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°2019.02.21.Thu | Are podcasts making me even more solitary?

I just started listening to Hidden Brains’ “Close Enough: The Lure Of Living Through Others.” I was expecting it to be the usual digital-self story I could skip, but I haven’t because of the focus on YouTube: a man who watches how-to videos instead of making stuff, a women who watches other womens’ meticulous bedtime routines to relax, and another woman who imagines being a musician without making the effort to do so.

I watch a lot of YouTube myself: how-to channels on boat building, lock picking, and knife making; explainers such as veritasium, CGP Grey, minutephysics, and Practical and Real Engineering; channels about alternative living and tiny homes. I was a huge fan of the user-generated content on Current TV – and was an early adopter of a DVR to remove the awful adverts – and I see YouTube as a fulfillment of its predecessor’s vision. Of course, not all of my 120+ subscriptions are user-generated: many news, visual arts, music, and documentary channels have mainstream media outlets as well. Still, I watch more YouTube than anything else, including Netflix. As someone who loves to learn, the allure is strong.

Although I don’t feel I’m living vicariously – and don’t feel guilty about watching YouTube, especially in the winter – I do have a different concern, in which podcasts are also implicated: I live a relatively solitary life. This has two obvious reasons: I am a shy introvert, and I’m well beyond the age of making lots of friends. Generally, that is fine, I live simply. I’m wholly content to spend a nice day with my spouse and our dog walking about the city, or sitting at the park and chatting with our dog friends. But I wonder if YouTube and Podcasts undercut one of my significant social drives: interesting conversation.

When I was younger and single, I’d spend my evenings in cafes. I could read, chat with newcomers and old favorites, and then leave when I wanted – a perfect scenario for an introvert. I also belonged to a few groups that welcomed heterodox discussions. I do have good conversations with my spouse, brothers, and students; I am fortunate. Still, I wonder if the quality and quantity of podcasts undercuts my motive to seek out good conversation? To put it in terms of the Hidden Brain episode, do I now live much of my conversational life vicariously?

°2018.08.09.Thu | Recounting my cameras

I look at my old photos often; it’s why a take them. I was recently wondering how many cameras I’ve had over the years (see Twitter).

After a Canon Rebel film DSLR in the mid-1990s, my first digital camera was the Fujifilm MX-1700. It was great to have a camera where I could see immediate results. It had 1.5 megapixels and was okay in bright light, but it struggled hard with indoor shots: lots of noise and slow shutter speeds, resulting in lots of blur. But I still have some favorite photos from then (1999). The Fujifilm MX-1700 was an odd looking camera, with a vertical design, but with the move to digital, why retain a film-based design?

In 2002, I moved to the FujiFilm F601ZOOM. At 3MP, its photos have twice as many pixels. Low light was still a struggle, and dynamic range was limited with plenty of blown out highlights.

Still, I have hundreds of photos from the F601ZOOM, some of which were in very difficult circumstances, like this concert photo of Matisyahu.

In 2007, I upgraded to the FujiFilm F40f. It had a horizontal point-and-shoot form factor. Digital SLRs were a thing now, but I prefer easy to carry compact cameras. Your best camera is the one you have on you.

The F40f was a modern camera, with a respectable 8M pixels, decent dynamic range, and facial detection auto-focus. I’d often hop on my restored muscle bicycle with the banana seat and ride around Red Hook Brooklyn.

I really miss those evening rides.

In 2011 features beyond megapixels started making a difference. I wanted to return to some of the manual control from film days but also go even smaller. I erred on the side of super compact: the Canon PowerShot ELPH 300 HS. It was so tiny it was awesome. 2011 was also the year a certain fuzzy critter makes an appearance in the albums.

The ELPH was also so tiny it was also only useful as a point-and-shoot. I returned to FujiFilm via the XF1 in 2012. The XF1 was my first camera to have a fake background blur that is now common on smartphones. Neat for photos of ginger beer bottles, but not for anything with a fuzzy edge.

I began 2013 with the Sony RX100. A tiny camera with a 1-inch sensor and viewfinder. The inch sensor meant excellent dynamic range, good low light performance, and some control over background blur (e.g., Casper taking a bath). Five years later, I still find its images beautiful.

In 2014 the perfect compact camera arrived, the Lumix LX100. It had a M4/3 sensor, fast zoom (f1.7 at wide) and manual controls! For years I dismissed complaints about dust getting inside to others’ carelessness. But it happened to me in 2017. I paid to have it serviced, took it to Prague this year, and the sensor dust was back.

I still use it when shooting with an open aperture (where the dust isn’t visible), and hope the rumors of a better sealed LX100ii are true.

This incident prompted me to get my first interchangeable lens camera in twenty years, the GX85. I can blow any dust off the sensor myself. I also enjoy using a telephoto lens.

That’s nine cameras (mostly inexpensive digital compacts) over twenty-three years. Not too bad in a hobby beset by GAS (gear acquisition syndrome).

°2017.08.15.Tue | The paradox and pragmatics of intolerance

In What White Supremacists Don’t Want You to Know, Valerie Aurora highlights Karl Popper’s Paradox of Tolerance and argues it is relevant to our response to neo-Nazis of today.

For his part, Popper was writing during the end World War II and was likely thinking about the tepid response to the original Nazis. Although they forced him to flee his home in Vienna, the Nazis are not mentioned in Open Society. Nonetheless, in a very long footnote, Popper consider the various “paradoxes” associated with open societies, including the paradox of tolerance.

Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. — In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law, and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal, in the same way as we should consider incitement to murder, or to kidnapping, or to the revival of the slave trade, as criminal. (Popper1966?, fn. 4, p.581)

Aurora applies this to the white-supremacy of today:

a tolerant society should tolerate protest marches in general, but it shouldn’t tolerate a white supremacist march advocating for the oppression and killing of people of color – like the march in Charlottesville, Virginia in August 2017 that ended with white supremacists beating and killing people who were opposed to their message of intolerance.

I think I first came across this notion by way of Aurora some time ago and I’ve been thinking about it ever since. I had hoped it would help me resolve my dueling values of being tolerant but also defending tolerance. Unfortunately, when I think about particular cases, I fear its resolution is dependent on who gets to define what is intolerant. I can imagine both sides of a debate making claims of intolerance about the other side. For example, those wanting to suppress Muslim immigration can claim Islam is a religion of intolerance and should not be welcomed/tolerated. Those in support of immigration will claim that this position is intolerant itself.

This then sent me in search of a rubric for judging intolerant defenses of tolerance. For example, how should we judge the punching of a neo-Nazi? My thinking has been aided by Yonatan Zunger’s “Tolerance is not a moral precept”; he characterizes tolerance as a type of peace contract with worthwhile ends, not a moral precept.

Tolerance is not a moral absolute; it is a peace treaty. Tolerance is a social norm because it allows different people to live side-by-side without being at each other’s throats. It means that we accept that people may be different from us, in their customs, in their behavior, in their dress, in their sex lives, and that if this doesn’t directly affect our lives, it is none of our business. But the model of a peace treaty differs from the model of a moral precept in one simple way: the protection of a peace treaty only extends to those willing to abide by its terms. It is an agreement to live in peace, not an agreement to be peaceful no matter the conduct of others. A peace treaty is not a suicide pact.

Even so, Zunger acknowledges that conflicts might be unresolvable.

If everything you have ever learned tells you that this is a real and present danger, and that certain members of the community — members of another religion, perhaps, or people of the wrong sexual orientation — are jeopardizing everyone’s safety, then a fundamental, existential conflict is inevitable. In a situation like this, there can be no peace treaty; only war or separation.

This is a useful framework, but I’m still in search of a rubric.

Perhaps the following questions about the initial act of intolerance and subsequent defense could serve as a start.

The initial intolerance (i.e., some exclusionary/hateful behavior)

• Is it born of a deep or long-lasting culture? Germans feel differently about neo-Nazis than Americans, for obvious reasons.
• Is it a significant or growing threat? A lone kook is less of a concern than an organized militia.
• What is the balance of genuine vs possible harm? Advocating for white culture is less of a concern (even if a “dog whistle”) than calls for genocide and violence.

The intolerant defense of tolerance (i.e., suppression of above)

• Is the response proportional?
• Is it likely to be effective?
• Is it applied fairly/equitably?
• Is it narrow in scope?
• Will it set precedent?
• What other values (e.g., speech and religion) are implicated?

°2017.03.10.Fri | The Magnetic Fields

Merritt and The Magnetic Fields have a new album out.

Coincidentally, Nora and I met thanks to DJ Chris Ewen, longtime Merritt collaborator. We even have “Manray” engraved inside our wedding rings – and plan to go dancing at Xmortis tonight.

My favorite song off the album so far is “Be True to Your Bar.” Though, I don’t drink and the only bars I’ve frequented were those that Nora was tending. She’d put my “three fingers of cranberry” in a tumbler, and people would ask about the exotic red liquor I was drinking.

°2013.12.17.Tue | Fishes and Ponds

I’d rather be well-liked by those nearby and unknown to those afar than to be a famous jerk. (Of course, I sometimes fear I’m a little-known jerk to all.)

°2013.02.22.Fri | Karma and interbeing

I’ve always liked the expression that something “gives off more heat than light”: in some circumstances ideas can hinder more than help. Buddhism has similar sayings. A teaching can be thought of as a finger pointing to the moon, but it should not be confused with the moon. A concept can be like a raft used to cross a river, but one should not cling to the raft once one has reached the other shore. Finally, if you see the Buddha, kill the Buddha.

I tend to view the notion of karma as one of these confounding concepts. Karma is often used in the sense of vengeance or divine justice: “karma sucks dude” seems contrary to the much more useful notion of compassion. And lest you think this is just a Western corruption, conservative Hindus and Buddhists use the idea much like an ignorant preacher blaming a natural disaster on homosexuality. (In fact, some Hindus blamed the 2004 tsunami on the growth of Christianity in India.)

However, there is an idea in Buddhism, interbeing, that after years of reflection has brought me to an understanding of what karma might mean. A practice of mine is that when I’m considering someone I do not like I think “had I been born with their biology into their circumstances, I would be just like them.” This is karma in the Zen sense: “this then that.” I like this meditation because it exemplifies interdependence, furthers compassion, and challenges the very notion of “I” and “them.” Some might be troubled that this seems deterministic, that there is no free will or accountability. As I’ve written elsewhere, even if we live in a deterministic universe we’re still accountable moral beings. And, if one is fortunate to have some measure of grace (either by birth, disposition, or even in overcoming difficult circumstances) one can affect the conditions of others for the better. (See the story of the sadistic killer Angulimala’s redemption.)

°2013.01.25.Fri | Hack your mental health

Of late there’s been much discussion of depression and suicide among geeks. (See Clay Shirky’s thoughtful piece.) Yet, like Valerie Aurora, I find much of it to be a “torrent of well-meaning but patronizing advice to suicidal people.” While I’ve struggled with anxiety and depression I also believe people have a right to die. What is tragic is when people commit suicide out of desperation. That is, they did not have the time or resources to deal with mental illness or life’s difficult circumstances –especially if those circumstances are unnecessary, as it is with bullying. Most tragically, many delay or forgo treatment because of attitudes of shame or “gumption.”

A 2007 study in the journal Psychiatric Services looked at 303 mental health patients who had, in the past year, thought about going to the doctor but decided against it. The researchers asked them why. The most frequent response, from 66 percent of the patients, had to do with attitude: They thought the problem would get better on its own. Seventy-one percent agreed with the statement “I wanted to solve the problem on my own.” Cost was a barrier too: 47 percent cited financial obstacles as a reason not to seek treatment. Still, attitudinal barriers about the value of mental health care seemed to be be the biggest obstacle. – Seven facts about America’s mental health-care system

My own attitude was affected by the following insight: untreated depression and anxiety is physically unhealthy. In addition to the excruciating mental anguish, they compound other problems, such as chronic pain and sleep disorders, and can even damage your brain. You wouldn’t continue to bear the pain of walking on a broken foot and possibly throw out a knee or your back as well, so why let this go?

Hence, as a geek, I think of my own issues as a brain with some bugs, but also one I can hack. That sounds silly and trite, but it helps me lighten up. One of my favorite Buddhist teachers, Sylvia Boorstein, similarly refers to this as a “neurological glitch.” In her awesome interview with Krista Tippit she notes:

There are people who are given to fretting without a fretful environment. I think it’s actually a genetic glitch of neurology and that it happens to some people and not for other people…. This is what happens when I’m challenged… I tell people that my glitch is that “when in doubt, worry.” It came with the equipment. I’m also short and I have brown eyes. If I could see that in the same neutral [way], it just came with the equipment, then I don’t have to feel bad about it, but I can work with it wisely.

We can work wisely with and hack many bugs (or glitches). Yoga, swimming, petting a dog, eating well, getting some sun, maintaining relationships, and cognitive behavior therapy are all DIY hacks known to be effective. (I also get a lot of this with Buddhism: mindfulness, meditation, and sangha.) I’ve also greatly benefited from medication when needed. That said, should I ever feel that my suffering (whatever its source) is too great and irreversible, I reserve the option to exit DIY style. And if I do that, it won’t be rash; I’ve been through the wringer enough to know that things can get better. However, whenever and however I do die, I hope to do it mindfully and with compassion for myself and others. I’ve owned a copy of Final Exit, in one edition or another, for over a decade. I hope to have it for many decades more. Its yellowing pages reminds me of the suffering I’ve surmounted; its continued presence reassures me that I have options when my time has come.

°2013.01.14.Mon | Baking Scars

While I like tattoos and a few piercings, I’m not so fond of ear stretching or purposeful scarification. However, I am proud of my baking scars.

The most recent scab, gained via a pot pie, is presently a minor nuisance. But the scars on the outer portions of my (palm side) wrists are kind of elegant. They are the result of my weekly pizza baking as I place and retrieve the pizza from the bottom of the oven without having first removed the lowest wire wrack.

°2013.01.14.Mon | Self-determination theory

Self-determination theory posits three psychological needs:

1. autonomy: control over your life, such as what you work on
2. competence: satisfaction in your performance, such as mastering a skill
3. psychological relatedness: good relations with others, including that one is appreciated

°2011.09.01.Thu | New blog

Until now, every page on this site was hand-coded. It was a great way to learn and experiment with HTML and CSS—sometimes each month had a custom design. I now prefer something easier, so I’m moving my blogging to Pelican, a static blog generator.

You can find older entries here.