Summer's almost over

Summer was a much bigger deal when I was a kid and it was also a much bigger deal in the US. Three months of summer vacation is nothing to scoff at (especially when you consider that Europeans get a mere six weeks), but once you leave school and find a job and start working for a living, well, summer becomes more or less the hot time of year when you have to work. Nothing exciting about that, even if we tend to pack in more power-weekends at this time of year, just to convince ourselves that our lives are not completely in vain.

Hint: if you have to power-weekend at all, your life's pretty much in vain.

This was just another summer and not all that much out of the ordinary: a bit too hot, a bit too dry, a bit too short, and a bit too time-consumed by everyday life. We all tend not to really appreciate what we have while we have it, and I'm pretty sure that come November, I'll be thinking back fondly of these very days which will have been made better than they actually were because there has been time between now and when I will think of them again. That's pretty much how our minds work. We don't appreciate enough of what we have when we actually have it. Yes, most of us in the West have been firmly conditioned to want "more", or at a minimum to be dissatisfied with what we have.

That's pretty sad when you stop to think about it. Yes, there is definitely one thing that you cannot, you may not, be in a capitalist economy, and that's satisfied. Where would we be if everyone were satisfied? Consumerism and consumption is predicated on the idea that you can never, ever be satisfied. That's not only sad, it's downright unhealthy. What kind of a world have we made for ourselves?

But those days of lazy reflection are just about over. Kids are back to school. Our daily and weekly routines have normalized themselves. For those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, the days are going to get noticeably shorter and the light is going to start fading. It's going to get cooler, then colder, and we're going to start getting a bit more precipitation than we like, so we'll grumble more, complain more often, be more dissatisfied than usual and, well, all the more "motivated" to go out and buy stuff we don't really need, because it's the only therapy we're willing to submit to. That's pretty sad, too, when you stop to think about it.

But once summer is over, we can at least act as if we're busier than usual and with the weather turning bad, no one's going to be coming along with extraordinary plans or demands. We can just get busy and do our thing, and start yearning for those crazy, lazy days of summer, which are so far off, and so beyond our reach.

Belief or knowledge?

One of things I learned very quickly while studying at a German university (though I had, in a somewhat lighter mode, been exposed to the approach in my undergraduate days in the States) is that if you are going to use terms (or, better, "concepts", "notions", etc.) you should be clear on what you mean by them. This applied just a well to new, technical terms as it did to everyday concepts as well. As I've been bantering around one such term in the past few posts, I thought it might be worthwhile to use it as an example of what I'm talking about.

The word I've been using, of course, is "belief". We all know what it means, regardless of what might be in the dictionary (for, after all, dictionaries are not authorities, rather they are the documentation of what is generally accepted at a given point in time ... words change meanings over time, which is another reason why it's good to stop and think hard about them every once in a while, like I'm doing now). One method of helping to make definitions and understandings clear is to compare or contrast them to similar terms and notions. One such helpful term in this case would be "knowledge". In other words, what do the two ideas have in common, but perhaps more importantly how they are different. Let's take a look.

A "belief" is something we think is true. We are convinced, for any number of reasons (or for no reason at all) that what we believe is true. It's "how things are" or "what something means" or anything along that line. By contrast, knowledge is something that we know is true. We are convinced in particular because there is some kind of verifiable evidence that others are aware of and acknowledge and hence we agree is "how things are" or "what something means". It would seem that the difference between "belief" and "knowledge" is the difference between thinking and knowing.

This difference is subtle, to be sure, but it is important. Others may believe what we believe; that is, others are aware of something and acknowledge it, yet the difference lies in the fact that the "evidence" is missing. Oh, believers may even believe they have evidence, but upon closer examination we find that it is not hard and fast evidence, rather it is an indication, a phenomenon of sorts, that the believers interpret in some way. To be fair, on the hard-evidence side, there is often data that needs to be interpreted, but here there are often strict rules of interpretation to assist in the interpretation process.

In the general and normal course of everyday life, this fine distinction isn't always that important, but it is becoming increasingly so, and for all the wrong reasons. When people have beliefs that contradict knowledge and insist that their beliefs are more significant/important/convincing/correct than knowledge, we have a bit of a problem. When beliefs go from being mere beliefs to this stage we can safely speak of ideologies, rather than mere beliefs. An ideology is, then, a set of beliefs (a way of thinking) that has been elevated to absolutivity; that is, it is presented as if it is knowledge. But, it simply is not.

Too many public discussions and too many decisions these days are being based on ideologies, not knowledge, and it's starting to become a serious problem.

If not reading, how about reflection?

While I do have my optimistic moments, I'm not the fool many take me for. I know well that most people I know wouldn't read much that is antithetical to their beliefs. The authors of those texts might have a point ... who knows? they might even be right ... and what do you do then? When our beliefs are challenged, the vast majority of us simply reject what we're being told (or what we're reading). It's a lot easier to simply deny than it is to change our minds. How sad is that.

Having said that, however, I'm not convinced that most people know why they believe what they believe. A lot of our beliefs are simply carry-overs from our childhood. Our parents believed certain things, we accepted them, and we believe them now as well. In our teen and young-adult years, our friends or people we admired or looked up to believed things and we decided to believe what they believed because we thought or felt or believed that we were like them. In our adult lives, we believe things sometimes simply because we would like things to be a certain way; our world would be much less threatening and stressful if things are as we believe. What all of these modes of coming-to-beliefs have in common, it is clear, is that they are passive in nature. We don't have to do anything to come to these beliefs, we merely need to accept them and make them our own.

That's fine in as far as it goes, but it's a rather weak foundation, especially when we think of how many people are out there claiming, arguing, hammering home, and trying to impose their beliefs on others. If someone wants to make a strong case for his or her beliefs, then I would like to think that they had at least thought about them seriously, that they had invested some energy in understanding what it is they believe and that they knew why they believed what they believed. Unfortunately, that's hardly ever the case. Beliefs are funny like that: all you have to do is believe them. Personally, I prefer people with convictions (thought-through and grounded beliefs), even if I don't share them myself.

So, now that summer is upon us, and now that many of us are thinking about time off or vacations or just lying out in the sun or going to the beach, I have little illusion that most of you will be taking a book with you. For those who are, I commend you, and I certainly hope you read it. For those of you who are not choosing that option, may I suggest a less strenuous, but I believe more challenging, and, perhaps, even more rewarding activity: reflecting. Yes, why not take the time in which you're not really doing anything else, and think about what you believe. Ask yourself why you believe it. Do little thought experiments about what it would be like, or what the world would be like, if you, or most people or anyone else, didn't believe what you believe. You really ought to try it. It can be a very enlightening experience, if done intensely and seriously enough.

No one's asking you to do anything but think ... about what you think and why. Who thinks they can handle it?

Summer reading

Summer is upon us, and those of you who can still afford it are probably already thinking about which spot in the sun you want to have your fun. We all need a break, don't we?

But WE; that is, those of us in the Western World; get ours at the expense of the rest of humanity, but, hey, don't let me spoil your fun. While you're relaxing, just letting your soul dangle, as the Germans say, you shouldn't really just turn off your mind. Let's face it: most of you rarely find the time to turn it on in normal, everyday life, what with kids and school and activities and work and bills and mortgages and doctor's appointments and re-landscaping the garden and washing the car, or whatever it is that "consumes" our own consumerist lives.

So, in those odd moments between rolling over to have the "other side browned" or between sun-screen latherings or just shifting your position in the hammock, I'd like to suggest a couple of things for your summer reading list. No, it's not light fare, no action-packed, thriller, mind-numbing, unrealistic fantasy. Rather, just a little bit of actual reality to gently challenge that perceptual illusion you think is "real life".

Since we in the West have traded in our societies for economies, it is only fitting that economic topics top the list.

• Try David Graeber's Debt: The First 5,000 Years for starters. Prof. Graeber has an entertaining and enlightening style that eases the pain of removing the veneer of false facts and downright propaganda that modern economists like to use to hide their machinations. Consider him a fan to blow away the smoke and a shade to expose the mirrors.
• Also, Michael Hudson's very readable and even more straightforward unmasking of how the financialization of our economy really works, namely The Bubble and Beyond, an honest and understandable look at how we got into the mess we are in. (And, just in case you haven't noticed it, we are in one helluva mess.)
• And, finally, since all good things come in threes, you might want to try a true classic of the genre, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon's What is Property?, an insightfully delightful conceptual exercise in understanding one of our most powerful and least understood "rights".

Don't get me wrong ... I'm not foolish enough to think that any of you are really going to read anything this serious, but I couldn't help but at least bring the subject up. You do want a break, I'm sure, and you feel you deserve a break, too. I'm only saying that you can "take a break" now, or you can be surprised, shocked, and overwhelmed when the real break comes.

We're at a critical juncture in history, folks. Something has to and is going to give, and in not the all-too-distant future. I pray that all of you reading this today will be around to experience it. You're not going to like it. You are going to be angry and enraged, you are all going to find yourself asking how this could possibly come about, how couldn't we have known this was going to happen. But you'll only have yourself to blame. You had the chance to find out, but you decided you needed a break.

Enjoy!

It's all over but the shouting

When we hear the shouting -- or maybe the fat lady singing -- we know it's over ... whatever it is that needs to finish. The same is true of the year. This is, thankfully, just about behind us.

This wasn't a good year. Oh sure, we avoided another major economic crash, but the American managed to pass legislation to at least allow their banks to make even riskier deals that the first time they ruined so much. What is more, the next time around, even simple savers will be cleaned out before the taxpayers have to step up and be counted. The rest of the industrialized world just sat by and watched and never made a sound.

This was a terrible year for geopolitical machinations. It took some effort, but we've managed to turn the clock back to the Cold-War days; we can demonize one side or the other, knowing full well it is everybody in the middle, the ones between the millstones that will be ground to dust. No, this was not the year that we learned anything from history.

This was an awful year for human rights and justice. The Americans can't their racism under control, and their smug sense of superiority led them to believe that all they needed to do was make different laws and they could be above those too. Almost 70 years ago at Nuremberg, they were singing a different song, but if you're the bully on the block, I guess you believe you can decide which tune is hummed. ISIS, of course, doesn't care in a whole different way. They're not better nor worse than whatever it is they think they're fighting. The old adage stands: you become what you hate.

This was a catastrophic year for the environment. US-China agreement be damned, the Canadians started shilling for Big Oil, America's trying its hardest to spread its fracking disease abroad, the Saudis are protecting their own interests and Mother Nature is simply getting screwed. We all know that we are not going to do a single thing for the environment until it is too late to do anything reasonable at all.

This was a distressing year for the poor and persecuted. It doesn't matter if you are poor here or poor there. You're not wanted anywhere. Whatever reason you think you may have for wanting a better life or at least the chance at one is mere foolishness on your part. Those that have don't want to share. They've made it indisputably clear, and there are a whole array of fears and prejudices that the manipulators can invoke to get you to do just what they want.

Glimpses of hope? Sure, small though they be: Pope Frank is still kicking butt, cleaning up one crony at a time and reminding the rest of us that if we're not doing whatever we can, we're not doing enough. I'm not even Catholic and I like the guy ... Person of the Year in my book. Several thousands of Americans made it out into the streets, finally -- adequate media coverage or no -- demanding more fairness and more justice. Thousands of Germans made it out into the streets, finally -- misplaced media coverage or no -- demanding that they allow their fears to rule them.

All in all, simply a bad year for all of us normal, everyday people. Our politicians ignore us, our enemies hate us, our friends mistrust us, and we're so afraid of our own shadows that we aren't about to go making waves. In the end, you know, we're going to get what we deserve. 2014 was proof of the saying that the inmates are running the asylum.

Don't forget to make sure you party to oblivion in a couple of days. You're going to need it.

A day of reflection

May may be a merry month overall, but today at least is a good day to put the merriment aside and stop to reflect. It never hurts to reflect a bit, and I think today is an especially good day for that.

What too many people don't know any more, but today is marks the 68th anniversary of the end of the Second World War in Europe. On this day in 1945, the Germans officially surrendered ending hostilities here.

I, for one, certainly do not gloat on days like today. Some people like to think it marks the winning of a war. Wars can't be won, they can only end. What's even better is if they never start.

The Second World War was a stupid war. Oh, sure, there are lots of folks who like to maintain that it was a "just" war; lots of others like to proclaim it was the last "just" war that America fought. The phrase "just war" is an oxymoron, like everything else that has to do with war. I'll go so far to agree that it was probably a necessary war. But wars only ever become necessary after the fact. If you do you're job right ahead of time, you can avoid wars ... at least most of the time. But, necessary or not, they're still stupid. You can't fix stupid.

For all of you who think I'm dishonoring all those who supposedly did all they did so that I can sit here and spout off such drivel, think again. I'm not dishonoring them. They did what they thought they had to do. When I was later faced with a war, I did what I thought I had to do. Other guys did other things. That's their business, just like what I did was mine. The war I was face with was even more stupid than the "big one", as my dad used to call it. This is another one of those cases where size doesn't matter.

Just so we're straight on this: all wars are stupid. It is simply impossible to have a smart war. No wars are good wars, for they always cause more problems than they solve. And, for those of you who like to believe that sometimes war is simply the last resort, well, it only is if you fail to solve your problems when you should.

You'd think after a few hundred thousand years of human history the penny would have dropped. Maybe we're not as smart as we like to think we are.

On the road again, again

Speaking of going nowhere fast. Duty calls, and I'm off to Vienna. I think it's only fair to remind you, that these jaunts are anything but vacation.

OK, OK, I'll make a confession. Our meeting ended a bit earlier than scheduled, so I had a couple of hours to myself. And I did what any self-respecting tourist in Turin would do: I went looking for the Shroud. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against what anybody believes. I truly believe we are allowed to believe what we want to and everyone should simply respect that. As long as what you believe isn't hurting anyone, it's fine. It's your belief. Go ahead and believe. As for me, and for everyone who knows me, well, I'm a bit more skeptical about what a lot of people believe, including myself. The things I do believe, I believe because those beliefs are the result of long, intensive and skeptical investigation and reflection. For the most part, I keep them to myself. After all, why should I think anyone should believe what I do? Belief is a personal matter.

Be that as it may, I made my way down the Via XX Settembre looking for the Turin Cathedral. If you didn't know what you were looking for, you could walk right past it without noticing. It is anything but one of those flashy, gothic, over-powering pieces of architecture. It is an understatement in and of itself. Inside, of course, it's old, and well traversed, full of wood, dark wood, hard benches, but it is quiet, sedate, unimposing, but not necessarily welcoming. It's not as threatening as some.

I say threatening because a Chinese friend of mine once told me that after visiting a number of dark Spanish cathedrals and seeing all the brutal crucifixes on display, he had nightmares for weeks. I doubt that was the intent of the sculptors, but he has a point. Touchingly, the only crucifix I encountered was humanely placed off to the side in a small chapel niche in the right-front of the church. It was worthy of its Spanish counterparts, but anything but in-your-face.

The Shroud itself is opposite this display on the front left. A prayer bench is in front of the massive (plexiglass?) window, behind which is a large box covered quite tastefully in a symbolically worked cloth, with a stylish wreath and centerpiece of thorns. Above the box, suspended majestically is a photo-enlargement of the face on the Shroud. It's a simple corner of the church that invites reflection.

But, before you get into the corner to meditate, you have to pass this massive flatscreen that is showing a continual subtitled presentation of the history of the Shroud. It wasn't the fact that the subtitles were in Italian. I doubt I would have sat long watching. No, it was the fact that there in this house of worship, steeped in the Middle Ages, there is, well, this garish, modern, high-tech display. It was almost an event. Not quite. But almost.

I don't know if the Shroud is real or not. I don't even know if it's really there, or not. It really doesn't matter to me, because I was there to sit quietly and reflect ... on what the Shroud may be, what it may mean to some, why it might be important or insignificant ... but I really couldn't. The ever-changing, ever-moving, ever-flashing of the heartbeat of modern media simply distracts your attention.

Once again, information, not inspiration, is writ large. And, as always, we're the poorer for it.

Thought experiment debrief

Some of you caught yourselves thinking things you didn't think you did, I'm sure. It happens to all of us at one or another. We have lots of little "built-in" assumptions, prejudices and other hinderances to completely objecting thinking. There's nothing wrong with you – in the sense of "out-of-the-ordinary" – for this is perfectly natural behavior. What's important that we are aware that such things can, occasionally, cloud our judgment. The more aware we are that such is happening is, the better chance we stand of being able to work against it.

It is simply not enough to have high ideals in regard to key notions such as equality or freedom. We also need to have a willingness to question our own beliefs, to put ourselves in someone else's shoes to see what kinds of effects our own statements and beliefs may have on others. Yes, it's a lot of work. Yes, it doesn't always work. Yes, there is a certain amount of risk involved. But, the risk is manageable.

One of the things about living in the modern world is its dynamism and unpredictability. We can suddenly find ourselves in situations that quickly turn out to be precisely 180 degrees around from what we think we they are. It is not enough to simply have a position or an opinion about something, rather, it is important that we consider in which situations that point-of-view is appropriate, or which particular aspects of a situation are driving us to think in a particular way.

In other words, we need to be more involved in our own thinking. We need to be more aware: not just aware of whom we are dealing with, what we think, but also which impacts our way of thinking can – and do – have on others. We need to think about why we believe what we believe and what reasons we have for thinking that way. As our little thought experiment showed: what seems reasonable in one situation is suddenly not so reasonable in another.

I'm not telling you to beware, rather to be aware … aware of your surroundings, aware of others, and, of course, aware of yourself.

Eleven pipers piping

On the eleventh day of Christmas, we yearn even more
for the wonder that's coming, that approaches the door.
We make our hearts ready, and hope we're prepared
for the gifts that the Other again with us shares.

The Christmas season, the time between the years, is a wonderful opportunity that most of us let slip by year after year. It is too easy to get caught up in the hectic, the commercialism, and the celebrating. Let's face it: resisting is practically futile, given that the advertising and marketing assault starts earlier and earlier each year. If there ever was "proof" that we have exchanged our society for an economy, it's Christmas. Of course, it needn't be that way. Oh sure, it takes a good deal of effort, but I'm sure there is not a one of us who has not uttered that plea of desperation: "It just can't go on like this!" at one time or another. But to do that, we are going to have to change and therein lies the rub.

Who wants to change? We think it's great when others do. In fact, we're generally very much in favor of that. One of the points that I've been trying to get across the past two weeks, though, is that we're in this all together, and because we are, each of us has to do our part to make things different. Nothing will ever change if we refuse to change ourselves. And, we can never change ourselves until we change the way we think.

In the English-speaking world, we learn that John the Baptist, the precursor to the one whose birth is the center of the celebrations this time of year, admonished us to repent. What most folks don't know is that in the original Greek text, that's not the word that he used. No, good ol' John was crying metanoeite which means more "change your mind", "change the way you think". Now, as then, we are being called upon to re-evaluate just how it is we are looking at the world around us. We are being asked to re-examine whether what we think is the best we can do. We are being challenged to not just take care of business as usual. No, if we change the way we think, we actually change the world.

I know you have all heard all of this before. I never claimed to be saying anything new. My job, as I understand it, is simply to remind us of what it is we already know and what we may have forgotten in the hustle and bustle of everyday life. And it's because of that turmoil that we should really make the effort, at least once during the year, to stop, look, and listen to what is going on around us, to slow down long enough to engage someone else, to talk, to be together, to reflect, to reconsider, and maybe even re-think a few things. This is what the turn of the year, the end-of-year celebration, should be about.