Game Theory.

Many of the readers who frequent this blog would no doubt be familiar with the concept of "Game". For those of you who are not, check "here"

Several Social Conservatives have voiced their disapproval of game, particularly religious types seeing it as nothing more that a manipulative technique to get women into bed. Curiously, Feminists too believe this as well. They point to Game's most eloquent proponent, Roissy, to show how it is a deeply immoral lifestyle which is contrary to Christian teaching. Indeed a superficial analysis of the phenomena of Game gives the appearance of a totally immoral system of male/female relations(from a Christian point of view). This view I think is profoundly mistaken.

Firstly what exactly is Game? Broadly speaking, it is the capacity to successfully attract and seduce women. A man who has Game is successful with women while a man who has not isn't

It can thought of as a body of applied knowledge that was developed over time by men who were initially unsuccessful with women, and who through trial and experiment, developed consistent techniques which made them successful. Game is a skill based upon an empirical knowledge of what works when it comes to the seduction of women.

Aristotle had a name for this type of knowledge, it was called Techne, a form of knowledge that produced practical results. The complement of Techne was Episteme, which can be defined as:

Pure science, in the strict sense disinterested, objective, without "telos" meaning without further aim, hence the meaning "knowing for its own sake". This form of knowledge stands in contrast to techne which is knowing with purpose, i.e. practical knowledge. Episteme may also be translated as theoretical science.

In modern parlance with reference to Game, techne is the practical skill of seducing women, episteme is the body of knowledge upon which that skill is based: Episteme is theory, Techne is practice. The important point here is that what intellectually underpins Game--Game's Episteme--is certain empirically validated notions about the nature of women. Furthermore Episteme is non-imperative and like all knowledge is morally neutral.

Now it is important to recognise what these notions are. This is not an exhaustive list but the important points are:

1) Women have a nature that is different to men's.
2) This difference is innate and hardwired.
3) Women think differently to men.
4) Women aim to choose the best mate possible.
5) Female mate selection is based on sexual attraction.
6) Women have sexual urges which seek gratification.
7) What women find sexually attractive is different to men but is discernible and predictable.
8) It has been repeatedly observed that what women find sexually attractive in a man are:

a) High relative social status.
b) Psychological dominance
c) The ability to elicit positive emotions in a woman
d) Superficial physical appearance.
e) The appearance of sexual satisfaction (i.e that the man does not appear to be sexually needy but can walk away from the deal if not on his terms)

9) Moral qualities generally rank low on the list of features which a woman finds sexually attractive.
10) Women are much more affected by their emotions than men and that women will gravitate towards positive emotional experiences.
11) The female emotional state is intrinsically intertwined with her thinking. Her rationalisations align with her emotional state. Emotional congruence is superior to intellectual consistence. " I know he is bad for me but he makes me feel good."
12) A woman who chooses a mate that does not satisfy her nature(beta) will become unhappy.

These observations may be considered as the axioms of Game theory which are at the core of Game's episteme.

Now for the pedants out there, these are broadly applicable "Rules of thumb". Some women will have preferences and act in a way that is different to the mean, but these are the exceptions and not the norm. Statistical outliers do not negate the validity of the mean.

Now while many Christians may recoil at the concept of Game, the episteme of Game or "Game theory" would be consistent with the Christian weltanshauung as espoused by St Thomas. Firstly, Game asserts the existence of a female nature or "essence". It recognises that the difference between men and women is more than just physical but lay in the natures of the sexes. It asserts that these natures are intrinsic to the being and not just "social constructs", and that by acting contrary to our nature human beings will become unhappy . The axioms of Game are Christian axioms. The basis of this congruence between the principles of Game and the Christian understanding of the sexes is the epistimology in which both systems of thought were developed, namely in a desire to understand reality.

As such, game theory is intrinsically opposed to the vision of Feminism. The more radical versions of Feminism, which see sex as a social construct, are repudiated by the Game's episteme
which sees the differences betwen the sexes as innate. Furthermore Game also poses a challenge to the more moderate versions of Feminism, which views spousal "equality in all facets of the marriage" as a precondition to marital bliss. Even these milder variants of Feminism are fundamentally flawed with regard to the nature of women, since they propose an idealised man who fails the psychological needs of a woman. For a woman's nature to be satisfied, she needs a partner whom she cannot subordinate and whom she can defer to. This too is consistent with the Christian vision which places the husband at the "head" of the family. A woman who "wears the pants" is acting contrary to her nature . Sensitve New Age Guys are deeply unsatisfying. As many beta divorcees will attest to, trying to keep a woman happy all the time will only earn her contempt and fuel her desire for a more dominant man.

Christian and Social Conservatives have also voiced their criticism of Game because of the Hedonistic lifestyle its practitioners espouse. But it is my opinion that their criticism is ill founded and based on a very superficial analysis of the Headonists. Many commentators have confused the Hedonistic lifestyle as practiced by Game's most eloquent proponents with the body of knowledge that is Game itself. Game is non imperative. It is a techne or episteme which can be used for good or evil. The hedonism which is associated with its most eloquent proponents is a more a consequence our current irreligious cultural climate which effectively denies a moral dimension on human acts.

It should be remembered that the greatest Christian theologians saw no problem in incorporating the insights of ancient Greek philosophy into Christianity despite the fact that the knowledge was proposed and promulgated by Pagans. Likewise conservatives should not be afraid of Game's episteme and techne despite the fact that its most eloquent champions are hedonists. I would propose that the knowledge of Game is a moral good since its insights are congruent with reality.

There is no doubt that there is currently a very serious and deep problem with relationship between the sexes. The years of Feminism have not yet delivered the promised Nirvana of female happiness. Indeed, there seems to be evidence that women were happier before the feminisation of the Western male and masculinisation of the female. This state of affairs would have been on no suprise to St Thomas or any of the modern proponents of Game. Men and women have been taught to act contrary to their natures with the predictable consequences.

The Christian male can profit from Game's episteme and techne in his relations with women. Firstly, in developing the skills to attract women he can be more selective about his mate. Secondly, by understanding the operating principles of female psychology he can endeavor to operate and act in such a way as to satisfy his partner and strengthen his marriage. Thirdly he can learn to recognise problems in his relationship well before they become irreparable. Fourthly, it will serve as an armour against feminist imperatives with regard to male behaviour which make him act contrary to his nature and render him therefore less attractive to women. Game is knowing how to be a man around women.

Some of the critics of Game suggest that it presents an unflattering and inaccurate view of women. Once again I think it is the critics who are wrong with this view. Firstly, many men from different cultures and social strata have found that once they have incorporated the principles of game in their lives, their relationship with women has drastically improved. The cross cultural/social extent and breadth of the reported change validates the underlying epistime. A theory is validated by demonstration.

Secondly, perhaps the Games relatively unflattering view of female nature may be as a result of the unrealistic or unnatural view of women that critics, especially social conservatives have of them. It is not that Game is unflattering to women its that some the of the conservative views with regard to women are unrealistic. Game puts a strong emphasis on the carnal reality of women, something traditional society has been loathe to admit. Supporting evidence of this comes from males who have tried traditional approaches with regard to attracting women and been rewarded with nothing but failure. ( I think commentator Thursday alluded to here. It is something I wish to write more about in the near future.) The

What needs to be understood is that Game serves to facilitate sexual promiscuity because of current society places no limitations on sexual behaviour. A man without moral limits, who understands how to attract and seduce women will exploit this to the full. His success being proportionate to the perfection of his Game. Likewise a Christian man, operating within a moral framework which places limits on his behavior, can use game to improve his relationships with women within that moral framework, benefiting both the man and the woman, since what Game ultimately teaches is what makes women happy. Game is not pro-promiscuous, that's Hedonism; rather Game is based on an accurate understanding of female nature. It is not just a techne on how to seduce women, but an episteme with regard to female nature. The fact that its practitioners are enjoying enormous success suggests that they're onto something.

Apologies

Firstly, I wish to apologise to my few long suffering readers who have been checking in on the blog. The reason that I have not been posting for the past two months is that I have been on holidays with My family in Europe and during that time I made a promise to myself and family to stay away from the computer. Haphazard transmission will now resume as per normal.

Living in Hell.

Amongst the blogs that I frequent, the topic which has received the most discussion is the one dealing with George Sodini(Pictured), the man who recently murdered three women in a gym. What's interesting about this fellow is that he left quite a bit of information about himself on the Web. People often speculate about the mind of a mass murderer and frequently these speculations are way off the mark, but the snippets of information that Mr Sodini left on the Internet are worthy of some reflection so as to be able to speculate as to what kind of man Mr Sodini was.

Reading his diary postings and other assorted paraphernalia, one certainly gets the impression of a profoundly lonely man. Whist most of the media have commented on his sexual deprivation, it's also apparent to the slightly less superficial observer that he was starved of common friendship and love as well. He lacked both male and female friends and believed others were the source of his woes. The blindness to personal failings is usually a sign of a narcissistic personality.

The themes that run repeatedly in his writings is of his inability to find a mate and of his incompleteness and emptiness. So the question that comes to my mind is why did he want to destroy the thing he most wanted.? Why did he want to kill the very sex that that he so desperately craved?

Perhaps the idea that can help us the most in understanding this unfortunate man is the concept of Poena damni, the pain of loss, a Christian idea on the nature of suffering of the soul in Hell.

In Christian theology, the worst terror of Hell is not the "fire and brimstone" but the sense that we are permanently separated from God and the associated happiness that that would bring. People who have not thought about the matter deeply imagine this loss as a loss God's company, sort of not getting to hang around God, but they are wrong. The best way of imagining this pain of loss is by looking at it's opposite, the beatific vision. Acceptance by God, is like being accepted and loved by your sweetheart. It's not just the local effect of possessing your beloved, but the "spillover" effects are as important as well. When you're in love, life is sweeter, injuries are born easier, life is beautiful, there is a sense of goodwill to all; we want others to share our happiness. The beatific vision is not "just" the possession of God's favour, but the state of being in God's favour. It is this state of existence is what we mean by being in heaven.

Being rejected by the thing we love or desire creates the opposite effect. Nothing gives us joy, everything is bleak, and if we know we will never have the thing we want, despair or resignation sets in. However, more often than not ,we come to hate the thing the we love. The boy who was spurned by his high school sweetheart,is still is still bitter toward her years later and wants to get back at her. The girlfriend who is dumped by her partner sets out to destroy his life. Hatred and despair are the companions of those who suffer poena damni. They hate that which they want to love, but which does not love them back.

George Sodini's actions, seen in this light, are perfectly understandable. The women that he so desperately wanted rejected him, engendering in him a sense of poena damni which reached it's cumulation in the shooting of the innocent women at the gym. Now while Sodini's actions are understandable, they are in no way justifiable. The women who were killed or injured in no way had personally injured Sodini, their capital offence was that they were women. He stands condemned.

Is Sodini's hatred legitimate? Are women to blame for Sodini's plight? Amongst some of the more "sympathetic" analyses of Sodini's actions, the opinion is put out that Sodini's anger was legitimate, the consequence of a breach of social contract. As the theory goes, a educated,hard working, quiet man is meant to be rewarded by female affection. After all, in days gone bye such a man would have made good husband material. Quite reasonably, in the 50's, such a man would have no problems getting married. But this assumption is flawed in several ways.

Firstly, the consequence of this line of though is that in the 50's people viewed marriage as an exchange of goods. A woman weighed up her options and picked the best mate on the basis of what she could get for her sexual favour. This of course is rubbish, in most instances in the West, women and men married for romantic motives rather than for the transactional benefits. This trope is common with Evo-Bio thinking which has to reduce all human action within the confines of its reductionist metaphysic. Love was the primary motive for most couples, not the transactional benefits. Indeed until recently, the "gold digger" was a woman who was culturally derided.

Secondly, this line of thinking assumes that certain behaviours are meant to be rewarded with sexual favour. Something that no intelligent person in the West has ever assumed. There has never been a formulaic answer with regard to attracting the opposite sex. There were rules for increasing the odds for attraction but they were never guaranteed. No morally legitimate station in life was ever guaranteed to give you access to sex. Ever.

The problem with this line of reasoning is that engenders a sense of entitlement after accomplishment. It lays the intellectual groundwork for the perception of personal injury where there is none and provides a motive for unjustified retribution. Sort of like yelling at your parents for not getting a good enough present for your birthday, the perpetrator forgets that no one is owed a gift. No woman was ever obligated to give Sodini sex, no matter how buffed, rich,hardworking or nice he was. No woman had to "pay" because he couldn't get any action. Sodini suffered because he couldn't get what he wanted, not because he couldn't get what he was owed.

I feel that most men can empathise with sadness and bitterness associated with female rejection. However we should not confuse empathy with the perpetrator with sympathy of for his crime. He coldly, methodically and with measured deliberation had planned the murder of innocents who had in no way caused him harm. The Catholic Church teaches that the deliberate killing of an innocent is a mortal sin, and the souls of such sinners go to Hell. Still the Church also teaches that we cannot be sure of what the state of a soul is after death. I do not know where George Sodini's soul rests, as he was a seriously disturbed and depressed man and perhaps this may have attenuated his culpability, but I do know that while he was alive he lived in this world as if it were Hell.

My sympathies and condolences to the victims and their families.

The Northern Light.

Although The Social Pathologist is about as Conservative as you can get, he does have an immense liking for Progressive Trance Music as I have always thought it akin to classical music. I know the many of my audiophile friends regard it as junk, however I've always felt it moved me in ways only classical music could.

Now, what do you get when you get a Finnish church organist who loves both classical music and progressive trance? Enjoy; it's out of this world. It's amazing.



Petri Alanko you are the legend of the day. Just when you thought all hope was lost, something like this comes around to restore your hope in civilisation. Western Civilisation.

Talking Past Each Other.

Recently I was engaged in a an interesting discussion over at Clio's blog. Namely, has the definition of rape changed? The discussion was basically a continuation of two previous discussions; one from Roissy's and one from the 2Blowhards site. Link 1 and Link 2.

Basically my assertions were that:
1) That in cases of rape, there is a degree of legal and social prejudice which renders the presumption of innocence ineffective.
2)Women interpret things differently to men.

It's on this second point that I wish to concentrate since the discussion itself turned out to be a fascinating example of my second point.

It is my belief, that men and women process information differently and this in turn affects the way that the they interpret events. Male/female misunderstanding is a common enough experience which seems to confirm my belief, but where this misunderstanding can lead to potentially tragic outcomes is in the area of human sexual relations, where frequently consent is not explicitly given but implied

Now in normal human intimacy, sexual escalation does not usually proceed through negotiation, the partner does not explicitly ask if he can kiss the woman, he proceeds and then waits for her response. If the man initiates actions which the woman finds agreeable, the combination of non-resistance, moans, etc. is enough to imply consent. The point here is that the escalation of human intimacy usually occurs through implicit rather than explicit communication.

Now the point of all this is that men are frequently terrible at understanding implicit meaning. A girl may be quite friendly to a man and having only friendly intentions while the same man may think the girl's actions are an attempt to initiate a relationship. This of course may cause offence to the girl and embarrassment to the man without any malice actually being present. For example a man my wish to complement a woman but she may interpret it as a form of harassment, once again without any malice being present.

Communication between parties can be though of as occuring in a first and second order manner. First order communication is unambigous transfer of information without implicit meaning. Implicit communication is what I would term as second order communication, perception is dependent on both the mental make up of the perceiver and the message. So for example a woman who is a militant feminist may interpret a complement as sexual harassment another woman who is not, won't. The point here is that the signal has a different effect depending on the "software/culture" of the receiver.

When Viagra first came on the market, I was surprised at the number of women who would not let their husbands take it or got angry when their husbands did. Initially, I interpreted this as the woman not wanting to be sexually bothered by the man. Until one day I was having a discussion with a lady who was unhappy about her husband using Viagra and I asked her why. "I should be able to get it up for him without him needing medicine". Upon further questioning it became apparent that this woman was unhappy about her husbands Viagra use because it confirmed her self-perceptions of unattractiveness. The husband, whom I knew well, thought his wife was gorgeous and he felt that his wife--whom he felt other men regarded as gorgeous--would leave him if he did not sexually satisfy. Now this was a classic situation where two people drew different conclusions from the same situation. Anecdotally, when I now prescribe Viagra I tell my male patients to go home and reassure their wives. The men are frequently quite perplexed when I point this out but surprised when they find out that their wife was anxious about their sexual allure.

Now what seems to have become apparent to me in my years of practice, is that human thinking tends to be a mix of first and second order communication. While both sexes are capable of both, men in general seem to operate more on a first order basis while women on a second order basis.

Now second order communication has both its benefits and its drawbacks, and these will be dependant on the culture of the recipient of information. Now, if a woman is obsessed with sexual politics she is going there is going to be a very wide variety of "signals" which she is going to interpret in sexuo-political way. More importantly, prejudices of any kind have a profound impact on second order thinking, since information is interpreted in context of the prejudice.

Where second order thinking assumes a dangerous dimension is when the second order thinker asserts that their interpretation is objective and not subjective.

A perfect example of this second order thinking is expressed by Clio in my exchange with her. Clio consistently imputes to me opinions which I do not hold. Now I can see how she could interpret my comments in such a way, but I would ask the reader to go over our little exchange and see if I explicitly make any of the claims she imputes to me.

For example:

Here’s a snippet of what you said to me in your last comment:
(The Social Pathologist)Now a sane and rational man would look at the facts in toto with due regard to each of them and come to the conclusion that this woman was grossly irresponsible in her behaviour. She did not deserve anyone’s sympathy or support. Yet your interpretation of the facts would nullify pertinent features because the conclusions would be “distasteful”.

(Clio) This is the comment to which I was responding when I took your words “personally” and argued in support of my own detachment. It certainly implies that I had been irrational and unreasonable.

It logically implied nothing of the sort, yet Clio perceived it to. Now it could also mean that a sane and rational woman would look at the facts differently. It does not logically follow that a different opinion is necessarily the opinion of an an insane or irrational person. Now it is possible that my writing was ambiguous, but if there was any lack of clarity on my part I suppose the appropriate thing would have been to seek clarification. I am quite capable of stating that women are idiots(even though I don't believe it) or utter other disagreeable comments if the situation arises. The point here is that Clio attributed sentiments to me which I did not posses and then proceeded to vigourously assert that I possessed them. Interestingly she self-identified with her position, perceiving an rebuttal to the subject at hand as an injury to her self.

This is the typical Men are from Mars, Women from Venus, stuff and quite frequently both the source of both mirth and marital misery. A fair portion of my time is spent counselling couples who are in marital strife because of the differences in their perceptions of their marriage.

Now this type of thinking assumes dangerous implications when it comes to sexual harassment (and rape) Suppose a man makes an ambiguous comment which is interpreted as an unwanted sexual advance by a woman. Now the man may have meant one thing but it has been interpreted as another. Whom do the courts believe; the woman who has "experienced" sexual harassment, or the man who has not intentionally offended? A man is dead in the water if his legal system is feminist prejudiced.

The point here is that we as a society need to recognise that men and women both think and perceive differently and take account of it. This does not mean that one is superior than the other. In fact, both forms of thinking have both the benefits and drawbacks, the point is however, that non-recognition of this fact does an injustice to both sexes and is a source of much male female grief.

Here is a LINK to a video by Deborah Tannen, a linguist who has studied how men and women miscommunicate. It's well worth the view.

Further proof that masculinity and femininity are not social constructs; they are innate.

Thank God That We Have Rid Ourselves of a Knave.

Robert Strange McNamara is dead.He died peacefully in his sleep, aged 93. He now joins the fifty eight thousand or so American sons, husbands and fathers who died less peacefully as a result of their involvement in the Vietnam war, a war which he so very much dictated the conduct of.

The Vietnam War was the polarising issue in the U.S. (and Australia) in the 1960's, the cultural and political forces that were unleashed as a result of the political and cultural debate on the matter were one of the principle motive forces that powered the cultural change of the 60's. And for what its worth, from my perspective, the cultural changes really started happening about 1965 and ended about ten years later. The America that entered the 60's was a totally different America than the one that emerged from it. In the space of a decade America was transformed from a country that was sure of itself, its sense of destiny and power to an America that seemed totally unsure of itself an powerless, an America as epitomised in the Carter presidency.

What had changed? What had so sapped American potency and might?

The rot was a long time gestating and began to make it appearance well before the 60's, however the old world still tenaciously hung on, hung on at least till the Kennedy Administration came into power, after which the old world was thoroughly swept aside. The Kennedy Administration was to the U.S what the Whitlam Administration was to Australia; transformative. The "Best and Brightest" of a generation gave their services and enthusiasm to the new administration. The hope was that new, young, enthusiastic men with transformative ideas were going to change America and the world into a better place. The hope was misplaced.

Chief amongst these "Best and Brightest" was Robert McNamara. His biography can read at Wikipaedia. The war in Vietnam was known as McNamara's war and rightly so, as he set out to fight it. And there was the problem, he was not a combat commander, he was a business analyst.

Indeed McNamara was one of the first of the new breed of "scientific managers'(currently today's MBA's) who ran things according to key performance indicators. Body counts, tons of bombs dropped, number of acres of forest cleared, etc. Errol Morris's Fog of War manifestly illustrates the point. He instituted corporate management for the military, not only in the orginisation of the American Military but in the conduct of its operations. To put this more bluntly, given the vast resources of the U.S, its superpower military, its total tactical domination of the enemy, the question is why didn't the U.S win the Vietnam war? The U.S lost the war because it was being run by accountants, not soldiers.

McNamara's evil lay in not knowing his limitations. Prior to McNamara, the Secretary of Defence's job was to provide the military with what it needed to get the job done. With McNamara, he was going to tell the military how to fight the war. Indeed in Morris's Fog of War, McNamara frequently refers to himself as a commander and of the strains of command. The problem was that he was not militarily trained. To quote his arch enemy; a good hospital administrator is not necessarily a good brain surgeon. McNamara dabbled in the surgery. He moved beyond his circle of competence. But he did more that just that, he made sure that surgeons operated according to how he wanted them to. If they didn't, they were isolated or fired and new more "compliant" surgeons were employed who were prepared to do their masters bidding.

His lasting legacy was in the transformation of the "culture" of the Pentagon. Yes-men generals and admirals were hired to replace military who were too outmoded in their thinking. He ensured that the president only got the advice that the he felt that the president wanted to hear. He maneuvered to have the Joint Chiefs of Staff politically isolated from the President so that dissenting voices would not heard. A good account of the politics of the time can be read in the book "Dereliction of Duty" by Robert McMaster. He did what no foreign tyrant was able to do to the U.S military, he "decapitated" its head and replaced it with soldiers and academics who were politically acceptable. Competence took second place to loyalty and ideology.

McNamara did not just lose the war, he broke the U.S. military by shooting it in the head. He destroyed its culture of success.

There was however a lone voice in the wilderness. McNamara's pathology was well understood by this man. As a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who believed in the sanctity of civilian control of the military, he was powerless to stop McNamara. Though, in no uncertain terms expressed his views at McNamara's ineptitude in private and amongst his peers and in official reccomendations, He was powerless to speak out in public as a result of his soldiers oath. However upon retirement wrote a book on the subject, warning his fellow Americans of the dangers that the McNamara and his ilk were exposing America to. The book, aptly titled "America is in Danger" is out of print, though is still worth the effort reading. Reading it is chilling especially especially in how it predicied intelligence failures as a result of McNamara's changes under the guise of efficiency. In light of the intelligence failures of September 11, the book is prophetic The author recognised that military affairs cannot always be quantified and that a military leader must always operate knowing that his decisions are clouded by the "fog of war". Furthermore he realised one tampered with a successful culture at one's peril since it was very difficult to produce a culture of success. Indeed this man was so worried about his country that he was prepared to tarnish his unblemished reputation in order to get a public audience for his message by running as a vice presidential candidate with a morally repugnant man. He was McNamara's arch enemy, his antithesis. He was Curtis LeMay.

That Smile.

The Smile.

(Hat tip, The Sartorialist)

Your life is never really the same after a vision like that.

Christian love. (Charity)

Charity is a potency which in actualisation, perfects.

Use the Force, Luke.

Commentator Tom made the following comment in the previous blog entry:

If someone's love for you is truly unconditional and does not depend on what you are and what you do, what about you is truly being loved?

I've been mulling about this for a few days and for the few of those that are interested in my thoughts here they are.

When we think of love, we though our culture, are conditioned to think of it in a sentimental way. The feelings which are associated with love are pleasurable. The love we have towards our children, friends, partners and things is a positive experience, and we delight being in being in it's state. Couples who have drifted apart try to "rekindle" that feeling in order to draw themselves closer to each other. We associate love with a positive feeling which comes about as a result of existence of the beloved.

Considered that way, in the absence of a beloved , there can be no love. In fact conceptualised as such, love is a second order phenomena; there must be a beloved before there is love. This however makes love a response, a reaction to something, a responsive sentiment. The object which elicits this sentiment usually is in possession of some excellence or good which we recognise and respond positively to. We may love a woman because of her beauty or character, our country because of its particular features, our friends because of their good natures, the love is always a consequence of some excellence in the beloved. Our beloved generates feelings in us which continue to be sustained in the presence of the beloved and since the feelings are pleasurable, we seek to maintain them. Should we loose our beloved, the ensuing deprivation grieves us and we seek the beloved return.

It should also be apparent then devoid of excellences, a thing can be unlovable. A hideous man or woman elicits repulsion, a bad character, disgust and so on. Indeed our reactions to other things may be that of indiffernce or repulsion. We pass people on the street and think nothing of them, we read about awful criminals and are revolted by their behaviour, not seeing any goodness in either we a devoid of the loving sentiment toward them and hence don't mourn their loss.

Clearly then, love thus conceptualised, is a pleasureable sentiment elicited by the qualities in another. This type of love seeks is sustained by the pleasure elicited by another, it is sustained by hedonic satisfaction. Once the pleausure stops so does the love.

When a couple say they have fallen out of love, what they are saying that they are not getting any pleasure from the existence of the other. The husband, whom the wife would at one time love with all her heart, farts in her presence, ignores her reasonable demands, is a brutish and boring lover and has grown a beer gut. There is nothing attractive about him, his character qualities are overshadowed by his repulsive nature; she loves him no more. His presence does not elicit pleasurable sentiments and at best she becomes indifferent to him and at worse is repulse him.

Now this concept of love as a responsive sentiment is a natural and dare I say it Pagan one. It is how the pagans conceptualised love. Their love was hedonic in that it only existed as long as the beloved gave pleasure. Looking at love in this light, this passage from Luke 6:32 takes on a different meaning:

³²"If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. ³³If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. ³⁴If you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again.

In all the instances cited above the lover is getting a benefit from the loved, and clearly Christ thinks that that form of love is nothing special. What precedes that bit of text and what follows is Christ's idea of Love.

‘But I say to you that listen, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, ²⁸bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. ²⁹If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. ³⁰Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again. ³¹Do to others as you would have them do to you.

and,

³⁵But love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. ³⁶Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

Now clearly in these two passages the type of love that Christ is taking about is a love that gets no pleasure from the object of its attentions. In fact that lover may be repulsed by the beloved but the lover still wishes good to the beloved. For years I interpreted this text as meaning one must do good and have pleasant sentiments towards the wicked, but I was wrong; my feelings while performing good works don't matter. The basis of Christian love is asentimental.

This has profound consequences for our understanding of Christian love. Unlike hedonic love which is a second order phenomena, Christian love is a first order effect, it exists prior to the existence of the beloved and independent of the nature of the beloved. Christian love is the intent of perfection manifest in self, others and the world. More importantly it can't be seen as a sentiment or a feeling, but rather a perfecting "force" present in Christian nature. When Christian love is actualised it is directed towards the perfection of its object regardless of how the actor feels about the object of his actions. Christian love is the force that can love what gives us no pleasure. So when Tom asks what is unconditional love? The Christian replies it is what I give to you(even under sufferance), not what you give to me. To the pagans this concept would have been ridiculous.

Love in the time of Hedonism.

Recently over at Roissy's there was a stoush between the Errant Wife and Himself. The Errant Wife objected to Roissy's vitriol and replied in vicious kind. I really did not see what the fight was about, since both parties have essentially the same philosophy of life; Hedonism. Roissy has often said that he loves Love and the Errant Wife seems to be in search of it. The question in my mind through this exchange is how does a how does a Hedonist "love"? Or more importantly, what is the nature of Hedonistic love?

Hedonism, being a teleology which aims toward satisfaction of the self, is inwardly focused towards the individual. The goods of life have their value insofar as they provide pleasurable satisfaction to the individual. In other words, the goodness or badness of a thing is really a measure of how it pleases the individual apprehending the thing. Now clearly according to this philosophy, things of little pleasure will have little value, while things of great pleasure will have great value. Now clearly, being loved-both physically and emotionally--is perhaps the greatest pleasure possible and a hedonist the will value the lover as long as the lover pleasures them: The love of a hedonist is conditional.

But the nature of Hedonistic "love" is not the same as the nature of unconditional love, although they may appear the same they in fact polar opposites. Hedonistic love is the love of the utility of the loved individual. Its a love that exists as long as it is satisfied, it is innately selfish. The lover of a Hedonist must continually "provide" in order to be loved. Once the provision stops so does the "love". The hedonist lover is continually "taking" from his "beloved" and what he or she gives to their beloved is purely incidental to their being as the object of hedonistic love is the self.

The "marriage" of two hedonists will have all the appearance of a marriage. The partners will take delight in each other and will appear in love. However after the novelty of each other wears off and the pleasure that each receives from each other lessens, they will "fall out of love". Now it is true that the Hedonist lover can feel pain at the loss of his source of pleasure, but it is the pain of loss of loosing the pleasure not the pain of the loss of the thing itself. Since what is valued is the pleasure and not its source. A man may love the beauty of a woman but when that beauty fades so does the "love".

Unconditional love on the other hand, has as it's object the other; it is extrinsic to one's self. The love of the unconditional lover delights in the other regardless of the pleasures or grief that the lover receives from the loved. Indeed the perfect unconditional lover loves when there is no pleasure there at all except for the existence of the loved. To quote Percy Sledge:

When a man loves a woman
Can't keep his mind on nothing else
He'll trade the world
For the good thing he's found
If she's bad he can't see it
She can do no wrong
Turn his back on his best friend
If he put her down

This is perhaps where the vow stands as the perfect symbol of unconditional love. Made of our own free choosing, at the moment when we have glimpsed the beloved in their perfection, it is our desired promise, publicly proclaimed that the love we offer the beloved is unconditional. That thick or thin, our love is always there. It is a promise, not a fleeting feeling of the moment. When we keep our promises we love unconditionally. Love is sometimes a pleasure and other times a duty. In fact duty to our beloved can be a form of love.

Today I had a patient whose wife of 55 years died recently. He was clearly distressed as he missed her terribly. They were not the most glamorous couple and walking down the street, one would not notice them for any particular reason. They argued and fought, she bossed him and he annoyed her but he was always there for her and she for him. When she died he was cleaved in two, he and his partner had become one.

Intended Objects of Actors.

An act is a specific operation of a being which results in a change in the ontic state. Or in more common parlance: An act is an operation which results in a change in reality. An act instantiates change.

Since in human acts, the will effects the cause of instantiation, the effects of such acts are attributable to will. Hence the person who initiates an act is the originator of it and thus responsible for it.

If the change effected is a result of the operation of the Will, it is voluntary, otherwise it is involuntary. Furthermore, voluntary actions seek to instantiate a desired ontic state, this state being the object of the act.

The intent on the other hand is the state of reality which the intellect seeks to ultimately bring about; the ontic state which it desires, its' intended object.

Intent is realised through act or acts. However this does not mean that what is instantiated is what is intended. Indeed there may be several acts which may need to be done in order to achieve the intended state.

It appears then that the acting person has two types of motive objects. The object that we directly bring about through an act, the instantional object and the the state of affairs we wish ultimately achieved, the intentional object.

When morally considering actions a consideration of the both the instantional and intentional objects must be made in order to correctly consider the act. For an act to be good both the instantional object and intentional object must be good.

Of note, the intention of the Will can be instantiated by means outside the operating being. If for instance, we wish a man to be killed and by some other means not connected to ourselves, the man is killed, the will's intention is actuated, even though it has not occurred as a result of a specific action of our will. This is why ill will alone is viewed as moral negative.

Taylor Swift: Beautiful Girl.

I'm not a big fan of country music. But the song in the link above is quite catchy and is what my wife would call a "happy song". It's sweet, innocent and traditional and a refreshing change to all the rubbish and soft porn that is peddled by the Music industry.

I must admit I was quite arrested by the appearance of the singer whom I find beautiful. While this girl is erotically attractive-(I'm old enough to be her father)-her beauty in a way overrides it and I find her attractive in an aesthetic sense. She is just so damn pretty and feminine. Throughout the clip her appearance changes from modern college student to traditional damsel. Interestingly her femininity seems enhanced by the traditional clothing that she wears and she is more beautiful because of it. I suppose it just goes to show how powerful an affect fashion makes on a woman's appearance. She is pretty in the modern garb but stunning in the traditional wear.

Enjoy the tune. Yes, I'm a soppy sentimentalist.

And Yet Another Thought.

The innocent man is by necessity inculpable, however the inculpable man is not by necessity innocent.

Some More Thoughts for the Day on Moral Objects.

Intention of will(Finis Operantis): The appetite directed toward a certain ontic state; the desired state being its "object".

Intention of act(Finis Operis): The ontic state to be instantiated by the act; the acts' "object".

Realising our intentions: The process of instantiating the object of our will through the the instantiation of the objects of our acts.

The realised ontic state of the will may be achieved through one or many acts.

Both acts and intent have objects and these objects become moral when subjected to the standard of the morality. Without morality, there is no moral object.

Through the Finis Operis we achieve the Finis Operantis.

Thought for the day.

When we act, we attempt to instantiate our intentions.

Psychological axioms.

The ultimate female fantasy is to have the one man that all the other females desperately want , but HER special uniqueness, her beauty, her feminine charms has “tamed” and “captured” him into committed monogamy.

(HT David from Hawaii)

Too much flesh, not enough class.

Summer in Australia is a feast for the lecher but a famine for the aesthete. I'm by no ways a prude but I must admit that I find that excessive displays of flesh rather off-putting. Not so much for the display of flesh itself, rather what it tends to signify of the barer. Others may disagree, but I've tended to notice that the girls that bare the most are usually either dull or morally unscrupulous, both undesirable features.

Most women usually take great care of their appearance: They want to appear attractive. People are visual creatures, and the choices a woman makes with regard to fashion, determine what features she wishes to bring to attention or accentuate. A woman who walks around with near exposed breasts and a skirt that barely covers her bottom is going to send the signal to men that she wants to appear as sexual, in a way that a woman covered head to toe is not. Still its not just an issue of display of flesh, display of form should be considered as well. A skin tight jump suit can be as erotic as baggy track pants are not. A woman not wishing to appear as sexual would make choices which will leave something to the imagination while still accentuating her femininity.


Jayne Mansfield was endowed with enormous breasts, which she unashamedly displayed. She was cognizant that they were her main attraction and she deliberately flaunted them. Apparently she could speak six languages and purportedly had an IQ of 163 but who would know. She complained that people did not want to know about her other attributes, while at the same time emphasising her breasts. She plied the skin trade for all that she could get, arranging for "wardrobe malfunctions" when they would be most noticed. She deliberately pushed the boundaries of good taste in order to expose her "attractive assets". As her career started to nosedive, her efforts at notoriety doubled finally posing in Playboy as a centerfold. She deliberately cultivated an image as a sex symbol; a monodimensional personality. Her personal life was a wreck, she married five times, was an alcoholic and died tragically in an automobile accident. Overt sexuality: Low class. Notice whom she is sitting with; much more classy.

Beauty Queens

Both of these women are attractive and yet one is more beautiful than the other. Both were contemporaries and both were the object of much media speculation. Both met tragic ends. One died alone and unhappy by a barbiturate overdose, the other a princess in a car accident

I suppose the question to ask is, what makes these women attractive? Which of course leads to the question, what is attractiveness anyway?

I shall posit an answer: Attraction is a force that compels us towards its source. It can also be thought of as like magnetism, in that it has "polarity". The thing in possession of an attractive feature can be thought of as "positive", while the thing deficient of the attractive possession can be thought of as the "negative" pole of the force. Therefore a proper understanding of attraction involves the analysis of both poles. The potential of attractiveness therefore comes form the "potential difference in attribute" between the attractive and the attracted.

An individuals total attractiveness can be thought of as the rough sum of the attractive potentials of an individuals attributes when considered in from the point of view of the attracted. Therefore deficiencies in one area may be made up by excesses in another.

Marilyn Monroe's attractiveness lay in her sexuality and in her ability to project it, and while she is physically attractive, I don't think one could call her beautiful. Her attractiveness lays in the potential for sexual satisfaction, which would appear to be in abundance. However she appears mono dimensional in having nothing else to offer. (Remember I'm only talking about her appearance)

Grace Kelly's attractiveness lay in feminine beauty. The is also a sense of sexuality in Grace Kelly but it seems subordinated to her overall femininity, her sexuality is more restrained and refined. There is a sense of "grace", in Grace Kelly which is absent in Marilyn Monroe. So while she does not appear as sexual a Marilyn Monroe, she satisfies on many different planes. The sum of her many attractive potentials are greater than Marilyn's superlative one.

However the other point to consider is that of the attracted. A person who just wants to "get laid" is going to find Monroe more attractive than Kelly, but a person seeking beauty, sophistication and sex will find Kelly more attractive than Monroe. Monroe's attractiveness in more primal, Kelly's attractiveness more refined. Since civilised pleasures are refined pleasures, Kelly is the objectively more beautiful.

Saying that though, I would not of married either. Both were promiscuous before they were married. Big turn off.

Deceptive Packaging.

It's a sad fact of life that you can't judge a book by its cover. Likewise it's also true that you really can't judge people's characters on the basis of their appearance. Still in the real world, appearance is what most people go for and numerous studies have shown that the beautiful seem to have an unfair advantage over the ugly. Studies have shown that they get better jobs, are perceived as more intelligent and morally upright than the unattractive.
Human beings place a very considerable importance on physical beauty. I suppose it's because in our minds, the beautiful is synonymous with the good, and hence an object worthy of attainment. I suppose a great deal of human misery could be explained away be the realisation that what looks good is not necessarily good, but sometimes the beauty is so arresting, so perfect, so desirable that other considerations are put aside in order to attain the beautiful.

Young Laura Zuniga certainly does present the visage of the beautiful. An articulate pre-school teacher, she was a Mexican beauty queen. I must admit looking at her, she presents the picture of beauty, charm, intelligence and goodness. And yet the image lies.

You see, young Laura likes to spend her time with her drug cartel friends; Laura is not really that nice. I imagine that at her trial it will come out that she had low self-esteem, was pressured, was under the influence of hormones, etc. The fact would be, that these excuses would all be lies. As an incredibly attractive woman, Laura could of had her pick of men, from CEO's, movie stars, and attractive but honest men. Beautiful women get to choose their mates, and unlike the less attractive members of her sex, her choices in nearly all instances are not forced. I imagine the advances of many good decent and upright men would have been rejected in preference to the company of vicious evil men. Her preference is for bad boys.

It is said that the Angels can see not only our visage, but its composite with our natures. Perhaps if Laura's nature could be seen, it would look something like this. I want you to try to form a composite image of the beautiful body encapsulating that hideous form, in doing so you will have gained a more accurate image of the nature of this woman. Her beauty is skin deep, the ugliness goes to the bone. The beautiful is sometimes not the good, something a man or woman should remember when on the dating scene. A man is never more likely to be deceived than when enthralled in the beauty of a woman. In making our assessment of potential mates its well to consider that the packaging may not be indicative of what's in the can.

The Day the Earth Got Bored.

I went out with a friend tonight to see the movie, The Day the Earth Stood Still. My advice to potential viewers, stay at home. Don't even borrow the DVD. To quote a fellow movie goer, "That was a waste of two hours of my life." The movie had every cliche imaginable. Keanu Reeves actually acted quite well but even that could not save the movie. Utter rubbish.

Disdain.

Over the past few days I've been over at Dennis Mangan's arguing that one cannot be a Conservative and an atheist at the same time: The terms are mutually incompatible. This of course, incensed Mr Mangan no end, and apart from some ad hominem attacks on my person, he presented no argument to refute my claim. What he did try to do, is to misconstrue my argument, as if I had said to be a conservative, one had to be a christian; this was not my position. I argued that at the bare minimum, a conservative must leave the room open for the possibility of some form of faith, be it in a traditional or personal form. He could be a Pagan, Hindu, Muslim, Lutheran etc.

Ed Feser does a much better job than I can do arguing this position in his essay, The Metaphysics of Conservatism. It is well worth the read. Realist conservatives leave room for faith, the others do not. To quote Mr Feser:

So let me end by citing another, and more practical, reason someone with truly conservative instincts ought to favor the Realist brand of conservatism over its rivals -- namely, that it isn't clear that the other versions are really versions of conservatism at all, any more than nominalism or conceptualism are versions of realism.

You see, metaphysics matter. Metaphysics determine both our ontology and epistemology.(Our understanding or reality and the nature of knowledge). The Ancient Greek or Roman may have disagreed with the Catholic or Lutheran about the nature of the the true God/Gods, but he would have agreed that there was some form of higher Deity than himself. More importantly, however imperfectly they did it, men orientated their lives to the imperatives of the Deity. The rules came from God, not from a rational agent's opinion of the facts. The locus of morality was external to man. The great cultural divide between the Modern World and the World that preceded it, lay in this metaphysical shift. In the Modern World, Man was the source of morals.

Can an Atheist therefore be a Conservative, if he does not share their metaphysics? I would argue not, for the same reasons Ed Feser does. Can a man be a conservative and disdain Christianity? Yes, but he cannot be a Western Conservative. He can be a Hindu, Buddhist, Confucian etc, type of conservative or he can be a Liberal.

Denis Mangan did not publish my last reply to his post. I really don't care as it is his blog and he has the right to do on it as he pleases. However the generally accepted form is to publish comments unless they are offensive, which my comments were not. I would invite the reader to to visit the discussion and make his own mind up.

Mencken, Conservatism, and Adversary Culture

Christianity and the West, II

Merry Christmas.

To my small band of readers , peace and goodwill to you all this Christmas time.



For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given, and the government shall be upon His shoulder: and His Name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace!


(Handel's Messiah.)

Dead White Man. No 1

I don't have White guilt and have always preferred civilization to savagery, light to darkness. Other civilizations have had their achievements, however I will maintain, no assert, that European culture, particularly Western European culture, has had a profound and beneficial effect on the rest of the world.

With that in mind, I hope to put up a few biographies of Dead White men over the next few months. These were the type of men that traditional European society produced in abundance and who so are despised by modern Lefties, because they are ashamed of their cultural inheritance. I introduce to you a man who was tough, courageous, resourceful and loved both God and country. Introducing:

Charles James Napier.




All round tough bastard, and the type of man you want with you in the jungle.

The wikipaedia entry pretty much covers his life, but I thought I would like to jot down some of his thoughts as applied to contemporary issues.

On tolerating foreign customs within his jurisdiction:

"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."

On Counterinsurgency:

"The best way to quiet a country is a good thrashing, followed by great kindness afterwards. Even the wildest chaps are thus tamed"

On negotiating with the natives:

"Come here instantly. Come here at once and make your submission, or I will in a week tear you from the midst of your village and hang you""

On local self government:

...so perverse is mankind that every nationality prefers to misgoverned by its own people than to be well ruled by another.

And how tough a bastard was he:

He Commanded the force employed in Scinde, and on 17th February, with only 2800 British troops, he attacked and defeated, after a desparate action of three hours duration, 22000 of the enemy strongly posted at Meeanee. On the 21st February, Hydrabad surrendered to him, and on the 24th March, with 5000 men he attacked and signally defeated 20,000 of the enemy posted in a very strong and difficult position at Dubba, near Hydrabad, thus completing the entire subjugation of Scinde.

Early in 1815, with a force consisting of about 5000 men of all arms, he took the field against the mountain and desert tribes, situated at the right bank of the Indus to the North of Skihapore, and after an arduous campaign, he effected the total destruction of the hill robbers.

Check out the odds, he was no metrosexual. There would be no place for him in today's modern Britain. The country to whom he bequeathed so much glory has dishonoured his legacy. But he lives in the Pantheon of Honour; three cheers for the Dead White Man.

The Darkness.

Some of the luminaries of the "Secular Conservative" fold have started a new blog site. Predictably religion was dissed almost immediately and rather vehemently, I might add. Which is a bit of a surprise as the Right was always seen as the natural home of religion.

For what it's worth, I think the term Secular Conservative is an oxymoron. Clearly the majority of the important Dead White men, or Hindu's for that matter, believed in some sort of supernatural existence, even though they disagreed--sometimes violently--about the composition of "the other world". God and religion get bandied about quite a bit in conservative thought, and the link with the dead through tradition is a mainstay of the conservative mindset.

Edward Feser, wrote what I think is quite a definitive piece on what in the end, separates Left from Right; a view with which I agree with. You see, in the end its all about epistemology; what we consider is valid knowledge. The secularists seem to believe that Empiricism is all that matters, and what cannot be empirically verified does not really matter. From their point of view, non empirically derived propositions are certainly not something to build one's society on. Furthermore-- and it's quite disappointing that supposed intelligent people hold these views--religious conservatives are painted as sort of nut jobs, who believe any fairy story uncritically and as people who would subordinate any scientific fact to a religious belief.

Now it is true, that there are quite a few conservative religious nuts, but every movement has its idiot adherents. But serious conservatism has never dismissed rationality or empirical evidence, it has however been open to the acceptance of truths which cannot be empirically verified such as religious teachings. I think it was St Thomas who back in the thirteenth century, stated that where faith and science are in conflict, our understanding of faith is probably wrong and needs to be modified, as the truth is indivisible and the two cannot contradict each other. Please note, thirteenth Century people.

The question to ask then is it rational to believe in things which are empirically unprovable?

Consider the following: A blind man is told of the existence of the colour red. There is no way he can empirically "prove" the existence of the colour since he cannot see, but clearly the colour exists. What should he do? If he is a Secular Conservative, he will deny that the colour red exists since he cannot empirically verify it's existence. Empiricism would have lead him to a false conclusion. The only way our blind friend can believe in the colour red is through an act of faith. He can't experience the colour red, through he can believe in it from the testimony of others. Clearly in this instance his faith leads to a belief which is congruent with reality. Empiricism on the other hand leads to an absurd result. Faith has its problems as well. It's also possible through faith to believe in things which are non congruent with reality, to believe in fairy tales.

The key issue of any knowledge is it's congruence with reality. That is, how do beliefs square up with reality. Empiricism is pretty powerful but it does have its faults. It doesn't deal well with non repeatable events and it's limits are defined by the perceptual abilities of the observer.

We can't for instance, scientifically repeat a murder in order to determine who caused it. If our courts demanded empirical proof of guilt, we would never be able to convict anyone. But we can, through a combination of science and rationalism, come to some form of conclusion about the nature of the killer. Sometimes they confess, and more often than not we're right. The point here being that valid knowledge that is congruent with reality may be obtained through non empirical methods. Sticking to empiricism is a bit like deliberately trying to live life with your eyes closed while overcompensating with your hearing.

The next question to ask then: Is there "stuff" in the Universe which we cannot perceive? I mean, are we capable of perceiving all that is out there? Just like our blind man who cannot see the light, is there other matter in the universe which we cannot sense and therefore not subject to empirical verification? I don't just mean religious things, I mean things like forces, dark matter etc. Because if there are, empiricism is not going to help us understand the phenomena. More importantly if there are such "things", the strict claims of empiricism may lead us to the wrong conclusions. Certainly at the subatomic and intergalactic levels, weird stuff happens. No one's seen dark matter.

The secular rejection of the mode of traditional conservative thought, by necessity undercuts the foundations of conservatism itself. Morals can't be derived from scientific facts, and hence conservatism becomes a "lifestyle"preference based on the hedonistic predispositions of the secular conservative; should his pleasures change so should his conservatism. The Dead White Men that made up conservatism in the past, lived that way because they thought it was the Tao of life; it was the truth.

But back to our secular blind man. His empirical enquiries have not been able to demonstrate the phenomena of colour. So when offered corrective surgery to cure his blindness, he angrily chases us away, because his method has taught him that there is no light.

(Cross Posted at The Forvm)

The paradox of extravagance.

John Maynard Keynes was profoundly influential in the field of economics, which is a bit of a shame because some of what he said needed to be thought out more. But while his unthinking acolytes continue to practice his solutions to the current economic crisis, it is worthwhile exploring one of his ideas further.

The paradox of thrift was one of those ideas of Keynes which explain the current government policy of "stimulus". It is assumed that in a normal household there is a balance between savings and spending. And tets take a hypothetical fellow who has a thousand dollars a week to spend, and let's suppose in normal times this fellow saves two hundred dollars and spends eight hundred dollars on stuff and services. That eight hundred dollars of expenditure, keeps business of all kinds profitable and in operation. On the other hand, the money that he has saved is put in a bank which then lends it out to other businesses which need it. There is both consumer demand and capital availability.

Now if our friend decides to save three hundred dollars a week, the amount left over to spend is seven hundred, a reduction of one hundred dollars. There is less consumer demand to go around and business is poor. Likewise if our friend saves only one hundred dollars, then there is more consumer demand and hence business prospers. Therefore the way to stimulate businesses is to increase consumption. However for a given income, more spending will mean less saving.

Should savings become scarce, in a natural market, the demand for savings would push up the rates of interest which would encourage more saving and decrease consumption. In a normal situation this would happen continuously so that the market would quietly hum along. Now Keynes's paradox always assumed that there would be savings to trade for consumption.



Keynes assumed wrongly. From the above chart, the U.S is spent. There are no more savings to trade for consumption. It also means that the U.S has no savings for investment. This is the paradox of extravagance. If an economy spends at its limit, then there are no savings for investment, and eventually the economy starts to contract due to capital starvation. Stimulating an economy to its maximum, eventually leads to a an economic contraction. And this contraction is going to start occurring during a period of economic boom, just as what is happening now.


Of course, one can argue that there is capital from overseas, which one can use to stimulate the economy. The logic being, that we should borrow more to get ourselves out of debt. If you can't see the flaws in the argument, then you should be the Treasury Secretary. The problem with Anglo influenced economies is that they continue to consume more than they produce, stimulating them will perpetuate the same and drive them further into debt. Over consumption is probably worse state of affairs than under consumption, since there are at least savings to invest in the latter situation.

Furthermore, this state of affairs puts a country's economy at the mercy of the providers of capital. If the Chinese and Arabs were to switch off the spigots; it's all over. If I were a Taiwanese I would be extremely nervous; the U.S. is not exactly going to bite the hand that feeds it. On the other hand, should the U.S default on its debt either explicitly or through inflation, the spigots will be closed for non-political reasons as well and U.S interest rates will go through the roof at a time of high indebtedness.

Oh just as I was about to post this, I noticed that Martin Wolf, of the Financial Times, was thinking along similar lines. His article is worth a read.

The economy needs to be restored to a point where there is approximately a 5-10% personal savings rate. This is what constitutes a healthy economy and economic policy should be geared to that goal. However given the fact that most Anglo economies have the same personal savings chart as above, trying to increase the amount of consumer savings is going to result in a contraction of consumer demand. Business is going to shrink, in the Anglo countries by a lot.
There is a lot of pain coming.

Sculptor of flesh, healer of souls.

It's been a rather unsettling week, meditating on ugliness and disfigurement. I would like to end it on some thoughts with regard to plastic surgery. I must admit to having a strong approval of the show Extreme Makeover. The change in a persons life after corrective plastic surgery is truly transformative. It would appear that healing the imperfections of the flesh, eases the sorrows of the soul.

Modern Plastic surgery has it's origin in the carnage of the First World War. Horrific head wounds left individuals grotesquely disfigured. The survivors were shunned and separated from society. In England, park benches were painted blue in order to warn people that the facially mangled might be sitting there, in France they had their own special train carriages. Struck down in the prime of their youth, one can only imagine the terrible and isolated lives these individuals must have had. Suicide, drunkenness, endless depression and despair. Repulsive to women and yet still a man. Wilfred Owen captured the torment in his poem, Disabled.

He sat in a wheeled chair, waiting for dark,

And shivered in his ghastly suit of grey,

Legless, sewn short at elbow. Through the park

Voices of boys rang saddening like a hymn,

Voices of play and pleasure after day,

Till gathering sleep had mothered them from him.

About this time Town used to swing so gay

When glow-lamps budded in the light-blue trees

And girls glanced lovelier as the air grew dim,

-- In the old times, before he threw away his knees.

Now he will never feel again how slim

Girls' waists are, or how warm their subtle hands,

All of them touch him like some queer disease.

.........

Some cheered him home, but not as crowds cheer Goal.
Only a solemn man who brought him fruits
Thanked him; and then inquired about his soul.
Now, he will spend a few sick years in Institutes,
And do what things the rules consider wise,
And take whatever pity they may dole.
To-night he noticed how the women's eyes
Passed from him to the strong men that were whole.
How cold and late it is! Why don't they come
And put him into bed? Why don't they come?

In an effort to heal the ravages of war a young New Zealand surgeon, Harold Gilles begins to operate on the terribly wounded soldiers and modern plastic surgery is born. There was recently an exhibition of his work, called the Faces of battle, it details his WW1 work and the men on whom he operated on. Warning it is quite graphic. It can be found here and here. Gille's aim was to restore these individuals to some form or normality so that they could return to society. He had some spectacular successes and for some there was no help. Looking at their faces, one wonders what sort of life they must have had. Although Gilles later pioneered aesthetic surgery techniques, he always felt that this was a distraction , his job was to restore the disfigured to normalcy.

It seems somewhat perverse, that modern cosmetic surgery, so often subordinated to the desires of the vain and superficial, had its origins in the noble ideal of restoring people to physical normality.

Harold Gilles, a Dead White Man. Healer of Mankind.

The truly disfigured.

Here's a link to a rather revolting You Tube video. For our more delicate readers, caution, it contains I suppose you could say sexual references.

As a follow up to the previous post on disfigurement, I thought I would comment on this video. The ugly are sorrowed by their ugliness, but not the character in our video. He seems to revel in his deformity. A bit like a greedy man singing the praises of his greed or a cruel man boasting about his cruelty. It's a disfigurement of his character, very hard to remedy.

Elephant Men

Its not very often that I read something that sends me into a bit of a rage. But anyway, this week I did. I will not link to the piece, since I feel that I will in someway, perpetuate the notoriety of the author and possibly contribute to the misery of his victims.

In a nutshell, the article viciously mocks the love of two unattractive people for each other. Furthermore, the author viciously mocks the unattractive for being so. It would have to be one of the most cruel and vicious pieces of writing I have ever read.

Normal human beings have a need to be loved. Even the vilest and most disfigured individual still seeks love. What gives The Elephant Man it's tragic pathos, is that locked underneath that hideous deformity, is an individual who feels and desires to be loved. As Joseph Merrick's friend, Sir Fredrick Treaves said:

...... Merrick always wanted, even after living at the hospital, to go to a hospital for the blind where he might find a woman who would not be repelled by his appearance.

Indeed, the characters in the movie, and in real life, who befriend and and saw the individual beneath the hideous visage, are ennobled by their actions. Likewise, those who exploit the individual for their advantage are seen as the corrupt demons that they are, tormenting the unfortunate for profit and compounding their misery.

But our author does "better".

Not only does he mock their unattractiveness, he mocks the love that they have for each other. He besmirches the little bit of joy they have in each other. He takes from the poor what little they have.

This author is not a sentimentalist. Beauty is to be preferred to ugliness, but to despise the unattractive for being so, is vile, especially if genetic misfortune is their lot. Nature is cruel. Good men are not. Loneliness is a curse, the unloved suffer, and though we may not be moved to erotically love the unattractive, we should not add to their pain or take what joy they have. Their little joys are worth far more to them than to the undeserving fortunate, who by the Grace of God, do not suffer as they do. As one commentator said, we're all a step away from a disfiguring illness.

The final word should go to Joseph Merrick.

"Tis true my form is something odd,
But blaming me is blaming God.
Could I create myself anew,
I would not fail in pleasing you.

If I could reach from pole to pole,
Or grasp the ocean with a span,
I would be measured by the soul,
The mind's the standard of the man."

Form without function.

Farnsworth house is truly beautiful architecture. Designed by Mies van der Rohe for a prominent urologist, Dr. Edith Farnsworth. The house is a triumph of aesthetic design. Architecture books sing the house's praises and the architect's vision. And who can argue? It's complimentary relationship with the environment, the way the structure is approached, how it sits above the ground, its clean lines all validate the greatness of its design. So I suppose it should not be to impolite to ask, what was it like to live in this triumph of modernism?

Crap actually.

According to Dr Farnsworth:

The truth is that in this house with its four walls of glass I feel like a prowling animal, always on the alert. I am always restless. Even in the evening. I feel like a sentinel on guard day and night. I can rarely stretch out and relax…What else? I don’t keep garbage under my sink. Do you know why? Because you can see the whole “kitchen” from the road on the way in here and the can would spoil the appearance of the whole house. So I hide it in the closet further down from the sink. Mies talks about “free space”: but his space is very fixed. I can’t even put a clothes hanger in my house without considering how it affects everything from outside. Any arrangement of furniture becomes a major problem, because the house is transparent, like an X-ray

A night, lit up like a lantern and situated as it was in a forest, the house was a beacon to insects from miles around. Fly screens were not designed for the house, as it would have spoiled the purity of the design, so you couldn't open a window. In winter it was freezing, in summer a furnace. The personally selected marble on the entry steps needed to be scrubbed regularly since the falling leaves tended to stain it. It was unlivable.

A house's primary reason for being is to provide us with shelter and comfort. If a house is unable to do this it has failed in its function. As a machine for living in, it is broken. Yet architects continue to praise this house lavishly. A beautiful house that cannot be lived in; a triumph of form over function. The triumph of Modernism, the failure of modern Architecture.

Form follows function.

No it doesn't.

Engineering is one of those fields where economy and efficiency of materials are highly prized. It, perhaps more than architecture, lives to the credo of "form follows function". Buildings and other engineering works, must satisfy the need that that willed their creation. A bridge that doesn't carry the load is useless.

However this philosophy places form subservient to function which I feel is not its proper place. By this same philosophy, if form does not contribute to function, it is deemed useless and wasteful. The architects agreed, ornament is a crime declared Adolf Loos. In a world of scarce resources, putting more into a structure than what is needed is a waste, and perhaps morally wrong. Accountants and economists would heartily agree. Efficiency uber alles.

Now lets take a look at this from a real world view. From an engineering point of view, both these women are the same. Both are capable of reproducing, performing useful work and both are capable of holding a conversation. The fact that the fatter one will probably die earlier than the thinner one--it's not a given-- is irrelevant if the "design life" is calculated at 60 years. From a functional point of view, both these women are the same. Their form is irrelevant.




And yet they're not. Clearly, though both satisfy the engineering criteria, one is preferable to the other. Likewise consider two bridges.



Both fulfill the same function of carrying traffic over a road, yet clearly they have different form. Most normal people would see one the more desirable than the other. Function alone is clearly not enough.

In an age where life expectancy was so much less than today due to poverty, disease and famine, our forefathers still felt it was worthy to ornament a structure in such a way as to make it both beautiful and functional. Our society baulks at the the cost, we are indeed mean and miserable men

Form should complement function. To hell with the modernists.