Writing is philosophy by existence proof · 6:07pm Sep 6th, 2014
I'm moving out of my house. Packing forces me to look at everything in my house, and it's a museum of my life. All the stacks of papers and books to read for unfinished projects, unanswered letters, or completed projects that I'd once been proud of but had since forgotten. Have you ever gone through a relative's house after they died, looking for something that had captured and held something of their maker? Letters to the editor, birdhouses, notes in the margins of obscure books, collections of pen knives, and shelves full of electronic gizmos all used exactly once. All of which seem sullenly dull and uninteresting, unworthy of the passion and attention bestowed on them.
This is like that, only it's me. It feels like reading my own obituary. Why did I do these things instead of something else? Should I have tried to accomplish more, travelled more, or partied more? I've often felt guilty about writing fiction, because it doesn't "accomplish" anything. Yet, looking back years later on the things I did "accomplish", they don't seem any more worthwhile.
What is worth doing? This is the question of philosophy, and of writing.
On one level, writing is the kind of philosophy we're used to. Every time you write something, you ask: What is worth writing? Do I need to have something important to say, or just a really good fart joke? Every time you put something out there for others to read, you're saying what you think is important in life, what you think other people should do or know or think about or feel. Sometimes you write something to be an experience: a comedy whose only purpose is to make people laugh, because you think laughter is worthwhile. While sometimes you write something to talk about experiences, to point to what a character is doing and say "This is or is not worthwhile."
In his Paris Review interview, Aldous Huxley said,
I think one can say much more about general abstract ideas in terms of concrete characters and situations, whether fictional or real, than one can in abstract terms. ... I think that probably all philosophy ought to be written in this form.... It's awfully easy to write abstractly, without attaching much meaning to the big words. But the moment you have to express ideas in the light of a particular context, in a particular set of circumstances, although it's a limitation in some ways, it's also an invitation to go much further and much deeper. I think that fiction and, as I say, history and biography are immensely important, not only for their own sake, because they provide a picture of life now and of life in the past, but also as vehicles for the expression of general philosophic ideas, religious ideas, social ideas. My goodness, Dostoevski is six times as profound as Kierkegaard, because he writes fiction. In Kierkegaard you have this Abstract Man going on and on--like Coleridge--why, it's nothing compared with the really profound Fictional Man, who has always to keep these tremendous ideas alive in a concrete form. In fiction you have the reconciliation of the absolute and the relative, so to speak, the expression of the general in the particular.
But there's another way that writing fiction is philosophy. It's an attempt to do something worthwhile. Something that won't make me wince when I look back years later and ask how I spent my life. Something that will preserve more of the feeling that went into it than a birdhouse or a stamp collection, that won't look, to the people going over my things, like another stupid dull object to throw out. It's philosophy by existence proof. It's answering the question "What is worthwhile?" with a kiss instead of a dissertation.
Regular old "philosophy" is philosophy by theorem: building a series of general logical arguments that arrive at an algorithm for classifying things as worthy or unworthy. Philosophy by existence proof is the attempt to prove, by example, that there exist things worth doing.
I guess I could also say all hobbies and arts are philosophy, love is philosophy, and everything we do that we don't have to do to live is philosophy.
Well, okay then.
I think it's possible, for the sake of argument, to have a piece that's worth writing that's not worth reading. Weird as it sounds on the surface.
Have a reasonably good move
2432329 Okay; but it's still a question of worth.
Maybe I have a niche interpretation, because I view it as an impressed idea by society of what's right and wrong. Thinking in those terms, I can see a Boolean interpretation: Either society approves of such actions, or society does not approve of such actions. Understandably, societal influence varies greatly depending on those present--mob mentality exists everywhere, whereas a conversation with an individual would likewise color opinion differently, so depending on which tier of society your moral actions are in light of, you may or may not garner approval.
This, of course, coming from someone with no basis in philosophy. Maybe I desire to see things in black and white; my thoughts do seem to predispose to judgmentalism, so that would be a typical knee-jerk reaction from me.
I know this wasn't a focus of the blog post, but that paragraph struck me because I seem like an outlier in that context. I'm certain that others think similarly to how I do, though.
I've always tried to only make comments when I have something meaningful to say, even if only on the level of a stupid joke.
What is the philosophical merit of the pursuit of adequately entertaining jokes, even if they are mostly stupid?
We write to inform and entertain. We read to learn and to be entertained. Many stories succeed in both regards. A large number of them succeed on only one. A vast quantity of them do neither. And then there are things that I have written which actively suck knowledge out of your brain and leave you less entertained than when you started.
(A friend of ours passed away fairly young in his 40s. He had a vast collection of books, FRP gaming materials, and huge stacks of reference materials from which he was attempting to create The Perfect FRP Game. Going through his belongings with my friends was a sobering experience, but it allowed us closure by remembering all of the good times we had together (mostly gaming) and how we each had grown with his influence as we progressed through life, spouses, and kids. It also reminded me to clean my own darned giant pile of useless junk, because I think we threw away two things for everything one of us wanted to keep.)
I really quite like this. :)
I hope the new place you settle is nice and that you can seed it with interesting detritus anew. And I hope that, too, someone beholding that detritus some day—may it be a long, long time in coming—finds some meaning and beauty in it. I remember quite clearly how my grandfather's home was, where there was order and where disorder, and I can see in this, reflected, an outline of his mind. It's a good memory.
Regarding morality. I generally use of the word moral[1] to mean something which is the potential subject of ethical reasoning and thus has a morality-value within a certain context. I always rather assumed that people used in the same way, except they didn't allow for the possibility of different contexts and, instead, assume there is only one[2].
[1] Well I do when I'm careful. I'm guilty of using it in the way most people do when not really considering my words with due care.
[2] Which is a sort of admixture of what society says and what our naive morality-sense says.
Regarding what's worthwhile. I think it's interesting that, considering your (interesting and quite probably correct) observation that the defining act of writing is choosing what is worthwhile to write[1], it can also be said that the act of choosing forces us to own what we write. We cannot blame external factors, nor can we evade responsibility: what we choice as to what to write is ours and it makes a philosophical statement whether we want it to or not.
So, having chosen to write what I have, what did I say is worthwhile? I'm too close to see it myself, I think...
[1] And, I recognize what 2432329 says, but I would counter-claim that his pathological[2] example simplifies to the more general Bad Horse one: It is, indeed, possible to create something worth writing that isn't worth reading, but only if your conception of what's worth writing doesn't include that that which is worth writing is also worth reading. Which I rather think it must, or at least it must if you intend to write as a method of communication with an audience, rather than just for yourself.
[2] In the mathematical sense.
2432343
If joy and laughter aren't worth while, then what is?
2432343 What 2432415 said. Suppose someone tells you they're depressed and nothing seems worthwhile. You can write them a thousand pages explaining what is and isn't worthwhile, or you can make funny noises with your armpit until they laugh.
I think some practices of Buddhism amount to thousands of hours of meditation and instruction to get you back to the point where you can laugh at funny armpit noises again.
The idea of doing something worthwhile with your life is, I think, something that every person has to struggle with. Certainly it's one I have often wondered about. It's not really a question that I think can be answered on a universal scale, only on a personal one.
In the end, everything that we are, all our accomplishments and failures will be nothing but stardust. Unless you achieve great fame, it is unlikely that anyone will remember you 500 years after your death. No matter what heights humanity may reach, it will end one day, and eventually all record of it will be gone. So what is worthwhile? Living your life according to what is worthwhile to you. I don't just mean by fulfilling your own base desires - ensuring the happiness and safety of the people you love can be one of the rewarding things in the world. Nor do I mean pure happiness - sometimes you have to do things not because you want to, but because you couldn't live with yourself otherwise. Do what you feel is right. You've only got the one life - don't waste it on other peoples ideas of worth, but spend it wisely on your ideas of worth.
I feel like I've said far to much, and that most of it was claptrap.
Forgive me for my ramblings.
2432444
Armpit farts? Seriously?
There are so many other ways to make fart noises. Even without using implements there is the lips, the mouth against the arm, the (somewhat dangerous) art of actually farting; but no. The only example that you would ever even think of is the armpit fart.
This place is overrun with uncultured simpletons. You have no appreciation for the finer things in life! *Raises nose higher than your noses*
2432415
Schadenfreude, of course!
(But seriously, thank you. The obvious answer may be obvious, but it's still well worth saying.)
2432641 The armpit fart is not only among the most ancient and traditional fart-noise-making methods, but has been proven in double-blind studies to be louder and result in more decibels of laughter than all competing methods tested (B. Hill, 1987). The use of lips alone is clearly logocentric, while using the mouth against the arm symbolizes one body part having hegemony over another in a Hegelian master-slave relationship.
I woke up last night in the grip of an anxiety attack stemming more or less from looking over my life so far. Then this blog post comes up. Normally I'm not one for fate but....
Maybe it's time to go back to the doc.
I've moved house so many times that I have got very efficient at throwing stuff out. Then occasionally I find I need an old book and wish I hadn't. But the great thing about the digital age is that nearly everything I have ever written is still preserved on my hard drive. The cost of storage is so low I never need to think about whether it is actually worth storing. It was worth writing at the time, but I doubt I'd get anything from reading it now. But it's still there.
The benefits of writing are many and complex. Whether or not something is worth reading depends on the reader. Young readers can learn a lot from even very bad writing. As you grow older, it becomes harder to appreciate bad fiction. Amateur philosophy becomes tedious when you've read it all before. So you just look for cute stories which will make you smile, and go back to watching childrens' cartoons. I guess we would like to look back at the silly stuff we wrote when we were young, and feel it was a stepping stone to something bigger. And one day we will write that truly great masterpiece.
Let's be realistic - the probability that we will ever write anything with a really original philosophical insight is pretty slim. We are basically reinventing and regurgitating old ideas. With the novelty that we do it with ponies. But it keeps us amused.
Love the irony when you put the beginning and the end together
2432414
Writing just for oneself can have much value, though, for a number of reasons. I believe it's one of the prescribed ways to cope with bad experiences, for example. It can also have a soothing effect, or be done just for fun, even when writing about something purely fictional; I used to do worldbuilding as a kid just for fun, imagining how worlds might fit together, how alternative earths might develop, to then write that down into something I never planned to show others.
Not to mention all the ways that writing can be used to support other activities. My adventure notes as a DM were never meant to be read to or by other persons, but instead to support me in telling an interactive story together with the players. And those moments were, for us, surely worth the time invested.
I played an MMO for 7 years. I got tons of levels, killed impressive bosses, and got some phat lewtz. Now, several years in hindsight, I burned hundreds of hours to make numbers go up, to trigger some flags, and to get some pixels.
Do I regret it? Do I feel it was a waste of time? No.
It produced some wonderful memories. Memories about friendships, or adventures, or ridiculous events. I treasure those memories. I feel confident that I'll treasure my memories of time spent here, too.
You wanna talk regret? I was gonna write a bunch today, spent hours on Imgur.
Now I'm wondering whether Eliezer Yudkowsky, Less Wrong, "Harry Potter & the Methods of Rationality" and "Friendship is Optimal" subscribe to this theory and are using it to further their own ends.
It would fit in with the fact that Yudkowsky consumes a huge amount of fiction while managing to, well, win at life and things.
Don't have the brain to engage with this post today, but I wish you a maximally non-frustrating move.
"To be is to do" -- Aristotle
"To do is to be" -- Descarte
"Do be do be do be" -- Sinatra
But seriously...
I'll soon forget what was never there:
The words are ash and dust.
All that's left is the song I've sung
The breath I've taken and the one I must
The last verse, in particular, is my guide to truth in writing:
Save for a few earnest, stalwart souls, show me a novice author who really -knows- what he wants to write. Inside this fandom, specifically. A neophyte wandering into the gilded halls of ponyfic will find witty comedies, soul-wrenching tragedies, fluffy yet thoughtful slice of life fics, numbing philosophic sadfics (here's to you, Background Pony. Even if your ending was shit), horror fics, science fiction, fantasy, with all genres carrying its star exemplar of the class, masterpieces most would agree are worthwhile, even if thr philosophical flavor of that question makes it hard to pin down.
Writing, at least for a novice, is the art of exploring what's worthwhile and personally satisfying. There exist stellar examples in every genre, but unless you're Skirts or Gardez, most of us are going to carve out a home in one or two categories. How do we decide what resonates with our essence the most?
While not every piece of writing is inherently worthwhile to the audience, the act of writing and exploring for the self absolutely is, for the process carves us into fuller, enlightened people.
(I'll second the notion of apologizing for my claptrap).
At what point do you say that someone is making a claim of what's worth doing? Does the writer have to make the claim intentionally? Does the writer have to explicitly believe that his implicit claims are worth believing? Do the claims even have to be consistent within a work?
I think I see where you're coming from, the idea that people only do (or persuade others to do) the things they think are worth doing, and they only try to get others to think about the things they think are worth thinking about. It makes sense when people aren't being dishonest.
Pride eats Belgian babies.
Good luck.
I wish you the best, BH. My family and I just moved last year from the home we had lived in for 17 years. Seeing the place slowly condense into boxes and carts, becoming completely empty by the end was, well, thought provoking. It makes you very introspective and contemplative, at least it did to me. Anyway, we're probably going to move again in a couple of months. So knowing what you're experiencing right now, I hope the smoothest path for you. I trust you're moving for good reasons, and to a better place?
I find it interesting you ask what is worth doing, because to me there's a more basic question: why should there be anything worth doing at all? Or why is there?
2437237
Wait, what?
5742438
That was a reference to some famous WW2 pro-war propaganda associated with the invasion of Belgium. I was suggesting that pride isn't a good guiding emotion. I still believe some variant of that, that pride tends to be better for making decisions than for making plans.