A Critical Thinking Exercise: Idealism vs. Logic

People like to think happy thoughts. I am one of those people. But sometimes out happy thoughts just don’t stand up to the brute force of logic. For example:

Ideal: Everyone has positive qualities.

This is something that a friend of mine said last year, and it’s been sticking with me. I think it’s probably a generally accepted statement. But I’m not too sure about it.

Logic: Some people have more positive qualities than others. There are some people that are beautiful in every way physically, and are intelligent and kind as well. But if there are people that have more positive qualities, then necessarily there are people with fewer positive qualities. And probability would lead to the conclusion that some people have no positive qualities. Look at it this way. Assume there are 10 total traits, with one positive, one neutral, and one negative possibility for each of the ten traits. If there are 59,049 total people (3^10), then every possible combination would be covered, and there would be one person with all positive traits and another person with all negative traits.

It’s true, of course, that there are many more traits and more possibilities for each trait, but it’s also true that there are more than 6 billion people in the world. I think it’s logical to assume that there’s at least one person out there that has nothing going for them. Of course, this only covers genetic traits.

Let’s try another.

Ideal: Males and females are perfectly equal and capable of doing all the same things except for a physical advantage in the males.

The Language Guy has been really pushing this lately. It’s politically correct to think it and espouse it. But is it necessarily true?

Logic:
Premise 1: Attitudes about the respective roles of men and women are culturally-based.
Premise 2: Culture adapts itself through the processes of natural selection, and therefore all cultural norms and practices are beneficial.
Conclusion: Attitudes about the respective roles of men and women are beneficial.

Did that shake your foundations? To some extent it should, at least if you haven’t thought about it before. But on the other hand, it was a test to see how much you’re thinking when you read this. There are two obvious arguments against the conclusion.
The first: natural selection has evolved culture to be beneficial up to a point, but it doesn’t work fast enough to keep up with a change in the environment. The environment has changed (physical labor has become less important while mental faculties have become more important), and so what is beneficial has changed also. How and to what extent are the relevant remaining questions.
The second: the attitudes themselves, though based on cultural experience, are simply a reflection of what is normally the most beneficial division of labor. Therefore, the attitudes in and of themselves are not necessarily beneficial because they may prevent people who are well-equipped to do certain tasks from doing them, or hamper people in doing necessary tasks.

Still, we have many ideals that beg for the application of logic. At the same time, the ideals aren’t necessarily harmful even if they aren’t true. The reverse of this approach could be applied as well, in an effort to debunk popular pessimistic ideas.

How's Married Life?

People have been asking me that question a lot lately. "How's married life?" My answer is usually "Not much different from unmarried life." I'd been dating Laura since Fall of 2002, and we'd been engaged since Fall of 2003. She'd been living here in Lincoln since June, and since then the only time I'd spent at my own apartment was when I was sleeping. We'd been eating together and spending nearly all of our time together anyway. So, married life, thus far, is not much different from unmarried life. The biggest difference is the way that Russell looks at me when I get ready for bed. You can see the one word in his mind . . . Usurper! Actually, no, I don't think that's in his vocabulary. The way I interpret the look he gives me is this: "So . . . where are you sleeping? I was just wondering because this is where I'm sleeping, whether you like it or not. And there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of room left. The couch is nice. Maybe you should go sleep there."

Laura and I do seem to have more of a team mentality. But maybe someone can explain the following to me. Included among our wedding gifts was a sum of money. One of the bills we received was a $100 bill. I had not yet paid the pastor, so I said that I would just drive over to his house and pay him with that. Laura said that I could not, because it was my responsibility to pay the pastor and I need to do that with my money. I responded by using one of my favorite methods: logic.

1. My money has become our money. Your money has become our money. It can't possibly make any difference whether I use the wedding money or not.
2. I will simply use the $100 bill and I will refund same amount to us for the purpose of buying something nice for us.
3. Money is a fungible good. I can replace the bill with something worth exactly the same. [Dictionary.com is currently down, so I can't direct you to a definition of fungible directly. Merriam Webster doesn't give a satisfactory way to link, but they define it as "being of such a nature that one part or quantity may be replaced by another equal part or quantity in the satisfaction of an obligation".]

Yet, she stood fast in the face of this logical onslaught. My dad overheard and said that he had been trying to explain the same thing to my mother for years, and it just doesn't seem to work. This brought to mind many occasions when my mother had given me money, or I had received money as a gift, and my mother told me to use the money for X, not Y or anything else. But as long as I have at least the same amount of money, what difference does it make if I use the given money for Y and then use the money I already had for X?

Can someone please explain that to me?

[Image © 2006 Kelly Hoffart]

You Might Need a Different Lawyer If . . .

- Your lawyer tells you that his last good case was of Budweiser.
- When the prosecutors see your lawyer, they high-five each other.
- Your lawyer picks the jury by playing "duck-duck-goose."
- Your lawyer tells you that he has never told a lie.
- A prison guard is shaving your head.

I got those off my calendar. I'd like to add a few of my own:

- Your lawyer quotes NWA in his opening argument.
- Your lawyer quotes Hitler in his closing argument.
- Your lawyer walks in and sits on the wrong side of the courtroom.
- You have a court-appointed attorney.
- Your lawyer carries a copy of Criminal Defense for Dummies.
- Your lawyer responds to an objection with "That's not what your mom said last night."
- You shared a cell with your lawyer.
- And he called top bunk.
- Your lawyer wears a t-shirt that says "I'm with guilty -->"

Feel free to add more in the comments.

Apparently, minivans can be fun.

Yellow

Here are some nice abstract pics I took the other day, mostly of a couple vases we have.

















All images © 2006 Kelly Hoffart

Omitted from the Top 100 Metal Songs List

Since I originally compiled my Top 100 Metal Songs list, I have expanded my horizons a bit. No, I haven’t started listening to rap or top 40 stuff, but I have delved more deeply into the realm of metal, seeing what lurks in its shadowy corners. Here are some of what I’m calling honorable mentions, but there are probably a few gems that belonged on the list (and maybe in a very high rank . . . I will not make a new list any time soon because that was a lot of work).

Trivium is a fairly new metal band. I’m not sure exactly what category they would fall into exactly, but I would say they’re a mix of death metal, hardcore, and just a pinch of (*gasp*) emo. Their album Ascendancy (2005) does not contain a low point. It hits hard the whole way through and does not take prisoners.

Lamb of God is equally new, and equally heavy. They are very much similar to Trivium, but they lean more to the death metal side of the spectrum. Their album Ashes of the Wake (2004) similarly kicks ass and takes names, as the opening monologue to “Omerta” suggests.

I excluded DevilDriver in the first list, thinking that they were just a poor man’s Coal Chamber, including frontman Dez Fafara (sp?). Their self-titled (2003) album is just that, without anything in particular to stand out. However, they came back with a vengeance and a complete sonic makeover on The Fury of Our Maker’s Hand (2005). They are truly and purely a death metal band on the latter, and Dez’s vocals are infinitely better than those of any other frontman in that sub-genre. Particularly, the song “Hold Back the Day” definitely deserved a place in the top half of the list.

I had previously dismissed Death as just another death metal band with what I call a constipated demon vocalist. What I didn’t know was that their 1998 album The Sound of Perseverance overcomes the handicap that the bad vocals give it, and is truly a superb album that deserves all the credit due a great album.

Iced Earth is another matter. I bought one of their albums back in my middle teenage years, and I don’t think I was ready for it. Now, I gave them another chance, and they’re actually very good. I don’t know if they would have made the list, but if they had it would have been for “The Reckoning (Don’t Tread on Me)” from The Glorious Burden (2002), featuring the guy who had until now replaced Rob Halford in Judas Priest. But sorry, Judas Priest still doesn’t deserve a place on the list. And neither does Iced Earth’s biggest influence (I assume) Iron Maiden. While both are good bands, they simply fall short of the kind of greatness I expect to garner a place on the list. Some may say I favor newer bands, but I think a lot of that is the simple fact of musical evolution leading to newer and better things, just like natural selection. Also, those people failed to notice Motörhead, Black Sabbath, and Mercyful Fate claiming several places throughout the list. Sure there’s a lot of really bad stuff out there now that’s getting a lot of attention (Trapt, Theory of a Deadman, etc.) but time will show those to be as useless as Mötley Crüe.

Meshuggah is a band I think I simply overlooked. These Swedes sound a lot like Sepultura with an advanced degree in mathematics. They are heavy and they use absolutely insane time signatures in their music, and at first it just sounds like noise. But the more you listen to it the more it grows on you. I’ve had Destroy Erase Improve (1995) for about six or seven years now, and I have no idea why I missed “Future Breed Machine” for a high spot on the list. Also worth mentioning is Chaosphere (1998), which is, without a doubt, their best album.

A good old friend of mine has turned me on to Avenged Sevenfold and Atreyu. I just thought I’d mention them here because they’re worth giving a listen, but neither one deserves a place on the Top 100 Metal Songs. They’re far too emo for that.

I’ll keep you posted if there’s anything else I discover that I wish I would have put on the list.

Load . . . No Longer on My Chest

Well, I finally got my grades for last semester, two days before classes start again. Nothing like keeping you in suspense. I did pass my tax class that I was worried about, and I calculate that my GPA has risen .39 since class standings were last calculated in May. (That's .39 on a 9-point scale, which translates to about a .17 on a 4-point scale).

Sioux Falls

Now that I've lost your attention, it's time to post some pictures I took at our honeymoon location of Sioux Falls, in order to regain your attention. These were all taken by me with a new Canon Powershot A520, which is very good for what it can do.
The first time we went to the park was at night to see the Christmas lights.



Since it was about 1 degree Fahrenheit, I didn't feel like getting my tripod out, so that's the only pic that turned out from that. But then the next day, I took many more.











The next one is my favorite. I call it "Frosted by Sioux Falls."



And, of course, the obligatory "take a picture of your family in front of the landmark" scene.



All images © 2006 Kelly Hoffart

Solid/Liquid

Well, I wanted to scan some prints from the wedding, but the scanner here doesn't seem to be working. So instead, here's a little teaser picture from our honeymoon that I shot on our new Canon A520. I call this one "Solid/Liquid".


Image © 2006 Kelly Hoffart