My Freeness

So free will is something I'm probably not qualified to talk about, at least when compared to modern-day philosophers and philosophy students. So all the shortcomings of this post are the fault of my more science- and math-oriented friends, with whom I was associated randomly by my college dorm, and who, after I said I was considering majoring in philosophy, snickered cruelly, and suggested I do something worthwhile. (Ten years later I work for oil, and they for tech companies - who's impractical now?)

Whether humans have free will is something people philosophize about lots. I think Newton's conjecture that if somebody knew the exact position and velocity of every particle in the universe, then he would be able to predict the future exactly, kind of brought the debate up. Heisenberg had something to say about that.

But I will keep this pretty macro-scale. Has anybody ever done anything that's truly altruistic? I don't think so. People give to charity, if not to save on taxes, then at least to feel good about themselves. People leave the last nacho on the plate not because they truly want some hungry soul to take it but because the shame they would feel in pigging out in front of their urbane fiends would outweigh the pleasure of eating the nacho. People run into burning buildings and save babies, I'm not joking, because risking death by fire outweighs a lifetime of ashed baby corpse nightmares.

The key is outweighing. In everything we do, we weigh the anticipated outcomes, to the best of our abilities (which certainly vary wildly from person to person), and choose the option that has the greatest overall personal benefit. Of course sometimes there are time limits, and when forced to think quickly we have a greater chance of calculational error.

The concept was introduced to my by a friend who learned it in an economics class (you faithful 'dlog readers know how qualified I am to talk about this). If a man has five dollars, he will spend it on whatever he wants to spend it on. Beer or the electric bill? He thinks - Beer. No - the wife will chew my ass off. Electric bill. The key is my ass. He saw his two options, calculated the ramifications for himself, and went with the better choice.

When a coworker, on Monday morning, claims he'd rather be in Aruba, I call him a dirty liar, because he has the money and access to an airport. He's at work because he wants to be at work. An inmate in a jail cell can say he'd rather be in Aruba because that option is not physically available to him. He'd better get digging, anyway.

So I draw two conclusions. As for free will, man is paradoxically bound by it; he cannot help but do whatever he most wants to do at any given time. So the non-existence of free will and the ubiquity of free will are two sides of the same coin.

As for altruism, it doesn't really exist. People don't do anything that doesn't have something in it for themselves. I think it is advantageous to associate with people who, for whatever reason, take pleasure in helping others, and who are pleased when the people around them are happy. I like to be around those people. Now if only I were one . . .

Are You Ready For Some?

Jitterbug Perfume, by Tom Robbins, is a good book. Robbins is a saracen of the simile: cloud cover . . . caused the sky over Seattle to resemble cottage cheese that had been dragged nine miles behind a cement truck. A few fat clouds folded themselves like crepes over fillings of apricot sky. His latest beard [flew] in the wind like a nauseated Chinaman losing his bird's nest soup. He's almost good to a fault, like a phenomenal juggler who makes sure to have six apples on him at every party, just in case someone should mention how neat juggling is.

Moving on: a character in the book has made it his life's goal to find a cure for aging. He says that human misery is rooted in our knowledge of our impending doom, and that if we didn't need to die, we would all be much happier and more peaceful - we could all get along. I think he may be very, very correct. When explaining himself to the book's heroine, he warns that if he succeeds in his fight against aging and death, that "it could mean the end o' Monday Night Football." Robbins didn't spell out what he meant, exactly, by this (nor was he necessarily expressing his own viewpoint), but I infer that the character meant to say that the human fondness for football is connected to our tendency towards violence, which is certainly an important factor in our cycle of misery, out of which the character is trying to break our species. This got me thinking.

Is the attraction I have to the game related to the causes of unending suffering in the world? I have said before that I am an ardent football fan, and also that I am part of the pacifist fringe of the American political spectrum. It therefore matters a great deal to me that someone connects football with real human violence, by which I mean a human's intent to physically hurt or kill another human. I love football, and deplore violence. Am I contradicting myself?

American football is violent, certainly at a shallow level - it requires tackling ball carriers, and blocking would-be tacklers, on every play. At this level, the violence of the sport doesn't cause me much concern. I think rarely do the players actually wish to injure one another, and more rarely still do the fans wish to see any player actually hurt. The crowd's dependable silence until injured players rise, and the applause after they do, regardless of team affiliation, attest to this. (You can be cynical about this, but I'm not. It's possible some fans like seeing people be hurt, but I guarantee there is at least one who doesn't.)

My point is that I don't feel like I'm attracted to the violence of the sport. If they could design perfect pads that would prevent all injury, like having the players bounce around in bubbles, I would support it. But I do wonder whether enjoying sport in general is violent at a level deeper than smacking limbs.

Watching any team sport is much more interesting if you care which one wins. A truly neutral observer will be interested if the game is good, but a partisan fan might sit glued to the screen well after the conclusion is foregone. This is pretty irrational behavior, as non-sports fans are wont to act all high-brow by pointing out. But why do I care how the Patriots finish the season? In what way does it benefit me when they win the Superbowl, given that I am not a serious betting man?

It benefits me insofar as I may look smugly at fans of the Broncos.

Now why would I want to do that? I know two Broncos fans, and they're both very dear to me. I wouldn't for a minute wish them any pain. But at some level I have a need for conflict, even if it's just teasing. When young lion cubs play, they wrestle and bite. They do the same things they would do to a delicious zebra or a menacing tiger; they just don't do it all the way. I think even mutual well-wishers tend to do things that cause one another some pain. It may be a result of the pain of living that we all feel, and that by recognizing that pain in others we identify more deeply with them. Are violence and misery so deeply woven into the human experience that to be human is to spread misery? I think this may be why Robbins's character tries to end death - if we remove the root cause of, or at least the greatest cause of, human misery, we relieve much of the need to cause each other pain - up to and including looking smugly at one another.

It's also doubtlessly true that there are lots of Patriots fans out there with whom I share a bond, with whom I can potentially make an alliance. The evolutionary advantage of belonging to a group is difficult to overstate. I would not be able to intake sufficient amounts of Vitamin E and iron, I am sure, if I weren't an accepted part of a social group, however loosely-knit.

What is war but two groups (or more) going at it? If we want to stop war, and do it right, by really taking away the desire to conquer and inflict damage, do we need to take away the desire to form groups? Do we need to rid ourselves of our irrational loyalties? Liking a football team is a good example, but it's the same for baseball or any sport. Is enjoying chess violent? Bridge? Red rover? Mario Kart?

The answer, I fear, is yes. But what to do about it is an even more philosophical issue. If you want to end drug use, do you ban drugs? Do you end abortion by banning sex? Do you end racism by banning discrimination? Do you end violence by banning sports? The answer, I'm sure, is no. Those methods are tried-and-false. They are often counter-productive, like trying to keep a rubber band from flying away by tugging on it as hard as you can.

Do you limit cocaine use by legalizing marijuana? Do you decrease abortions by handing out condoms, with a knowing wink? Do you fight racism by letting a racist be his asshole self, for all the world to see? Do you curb violence with a bone-rattling tackle?

I don't know. It seems different people have different propensities towards addiction, and indulgence for one is abuse for another. Maybe our hope of becoming a better species rests in our understanding the value of moderation, and accepting responsibility for excess.