Optimism is about emotional states of being including hope, wishful thinking, and at its worse fairy-tale views of the world that its always getting better.

Pessimism is its opposite, which includes hopelessness, despondency, and at its worse fatalism that the world is going to get worse.

Both lead to paralysis since at their most extreme, the world is just fine as it if you are optimist so why worry about it, or its going to hell if you are pessimist and there is nothing that can be done about it.

As soon as one accepts optimism or pessimism as their worldview, they shut themselves off from asking questions. I used to consider myself pessimistic and a cynic but after finally reading those definitions, I realized that this was not me.

My blog is about asking questions, hopefully relevant and rational questions. My goal is to find solutions, not preach optimism or pressimism. I realized that I am a skeptic.

So, perhaps this is the political philosophy that I am waiting for, one based on the principles of skepticism. Interestingly, some people have gone ahead and done just that with a new political party being formed in Australia challenging one of environmentalism’s holy cows, global warming, under the banner of The Climate Sceptics Party. Its a bold move and is sure to cause huge controversy but good skepticism is necessary for all political philosophies, including the Greens and their conviction in global warming.

I am pleased that they have been established. They have provided to the world a small but important step towards embracing skepticism as a way of viewing the political world. Perhaps, with persistence the political manifestation of skepticism can be the cure of the mental diseases of optimism and pessimism, and ultimately help us better understand our human nature.

Based on my experience with Socialism, Green Politics, and Anti-ideology thinking, I have arrived at a conclusion that the problem with politics, political philosophy, and philosophy in general is that humans fail to understand human nature.

Absurd isn’t it? To be human and yet not understand what human nature is…

Yet, that is exactly what I think is the problem. Let me illustrate:

I have argued for quite some time that ideology is a human disease that creates wars and immense human suffering. Yet, ideology is just the dogma of political philosophy, which in turn is just a world view that claims to understand what human nature and life is.

All political and general philosophies are about understanding what our human nature is. General philosophy will be about our relationship with the world, purpose of life, etc. but it is political philosophy that deals with social relationships and the use of power within society including how to manage the economy and the government’s role in the lives of its citizens. Since governments and economies are fundamentally tools that represent parts of our humanity, political philosophies that focus on economics still make fundamental assumptions about human nature.

So, it is all about understanding what our Human Nature is, or as inspired by a past U.S.A. Presidential campaign, “Its Our Human Nature, Stupid”.

Now I am going to argue that the reason why all political philosophies are inherently limited and ultimately very dangerous is because they have limited and inhuman understandings of human nature. You will see that their definition of Human Nature is so distorted with blind, stupid ideology, it is little surprise we have the problems we see in the world today.

The largest political philosophies/ideologies can be generally summarized to believe the following about human nature.

• The Socialists and Communists believe that humans deserve equality of economic outcomes. Nature (human and mother nature) can be improved upon and perfected. It is natural for humans to share and be egalitarian. The weakness of Socialist and Communist thought is that they do not recognize humanity’s inherent inequality and the freedom to allow gifted elites to evolve the species.
• Libertarians and Anarchists believe that humans deserve equality of opportunity and freedom from coercion. Human nature can be improved upon if a person chooses it and people need to be given the opportunity to figure out their own way of happiness. The weakness of Libertarian and Anarchists thought is that they do not recognize that many people require authority in their lives and believe in Utopian societies where consequences do not exist.
• Welfare Liberals believe that humans deserve protection and opportunity to be contented. They do not believe in the free market, but tolerate it because it allows them to fund their government programs.  Human nature is perfectible when society provides everything that is needed. The weakness of Welfare Liberal thought is that they want to provide a perfect world where imperfect outcomes is natural.
• Conservatives believe that humans need to be ruled so that society can function. They believe that society functions best when the elites of society are properly ruling. Human nature is imperfect, but the best (through birth, connections, knowledge, or something else) will rise above the masses to be an example for the rest. The weakness of Conservative thinking is that it creates institutional thinking and thereby weakens society.
• Fascists and Nationalists believe that humans are tools to be used for the needs of the nation. They believe that human nature is only perfect if it serves the nation, otherwise it will degenerate into selfish and aimless behaviors. The weakness of Fascist and Nationalist thought is that it falls prey to xenophobia and racism.
• Populists believe that humans (‘the people’) need to be consulted with matters that affect them. Human nature is presumed for everyone who one of the folk and you continue to possess this human nature so long as you remain part of the group. The weakness of Populist thought is that it falls prey to mob mentality and tends to be reactionary.
• Humanists believe that humans are the pinnacle of evolution. Because humans are able to think, create technology, and communicate with advances symbols, the natural world and the universe is its oyster. The weakness of Humanist thinking is that it tends to be materialistic, expansionist, and insular.
• Greens believe that humans need to live in balance with the natural world. They want human society to be smaller, more peaceful, and egalitarian so that humanity can be happier. The weakness of Green thinking is that it falls prey to employing scare tactics, self-extinction, and scarcity thinking.

Can you see how each of the political philosophies has a rigid understanding of Human Nature? It is one thing, and one thing only, not being allowed to change. Political philosophy and its bulldog, ideology, tell us only they they understand human nature and there are no other interpretations. Sounds just like most religions.

So, what exactly is Human Nature? It is generally described as “the psychological and social qualities that characterize humankind, especially in contrast with other living things.”  While this definition is accurate, it is far too vague and does not list the qualities that makes up human nature.

Based on my own insights and a brief peruse of the internet, I think Human Nature possesses at least the following qualities:

• It is complex, and is made up of multiple factors.
• One of the most overt factors was all share is that we are physical beings that depends on our physical environment to survive.
• It is dynamic, possessing the ability to change and evolve.  See blog post ‘Are Most People Good?’. This is direct contrast with those philosophies that see human nature as being inherently good or evil.
• It possesses the ability to self-regulate, initiate action, but also be influenced by its environment. The question of Free Will vs Determinism or Nature vs Nurture is a needless distraction. See blog post ‘A Continuum of Human Nature’. We possess the ability to make choices, but also appear to generally prefer to have choices made for us.
• It is prone to solidifying and measuring things. This is done in an effort to exert control over its environment. We tend to spend lots of energy understanding and organizing our environment using symbols and technology. We create mental constructions and memes that encompass concepts such as Self, Human Nature, and Life. (This blog post is an example of this manifestation)
• It experiences a wide range of sensations, emotions, and thoughts which are intensely felt but rarely understood.
• Is is governed by what appears to be dilemma inducing laws such of Supply vs Demand, Freedom vs Safety, Time vs Money, Happy vs Right, Justice vs Peace, Familiarity vs Contempt, Mastery vs Ease.
• It resorts to past behaviors that worked, even if the problem and solution has changed.
• It possesses expectations and desires that are always changing and rarely satisfied.
• Is is easily led and suggestible where broken windows and littering can lead to increased vice and crime (as taken from the Economist article Can the Can).
• It has immense capacity for inflicting, experiencing, and tolerating suffering.
• It learns by making mistakes before getting it right.

I do not believe this is an exhaustive list of qualities, but is just a starting point. But what is listed provides a stark contrast to the political philosophies I listed above. It is now little wonder to me why I find those political philosophies to be inadequate.

Yet, I once too believed that ideology was the solution. And even when I realized that ideology is the problem, I did not understand the subtlety of the matter. I was wrong when I wrote in my 2005 resignation letter to the Green Party that the personal is more important that policies. While the the essential spirit of the letter still resonates for me, I now understand that the continued understanding of human nature is the solution.

And so, I continue to wait for a political philosophy that fully recognizes the potential and scope of Human Nature, instead of limiting it. I wait for a new political philosophy that tries to understand and support Human Nature. One that is prepared to ask questions, receive answers, and then ask more questions. It needs to be always open to learning.

With such a political philosophy we can finally become free of the dehumanizing yoke of ideology.

As one of the younger people at my office, I belong to the Baby Bust / Generation X cohort. which is in contrast with most of my colleagues who are in their mid to late 50s and are part of the Baby Boom.

It has been my experience that Baby Boomers are generally a positive group who believe that the world is always getting better. In contrast, I am pretty cynical about the future, particularly the Health Care industry I work in where the future challenges are being solved with more bureaucracy and institutional thinking. While I see us being faced with a very negative future, my older colleagues see lots of strengths. Who is right? I don’t know, since the correct answer depends on the question being asked. A big part of my perspective is my fiscal conservatism which which asks, “How are we going to pay for all of this?”

What I do worry about is that the Baby Boom in their enthusiasm, rose-colored view of the world, and breaking of social rules will leave the younger generations with a huge financial and social headache. I don’t see them as a group asking any of the hard questions, nor even caring how things are being run. This is demonstrated in Europe’s debt crisis with Greece not being able to afford its government programs. I am worried that this is what we will face in the future, especially as the Baby Boomers retire and begin drawing on government programs yet contribute less to the tax coffers. The problem is that the Baby Boomers are spending the money now, and it won’t really be there for them (or the following generations) when they need it.

What is interesting is that this all seems to be part of a natural cycle expressed by an interesting website I stumbled upon. The website combines mythology and generation gap issues into a thoroughly researched perspective called the Lifecourse Insight. Check it out.

I never asked her, but I am sure the presenter thought that all of the evil acts of the world are committed by a small number of bad or misunderstood people. She saw people themselves being valued as good or bad. For her, the world is made up mostly of good people whose lives get ruined by a small number of bad people. The value is placed on the person, not on the behavior.

My experience tells me otherwise. Instead of seeing human nature being inherently good or bad, I would instead that it being imbued with potential for both. Across time and place people have struggled to avoid suffering and find happiness in life.  It is the limitless ways of finding happiness that makes human nature appear so complex. Yet this complexity does not mean that we have to leave our ability to judge at the door. The value judgment of whether a particular pursuit of happiness is good or bad can be judged by the actions undertaken. The continuum between good and bad would be based around how one pursues happiness. “Good” behavior would be demonstrated when one enjoys putting the needs of others before their own needs and/or taking happiness in another’s happiness, while “Bad” behavior would see a person putting their own needs before others or having to harm/kill others to be happy.

By becoming aware of the distinction between these different kinds of happiness we can stop labeling the person or our human nature as inherently bad or good. We will find that there is no original sin or inherent angelic quality in us, just dynamic potentialities. We can then judge the actions and not the person. Awareness of this subtle but critical distinction will lead us to a healthier place as captured by Ropbert Pop in his quote: “Awareness is the first step towards healing”.

With awareness we can leave the fairy-tale worldview that human nature is inherently good and toward a more complete view of ourselves.

WHO? Every topic needs a subject.
WHAT? Every subject needs an event.
WHEN? Every event needs a time.
WHERE? Every event needs a place.
WHY? The existentialist question. There is a reason behind the subject experiencing the event, at the time and place it happened.

That’s five W’s… but there is actually a sixth, forgotten one. I will argue that the sixth W is found at the end of the question and word: “HOW?”.

HOW is the most forgotten and subtle question. It is the only future-looking or solution-focused question. After we have answers to the first five questions, we need to ask HOW so we can re-frame the entire situation to consider change and solutions.

HOW do we create peace?

HOW do we reduce suffering?

HOW do we find happiness?

Perhaps problems remain unsolved because we stop short of asking the forgotten ‘W’ question of HOW.

In contrast to the Leftist/Communist understanding of Class Conflict, the Creative Class is a term given to what is considered to be an expanding and powerful socioeconomic class which cuts across nations. Its a concept that is heavily promoted by Richard Florida with books and websites.

While his use of ‘class’ is problematic for me, because class implies group-consciousness, I do think that he is identifying a clear socioeconomic transformation of our societies. Whether this leads to a creative class consciousness or not, there is no doubt that we are seeing a large amount of wealth generation coming from intellectual property, new business models, and the arts. Here are some interesting links about the rise of a new creative/entertainment class.

Check them out:

Creative Class

Time Magazine’s article on America’s New Class System

New Stateman’s article on Replacing One Social Class System with Another

…

Middle of the Muddle: A Poem About Mid-Life

by Christopher Billows

…

I have learned,

that facts and theory,

found in degrees and libraries,

do not grow or touch our psyche.

…

I have met many,

the brilliant and the dull,

and the rich and the poor,

and found happiness being the pursuit of all.

…

I have worked for years,

seen the capable abhorred,

found leaders be the first to hide,

and watched justice be ignored.

…

I pursued self-actualization,

and have always been stung,

that the pursuit of the perfect,

is the cause of all wrong.

…

I have loved and adored,

witnessed another’s death,

fathered and seen birth,

and now ponder the drama of a final breath.

…

Yet, there is a second Golden Rule which is just as relevant but quite a bit more cynical. The second Golden Rule is, “The one with the gold, makes the rules.”

On one hand you have a succinct summary of good ethical and moral conduct, on the second you have a summary of how most political, economic, and sociological conduct takes place.

I personally think that both Golden Rules are relevant and are actually compatible. The first one deals with the idealistic and religious realm of human beings, the second deals with the conventional truth of human relations and history. Some people operate exclusively in one realm and ignore the other realm. History has shown that idealism alone does not work, while misused power is destructive.

A balance between both Golden Rules is quite possibly the real Golden Rule to follow…

My in-laws are living examples of people who took full advantage of what Canada offers them. They are immigrants who worked very hard and created wealth through their industry which appears to be lost of many native-born Canadians. Technically they have always been “poor” as far as annual earnings are concerned, yet the life they lead is as far away from poverty as can be. Their example tells me that that poverty is not a state of physical or financial want, but a psychological one. These are people who don’t think of themselves as poor and in terms of how they live, they are not. They have more than enough money because they are content to live within their means.

Yet there is nothing simply psychological about the poverty experienced by Canada’s aboriginal people. I can only conclude that what they have experienced collectively is a poverty due to systemic discrimination, learned helplessness, welfare mentality, isolation, familial dissolution, and a culture of victimization. Looking at their situation, there is no doublt that what they are experiencing is psychological, but the roots behind it are due to social and political forces. In their situation poverty is a political issue, not a personal one.

So I would say that Poverty has two manifestations:

1) Personal Poverty is about the individual psychology behind being poor. It is all about personal expectations and financial competency. It is how a person defines himself/herself when it comes to wealth or lack of same.

2) Systemic Poverty is about how government programs and social pressures (internal and external) impact on people. It is not about how much money you keep, but how a system, government, or collective defines what poverty is and how to fix it. Using the aboriginal people as an example, the Canadian government has consistently undermined that group’s ability to be self-sufficient through its paternalistic, welfare policies.

A individual can experience both kinds of poverty, one of them, or none of them, which would provide us with a broader spectrum and hopefully more insightful way of understanding what poverty is. Perhaps with better understanding, comes the possibility to deal with the problem.

The response of the government has been the same as a wise parent would have with misbehaving children. When highly-paid and highly-educated bank executives act as stupid as they have been, it appears completely rational to  provide oversight and limitations on their behavior. We are told that free market capitalism has been wholly discredited. Governments need to cut the roots of the problem, just like how Jack cut down the beanstalk in the fairytale.

Governments see themselves as having a role to protect citizens from harm including protecting the integrity of the economic system. They have a duty to the businesses and citizens who were hapless victims to the financial crisis just like how Jack had to defeat the evil Giant by by cutting down the beanstalk.

So we see an interesting parallel between the Jack and the Beanstalk fairytale and what took place in the 2008-2009 Financial Crisis. With a bit of play, we could suggest a parallel casting of:

Jack = Government
The Giant = The Large Financial Corporations who created the financial crisis
The Beanstalk = The Free Market
The Golden Goose = Corporate Profits, Employee Taxes, and Tax Revenues

As most people know, the fairy tale ends with Jack owning the Giant’s treasures after the Giant is killed. The fact that the Giant was systematically targeted, stolen from, and then killed calls into question the moral fibre of Jack. And in the same way, I also think that governments stepping in to save the economic system is wrong for the following reasons:

1) Jack Should Have Stayed Home = Government Needs To Mind Its Own Business

If you recall, Jack was the initiator of the entire story as it was he who went looking for mischief. Jack takes a marked non-heroic path by essentially breaking into the Giant’s home, stealing his most prized possessions, and ends up killing the Giant who rightfully pursues him at the end of the story. Jack intervened into the Giant’s life for his own benefit.

In the same way, the government is doing the same thing now. It is directly supporting certain businesses, yet letting others die. Because of its immense size, governments should not get involved with deciding which companies live or die. The free market works because it is dynamic and responsive. If a company makes too many mistakes, they go out of business. Yet the government is creating moral hazards in the marketplace by rewarding business mistakes with corporate welfare. This ends up tainting the benefits of the free market system.

Jack should have stayed home and not climbed the Beanstalk just like Governments should not get involved with rescuing companies.

2) Jack Depends on the Golden Goose = Government Depends on Taxes

Jack takes the Golden Goose from the Giant for himself. He has now acquired a means to secure his financial future because this magical creature lays precious golden eggs. Hooray for the hero but too bad for the Giant.

In the same way, Governments are dependent on the profits and wealth generated by the private sector. Governments need to pay for all of the employees, politicians, and public services, so they need a Golden Goose of their own. And in our world it is called Taxation. And it is not just the taxes that paid by public sector employees that counts here, since only true wealth generation and industry comes from the private sector as I had blogged before.

Jack claims the Golden Goose for himself just like how Government dependence on private wealth generation (including international trade) has it claiming ownership over the the marketplace.

3) Jack Does Not Know How to Care For the Golden Goose = Government Will Harm Itself By Intervening In The Marketplace

The Fairy Tale leaves us with the assumption that Jack lives happily ever after. He has the Golden Goose, the Magic Harp, etc. Yet what if the Golden Goose required a particular diet to help lay those golden eggs? How can we be sure Jack will know how to care for the Goose? The Giant who had been able to care for the Goose is now dead and cannot teach Jack how to care for the Goose.

In the same way, we see the Government intervening in the marketplace by punishing or saving certain Giants, they end up compromsing the results. Instead of allowing the market to decide who wins or loses, they are intervening in an attempt to change the outcome. This ends up doing more harm than good as evidenced by governments propping up capitalist/state-funded monstrosities such as General Motors.

Jack is not capable of caring for the special needs of the Golden Goose just as Governments are not capable of controlling the marketplace.

4) Killing the Giant Requires Killing the Beanstalk = Neutering or Propping Companies will eventually Poison the Marketplace

According to the story, Jack kills the Giant by cutting down the Beanstalk. He has to basically destroy the Beanstalk in order to topple the Giant to his death.

In the same way, we see the government intervening in the markeplace to stop the capitalists from making more mistakes. But by too strongly intervening into the economy they end up harming it. Governments fail to understand that business entities will be born, rise in power, and will one day end, but others will be there to replace them.

It is the way the natural world works and it is the way the marketplace works.

The problem is not that the Giant died, but that it was killed by Jack. The Giant, like the capitalists, is not evil, but is very dumb at times. They will over extend themselves and when they fall down, will leave quite a mess. But they will be replaced by another who will need to learn from its own mistakes in order to survive. Its an imperfect process that is a reflection of humanity’s own imperfection. It continues to astound me that as an imperfect species we hope to create a perfect system.

5) Jack Created the Mischief = Government Created the Roots of the Financial Crisis

Jack trades his cow for the magic beans and we know how the rest of the story unfolds, which is all set in motion by Jack’s mischief-making. Instead of minding his own business and doing what was asked of him, Jack gambled away the cow for something shiny.

In the same way, the governments contributed to the financial crisis by doing more than was asked of them. By creating an artificially low inflation/low-interest economy (they are the controllers of the interest rates) they encouraged a large number of investors to park their money in the more speculative investments. You can see how this all take place  in the brilliant video here.

Governments have now ran up huge budget deficits to save the economy because they were just as responsible for its collapse as the greedy and speculative investors. Like Jack, the Governments are not the hero of the story, but the cause of it.

I would end off by saying that Jack and the Beanstalk would have an entirely different meaning as a fairy tale if we saw it written from the Giant’s perspective and was called: Jack the Thief and Giant Killer. In the same way, holding people responsible for our financial crisis must not be isolated to greedy capitalists, but also to arrogant politicians that seek perfect outcomes.

The rational response to the global financial crisis needs to be the same as a wise parent would have with children.

If the highly-paid, highly-educated executives of the banks are as stupid as they have been, then yes we need to legislate them. Ideologically, we shoud move towards more freedom and independence, but it is a virtue that needs to be earned. Like a kid who learns to be an adult.

Governments have a role to protect people from other's stupidity and short-sightedness. Protection of the integrity of the economic system. Let people make their own mistakes, but mistakes that have the effect of ruining the lives of others who have no control over the circumstances is wrong and unethical.

A person gambles his family's life savings away. His wife and children and himself are left destitute. It is tragic and horrible. Who is responsible? The individual, but also the spouse. She had control over her choice. She also had as much right to know what he was doing with their money. If she does not take that responsibilty because that is her mistake to trust the wrong person. It is all about learning to trust the right people.

The fundamental assumption is that people are greedy and need to have legislated protection to protect them from themselves. This assumption has borne out to be true. This is a black eye in those who believe in a free market like myself. How do I resolve the two?

Its really about maturity. Its about milestones. Would a bank rationally give a startup millions of dollars if the business was entering a saturated market or had no experience? No. They might give a lot less. It is about graduated freedom.

The free market is the ideal system to adopt, but it needs to be graduated to. As a firm demonstrate maturity and responsibility, it should be given more and more freedoms. Like a child. 

Its one thing to assume that all adults are competent to make their own decisions, but it is another stretch if we assume that educated, trained, and experienced banking professionals know how to run their business yet end up harming the rest of the economy because of it. It is unethical for the rest of the population to suffer the stupidity of a few fools.

I would argue that the lending power of banks be controlled, but gradually and reasonably expanded as they demonstrate greater competence with it. When a bank goes over its lending restrictions, then there needs to be a citizen focused group that is picked by government that fines the bank for same.

Government should not be delivering services or oversight. They just need to fund it. Ultimately if government picks the wrong people to provide the oversight, then they would suffer the consequence. 

Yes, the free market the way to go. It is the most natural system that makes sense, but freedom is something that is earned, not blindly given. It is time we demonstrated this in our economy.

But is all generosity the same? Is giving to a charity that buys books for disadvantaged children as beneficial as giving to a charity that prevents children from becoming disadvantaged? What about charities that protect our environment or those that promote particular religious perspectives?

The problems of modern society is overwhelming and the charitable response is just as confusing. While I commend people to give to a cause they believe in, I also think that some things are not as high a priority as others. A blogger named “Gates” posted a bold and insightful blog that helped me develop a rationale method on prioritizing which charities I should give to.

For example, I will be excluding charitable organizations from most of my future donations based on the following criteria:

1) Charities that have high administration and fund-raising expenses. What’s the point giving to a charity if a large portion of your donation is not even reaching the people the charity is intending to service? Unfortunately, there is no clearing house for information on Management Expense Ratios for Canadian charities, but there is one called the Charity Navigator which does a good job of providing reviews on U.S. based charities. A brief review of some Canadian charties indicates that MERs run between 5%-8%.

2) Charities that have goals that are unrealistic, which puts them at the risk to becoming little more than institutions that do little good. A group like Make Poverty History possesses a laudable but unattainable goal to fix global poverty. How are they going to do what the United Nations and national governments are not already doing? I am fine with interest groups promoting their perspective, but they should not be allowed to be charities. Poverty is a political issue and not about charity.

The goals must be attainable since in my way of thinking most charities should be in the business to put itself out of business. It should only exist to meet an attainable goal and once done so, then be dissolved.

3) Organizations that partially duplicate what the taxpayer is already funding. There are a multitude of member-based disease societies such as the MS Society, MD Society, etc. whose members receive most of their medical and physical care by our taxpayer funded health system. Same thing with Literacy and Poverty organizations whose targeted populations are mostly supported through the education and welfare systems funded by taxes. Our tax dollars are already a form of charity, the biggest problem being the huge MER that comes with government run programs, but that’s content for another post.

4) Charities that promote ‘civil society’ like Historical and Art societies. I would happily support an Arts Council or a Museum if I knew that the other concerns I have about our society was addressed. As long as there are people living in deplorable circumstances (the old bread vs circuses debate), my donations to these types of charities will be minimal or nil.

So who does this leave to give to? Well, this is my short list:

• Organizations that help reduce abject poverty (such as UNESCO)
• Organizations that are provide societal harm-reduction (such MADD or John Howard Society)
• Organizations that help animals and natural ecosystems (Top Environmental Organizations)
• Organizations that help people to help themselves (such as Kiva or FINCA or United Way)

If the purpose of generosity is to help fellow persons, then the giver needs to think how best to help others. While any form of generosity is good, the benefit is less if those dollars are given blindly. Hopefully, this post will prompt you think about where to place your generosity and dollars to maximum affect, since it is not possible to both be everywhere and be effective.

In 1968, distinguished personality theorist Walter Mischel pointed out that correlations between a person’s behavior in one setting and another are often surprisingly low.

Mischel’s analysis revealed that the individual’s behavior, when closely examined, was highly dependent upon situational cues, rather than expressed consistently across diverse situations that differed in meaning. For example, people we label very talkative may hardly talk at all at a formal gathering. If personality is measured by one’s behavior, then we find that personality is indeed more fluid.

Another theorist, Richard Nisbett, took this argument farther and argued that personality traits are merely cognitive delusions people create regarding their friends and family in order to give their worlds and their relationships an artificial aura of predictability. Thus the personality becomes little more than a mirage that gives us a sense of comfort. Pretty harsh!

Its a jarring message that rips apart a mostly universal understanding of ourselves. It does away with the ’sacred cow’ of the personal which I find both unnerving and compelling. Its a message that is found in various mystical traditions and certain introspective philosophies, where we are encouraged to move past who we think we are to discover a deeper understanding to our lives.

I am now inclined to the think of the traditional notion of personality is akin to a pacifier. An object that eventually needs to be done away with as one truly matures.

The problem is that self-determination is a concept that does not possess singular qualities, but is multifaceted and complex. Each facet has a subtle difference that requires some degree of mental focus and contemplation to look at. It is this lack of focus and contemplation that dooms us to be caught up in issues that are not ours to own and also ignore issues that we should deal with.

I have spent some time thinking about this and I happy to share how I see these facets existing on the theoretical Slope of Self-Determination:

1) People Have the Right to Make Bad Choices

We start out at the top of the the slope. The assumption here is that everyone is competent until proven otherwise. It is both reasonable and practical to assume that people are competent to make their own choices, whether they are good or bad. People are given the freedom to succeed or fail.

A person may choose to smoke despite its health risks or to gamble despite not having money for their other obligation. Those who make good choices will find life to be challenging but possessing a sense of progress, while those who make bad choices will find themselves victimized by the eventual boomerang of their action’s consequences.

The lesson to learn here is that a free and just society would allow people to make their own choices AND suffer the resulting consequences of those actions.

2) Making Bad Choices Does Not Make One Bad

When a person makes good choices, there is little ethical or social debate. It is only when a person goes against the conventional mores of society that problems follow. Yet, regardless of the choice being made, there tends to be a societal prejudice to confuse the action with the inherent quality of the individual.

For example: a person spends all of their money on gambling and does  not have enough money to pay their rent or to pay for clothing for their children would generally be seen as somebody who is making bad choices. This individual obviously has some serious issues, but the poor choices do not translate into saying the individual is tainted or bad.

The person might have an addiction problem, an impulse problem, or perhaps a mental illness. They might also have wrong ideas about gambling. The problem of gambling is actually a symptom to a more subtle problem. To blame the individual for their poor choices ends up doing more harm than good since it alienates them from being given the opportunity to potentially change for the better.

The lesson to be learned here is to separate the action from the person.

3) Offering Assistance Does Not Impose on Self-Determination

Carrying on with the previous example, our person who is struggling with a gambling problem, may be seen as making conscious choices to gamble. Some argue that they are doing to themselves and there is no point offering to help them.  While it is true that nobody is being coerced to gamble, there is a sad truth that sometimes people do not utilize the proper skills to deal with what life throws at them.

Some people think that since the troubled person has not yet successfully dealt with their gambling problem that they are not interested in offers of assistance. Its a variation of blaming the victim. Its as if that to offer a potential solution would impose on the gambler’s self-determination.

This is a twisted misconception. A person always has a right to refuse assistance, but they must first be given the opportunity to refuse it. This means that the care or treatment needs to be offered first.

I have met some well-intentioned, but mislead people who think that respecting one’s Self-Determination means expecting clients are take the initiative to ask for help. Yet there could be a range of reasons why people do not ask for help. Respecting Self-Determination means respecting the person’s right to refuse and not assuming they do not want help because they have not asked for it.

The lesson here is that to truly respect self-determination is to give the individual the opportunity to say no.

4) Refusing Care Is A Right, But Not A Sentence

This is closely tied to the above point, but possesses a subtle difference, as it focuses on the caregiver’s perspective.

A person refusing assistance is not the same thing as not asking for care in the future. Self-determination means being allowed to say no to a present choice, but not being condemned by that choice for the rest of their life. There are times when people are sometimes too tired, too confused, or too proud to ask for help but a choice can always be reversed.

I had a client who refused a treatment for his diabetes, he thought that he was going to manage this on his own. He never did a good job with managing it, and when he developed complications, it became incumbent on the health care team to ask him if he wanted help. He still did not accept the offer, but the point is that he just made another choice to say no.

And there may possibly come a time when he will accept the offer for assistance since it is completely reasonable to assume that people do change their minds and may actually want the help.

The lesson here is to always keep the door open to the person to change their mind about accepting help.

5) Evidence of Chronic Poor Self-Determination Should Not Be Ignored

It is assumed that people will eventually learn from their mistakes. Their bad choices if allowed to boomerang to them will hopefully show them the error of their ways. But what happens when some people never learn? What happens if they continue to make the same bad choices and are hopelessly in trouble?

I have had clients who could not learn from their mistakes and they tended to have one of the following problems:  a birth defect, dementia, mental illness, uncontrolled addictions, or very rigid world view. Given such conditions, I think that it is wrong to ignore these limitations and allow the person to continue to make the same mistake.

When a person makes the same mistakes and after many years (or months if the decisions are particularly disastrous) the person then requires intervention by family and/or the health professionals. Ultimately, the person may be declared incompetent and will have their affairs taken over by somebody else.

Human beings are biologically built to learn so it is reasonable to expect people to learn from their mistakes so they can function at their optimum. Thus, I would argue that a person who is not able to learn needs to be protected and their range of choices would need to be more limited than somebody who is able to learn.

The lesson here is to be prepared to step in to help a client when the poor decisions have reached a state that is unreasonable.

6) An Incompetent Person still retains their Right to Dignity and Some Self-Determination

Now just because a person is incompetent, does not mean that they are non-persons. They continue to have feelings, opinions, and still retain aspects of their decision making.

A person with advanced dementia will still remember how they have been made to feel. They might not remember the content of the conversation, but they definitely will feel all of the non-verbal communication directed at them. Just because a person cannot make appropriate decisions, does not mean they need to be devalued.

I had a client with advanced dementia who was given the option to choose what kind of clothing he would like to wear from two different choices. He would not be allowed to self-determine to not wear clothing or to wear soiled clothing, since either choice is unreasonable, but he would be asked to become involved with this limited decision making.

The lesson her is that giving people with limited capacity the dignity to make some decisions is the sign of a compassionate society.

7) A Person Who Harms Others or Themselves Needs Protection Must Have Their Actions Curtailed

A person who chronically abuses chemicals to the point they cannot function normally needs protection. Most states have laws that dictates that society needs to both protect the vulnerable and to be protected from those who do not respect human life.

Chemical restraints should be the preferred method to protect the larger community from individuals who have slipped to the very bottom of the slope. A community’s need for safety should  trump the needs of any individual who is so incapable to make proper decisions. There should be no negotiation in regards to this.

The bottom of the slope is the most extreme and difficult aspect of self-determination. It is where people end up at when they are both the most vulnerable and the most difficult to deal with. The difficulty with our society is that it refuses to acknowledge the importance of community in the decisions to release dangerous offenders back to re-offend again or when it comes to protecting the incompetent. Our heads are collectively in the sand.

I had a client who had dementia, was financially abused by members of his family, and could not manage his medical needs. Upon entering the hospital, he was returned home to the same situation despite my expressed concerns. The doctors had assessed that he was choosing to make this decision to return to his home. They ignored all of the signs that he was vulnerable. Yes, he wanted to return home, but this was because he did not understand that he was vulnerable or that he was being stolen from. The system failed him and he inevitably ended up in hospital again after being booted from his home due to the family not paying the rent.

The lesson here is that if there is no protection of society and the vulnerable, then government and its institutions become drags on the happiness of its citizens. It is this weight that drags society down to the base of the self-determination slope. A society that does not protect itself is doomed to dysfunction, corruption, and forever impairing the happiness of its members.

Yet was the earth and its various biological systems created for human happiness? Is a stunning sunset with a backdrop of mountains made for humans? We would like to think so… but it assumes that in enjoying these sights and wonders, we are made special.

We witness a wonderful sunset and a nice feeling arises. Nothing new there, but it is that rising feeling that tells us more about ourselves than about our environment.

For example, a beautiful bird is not put there for bird-watching. It’s foliage is not for our enjoyment. The actual purpose is biological as the beautiful colors are there for the purpose of mating. They are beautiful because beauty works. Its a simple as that.

Mountains are there for their own purpose. They were not created for human appreciation but simply represent the collisions of continents. Yet our appreciation of them leads us to believe that they are a wonderful gift proving that we are cherished and special.

The stunning space environment we see courtesy of Hubble was there before we possessed powerful telescopes. Those stars have already been there for billions of years, way before our species even existed! The fact we are now able to witness them does not change our fundamental relationship with the universe. But it does change our perception of the universe. We begin to think that we are unique and special because we have witnessed something amazing. We extrapolate these powerful feelings of gratitude into projections of ownership.

But it is not ownership that makes something beautiful. Art is beautiful because it works, not because we can possess it or derive an emotional meaning from it. A beautiful setting is there regardless whether we enjoy it or not.

And when we do come across a beautiful setting, we are challenged to recognize that gratitude towards the planet and universe will naturally arise, but should be based on appreciation for its own sake, and free from any taint of ownership and delusion.

People who believe in the Free Enterprise generally possess the following characteristics:

• Humility – They don’t believe that the marketplace can be controlled.  It is far too complicated to be controlled and fully understood, but it works because individually the marketplace works for most people.
• Modesty – They don’t pretend to have the all of the answers or claim to know how to fix the marketplace. They trust the collective wisdom and decision making of  the participants to do what they need to do.
• Patience – They understand that businesses with make mistakes, that there will be market crashes, and that the long term view is important.
• Positive – They believe that everyone has the capacity to make it their way in the world to the best extent possible. They believe that people find happiness in the market and if they are not happy, they will have the opportunity to change things. Fundamental to this is an assumption that people have the capacity to learn from their mistakes and make their own decisions.
• Introspective – They believe that the high standard of living reached is a indicator of the system’s success. Seeing people thrive when given freedom reinforces their convictions.
• Realistic – They don’t believe that life is about finding perfection, but about reaching the greatest good for the greatest number of people. It is utilitarian perspective.

In contrast, the Anti-Free Enterprisers (socialists, government interventionists, etc) possess the characteristics of:

• Arrogance – They claim to know the answer to finding happiness for everyone. They believe that a complicated system like the Free Market can can be reduced to a simple formula which can then be controlled. They will have answers and complex theories why the Free Market system does not work, even when they have never ran a single business in their entire life.
• Intellectualism – They believe in ideas over experience and that everything can be explained and thus controlled. They are looking for perfect understanding and perfect control. Some are prone to ideological purity.
• Pessimism – They believe that the free enterprise is full of exploitation and dog-eat-dog competition. They believe that perfection is possible and that full-efficiency is attainable. Because the world is so far away from perfection, they tend to be predisposed towards grumpiness and negativity.
• Paternalism – They believe that people need to be protected from the Free Market. They see victimization as a ritual occurrence and must be vigorously countered. They are constantly fighting causes for the weak and disenfranchised, be they the economic poor, the ethnic minorities, and mother nature.

Its a pretty lopsided list against the Anti-Free Enterprisers. While they are speaking from a place of concern and protectiveness (admirable intentions) they make a  fundamental error of judgment: That people can and do evolve to be stronger and self-reliant when challenged to do so.

Alternatively, the people who believe in Free Enterprise have a sensible and intuitive approach, which is based on informed observation and philosophy.

What is interesting is this list has provided for me a litmus test for the type of leaders I think we need to cultivate. I have maintained in other posts (Green Party and Ideology vs Philosophy) that people and their individual qualities are more important than the political ideology they follow. This comparison list allows for these qualities to be tested for, regardless of political party.

The questions could help remind our politicians and citizens that government has an important but limited role to play in the Free Enterprise system. That knowing one’s limits is a sign of humility, and humility is always a virtue.

The store manager decides that the store losing $15 on the plant so that both he and the complaining customer can be  satisfied is a rationale way to operate. The complaining customer gets what they want and the manager keeps his reputation clean and bonus intact. Obviously it is the fear of losing his financial bonus that is driving his behavior.

So, we now have two people benefiting at the shared expense of all others. The victims, the thousands of others customers who subsidize this action through the higher prices they pay, are unaware that the customer is getting a plant they don’t deserve. It is not fair, but I would argue that it likely happens far more than we would care to entertain.

Sadly, the same thing happens in the public sector where managers and politicians are driven by fear to use tax revenues to appease the few at the expense of the many. It is fear that drives overt behaviors such protecting one’s constituency seat to the subtle behaviors of avoiding unpleasant emotions during a day’s work. The true victims of all of these situations are the millions of clueless and faceless taxpayers, who pay for the system to operate, but are unaware that the fear of social heights is what drives up costs, increases our taxes, and leads to bad outcomes.

Yet, this is a gross misunderstanding made by both anti-capitalists and pro-capitalists. Capitalism is not about valuing competition over cooperation. It is about having freedom to decide how to engage in the marketplace, either employing competition or cooperation or typically some fluid combination of both.

Capitalism is the only  system where voluntary economic cooperation can exist. Collectivist societies will place extensive social pressures on its members to “play nice”. This will determine what you are allowed to produce, who you are allowed to buy from, and who you are allowed to sell to. In a collectivist society you might not be allowed to sell your product to a particular region because they are not part of your social or ethnic group. The essence of being collectivist and having a common identity also means that there will be some kind of exclusion, since most collectivism is based on ethnic, familial, or religious identification.

Along comes capitalism which turns the old equation on its head because  each person is now allowed to choose for him/herself the extent that cooperation and/or competition is practiced. It does not place a value of one over the other. But because most humans are social creatures, capitalism is based on far more cooperation and trust than competition.

One example is a story that a friend told me. He works for a major courier company and told me how the largest courier companies  have cooperative agreements with each other to divide up geographic territories to save costs and create efficiencies. While some may say that this is an example of collusion, I would argue that it is an example of cooperation. These companies have decided that competition is not in everyone’s collective best interest.

A personal favorite example is where software firms have successfully established themselves by giving away their product for free. They are not even competing on the basis of price, but instead by providing a relationship through the use of their product. It is because capitalism allows people the freedom to choose how to conduct themselves, the Open-Source concept is alive and well.

Another example of this cooperation and trust taking place is that the basis of marketplace transaction is contract law. Companies will compete with each other but they do so by pursuing the most lucrative contracts, with investors, customers,and suppliers. The essence of any contract is about trust, partnership, and cooperation. The company who successfully cultivates the most successful relationships becomes the market leader. Unlike warfare where opponents actually battle directly with each other, capitalism diffuses this direct conflict by having the would-be competitors to play to their own strengths.

This happens because full-frontal, outright competition (like price wars) is exhausting and harms profitability. Instead, companies will participate in “monopolistic competition” where they each tries to carve out an economic niche (just like a species does in an ecological one) to survive and ultimately grow. Companies spend billions of dollars to figure out ways to distinguish themselves so they can find ways to not directly compete with others.

In this way, Capitalism emulates  the flexibility of an ecological system, tolerating diversity, allowing both competition and cooperation to co-exist and at times be partners in a fluid dance.  Capitalism may get all of its press from hyped-up gladiatorial competition, but this distorted image ignores the immense cooperation that has allowed it to exist and thrive.

I do, and I always thought it would be so cool to have Telepathy. If we could understand what everyone else was thinking, would that not make life easier?

There would be no more guessing what your partner, family, coworkers thought. You just would know. It would improve understanding and make communication easier. Sounds like a good thing.

But, now I think there are a couple of really good, solid, and practical reasons we did not evolve to have telepathy: Self-preservation and our need for solitude.

Our self-preservation would be compromised If we knew exactly what other people were thinking. We would probably go insane if we had no way of shutting out another’s thoughts. Our own minds are crazy enough, so I would not also want to know everyone else’s thoughts. We would hear every stupid, hostile, and inane thought which would have us ending up in mortal strife with everyone. Look how poor communication creates problems already.

Solitude allows us to keep secrets, plan in private, mull things over, and ultimately find some semblance of peace. In many ways modern technology and the internet has given us almost telepathic abilities. We now have daily communication via cellulars and email where we are completely kept up to date with what everyone is doing. Thinking and doing is easily tracked thanks to Twitter and Facebook. While it can be fun, it is also painfully distracting.

All mystical traditions teach us that the only way to true happiness is through concentration and solitude. It is coming from a position of solitude that the preciousness of our relationships begin to matter. Being alone in our thoughts allows for spirituality, invention, artistic creation, and secrets. Not being able to read another’s thoughts is actually a blessing and has likely contributed to our survival as a species.

Unfortunately, I have just cursed you because you are reading what I am thinking via this blog post. Sorry about that. Good thing I don’t know what you’re thinking.

For me, I remember making a conscious decision when I was about 17 years old to give up on playing music. I loved it but not enough to want to play it. Playing music did not resonate with me the way it would resonate with somebody who needed to play it. I can play music and believe I would have been a competent musician if I put in hours into it. Its just that I have other interests.

My friend says that he desperately wanted to play music but just could not. He said that people would show him how to play the guitar but he could not get his fingers to move the right way. It is was such a struggle that he decided that if it is not going to come easy, then its simply was not meant to be.

He said that this proves that we both lacked talent. I disagreed with him. Part of the reason for that disagreement is that we lacked a definition of what Talent is.

is Talent drive or is it innate ability to play? Is it both? Or something else?

First of all, I believe that Talent cannot be measured by being famous or popular.

Secondly, Talent is not just the speed by which one learns to play music. That is a combination of intelligence and coordination.

Thirdly, Talent is not just the personal drive and effort that is required to be good at something. Stubborn persistence is also a staple of successful politicians and businesspeople.

I believe that the technical aspects of playing music are available to most people, but that there is something else… An intangible element that makes a person connect so strongly with the activity in question that it is part of everything that they do. Talent is something innate but also environmental. It is like a gene that is triggered by the environment and then comes to possess a life and dynamism of its own.

For the sake of illustration, lets use a musical chord to illustrate how Talent works.

Somebody strikes a nice sounding chord on a guitar. The chord is there hanging in the air. What created the chord?

The first raw material would be the guitar.

The second raw material would be the guitar player.

But that is not enough. The chord needs an environment to thrive in. If there was no atmosphere for the sound waves to travel through, the chord would not exist. The acoustics of the place the chord is played is also relevant. The chord will also be imbued with more energy if there is somebody else to listen to it. Finally, the person who is doing the playing also needs to decide if the energy created is meaningful. It needs to resonate both ways. There has to be the right two-way encouragement.

Michael Jordon is an amazing basketball player. But his talent would not be appreciated in a society that had no basketball. He would not have been encouraged to play. But, the environment is only a piece of it. It also needs to resonate internally, it needs to fit with one’s own self-image and a will to do it. Michael Jordon not only had the talent, but also wanted to use it.

So I would have to say that there are four essential components to Talent:

1) Physical/Mental Ability

2) Environmental Trigger and Support

3) Personal Resonance

4) External Recognition (a talent that is not recognized as such will not be valued and perhaps even be seen as a curse)

A person can possess the ability to play, but if lacking a supportive environment, or a personal disinterest, that talent will be untapped. If it does not resonate, then no matter how beautiful it may sound, it is not going to work. I personally lacked personal resonance. Could I get it back? I don’t know. To this day, I am not hungry to create music. I dabble a little bit, but that is all and I don’t feel robbed by it. Unfortunately for my friend, he does feel cheated, and perhaps for him he had the personal resonance but lacked the physical/mental ability to do it.

And so in the end he was actually right. We both lacked Talent because each of us lacked at least one of the essential components of Talent.

Check it out…

Wealth Builder

J.P. Simmon (link lost) wrote:
“Music – is not an ethical realm, but a realm of feeling. It not about ethics (right and wrong) but about how one experiences something. Even shock rock is offensive to so many people, they are doing it for themselves. It is offensive to their tastes – though biting the heads off animals does pass it into the realm of ethics. It would be absurd to charge a person for murder when they commit suicide – it would be absurd to judge a personal experience such as music based on something that is right and wrong.”

Jordan Francke wrote:
“As a cinema major I am fortunate to have film history and terminology at my disposal to vocalize my opinions. This education helps me to explore my own preferences in cinema, but it does not give me any authority to place objective value on cinematic works. It may seem slightly disconcerting that everything is open-ended with no worldly means of determining the quality of human creation. But, if art were like a math problem with only one correct way to be expressed, life would be exceedingly dull. Everyone would hold the same ideals and see the world in an identical fashion. There would be no more intricacy and extremes in life.”

Jeff Jarvis wrote:
“Would I have critics? Yes, but their roles would change. They still should give their views and set art in context. But rather than issuing pronouncements and bon mots, unchallenged, from the screening room, I’d want them to spark the discussion about entertainment: find the good voices, pinpoint the arguments, even referee debates among artists and critics. A great critic should be a magnet for fascinating discussion. Take the debate around politics at the Guardian’s Comment is Free and imagine similar discussion over the arts, with critics acting not as pontificators but as opinionated moderators, even generous hosts.”

Jay Nordlinger gave a talk at Steinway Hall, New York, back in 2003 entitled “Who Cares What Critics Say?”. Its eloquence and power prompts its full inclusion here:

“Ladies and gentlemen, it’s a pleasure to be with you.

I thank Hilton Kramer and Roger Kimball for all they do to produce The New Criterion. I thank all who work under them, too. Hilton and his friend Samuel Lipman did a marvelous thing, 20 years ago, when they founded The New Criterion. I feel privileged to write for it. I feel privileged to read it, too! I have long considered The New Criterion part of my continuing education.

So, I thank all of you who support this journal. Your gifts are well directed. And, along with so many others, I’m especially grateful for Donald Kahn, a benefactor of The New Criterion, and of a great many institutions and individuals around the world. I’ve called him an Esterházy for our time. Moreover, he’s a lot of fun.

And, before I get down to business, I’d like to say that it is a particular pleasure to be with Bill Buckley, and with Pat Buckley.

It was some years ago that I was first asked to speak on “the role of the critic.” I have to tell you, I hesitated. I didn’t want to accept the assignment. And the reason is, I have always operated largely on feel. I was loath to jeopardize my work by the awful activity of thinking. I did not want to be subject to, what we call in golf, “paralysis by analysis.” If there’s one thing I dread, it’s being frozen at the keyboard. The truth is, much of what I have accomplished has been done by sheer bulling ahead, for better or worse. A critic has to be obstinate, cocksure—even heedless, at times. Otherwise, he can be swallowed up in a sea of hedging, and anxiety, and doubt.

Well, I did think about the role of the critic, those years ago, and I have since thought about it further. You’ll be relieved to know that I have reached certain conclusions. The first thing we must say—rush to say—is that we must not exaggerate the role of the critic. I’m sure any musicians present would agree! Of all the roles there are to play in music, that of critic must be very small indeed. Many people would put it at the bottom of the list, or quite near it. There are composers, pianists, conductors, singers, teachers, impresarios, limo drivers, hair stylists—the critics are barely an afterthought!

So, who are the most important, most famous music critics in history? They are, probably, Eduard Hanslick and Julius Korngold. Most people have never heard of them—but they have heard of the composers whom they were most closely associated with: Brahms and Mahler. That’s the point.

Hanslick was the most influential critic in Vienna, during the time of Brahms, his friend and hero. He was also an anti-Wagnerite, proving that you can’t be right about everything. His successor as the top critic in Vienna was Julius Korngold, now best known as the father of the composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold—and there’s our point again. Korngold was a great friend and booster of Mahler, who, as you know, was an intensely controversial figure. There are no anti-Mahlerites today—at least none who are too public. But in the composer’s own time, Vienna, and the rest of Europe, were swimming in them.

Did Korngold’s activities hasten the acceptance of Mahler? Maybe. But Mahler’s hour, owing to his genius, surely would have come, no matter who scribbled what.

George Bernard Shaw and Virgil Thomson were famous music critics, too, but they are famous now, obviously, for other things: Shaw for being . . . well, Shaw, and Thomson for being a composer. If anyone could cite any of their music criticism, it would be a great surprise. Thomson, if he is known for anything, critically, is known for his brutal dismissal of Tchaikovsky. Better for Thomson that he be known for his music, some of which is really quite fine, and deserves to endure.

Closer to our own day, Claudia Cassidy, the critic in Chicago, was famed, feared, and loathed. One of the reasons George Solti didn’t take the conducting job in Chicago on first being offered it was that he feared he couldn’t survive Cassidy—that she wouldn’t give him a fair shake. Can you imagine? But chances are, few people remember Cassidy’s name today, even in her hometown.

Out in Los Angeles, the critic for many years was Martin Bernheimer, another object of fear and loathing. His nickname was “Martin Slash-and-burn-heimer.” I understand that a woman in L.A. once walked up to him and said, “Mr. Bernheimer, I’m sorry, but I can’t stand you.” He replied, warmly, “Oh, don’t worry, dear: No one can.”

Standing up to public opinion is one thing a critic does; shaping it is another. I feel we should probably do both. What we should never do is do it consciously; we should simply write what we think is correct, letting the chips fall where they may.

Now, a bracing question: Why have music criticism at all? I tell you that, when I was young, and a musician, I was puzzled by the very existence of music criticism. It didn’t seem very helpful. It wasn’t performance, it wasn’t composition, it wasn’t teaching, really —it was just, mere, criticism. It seemed crabbed and pointless and vain. So a guy liked it, so what? So a guy hated it, so what?

Perhaps my question should have been more narrow: Why have concert reviews? As a kid, I could see the utility of, say, movie reviews: They could help you decide whether to see a particular flick. But a concert? That was over and done with. Who wanted to read about that? A review just gave some guy a chance to spout off, in public, and that was a waste of newspaper space.

Now that I’m the guy spouting off, my opinion has changed somewhat—but I still understand, and to an extent sympathize with, my earlier point.

A feature piece, I could always understand: Here is the story of this or that musician. He was born in this country, he attended that conservatory, he is rumored to have had amorous relations with the following colleagues: . . . I could also understand a musicological essay: something on the development of the trombone, say, or the disappearance of the contralto, or the career of the twelve-tone system. But concert reviews?

One answer, I suppose—a short one—is that certain people like to read them. And certain others like to write them. Do you know the old definition of a critic? Someone who finds it impossible to read something—or see something or hear something—without a pen in hand. Well, I confess it has been many, many years since I attended a concert or opera without a pen in hand.

Music critics sometimes complain about how hard their subject is to write about, and they are right: It can be murder. Music is an aural art, and must be understood aurally—and spiritually, in a way. If we could talk about it satisfactorily, we would talk, not compose, or play, or listen. Debussy once said, “Music picks up where human speech leaves off; it expresses the otherwise inexpressible.” A few years ago, the critic Bernard Holland wrote, “I am powerless to describe what music is; I can only describe the aftershocks it leaves.” I feel much the same way: A strong dose of humility, I think, is requisite in a music critic.

But hang on: I now wish to contradict myself, baldly—or to supplement my statement, or to provide a counter-rule: A strong dose of arrogance, too, is required in a critic. That is, in fact, what I think gets a lot of us through, what enables us to write the criticism we do, and copiously: the belief—the firm conviction—that we are right, and that others, if they disagree with us, are wrong. Isn’t that disgusting? But it’s most helpful, even necessary. My action as a music critic is predicated on the abhorrent notion that I know better than the next guy—or at least that I have something valuable to say. Frankly, that’s the only way I know to manage it. That’s the only way I can say what I do, in public, and thereby subject what I write to the scrutiny and criticism of millions (or of thousands, or of hundreds). (Or of dozens, as the case may be.)

I’m afraid that my view of criticism is somewhat peculiar and personal, which is why I’m obliged to use “I” and “me” and related words so much before you. I hope you will forgive me. It’s not so much arrogance or egocentrism as a form, believe it or not, of modesty: for I don’t wish to over-generalize or to pretend to speak for my fraternity, much less for all mankind.

What I try to do, in my criticism, is defend the musical principles I was reared on, and that I think should be upheld; I try to speak for music, as music’s advocate, against its defilers; I try to hold performers—and, to a lesser extent, composers (which is to say, present-day composers)—to account; I try to teach something along the way; I perform the simple act of reporting the event; and I try to give people something interesting—or beautiful, or stimulating, or memorable—to read.

Let’s not forget that: Music criticism, in addition to the myriad other things it is, is writing, a form of writing. I wouldn’t blame you if you expected a music critic to be a writer first, and a critic second. If V. S. Naipaul wrote music criticism, I would read it, for the excellence of the prose, no matter what I thought of his musical judgments.

I was talking about musical principles, and my defense of them: What are they? Well, one of them is fidelity to the score—serving the composer’s interests, as against those of self. You might say I am a bit of a conservative, musically—although I caution against applying political or even philosophical terms to this field. You might say—and here I’ll go against my own caution—that I’m a strict constructionist, in music as well as in law: I favor the letter—and the spirit, of course, and here is where it gets tricky—of the law, or the score. Neither a score nor a constitution is an empty vessel into which the William Brennans and Leonard Bernsteins of the world should pour all their feelings and desires and biases and tics.

But then, there are a million exceptions, and I find myself getting less strict, musically, as I go along. An overly subjective performer who is talented can be more satisfying, more defensible, than a strict constructionist who is less talented, or who clings stupidly to the letter. We don’t rule Horowitz out—although I happen to think Horowitz was best when he bothered to discipline himself. I also cherish Celibidache, for all his idiosyncrasy—even because of it. He almost always convinces me. As I say, it gets tricky, and my rules are less rigid than I sometimes state them. But then, if we don’t state things confidently and clearly, we get sucked into a world of hedges—and begin too many sentences with, “But then . . . ”

Here is something that drives me a bit crazy: when a performer says, “Oh, I’m doing this in order to be creative. This allows me to express myself.” We all know singers, violinists, and others who talk this way. I always want to pipe up, Oh, yeah? You want to be creative? You want to express yourself? Fine: Get yourself some manuscript paper and compose something. Then you’ll really be expressing yourself. But you aren’t the creator here, you’re the servant of the creator, the composer of the music. Mr. Handel has expressed himself already, or Mr. Schumann, or Mr. Prokofiev, or whoever. Your job is to bring it out, to be faithful to him—and you do this through . . . through what? Through study, musical sense, and a kind of communion. There is no other way. And some—in fact, most—simply don’t have it. Musicality is both the most important quality in a musician, and the one hardest to define, neatly.

I believe, by the way, that there is such a thing as performing genius, which is distinct from—and, naturally, lesser than—creative genius. Artur Rubinstein, for one, had a performing genius, and so did Leontyne Price. You could throw any score in front of them, and they got—simply got—its essence. Not only did they themselves get it, they could show it to you.

I am always calling for honesty in music-making—my best models are big on this: honesty. You can tell—or rather, to be immodest about it, some of us can tell—when a musician is being honest, and when he isn’t. A musical honesty is linked to a proper conception of the performer’s role, and the performer’s relationship to the composer.

There is a story I love about the conductor George Szell, who is an exemplar of what I sanctimoniously have called my musical principles: He was rehearsing a Mozart symphony, with his usual intensity and dedication. Afterward, someone approached him and said, “Maestro, how can you conduct that way in an empty auditorium?” Szell answered, “Ah, but Mozart is listening.” Szell clearly cared more about Mozart than about the applauding masses. All the best do. And they play and think as seriously and joyfully in the privacy of their own practice rooms as they do in the fullest and grandest concert halls.

A few seasons ago, I wrote very, very harshly about a popular young pianist. I intend to quote what I said, but before I do, I must tell you about a hurdle I had to get over before I could write true criticism. I had to get over an inhibition against slamming, against rebuking, against assessing a performance bluntly—even mordantly. After all, doesn’t the performer have feelings? And doesn’t he have a mother, who has even greater feelings?

I got over it this way: These people—these performers—are enormously lucky to have lives in music. They are privileged beyond belief. And if they are going to concertize, they had better do it well, and serve music. They are not only pleasing themselves, or fans; they are undertaking to present music to the broad world. And this is a grave responsibility, no matter how much fun it is. Part of my job, as I have said, is to hold musicians to account. If the critic has any role at all, it is that of defender of music—but then, the best performers are the ultimate defenders of music.

There is a phrase from the columnist William Safire that I love, and that I try to apply to my journalism across the board: “Kick ’em when they’re up.” Well, musicians are practically always up. If only by virtue of their appearances in the toniest concert halls, they are up. If only by virtue of their fees and adulation, they are up. That’s what frees me to say that so-and-so is impossibly vulgar and absurd and anti-musical, when the musician in question is, in fact, being vulgar and absurd and anti-musical. Not only is he up—but, in all likelihood, he should know better. So I don’t mind kicking such people (though I don’t relish it, either, and never seek to do it).

Now to the popular young pianist I mentioned earlier. I won’t name him—there are many candidates—not because I wish to be coy, but because the point to be illustrated is far more important than any individual personality:

“In recital at Carnegie Hall Friday night was [so-and-so]. He began with the D-major sonata of Beethoven known as the ‘Pastoral,’ one of the smallish glories of the piano literature. As he played, the notes seemed familiar; they were in the right order; but it wasn’t Beethoven; it seemed to be Beethoven as re-imagined, or re-composed, by this presumptuous upstart. The pianist’s interpretation was beyond the individualistic or idiosyncratic; it was vulgar, musically impermissible. The phrasing was foreign. Wrong accents abounded. Notes were crudely clipped. There was staccato where there should have been legato—that sort of thing. Absurdly, he conducted (or did something) with his hands, fluttering about, rather like David Copperfield in a Vegas lounge. Some teacher should have slapped him long ago. Now, I (almost) never mention any physical aspect of a performance, music being a strictly aural art. But I mention the conducting bit because it is revealing of a mindset—one destructive of a score, and of a composer.”

“I left after the Beethoven. When a pianist announces himself like that, you don’t have to stay for more. A guy has a purple mohawk and a nose-ring: Do we need to check for tattoos? And here’s the real pity about [so-and-so]: He’s such a good pianist. Full of talent. If only he had his head screwed on right.”

I kicked him hard, yes: but I also flatter myself into thinking that I stuck up for music, however obliquely. Honest musicality contains no artifice or chicanery or misplaced ego. What a pianist wants to do with his own music is his own business; what he does with Beethoven’s is something else.

Here is another role of the critic: to boost, to plump, to champion—to wave the flag for a musician, or for some musical cause. There is a long tradition of this among music critics, and I regret that this tradition has faded somewhat in recent years. I think of Hanslick and his man Brahms, and of Korngold and his man Mahler. I think, too, of the grand old war between B. H. Haggin, the acid critic of The Nation magazine, and Irving Kolodin, the curmudgeonly critic of the New York Times. Haggin loved Toscanini, and Kolodin loved Furtwängler—and they fought bitterly. What fun!

I myself tend to plead the case of James Levine, who, many years ago, was protégé to George Szell in Cleveland. He has a lot in common with that old maestro, sharing, for example, the same insistent dedication to music. I often say that Levine is not only formidable in his own era, but a conductor to be assessed in historic terms. Of course, even Homer nods, and Levine did a worrying amount of nodding last season. But, many, many nights, I leave the concert hall or, more likely, the opera house truly grateful for what I have heard. A pet beef of mine is that we underappreciate the living. We are afraid to render a strong judgment. Immobilized by caution, and fear of embarrassment, we tend to wait until a performer is retired or dead—and that’s no good.

In fact, one of the things I do, as a critic—perhaps ad nauseam—is point out that, in certain respects, we are living in a golden age. We have a plethora of performers who will be judged—should be judged—as historic. When a living performer—even a quite young one—is great, we ought to say so. This might be taken as a critical duty. I happen to think that Hilary Hahn, all of 23 years old, is a great violinist: not a promising one, not a lavishly talented one, not an unusually mature one, not a phenom—but a great violinist, here and now. The last recital I heard of hers left no doubt. I believe the same can be safely said of Maxim Vengerov—although he is practically a senior citizen compared with Hahn.

And how about singers? Here, I believe we are unquestionably in the midst of a golden age, even though it won’t be recognized as such until it is good and past. There is no need to sit in our rooms with our record collections. Fans are often full of nostalgia, wishing they could go back to . . . whatever year they imagine to be optimal. But how about 2003? What George Jellinek calls “the vocal scene” offers you Deborah Voigt, and Susan Graham, and Renée Fleming, and Christine Schaefer, and René Pape, and Thomas Quasthoff, and Matthias Goerne, and Thomas Hampson, and Dmitri Hvorostovsky, and Magdalena Kožená, and Susanne Mentzer, and Ewa Podles, and Natalie Dessay, and Barbara Bonney, and Olga Borodina, and many, many others who are not only worthwhile but virtually immortal (thanks to CDs). I once titled a piece on Borodina “Greatness, Here and Now”—that’s pretty straightforward. No, I don’t think I’d trade places with anyone, in an earlier era, at least as far as singers are concerned. Conductors and pianists and composers—they’re another story.

Not only critics, but editors, now and then, are wary of praise—especially of the exuberant kind. It is hard to be censured for being strongly negative—that is often taken as a sign of sophistication and guts. It is easier to be censured for being strongly positive—that is often taken as a sign of naïveté or ignorance. What will almost never get you censured, of course, is the moderate, hedged review: a bloodless thing, saying nothing, venturing nothing, worth nothing. Then again, sometimes a performance is neither here nor there—acceptable, but nothing special. Frequently I have written that an evening “suffered from the quality of okayness.”

As I have said, I try to make it my practice to write what I believe is true, and I’m lucky to work for publications that afford me this privilege. Furthermore, I find that if I think, while writing, “I’m now praising,” or, “I’m now damning,” I can’t go on: My hand is stayed. My best shot is to react candidly; how it comes out on the page is its own business.

And I try to make myself write quickly after a performance, before I get cold feet. Truth is—tough as I talk—I often temper myself when I sit down at the keyboard: I mute the positive a bit, cushion the negative a bit. I don’t say this with pride—it’s the natural human adjusting.

I might also say that we must not fear to repeat ourselves in this business. (Maybe I should say it twice!) Repetition is one of the joys of it, and necessary to unfold a worldview, or musical credo. I am always saying what I say about Levine, while further noting that I’m always saying it. And I have often wondered the following: What if I were stuck in a city doing music criticism for a daily newspaper and found the conductor of that city’s orchestra a lousy one? Would I simply say it, 30 times a year? Avoid it? Concentrate chiefly on the music performed, rather than the conducting of it?

I don’t know. I just thought I’d bring it up, for you to ponder.

So far, I have spoken almost exclusively about one kind of criticism, that of musical performance. There is a great difference between writing about performance and writing about composition. The latter is more demanding. I will confide to you that I have a hard time listening to both at the same time—to both the performance and the music. I would rather listen to the performance and judge it, or listen to the music and judge it—but not both, simultaneously.

Most nights of the year, we engage in performance criticism; but we are, naturally, called on to write about new music. This requires a whole other set of faculties. It is a delicate business, too. Composers depend, to a certain degree, on the response of critics for their advancement. And a critic can court trouble by writing negatively about new music, which many feel must be protected, and nurtured, and pampered, like a newborn babe. Some regard an attack on new music—or even skepticism about it—as all but impermissible, something on the order of infanticide. (Of course, if the music is what is labeled “conservative” or “traditional” or, heaven forbid, “neo-Romantic,” all bets are off.) There is rarely a penalty to be paid for cheering new music; there are serious penalties to be paid for opposing it.

I don’t make it a habit to engage in new-music debates, but one thing I have said loudly is that I don’t believe music should be performed merely because it is new, or American, or written by a woman, or written by a member of an interesting ethnic or racial group. Music should rise or fall on its merits.

In writing for the general public, a critic is often faced with the question: How technical should I get? How general should I keep it? Through trial and error, I have concluded that I am best off relying on the intelligence of the reader, and his ability to discern things through context. I don’t go out of my way to use technical terms, but neither do I go out of my way to avoid them, as much as I used to. For example, I don’t necessarily pause to explain what “rubato” is. Usually, I just trust: and it seems to work out. Remember that music criticism is a minority taste, anyway.

I tell you something else I have sneaked into my music criticism: those awful words “I,” “me,” and so on, which I have used so flagrantly today. For years, I religiously eschewed these words, thinking that they were arrogant, self-regarding, pompous—that they inserted oneself inappropriately into the piece. I found the use of such words egotistical.

In truth, it is exactly the opposite: What is egotistical—what is truly arrogant—is to shun “I” and “me” in favor of an objective voice that makes you look like pure, unquestionable truth—the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. These days, I will slip in the first person when I want to suggest some modesty—when I have a bit of doubt, or reluctance. It is a way of saying, Look: This doesn’t come down from Mt. Sinai; it is my opinion. (Then again, I may want my opinion to seem as though it has been chiseled on sacred tablets.) The use of personal pronouns, in music criticism and other forms of criticism, is an act of modesty. I hold to this.

Sometimes I’m asked whether I applaud. You bet I do. I know critics who don’t, as a matter of principle, and that is a principle I find difficult to comprehend. I applaud even bad performances, out of politeness. And I applaud heartily for performances that deserve it. When people think of critics, they often think of people who are extra-negative about things; people who like things less than the general public does; people who are pickier, because more knowledgeable. This may be. But it can also be that good music critics, or musicians, like things more than the general public does. The point is, they should have greater powers of appreciation, one way or the other. Audiences can roar wrongly for a performance; they can also withhold roars wrongly. A tepid response can be just as uncalled for—just as unknowing—as a wild ovation.

I could recite countless instances of my disliking a performance that others were mad for. But I have also been the only person in a very large hall on his feet for something. I stood for Han-Na Chang, a cellist then 14 or 15 years old, in Avery Fisher Hall, after she played the Saint-Saëns A-minor concerto. I felt I had to. There have been many times when I have not stood—for reasons of self-consciousness—and been ashamed of myself.

I mention all this, not to trumpet my powers of discernment, but to stress that one of the things a critic can usefully do is invite enthusiasm for that which has been inadequately received. This is a companion to knocking down things—performers, music, trends—that are celebrated unwisely.

Ladies and gentlemen, in thinking about this subject, and preparing this talk, I’ve had a good deal of fun—which brings me to my final point: Let’s not rule out fun as a reason for music criticism, or a justification of it. I recall a superb professor of history I had, Shaw Livermore Jr., who began one course roughly this way:

“We’re often told that we study history because it’s necessary—necessary to avoid the mistakes of the past. The past, we’re assured, can shed light on the present. Actually, it’s equally true that the present can shed light on the past—but be that as it may.

“The truth is—and we have to say this softly—we study history because it’s fun. Because we enjoy it. Because we get a kick out of it. And that’s okay.”

Yes, it is okay.

I am delighted that we have arranged this forum; I believe occasions like this have value. But it’s much better to listen to music than to talk about it, or to hear someone else talk about it. I’ve cracked that the most dread hyphenated word in the English language is “concert-lecture.”

People sometimes ask me, “What should I read, to learn more about music?” I usually tell them, “Oh, if you have the time, don’t read anything: Listen to something. Words, in the end, can do so little. That’s the point of music.” Critics have a role to play—I wouldn’t suggest otherwise. They have a role to play in explicating, in promoting, in teaching, in making mischief. But the keys to the kingdom of music must be gained by joining with music, by entering that separate world of sound, of musical thought, where words have little place.

For someone who purports to disdain talk about music, I can go on, can’t I? But now you will be treated to something truly musical: the voice, thought, and style of William F. Buckley Jr.

Thank you.

As long as there has been Artists there have been Critics. But there are other players besides these two players. In addition to Artists and Critics, there are Consumers and Reviewers that appreciate the Art. Each contributes to a delicate ecology.

Artists are driven by the need to create Art. At times, Artists will seek feedback on what they create and sometimes that seeking will lead them to simply become Performers. As Performers they derive their feedback in the form of money, ticket sales, fame, etc. For a Performer the Art becomes a means to Performance and at the highest levels, the Performance becomes the Art itself (Cirque du Soleil is prime example of this).

Performers and Consumers have thus created a balanced ecology. If the Performers give they Consumers what they want (a good performance or Entertainment), the Consumers will give the Performers what they want (money, accolades). The Art itself becomes a product that is essentially traded at concerts, stores, galleries, etc.

This is how most of the modern entertainment industry works – everything from books, music, movies, theater, television, and video games are governed by this ecology.

Now this system is working well. The problem is that there is such an abundance of entertainment, it becomes difficult for people to decide what they will do next and where to spend their dollars and time. This is where the role of Reviewers and Critics come in.

Reviewers are Consumers like me. I am sharing my personal opinion on what I read, listen to, etc. If you like what I recommend, you will come back and ask for more. You may also share with me stuff you think I may like. It is pretty egalitarian since everyone has an opinion. And it is also pretty meritocratic, each of us are rewarded with people saying they like the same things which is a form of validation.

Critics see themselves as filling the niche by keeping the Artist honest since they see most feedback as vapid or blind. In contrast, Reviewers see themselves are sharing their opinions about they like and do not like. Both are based on personal opinion, but the Critic sees himself as defending the Art, much like a Park Ranger is responsible for animals on a wildlife reserve. There is a self-perceived higher purpose to the Critic.

Defending Art is the purpose of the Critic. That is why they are so down on the Entertainment industry. They see Art as being devolved into its baser aspects, sort of like seeing a majestic animal being caged and put in a circus. They also see themselves as defending the species by keeping it pure – We don’t want any mongrels here!

Critics see Art as representing special insight into the human spirit. It is Art is what makes humans a unique species. Art is communication on a deeper level. Art is about controversy and making us uncomfortable in contrast to Entertainment which is about providing fun and good times. So for a Critic, Art at its best is about touching something deeper and controversy is a symptom of this.

When the Artist keeps recycling old ideas and does not grow in terms of artistic range, then they simply become Performers and the Art then becomes Entertainment. The Critics will criticize the Artist for this lack of bravery and the Reviewers will simply share their opinions, but the Fans will be spitting fury at the Critics.

And it is at this point that Critics are irrelevant. The Fan and the Critic are at two different perspectives, both valid. The Critic should not be criticizing an Artist turned Performer for doing what they do. The idealism of the Critic puts him out of touch with the pragmatism of Fans and Performers.

After all, the purpose of Entertainment is to entertain. Sharing an angst-ridden message of revelation is meaningless to somebody who is looking for a good time. That is why more obscure Artists will never find a larger following and why most Performers will never receive the positive opinion of Critics. They are talking different languages and belong in different ecological niches.

Like any healthy ecology, there needs to be respect and tolerance of each other’s roles. Giving too much control to one will destroy the ecological balance that makes up Art.

The reason why this happens is they fail to embrace Complexity Science.

Basically, it is because our social institutions continue to operate like machines, believing that events can be tracked in a linear fashion and have measurable inputs that neatly match known outputs. While there is no denying that some institutions do operate like machines (take most factories), the fact that humans end up doing most of the work leaves the model sorely lacking.

What is more accurate is to realize that all human based organizations are non-linear and complex. It is common for these systems to exhibit the following characteristics:

• Small inputs can lead to dramatically large consequences.
• Very slight differences in initial conditions produce very different outcomes.
• Global properties flow from aggregate behavior of individuals.
• Emergence (of order) is certain, but there is no certainty as to what it will be.
• Greater diversity of agents in a system leads to richer emergent patterns.
• Change is continuous and prediction and control are impossible.
• Be prepared to adapt In living systems where relationships and connections are critical.
• Self-organization requires a constant flow/access to information and the capacity/commitment to reflect on what is learned.
• Good Enough visions should be supported by minimum specifications or principles to leave room for new ideas to emerge.
• Paradoxes and tensions exist so we need to work with them and challenge our assumptions; Be comfortable to sustain creative tension and mix cooperation with competition.

Despite continuous examples of human nature rejecting the machinist worldview, we keep on assuming that it is the most sensible way of viewing our world. I have seen it all of the time in Health Care where immense energy is spent to measure everything in an effort to track inputs and thus control outcomes. We see it in the movement of ISO 9001.

We would all be better served if we changed our practice to make plans that identify minimum specifications; defining only a few key requirements which must be met in order to achieve a shared vision. We need to for flexibility and prepare for a variety of possible futures.

To learn more about Complexity Science or Complex Adaptive Systems check out…

Codynamics and Plexus Institute

What caught my interest was its statement on its notes page that “all things should be examined according to their impact on life, and popularity by itself is not enough endorsement.” Wow! That struck home and made so much sense.

Democracy is not about rationally evaluating what matters or counts most, but about simply giving power to people who are not necessarily capable of measuring or judging competently. Instead voters resort to treating democracy as popularity contests.

The site is extensive and I personally find the reference to a mythical character of Prometheus to be very cool. It speaks about Individualism but appears to understand that there is no such thing as a self-made person for we are dependent on the sacrifices of others. Its anti-collectivist stance appears to be a bit too rigid – if individuals have freedom, then surely they have the freedom to join (and leave) a collective.

Its something I will peruse over the next year and write a more extensive summary.

Check it out…

Promethea.org

My own experience in working with people and with meditation is that emotions are essential components of our being. Those who advocate sterile logic and academic intelligence fall into the trap of ignoring emotions and thus disabling their understanding of what makes people human.

I would say it is like Oscar Wilde’s quote that the cynic knows the cost of everything and the value of nothing. Replace the term ‘cost’ with ‘measurement’ and we can see why emotions are ignored since they impossible to measure. But because emotions are not measurable we cannot ignore them. Doing so is at our own peril.

Check it out…

www.EmotionalCompetency.com