The Seahorses

Larry King: Welcome to Larry King Live, we have a great show for you this evening, a pair of fantastically well-spoken and famous guests who are participating in the panel tonight in order to enlighten all of us as to the actual meaning of life! Wow! Like I said, quite a show, but back to the guests may I introduce Dr. Richard Dawkins, Charles Simonyi Professor of Public understanding of science at Oxford, author of "The GOD Delusion" and here to promote his new book "The Convection Principle: Darwin Unleashed." Welcome Dr. Dawkins.

Dr. Dawkins: Glad to be here Larry.

Larry King: And I would also like to welcome, coming to us from his cave in the Swiss mountains, Friedrich Nietzshe, renowned author of many incendiary and deep works such as Twilight of the Idols, Beyond Good and Evil and the evocatively titled The Gay Science. Welcome Dr. Nietzshe.

Nietzshe: Thanks for having me.

Larry King: So I throw it to you gentlemen: why are we here? It's a question that has vexed us for centuries, and will continue to do so well into future I believe. The largest minds in history have attempted to answer this question and been rebuffed and now, more than ever, with the Islamic fundamentalists blowing themselves up at every opportunity, we must confront this important question of human existence.

Dr. Dawkins: I'll take that one Larry, but first I was wondering ... Why is Nietzshe here? My Book is called the god delusion and wasn't he the one who told everyone that God was dead?

Nietzshe: You are correct, that was me. You know I actually enjoyed parts of your book. Religion really is insufferable.

Dr. Dawkins: Thanks! I knew that all I had to do was to explain my positions clearly and forcefully and the pure correctness of my argument would carry the day. How anyone could remain religious after reading my book is totally inconceivable, to say nothing of hugely improbable given my intelligence. I guess most everyone who goes to church must be akin to crazed lobotomized lemmings.

Nietzshe: Well, you won't get an argument from me on that point. But haven't I heard of an alternative concept you are involved with? It explains this sick charade called human existence doesn't it? What was it called again? You must forgive me, I don't get delivery of the New York Times up here in my cave.

Dr. Dawkins: Quite. We moderns call it evolution. It's the process by which different kinds of living organisms diversify and develop from earlier forms during the history of the earth. Darwin and his successors have shown how living creatures have evolved by slow gradual degrees from simple beginnings. We can now say that the illusion of design in living creatures is just that - an illusion. The data is incontrovertible. The probability of God existing is on the same order as the earth being rhombus shaped, and borne through the cosmos in the pincers of two enormous green lobsters named Esmerelda and Keith.

Nietzshe: Well that is really a fascinating concept, but I have one question. How can you be sure that your interpretation of the data is not just that- an interpretation? Couldn't another observer with totally different predilections and modes of interpretation observe the same phenomena and "laws" of nature and extract from those "laws" a completely different conclusion? Perhaps that the universe has a "necessary" and "calculable" course not because laws constrain it but because the laws are completely lacking? Maybe this hypothetical observer would conclude that every power and occurrence reaches it's own consequences in it's own actions that very moment? That there is no unifying theory - that in effect everything is random - Isn't this possible?

Dr Dawkins: Ugh. I see where this is going. Yes I concede that it is possible, in the widest possible definition of that word, but it is an EXTREMELY unlikely interpretation of observable phenomena which have much, much more logical explanations.

Nietzshe: But that is exactly my point; both your theory and mine are Interpretations of the "facts" which you observe.

Dr. Dawkins: That point of argument has always annoyed me. It is a red herring which always crops up when people with a smattering of philosophical learning put on their postmodernism caps and want to stir up the pot. Sure everything might be relative and maybe we scientists are guilty of arbitrarily choosing the definitions of the words "truth" and "facts" but in NO WAY does this have ANY bearing on the sick charade called human existence as you so charmingly put it. All of us believe in evidence, whatever we may profess with our amateur philosopher hats on. If you ask me if I really exist, if I am really talking right now or what my last name is, there is one answer which is correct and every other answer is incorrect. The assignments of the terms "truth" and "facts" are not up for grabs in any PERTINENT sense. You, I and everyone who has ever drawn breath on planet earth has defined these terms in this way, they can have no other relevant meaning. It is not, my dear fellow, simply a matter of "how you look at things."

Nietzshe: So you are underpinning your theory of evolution not with any absolute idea of truth, but rather with the kind of truth that is the most sensible for us humans; If you ask me that's not the strongest of foundations. Isn't one of our most ubiquitous observations the one that teaches us to ignore our senses? The sun doesn't revolve around the earth you know, despite appearances.

Dr Dawkins: No no you have missed the point, we know that the earth revolves around the sun not because we observe it to be so but because we REASON it to be so. There are countless examples of scientific phenomena which run counter to common sense but which are proven facts because they have been hypothetically tested and mathematically proven. Quantum mechanics makes brilliantly successful predictions about the real world but the assumptions that it needs to make in order to deliver on those predictions are often shockingly deadly to common sense. But that doesn't matter, the only thing that matters is that the mathematics work and the predictions are experimentally fulfilled. Every time you drink a glass of water, the odds are good that you will imbibe at least one molecule that passed through the bladder of Oliver Cromwell. It's just elementary probability theory. The number of molecules per glassful is hugely greater than the number of glassfuls in the world. And that's just one example. If you Ignore these reasoning concepts it is like denying that all inclosed three sided shapes are triangles just because you can't see all of them at one time. You might think so but you would be wrong in every conceivable definition of the word.

Nietzshe: Hmmm... let me get this straight, you are defining "truth" as an interpretation of rationally derived evidence. Did you choose this definition because it was the only one available or because it was the best one available?

Dr. Dawkins: Oh it's the best, If by opposite of best you mean totally inimitable to any form of meaningful life. First of all it is the best because it's beautiful. The natural world is a phenomenon which betters anyone who takes the time to step out of his front door and contemplate what meets his eye at that moment. Science and rationalism are the basis for man's contemplation of his world and his crowning achievement. What could be a better way of celebrating our world than really paying attention to it with the full breadth of our cognitive power? Science is not anti imagination- on the contrary- it just involves creating categories of "true" and "false" which don't refer to the imagination, which is static regardless of what we happen to believe or what we wish to believe and- paradoxically- serves to give vitality and organization to the imagination. Second of all, it's the best because it's useful. Civilizations have never gotten along healthily and cannot get along healthily without large quantities of reliable factual information. People need to know things about things in order to know what to eat and what not to eat, how to dress (climactically speaking) and where to live (volcanoes, elementary schools etc.) as well as how to do what they are paid to do, how to raise their children, what to think of the people they meet, what they are capable of achieving, what they would like to achieve and dozens of other mundane but pretty useful things.

Nietzshe: You know, every morning in my cave, as I am preparing my coffee and strudel, I look out upon the Alps and enjoy the view; the snow capped mountains, the winding, flashing rivers, the deep green of the trees are all very beautiful and inspiring. But as you said, without the capability for rational thought and scientific calculation, it would be difficult for me to procure coffee or even to know why I needed coffee in the first place! All this talk of utility reminds me of something. Once, as I was riding my donkey into town to get some batteries, I fell in behind two women, also on donkeys, who were gossiping and chatting. Both of them had loaded enormous bushels of vegetables and broken hi-fi equipment on their donkeys to try and sell at market and as they were completely blocking the path I had no choice but to follow on behind and listen in to their conversation. The gist of it went like this if I am remembering rightly:
"So what did your great uncle say again?"
"Well he started talking about when he was a U-boat pilot in WW2 and how there were some really strange stories circulating among the crew after they got back from their third deployment."
"What sort of stories?"
"Well, one went that if you were exactly 26 miles off the southwestern coast of the island of Shikoku, Japan and descended deep enough and long enough you would find the remains of an entire city, beautiful and perfectly preserved."
"Oh wow! I wonder what sort of people lived there?"
"You couldn't be sure that they were people at all. According to the story, the inhabitants of this ancient city might have been fish or even a type of very intelligent sea-horse because they left absolutely no images or monuments."
"Oh no way! How could a civilization not want to create anything lasting?"
"For one thing, this civilization lived entirely in the present. It was ahistorical. For these seahorses, nothing interesting had happened in the past and nothing interesting would happen in the future. For them, history wasn't a procession -each event attaching to another extending in a line- it was the continuous blooming and decay of the present moment. History didn't exist. Rationalism didn't exist. Life was viewed as inexplicable, alive and finite."
"So these seahorses had no goals? No plans or hopes for the future?"
"I guess not. They went about their lives placing no value on understanding or explaining things in any universal way, each moment held its own laws. Things simply were and arranged themselves according to their own inner characteristics - they couldn't be any other way. Food and shelter were needed and acquired according to natural promptings, art was created and forgotten, nothing was lasting because everything held the same value. The present moment was more compelling than any future goal. Every action and occurrence contained its own importance in its existence at that moment."
"Oh snap! Those seahorses sound fun! Never worrying about if you were 'getting anywhere' if you were 'doing anything' "
"Exactly. Everywhere the seahorse was was just where the seahorse wanted to be."
And that's how the conversation went until all of us reached a wider path and I was able to overtake and pass the ladies on my donkey.

Dr Dawkins: Hmm. Interesting. You know I do think that in some ways those seahorses had a point. However, an existence without goals and hopes would feel, to me at least, a lot like no existence at all. All sense of self comes from pushing up against limitations. Reality provides a perimeter within which I can discover my capabilities and my limitations. In short, define my entire identity. With no aspirations and no limitations, true individuation would be impossible and we would all be a big random static mass. I'm guessing that's what being an sea-horse must have felt like. I'll take my reality, thanks very much.

Nietzshe: I completely understand. If I were you I would want to stay being you too -you are a pretty cool guy. But that's my point, you are choosing this idea of reality because you think its the best one. If I showed you a concept of reality (maybe one that didn't involve seahorses) that was better suited to human existence than your concepts, you would be logically required to change your opinion about what was true and what was false. It's not so unlikely as you might think -those polar ice caps are melting pretty fast.

Dr. Dawkins: I guess you are right but believe me, I'm not holding my breath.

Nietzshe: Thats ok. Just stick to being a scientist, it really is a neat thing to be, and leave the philosophizing and polemicizing to people who are gifted with a greater capacity for stupidity and misstatement than you. The world needs more evangelical scientists like it needs a hole in the head. You are a single piece of the universal structure of life -not an irreplaceable foundation- just like our mutual friend Jesus Christ.

Dr. Dawkins: Ok.

Larry king: Well that was an interesting show, I'm not sure what the seahorses had to do with anything, but regardless it was captivating. Good night from New York, Anderson Cooper 360 is on next.

How to hear a joke

OK. All you crappy joke hearers out there, I need you to listen up. When someone tells you a joke that is in the format of call and response, i.e. "What do you call a ...?" "I don't know, what?" "you call it ****!" (laughter), you need to follow the rules.

What you need to do, if someone is telling you a joke like that, is be obedient. You need to just say "what?". DO NOT try to come up with your own punchline. DO NOT ask a smartass question of clarification. DO NOT do anything at all except for the simplest possible thing you can do to allow the person who is TELLING the joke to get to the punchline, uninterrupted.

You see, not only is it kind of annoying for you to usurp the opportunity of the joke teller to be funny, but it inevitably ruins the joke. Comedy is 75% timing. If the joke teller has to first deflect your guess as to what the punchline is before telling the actual (and I guarantee, funnier) punchline, then the momentum of the joke is lost. If you do this, and the joke is not funny, well... it might not actually be a funny joke, but.... you HELPED to kill it. There is comic blood on your hands. And by comic blood, I don't mean ketchup. I mean the blood of the joke you just murdered with your self centered, attention seeking, arrogant idea that you can improve a joke you haven't even finished hearing with your own peanut gallery style quips.

I'm telling you, when someone is telling you a joke, you need to be humble. You have to just say your one line and get off the stage. Don't try to steal the spotlight from the headliner. Nobody wins when that happens. And thousands of jokes die every day from people who think otherwise /RANT

A new contributor to The Tally Ho

I'd like to introduce my partner in crime, JWVG. He's an old friend and has a similar predilection to long-winded, crackpot, highly opinionated writings on the particulars of reality and philosophy. He also, like me, is interested in some dumb things, like sports. Please enjoy his entries and perhaps even an occasional debate between the two of us.

American Idol and the Nature of Reality

So my predictions were almost spot on so far, except that I expected Phil to be a goner before the last three. I guess what happened with him is that he managed to get just a few more votes than each of the other sucky people have been kicked off, and then last week he was surprisingly good, which gave him a larger reprieve. Also, I think Phil must have some sort of appeal I just don't understand. I like him more after the country music show, because I see a facet of him that does show talent and charisma, but I doubt we'll be seeing that again. Anyway, if he sucks in every genre but one, doesn't that still make him pretty much a person who sucks? In any case, he can't win so he will be eliminated eventually, possibly next week. I would like to see him have some success in the country music scene following the show. I think he deserves it. In fact, all of the top 6 (except maybe Chris, who I also don't get at all) deserve some sort of success in the music industry.

I also have a more interesting observation: Ever since I began watching the show, I have been pondering the question of whether or not the voting actually guides the choice of who is eliminated. On one hand, it is a nice reality to believe in. The show's democratic nature is a large part of its appeal, and to believe that our votes do not actually count makes the show yet another piece of vapid, pointless television. I guess I would never argue that it's much more than that, but I would argue that were it not for the sense of audience participation, the show would not be successful. I know this doesn't make it true, but it makes me want to believe it's true. Because if I don't, then my enjoyment is diminished and my life is poorer as a result.

On the other hand, I have a compulsion to be intellectually honest with myself. This is why I'm not into organized religion. I can't make myself believe in some shit just because I want it to be true. My rational side is just too dominant. One of my favorite movies of all time the movie Quiz Show, which documents the unveiling of the scandals surrounding the shows "21" and "The $64,000 Question" in the late 50's. The trivia questions asked of the contestants were supposedly locked in a bank vault until just before airtime, and it seems like pretty much every one in America believed this. The shows were wildly popular in the common culture, much in the same was as American Idol is today.

It turns out of course, that the questions (and answers) were given to the contestants ahead of time. The whole thing was fiction, complete with fantastically dramatic failures of contestants who had been "winning" for long periods of time. The producers would analyze the ratings and public opinion each week, decide what the most compelling and dramatic thing to happen would be for the next week, and then make it happen.

Of course, when the little man behind the curtain was revealed, there was massive outrage among the public. There were congressional hearings, and lives (mostly of the contestants who had previously been seen as heroes) were ruined. The movie tries to cast these events as the begining of the loss of American innocence that seemed to take place between the 1950s and the 1960s. I don't know how true that really is, but I buy it as a factor at least. I don't think people were ever that trusting of television again.

Which brings me back to American Idol. Is it fixed? And does it matter? The argument that it is fixed lies mostly in sheer economics. A lot of money rides on the show. Would you, as an American Idol producer, with huge sums of other people's money riding on subtle ratings changes on the show, risk a less compelling outcome based on the whim of the public? I wouldn't want the outcome to be in control of anyone but myself. Especially if I was an expert in creating dramatic entertainment. And I really do think those guys know what they're doing.

My evidence to back this up is the story Sanjaya, who was eliminated this week. I remember hearing a while back that ratings for the show were down this season. I don't know if this continues to be the case, but I do know that Sanjaya has been the primary topic of Americna Idol discussion in nearly every medium. Even people who have never seen the show seem to know who he is. There is no way that his continued presence has driven up the ratings significantly. Also, he seems to have exited at precisely the right time. The joke was starting to get old, and it is perfect timing due to the fact that next week is the big charity show they've been promoting all season. The idea behind the charity show, I'm sure, is to increase the credibility of the show which pretty much everyone agrees is fluffy entertainment. Sanjyaya was making people talk, but the higher he climbed, the more he was undermining the little respect the show actually carried. Now, they can shed this old, stale joke that was weighing them down, and go forward with their very serious and very very important charity spectacular. His exit could not have been more perfectly timed.

Being a member of the post-quiz-show-scandal, post-loss-of-American-innocence generation, I cannot say I believe the show is genuine in its claim that the votes choose who goes home (although I am sure they factor into the decision the producers make - it's very helpful in determining public opinion). I do however, vote for Blake dutifully each week. Why do I do this? As stated earlier, I simply could not enjoy the show if I wasn't able to suspend my disbelief for at least a few hours each week.

As I get older, the more able I am to do this. I am increasingly comfortable with contradictions and a small amount of controlled, irrational behavior. I don't think this means I'll start going to Church and eating body of Christ crackers, but you never know. Maybe American Idol is the gateway drug to full born-again brainwashing! It's too late for me, but if your kids are rational beings like I once was, keep them away from this stuff or before you know it, they'll be proselytizing door to door and throwing rocks at pregnant teenagers.

Useless Opinion on a Useless Show

My prediction of the order in which contestants will be eliminated from American Idol:

1. Phil
2. Gina
3. Haley
4. Sanjaya
5. Chris

Remaining: Lakisha, Melinda, Jordin, and Blake. I think any of the could easily win and don't have enough information to predict what will happen in the final 4. I desperately hope it's Blake but passion, love and lust make me biased. I've thought at different times that each of those three women was definitely the best singer in the competition. Whatever happens, I hope that each of the four finds success in the music world. I kind of hope Sanjaya does too, because I'm sick. No! Because I actually like him despite his lack of talent. I know I'm not crazy, because I'm not voting for him and somebody sure as hell is.