Art is perhaps too complicated a topic to even attempt to discuss. I like to begin a discussion with a basic (if inadequate) definition. The complexity of discussing “art” stems from the fact that the very definition is complicated, controversial, and elusive. The Wikipedia entry on “art” gives a definition from Britannica Online, which I suppose is as good as any: “the use of skill and imagination in the creation of aesthetic objects, environments, or experiences that can be shared with others”. Wikipedia also notes that philosopher Richard Wollheim describes the nature of art as “one of the most elusive of the traditional problems of human culture”.
Questions regarding “What is art?” can become highly emotional, and are impossible to answer objectively. Like beauty, art is in the eye of the beholder. While I personally am more comfortable with using the term “art” to describe things like paintings and sculptures and music and literature, almost ANYTHING can be viewed as art, and I cannot objectively disagree with someone whose definition of art is different from mine.
At the same time, if we agree to label EVERYTHING as “art”, then the term loses all meaning and usefulness, just as if we were to label all colors shades of “blue”.
In the end, I suppose we must simply acknowledge that each of us has our own standards not only for what constitutes “art”, but also for what “art” we personally find appealing. I would be happier coming up with some objective judgement on what constitutes art, or at least some way to assure that those who were claiming something was “art” were at least sincerely representing their own view, but I know of no way to accomplish either of these goals.
Truth is complicated.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Capital Punishment
I am in favor of capital punishment , though I hasten to add that at the present time, there seem to be insurmountable problems with actually USING capital punishment.
Wikipedia defines capital punishment as “the infliction of death upon a person by judicial process as a punishment for an offence”, which I suppose is as good a definition as any. In recent years, the entire idea of capital punishment has become increasingly controversial, and it has been abolished in many countries and individual US states.
People on both sides of the issue have an almost infinite number of reasons for their positions. Curiously, one of the reasons some Americans oppose capital punishment is that under our present system, it ends up costing much more to execute a convicted criminal than to keep them incarcerated for life.
For me, there are currently TWO good reasons NOT to use capital punishment. The most serious is the fact that our system does not do such a good job of determining guilt or innocence. When a person sentenced to prison is later determined to be innocent, they can be released (which does not make up for wrongly imprisoning them, but it’s better than keeping them in prison). When an executed person is later determined to be innocent, there is no solution. Still, in certain cases, this “guilt or innocence” problem can be overcome. In certain cases there is NO reasonable doubt about guilt.
The more insurmountable problem with capital punishment is harder to put into words. Basically, it is the idea that we need a more serious punishment to hold over the heads of lesser criminals to keep the less serious crimes from becoming more serious ones. For instance, I believe that rape should be a capital offense -- though there is still the problem of separating the innocent from the guilty. However, if the punishment for rape was the same as the punishment for murder, a rapist might conclude that they should go ahead and murder their victim, rather than risk the victim testifying against them.
It is this second problem that may be impossible to overcome. Even if we come up with ways to absolutely separate the guilty from the innocent, we will still need a way to prevent the “smaller” crimes from escalating. If not for this problem, I would favor capital punishment for a shocking variety of lesser crimes.
There is a third serious problem with my visions for capital punishment, but this problem applies to almost all crimes and punishments. Potential criminals must both understand what actions are considered illegal, and realize that they will truly face punishment. As an example, take “speeding”. Currently, most American drivers do not consider driving a few miles per hour over the posted limit to be “speeding”, or at least they do not believe they will be punished for driving a few miles per hour over the posted limit. Personally, I would like this to change, and have the posted speed limit be the ACTUAL “limit” -- the fastest that a person could drive while avoiding punishment. However, I realize that under our current system this would be unfair, since no one is AWARE that they risk punishment for driving 56 miles per hour when the posted “limit” is 55.
The same applies to capital punishment. IF we made shoplifting a capital offense, then people would have to be AWARE that shoplifting was a capital offense. By the way, I am NOT arguing that shoplifting should be a capital offense. However, if there was some way to solve these three problems, I would favor capital punishment for a wide variety of crimes -- many of them malicious rather than serious. For example, if someone deliberately throws a brick through your window, I would consider capital punishment -- IF there was some way to absolutely determine that they were guilty of intentionally doing this maliciously, AND there was some way to keep smaller crimes from escalating into larger ones, AND everyone was AWARE that brick-throwing was a capital offense.
I have not addressed any of the other objections to capital punishment. Basically, my belief is that we presently have too many people on earth, AND we are not very good at actually “rehabilitating” prisoners, and therefore capital punishment, though far from perfect, makes sense on a philosophical level. But I cannot overcome those two problems.
I am left in the awkward position of favoring capital punishment on a philosophical level, but opposing it in many cases unless we come up with a way to overcome those problems. By the way, I am basically okay with those few cases in which our society currently uses capital punishment, since I am fairly certain those particular people have actually been proven guilty.
Truth is complicated.
Wikipedia defines capital punishment as “the infliction of death upon a person by judicial process as a punishment for an offence”, which I suppose is as good a definition as any. In recent years, the entire idea of capital punishment has become increasingly controversial, and it has been abolished in many countries and individual US states.
People on both sides of the issue have an almost infinite number of reasons for their positions. Curiously, one of the reasons some Americans oppose capital punishment is that under our present system, it ends up costing much more to execute a convicted criminal than to keep them incarcerated for life.
For me, there are currently TWO good reasons NOT to use capital punishment. The most serious is the fact that our system does not do such a good job of determining guilt or innocence. When a person sentenced to prison is later determined to be innocent, they can be released (which does not make up for wrongly imprisoning them, but it’s better than keeping them in prison). When an executed person is later determined to be innocent, there is no solution. Still, in certain cases, this “guilt or innocence” problem can be overcome. In certain cases there is NO reasonable doubt about guilt.
The more insurmountable problem with capital punishment is harder to put into words. Basically, it is the idea that we need a more serious punishment to hold over the heads of lesser criminals to keep the less serious crimes from becoming more serious ones. For instance, I believe that rape should be a capital offense -- though there is still the problem of separating the innocent from the guilty. However, if the punishment for rape was the same as the punishment for murder, a rapist might conclude that they should go ahead and murder their victim, rather than risk the victim testifying against them.
It is this second problem that may be impossible to overcome. Even if we come up with ways to absolutely separate the guilty from the innocent, we will still need a way to prevent the “smaller” crimes from escalating. If not for this problem, I would favor capital punishment for a shocking variety of lesser crimes.
There is a third serious problem with my visions for capital punishment, but this problem applies to almost all crimes and punishments. Potential criminals must both understand what actions are considered illegal, and realize that they will truly face punishment. As an example, take “speeding”. Currently, most American drivers do not consider driving a few miles per hour over the posted limit to be “speeding”, or at least they do not believe they will be punished for driving a few miles per hour over the posted limit. Personally, I would like this to change, and have the posted speed limit be the ACTUAL “limit” -- the fastest that a person could drive while avoiding punishment. However, I realize that under our current system this would be unfair, since no one is AWARE that they risk punishment for driving 56 miles per hour when the posted “limit” is 55.
The same applies to capital punishment. IF we made shoplifting a capital offense, then people would have to be AWARE that shoplifting was a capital offense. By the way, I am NOT arguing that shoplifting should be a capital offense. However, if there was some way to solve these three problems, I would favor capital punishment for a wide variety of crimes -- many of them malicious rather than serious. For example, if someone deliberately throws a brick through your window, I would consider capital punishment -- IF there was some way to absolutely determine that they were guilty of intentionally doing this maliciously, AND there was some way to keep smaller crimes from escalating into larger ones, AND everyone was AWARE that brick-throwing was a capital offense.
I have not addressed any of the other objections to capital punishment. Basically, my belief is that we presently have too many people on earth, AND we are not very good at actually “rehabilitating” prisoners, and therefore capital punishment, though far from perfect, makes sense on a philosophical level. But I cannot overcome those two problems.
I am left in the awkward position of favoring capital punishment on a philosophical level, but opposing it in many cases unless we come up with a way to overcome those problems. By the way, I am basically okay with those few cases in which our society currently uses capital punishment, since I am fairly certain those particular people have actually been proven guilty.
Truth is complicated.
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Exaggeration
I am often accused of exaggeration when attempting to accurately state my feelings. Even worse, sometimes people simply assume I am exaggerating, without stating their belief that I am exaggerating. This makes communication difficult.
If I feel quite strongly about something that you cannot imagine feeling strongly about, it is understandable that you might assume I am exaggerating. Unfortunately, this happens at the very moment I am trying to communicate the fact that I feel strongly about something that you cannot imagine feeling strongly about. The question becomes whether there is any way to effectively communicate these strong feelings that seem so totally outside of another person's perspective.
A true example: Ice cream is one of my favorite foods. Ice cream with peanuts is one of the worst substances I can imagine putting in my mouth. This is my opinion, and my preference, and it does not necessarily make sense, but it is truly the way that I feel. Generally, if you put peanuts on ice cream, and then attempt to remove them, some of the flavor remains behind, if not some of the actual peanuts, and I do not ever wish to consume ice cream that has ever had even a trace of contact with peanuts. I understand that my strong feelings on the subject of ice cream with peanuts are unusual and difficult to grasp, so when the situation arises, I try to make them clear. Here are a couple of true statements:
1) If you gave me a choice between consuming a dish of ice cream topped with a single peanut, or a dish of something commonly considered horrible, like animal excrement, there is a good chance I would choose the thing commonly considered horrible.
2) Even though ice cream is one of my favorite foods, if I became convinced that SOMETIME in the future my ice cream would in fact contain a peanut, I would seriously consider never consuming ice cream again, just to avoid the risk.
Anyone hearing or reading either or both of these statements can be forgiven for assuming that I am exaggerating, but I am NOT. I really, really, do not like ice cream with peanuts, and it doesn't help to "ignore them" or "scrape them off". I would rather just not eat ice cream that has been in any way contaminated with peanuts. Again, the question is whether there is any way of actually communicating these strong feelings, since most people will simply assume that I am exaggerating when I try to state my feelings.
The previous example may have been too inflammatory. Anyone reading this may simply be thinking, "This person is a wacko. NOBODY could dislike peanuts in ice cream THAT much." Of course, this illustrates my point. If someone expresses strong feelings that seem unusual and foreign to you, one of the easy, understandable routes is to assume that they are exaggerating. (Another route is to consider them to be a wacko.)
I have not addressed the fact that sometimes people truly do exaggerate. This leads to a "boy who cried wolf" phenomenon. Frequent exaggerations make people anticipate more exaggerations, even if one person is doing the exaggerating, and a completely separate person is attempting to accurately state a strong but unlikely belief.
In earlier postings I have pointed out that sometimes I can clearly see a problem, but cannot see any solution. This is one of those areas. It is a problem that people attempting to accurately express strong feelings are often believed to be exaggerating. I guess a partial solution would be to come right out and ASK whether a person is exaggerating in cases in which you are having trouble accepting their stated strength of emotion. This approach has various pitfalls, including the facts that the person might lie to you or to themselves, or that the person might be insulted by the question. Another partial solution is to do your best to accurately state your own strong feelings, without exaggeration. Still, the problem remains.
Truth is complicated.
If I feel quite strongly about something that you cannot imagine feeling strongly about, it is understandable that you might assume I am exaggerating. Unfortunately, this happens at the very moment I am trying to communicate the fact that I feel strongly about something that you cannot imagine feeling strongly about. The question becomes whether there is any way to effectively communicate these strong feelings that seem so totally outside of another person's perspective.
A true example: Ice cream is one of my favorite foods. Ice cream with peanuts is one of the worst substances I can imagine putting in my mouth. This is my opinion, and my preference, and it does not necessarily make sense, but it is truly the way that I feel. Generally, if you put peanuts on ice cream, and then attempt to remove them, some of the flavor remains behind, if not some of the actual peanuts, and I do not ever wish to consume ice cream that has ever had even a trace of contact with peanuts. I understand that my strong feelings on the subject of ice cream with peanuts are unusual and difficult to grasp, so when the situation arises, I try to make them clear. Here are a couple of true statements:
1) If you gave me a choice between consuming a dish of ice cream topped with a single peanut, or a dish of something commonly considered horrible, like animal excrement, there is a good chance I would choose the thing commonly considered horrible.
2) Even though ice cream is one of my favorite foods, if I became convinced that SOMETIME in the future my ice cream would in fact contain a peanut, I would seriously consider never consuming ice cream again, just to avoid the risk.
Anyone hearing or reading either or both of these statements can be forgiven for assuming that I am exaggerating, but I am NOT. I really, really, do not like ice cream with peanuts, and it doesn't help to "ignore them" or "scrape them off". I would rather just not eat ice cream that has been in any way contaminated with peanuts. Again, the question is whether there is any way of actually communicating these strong feelings, since most people will simply assume that I am exaggerating when I try to state my feelings.
The previous example may have been too inflammatory. Anyone reading this may simply be thinking, "This person is a wacko. NOBODY could dislike peanuts in ice cream THAT much." Of course, this illustrates my point. If someone expresses strong feelings that seem unusual and foreign to you, one of the easy, understandable routes is to assume that they are exaggerating. (Another route is to consider them to be a wacko.)
I have not addressed the fact that sometimes people truly do exaggerate. This leads to a "boy who cried wolf" phenomenon. Frequent exaggerations make people anticipate more exaggerations, even if one person is doing the exaggerating, and a completely separate person is attempting to accurately state a strong but unlikely belief.
In earlier postings I have pointed out that sometimes I can clearly see a problem, but cannot see any solution. This is one of those areas. It is a problem that people attempting to accurately express strong feelings are often believed to be exaggerating. I guess a partial solution would be to come right out and ASK whether a person is exaggerating in cases in which you are having trouble accepting their stated strength of emotion. This approach has various pitfalls, including the facts that the person might lie to you or to themselves, or that the person might be insulted by the question. Another partial solution is to do your best to accurately state your own strong feelings, without exaggeration. Still, the problem remains.
Truth is complicated.
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