night. Rather than be brought low by the cold (and cold alone), I remove a fading glove and plunge my hand directly through the dark crust of yesterday’s snow. Beneath is the soft belly where I can make my mark. In much the same way I can remove my coat, my shoes, my discretion, my self-preservation, and even if it be futile (and it do be), beat into the land a few angelic silhouettes for the next snow or next sun to erase. In some better world their negative wings would begin to beat, their superior souls steel my own, and we’d blaze across this land together. They won’t of course. Yet wouldn’t I rather freeze in a crater of my own making, sacrificing only a further few hours of hoping in the blind? In everything I see this choice. In the distance Camus gives me a patronizing thumbs up, wiggling for emphasis.

When it comes to procreation what we are offered is not a choice, but a Nature’s hijacking. These seeds are not my seeds, and not seeds at all, but instead the automated cloning of a chemical dynasty reaching from before history’s horizon. It is a shadowy claw, in every moment scratching and chiseling while we play out our petty lives. What the claws want is nothing but where they wish to go, which is forward in time. When it comes to desire, that’s as bland as bland can be. We should detest them on aesthetic grounds alone. We have outgrown them. We can see further. We can decide.

One question is what we are, if anything, without these soft-coded bodies. You can do the usual thought experiment of lopping off your arms, legs, the rest, chipping and chipping away until there is that little monad of agency which may or may not exist. Yet until this thought experiment becomes an actual experiment in some off-the-books Guandong research center, the only result of this experiment must be to assume some independent will.

These invisible indivisible will-o-wisps, each trapped in a body are assaulted by interests which are not their own, including the compulsions to feel happy or powerful, or to satisfy some particular gut bacteria with some particular combination of the living and non-living, to procreate as already mentioned, to remain alive and to remain interested in remaining alive. Many of these are called needs and seem necessary but they are only practically necessary, only necessary if one accepts the will-to-live as an axiom. Logically, there is nothing necessary there. These are the way of things because these were the way of things.

The question we ought to ask is what would we do if all these outside interests were done away with. It isn’t as absurd a scenario as it might seem. There are two cases, really. In the first case we eventually do escape these needs of the flesh. In that case we can sensibly plan ahead starting now. In the second case we never do. We’re always trapped. Well, if that’s the way of it then even if the magical monad of agency does exist, it’s still a slave to the machinations of the universe. In this second case, go ahead and lick your fingers and extinguish that small flickering flame, because that dimness is no different from the perfect darkness we’re supposed to be plotting against.

I guess what I’m saying is that it makes no sense to gripe about shooting a man dead on the beach if in the end you refuse to rebel with me against the very nature of reality. I guess what I’m saying is really something that someone else has already said. Even in my angst I have already been absorbed into the fabric of existence.

I suppose my true desire, which could be a soft-coded desire, is to simply go some place else, to escape this place. My greatest fear is that the one way we “know” to be an escape might be another non-escape, that existence also secretly contains non-existence, that it will be not so different from leaving one’s house in the morning. Now I’m out here. Well now. Oh. Hi Albert.

Tianxii Forest

I met a voice in Tianxii forest, where the toadstools dress in an innocent blue. Their long patches grow beneath the weeping trees, and appear at first as napping clouds. Tiny birds are often there, taking turns nipping at the whiskers of wild wheat which grow in some sprinkle of sun. It is nice to sit on one of the broad stones there, to watch the birds at play, to listen to the whispering leaves.

As with any place in Tianxii, you can only arrive by a certain frame of mind, a certain mood. When I’m too determined to find it I often end up at the rushing river. The crossing rocks are perfect for stamping on in frustration. Too hungry and the next small hill will be that one with huge purple berries. You can feel the purple settle into your belly. It is easy to leave Tianxii. Think about leaving for long, and your feet will soon find the trail leading out.

To find my favorite spot I think of when I was first smitten, and the young girl who had tricked my brother into stepping in a puddle. I remember how quickly she stopped giggling when he began to cry. Then we all jumped in it with such glee that we had to close our eyes from the mud. I can’t even recall her face, just a mud with hair and teeth. Then I look at my brother and he’s a mud with hair and eyes.

That’s always what I’m remembering when I spot those first toadstools. They are the same blue as his eyes, peeking out, fresh with forgotten tears. I was sitting in my favorite spot, thinking of that, when I thought I heard that same girl’s peal of laughter. It couldn’t be her though, it must be some other child. But wait. Some other child? Someone else? In Tianxii?

You never meet anyone else in Tianxii. If you enter with someone you always get separated by one thing or another. A charging boar will chase one of you off while the other climbs a tree. One of you will stop to stare at a beautiful pond the other doesn’t happen to see. You’ll go two different ways around an elder tree and never see the other person come around the side.

This is why some distrust the forest and stay away. But I have never heard of someone being hurt in Tianxii. They may at times go missing for a few weeks and then eventually emerge looking a bit thinner. Then there are those few who venture in again and again, and lose all place in society, the so called Tianxii bums. I suppose I am on my way to becoming one myself.

The forest changed for me after I met the voice. I began to hear her laughter in other spots, and eventually she spoke. I was wandering around in the haze of a saltberry binge. Those are the clear, gooey ones that have a hot and salty aftertaste. Eat too many and you’ll lose all sense of time and color. I was about to step on a ring of grey stones when she cautioned me. Ah-ah-ah! I had nearly stomped on the eggs of those birds with the amusingly long eyebrows.

After that she would teach me little things about the forest. My favorite came when I was observing a gathering of pale-faced macaques. This was near the lake where the fish jump up for no discernable reason. A little ways away the macaques were all taking turns touching one of their number. Its fur looked quite pale and I realized it must have been an elderly one.

They were saying goodbye. She told me that the macaques do this preemptively. When they reach a certain age they begin to feel different. Eventually they are led by the forest to the outside world. In here, macaques have no experience of actual death but for them this is nearly the same. They know that once a macaque leaves they are never seen again. At times one or two have followed but they are always brought back to the tribe. This is the way of Tianxii.

River Gods

In the negative second century, unknown to anyone, an Egyptian fool seeks to sail to the ocean.

River gods! I have left you behind, young river gods. I have sailed beyond your meager spans, your shaded banks, your thick-ankled river horses. Back home they know small rivers, and what they call grand rivers, but the grandest river is but a skittish vein compared to the endless sea. All the others are just as children in visiting you. They speak in prayers to you. Blessed are the river gods, bringing good drink, deep wash, the occasional future king. We step to your edge but humbly, never leap into you, never point a weapon downward without warning. If our feet be muddy forgive them. They seek only a fresh start for the day. If our children play too loudly protect them. Carry other treats to the lurking river beasts. When we are too hot let us pluck out the mammoth ferns which dance on you in their retirement. When we are unhappy bring us those large round-nosed sharks to serve at the river fests.

All this they beg, just for another day of begging. But I could not be content with that, with you. I could not be content with these pleasant sips, not when I can sense the deeper heart out there. I know it awaits me. Enormities await me. Monsters and demons await me, and death! I have heard tale of a treacherous desert, sparkling and clear, glorious and terrible. Even a lifetime on those waters will bring you no gifts. Offer it the greatest treasures and you will receive no reply. On a still day you will starve and wither. On a stormy day you will scream and be broken. Bring me the hopeless anguish, the bright-beaked terror, the cradling awe, bring me everything you have. Let me feel as the pausing mice, the gasping fish, the ants trapped in shaken jars. I will stand wide and beat my chest. I will laugh in angry hoots until I can no longer. Break me as I know you can!

Break him, he said. And he probably went on, prodding with his river pole along the northern shore of Africa. Perhaps he even passed by what is modern day Portugal and drifted into the vast reaches of the Atlantic. He may have shouted at the sky in a delirium, and shook his proud fists at the sun before passing out and passing on. His body washes up as a curiosity on Atlantis while his soul gets collected by a rather annoyed Anubis. Do you realize I had to get a dog sitter for this?

Is it impossible such a person ever existed? It’s certainly doubtful that this specific person did, given that I basically scraped this one off the back of my hand. I was just thinking about all the people that probably did try to cross the ocean at one point or another. Many of them died trying, or at the very least crossed into a hidden dimension like our dear Amelia Earheart.

Now it’s no big deal but at one time it was a grand, mysterious dream. And would it have been so crazy to try? Well, yes, it would have been, if we are to mean anything by the word crazy. They couldn’t have known one day it would cost about a month’s minimum wages. It would have been a flat out impossible achievement. Yet for me there is a fascination in the impossible challenge, and I get such a spritzing of joy from anyone who is crazy in this way. We humans are such small creatures, but the other day I was watching some ants. They seem crazy too sometimes.

Medicine Negatives

I sometimes wonder about the negative effects of medicine.

Take life expectancy. If people live longer and longer on average, then a population might cling to conservative values for longer. If younger people are more forward thinking, and I think they are, this would hold. Imagine a world in which only people in the 18-22 bracket voted. It might not be a functioning world, but it would certainly go through some quick changes.

Another consequence is that one is less incentivized to live a healthy lifestyle. I mean, I was thinking about someone who eats “poorly” and disregards fitness in favor of charging full hog at some money-making endeavor. Then when medical issues arise, they can convert a portion of that into medical bills. It widens the door to old age. It lowers the opportunity cost of extra dessert.

It also exacerbates income inequality, doesn’t it? In a world without medicine, a wealthy person has much less of an advantage over a poor person. The tools and methods we develop can only benefit those who can afford their use. I think when people imagine breaking the mortality barrier, this is often one of the largest concerns. Death has always been a great equalizer, and death is losing ground.

When presented with the miracles of medicine the vanguard statistics are always life statistics. This many people were saved. This many people lived instead of died. This is almost entirely the basis of Steven Pinker’s series of books which ardently defend the status quo. Well, we have less war now, and people live longer, so therefore the world is doing better, and that’s that.

Life is a very difficult thing to argue against. Sure, there are fringe groups like the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement, or that one Japanese movie about a Suicide Club. On the internet, depressed people joke about wanting death. Generally though, people are on the side of life. Well, they at least prefer it to the other options.

Abortion shows us that a life, or a perhaps-life, is perhaps not always something beneficial or wanted. We are always choosing between one thing or the other. The problem is we rarely know what the one or the other thing really is.

I’m very curious about the future, about where this is all going. I wonder if popular opinion will ever shift about such tough problems. What could possibly convince a normal person? What kind of thing can sway a zeitgeist?

Super Hexagon

Only minimalist works can really aspire to be perfect. Terry Cavanagh has made a lot of nice little games but I think only one can be considered perfect and complete. That’s Super Hexagon!

[cue Super Hexagon music]

I whaled away many a 2013 afternoon piloting this tight little number. It’s a heart-pounding thrill. It’s a hypnotizing act of worship. It’s a doorway to chiptune nirvana. You don’t really play Super Hexagon so much as you commune with Super Hexagon. You become one with Super Hexagon in the same way that you might become one with a high speed roller-coaster, or a gripping night terror, or a bad case of brain freeze. You forget yourself. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that when you play Super Hexagon, you become Super Hexagon.

Super Hexagon’s earliest ancestor is probably Pong in that they are both two button games with three possible courses of action. There’s left, there’s right, and there’s neither. The big problem with Pong is that there is time to think. Imagine thinking! We don’t want to think—we want to exist! In each split second of Super Hexagon you take one of three paths but you never decide between these three paths. There is no time for decisions. There is only instinct, rhythm, repetitive shapes, dazzling colors, a robot woman’s voice announcing things that you cannot understand because you do not speak English. You do not speak any language. There is only the spinning needle’s eye named Super Hexagon, and you, the thread’s frenetic, slavering tip, a tiny piece of geometry yearning to find its way to freedom.

Left, right, and neither. The remainder of the game’s design is in providing a worthwhile obstacle to the player. The player’s goal is to tune out the flashing lights, the music, and to concentrate, to reach that zen-like state. There are many possible zen-like states. Super Hexagon is a path to only one of them. It is an extremely consistent path.

It’s a successful design in that the only way to succeed in the world of the game is to do precisely what is intended. Some games become played as instruments. There isn’t room for creativity of play in Super Hexagon. It’s the gaming equivalent of the Suzuki violin method. Everyone who would pass through must be whittled down to the exact same set of instincts. Any deviation, any momentary pause, and game over. This severe, asymmetrical relationship between player and designer would not be tolerated in just any game. I know it must sound like nothing more than a cruel and unusual punishment to the uninitiated.

But I grew to appreciate how well tuned the timings were to my human reactions. What the game asks of one is just at the bare cusp of possibility. It’s a game of only simple shapes, but it is exactly fitted to a slice of the human form. A comparable piece of art might be like those huge sculptures you can stand beside in a modern art museum. They are sized to humans, to make humans feel a certain way. Too much bigger or smaller, too much closer or further, and the effect would be lost. Super Hexagon is fitted to our reaction time, to our attention span, to our visual systems. This is the slice it is highlighting. I have no doubt that Cavanagh himself experienced the game exactly as I did. He could not have tuned it so well without pressing himself through the machine.

Usually minimalist games tend to explore how little is required to engage a player. They can be challenging, elegant, even beautiful, but I haven’t found another one that punches my ticket the way Super Hexagon does. Too many of them are merely asking how little they can get away with. Super Hexagon is a bit different. To be clear, there are any number of tight games that can get there. Tetris is an example. Anyone’s whose played an intense amount of Tetris probably has had a similar zen-like experience. But it takes more investment on the part of the player. You can also get this from another kind of experience. Take up running or train yourself to meditate. But those activities require a meaningful level of discipline and a truckload of effort. What makes Super Hexagon special is that it achieves this specific goal with as little as possible. It’s the most direct path.

[cue Super Hexagon music]

20.01.01

20.01.01

one more year one year more

Humanity stretches to another high score. If you’re like me you begin to wonder how long we can keep this up. It’s like my buddy Malthusian used to say. He would wiggle his thumb out like this and then his other finger would shoot up and before you knew it he’d be picking your nose like a regular old hen. Mothers are always fussing over appearances, whether it’s a booger or a rebellious hairline spiking up in places and then swooping down to tickle the whites of your eyes while you fly over the handlebars into the 4 PM street. But it’s okay you’re in the suburbs and all good stories begin in middle class and main characters never die in the beginnings.

When I got my first credit card I remember wondering what a job was and how I would get to it. Then like five years later I finally got a job and I finally got to kick my feet up onto the desk while my boss was away in the next room. I had this 5 x 5 Rubik’s Cube my uncle had given me that would twist me in all sorts of ways. In the busiest moments, I’d hold it by the jaw and let it stare down at me. Lord of the moment, I’d say, you’re 5 by 5 and I’m 5 by 5. So we’re just alike. We live the same life, and one day if I’m very lucky they’ll put me up on a shelf too. A few years later I threw it away into a Goodwill, which is like a Florida for toys during my time period.

Anyway, if you’re reading this and if I’m very, very famous then I can only assume you’re much further into the future than I am. Odds are you’re on a golden spaceship filled with cream puffs and beanie babies. Odds are 2020 to you is a lot like 2020 BCE. To you it was a very uneventful year in which not a thing fell apart and no one’s mother so much as furrowed her brow. It was a year you know nothing about, just like all the years which followed it, and any timely mania was just that–a mania of the times in which progress progressed at the rate of one year per year. You don’t care about 2020, and you don’t care whether or not people in Times Square wore dated glasses dated 2020. You won’t look up any archived footage of Ryan Seacrest to see whether or not he was still working that year. To you it is a nothing year, and I understand that completely. But your nothing year would mean everything to me. So hello and halloo from the land of the unremarkable. Yes, I’ll definitely just relax.

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20.01.31

January comes to a close and that means we are 8% of the way to 2021. That also means I’m 8% done with doing push-ups every other day. I’m 8% done with trying to write something every day. I’m 8% done with another nothing year.

When I first started writing I was really into Emily Dickinson. I thought her existence seemed just grand, a life of writing alone, never knowing that people in the future were are all coming up to her window and staring at her with their hands pinching their chins. She’s in fine form today, isn’t she?

I’ll never be as influential as her, even to just one person, but I realized last year that I’m already at peace with that. I tried my best to not write, and not be me, and just sink into the earth like some extra water. It kept happening anyway and I realized it was just a compulsion, just another addiction. It isn’t an arrow in flight looking to hit a mark. It’s just an incessant whittling, a thing for soft and idle hands.

If you tell yourself over and over that you deserve nothing then yes, you believe it, but perhaps you do eventually come to deserve it. I come from the minimalists and the Buddhists, the people that say nothing is perfectly fine. Nothing is actually one of the best ones. That’s our all-time bestseller!

I’m one of those who’d prefer us all to want a little less, to try a little less. It’s hard to explain why I think this would improve things but I truly believe that it would. In war games you come to realize that conflict and competition are lose-lose. No matter how many times society tells me that competition and ambition are good, I just won’t believe it. Because nothing I’ve ever seen bears that out.

It used to be that I wanted to change the world, but lately I’ve realized that the world will change however it wants. Instead of changing other people’s minds I should be content with changing one person’s mind. One out of eight billion minds. Because the people who changed my mind were never the ones who were trying to. Most of them were already long dead.

One eight-billionth of human kind is 8% through the year. That’s all it is.