I’ve had several fantastic discussions recently, and I have things to say that I feel more strongly about then I have in a while.

Until recently, I’d been more intrigued by the events of the world than concerned by them. Being more interested in things philosophically and academically, and being more interested in trends than invested in particular structures, I could stand back. Conservative people aren’t wrong; corrupt politicians are to be expected; and the wrongs in the world result from large enough structures that they are best attacked on a long time scale.

Recently, though, I’ve become very afraid. Said simply, I think that the current trajectory of the United States could result in a Hilter-like state in the next 10 years. The biggest reasons I have concern the use of fear, and recently hatred, for political purposes, and the effects of modern propaganda techniques, from both parties, on the workings of democracy. This is not a test.

But the reason to fight now, very hard, at the expense of practicality and in disproportion to the clear evidence, is not that the doomsday fears are correct. It’s because the fight is righteous. First they came for the terrorists and I did not speak out because I was not a terrorist. Next they may come for the homosexuals. There’s something mad about that kind of virtuous life, but I want that kind of madness in my life.

That said, I still think I can finish my year at Olin, before I commit myself full-time to the task, as long as I’m making progress. But the natural end of these thoughts are all-consuming.

I’ve recently been reading about the poststructural feminists, like Luce Irigaray and Helene Cixous, for my backwards history of philosophy, and I think I agree with them.

If the current phallocentric logos is to be deconstructed, and it must for us to exit this cycle of fear that characterizes the modern response to differences, it needs to be through the positive create of a new logos on the part of women. We can’t build a new world when the very act of producing meaning is infected.

There are lots of differences between people, and so lots of potential different origins for making a new logos. But the shear obviousness and pervasiveness of the male-female differences cannot be ignored.

It could be argued that perhaps the fear of difference is something essential to humankind. But given the power our paradigms have over us– that we appear to interact with our models of the world and our minds far more than the things themselves– it seems silly not to hope.

Colleagues ask me how I’m doing, and I feel guilty to say just “Good.” In truth, two days ago, I was pretty bummed out: I’d lost my cell phone a week earlier, my ears had been clogged for longer, and I had less to do for work. Yesterday, that all changed. I found my phone lying in a pool of light in the middle of the floor, my ears unclogged, I got unexpected money, and my stock prediction program progressed swimmingly. When I got home, I found Claudia’s lost Tamogatchi, and Claudia hired me to teach her something in return for 5 books so I can learn it too.

I said, “Surely the gods are smiling–” before getting interrupted. I think I scared my benefactor away, because within an two hours I developed a sneeze and Claudia told me that she would be gone until Saturday.

But by then it was too late! I had already come up with a nice collection of new projects to work on! Here are the highlights:

• Cooperative Coordination Page: Facilitate people combining their resources for common purchases, like magazine subscriptions and fresh food. More importantly, all levels of cost (from produce to multiple consumers) would be transparent and changeable.
• Backwards History of Philosophy: Develop a course on philosophy, starting from present day and working back to the pre-Socratics, presenting each philosophy as a holistic paradigm, while allowing the learner to understand their own paradigms by seeing their ancestry.
• Other new projects: “Fair Use” Learning Materials Page; Design for collective data collection site, to make a historical trends graph; a PIC-based Neural Network ALife pendant; Your Money or Your Life FI program; Following siderea‘s RBC re-education project.

I Heart Huckabees is great. I can’t decide if I want to be an existential detective, or if I want one on my case, whatever my case might be. It touches on a lot of issues, but it spends most of its time on the connectedness issue, which until now I had never thought much about. Through a twist or two, it brought me to the following rant, which I’ve wanted to say to so many people I’ve wasted hours with in philosophy classes, trying to convince them to care (but haven’t know how to express the problem).

Knowing and Not Philosophy– Rant

I’m so jazzed about my HSD class (I’m using it as an excuse to xerox and then pdfify (on the spiffy ADF scanners we have at Olin) lots of my favorite excerpts), that I can barely think about the fact that I’m leaving for a week in New Orleans before Olin starts. Now. Bye.

I was at work, but this story sounded too good to leave so soon to the sands of time.

Claudia’s Day at the DNC

I’ve have lots of notes that I should post about, but the more I have to say, the less I want to take the time to say it. So I gave up and buckled down. Here are the recent bits.

[SCA]

At a recent Milk & Cookies (HRSFA story-reading event), I mentioned being in the SCA to the Milk & Cookies leader. “So you’re in the SCA?!?” “I am, or was.” “I’m supposed to be the provost of the Harvard group– but I don’t know anything about it.” “Oh, really…” I gave some pointers. I hope to encourage a group at Olin this year, so I should take some of my own advice soon.

[ESG]

Alex Slocum (new ESG director) has been trying to assert authority over ESG. I have a proposal for leaving the first days of the semester as a “trial period”, to let frosh experience ESG, rather than just hear about it, before making final decisions. Alex said, “I say no. period. end of discussion.” And the ESG community is responding appropriately.

[Holiday]

I recently discovered more holiday than I had expected this year. An oversea trip with friends fell through, but from its ashes rose one to New Orleans at the end of August. Plus, at the end of this week, I’m going to a family reunion in Illinois, then to either Vegas, Cider City, or L.A., depending on whom I can visit.

Monday I finalized out my plans for teaching next semester. Olin is going to let me teach my Human System Dynamics class (which will be a blast!), and I’m going to help with the engineering side of the freshmen “integrated course blocks” (Concourse-style combined math, physics, and engineering required of all Olin frosh). I’m very much looking forward to it.

Does everyone have as much angst about staying involved as I do?

Last weekend, ESG had a big reunion in Silicon Valley (as a prelude to asking for money for this year’s seminars). The [associate] director told me how it went. The alumni say they want to “stay involved” in ESG. My name came up more than a few times.

During college, I interacted mostly on the community level: being a presence, taking responsibilities, and generally participating in a human give-and-take that defined my communities. Now, by leaving those communities, more than one life’s-worth diverges from mine, I lose friends, and I feel like I lose something of myself.

And I’m still essentially at MIT. But Claudia interacts on the individual level… and the two modes appear to be at odds.

The problem isn’t “staying in touch”– I now have a database for that (I still hope that a technological solution can solve that problem). The problem is that community interaction has threshold below which the ties fall apart, and my plans for personal growth have thresholds to get positive acceleration (I’m still working out the equations). The optimal solution is when the community and the opportunity for personal growth coincide, and I’ve lost that.

Anyone want to do my simulated-robot-navigation experiment? I need more data to analyze!

1. Download the experiment and unzip the folder.
2. Run the program (experiment.exe) and follow the instructions. It should take about 15 minutes.
3. Zip your results file (output.txt) and send it back to the address in the instructions.

Thanks!