A definition-dependent paradox for #makeachartday: value, quality, etc
Thoughts and insights on culture and human behavior, living blissfully at the intersection of rationality and irrationality (but mostly irrationality)
I sometimes wish we could freeze a person and examine - in a very comprehensive way - how any one person's thoughts and experiences have led them to see the world in the very specific way they perceive it. Why any one person is exactly where they are, making the decisions they believe they are making, when they could be in an infinite number of other places, thinking and deciding an infinite number of other things.
This site exists because I've come to believe that we learn something from everything we experience. It's not always big. It's not always what we expect it to be. We might think it's contrary to what we already know. Or believe. But it's always something. And it always has a greater impact on our choices and experiences than we ever realize.
Contributors
Filed under
paradox
One model for thinking about roles and relationships: Philosopher/Scientist/Entrepreneur/Artist
The above is something of an infographic that I threw together to start modelling a ton of complicated questions that have been going through my head, when thinking about the complex ways that value and meaning manifest themselves in the world. As I think more on these things the nature of the above will surely evolve but I figure it's a good place to start.
The questions in my head that have driven the above come from a lot of places and my thinking on them I'll explain more deeply in future posts; some basic thoughts on it for now:
- It's not a perfect model for anything, but it has helped me frame things in a way that I've found useful. Certainly everyone fills these roles in different ways and incorporates combinations of characteristics into their own lives - it's not useful to think of anybody as falling into just one of the above, and its not useful to think that anyone falls into all four.
- I started by primarily trying to express the nature of how each role informs the others. The basic question here is: who is more valuable to the world: the artist or the scientist? The basic answer is: neither.
- Another basic question: how should we think about the different kind of value between things that are simple, widely-adopted and business-valuable as compared to things that are niche, difficult, and wisdom-valuable? @tylertravitz approaches the idea below:The thinking comes seeing a question many people have to ask themselves as they create things in the world: do I want things like more page hits (which genuinely leads to more influence) or do I want to express more insight at the risk of losing that level of influence? (On another level: is this a question of balance, or is this an arena where balance isn't the optimal strategy?)
- I've also touched on rationality/irrationality, beginning from questions like: how has 'irrationality' become a pejorative, and how can we model it in balance with rationality?
Lots more thinking to follow on all the above; stay tuned. On some level I've questioned that these things even exist on linear scales, but for the time being it's been a useful place to start.
[imgs by Hans and Carolyn, densitydesign]
Posted by Kyle Cameron Studstill
Comments [4]
Will humans ever strike sociocultural equality?
John Horgan, author of Rational Mysticism and The End of Science has been asking people for the better part of a decade: "do you think humans will ever stop fighting wars?"
The answers are varied of course, and the question is deeply intriguing. Suffice to say that those of both camps could make valid arguments and find evidence that supports their reasoning.
I've been wanting to identify a question of my own of similar complexity, and I think I may have found it.
It's a question inspired by Danah Boyd, someone whose thinking I've followed and found fascinating for years. Her most recent talk has been about making sense of privacy and publicity in social interactions, and the dangers of assuming that privacy is not important.
She makes a lot of very well thought and well supported points about people whose lives are directly and deeply impacted by privacy concerns. Her thoughts in this case, as in most cases of hers, are directed within the context that she enjoys a relatively privileged life and it is an unfortunate reality that many others do not. In all her thinking, she makes it clear that at her core what she is most passionate about is sharing that privilege with others, particularly by doing all that she can to counteract the injustices faced by marginalized groups.
Those who know me know that I believe that the history of humanity has moved in only one direction, which is to deliver more rights to more people. I look at marginalized groups today and think about how ridiculous it will seem in the future that we ever even tried to argue against rights for homosexual couples.
Still I can't help but wonder: do you think humans will ever strike sociocultural equality?
And I can't help but feel like that world with equal rights and advantages for all is that same conflict-less world with no wars.
(quick edit: I should note that while I don't believe the above scenarios are ultimately possible, there's certainly a part of me that believes there's value in the work that goes into trying.)
Posted by Kyle Cameron Studstill
Comments [2]
Two kinds of truth
There are two kinds of truth. There are superficial truths, the opposite of which are obviously wrong. But there are also profound truths, whose opposites are equally right." --Niels Bohr
via siliconyogi.com
Posted by Kyle Cameron Studstill
Comments [0]
Walt Whitman on identity and the paradoxical conflict of change
via books.google.com
["Song of Myself," Walt Whitman]
We have a strong repulsion to being thought of as hypocrites. I think we take it too far sometimes.
Posted by Kyle Cameron Studstill
Comments [0]
My Blogroll:
Comments [0]