On Intellectual Arguments... How to be a better at being critical...

On intellectual arguments: "In disputes upon moral or scientific points, let your aim be to come at the truth, not to conquer your opponent." ~Arthur Martine

Going further from the originating game theorist Anatol Rapoport:
1. You should attempt to re-express your target's position so clearly, vividly, and fairly that your target says, "Thanks, I wish I'd thought of putting it that way.
2. You should list any points of agreement (especially if they are not matters of general or widespread agreement).
3. You should mention anything you have learned from your target.
4. Only then are you permitted to say so much as a word of rebuttal or criticism.

If this was applied to political commentary, social media commentary, then we would have people acting in sound psychological strategy that transforms your opponent in to a more receptive audience for your criticism or dissent, which in turn helps advance the discussion.

Combine this with Susan Sontag's techniques for refuting an argument:
Find the inconsistency (notice not your opinion but an actual inconsistency)
Find the counter example (again an example not an opinion)
Find a wider context (apply the rebuttal to more than your singular experience)

Thus we have a formula for intelligent debate.

For further reading: Daniel C. Dennet's Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking

The Social Media Experience

I often find it interesting that complete strangers comment in response to my comments on a friend's page with the determination to invalidate my experiences and opinions with their experiences and opinions. As if somehow their experience trumps mine and I need to be schooled. We each have our own experiences that create our worldview and it would behoove people to be more sensitive to the fact that we all experience things differently and that sharing our experiences doesn't mean that it opens up a forum for debate or conversion to another's personal perspective. 

I am not speaking here of trolls, because they are easily identifiable with their incorrect grammar, syntax, and spelling. They are usually uneducated and overly full of random opinions that have very little academic or scholarly basis. Hence, they elicit giggles and eye rolls. I am talking about those people who take EVERYTHING anyone says personally or as a personal invitation to espouse their knowledge in a direct attack on someone else because their experience is different than theirs.

Sounds close to trolling, but inside it I see a psychological need for validation. That in of itself is what social media is all about. Validation. I have hundreds of endorsements on LinkedIn, a couple thousand friends of Facebook, and 500 plus followers on Twitter. What I don't have is a dozen blog followers or readers. The title of this blog is apropos to this conundrum, I am afflicted with perpetual contemplation. Thus, writing and psychology are the most important things in my life. Both require deep thought and information processing.

It has gotten to the point where social media has become a tiresome tirade of uneducated and insensitive people who get offended mostly because they don't take the time to read but skim and the immediately find something to combat. So blogging seems to be about the only form of social media where you can fully espouse an opinion and you can control the amount of vitriol that you receive in response.

The rampant insecurity that people feel that sits like an overcoat on top of the need that people have to connect in their experiences only serves to push others away further.

That thing called Religious Discrimination

 
Buddhist child prevails in Bible Belt discrimination

  When I saw this article and the vitriol that these poor parents had to suffer, I felt I must offer my viewpoint.

Schools are no longer doing what they are supposed to be doing- providing education. They are a Petri dish of political, religious, and discriminatory behavior that exacerbates the social consciousness of the community and creates situations that promote bullying, racism, and anti-social behavior. I have yet to read one psychological study on violence in our youth that doesn't have significant statistical evidence of the school's negative affects on adolescent youth in crisis.

The ruling stated in defense of the Buddhist child:
"School Officials shall not denigrate any particular faith, or lack thereof, or single out any student for disfavor or criticism because of his or her particular faith or religious belief, or lack thereof.”

She also ordered that all members of the school board, as well as all faculty — both current and incoming — be trained by an attorney approved by the ACLU and the ACLU of Louisiana as to their responsibilities with respect to the First Amendment. The training will emphasize the “the psychological and developmental impact of religious discrimination on students.”  

My daughter went to a Buddhist run preschool and it wasn't until she entered a state funded charter school that I yanked her out in preference of homeschooling. It wasn't because of religion but the discrimination she was getting from being the only non-Spanish child there. I don't believe in racism on any level. Her skin may be light but she is Native American, African American, and Irish. Three of the most oppressed cultures in America. We are non-religious but we are not without faith. I teach her that religion is personal, private, and should never be proselytized. I teach her that she and I don't have to believe the same things but that we should have the common ground of love and kindness between us. I will never stand for religious discrimination towards another human because no one know who is right and who is wrong, period.

One Hour Twice a Month

"Our country needs us all right now to stand up and be counted. We need to try to be great citizens. We are necessary in this country, and we need to give something -- that is to say, go to a local hospital, go to the children's ward and offer to the nurse in charge an hour twice a month that you can give them reading children's stories or poetry," she said. "And go to an old folks' home and read the newspaper to somebody. Go to your church or your synagogue or your mosque, and say, 'I'd like to be of service. I have one hour twice a month.'

"You'll be surprised at how much better you will feel," she said. "And good done anywhere is good done everywhere." - Maya Angelou

These word spoken by the famed poet, activist, professor, dancer, singer, and prolific writer touched something that I have long been wanting to speak on. Volunteering. As I wrap up my Masters degree program and move into my Doctorate in Clinical Forensic Psychology, I will be required by my program to volunteer 20 hours a week to fulfill my obligations. This is exciting because I have always loved volunteering. The idea of doing work with no other outcome than to make someone else's life better. 

When you are a "smart" kid and you are part of the National Honor Society in high school, you have to complete 35 (it may be 32) hours of volunteer service along with maintaining a high grade point average. I volunteered with Phoenix House every year during Christmas break. I loved it. 

I have done many volunteer things over the years on my own, mostly for animal rescue and the homeless, both populations I am very passionate about. But it occurred to me, that most people aren't required to volunteer, most people don't volunteer. Kids that are troubled aren't asked to volunteer, but the academically minded are required to. Why is this? Why are we ALL not volunteering? I have been trying to get in on programs for my daughter but unless they are met with the proper insurance that a school can afford, there is a certain age that children must be to volunteer in certain situations. This has frustrated me to no end. Occasionally, I will find something that has a special volunteer day, that fits in the age range that she can do, but it often conflicts with our schedule.She wants to go read to kids in the hospital but she can't because she is too young.

When I am down and just hate the world, I have always felt better if I did something nice for someone else. So I can't imagine that this philosophy wouldn't work for others. Maybe the most in need, should help others, because it would give them the sense that they are not alone in their plight, that there are others who are out there suffering as much or more than they are. The privileged should not just donate money but their time. Not that money isn't needed, but most of the money for charities goes into the overhead of maintaining the charity and very little goes to the people who need it. 

So on this day of a great lady passing, inspired by her words, should we not make an effort in this area to pledge two hours a month to helping someone. A stranger, a friend, without the noise of obligation or requirement but from within the shouting of our own souls to reach out to others. Let the stories of volunteerism not be celebrated for their rarity but for their commonplace occurrence as part of being a human being.

On Eating Healthy

Twice in my life there came a time when a change in diet was necessary. The first time came when I was convinced that my physical issues where caused by a body wide yeast infection called Candida. This led to a month long cleanse that began with just water drinking and gradually weaning myself back into "clean" foods that were void of starches and sugars. I did it all with great aplomb and found myself disliking the taste of fats and grease that had been the staple of my Southern upbringing. I explored more ethnic foods and began to eat things that I would have never imagined eating the year prior. It may have taken me almost 2 years to eat pizza again but it definitely made me choosier about the pizza I ordered.

The second time that I had to revise my personal menu was when I was pregnant. My healthy eating did not translate so well during the pregnancy and put my little one at risk when I simply could not gain enough weight to sustain her existence. I had to go back to eating some of the fatty foods and eating larger portions and finally after I stopped working on my feet in the 8th month, I was able to gain enough weight but I was still at high risk. I tried to eat, I just wasn't as hungry as my little one was. This still remains true today. She out eats me everyday.

So now after years back on a semi-healthy (I have my slip ups) diet, I find something startling has happened. After eradicating pretty much anything frozen, processed, or preservative laden... a slip up can cost me more than just an oops or even a pound or two. It makes me physically ill. As we moved into our new little haven, we were lapse of anything to toast our bagels in the morning. I knew that the movers would be coming in a few days, so I thought well let's be bad and treat ourselves to some donuts for the mornings to get us going. Today, I wake up on morning three of doughnut days and I feel sick, nauseated, and gaseous. Entemann's glazed doughnut holes have destroyed my insides. I thought they were the good guys, the ones that were a class act, and then I read the label. I almost threw up once again. A doughnut should not have 30-40 ingredients. So I have sworn off the last of my bad foods and will no doubt be the better for it.

But what I find is the lengths the body will go to, to tell you, the eater; what it doesn't want! Why do we ignore these perfect machines that we live in? Why do people drink alcohol at a level they know they will feel sick from the next day? Why do people drink sodas that can erode a penny in one evening? Why do people revel in their grease and fatty foods? It isn't worth it. They say that eating healthy is hard when you are on a budget but I don't buy it anymore. Since I have been shopping at Trader Joe's religiously for the last 4 months, my grocery bill is some 20-30 dollars cheaper than when I was shopping at Ralph's. Why? BECAUSE THEY MARK UP their organic foods as if they were specialty items.

But even Trader Joe's has flaws, like why does a Health Food market, have microwavable food? It's not okay to eat food choc full of preservatives and crap but it's okay to subject yourself to radiation everyday? Interesting. It's all a conundrum to me, and people are so lazy that they just accept this is all okay because everyone else does it. Do I need to remind you of that adage? "If everyone jumps of a bridge...."

My daughter paid the same price as I did this morning, this past week. She is allergic to however cow's milk is processed... namely vitamin D milk in which they zap the crap out of it to destroy bacteria and nutrients and then add it all back in after the fact. She can eat cheese (active cultures) and yogurt (active cultures) but ice cream and vitamin D whole or 2% milk destroy her with a fever, and now as she found out, two days of severe stomach aches and hugging the porcelain throne. All this because when I said at a birthday party not wanting to embarrass her, that she could have one bite of ice cream when she asked... she decided to eat a crap load. While holding her hair back and rubbing her tummy, I won't lie and say I didn't chuckle a "told you so" a few times.

Gas, tummy aches, hangovers, weight gain... these are all signs that we aren't listening to our own bodies telling us that we are poisoning it with bad things. Why do we think that we are superior to our own bodies? Wouldn't you rather spend a few more dollars on a real hamburger freshly made, than a fast food burger? Milk was a necessity when food was scarce, or a baby having lost its mother needed those nutrients from a cow's milk. Yet, we don't need it as adults! We are the only species who drinks another species milk! Why?  Why do we feed dogs kibble, full of awful ingredients from a can or a bag when their natural diet of raw meats and fruits and vegetables, the very same foods we eat, are good for them? Isn't it odd how our table scraps are bad for them now? Why? Because the food we eat is bad for us!!

Anyway, I like listening to my body. I have enough health problems that diet can't fix entirely that I don't need more piled on because I simply am too lazy to read labels, eat and cook fresh foods, limit the fat in my diet, and when eating out, chose restaurants that serve fresh foods. I will pay that extra price. Food is Life.

Turkey Time Troubles

Turkey time has come for most Americans. Most people are satisfied with the overview (fantastical at best) of the historical event. I am not. Maybe if their weren't reservations and obesity/alcohol issues, maybe if the Bureau of Indian Affairs didn't exist, and maybe if Casinos and making dream catchers for roadside stands weren't their only sources of income. Maybe if their oppression was overcome and heralded like some other race that were unfairly treated was a modern reality. BUT it is not.

The one thing I find interesting is how offended people get by my refusal to celebrate Thanksgiving day. I don't judge others for choosing to mask over the reality of the day and abide by the commercialized version of football and family time.  I do it with Xmas. I do not have a religious belief attached to that day, but I do for all intents and purposes enjoy the magic that the commercialized version brings. The farther it gets from the fact that it doesn't actually celebrate the actual birthday of an important figure in history, the happier I am. The more people realize that Xmas was the repositioning of a pagan Yule Solstice celebration so that people can be indoctrinated under one religion, the happier I am. Xmas for me is about a magic in the coldest part of the year.

But Thanksgiving, despite its lovely intention of name is not celebrated anywhere but America. It is not a religious or a pagan holiday. It is the National Day of Mourning for most Native tribes in the Northeast and some tribes celebrate it, some do not.  However, I ask those to  respect my decision, without a quirky look or trying to convince me that I should view it from their universally accepted interpretation.

 I get it. You like the modern day ritual that it has become. But for me, just like most holidays, I don't buy into it. One, I prefer to pay homage to my Native American and my daughter's two fold tribe Native roots. Two, I have no love for the particular food that is traditionally served, and three, I sincerely love to go to the theater and spend all day free from a schedule and watch movies.

 But the anxiety that comes over me when someone kindly offers an invitation, knowing that I am going to have to carefully explain why I don't celebrate it, and then listen to their reasoning in an attempt to make me realize the error of my ways, and just come hang out =  the reality of discrimination. Because I actively chose not to conform to others ideals, they become offended and form some sort of opinion about me as a disagreeable person.

I take pride in not following the flock, not pandering to mainstream ideals, and at the same time I do not infringe on anyone else's right to enjoy what they enjoy. It would be lovely if one day, I received the same indifference.

This was my Superman. Man of Steel Commentary.

There have been many opinions out there about this new vision of Superman. There isn't one that I have read that I totally agreed with and many that if I had telekinetic powers I would have singed a few brains over. However, I need to write my opinion because, this is one thing that I am THAT passionate about.

What I love about this re-imagining of the Man of Steel, is that one, I am not a terribly sentimental person. I do not believe that everything should be held to canon. As we change and evolve in our society, the goal is to root out what doesn't work, what does. We do this with law, with culture, with language, etc. No, it doesn't always go the right way but that is change.

Each person who has taken to writing Superman has taken liberty with certain things here and there, some artists draw him in ways I find atrocious, and some nail it on the head. But these are my perspectives and film-making is the same. It is an interpretation of a collaboration of people who saw something in a character that just didn't fit with the current reality and changed it. For the better in my opinion.

Psychologically, it never made sense to me that Clark Kent was a bumbling idiot, because well obviously he wasn't, so he was faking it- acting like it, and that to me was always something disingenuous about the character. So to me that was the flaw in the writing of the character. A trait of a person high on the psychopathy spectrum is someone who openly and charismatically lies to the faces of people to achieve a goal in their own favor. The fact that it was not present in this incarnation of Superman was this movie's greatest triumph to me. It was real, visceral. There was a stoic manner, a contemplative and intelligent manner that Henry Cavill brought to it, a calm assurance of a man with immense powers and the patience to understand the right time to use them without flaunting them or pretending to be something he isn't. Superman was an introvert. Someone forced to hide his greatness, his intelligence, and his emotions in order for the greater good of a world he loved. He is genuine, thoughtful, and well mannered. He never needed to be dramatic nor showy like other superheroes that came after him. The deep level of humility and grace was overwhelming driven by Cavill's performance.

The other great thing about this film is we didn't need another regurgitation of the growing up of Clark. We all know his history, what made him who he is, and I am so glad that I was not forced to suffer a lengthy progression of his childhood development, but given pivotal moments that reaffirmed who he was. It made so much sense in terms of the Hero's Journey that after the death of his father, he traveled, he explored the world, and kept himself hidden until it was time not to. Goyer mastered the truth of the character and what he would genuinely do as a human or someone raised as a human.

The back story of Krypton, the speech of Zod about being a product of his world, so poignant. This was a testament to a blind love for a culture and being unable to see past it to the very devastation of themselves.

Zack Snyder has been a film maker who isn't afraid to push the boundaries, and I for one have adored everything that he's ever done. But his films are not those you can watch once. He performs a ballet of film-making that is aggressive and violent but if you step aside from prejudice is enormous and immense. There was not one moment of false bravado.

The battles were bombastic and people whined about the destruction and some crap about 9/11 reminders, so every movie that came before 9/11 that destroyed cities is apparently exempt from this? Are we that fragile? Are these same people griping about fictional body counts devastated at the demolition job we did to cities in the Middle East, or rolling around in their beds mourning Hiroshima, Nagasaki, etc.p or the lives continuously lost in Afghanistan, or are we only morning the soldiers that are from our country? You are really that upset and short sited about a film that has done the same thing every single movie has done in the last 10 years? Iron Man, Avengers, Thor... they were exempt because they apparently care less about damage control so this gives them a pass, but because you hold Superman to a higher standard; he is villainous? He was forced to kill Zod, because he couldn't let him kill people RIGHT IN FRONT OF HIM and it devastated him to do it. But these "fans" are all put off about it.

I am glad that this was not another attempt at telling the origin story. I love that Lois was not some easily bamboozled reporter, but that her prowess was portrayed as the daughter of a military man was explored by her reporting on war issues. I was tired of Lois Lane being the supposedly strong willed person but ended up being unable to see past a pair of glasses? Really? I don't remember Clark ever having the power of fairy glamour?? I love that she knows Clark's secret from the get go. It makes their impossible romance so much more real and not a product of some man projecting how he would live two separate lives.

I could go on and on, but mostly, this was my Superman and I am very happy that despite the NaySayers and hapless critics, I will have the version of Superman that was always living in my mind. That was the one I always dreamed of and imagined and was written the way I would have written him.