Making Sense of Ferguson, MO.

The tragedy that continues to occur in Ferguson, MO over the fatal police shooting of an unarmed teenager named Michael Brown and the protests and police response which followed follow a familiar American pattern, one which is not about the political left or political right, but about the general state of American attitudes.

Liberals have focused on the injustice of the original shooting, given that Brown was unarmed and the shooting officer had no knowledge of the prior crimes committed by Brown.  They have also focused on the police response to the incident with shocking violence and weapons of war.  For them, this is about a bigger picture--the government abusing its power and trying to grab more for itself and suppressing minorities who already face discrimination.  It is about the police using military style tactics to take a dump on our freedoms.

Conservatives have focused on the appalling behavior of Michael Brown himself.  Video released from earlier in the day shows his storming into a convenience store and stealing cigars.  When he is confronted by the clerk, he gets in the clerk's face and pushes them aside with amazing arrogance, bravado, and total lack of respect for others.  Seeing his behavior, you can't help but think he's a piece of shit.  Conservatives have also focused on the problem of protesters who are now looting and using the protests as means to take a shit on the rights of others, particularly innocent business owners.  For them, it is time we restore some law and order.  When looters are given free reign, we have anarchy, and this isn't safe for anyone.

It seems we have these types of racial situations in America quite a bit.  The truth is that many whites are afraid of young black men.  Watching the news, it appears to whites that young black men are scary--they are killing each other in the inner cities, fill the prisons, and look, talk, and dress different than whites.  Many whites live in the suburbs and rural areas.  Ferguson, Missouri is a small town of mostly blacks with a white police force.  The cultures are different and misunderstandings are inevitable. 

Being black in America still sucks.  If you are a young black man, you already have a lot of shit stacked against you.  In the minds of whites, you get lumped in with the "bad blacks" all the time.  You are more likely to get stopped by police, harassed, and followed while shopping in stores.  You don't get the privilege of not having to think about race.  You should be judged by who you are as a person, not by your race.  But in America, that simply doesn't happen. 

The problem is that racism isn't the sole cause of this.  White folks tend to over react.  This is the white way.  Think about the Puritans--they were so upset over how to baptize their children they decided to face sickness and disease crossing the ocean because Europe wasn't uptight enough for them.  Think of the Salem Witch Trials, which was a purging of old white women because their uptightness got the best of them, or the McCarthy Communist scare.  America is built on white anal retentiveness.  Whites turn on their TVs or laptops at night and see black men doing scary things.  This freaks them out.  They respond by over reacting, which escalates the situation instead of defusing it.  So instead of arresting Michael Brown, he gets shot to death.  Instead of calling in the police force to handle the protesters, they get armed to the teeth with military weapons.  Instead of being supervised, protesters get tear gassed.  In the minds of blacks, this only confirms the racism and hatred of the mostly white police forces, which leads to more frustration.

Blacks are tired of being prejudged.  Whites are tired of seeing young black men committing crimes.  Seeing the looting of innocent businesses by little punks calling themselves "protestors" is not helping the situation.  The police are supposed to preserve law and order.  But because of the fucked up original response of the situation, they are unable to effectively do their jobs, like protect and serve.  So now the governor has needed to call in the Missouri National Guard.  Law and order must be restored.  Enough is enough already.

The truth is that Michael Brown didn't deserve to die.  He appears to have been a little punkass turd with no respect for the rights of others.  He is hardly a sympathetic figure, but the police did act wrongly in killing him.  The frustrated black community members had the right to voice their opinions peacefully through protest without the white shock troops being sent in to circle them.  But this over reaction doesn't give young punks the right to act entitled and loot businesses and commit mayhem.  Because the police lacked the social intelligence to adequately weigh the situation, Brown was shot and killed.  The same reason exists why the mostly white police force showed up in army vehicles and started tear gassing the crowds, making things worse.  It only confirmed in the minds of the blacks that the police were a bunch of racist dicks.

Part of the reason these problems exist is because America is more isolated and atomized than ever.  People don't interact with each other because they are too busy living apart from one another and staring at computer and phone screens.  This is especially true in rural areas like Ferguson.  As income inequality increases, blacks and whites move farther apart.  Rich whites live in gated communities and attend private schools.  Poor blacks live in ghettos and go to ghetto schools.  The suburbs are fading because the middle class is dying.  People don't run across each other at the malls anymore.  The opportunities for increased misunderstanding and fear increase.  Blacks and whites have little opportunity to get middle class paying jobs.  When you grow up in the ghetto and the future is bleak, people form gangs for protection and then the gangs turn on one another.  People are left fighting for the scraps left behind by the super rich.  Many young black boys have no fathers.  They have no positive male role models, so they don't learn what it is like to be a man.  They see rappers and sports stars as their heroes.  They aren't receiving the guidance they need, and this is reflected by ghetto culture.  The family has been destroyed by the lack of economic opportunities.  When men become unnecessary, they feel unnecessary and don't act responsibly.  In some schools, working hard and studying means you are "acting white" and is an open invitation to getting bullied.  If that isn't a diseased culture, I don't know what is.

The white response to economic misfortune is also fucked up.  From the 1980's until now, when the rich were busy dismantling the manufacturing sector, exporting jobs to increase stock returns, and desperately trying to get as much money as possible by playing financial games and bubbles, most whites adopted the attitude of "Oh well, there's nothing I can do about it.  I just have to look out for me."  With no social solidarity and the screwed up libertarian attitude of "Everyone can do it for themselves," the situation was ripe for economic fucking.  Now the chickens have come home to roost.  Whites are feeling the pain.  Now their jobs are going away.  Being a white Christian doesn't save you from economic misfortune.  Where once you could work right out of high school and buy a new car every few years, send your kids to college, and have your wife stay home, now you get to work for shit pay while your wife also works.  The kids have to be watched by parents on opposite schedules.  Student loan debts keep you enslaved to corporate America.  A new car?  Very funny. 

Instead of blaming the real bad actors, whites turn on each other.  Instead of resorting to gang violence, they blame immigrants, minorities, liberals, or the black president.  "If only we can get rid of these bad guys, things will be good again."  It doesn't matter whether Hilary is president.  It doesn't matter whether we have a Republican or Democrat in the White House.  The fundamental nature of the system is not going to change.  Part of this is the nature of the political campaign financing laws.  There is too much money in politics and it makes it corrupt.

The more scary reality is that in some respects, we get what we ask for.  At the end of the day, we do have free and fair elections most of the time (not always).  This country has millions of residents.  If we really wanted an honest president and congress members, we could find them.  There is an ugliness about America that is reflected in our politicians.  They are us.  That is why we let George W. Bush's heinous regime commit torture and atrocities and let them get away with it.  It is why we let the Wall Street greed monsters take over.  It is why we support the terrorist state of Israel which kills thousands of Gazan residents and no one cares.  Americans believe that they are the temporarily embarrassed rich, that one day they too will also be rich.  It doesn't matter whether you grew up in the ghetto or in a trailer park, you think you too will be the next LeBron James or Warren Buffett.  Americans don't have an attitude of social solidarity or being their brother's keeper.  They don't see themselves as "being in this together." 

Driving on the highways, you see how selfish and shitty people are.  Rather than let you in, people would have you smash into the guard rail or miss your exit.   "Fuck you buddy, I got's to get mine" is the prevailing attitude.  The problem is that everything is interconnected.  Like it or not, if you don't let me in to my lane and I have to choose between smashing into the guard rail or hitting you, I am going to hit you because my chances of survival are better.  You may not feel it is your problem, but it is.  When the environment gets screwed up beyond recognition because you pollute the drinking water and people in Toledo have no water, it will become your problem.  When you decide to make short term profits and invest in corporations which switch your manufacturing jobs to China, it becomes your problem when you have no job.  As a white collar professional, it becomes my problem when there is no middle class that can afford to pay for my services.  Even if you think you are immune to economic problems, when the impoverished mob comes to loot because they have nothing to lose, it becomes your fucking problem. 

What can I do?  It is not hopeless.  If every single person took small steps to not be a selfish dick things could improve dramatically.  Most of it is about fixing your attitude.  Think about how others have problems and give a shit.  Try to help them as best you can.  Toss out the "fuck you, I got's to get mine" attitude.  Let someone in while driving, even if you have the right not to.  Try to imagine what it is like to be born as someone different from you, whatever race or religion that person might be. 

If we voted our conscience instead of what was "practical," things would improve.  If we stood up against injustice, whether it be by politicians, the police, or individual thugs, things would improve.  The peaceful protestors in Ferguson are heroes.  And so are the business owners who armed themselves to the teeth and protected their businesses from looters.  Giving those who are different from you the benefit of the doubt and not prejudging them is important.  And regardless of your race, you have the responsibility not to be an asshole.  You need to not commit crimes, loot, act entitled, and work hard to better yourself. 

If all people embraced compassion with justice, solidarity with peace, along with tough love and personal responsibility, we could solve our problems.  None of them are inevitable.  It is up to us to solve them.  We can, if only we put our minds and hearts to it.







 

Yes, Virginia, Evil Exists

"She is beyond the grace of God.  She is damned."

--Brahm Stoker's Dracula

As Americans, we like to believe people can change and become good.  It is practically programmed in our genes to forgive.  Whether it be Michael Vick, LeBron James, or Tiger Woods, the formula is the same--if you do a bad deed, you are expected to be punished.  After some time, if you apologize, we will forgive you.  America gives people second chances.  We believe in the ability of people to remake themselves and redeem themselves.

Many Americans are Christians.  The Bible is filled with examples who were bad actors who later turned good.  St. Paul used to help Christians get killed before his conversion experience on the road to Damascus.  After this, he became one of the greatest missionaries in Christianity.  The notion that God's grace cannot touch certain people's hearts and reform them is antithetical to our deepest held notions of what is right and true.

But what if there are some who cannot be saved?  What if there are those that thanks to biology and brain damage, are unable to do good and actually mean it?  Recent advances in fMRI technology and psychological testing has shown that psychopaths are incapable of experiencing empathy.  As an experiment, these people were hooked up to machines which recorded the activation of certain areas of the brain related to emotion.  When hearing words that are neutral, like "table" and "ball", normal people show no activation in the emotional areas of the brain.  But when hearing words that are emotionally charged, like "cancer" or "death of loved one", the areas related to emotion show activation.  In psychopaths, the words "cancer" and "death of loved one" registered the same as the neutral words.  In the more sick psychopaths, the words of suffering toward others caused their pleasure centers of the brain to be activated.  They were "turned on" by the suffering of others.  Likewise, the areas of the brain responsible for empathy were unaffected by images of the suffering of others, unlike the controls.

There are things in the brain called mirror neurons.  These are activated when we see another person perform an action like cry or smile.  When a baby hears another baby cry, it will cry too.  These mirror neurons allow the baby to perceive the pain of others.  This then encourages their empathic centers of the brain to be activated.  In psychopaths, they have the same number of mirror neurons.  They can perceive the pain of others.  The problem is they simply don't care.  Their empathic areas of the brain don't get activated.  Like a reptile, they remain cold blooded.  That is why when psychopathic criminals are later interviewed about their crimes, they speak about killing people in a matter-of-fact sort of way.  When non psychopathic killers are interviewed, they are more likely to talk about the spiritual and moral meanings of their crimes.  Psychopaths never talk this way.

Experiments were done with identical twins to see what portion of the psychopathic personality is based on genetics and which part is the environment.  We do know that to get a violent psychopath like Joel Rifkin or Jeffrey Dahmer, the child must be beaten and abused.  But what if a psychopath is not physically abused?  Twins studies indicate that there is a 80% genetic inheritance for psychopathy.  To the extent that non violent psychopaths don't harm people, it is because their parents did a good job.  These psychopaths spend their time committing white collar crimes and living like parasites off the good will of people.  Some of them may even do good, the difference being that cognitively they know what society expects of them and do it.  But they still don't care about the suffering of others or remain law abiding because they have internalized these norms.  It is only in this sense that they are "saved" by God's grace--the love of their parents.  But it doesn't make them normal, empathic people capable of love.

Autistic people lack the ability to actually see the suffering or pain in others.  It doesn't properly register with them.  If you tell someone with an autistic spectrum disorder like Asperger's that they hurt your feelings, they would care and feel bad.  They don't have an inability to feel empathy.  They are caring people.  It is like they are colorblind to facial expressions.  The psychopath knows full well that you are suffering and can recognize your pain--they just don't give a shit.

James Fallon is a scientist who studies the brain.  He also is a psychopath.  He states in his book "The Psychopath Inside" that after the age of 5, the brain structures responsible for empathy are formed.  If they are underdeveloped or don't exist, it's too late.  After this critical window, they cannot be "gotten back."  The child will remain a psychopath forever.  The best we can do is show children with psychopathic tendencies as much love and kindness as possible to minimize the later harm they will do.  We may prevent them from becoming violent.  But they will still never be empathic and truly care for others.

Psychopathy tends to run in families.  It's not one gene, it appears to be a constellation of genes.  There very well may be epigenetic factors that help these genes be turned on or off.  How to avoid the expression of these genes and prevent psychopathy in those with the inherited condition remains a mystery.  It is estimated that 1% of the population are psychopaths.

One of the worst things we can do is hope that a psychopath will change.  We project on to them normal emotions like love and compassion.  A psychopath is an expert at imitating emotions, at feigning concern when it serves his or her purposes.  But these are crocodile tears.  When psychopaths are interviewed about their crimes, many of them will pretend to be sorry for their crimes.  But later in that same interview, they will talk about how the victim "Had it coming to them because they were stupid."

Even some children as young as the age of 18 months can demonstrate psychopathic traits.  One psychopathic child at the age of 10 hanged his mother's cat and left it there for the mother to discover.  When she was horrified, the child smiled, enjoying her reaction.  Psychopathic children enjoy hurting animals and playing with fire.  They are fearless and avid risk takers.  They usually have discipline problems after the age of 13, like delinquency, selling drugs, and other problems.

Strangely, words you say to a psychopath don't affect them.  As long as they get what they want, they don't care what you say about them.  Their confidence is rock solid.  They believe in themselves.  They feel they are superior to others.  They feel no sense of conscience as in people owing a duty of moral obligation to others.  They know that people are bound by these rules, but they don't value it and don't care.  That is how they can abandon their families and move away without a second thought.  Once they drain their hosts of their reputations, money, and resources, they move on.  They are living vampires, living in their own hells removed from all love, compassion, and goodness.

Many of them feel a sense of nothingness inside.  They feel devastating boredom.  Their emotions are shallow.  They hate the world and feel persecuted although they shit on people every chance they get.  They will kick you in the balls and make you apologize they did you the favor.  Anything you say or do, they will twist and turn to make you feel insane.  Because they have no social compass, they will trash talk about you behind your back and turn everyone against you.  They seek to crush you on every level if you don't give them what they want.  They are the darkness.  Listening to a psychopath attack you is fascinating because they will accuse you of the things they themselves have done to you.  If they are abusive, they will accuse you of abusing them, even though the facts are totally contrary to this. 

If you have a psychopath in your life, you need to cut them out like a tumor.  It doesn't matter if they are a spouse, parents, sibling, or whatever.  They will destroy you.  They will never change.  They will not be saved or born again.  Get away before it is too late.

You don't get a blue ribbon for being a victim.

When "Work" No Longer Works

There are many things we accept without thinking.  One of them is that to get money, you must work.  This model is based on scarcity.  In a world where labor must be mixed with capital to create goods and services, working makes sense--you provide a value and you receive value for that labor in return.  The concept is that if you create value, you receive compensation.  This rewards hard work and punishes the lazy and moochers.  The problem, however, is that technology eliminates some forms of scarcity.  This upturns the traditional model of labor.  In a world where machines can do the work humans used to do, human labor is worth much less.  Sometimes human labor is rendered obsolete.  An example would be the video store.  It used to be that you had to physically travel to Blockbuster to rent a movie, which needed to be checked in, organized, and returned to the shelf.  The advent of the Internet and Netflix made this business model obsolete.  Video store workers were left unemployed. 

The existence of the Internet has killed the job market because it has eliminated the scarcity of labor.  If you were formerly making big money as a software programmer in the U.S., companies can now hire Indians across the globe to do the work for a small fraction of the price.  The same goes for customer service.  Lawyers are finding that their jobs are also being outsourced.  3-D printers will be available in a few years such that many consumer products will be printable on demand.  Robots will be fulfilling the duties of caregivers and assistants.  Even truck drivers are under threat by driverless cars and vehicle systems.  Watson, the IBM computer that won on Jeopardy, can diagnose medical problems and treat patients much more effectively than humans.  Watson could be available on anyone's smartphone.  And many medical tests are able to be administered via smartphone apps and attachments as well.

The bottom line is that labor isn't what it used to be.  If you now own the means of production, you are making a killing.  The wealth becomes concentrated at the top while the bottom 99% suffer.  The myopia of the super rich is apparent.  The masses will only take poverty and suffering for so long before they react.  This could be positive if it means grassroots organizing, political reforms, and means used to change the system.  It could be negative if people outright revolt.  The haves must recognize that shitting on people will only work for so long before you get a backlash.  We are seeing this in Gaza right now.  The Palestinians have had enough of being terrorized and are striking back.  The Israeli response is typical--using violence and terrorism to beat the people back into submission.

The present system of working for money is coming to an end.  In the future, when labor is essentially obsolete, goods and services will need to be distributed to people in a more efficient manner.  It could mean taxing the richest corporations and guaranteeing a basic standard of living for everyone.  People will still do work, but it won't be for money.  I reject the notion that people are essentially lazy and will only work if threatened with starvation.  People work on the things they are passionate about.  Scientists will work for 80 hours per week to learn new things.  Musicians will starve for years to pursue their craft.  It is the shit work that people hate.  But if you hate this type of work, you are labeled "lazy."  Technology is making these sorts of tasks obsolete. 

The truth is that there is enough wealth and technology right now to enable all people to work part time and have enough.  The problem is that our present system is based on 19th century notions.  We have so much food grocery stores throw food away while people go hungry.  We have millions of homeless people and millions of unused, foreclosed homes.  We have people dying from polio when vaccines exist to prevent the disease.  We have sick people dying from preventable diseases because our system only pays for treatments when people are about to die instead of investing in preventative care. 

Part of this is rooted in human psychology.  Studies have shown that primates have a built-in sense of "fairness" that encourages people to punish moochers, even if this means hurting themselves in the long run.  This might have made sense 10,000 years ago, but now, our desire to punish others is destroying our society.  Similarly, our sense of tribalism and worrying about excluding the "other", whether it be immigrants, those who have different tastes or preferences, or whatever, will ultimately lead to our own doom.  In a world of nuclear weapons, tribalism can be fatal to everyone. 

We have all sorts of natural inclinations.  But we have evolved to live in a different age.  Sometimes common sense lacks sense.  We aren't designed to live in a world that is connected by the Internet, where we have contact with thousands of people, where we know what is going on halfway across the planet.  Sometimes we have to think outside of the box. 

Fear, suspicion, and xenophobia can and will destroy us if we let it. 

Guardian Angels

Sometimes in life, when things seem at their worst, and we feel like the world is a terrible, vicious place, we find tender moments of grace.  These are the moments when God lifts us up when we least expect it.  It is when He works through people to touch our lives, surprise us, and let us know that love is bigger than the sorrows we face and the adversity which challenges us.

I came home tonight, exhausted from a long week, with stress having taken its toll.  My pregnant wife had an ultrasound for our two babies earlier in the day.  I love them very much.  They are my world.  So of course my anxiety levels were sky-high until the appointment ended.  Thankfully everything went well, but it doesn't mean a father doesn't worry every time.  Nothing else in my life is as important to me as my wife and our two babies. 

Coming home, I found my neighbors had the goodness in their hearts to work on mowing my yard.  It was an act of kindness and service that I will never forget.  "We figured you were tired from dealing with doctor's visits and everything that we wanted to help you out."  They brought over some garden vegetables so my wife would have them.  It meant so much.

In a society that has become increasingly atomized and isolated, it is so wonderful to have neighbors that care for one another.  It is truly like the kingdom of heaven.  It is made of the good deeds and acts of service people share with one another. 

I'm A Victim, Are You A Victim Too?

There is power in victimhood.  Whether it be blaming one's parents, society-at-large, immigrants, other races, conservatives, liberals, the religious, atheists, Christians, non-Catholics, or whoever, victimhood is a hot commodity on today's market.  Turn on Fox News and you never hear the end about how non-white liberals like Obama are out to destroy the country for God fearing good white Christians.  Or turn on MSNBC to learn about how Tea Party members are hell bent on turning America back into the segregated South of 1952.  Whether or not your are a member of the majority in this country, you can feel good about your victim status.

People like to be victims.  It gives them a sense of power in a world that makes the individual feel powerless.  When the financial system and economy is rigged to outsource jobs, destroy financial security and eradicate the middle class, it feels good to have someone to blame.  If you can point your finger at Obama, the liberal elite, Tea Party members, atheists, Catholics, immigrants, or whoever, at least you know your enemy.

The problem is that our nation's declining economy is much more complex and nuanced.  If it were simply a matter of securing the border or more prayer in schools, fixing our problems would be easy.  I wish it were that simple.  To really fix our economy, however, we need to make fundamental changes in the way the system works.  This means the kind of change that would make your average person very uncomfortable.  It would mean reforming our election laws and the Constitution to have publicly funded elections so special interests won't dominate political ads.  It might even mean changing the government itself to a parliamentary system.  The reason for this is because our current system was designed by Madison to limit the public's ability to make real change.  The purpose of the Senate is to slow down powerful and system changing legislation coming from the House.  Needing a supermajority to pass anything, the Senate is the wet blanket for the kinds of real change that might benefit the public.

Focusing on being a victim and blaming others works well for those in control.  It allows them to scapegoat others while avoiding real responsibility.  While the Wall Street bankers who designed the housing bubble walk away with their profits, people spend all their time pointing fingers at immigrant children.  Solving our problems is systemic.  It is not just a matter of getting nicer people to be CEOs and investment bankers.  The way the system is designed, if you are a CEO and you do something that is ethical but doesn't bring in short term profits, then you are removed by the board of directors.  These people are elected by shareholders who want profits at all costs.  If this means a company like GM not telling people about defective car parts and people die, oh well.  If it means polluting a river to avoid expensive clean up costs, oh well.  You don't have to pay for the medical bills of children who get cancer.  These costs aren't part of the corporate bottom line so they don't count.

Blaming the poor is a popular one.  The American myth is that if you work hard, you can achieve anything.  If only this were true.  What if the only thing you are good at is something not valued by our society?  If LeBron James lived in Africa 100 years ago, he wouldn't have been rich.  If Jonas Salk were a Navajo Indian, he wouldn't have developed the polio vaccine.  And there are some people who simply aren't good at anything, no matter how hard they try.  Does this mean they should starve?

What is fascinating to me are the people who feel comfortable beating their chests like gorillas about how hard they work and how everyone else are a bunch of moochers hell-bent on living off others.  It's an interesting psychological projection because they seem obsessed with how much work others do.  They must really hate working to project this onto others.  If not, they wouldn't be so bitter about it.  The truth is that they want to do less work and live the way they believe these folks do.  And why not?  The way our system is designed, many jobs do suck.  Why would anyone want to go to work for an organization where the boss has near total control over your life.  He gets to say what you wear, how you conduct your time, what you say, even what kind of health care coverage you get.  This is hardly democratic.  If the company makes profits, you don't get any.  You are renting your time to some else's little tyranny.  People are naturally freedom loving.  No one loves to work under such conditions.  Hating it is natural, except in the U.S., where you are made to feel guilty if you don't think this type of repressive system is awesome.  After all, you might theoretically own Wal Mart one day, right?  Such organization isn't a law of nature.  We could have worker cooperatives, profit sharing, and co-ownership of businesses.  If everyone had a bigger stake in the game, then things might be very different.

The most detestable to me are the folks who use victimhood to abuse others.  This is despicable because it takes the good natured empathy of others and uses it against them.  It is psychotic, cruel, and a fundamental destroyer of society.  It leads to increased callousness and bitterness.  Israel is this way.  Whenever you criticize those in charge, you are labeled an anti-Semite.  When Israel commits acts of terror, it is "defending itself."  Because of the Holocaust, Israel can do no wrong.  Because labels are more important than actual deeds in American society, this means Israel gets a free pass.  Confronting our real problems would mean systemic change, which isn't going to happen.  Instead we focus on whether someone is politically incorrect or not.  Sorry but using the word "nigger" isn't the ultimate crime.  Putting millions of black boys in prison each year for petty drug crimes and stealing their futures is.  Cutting food stamps so poor black children go hungry to punish their mothers is a crime, yet we applaud these things each day.  We are a nation of hypocrites.

I make no illusions about being a victim.  By normal standards I have done fairly well in life.  I graduated from law school, am married, and live a fairly middle class life.  I acknowledge I am no Ayn Rand superhero.  I worked very hard studying, working, and trying to make it through school while my mother was dying from cancer, I went through a divorce, fought through debilitating pain with autoimmune arthritis, and helping to care for my disabled father.  I acknowledge that while I have had difficulties, I have also been blessed with advantages.  I came from a home that valued learning.  My mother taught me to think critically.  My family supported me in my academic ventures.  I didn't come home to a father that was a drunk.  I lived in a safe neighborhood.  I didn't face discrimination based on the color of my skin.  In many ways, although I did work hard, I also had many advantages that others have not.  That is why I don't believe that simple hard work will bring everyone up to the same level.  We all start at different points.  Pointing to one or two ghetto children who later become doctors or lawyers through hard work does not mean that our system is designed to be just for most people.  Hard work can get you very far, indeed, but it isn't everything.

I believe in efficiency.  America has the talent, resources, and ability to solve most if its most serious problems.  It is not a matter of ability, it is a matter of organization.  We have millions of people who are homeless and millions of homes that are empty.  We have millions of people with talent who cannot find work while our cities are decaying.  A system that cannot connect the two is one that has failed.  It is interesting that a small country like Cuba has an economy that is a fraction of the size of the U.S.  Yet it finds the money to educate its citizens and provide health care to all.  And this is not a matter of opinion.  Cuban health outcomes are better than those in the U.S. given the amount of money spent.  This is also true for many other countries.  Yet we act like it is a law of nature such as gravity that health care costs have to bankrupt an entire nation.

We get wrapped up in smokescreens.  Instead of rolling out renewable energy, we invest trillions of dollars in wars with Iraq to secure oil supplies.  We focus on the short term instead of the long term.  What ISIS does shouldn't matter to us.  If it weren't for oil, we wouldn't care.  We aren't going to war to fight Boko Haram in Africa, even though they are worse.  Why not?  Because oil isn't at stake.  If we put our energy into getting away from oil, we wouldn't need to waste money on wars in the Middle East.  As an American, I shouldn't have to worry about what goes on in the Middle East.  That is not my business.  It is only my business now because the oil companies which have bought the politicians and Supreme Court Justices want it to be my business.

Keeping people divided and feeling like victims works great for those in power.  It keeps people from organizing and focusing on the real issues.  Justice Roberts has effected a brilliant coup against democracy through his last several decisions.  The formula is obvious:

1.  Take a hot button issue like gay marriage, abortion, contraception, or whatever.
2.  Focus on that issue so as to avoid the larger discussion about what changes to the law might mean.
3.  Make a decision that further limits the freedoms of the public but initially seems to be a victory
     for "freedom."
4.  Use these new laws to continue eroding bigger, more fundamental freedoms.

The Affordable Care Act is a perfect example.  Roberts used this to destroy the commerce clause.  This means that the federal government has less power to regulate business, giving the states more freedom to be bullied by large corporations.  Liberals wanted the ACA passed.  Conservatives wanted the law struck down.  The law itself became a smoke screen.  At the end of the day, the federal government is weaker.

Or the issue of gay marriage.  Liberals wanted it.  Conservatives did not.  The cynical Supreme Court justices on the right don't care.  They used it as a way to again erode federal power and give more power to the states, which means more power for corporations to control state governments.  Only the federal government has the power to stand up to corporations like Exxon.  People were so focused on whether gays are getting married that they missed the larger point--that the federal government, the only roadblock between us and utter domination by corporations, was eroded.  In the future, this means less control over civil rights legislation at the federal level, etc.  This means increased disempowering of the people.

The Hobby Lobby contraceptive decision is another one.  By letting people frame this as a religious freedom issue, the government gave corporations the right to use religious whim to avoid laws which are designed to protect all people in the secular marketplace.  Because contraception is a hot button emotional issue, our brains are turned off to the larger issue.  The strategy was genius.

As college education has become unaffordable, this has made the situation much worse.  Instead of having a population that is used to questioning and fighting back, college has become a necessity to please employers.  By keeping college debt high, workers remain tightly controlled by their corporate employers.  You can't make trouble when you are an indentured servant.  You aren't going to be hopping from job to job when you have massive student loans.

America is a funny place.  We like to believe that we are in control, but at the same time we relish at being victims.  It allows us to throw our arms up in the air, feel powerless, and resign ourselves to not fighting back.  My attitude is fuck victimhood.  Take responsibility for what you can and resist domination as best you can.  Force yourself to look at reality.  Challenge injustice where you see it.  Be like the honey badger--small but fierce, fearless, and tireless.

As it is July 4, it is time to reflect on some of the special freedoms we have as Americans. As far as free speech, America is the freest country in the world. In Europe, you can actually be jailed for saying things which are politically incorrect. France and Germany are excellent examples of this. In America you don't have to worry about the secret police coming to get you if you say the wrong thing. Now, you may be audited or spied on by the NSA (LOL), but you aren't going to be sent to the gulag.


This country has many flaws. It is a young country still looking to define itself and find its true identity. But within this adolescence is a spirit of hope, that perhaps the future may be brighter. Even though there are many ugly things about America, there is much beauty here as well. I love this country. I live here because I want to help make it better for me and my upcoming children. America is a family. You hang in there, love it, and try to contribute what you can when you can.

One of the great American literary narratives is that of the road trip. Wide open spaces, an infinite horizon ahead, multidimensional characters, and a sense of unbounded possibility help to contain the protean character of the American experience. This is the America I have come to know and love.

Welcome to AmeriKKKa

Today's SCOTUS decision had absolutely nothing to do with contraception. It is about corporations controlling people and using religion to do whatever they want, to hell with the health care law mandates. The public at large lost a big one today.

Thanks to our corporate bought Supreme Court, now orthodox jewish employers can deny the coverage of insulin, Jehovah's Witnesses employers can deny blood transfusion coverage, and any other closely held for profit companies can withhold coverage based on their religious whims. The real implication of today's ruling is to deal a mortal blow to universal health coverage. It also allows closely held tyrannies (aka corporations) to disembowel the well being of the public. Shame on the owners of Hobby Lobby and the degenerate Catholic bishops who yammered on about their "Fortnight of Freedom."
 

Justice Ginsburg, speaking for the dissent, best summarized the implications of the decision here:

"Would the exemption…extend to employers with religiously grounded objections to blood transfusions (Jehovah's Witnesses); antidepressants (Scientologists); medications derived from pigs, including anesthesia, intravenous fluids, and pills coated with gelatin (certain Muslims, Jews, and Hindus); and vaccinations[?]…Not much help there for the lower courts bound by today's decision."

Justice Roberts is using each one of these cases to give corporations more and more rights at the expense of the public.  By using hot button issues to do so, he has masterminded a conservative coup that will shake this nation's freedom to its core.  We focus on the red herrings of the issues while he takes us one step closer and closer to a right wing corporate controlled society. 

It is disgusting how America has become so myopic that it has focused on the aspect of contraception while missing the larger point--that now the health care law will be so watered down that it will be essentially useless.  And now corporations have been given a free card in the name of "religion" to do whatever they want.  The big losers are all of us.  More freedoms for corporations, much less for real people.  That is the real outcome.

It is a sad day for America.  

 

We'll Make Great Pets

Some have made the argument that human beings are special above all other creatures because they are intelligent.  We can program a computer, whereas a chimp cannot.  We can write a play, but a dog cannot.  But what happens when artificial intelligence surpasses human beings in all areas?  Then we are indeed faced with a crisis--what then, makes us special?

It used to be that the domain of chess was considered a gentleman's game.  It involved higher order logic, planning, and intelligence.  It was believed that a computer could never beat a chess grandmaster.  But in 1997, this is exactly what happened--a computer beat the world chess champion.  To this day, computers can clean the clocks of any human player. 

It was inconceivable a few years ago that a computer could beat a human in Jeopardy!.  Yet last year IBM's Watson beat Ken Jennings, the greatest Jeopardy! player of all time.  This is no longer the realm of science fiction.  It has been done.

It used to be that those who could calculate numbers in their heads and do computation were valued workers.  Now a $1 scientific calculator can do computation much quicker than any human mind. 

More and more areas of human ability are going to be surpassed by computers.  We need to start looking at ourselves and instead of degrading ourselves, we need to recognize the intrinsic human dignity and value of each person without regard to his or her mental abilities.  Qualities like love, empathy, and decency will begin to matter more.  In a world where deep thinking is done by computers, the cognitive elites in our society will be humbled. 

If enough of the onion is peeled away, how far do we have to go before we don't know who we are anymore?  At what point do we discover that we are hollow men?  These are the questions we will need to begin pondering.  The computers aren't going to need us.  The scientific calculator doesn't give a shit if your feelings are hurt or not.  This will be the time to look inside and see what you are really about.

Some people are going to look deep inside and find there is nothing there.

An Important Lesson I Plan on Teaching My Children

In elementary school, most subjects weren't too difficult for me.  I could blast through reading, social studies, and science with no problems.  But math was another matter.  It didn't come easily.  This led me to the conclusion that I wasn't good at math because I wasn't a "math person."  Throughout my primary school years and into my middle and high school years, I struggled with mathematics.  In high school, I wanted to get a good GPA to make college scholarships more available.  This meant avoiding as much math as possible.  Of course, this didn't help me on the SAT and ACT, considering I had no clue what a cosign or tan were (I still don't).

My frustration tolerance level was low.  At the earliest signs of difficulty, I would give up.  I made it through algebra I, geometry, and algebra II.  That was the end of my mathematics education.  Although I enjoyed science, the mathematics portion was very challenging for me.  This also meant my career opportunities were limited.  I wouldn't be attending medical school or majoring in physics.  Since my natural strengths were in the humanities, I ended up going to a liberal arts school and receiving a bachelor of arts degree.

With age, my patience in dealing with frustration has increased.  Now that I am within a few years of forty, I don't feel like my self-esteem and self-worth are tied to my grades or my failures.  I don't feel the need to prove anything to anyone.  I no longer worry about seeking the approval of older authority figures.  This has been very freeing.  I feel more comfortable taking intellectual risks and failing.  I don't mind being more playful in my approach to solving problems.  This is enormously freeing.  It allows me to actually have fun solving problems instead of seeing them as existential threats or indicators that I am unintelligent.  If I would have known this as a child and later as an adolescent, my life might have been very different.

The concern I have is that the current educational system does little to encourage the playful and creative approach to problem solving that people need to be successful in life.  By awarding grades, it encourages perfectionistic children to avoid risk and avoid challenges.  It discourages the kind of intellectual risk taking and playfulness in problem solving that is so vital to life and living in a new, constantly changing, technological society.

It murders the natural curiosity of young learners.  If I had the money, I would send my children to Montessori school.  I worry about their futures.  I really worry about all the standardized tests that children are expected to take.  Memorizing facts and filling in bubbles on forms is not the sort of education that builds a love of learning or encourages creativity.  In a world filled with smartphones that can access all of the world's knowledge and compute equations with little difficulty, I don't see the point in memorizing facts.  I would rather my children learn how to do research on the computer and then use this information to synthesize it and solve difficult problems.  The future is going to require them to work with computers, not calculate basic math in their heads or memorize a list of historical dates.

As a child, I assumed that you were naturally good at some things and not good at others.  Some people were born lucky, others were not.  No sense in trying to improve the things you weren't good at.  I didn't have the notion that with deliberate practice and extreme effort, one could achieve great things.  I didn't see Michael Jordan practicing for hours.  I believed talent was innate.  If I had had a different view of human nature--one that led me to believe that talent was the result of hard work, and that the brain was like a muscle that needed strengthening to really improve, this would have done me an enormous amount of good.  Had I possessed more grit and a different philosophy, things might have been very different for me.

I want my children to learn the lessons I failed to learn until middle age.  If I were independently wealthy, I would quit my law job and dedicate 100% of my time individually tutoring my children based on the classics, active learning projects like learning how to prepare microscope slides, conducting experiments, writing letters, programming computers, and visiting museums.  My wife was home schooled and learned to love learning for its own sake.  To this day, she spends hours each day reading up on her various interests.  Our home is like a college seminar as we watch TED talks and graduate school lectures on Youtube.

I hope my children learn that you can do far more than you might think.  80% of success is just having the courage to try.  Most people give up before they get started.  "That is for experts," and "I don't know how to do that" are the famous last words of someone about to get his wallet drained by a professional widget installer.

"Try goddamnit."

 I wish I knew this years ago.  Better late than never.  Maybe by tackling tough projects together, my children will learn that few problems are so large that persistence, planning, and practice cannot solve them.

How Privacy May Kill

Like many people, I was horrified when the Snowden leaks revealed the massive NSA spying apparatus that was invading the privacy of millions of Americans.  I was disturbed at how the government was using its power to abuse the privacy rights of average Americans without respecting the Constitution.

Privacy is important.  Without it, we are not free to be ourselves and feel comfortable in our own skin.  We risk being falsely charged with crimes we didn't commit.  It promotes an unfair power relationship between those in charge and the governed.  There's a reason why the Stasi existed--to suppress people.

However, privacy also has its limits.  This is especially true as new medical technologies become available.  IBM's Watson, the computer which was able to understand natural human language and beat Ken Jennings on Jeopardy! has now gone to medical school.  Watson is able to read over 4 million medical journal articles and process entire libraries of medical records and data in a matter of seconds.  Using this information, Watson is able to diagnose diseases and suggest medical treatments with varying levels of confidence based upon percentages. Working with a doctor, Watson can suggest treatments that might otherwise be beyond the ability of a doctor to put together.  Studies have shown that the average doctor is so busy he or she only has the time to read about five medical journal articles per month in his or her chosen field.  The demands of economics require these doctors to see a massive number of patients to be able to sustain his or her medical practice.  This does not lend them time for additional research.

Advances in DNA analysis and genomics allow the human genome to be sequenced for about $1,000.  Within a few years, this cost will be $100.  The human bacterial microbiome is also being sequenced.  By collecting this data on a mass scale, comparing the results with disease profiles, and then analyzing this data, Watson will be able to come up with new treatments for diseases that would be impossible for the average human to figure out unaided.  The problem is that current privacy regulations greatly reduce the ability of such scanning to take place.  Most of the reason for this is to protect consumers against unfair targeting by health insurers if they discover someone has an expensive disease.  The same goes for employers firing people for having expensive diseases.  These problems would be non-existent if we had a functioning health care system.  These are legislative issues, not technical ones.

Smartphones are becoming smarter and smarter.  The proliferation of self-monitoring devices permits data to be collected that formerly was impossible. This allows small changes in one's vital statistics to help indicate the early signs of disease.  "Prevention", as Benjamin Franklin once said, is "Worth a pound of cure."  Imagine this data being stored and analyzed in the cloud by Watson to find new patterns in disease pathology.  It would be a real paradigm shift away from what is done now.

Solving the problem of privacy should involve a program that redacts the personal information of patients while permitting medical data to be centrally stored on electronic servers and made accessible for big data analysis.  This will help preserve privacy while still permitting computer intelligence to help solve some of our most difficult medical problems like heart disease, cancer, and autoimmune diseases.  Technology is leverage.  Just as we cannot go 60 mph without an automobile, we won't be curing cancer without the assistance of artificial intelligence.  Overcoming problems is what humans do.  Tools exist for this purpose.  We owe it to humanity to solve these problems because we can.  Let's get to it.

Watson Treating Cancer Demo

Watson Goes to Medical School

The Quantified Self

Smartphone Medical Devices

Overcoming Problems Is What Humans Do

Without modern technology, we would be dying from unsanitary water, simple bacterial infections, and likely face mass food shortages.  Without the polio vaccine, millions of children would continue to be paralyzed each year.  My wife has Type 1 diabetes.  It is an autoimmune condition in which the immune system attacks the islet cells of the pancreas.  The body is unable to make insulin.  Without insulin, people can eat but the energy cannot be released to the cells.  Type 1 diabetics essentially starve to death.  The disease is incurable.  Watching one's diet and taking pills will never cure this disease.  Without artificial insulin, my wife would die within a few days.  The insulin diabetics now use is produced by bacteria.  It is a genetically engineered product.  She wears an insulin pump that delivers insulin to her system via a mini IV all the time.  There is nothing "natural" about her survival.  Yet thanks be to God because of science and technology, she is here.  She is thriving.  Thanks to the technology which allows her to test her blood sugars and keep them within the normal range, she can safely be pregnant.  Sixty years ago she would have been dead. 

As human beings, we use tools to solve problems.  We use understanding and learning to observe things, make adjustments, and test our theories.  Those that work are kept, those that do not pan out are discarded.  The process may be messy, but it is the best we've got.  Overcoming human problems is what humans are designed to do.  We have been doing this since the invention of the wheel and the discovery of fire.  Yet it saddens me that in recent years there has been a war on science. 

When Ray Kurzweil, the inventor of the flatbed scanner was a child, the philosophy of his family was "There are problems in this world.  It is up to you, Ray, to find a solution.  You need to go find the answer and when you do, share the solution with others."  This personal sort of can-do attitude is what will help the human race make progress in the future.  Grit and persistence can go a long way when combined with rational planning and the scientific method.  My wife and I have twins on the way.  As they grow, I plan on teaching them this philosophy. 

Science can overcome many problems, but it is difficult to solve problems when people are too afraid of embracing risk.  Taking chances is required to succeed to solve life's most difficult problems.  Sometimes you have to take a moonshot to making things better.  Sometimes you have to try something even though you think there is a 99% chance it won't work out.  Why?  Because no one else will take that risk because they figure it is too crazy.  So no one ends up doing it.  That is part of the reason why we still are so dependent on gasoline vehicles.  It took someone as insane as Elon Musk to start Tesla and show that electric cars could be a real solution to gas vehicles.  And Tesla is succeeding. 

Look at Japan.  It is a very risk averse culture.  It is also highly conformist.  Japanese workers have tremendous work ethics and discipline.  But Japan doesn't innovate for shit.  That is part of the reason why the Japanese economy has been stagnant for so long.  Being entrepreneurial isn't part of their culture.  Compare this to Israel, which has a thriving economy despite its small size and lack of natural resources.  Israel is a world leader in the biotech industry. 

We can do far more than what we think.  But we have to be willing to try and fail.  Babies will keep trying to walk even after they stumble.  Eventually their brains make the right connections and they succeed.  Why should it be any different for us?  To grow, we must become young again.  We must be open to hearing new ideas, trying new skills, and attempting new solutions to persistent problems.  We must be willing to risk a fall here and there.  If we do fail, we must pick up and move on. 

The future is not going to stop for us.  If technology makes our jobs obsolete, we need to learn new skills, no matter how old we are.  If we stink at a particular skill, we must practice it for hours until we master it.  If not, we lose out on the treasures of the new things which await us.  Our quality of life will suffer.  Being adaptable and open to change is vitally important. 

Coping With Climate Change

Debating whether or not climate change is man made or not is a waste of time.  It wastes time because it doesn't solve the problem.  Either way, the global climate is changing and we are going to have to deal with it.  One way we are not going to deal with it is by radically changing our lifestyles.  For all the calls for renewables and energy conservation, the population of the world is simply not going to accept radically more expensive energy costs or living a greatly reduced quality of life.  People will not give up their cars in favor of public transportation.  They aren't going to be cold in the winter or hot in the summer.  They aren't going to give up their videogames, computers, and air conditioning.  No amount of guilt about future generations is going to change that.  For the Indians and the Chinese, cries from the West to reduce air pollution sounds as smug, paternalistic, and racist.  Why should the average Indian or Chinese person not get to enjoy the fruits of modern technology and comforts as those in Europe or the U.S.?  If renewables like wind, solar, and geothermal could meet our energy needs at the same cost as fossil fuels, we would all be using these technologies now and the matter would be moot.  The problem is cost.  Renewables are still not cost effective for most of the world.

The climate change deniers pose an untenable position as well.  They claim that global warming is a natural thing and that we should simply keep using fossil fuels as we need them.  The problem with this position is that it is unscientific and not based on facts.  The consensus amongst scientists is that climate change is real and that real consequences will follow if we fail to make changes regarding our energy usage.

My position is twofold.  First, solar power will meet 100% of our energy needs within the next 20 years.  Solar power technology is growing exponentially.  Within this time solar power will be much cheaper than fossil fuels.  A distributive energy grid based on everyone having their own solar panels will become commonplace.  We will have a smart energy grid that operates like the global web.  Energy production will become decentralized and locally grown. 

Until this time, however, we must deal with climate change and prepare for it.  Instead of yammering on about it being the end of the world or denying it altogether, we must realistically predict how much the climate is going to change between now and 20 years.  Once we can predict the scope of damage, we can plan ahead to adjust to this new reality.  This may mean relocating people on coastal cities.  It may mean preparing for shifts in agricultural production and new weather patterns.  Adapting to climate change within the next 20 years is the only adult response that will work.  Asking the Chinese to accept a lower standard of living is not going to work because they are not going to do it. 

Discouraging the use of energy also limits technological and human progress.  Google, Facebook, and the Internet in general require massive amounts of energy.  Computing and transportation require energy.  Living in caves is not going to be our salvation.  Improvements in solar technology will. 

Republicans who threw a hissy fit when Solyndra failed were being myopic.  Innovation and new businesses sometimes fail.  Risk is part of creating new things.  The Germans and the Chinese governments directly subsidize their solar power industries because they know that this is the future.  They know that these technologies will dominate.  The market has a hard time supporting these industries now.  But the future will be different.  It is like the Kodak company.  They invented the digital camera but instead of going with it, they buried it away because they were making absurd sums on their film sales.  Management failed to understand that the future was digital.  Now Kodak is bankrupt.  The United States must not make the same mistakes.

We must use creativity to solve the problem of climate change.  Innovation and new ideas will save us.  We were wrong predicting that overpopulation would cause mass starvation by now.  Norman Borlaug and his Green Revolution improved crop yields and saved us.  The same will happen with climate change, so long as we don't have Republicans throwing fits when the government chooses to help solar companies make some progress. 

Rethinking Energy Efficiency

Your smartphone updates itself as needed.  The presumption is that improvements can and should be adopted as they are discovered.  Yet we don't use the same logic with our homes.  While not as sophisticated as a smartphone, your home does rely on technology to operate--complex plumbing, electrical, heating, cooling, and insulation keep your home comfortable year round.  But if you have a house that is more than ten years old, these technologies aren't built in to your home.  You might still be working with a furnace which is older than you.  Efficiency was not the same 30 years ago as it is today.  The same goes for your appliances. 

When fuel is cheap, you may be able to afford poor insulation.  You just crank up the heater and you are fine.  But as the cost of propane and electric go higher and higher, energy efficiency starts to make more sense.  Winters here in Ohio and throughout the country have become harsher.  Summers have been scorching.  Only energy efficiency is going to help you recover these losses.

As a kid, I thought the idea of energy efficiency was totally boring.  But now that I have to pay the bill, I appreciate my father yelling "shut the lights off" or "close the door, I'm not paying to cool the entire neighborhood."  The Germans have developed a new efficiency standard called the "Passive House."  It involves making the home so well insulated and enclosed that it doesn't require much additional heating and cooling, even in such locations as Fairbanks Alaska.  Walls are made very thick with insulation, all gaps are sealed, and a high efficiency air and heat exchanger is used to recirculate the air.

The same incentive for energy efficiency goes for cars.  I never thought the Toyota Prius or other hybrids were particularly exciting.  But as gas becomes more expensive, not paying most of my monthly income on such expenses is looking better and better.  If I were to run across a good deal on a used Prius, I would probably go ahead and get it. 

I never thought I would reach an age where the idea of staying home for a quiet evening and watching Youtube videos about home insulation would be exciting.  I suppose I have officially entered middle age.

Design Matters--Revisited

Design matters.  When I get into my car and the seat belt nanny bot dings until I fasten my seat belt, I don't feel a sigh of relief that the car company is trying to save my life.  Instead, I see it as a paternalistic intrusion in my life that I resent.  I wear my seat belt as a matter of course.  But if I am driving to my mailbox at the end of the driveway, I don't need big brother Co. telling me to fasten up.

The same goes for keyless car door clickers.  The designers of these products seem to have an autistic sense about them--they know precisely how to make the products work for 1% of the population.  An intuitive design would be one click to unlock all doors.  The next click would lock the car again.  This would require only one button.  Instead, the designers create an overly complex sequence that opens some doors, sometimes opens others, and even sets off a panic mode to scare the hell out of you when it senses you are tired or annoyed.

This panic mode is the bane of my existence.  On my Escape, if you unlock the door with the key too fast, and then open the door, it will set off the alarm.  And this alarm is LOUD.  Your ears ring after hearing it.  The only way to stop this torture is to put the key in the ignition and turn the vehicle off.  Sometimes this works, other times you have to disconnect the battery. 

A friend of mine has a Honda Accord.  I am 5 ft 6, the same size as your average Japanese man.  You would think they would have designed these cars for someone my height given their market--wrong.  You have to be a contortionist to get into this car.  And if you have arthritis and want to get out of it, God help you.  Another lovely feature of the design of this vehicle is the window pillar right behind your left shoulder--perfect for eliminating visibility when changing lanes in heavy traffic. 

If you are a corporation spending millions of dollars to develop and sell a product, you would think someone might consider studying the design implications of their products on usability.  After all, this is only one of the most important things in owning a product.  The genius of Steve Jobs was that he took ordinary things and made them more intuitive to use.  The old mp3 players of yesteryear sucked.  They had a half dozen or more tiny buttons that controlled music playback on the device.  Using them was like programming your VCR--impossible.  By introducing the scroll wheel and a large hard drive with an intuitive menu system that made sense, the iPod revolutionized music playback.  The technology got out of the way and let people actually focus on listening to music instead of screwing around.

This was part of the great design of the iPhone.  The touch screen and intuitive menu system made smartphones accessible. 

Google and its ecosystem of cloud computing products shares a similar simplicity.  With one gmail address, you have access to a world of computing products that can have a dramatic effect on your life.  You can save your important files in the cloud and have them be secure with two step verification, watch Youtube, create spreadsheets and word processing documents that are available to all of your devices immediately, synchronize your calendar, run your voicemail and get visual voicemails on your mobile phone, check your email, back up your photos from all your devices, and much more.  You can restore your lost Android phone in a few minutes without losing your data. 

The bottom line is that design is as important as function.  If you have to interact with a product on a daily basis and that product makes you want to tear your hair out, then you remain alienated from the tools which are designed to make your life better.  Using your consumer goods should be intuitive, fun, and if possible, beautifully designed.  Even the most simple and inexpensive items can be all of these things if the makers of these products spent just a bit more time on design and not just on engineering--or cutting corners to save money.  If the world learned anything from the iPod, it is that corporations can make huge amounts of money by making products people can actually use.

Design Revisited

Design matters.  When I get in my car and the seat belt nanny bot dings until I fasten my seat belt, I don't feel a sigh of relief that the car company is trying to save my life.  Instead, I see it as a paternalistic intrusion in my life that I resent.  I wear my seat belt as a matter of course.  But if I am driving to my mailbox at the end of the driveway, I don't need big brother Co. telling me to fasten up.

The same goes for keyless car door clickers.  The designers of these products seem to have an autistic sense about them--they know precisely how to make the products work for 1% of the population.  An intuitive design would be one click to unlock all doors.  The next click would lock the car again.  This would require only one button.  Instead, the designers create an overly complex sequence that opens some doors, opens others, and even sets off a panic mode to scare the hell out of you.

This panic mode is the bane of my existence.  On my Escape, if you unlock the door with the key too fast, and then open the door, it will set off the alarm.  And this alarm is LOUD.  Your ears ring after hearing it.  The only way to stop this torture is to put the key in the ignition and turn the vehicle off.  Sometimes this works, other times you have to disconnect the battery. 

A friend of mine has a Honda Accord.  I am 5 ft 6, the same size as your average Japanese man.  You would think they would have designed these cars for someone my height given their market--wrong.  You have to be a contortionist to get into this car.  And if you have arthritis and want to get out of it, God help you.  Another lovely feature of the design of this vehicle is the window pillar right behind your left shoulder--perfect for eliminating visibility when changing lanes in heavy traffic. 

If you are a corporation spending millions of dollars to develop and sell a product, you would think someone might consider studying the design implications of their products on usability.  After all, this is only one of the most important things in owning a product.  The genius of Steve Jobs was that he took ordinary things are made them more intuitive to use.  The old mp3 players of yesteryear sucked.  They have a half dozen or more tiny buttons that controlled music playback on the device.  Using them was like programming your VCR--impossible.  By introducing the scroll wheel and a large hard drive with an intuitive menu system that made sense, the iPod revolutionized music playback.  The technology got out of the way and let people actually focus on listening to music instead of screwing around.

This was part of the great design of the iPhone.  The touch screen and intuitive menu system made smartphones accessible. 

Google and its ecosystem of cloud computing products shares a similar simplicity.  With one gmail address, you have access to a world of computing products that can have a dramatic effect on your life.  You can save your important files in the cloud and have them be secure with two step verification, watch Youtube, create spreadsheets and word processing documents that are available to all of your devices immediately, synchronize your calendar, run your voicemail and get visual voicemails on your mobile phone, check your email, back up your photos from all your devices, and much more.  You can restore your lost Android phone in a few minutes without losing your data. 

The bottom line is that design is as important as function.  If you have to interact with a product on a daily basis and that product makes you want to tear your hair out, then you remain alienated from the tools which are designed to make your life better.  Using your consumer goods should be intuitive, fun, and if possible, beautifully designed.  Even the most simple and inexpensive items can be all of these things if the makers of these products spent just a bit more time on design and not just on engineering--or cutting corners to save money.

Cell Phone Etiquette

Technology moves faster than our etiquette.  Knowing social cues and remaining polite is difficult enough, that's why Miss Manners, Dear Abby, and Emily Post had jobs.  Watching the subtle cues for social appropriateness is easier for some than others.  But the rapid introduction of new communication technologies has thrown a curve ball to even some of the most socially savvy folks.

Prior to the introduction of the cell phone, reaching someone meant calling them on a telephone that was hard wired to a fixed location.  Need to talk to someone and they aren't at home or the office?  You will just have to wait.  Want to escape and go for a walk in the woods without being reached?  No problem.  Need a break in your car?  Not a worry.

Now we are expected to answer the phone any time of day or night.  People get pissed if they cannot reach someone.  This leaves no room for people to be unplugged and simply be.  It doesn't take into account having meals, using the bathroom, exercising, or simply visiting uninterrupted with others.  In many ways, it is a real violation of one's privacy when there is a societal expectation of "always on" availability.

For my law office, I only take calls during normal business hours, which are 9 am to 5 pm, Monday through Friday.  If someone calls before or after these times, they are expected to leave a message.  The purpose for this is to keep my time and life segmented in a healthy way.  It is simply too stressful to be dealing with crisis situations at 10 pm.  There needs to be a mental expectation that one can relax and maintain balance in one's life without always being available.  If not, job burnout and poor performance result.

The same goes for visiting with others.  When I go to dinner with someone or I'm having a cup of coffee with friends or family, I don't take calls.  By doing this, I am telling the person who is present they are more important and have my full attention.  It is showing respect for that other person and their time.  They don't need to sit and listen to me chat with someone on a conversation they cannot hear. 

Bathroom breaks are the same.  I'm sorry but if I am using the bathroom, that is private time.  The calls will have to wait.  Hearing another person flush while they are talking is disgusting.  Sorry.

Smartphones make the problem of cell phone etiquette even more complex.  On top of calls, one can receive Facebook messages, Twitter updates, emails, Instagrams, and God knows what else 24/7.  If you are waiting in line at the bank or pharmacy and checking these helps you to pass the time without being impatient and being a dick to the clerk, then fine.  But once you reach the front of the line, put your smartphone away.  Nothing is more rude than taking a call or checking Facebook while the clerk is made to wait. 

If you are visiting with a doctor or lawyer, keep the cell phone put away.  Don't read your text messages.  It tells the person that you aren't fully present and don't value their time.  Be present.  Pay respect to that person. 

Not texting while driving should be a no-brainer.  Unfortunately it is done far too much.  You are better off driving drunk than texting while driving.  Both will get you and others killed quickly.  If you want to use your phone in the car, buy a Bluetooth headset.  Have both eyes on the road and both hands on the wheel.  I can't believe I have to say this, but it is true.

The urge to not check one's phone every few minutes relates to the dopamine reward center of the brain.  Studies have shown that the sensation one gets from checking one's phone is the same as one gets from tasty food and even cocaine use.  It releases dopamine and other "feel good" chemicals in the body.  Yet the will can overcome these urges.  We don't have to be slaves to our machines.

All of this doesn't mean getting rid of your cell phone.  It does mean letting the cell phone remain a tool and you not becoming a tool.  That is the difference.