Immanel Kant, Types of Truths, And Why We'll Never Talk With Aliens

Immanuel Kant, eminent German philosopher and key player in the Enlightenment, postulated that we humans possess a priori “rules” for processing and understanding the universe around us. We perceive events occurring in time and space according to our own mental capacities. This means that “truth” can only exist for us insofar as our constitution allows us to perceive it. What’s true for us, whether it be a physical law or the existence of a particular color, is our truth, inseparable from our ability to recognize it.

Which brings me to life beyond Earth. If our constitution is such that we perceive truths that an animal could never conceive of, wouldn’t an “alien” similarly perceive truths that we could never conceive of? And, given the discrepancy in understanding between creatures on Earth — a relatively small, constrained area considering the size of the universe — doesn’t in stand to reason that a being from a distant galaxy would have a constitution that separates it from us even more than our faculties separate us from a fruit fly?

In our hubris, we often fail to acknowledge the very limited scope of our understanding. Theorists and physicists seem to think we could “figure it all out,” with some even championing the possibility of a unified “theory of everything.” Really? Everything? It seems patently absurd. 

We are indeed a remarkable species, aware of our own consciousness and mortality in ways apparently unique among life on Earth. But it’s safe to assume there are truths inherent to the universe that exist beyond what we’re capable of grasping. We can “understand” reality to the best of our ability, just as a fruit fly can understand its buzzing around a jar of raspberry jam, but that understanding is likely to far far short of what a greater being would be capable of, a greater being for whom communication with us would be as pointless as us talking philosophy with an insect.

This isn’t to belittle humanity or its achievements. It’s just to instill a sense of perspective. 

“Truth” is still an important concept (perhaps the most important concept), but it clearly exists in levels or degrees. There are relative truths (“Democracy is preferable to autocracy”), which are derived from human experience; scientific truths (“For any system closed to all transfers of matter and energy, the mass of the system must remain constant over time”), empirically derived and representing as solid a picture of physical reality as we can muster; and absolute truths, which exist hopelessly beyond our understanding, reason, and language.

Beyond our understanding...but there may be other creatures in the universe who carve their own relative and scientific truths from reality. But the real, absolute truth? It’s almost certainly unknowable by any conscious mind, which makes it a strange sort of truth, indeed.

Cancel Beethoven? Politics Shouldn't Override Artistic Merit

 “Cancel Beethoven” has, apparently, become a serious battle cry among some on the left, with the classical composer cast as a stale, overrated, and all-too-white impediment to greater diversity in the arts. In a recent opinion piece in the University of Cambridge newspaper, a student wonders if the cancellation of Beethoven would bring about a “more diverse, inclusive and accessible classical music scene.” He muses on the benefits of a cancelation, “notwithstanding that some people actually like Beethoven’s music.” While he ultimately concludes that a “mass cultural boycott” would prove counterproductive (since other white composers like Mozart would take his place), it’s the relegation of the work’s artistic merit to a secondary concern that should trouble lovers of the arts.

Far from an isolated incident, the “Cancel Beethoven” movement is just one manifestation of a well-intentioned but dangerous notion: that political-minded engineers must realign the artistic world in accordance with their agenda. This agenda, normally, revolves around diversity, which in itself is a worthy goal. The problem is that in the pursuit of this end, art itself becomes secondary to the group identity of its creator. Last week, Viet Thanh Nguyen wrote in the New York Times that white writers who don’t address political issues are guilty of “a retreat back to white privilege,” as if the tenor of someone’s artistic creations should be dictated solely by their race and historical circumstances, and individual artists are ethically-obilgated to take on only certain topics.

Now, there’s no denying that art is inescapably political. Decisions about what gets published, displayed, or performed are inseparable from sociological and political circumstances. And yet, the way out of this morass comes through eliminating restraints, not imposing them. A certain freedom of spirit and imagination is necessary for the appreciation and creation of art, and we should all be rooting for art to keep slipping from the hands of those who would seek to control it.

A lack of diversity in the art world is certainly a problem. A New York Times study recently found that, among a dataset of books published in 2018, 89% of the writers were white. That’s shocking, and it needs to change. Through the breaking down of barriers and increased opportunity, people of color need greater access to artistic spheres. But what I can’t abide is an atmosphere where Renior’s “Luncheon of the Boating Party,” Beethoven’s “Midnight Sonata,” or Proust’s “In Search of Lost Time” are blithely disregarded, simply for being the work of white men.

Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca once spoke of “the mystery, the roots that cling to the mire that we all know, that we all ignore, but from which comes the very substance of art.” German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe referenced that “mysterious force that everyone feels and no philosopher has explained.” This is where the essence of art lies. This is where the magic happens. And there’s nothing so inhuman as banishing or controlling instantiations of artistic magic for political purposes, no matter how good the intentions. 

U.S. Soft Power Can Save the Amazon and the Planet

Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, perhaps the United States’ best literary work and almost certainly its most optimistic, reads a bit like a eulogy in October of 2020, commemorating a nation that’s ceasing to exist. While the country Whitman praises for unfurling itself into its manifest destiny was actually far from perfect, the idealist spirit he captured was unquestionably real.

We are now learning that a deeply flawed United States striving for a beautiful ideal was still much better than a country with no ideals at all. 

Whitman described the United States as “Earth’s modern wonder,” a country where other nations gather “beneath thy banner Freedom.” In Trump’s America, such notions sound quaint. 

The United States has not been stripped of its global leadership position, but willfully abdicated it. Nowhere is this more evident that in the fight to protect humanity from the perils of climate change. You would expect the supposed international leader to take charge in dealing with humanity’s first truly global issue. Instead, the United States — with billionaires counting on fossil fuel industries and a population that largely scoffs at scientific consensus — has become a major impediment to international cooperation. 

But there’s still time to change. We can still lead, and we can still serve as an example to other nations in the climate fight. This is most clear when we look at the situation in Brazil. 

The Amazon Rainforest is uniquely important to the health of the planet. The 2.1 million square miles of rainforest most of which are in Brazil, play an instrumental role in producing oxygen and sinking carbon, both of which mitigate the effects of industrial pollution and decrease global warming.

Brazil’s President Bolsonaro, a no-nonsense leader who proudly styles himself after Trump, has slashed environmental protections and encouraged further economic exploitation of the Amazon. The results have been as devastating as they were predictable. While the Amazon’s fires were major international news last year, they’ve actually been even worse in 2020. This nauseating trend shows no signs of abatement. 

Bolsonaro and his supporters insist that the Amazon is their territory to be dealt with as they choose. And, in a sense, they’re right. European powers telling a developing nation how to use their resources has more than a whiff of imperialism, and even if the intentions are good the resistance is understandable. 

But the issue at hand is more complicated. The natural processes underlying global warming have no respect for national borders. What happens in any one country affects what happens in all the others. A vibrant Amazon is crucial to the wellbeing of the planet and the future of humanity. It’s on all of us to save it. 

But how? No country can force Bolsonaro or Brazil to do anything, but they can prod, cajole, and lead by example, insisting that every nation, Brazil included, works toward a sustainable future.

The United States, still the eminent global superpower, is the country best suited to push Bolsonaro and other leaders to do the right thing. But in order for that to happen, the U.S. needs to take the issue seriously and resume its leadership position. 

This is yet another reason why the coming presidential election is so important. When scoffing at the dangers of the coronavirus pandemic or ignoring climate change, President Trump invites Bolsonaro and other like-minded leaders to join in his irresponsible behavior. The United States used to be a country that pushed ideals on the world. Under the current administration, it only encourages other nations to replicate its shortcomings. 

If elected, Joe Biden would reunite the U.S. with the reasonable nations that understand the stakes of the current climate catastrophe. He would also push Bolsonaro and other renegade leaders to join the fight, building the type of board coalition necessary to defeat this mortal, non-discriminating enemy. 

It might sound dramatic, but the future of the planet really does depend on the electoral defeat (and subsequent removal) of President Trump. 

In Search of (Reading-Induced) Mental Patterns

I'm just now finishing In Search of Lost Time, a book with a special power to invite personal reflection.  As Marcel Proust describes it in the book's unforgettable final chapter, the novel compels readers to "read" their own lives alongside that of the protagonist. 

The way people change over time is a constant theme in the book.  Just as Heraclitus says you can never again step in the same river, Proust insists you never meet the same person twice.  Every time you see your best friend they're a different person than they were the day before, and the previous day's version of them exists only as a memory.  

Naturally enough, reading all of this got me thinking about my own life and how I've changed.  I realized my attitudes, my personality, my tastes, and even my appearance have changed less in the past year than they did the year before.  I then realized that the two years ago I'd changed even more.  Back in college, my entire worldview would shift during a single semester.  In high school, I seemed to reinvent myself every week as puberty and rapidly-acquired experience dragged me from adolescence toward adulthood.  I can scarcely imagine the yearly (and monthly...and weekly) changes my parents saw in me when I was a child. 

These observations begged analysis.  I determined that every year we change a little less than we had the year before- until old age, that is, when the changes again accelerate.  A line graph showing the rate of annual change over a lifetime would look like a V, albeit one where the second line fails to reach the initial height of the first.  

Whether this line of thinking is novel (or even accurate) I'm not entirely sure.  What I do know is that the process by which I came to my conclusion fits a pattern that, for me, represents one of the principle joys of reading.  The book spoke of general truths (personified by the characters), these general truths evoked my personal reflections, and I extrapolated on these personal reflections to compose another general truth.  My personal experience served as a conduit by which a general truth from without became another general truth forged within.  

Perhaps this phenomenon isn't unique to literature, or art.  Maybe it's the universal process by which we add what we learn to what we already knew, thereby producing what we're just now knowing (new knowledge + personal experience= new understanding).  In any case, reading is one of the principle means by which this process is actuated in my mind, and for that I'm eternally grateful to the magic of the written word.

On Wanting to Say "God Bless You"

"God bless you always."

It's a phrase I hear almost every day here in the highly-religious community of Santiago Atitlán, Guatemala- from my fiancee, from her family, from friends, from neighbors and people on the street.  It's a darn good way to express a genuine concern for another's well-being. 

I wish I could say it, too.  But, given my lack of religious faith, I'm afraid I can't.

This little problem represents a lot of what's missing in a secular, non-religious world- a world where, as Nietzsche put it, "God is dead."  Without belief in a divine being, how does one express the sentiment behind "God bless you?"  "Have a nice day," doesn't cut it. 

I might just be looking for an adequate phrase- or maybe this superficial concern covers a deeper longing for much, much more.  

Misinformation Is Inevitable in An Increasingly Complex World. We Still Have to Challenge It.

Is Covid-19 real? Are "the numbers" to be trusted? Is hydroxychloroquine a legitimate treatment option? Do masks constitute a useful public health measure? Most readers will have a firm answer to each of these questions, but those answers might be different. What we can all agree on is that the world is full of misinformation, and it's harder than ever to determine what's true and what isn't.

It's easy to blame the current situation on unscrupulous actors or the organizations they represent. For "politicized” issues, blame usually falls on politicians and news organizations from "the other side." The lies come from Republicans or Democrats, Fox News or CNN, Tucker Carlson or Chris Cuomo, Donald Trump or Joe Biden. While these people and entities deserve their share of the blame, the issue largely stems from inevitable social conditions- namely, society's increasing complexity and the massive amount of information out there to be consumed. 

In 1800, the average person could explain more-or-less the entirety of their social universe. They knew how their local economy operated, how all the machines they used functioned, and how their government worked. A well-educated individual was probably conversant with all the latest theories in science, economics, philosophy, and the arts. Society existed on a scale that was more easily grasped. 

Fast forward to 2020...How many of us really understand how the world around us works? We depend on technologies whose secrets elude us. We count on a global economy that we could never begin to understand. Even the most learned of individuals would struggle to explain quantum mechanics, the workings of the internet, and the latest theories of global capital. In a world that none of us fully understands, we rely on networks of experts and the information they disseminate to build our conception of the world. 

In a society where the most self-interested rise to the top, it should come as no surprise that those networks of information have been compromised. We all know we can no longer take information at face value. In the American context, we can't un-see Watergate or the Pentagon Papers. Even younger Americans who don't remember those scandals have absorbed their lessons. From the government to the media, neighbors to local leaders, it seems there's no one in whom we can safely place our trust. 

And yet we have to form a worldview somehow. And we can. It just requires discernment and critical thinking. We have to analyze our news sources, parsing out the self-interested from the benevolent, the mendacious from the truthful. It might not be simple or foolproof, but it's possible. 

Politicians are generally self-interested. We should doubt them. Some news sources lie, others simple deliver truth in a biased way. We should be wary. But there are institutions we can trust, information we should believe. Social progress depends on trust in these organizations. 

Without trust in modern medicine, life expectancy would not have improved. Without trust in accredited, non-partisan news organizations like the Associated Press, we would have no idea what's happening in the world. Without trust in the scientific method and the organizations that use it, we couldn't fly in planes, drive cars, or advance our technologies. 

What we need to practice is qualified trust. We must determine which individuals and organizations can be trusted, and which can't. With this basic, general ground rule, we can develop an understanding of the world that at least somewhat reflects "reality."

So here's my take on the questions from the first paragraph:

Is Covid-19 real? Yes. In this case, I can count on personal experience (friends who have had it and a distant relative who died). 

Are the numbers to be trusted? Yes, because I believe the governmental organizations releasing the numbers to be non-partisan and invested in the truth. I also believe the scientific studies that suggest the actual case counts are probably higher since these studies are conducted by legitimate research institutions. 

Is hydroxychloroquine a legitimate treatment option? No. The advocates of the treatment tend to be self-interested politicians (Trump, Bolsonaro) or rogue doctors with little institutional credibility, while medical professionals have formed a near-consensus against the treatment. 

Do masks constitute a useful public health measure? Yes. This one's a bit more complicated, because many of the organizations I trust initially advocated against masks and have since changed their outlook. All the same, the consensus among public health experts seems nearly unanimous, and so I've adjusted my thinking accordingly. 

I know some readers might not agree with my own conclusions. I get it, and I won't turn nasty in defending my positions. While uncertainty abounds and trust remains low, we need to be mindful of our own discourse. Calling someone ignorant never made the world a better place. We live in unprecedented times, with global airwaves and local communication networks inundated like never before with information (and misinformation) about an increasingly incomprehensible world. Belittling others for their views won't get us anywhere. What we need to do is develop standards to gauge the accuracy of the information we receive, build the truest conception we can of the society we inhabit, and encourage our friends, relatives, and fellow citizens to do the same. 

The Art of the Unsettling

Feel-good art is nice, isn’t it?  Who doesn’t enjoy settling down into a lovely melody, gazing at a gorgeous landscape painting, or losing themselves in a pleasant book?

But such uplifting works only comprise a portion of humanity’s artistic production.  It can’t all be butterflies and rainbows.  In art, as in life, there’s a dark shadow beneath the prettiest of clouds.

Take Kafka, for example.  His fiction shows the powerlessness and inanity of a human existence lived not only within the confines of birth and death, but also in a labyrinthine hellscape of our own creation. Give it Up!, a story of just a few sentences, offers an exemplary look at the helplessness he so skillfully captured.  

In music we have Schoenberg, that modern maverick who composed music with a devastating, atonal dissonance that doesn’t merely describe anxiety, but actually recreates it.  Check out his Drei Klavierstucke for a taste.  

We can imagine the creator of uplifting works lying on their deathbed thinking, “Well I can rest easy, knowing I made so many people just a little bit happier, their lives just a touch more pleasant.”  But what can Schoenberg, Kafka, and co. claim to have done?  Injected anxiety into unsuspecting victims?  Catalyzed the fear and existential unease in us all?

And yet we feel instinctively that this art deserves its place in the cultural pantheon.  Why?  Because we appreciate how it captures aspects of life and human nature that have always existed.

Take Schoenberg, for example.  As much as we enjoy soothing melodies and consonant tones, we know life is more than a walk through a breezy meadow.  There are emotions we feel that the gorgeous cello of Brahm’s Third Symphony (third movement) just couldn’t possibly represent.  In fact, no tonal, consonant, pleasing music could ever match the emotional pitch of certain moments and situations.  Schoenberg realized this and composed music that embodies the manic, the nerve-wracked, the nightmarish, the insane. 

The key is that these artists don’t create these feelings of anxiety and pain- they don’t conjure them out of thin air.  What they do is capture those feelings as they already existed.  That is why we appreciate their work.  It’s also why we need them. 

We can’t eradicate the pain and stress of life.  We’re all going to die.  Life is hard.  None of us know what the hell we’re doing.  There’s no changing all that.  What we can do is strive to understand our predicament, and that’s where this hectic art proves useful.  Identifying the painful sensations we so often feel in a work of art outside ourselves, letting it pass through us, and sensing it come out the other side is, in some way, a spiritual and healing event.  It fires our brains and sets our own humanity glowing.  Once we’ve experienced it, we can’t imagine living without it. 

Art isn’t a narcotic; it’s a psychedelic, and sometimes it takes you on a bad trip.  But that’s alright.  In fact, it’s perfect.  We wouldn’t have it any other way.  

All that being said, there is, of course, relief to be found in a well-rounded selection of books, songs, and paintings.  The pain-capturing and pain-inducing works serve a useful function, but so do more uplifting pieces.  Spending your whole life reading Metamorphosis, listening to Le sacre de printemps, and looking at Saturn Devouring His Son probably isn't healthy.  Give all those works their due, then put your feet up, take a glance at Monet, put on some breezy Brahms, and open to the first page of a nice beach read.  In the art of life, a true master wets their brush with all the colors of the emotional pallet.