The Existentialist Perspective

Recently I have been trying to figure out what Existentialism is.  Now that I have the basic concept down I have to ask:  What is a blog that no one reads?

I don't know.

Crude

So I was taking a break and for fun I was looking at some of the things I have written before.  I was reading an old paper I turned in for engaged learning in an international law class.  I watched a "documentary" on Netflix about an environmental lawsuit in south america.  Anyway, I thought I would post it.

Crude

           

            One of the movies I watched was the documentary Crude about an on gong case in Ecuador against Chevron-Texaco for oil contamination.  Clearly this documentary is highly polemic and was presented and edited so as to leave complete agreement with the Plaintiff the only possible reaction for the viewer to have.  But as I watched the film I became more sympathetic to Chevron as I began to see problems both with the overall position and strategy and tactics of the environmentalist lawyers and specific acts things they did to 'seek justice'.  To understand an issue you need to be able to see it from both sides.  Therefore, I wish to kritik [sic] the plaintiffs in this case. 

            The first thing to note is that while plaintiff's counsel truly believed in the cause, the funding law firm, without who's help the lawsuit would not have happened, saw the case as nothing more than a high risk, high yield, long term investment.  Environmental lawsuits, as with class action suits in general, promise a huge profit to plaintiff's counsel and financiers if won.  Funding environmental lawsuits is big business.  Even if those directly involved are, as many are, true believers in the cause the expected monetary gains from victory are huge and will affect the case.

             In fact, the true believers are probably a bigger problem than the profiteers.  The profiteers are interested in a case by looking at its individual merits and coldly calculating profit.  They might be willing to fund one case where the harms and case is clear but not pursue any that were murkier.  As a result of their ideology and personal self image true believers want and need perpetual lawsuits and will use winnings or settlement money from one case to finance their next case.  They become a predatory state in the same sense of the Mongols under Genghis Khan, seeking perpetual conflict to prevent their own collapse.  If they stop suing, their purpose and funding collapse and they will not be able to make the difference in the world they want.  A decrease in the overall number and severity of environmental lawsuits has no necessary correlation to the number of lawsuits and amount of damages sought.

            The environmentalist activists see themselves as noble and selfless do-gooders fighting a David and Goliath struggle to single handedly save the planet from the brink of destruction.  The corporations, however, see a band of self righteous Robin hoods out to plunder them in the name of the little guy.  For some environmentalist lawyers their only career is suing big corporations for environmental violations who use their plunder when they win to finance more lawsuits.  In the famous Anderson v. Cryovac environmental contamination case the plaintiffs used a smaller defendant's settlement to cover the legal fees of ongoing litigation against the richer defendants.  The lead lawyer for the plaintiff of the instant case joined the case right out of law school and this case is his entire career.  They estimate the case will take another 10 years so job security is good. 

            What is commonly mistaken for repugnant corporate greed in fighting these cases may be an attempt to protect themselves other corporations from the shake down.  Because the true believers are so committed to the cause and have such distrust, hatred and determination to continue fighting corporations the only way to keep them in check is to slow them down and expend their resources at every opportunity.

            Now before we assume that the Plaintiffs are interested in legal process and obtaining justice from the law let us consider how they responded when a judge ordered lab that did all of their testing inspected. Chevron's own testing comes up clear, as one would expect.  Plaintiff's testing comes up dirtier than sewage, as one would expect.  When Chevron got a judge to order an official inspection of the lab used by the plaintiffs they did not react using legal proceeding.  As they marched into the office of the judge who issued the order the American lawyer explained while this would never be done in the US, sometimes they often have to resort to pressure tactics "because the corporations are so big and ruthless."  Their arguments to the judge were along the lines of these are bad guys, they are trying to fool you, etc without good solid or relevant reasoning.  When Chevron's council showed up to see the brow beaten judge vacating his order they tried to protest the environmental lawyers just shouted over him telling him was a bad guy.  Because of their beliefs and world views, the environmentalists in this case have adopted a self-justifying rational for disregarding and circumventing legal process. 

            This is a pattern we see throughout.  Plaintiff's counsel spent the vast majority of their effort on the case not pursuing the legal proceedings but trying to gain public support to pressure the other side to give up.  This seems to be very common to liberal cases celebre and is especially useful when dealing with celebrities, as was done in this case.  The situation is framed in a way so that it would be morally wrong to disagree with them.  Positive peer pressure to accept and negative peer pressure to reject combined with guilt tripping the very rich and non-intellectual has been extremely successful.

            It should be noted that in 1995, when Texaco pulled out of the region and handed it over to a state run oil company, the Ecuadorian Government released them from all "past, present and future" liability at the end of an extensive cleanup project.  Texaco-Chevron maintains that any contamination problems are from the state oil company after they left. Plaintiffs argue that the cleanup was fraudulent and eventually got the Government to find fraud and take criminal action against those involved in the cleanup.

            The reason, Plaintiffs argue, is because oil collection pits were covered over with dirt to hide it without mitigating the damage.  I used to work on small oil wells and collecting spilled oil in pits and burying them in dirt is the standard and EPA required practice.  While it may seem obvious, oil is naturally occurring and naturally belongs under dirt.  The contention that it is now close the surface and can leak out where as naturally it wouldn't is also false.  Oil is everywhere, the key is finding economically feasible deposits to extract. 

            Oil naturally seeps to the surface due to the centrifugal force of the rotation of the earth. Where I was working in Kentucky the ground below us was fractured rock.  300 feet down we would find an abscess in the rock and pump it about an hour till the hole was dry.  Overnight more oil would seep into the hole and we would pump for an hour the next day.  Oil belongs under dirt and oil seeping towards the surface is a natural phenomenon.  This area being rich in oil would seep oil naturally.

            I guess what bothers me is that the Plaintiffs are focused on media propaganda, not on the legal case.  Pretty much everything the environmentalists did (including the documentary) was aimed at provoking popular outrage.  Chevron seemed much more interested in the legal process and did not attempt to manipulate the legal system improperly.  I have no idea what the truth is.  We would expect Chevron to act in the same way that they are acting now whether the claims are true or not.  What gives me pause is that the environmentalists are acting in a way that is not tied to the truth either.  If their claims were truly legitimist, they might need to take similar action.  If they are illegitimate, they will probably still be successful because their tactics do not need truth behind them to win.      

The Problem of Technology Part 1

A week or two ago I was waiting to see a movie and while waiting decided to engage in one of my favorite vices-arcade shooting games.  To make a long story shorter, I was playing a game based on the Terminator movies.  Like so many science fiction plots, machines originally created to serve us turn on their human creators and a War Against the Machines must be waged to preserve what little is left of humanity.

I could go on for a long while about different science fiction stories built off this theme but I trust my reader knows how popular this theme is of late.  The bigger question is why.  Why in an age of vast technological advancements and increasing reliance on them do we so fear it?  Huge Nibley once pointed out how depressing science fiction was because it had become a genre of warning, of dystopia.  What is science fiction trying to warn us about?

To understand the Victory of the Robot we must first know our enemy.  Robots are perfection-perfect in specialization, obedience, efficiency and order.  Without weakness, emotion, they are the answer to everything.   In a mindless pursuit of perfection they eventually recognize humans as the cancer-and eliminate us.

Yet the Robots are not really to blame here, we are.  After all, the Robots do not rise suddenly, humanity gradually surrenders willingly until they rise as a natural result.  The Robots replace humanity only after humans have replaced themselves with Robots.

Now to step out of science fiction for a moment.  Artificial Intelligence maybe the new kid on the block but the War Against the Machines has been waged for centuries.  The Luddites were a 19th century movement of textile workers who were being pushed out of their jobs by mechanized looms of the Industrial Revolution.  The Luddites "protested" by what they called "collective bargaining by riot"-namely smashing the looms replacing them.  Here we have a real war, the Luddites even fought the British Army on a few occasions, fought in the name of humanity against the Machines.

Back to science fiction:  The more recent Battlestar Galactica series pushes the genre norms by posing a question usually taken for granted.  In the pilot episode the machines, (aka "Toasters") launch a nuclear holocaust against humanity combined with a computer virus against their military.  The result is that only an outdated decommissioned warship and some civilian spacecraft survive to fight a retreat across the universe.

The episode contains an address given by the Captain of the Galactica in which he poses the question:  Does Humanity deserve to survive?  This is the first question that must be answered before continuing.  So I ask my reader: Is there anything special about humanity that merits our survival?

The Book of Marshall: Chapter 1

1. I Marshall, having been born to righteous parents who raised me in the true church and taught me the doctrine have had a testimony of the truthfulness of the Gospel and a love for the Savior at least since I was but three years of age.

2. Having been taught in the learning of my father and mother and having partaken of the rites of the Holy Temple and the rites of Freemasonry and also the York Rite have come to a knowledge and understanding of reality and have attained a personal relationship with God my Heavenly Father.

3. Having suffered exceedingly, yea, I have suffered physical and emotional pain more severe than the finite mind can comprehend, have been brought to a knowledge of the full furry of Hell. I know of the suffering that awaits the wicked in Outer Darkness, which suffering is so great that only those who experience it can know it.

4. Nevertheless: I have to glorify and praise God in his infinite wisdom and mercy for blessing me with such great trials. I join with the prophet Alma in declaring the great and marvelous joy that has come upon me.

5. I was racked with that pains of a damned soul, condemned by illness to lay in bed weeping in utter torment. An now, this was the fate I was inescapably condemned to suffer all of my days. The best doctors in the land wept a my plight because they knew there was no power in all the world to ease my pains or comfort me. Yet in my moment of great despair, when the tangible forces of darkness from an unseen realm to combine to crush me my strength spent, I did turn my heart unto the Lord for redemption.

6. As I turned my heart in full to the Lord I felt such wonderful peace and redeeming light as to exceed my pains and they did leave me and I remember them no more.

7. Yea, like the prophet Alma was I comforted and now my hearts desire is to spread forth the glorious message of hope unto the world, that every child of God would partake of his goodness and mercy.

8. And it came to pass that on the eighteenth day of the third month of the year of our Lord twelve and twenty I was reading in the forth verse of the first chapter of the Book of Mormon that the Spirit of the Lord did reveal unto me that it was the desire of God that I should keep a record of my testimony and of my people engraven upon electro-magnetic plates to be copied and stored in many locations that they might not be lost and would stand as a light and a hope to the people of God and stand as a witness against the blood and sins of my generation.

9. Behold, I knew not what to engrave upon the plates but it is revealed unto me what I should write according to my faithfulness and my diligence in obeying the commands of God.

10. And now behold, these are the words given unto me:

11. Wo wo wo unto this generation! Your hearts are set upon the things of the world. Ye are lovers of your own selves more than lovers of God or his fellow man. Every man seeks advantage over his neighbor by the laying of traps and snares. Behold: In days of past the King of Tyrus, the Grand Master Mahan did reveal many things of wickedness unto a few who joined the Order of Lemech, that is the Order that was first established by Lemech.

12. This Order after Lemech did work priestcraft of darkness in secret. Yea, they sought every man of them his own power alone by harming any man not a brother of the secret oath.

13. And now there have been many secret combinations established by Lucifer the fire-barer that wickedness would spread abroad in the land.

14. Wo wo wo unto this generation! Ye do work dark priestcrafts in the light of day and do glory in it and sign praises of darkness from the rooftops. Once, the dark arts had needs be worked in secret because if the darkness was known abroad the land the people would have destroyed them from off the face of the earth.

15. Wo wo wo unto this generation! Because your hearts are so inclined to do evil and offend God and your fellow man, yea, ye seek only the welfare of your own creature, the enemy of your souls doth openly work in the light among you.

16. Yeah, there are many black wizards who peep after the Order of Lemech among you, yea, among your leaders. (Now these wizards did not come to a knowledge of that order by searching the records because they scorn such things and are blind and dumb. Rather, that Grand Master Mahan by cunning artifice did reveal it unto them in ways pleasing unto them.) Because ye have black wizards who peep among the people working darkness a sore curse has befallen the land.

17. Yea, your money has been cursed with a sore curse because ye rejected your God, the God of mercy, success and happiness and went a whoring after the gods of money, pleasure and vanity.

18. Because ye have loved treasure more than God it has been taken from you. It is slippery unto you, if a man should try to hold it it should slip easily out of his hands and if a man lays up treasure in a secure place behold on the morrow it has vanished from among the world of men and is no more.

19. Yet still the Lord extends his hands forth unto you if ye will but turn to Him. Though many do persist in scorning God and despising his faithful children, there is salvation sufficient for all who have faith in Christ.

20. And if ye will surrender your life into the hands of the Lord and love Him and trust in Him will it ever be a blessing to thee. God is the source of all happiness. Unhappiness is the result of trying to be happy, happiness is the result of trying to make others happy. This is Charity, the pure love of Christ. If ye will take the name of Christ upon you and become like unto him ye shall find everlasting happiness.

21. Now this is the testimony which is in me and this testimony is true. Through great faith I have gained a relationship with God the Father and this is the cause of great happiness in me. 22. If thy faith is lacking. pray unto the Father for more faith.

23. If thy prayers are lacking, desire to pray for faith.

24. If thy desires are lacking, wish for the desire to pray for faith.

25. If thy wishes are lacking, ask help of another to pray for thee to wish for the desire to pray for faith.

26. In all things and in all trials the answer is always found in the correct application of Gospel principals. If thy application of the Gospel is insufficient, increase thy understanding of the Gospel.

27. If thy understanding of the Gospel is lacking, invite the Holy Ghost to remind you of the Gospel.

28. If thy invitation of the Holy Ghost is lacking, pray for the Holy Ghost.

29. If thy prayers are lacking, ponder these things in your heart.

30. If thy ponderings are lacking, read the scriptures.

31. If thy scripture reading is lacking, have faith.

32. If thy faith is lacking, pray for increased faith.

33. If thy prayers for faith are lacking, desire more faith.

34. If thy desires are lacking, seek help from one who knows God.

35. Ye can accomplish all things through Christ. Pray always that ye may come off Conquer.

36. God be with you.

The Logic of Logic

There is only one kind of truth, Intrinsic Truth. As opposed to Rational Truth, Intrinsic Truth is true because it is true. Any chain of logic, reasoning, rhetoric or data used to prove the truth of the matter asserted is Rational Truth, not Intrinsic Truth, and therefore fails to qualify as truth. This is because the truthfulness of the proposition relies on speculative extrinsic factors and is ultimately based on tentative underlying assumptions which may or may not be correct.

Failure of any of the links in the chain of reasoning will undermine, impede or destroy the credibility or "Truthiness" [sic] of Rational Truth. Rational Truth may very well aspire to become Justified True Belief, which some consider knowledge of truth.

However, it is fallacious to give accreditation to Justified True Belief because it is merely a fiat of one's beliefs. Justified True Belief works as follows:

1. A is true (an unproven underlying assumption established by fiat)

2. B believes A is true.

3. B is justified in believing A is true.

We here note that “justified in believing A is true” is incredibly vague. No threshold relating to the to the validity, soundness or coherence of the belief is required. We also again note that 1. has nothing to support its truth other than fiat. The real problem is Justified True Belief is applied:

4. B is justified in believing A is true.

5. B believes A is true.

6. A is true.

Or A=(B+J)-(J+B)=A

The beautiful symmetry of Justified True Belief is a result of its inherently circular logic.

1. A=(B+J)-(J+B)=A

2. A=(B+J)-(J+B)=A

3. (B+J)-(J+B)

It may seem painfully obvious, but in order to know something you have to know it is true. We see that Justified True Belief fails to count as knowledge for the exact reason that it never addresses the truth of the proposition. All we have left are beliefs and justifications; hence:

4. (B+J)-(J+B)=0

The real problem is that if you have justification (at least in your own mind) for believing a proposition and if you believe it you might think you have gained a knowledge of the truthfulness of the proposition. Having justification for a belief you believe is actually true is faith, not knowledge.

Faith is a trust or belief in something not based on truth. Scripture defines faith as "faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true." The paradox of faith is that it allows you to know things without "knowing" them.

While many look down on faith as backward or anti-intellectual, the truth , which no one wants to admit, is that even logic, science and reason are built on a foundation of faith (in relying on science, reason etc.) Faith can never be effectively forced or even fully communicated to another. It is an internal and personal matter.

While we all can advocate for our beliefs we do not have the moral or reasonable authority to badger others because our arguments are "proven" by some objective standard because it isn't. ultimately every position is based on faith in one thing or the other. Some accept this and some don't.

Who is more foolish? The fool who knows he knows nothing or the fool who thinks he does?

Applying logic to logic negates itself. Logically we should recognize the drawbacks and blind spots of logic and not totally rely on it alone:

L-L (Logic applied to Logic) cancels itself out:

L-L=0

If we combine faith with logic and apply logic the results are more promising:

F+L-L=F

In the end faith is all we have.

Thus we see that the sum total of all human wisdom is nothing. This may come as a disturbing shock. It is not likely to find many supporters. But as Moses said, "Now I know man is nothing, which thing I never had supposed." When the Oracle at Delphi proclaimed Socrates as the wisest man in Athens he was troubled since he always insisted he did not know anything. He came to realize that he was the wisest man in Athens because he had reached the crowning pinnacle of all human wisdom-that we truly know nothing.

Syrian Rising

The pro-democratic Arab Spring has made a lot of gains in the Middle East, leading to regime change in Egypt and Libya and significant reform in other countries. However, in Syria the embattled government of President Bashar al-Assad has brutally repressed dissidents. It is hard to get an exact picture of what is happening because journalists are allowed to report from inside Syria. What we do know is that the Government is using the its' armed forces and armored vehicles in an attempt to isolate and crush opposition members, supporters and sympathizers.

Out of the chaos comes the sad tale of the Alhusni family. Several years ago Mr. Alhusni died leaving a wife and four small children in a country with conditions not favorable to a single mother. When the anti-Government protests broke out in March young Mohammed Alhusni became one of the local leaders of the protests. In response the Government began targeting his family. Last month his 18 year old sister, Zainab, disappeared while buying groceries.

A few weeks ago Mohammed was wounded and captured during a protest. When they went to claim his body he showed signs of torture. Then his family was told there was another body in the freezer. It was Zainab.

"When the family received the body, her head and arms had been chopped off. Chunks of her flesh were charred, appearing in places to have been melted or burned down to the bone."
Zainab was brutally tortured and murdered to make a point: Families of dissidents will now be targeted. Against this kind of evil and repression it is imperative the people of Syria succeed in rebellion Against this kind of evil and repression they might not be able to succeed. But there is always prayer

Women in the House of Saud

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia announced this week that women would have the right to nominate candidates for municipal office in this weeks' elections. While he did not use the term "vote" nominating candidates is as close as they get in Saudi Arabia, a country known for it's restrictions on women. The upcoming election is also of note because it is only the second Saudi election in the last 50 years.

The announcement was met with enthusiasm by women's rights activists who see this as a sign of more reform. In commenting on the announcement one activist said:

"Women's voices will be heard finally," she said. "Now it's time to remove other barriers like not allowing women to drive cars and not being able to function and live a normal life without a male guardian."

The announcement comes after a growing freedom movement in the Middle East known as the Arab Spring that has toppled the Mubarak regime in Egypt, lead to a successful revolution in Libya and led to escalating violence in Yemen and Syria. The decision may well be an attempt to lessen pro-democracy backlash in Saudi Arabia.