I have more or less decided that anything I write should be a narrative from my personal experience rather than some kind of philosophical exposition. We will see how that goes because I still need to link this discussion of dogma to one or more of my numerous memories. There are benefits to being somewhat old, especially when the mind continues to be active and inquisitive. My heart overflows.
When I was growing up I found myself straddling two different worlds, as embodied by my perception of the difference between my mother and my father. I have always found it interesting how often couples have compatible zodiac signs, which I think now is likely to be related to the way that the signs of the zodiac are structured. But that analysis is for another time when I have run out of all other topics to discuss. My mother was a Gemini and my father is a Leo - compatible signs that may not say anything about how they aligned with each other.
It is in the nature of a mother to have a warm supportive relationship with her children, just as it is in the nature of a father to have expectations and ambitions for his children. That was how I saw things then. Since then, my parental perceptions have been confused and washed away in the flood of reality, both by seeing the full arc of the story for my parents and also by the personal experience of being a parent. Regardless, when I was leaving high school to go to college I was caught up in the romance of the polarity I saw between my parents: the workings of the spirit versus the unyielding edifice of logic and science. I was actively seeking a synthesis.
Scientific certainty has an unsatisfactory definition: a probability of 95%. There is a lot of necessary discussion and qualification around that definition. The point is that science is always acutely aware of the margin of uncertainty - the margin of error.
In recent years I sometimes have structured "visions". They are always clearly marked as such in my mind. I do not confuse my visions with actual reality any more than I confuse my dreams with reality (except in the moments before dawn). I have often woken up to great relief with the realization that the evaporating dream never happened and never could happen. The struggle is real. There has been plenty of events in my life that I regret. Still, I seem to have escaped the worst consequences - as much as anything due to aggressive persistence or maybe merely passive endurance.
I have arrived at this point in my life horribly mutilated: physically, mentally, and spiritually. Two days ago I found an avocado in the refrigerator in a similar condition yet when I cut it open the flesh was green and unblemished. If only all avocados could age so well. If only it might turn out that I have aged equally as well - all set to be turned into a delectable guacamole for the benefit of all people everywhere. To erase all suffering.
The Pieta captures a mother's pain, just as depictions of Christ on the Cross capture unimaginable personal pain. I have a wide streak of graveyard humor yet I do not whistle as I pass these images. They superimpose themselves on various moments in my life. I see them when I read about the life of Darwin, who was possibly the original prototype for the "absent-minded professor". I have visions of Dr. Darwin holding his daughter Annie's body in his arms when the "Water Cure" failed to help her. Some think that she died of TB (the cause of 25% of all deaths at that time). Meanwhile, the crucifix is a graphic depiction of one aspect of the process of Natural Selection, one recognition of humanity submitting to the will of God yet triumphing over decay and death.
This synthesis is real. The experience is real but it is not science with its requirement for a (qualified) 95% or better certainty. This is where religion and science can never agree. We can all agree on the basic condition of this vale of tears based on our individual direct experience. Science, however, will always consider that the experience is "all in our heads". Jesus on the cross, Mary on the cross, Darwin on the cross, parents on the cross, lovers on the cross... By contrast science does draw back a corner of the curtain. It does allow us to see an unfolding cosmic pattern that is not entirely of this world.
Saturday, December 21, 2019
Saturday, November 9, 2019
The Ocean Flowing Among the Trees
Written sometime last summer.
It is raining today, for the first time in a few weeks. The weather has been cool yet not the freezing weather we expect this time of year when the rains stop. It is during the transition from oceanic rain to continental blue skies that we usually get our snow, or worse still - ice storms. During the ice storms snow falls at night then melts and freezes on all the shrubbery, dragging everything down under the weight and sometimes breaking trees completely off their roots.
Last summer we had a few weeks of hot dry weather. It was making me apprehensive about maintaining my garden. The garden was looking good after a long cold wet summer. I have come to understand that cold wet weather is the weather preferred by rhododendrons. I am weak in faith. I always assume that the current weather is what I will experience for the remainder of my life. So now I firmly believe that it will always be dark and rainy every day. It is four PM and the light is already fading. The impulse is to hibernate in some warm cozy bright cubbyhole, a place such as my home office. It would seem that I am not a rhododendron, however much I might wish to spend my days standing in the rain with my roots buried in earth and mulch, waiting patiently through the centuries for each ecstatic moment of sudden bloom.
I have been touring my garden and many of the rhododendrons are covered with flower buds. If the winter is not too harsh my springtime will be extravagant with flowers. At my age (not even one of the centuries of rhododendrons) the anticipation is almost as good as the event itself. Things happens just as they have happened for millions of years before my birth and I greet them as if I were one who has been here all along. "There you are," I think. "You are back again. It is just as though you had never left. Nor have you been forgotten while you were gone. In my faithless way I wistfully thought that you might never return, yet somehow the world has come back to life." Is this what they meant when they spoke of the return of Christ. Perhaps some people of great faith understood that perfectly.
Last summer after a couple of weeks of bright hot dry weather I was pretty sure the whole world was going to dry up and die - even though everything was yet looking good from all the previous wet weather. I could feel my skin burning and cracking even though I never exposed myself to the weather and we had (newly installed) air conditioning to protect me from the heat. I was prepared to linger and suffer for a time after the end of times. After that time when the sun grows into its red giant phase and engulfs the earth. I will need a stronger bubble and better air conditioning.
Then the ocean returned, rising up from the Puget lowlands and threading its way among the trees. I imagined that I could smell the salt and the seaweed in the air. It was a small change actually. I went outside and enjoyed the wetness and the coolness. I pulled alien weeds from my patch of forest and planted more exotic and more difficult aliens in their place.
The summers of 2017 and 2018 were very hot and dry. Our water bill was extravagant. Certain people with less climate sense than mine predicted the extinction of the Western Red Cedar (with its love of moisture). Certainly there were a lot of dying trees in the forests: both hemlocks and cedars. All of my larger trees are well. I believe that the Western Red Cedar is safe for at least fifty years in this area, even with climate change. Someday perhaps it will grow happily on the shores of the arctic ocean, and probably as an immigrant in many other northerly and southerly locations. Perhaps even across the southern sea where now only glaciers and ice bergs grow.
It is raining today, for the first time in a few weeks. The weather has been cool yet not the freezing weather we expect this time of year when the rains stop. It is during the transition from oceanic rain to continental blue skies that we usually get our snow, or worse still - ice storms. During the ice storms snow falls at night then melts and freezes on all the shrubbery, dragging everything down under the weight and sometimes breaking trees completely off their roots.
Last summer we had a few weeks of hot dry weather. It was making me apprehensive about maintaining my garden. The garden was looking good after a long cold wet summer. I have come to understand that cold wet weather is the weather preferred by rhododendrons. I am weak in faith. I always assume that the current weather is what I will experience for the remainder of my life. So now I firmly believe that it will always be dark and rainy every day. It is four PM and the light is already fading. The impulse is to hibernate in some warm cozy bright cubbyhole, a place such as my home office. It would seem that I am not a rhododendron, however much I might wish to spend my days standing in the rain with my roots buried in earth and mulch, waiting patiently through the centuries for each ecstatic moment of sudden bloom.
I have been touring my garden and many of the rhododendrons are covered with flower buds. If the winter is not too harsh my springtime will be extravagant with flowers. At my age (not even one of the centuries of rhododendrons) the anticipation is almost as good as the event itself. Things happens just as they have happened for millions of years before my birth and I greet them as if I were one who has been here all along. "There you are," I think. "You are back again. It is just as though you had never left. Nor have you been forgotten while you were gone. In my faithless way I wistfully thought that you might never return, yet somehow the world has come back to life." Is this what they meant when they spoke of the return of Christ. Perhaps some people of great faith understood that perfectly.
Last summer after a couple of weeks of bright hot dry weather I was pretty sure the whole world was going to dry up and die - even though everything was yet looking good from all the previous wet weather. I could feel my skin burning and cracking even though I never exposed myself to the weather and we had (newly installed) air conditioning to protect me from the heat. I was prepared to linger and suffer for a time after the end of times. After that time when the sun grows into its red giant phase and engulfs the earth. I will need a stronger bubble and better air conditioning.
Then the ocean returned, rising up from the Puget lowlands and threading its way among the trees. I imagined that I could smell the salt and the seaweed in the air. It was a small change actually. I went outside and enjoyed the wetness and the coolness. I pulled alien weeds from my patch of forest and planted more exotic and more difficult aliens in their place.
The summers of 2017 and 2018 were very hot and dry. Our water bill was extravagant. Certain people with less climate sense than mine predicted the extinction of the Western Red Cedar (with its love of moisture). Certainly there were a lot of dying trees in the forests: both hemlocks and cedars. All of my larger trees are well. I believe that the Western Red Cedar is safe for at least fifty years in this area, even with climate change. Someday perhaps it will grow happily on the shores of the arctic ocean, and probably as an immigrant in many other northerly and southerly locations. Perhaps even across the southern sea where now only glaciers and ice bergs grow.
Monday, October 14, 2019
Monotheism
Let us suppose that there are more than two worlds. In fact, let us suppose that every person lives in their own individualized world. A person with great insight would immediately recognize exactly which world each person inhabits. If that person were somewhat insensitive he might also characterize each world, categorize it, cut it, dry it, and sell it by the ounce. I am not that person. I am neither so good nor so bad. One my great virtues is the occasional ability to avoid the effects of my own intense curiosity or idle meddling. I can take on a combination of compassion and resignation at key moments to avoid innocent insult or injury to someone else. I wish that I were better at it.
Objectively, of course, there is only one world that we all inhabit - knocking elbows and politely finding our ways - or not. Such is the source of much drama, much suffering. It starts small and grows. One wants something. One wishes for something. One accepts a gift. It is something small and innocent or else perhaps it is great and beautiful. Or something else...
Suddenly I am writing about the wonderful multiplex world of the spirit (subjective reality). One has not really lived until one has experienced obsession. A small obsession might be sufficient as a "sign and a wonder", a warning. It is the stuff of addiction. But never mind about that for now. I have enough material for a whole blog entry on addiction.
I have experienced the effects of abruptly cutting off an obsession (neurosis?). What else can we call grief? I have not experienced the more usual drug induced addiction. From time to time I have been obsessed about someone, but that is not usually considered addiction. It is not addiction when there is an inevitable cure, when the process ceases to be mechanical and takes on a life of its own. The greatest potential obsession may be exercise of the power to make a change in the world. This, too, has an inevitable cure - even if only death at some point. By this, I know that there is a greater suffering than death and it all starts with a wish, a desire, or consenting to accept something (perhaps as a gift).
But I digress.
In monotheism (leaving aside all the multiple and infinite definitions of God) all the values that motivate us always hearken back to one supreme value, from which all meaning falls out and which informs the various pieces and aspects of our lives. This, of course, is my own personal definition. Ideally, as we move through our lives and the necessary projects and actions mutate to fit circumstances, there is still that one unchanging guiding principle that causes everything to make sense. To lose that guiding principle is also to risk death, either by suicide or else from a broken heart. So monotheism is one of those things with a price to pay. Is the price we pay for meaning worthwhile? I think so. I would pay a lot to see all the way to the heart of the world.
There is just that one small worm eating away at it. I have the certain knowledge that my understanding is not perfect. In the best of circumstances it may only be accurate to the nearest quarter inch. Such a small error could easily be critical.
So. What is the supreme first cause in your life? Should we even have one? I never had a choice.
Objectively, of course, there is only one world that we all inhabit - knocking elbows and politely finding our ways - or not. Such is the source of much drama, much suffering. It starts small and grows. One wants something. One wishes for something. One accepts a gift. It is something small and innocent or else perhaps it is great and beautiful. Or something else...
Suddenly I am writing about the wonderful multiplex world of the spirit (subjective reality). One has not really lived until one has experienced obsession. A small obsession might be sufficient as a "sign and a wonder", a warning. It is the stuff of addiction. But never mind about that for now. I have enough material for a whole blog entry on addiction.
I have experienced the effects of abruptly cutting off an obsession (neurosis?). What else can we call grief? I have not experienced the more usual drug induced addiction. From time to time I have been obsessed about someone, but that is not usually considered addiction. It is not addiction when there is an inevitable cure, when the process ceases to be mechanical and takes on a life of its own. The greatest potential obsession may be exercise of the power to make a change in the world. This, too, has an inevitable cure - even if only death at some point. By this, I know that there is a greater suffering than death and it all starts with a wish, a desire, or consenting to accept something (perhaps as a gift).
But I digress.
In monotheism (leaving aside all the multiple and infinite definitions of God) all the values that motivate us always hearken back to one supreme value, from which all meaning falls out and which informs the various pieces and aspects of our lives. This, of course, is my own personal definition. Ideally, as we move through our lives and the necessary projects and actions mutate to fit circumstances, there is still that one unchanging guiding principle that causes everything to make sense. To lose that guiding principle is also to risk death, either by suicide or else from a broken heart. So monotheism is one of those things with a price to pay. Is the price we pay for meaning worthwhile? I think so. I would pay a lot to see all the way to the heart of the world.
There is just that one small worm eating away at it. I have the certain knowledge that my understanding is not perfect. In the best of circumstances it may only be accurate to the nearest quarter inch. Such a small error could easily be critical.
So. What is the supreme first cause in your life? Should we even have one? I never had a choice.
Thursday, September 19, 2019
simultaneity
Of course, as we all know, the universe is an amalgamation of massively parallel quantum entanglement. It follows that, of course, this is associated with a whole fun-house of emergent phenomena. This is what the "systems" people would say.
It is out of all this quantum entanglemen that the possibility of a notion of simultaneity emerges. I see no other possibility for even as much seamlessness and continuity as is visible from my tiny little knothole view on the All. It is all part of God's Ineffable Plan.
I was hugely disappointed when I discovered that "simultaneity" was a victim of that major constraint on cosmic cause and effect: the speed of light. In a way it makes sense that there is a maximum speed at which cause and effect propagates. It locks everything down into a matrix of relatedness. You know - time, space, energy and all that sort of thing. We could, I suppose, call it relativity. It is physics and it is what makes the world go around - and everything else.
It is out of all this quantum entanglemen that the possibility of a notion of simultaneity emerges. I see no other possibility for even as much seamlessness and continuity as is visible from my tiny little knothole view on the All. It is all part of God's Ineffable Plan.
I was hugely disappointed when I discovered that "simultaneity" was a victim of that major constraint on cosmic cause and effect: the speed of light. In a way it makes sense that there is a maximum speed at which cause and effect propagates. It locks everything down into a matrix of relatedness. You know - time, space, energy and all that sort of thing. We could, I suppose, call it relativity. It is physics and it is what makes the world go around - and everything else.
Friday, August 16, 2019
Awareness 1
I notice that I have not been systematic in my writings. It is likely that I am repeating myself. That is something that I will have to accept until such time as I harvest and delete this blog, gathering all the trains of thought and only speaking to particular subjects a limited number of times using some other tool (perhaps a book, perhaps a wiki).
So the three graces are love, hope, and faith. At one time, when I only knew the three graces and did not know the commentary (that immediately follows) I would have said that faith was the most important one. I considered that faith was the starting point, the way that we make the connection (the leap) across the gap from the "world within" to all of exterior reality. I was never one to assign much value to blind faith. The conceptual framework that we build around the elements of our faith is very important as to content and structure.
Last night I watched an hour-long interview between Stephen Colbert and Anderson Cooper. One would not expect to find much in common (aside from politics) but it turns out there are many parallels between their lives. The interview turned out to be more of a conversation than a one-sided exposition of remarks from one person.
They both lost their fathers just before becoming teenagers. My father lost his mother at about that age, with potentially greater consequences based on my understanding of his father. For Colbert and Cooper the loss marked a major transition for each of them. The word "shattering" (as in broken glass) was used. Today I read an unkind review of the works of Conrad Aiken (a poet I have read) where it was noted that at roughly that age his father murdered his mother and shot himself, leaving the bodies for Aiken to find. Cooper's brother killed himself ten years after his father died during open heart surgery. Two of Colbert's brothers died in the same plane crash with his father.
I was able to wait until my mid-thirties before I experienced that kind of world-shattering grief. Of course, every subsequent death (of which there were many) is just another blow to the open wound. We move on, with the realization that the bubble we always took for granted is now deliberate. Colbert has a strongly developed appreciation for the innate suffering of human existence. It may be that most of that comes from his strong commitment to Catholic faith (there is that "faith" word again). Much of the appeal of christian faith comes from the pathos of human existence, as symbolized by Christ on the cross or (alternatively) by the suffering of our lady, Mary.
So Colbert knows about the "grace" of love but that is not what he kept coming back to. He kept coming back to gratitude, to being thankful for God's gifts and in particular for the gift of life. Colbert says that everything God dishes out to you is a gift.
GOD: "Here, take this!"
GOD: "You like that? Well how about this?" (Out of compassion I have omitted the Youtube video.)
Until finally one is destroyed, either physically or psychically or else in the depths of one's soul. The one thing we know is that we will be tested to our utmost destruction - either by events or else by sheer change to the world until we no longer know who we are or why we are what we are.
So then I am forced to say that these blows are the elements of the meaning of our lives, the self-evident result of cause and effect. For Colbert gratitude is the proper response. For me it is to be caught up in the beauty, which is synonymous with truth (and so on). But perhaps they are not so much different. Either way, we are engaged with the world around us, whether we perceive it as a gift from God or whether it is seen as the amazing result of an intricate process full of awe, stretching out across aeons of time. My own vision fills in a lot more of the details but is it really necessary to pursue all that research?
I do not need eternal life to know that my life is not meaningless. The events of my life are woven into an eternal chain of cause and effect. I am a participant.
So the three graces are love, hope, and faith. At one time, when I only knew the three graces and did not know the commentary (that immediately follows) I would have said that faith was the most important one. I considered that faith was the starting point, the way that we make the connection (the leap) across the gap from the "world within" to all of exterior reality. I was never one to assign much value to blind faith. The conceptual framework that we build around the elements of our faith is very important as to content and structure.
Last night I watched an hour-long interview between Stephen Colbert and Anderson Cooper. One would not expect to find much in common (aside from politics) but it turns out there are many parallels between their lives. The interview turned out to be more of a conversation than a one-sided exposition of remarks from one person.
They both lost their fathers just before becoming teenagers. My father lost his mother at about that age, with potentially greater consequences based on my understanding of his father. For Colbert and Cooper the loss marked a major transition for each of them. The word "shattering" (as in broken glass) was used. Today I read an unkind review of the works of Conrad Aiken (a poet I have read) where it was noted that at roughly that age his father murdered his mother and shot himself, leaving the bodies for Aiken to find. Cooper's brother killed himself ten years after his father died during open heart surgery. Two of Colbert's brothers died in the same plane crash with his father.
I was able to wait until my mid-thirties before I experienced that kind of world-shattering grief. Of course, every subsequent death (of which there were many) is just another blow to the open wound. We move on, with the realization that the bubble we always took for granted is now deliberate. Colbert has a strongly developed appreciation for the innate suffering of human existence. It may be that most of that comes from his strong commitment to Catholic faith (there is that "faith" word again). Much of the appeal of christian faith comes from the pathos of human existence, as symbolized by Christ on the cross or (alternatively) by the suffering of our lady, Mary.
So Colbert knows about the "grace" of love but that is not what he kept coming back to. He kept coming back to gratitude, to being thankful for God's gifts and in particular for the gift of life. Colbert says that everything God dishes out to you is a gift.
GOD: "Here, take this!"
GOD: "You like that? Well how about this?" (Out of compassion I have omitted the Youtube video.)
Until finally one is destroyed, either physically or psychically or else in the depths of one's soul. The one thing we know is that we will be tested to our utmost destruction - either by events or else by sheer change to the world until we no longer know who we are or why we are what we are.
So then I am forced to say that these blows are the elements of the meaning of our lives, the self-evident result of cause and effect. For Colbert gratitude is the proper response. For me it is to be caught up in the beauty, which is synonymous with truth (and so on). But perhaps they are not so much different. Either way, we are engaged with the world around us, whether we perceive it as a gift from God or whether it is seen as the amazing result of an intricate process full of awe, stretching out across aeons of time. My own vision fills in a lot more of the details but is it really necessary to pursue all that research?
I do not need eternal life to know that my life is not meaningless. The events of my life are woven into an eternal chain of cause and effect. I am a participant.
Saturday, July 13, 2019
Footsteps into the Future
This post was started Jul 13th, 2019
I am going to use this posting to gather some notes about evidence of selective sweeps in the human genome, which is to say evolutionary processes. There are a few caveats assocciated with this posting. One is that it operates on the assumption that human evolution is an ongoing process (I would say at the Hand of God). Another is that it skirts around the subject of eugenics, which is rife (Rife! I tell you) with both classical and christian hubris. Being a romantic, I deny any association with the eugenicists. When the time comes for "natural" (or otherwise) selection within the human race, I prefer the hand of God.
I will add to the discussion of "selective sweeps" some of my own speculations about how changes in medical expertise may also have an eventual impact on our genomes, assuming that there is any normality in the ways that our genomes change or are edited in the future. We may already be a long ways past the usual understanding of Natural Selection when we talk about the human genome. I strongly distinguish between selective sweeps that may be permanently incorporated into the human population genome and selective sweeps resulting from external agents such as infectious diseases.
So here are a few interesting links from Wikipedia:
http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~peicheng/newVersion/pdfs/plosGenetics2007.pdf
Geneticists are always suspect from a political viewpoint for this reason (the assignment of "value") and also because they have been associated with the eugenics document "The Geneticist's Manifesto" written by Hermann Muller in 1939. As you may guess there were a lot of things wrong with the timing and the politics. It is hard to find a copy of this document online, perhaps because it is still under copyright protection, and also possibly because no one would consider it politically correct since WWII stamped out Aryanism for a generation.
I have a few comments about the Manifesto:
One other major change in culture, at least in developed countries, is the prevalence of caesareans as a way of giving birth. It is estimated that something like thirty percent of the births in the United States are by caesarean section. Caesareans happen for many reasons, but one factor is the size of the baby's head at birth. When I worked in the X-ray department at Community Memorial Hospital in Ventura, California, one of the procedures that we regularly performed was a "pelvimetry". There would be an image of a baby's head fully engaged in a woman's pelvis. Measurements would help to determine whether it was going to work or not.
At one time, many women died in childbirth (and there were many reasons for that). At least one reason was that the baby's head was too large to pass the birth canal. The incidence of caesareans removes that constraint to the tune of some value less than thirty percent of all births. In evolutionary terms this is huge. In usual evolutionary processes the selective pressure may be as little as .1 percent or less. It acts over time, over many generations.
If the current rate of caesareans continues for as long as ten generations. I predict that few women will be able to give birth normally and that the human race will embark on a new wave of selective sweeps based on the lack of a constraint on the size of a baby's head at birth.
I am going to use this posting to gather some notes about evidence of selective sweeps in the human genome, which is to say evolutionary processes. There are a few caveats assocciated with this posting. One is that it operates on the assumption that human evolution is an ongoing process (I would say at the Hand of God). Another is that it skirts around the subject of eugenics, which is rife (Rife! I tell you) with both classical and christian hubris. Being a romantic, I deny any association with the eugenicists. When the time comes for "natural" (or otherwise) selection within the human race, I prefer the hand of God.
I will add to the discussion of "selective sweeps" some of my own speculations about how changes in medical expertise may also have an eventual impact on our genomes, assuming that there is any normality in the ways that our genomes change or are edited in the future. We may already be a long ways past the usual understanding of Natural Selection when we talk about the human genome. I strongly distinguish between selective sweeps that may be permanently incorporated into the human population genome and selective sweeps resulting from external agents such as infectious diseases.
So here are a few interesting links from Wikipedia:
- ASPM (gene)
- DAB1 (among Chinese)
- SV2B (among African Americans)
- Selective sweeps In humans (more generic)
- Microcephalin (potentially introgressing from non-modern human race)
http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~peicheng/newVersion/pdfs/plosGenetics2007.pdf
Geneticists are always suspect from a political viewpoint for this reason (the assignment of "value") and also because they have been associated with the eugenics document "The Geneticist's Manifesto" written by Hermann Muller in 1939. As you may guess there were a lot of things wrong with the timing and the politics. It is hard to find a copy of this document online, perhaps because it is still under copyright protection, and also possibly because no one would consider it politically correct since WWII stamped out Aryanism for a generation.
I have a few comments about the Manifesto:
- I have a copy which, as usual with learned documents, I have not carefully read. I could scan it and put it online but I fail to find the motivation since it may be a copyright violation.
- Leonard Darwin (Charles's son) at the age of 89 wrote an article for Nature magazine in 1939 about the manifesto, an article which he also called "The Geneticist's Manifesto". It was only a review of Muller's manifesto without much discussion of the contents of the manifesto. Note that he pretty much endorsed the manifesto and that he was a known eugenicist (and military man).
- The manifesto was written before the existence of the gene as a physical entity was demonstrated by the description of the DNA molecule in 1953. In those days the "gene" was purely a hypothesis of Mendelian science experiments. In Charles Darwin's world there was no rigorous science of inheritance (Mendelian or otherwise) at all, only ad hoc observation. This means, in the light of current science, that Charles Darwin was all but prophetic - along with the malarial fever dreams of Wallace.
- In 1939 it might have been possible to form some clumsily obvious goals (smarter? tamer?} for a eugenics program. In our era things are not so clear cut and I can see many problems for a nation that attempts to enforce genetic conformity or even just to offer a genetic standard as a so-called "improvement". We do see some efforts with regard to certain obviously harmful genetic diseases. This seems reasonable but nothing is certain. Deaf people are now organizing against treatment since eliminating deafness will also eliminate their unique culture.
- We live in a time when genetics may become "fashion". It is possible that "fashion" will lead us into all the same problems that the disgraced science of eugenics might have given us. Even now people in India and China are adjusting the sex ratio of their populations in ways that may lead to disaster (or perhaps merely to extreme weirdness).
One other major change in culture, at least in developed countries, is the prevalence of caesareans as a way of giving birth. It is estimated that something like thirty percent of the births in the United States are by caesarean section. Caesareans happen for many reasons, but one factor is the size of the baby's head at birth. When I worked in the X-ray department at Community Memorial Hospital in Ventura, California, one of the procedures that we regularly performed was a "pelvimetry". There would be an image of a baby's head fully engaged in a woman's pelvis. Measurements would help to determine whether it was going to work or not.
At one time, many women died in childbirth (and there were many reasons for that). At least one reason was that the baby's head was too large to pass the birth canal. The incidence of caesareans removes that constraint to the tune of some value less than thirty percent of all births. In evolutionary terms this is huge. In usual evolutionary processes the selective pressure may be as little as .1 percent or less. It acts over time, over many generations.
If the current rate of caesareans continues for as long as ten generations. I predict that few women will be able to give birth normally and that the human race will embark on a new wave of selective sweeps based on the lack of a constraint on the size of a baby's head at birth.
Selective Sweeps due to Disease
What the Lord giveth can also be taken away. I consider disease related selective sweeps to be contingent on the ongoing pressure from the disease. This is especially true since there is often a price paid in genetic fitness for the benefit of resistance to infectious disease. A classic example is genetic resistance to malaria. Malaria is a big deal, which is under a steady attack from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, but is still a big killer around the world. HIV-1 resistance is also found in a small proportion of certain western populations. That is guessed to be the result of infectious disease-related selective sweeps. The sweeps were not driven by HIV since that disease entered human populations relatively recently. It takes a relatively strong sweep to get to 10% (heterozygous) frequency in the short estimated time since the origin of the gene (~2k years before present). With the extinction of Smallpox and HIV we could expect a reverse sweep on this allele since it carries significant drawbacks in terms of other diseases (such as West Nile virus and tick-borne encephalitis).Barb's Medical Adventure - Disgruntled Bob
Early April 2019
Barb has recovered from her latest bout of digestive upset. This one lasted three and a half days and it was precipitated by the procedural inflexibility of the staff at the UW Medical Center. She was referred there by the staff at Valley Medical for surgery on her hiatal hernia. Now that all of the (I think) unnecessary tests are done the UW staff has announced that eighty percent of her stomach is above her diaphragm. In order to find that out they took her off all of her medications and ran tubes down her nose, including overnight, checking the Ph in her esophagus. Then they did fluoroscopy with barium. All of this involved multiple trips to the UW through rush hour traffic (the way they scheduled it) - over an hour each way.
Then they pointed out that she has a hiatal hernia. That was the diagnosis when she was originally referred there for surgery. She missed her appointment with the surgeon when she was down throwing up all day after all this nonsense. They could have just believed the CT scan from Valley Medical. Her next window to see the surgeon is April 4th. Even this was delayed when someone decided to indefinitely delay the phone call that was scheduled to get her medical history way back in the beginning. Have I mentioned that Valley Medical is a part of the UW Medical System? So far, the UW is looking far worse, substituting their own procedures for a known diagnosis.
Barb finally had her surgery May 3rd. She recovered remarkably fast. She has had no further vomiting episodes. This is a great blessing since I rely upon her so heavily and in so many ways. It is also good for her.
Barb has recovered from her latest bout of digestive upset. This one lasted three and a half days and it was precipitated by the procedural inflexibility of the staff at the UW Medical Center. She was referred there by the staff at Valley Medical for surgery on her hiatal hernia. Now that all of the (I think) unnecessary tests are done the UW staff has announced that eighty percent of her stomach is above her diaphragm. In order to find that out they took her off all of her medications and ran tubes down her nose, including overnight, checking the Ph in her esophagus. Then they did fluoroscopy with barium. All of this involved multiple trips to the UW through rush hour traffic (the way they scheduled it) - over an hour each way.
Then they pointed out that she has a hiatal hernia. That was the diagnosis when she was originally referred there for surgery. She missed her appointment with the surgeon when she was down throwing up all day after all this nonsense. They could have just believed the CT scan from Valley Medical. Her next window to see the surgeon is April 4th. Even this was delayed when someone decided to indefinitely delay the phone call that was scheduled to get her medical history way back in the beginning. Have I mentioned that Valley Medical is a part of the UW Medical System? So far, the UW is looking far worse, substituting their own procedures for a known diagnosis.
Barb finally had her surgery May 3rd. She recovered remarkably fast. She has had no further vomiting episodes. This is a great blessing since I rely upon her so heavily and in so many ways. It is also good for her.
Saturday, June 22, 2019
Five Days at the UW Medical Center or "Here's Your Hat, What's Your Hurry?"
My first distinct memory after waking up was being moved from the gurney into my hospital bed. All beds and patient support devices have wheels so the reasons for moving people from one device to another are not clear to me. I suppose that beds are better than gurneys for longer term stays.
The hospital room had a builtin patient crane on the ceiling. Dangling from a cross member was a funny looking (Art Deco) mobile, which turned out to come apart and provide individual support for the body and the various limbs so they could lift me up and set me down gently in the bed. Every day I would see that mobile hanging in the corner of the room and wonder about it until I would remember. The patient handling system had similarities to the material handling systems used on the Boeing assembly lines to move around airplane parts (and entire fuselages).
I discovered that my grip on reality had become more fragile. Sometimes when I woke up during the night there would be Maya glyphs covering the ceiling in a regular grid pattern. Sometimes there would be fish scale patterns overlaying patches in my field of vision. When my imagination created faces or figures from features in the wall plaster I would sometimes discover that I could anticipate their movements, their transformations, the changes in the expressions on the faces. I would not be surprised to learn that this was a symptom of the pain killers. I also had optical migraines without the headaches (blind spots) every few hours. Waking up became more of a process as I sorted out the dreams from what was somewhat visible around me.
The staff had their processes well estaablished. I was handed a list of five goals they needed me to accomplish in order to be discharged. Their goal was to have me out of there in five days, or seven at the most. During daylight hours there was a stream of professionals coming through with information, training sessions, equipment for me to take home, or else asking me to get out of bed and walk around the floor. I think that I had a right to be tired before they even got to work on me.
It was worrisome that that first night Barb took over an hour trying to drive to a hotel that is five minutes from the hospital. We should have practiced that trip ahead of time because, like many urban areas around hospitals, the streets are a maze - trying to accommodate both the needs of a major university and the needs of a major hospital. In desperation she finally called me but fortunately, perhaps at random, she was just arriving down the street where the hotel was located at that moment. Barb was very fond of that hotel room. It was her refuge.
They got me out of bed the the next day, the first morning. An occupational therapist came to visit me. There was also a physical therapist, asking questions about the height of our bed at home. When I told her it was "hip high" she sighed with relief because she was not going to have to give me pointers for lowering myself into bed.
There was a pair of MD pain experts who visited every morning to see how my epidural was working. I thought of them as a comedy team. One of the goals was to get me off of direct pain medicine administration (epidural or IV) and get me to be eating opioids instead. Those two guys were quite disturbed and puzzled when my epidural came out after only a few days. They were also the ones to try and solve the problem of my (dry heaves) nausea that started getting to be a problem after a couple of days. They added a rainbow assortment of anti-nausea meds to what was available to me.
There was also a small group of Urology residents that came around every morning. I came to think of them as a flock (a murder?) of crows. Their chief was very goal oriented. She was mostly interested in assessing my overall status. I could see her mentally checking off each goal as it was (even marginally) achieved. I was not well. Something serious had happened to me and I was adjusting to a new state of being. (I still am adjusting.) There was not much sympathy from her.
My own urologist/surgeon, Dr. Dash, showed up a few times - usually after hours. Once he fit me in after visiting his mother. I like Dr. Dash. I want to make things as easy as possible for him. At the same time I sometimes have questions for him. The second time he showed up he mentioned that the pathology results were back on the organ that had been removed. The pathologist reported that he found no sign of living cancer in my bladder, only some scar tissue. So my odds of a cure suddenly went way up.
After that, later, Barb said that for the first time in a long time she was waking up without a panic attack. It would seem that she likes having me around.
I liked the nurses. The daytime nurses were hard workers with agendas. They were sympathetic yet relentless. I noticed that there was a fairly high level of morale at the UW Medical Center. People seemed to be happy. That helped my own morale.
The night of January 5th/6th a powerful windstorm hit western Washington. I was awakened by the sound of the winds slamming into the side of the building. I might have supposed that a large truck on the street below my window was revving its engine on high for several minutes. Then it would stop. Then it would start again. During the night the house in Maple Valley lost power. Power did not return until Thursday the 10th.
So then the welfare worker came around offering funds to put us up in some dump for one night upon discharge from the hospital. There were no funds for more than that and Puget Power email notifications were making it clear that would not be enough. The welfare hotel definitely would be the wrong hotel.
Meanwhile, there was this brand new little opening in my belly that I had to learn how to tend. I am sorry for all those people who live alone after the surgeons have done their work. If Barb had not been there I doubt that I would have been able to get through the three lessons we received from the UW ostomy nurses. My eyesight was not good during the time I was in the hospital. There is fine detail that has to be seen in tending a urostomy. So we had three one hour test runs before being on our own.
I did not sense that I was getting much better. I was now making the circuit of the floor without a walker but it was extremely tiring. After five nights in the hospital I was told that I would be discharged that day. We still had two nights reserved in the hotel where Barb was staying so that is where we went. The nurses brought in more supplies to take home. I was offered a walker but the idea of having that thing sitting around the house was too much to contemplate. I received a box of 28 shots with instructions to inject myself in the belly with one of them each day. With great effort I pried myself into my clothes and them lay exhausted on the bed with my hat on. One of the aids loaded me in a wheelchair and took me down with Barb to the Forester in the parking garage.
Barb and I sneaked/trudged into the hotel through the lobby, with me carrying my urine bag in one hand but otherwise bundled up against the chill. She must have carried up all the stuff the nurses gave us. In spite of my misgivings I was much happier to be out of the hospital. Barb had stocked the mini refrigerator with some sandwiches. It was not until later, after Barb started one of her nausea bouts that I sneaked out of bed and stuffed my face, kneeling in front of the mini frig, hiding from her so that her nausea would not be worse. It was far more than I had eaten in the hospital. My own nausea was gone for the time being. It returned a week or so later, but that is another story that I probably will never tell.
Barb was sick for two days in the hotel while we waited for power to return to our house in Maple Valley. She recovered in time to take me home, driving slowly on the freeway, the two of us consulting about directions. In retrospect, I am reminded of various older couples where the romance is no longer really physical but all about shared goals, shared memories, and shared expertise. I know such a couple in their nineties, not that I think both of us will live that long.
The hospital room had a builtin patient crane on the ceiling. Dangling from a cross member was a funny looking (Art Deco) mobile, which turned out to come apart and provide individual support for the body and the various limbs so they could lift me up and set me down gently in the bed. Every day I would see that mobile hanging in the corner of the room and wonder about it until I would remember. The patient handling system had similarities to the material handling systems used on the Boeing assembly lines to move around airplane parts (and entire fuselages).
I discovered that my grip on reality had become more fragile. Sometimes when I woke up during the night there would be Maya glyphs covering the ceiling in a regular grid pattern. Sometimes there would be fish scale patterns overlaying patches in my field of vision. When my imagination created faces or figures from features in the wall plaster I would sometimes discover that I could anticipate their movements, their transformations, the changes in the expressions on the faces. I would not be surprised to learn that this was a symptom of the pain killers. I also had optical migraines without the headaches (blind spots) every few hours. Waking up became more of a process as I sorted out the dreams from what was somewhat visible around me.
The staff had their processes well estaablished. I was handed a list of five goals they needed me to accomplish in order to be discharged. Their goal was to have me out of there in five days, or seven at the most. During daylight hours there was a stream of professionals coming through with information, training sessions, equipment for me to take home, or else asking me to get out of bed and walk around the floor. I think that I had a right to be tired before they even got to work on me.
It was worrisome that that first night Barb took over an hour trying to drive to a hotel that is five minutes from the hospital. We should have practiced that trip ahead of time because, like many urban areas around hospitals, the streets are a maze - trying to accommodate both the needs of a major university and the needs of a major hospital. In desperation she finally called me but fortunately, perhaps at random, she was just arriving down the street where the hotel was located at that moment. Barb was very fond of that hotel room. It was her refuge.
They got me out of bed the the next day, the first morning. An occupational therapist came to visit me. There was also a physical therapist, asking questions about the height of our bed at home. When I told her it was "hip high" she sighed with relief because she was not going to have to give me pointers for lowering myself into bed.
There was a pair of MD pain experts who visited every morning to see how my epidural was working. I thought of them as a comedy team. One of the goals was to get me off of direct pain medicine administration (epidural or IV) and get me to be eating opioids instead. Those two guys were quite disturbed and puzzled when my epidural came out after only a few days. They were also the ones to try and solve the problem of my (dry heaves) nausea that started getting to be a problem after a couple of days. They added a rainbow assortment of anti-nausea meds to what was available to me.
There was also a small group of Urology residents that came around every morning. I came to think of them as a flock (a murder?) of crows. Their chief was very goal oriented. She was mostly interested in assessing my overall status. I could see her mentally checking off each goal as it was (even marginally) achieved. I was not well. Something serious had happened to me and I was adjusting to a new state of being. (I still am adjusting.) There was not much sympathy from her.
My own urologist/surgeon, Dr. Dash, showed up a few times - usually after hours. Once he fit me in after visiting his mother. I like Dr. Dash. I want to make things as easy as possible for him. At the same time I sometimes have questions for him. The second time he showed up he mentioned that the pathology results were back on the organ that had been removed. The pathologist reported that he found no sign of living cancer in my bladder, only some scar tissue. So my odds of a cure suddenly went way up.
After that, later, Barb said that for the first time in a long time she was waking up without a panic attack. It would seem that she likes having me around.
I liked the nurses. The daytime nurses were hard workers with agendas. They were sympathetic yet relentless. I noticed that there was a fairly high level of morale at the UW Medical Center. People seemed to be happy. That helped my own morale.
The night of January 5th/6th a powerful windstorm hit western Washington. I was awakened by the sound of the winds slamming into the side of the building. I might have supposed that a large truck on the street below my window was revving its engine on high for several minutes. Then it would stop. Then it would start again. During the night the house in Maple Valley lost power. Power did not return until Thursday the 10th.
So then the welfare worker came around offering funds to put us up in some dump for one night upon discharge from the hospital. There were no funds for more than that and Puget Power email notifications were making it clear that would not be enough. The welfare hotel definitely would be the wrong hotel.
Meanwhile, there was this brand new little opening in my belly that I had to learn how to tend. I am sorry for all those people who live alone after the surgeons have done their work. If Barb had not been there I doubt that I would have been able to get through the three lessons we received from the UW ostomy nurses. My eyesight was not good during the time I was in the hospital. There is fine detail that has to be seen in tending a urostomy. So we had three one hour test runs before being on our own.
I did not sense that I was getting much better. I was now making the circuit of the floor without a walker but it was extremely tiring. After five nights in the hospital I was told that I would be discharged that day. We still had two nights reserved in the hotel where Barb was staying so that is where we went. The nurses brought in more supplies to take home. I was offered a walker but the idea of having that thing sitting around the house was too much to contemplate. I received a box of 28 shots with instructions to inject myself in the belly with one of them each day. With great effort I pried myself into my clothes and them lay exhausted on the bed with my hat on. One of the aids loaded me in a wheelchair and took me down with Barb to the Forester in the parking garage.
Barb and I sneaked/trudged into the hotel through the lobby, with me carrying my urine bag in one hand but otherwise bundled up against the chill. She must have carried up all the stuff the nurses gave us. In spite of my misgivings I was much happier to be out of the hospital. Barb had stocked the mini refrigerator with some sandwiches. It was not until later, after Barb started one of her nausea bouts that I sneaked out of bed and stuffed my face, kneeling in front of the mini frig, hiding from her so that her nausea would not be worse. It was far more than I had eaten in the hospital. My own nausea was gone for the time being. It returned a week or so later, but that is another story that I probably will never tell.
Barb was sick for two days in the hotel while we waited for power to return to our house in Maple Valley. She recovered in time to take me home, driving slowly on the freeway, the two of us consulting about directions. In retrospect, I am reminded of various older couples where the romance is no longer really physical but all about shared goals, shared memories, and shared expertise. I know such a couple in their nineties, not that I think both of us will live that long.
Sunday, May 26, 2019
Living with Impending Death
I have never known precisely what moment I might die. There has been times when I knew it was drawing closer than at others. For the most part subjective life is book-ended between a definite moment of birth and a moment of death that lies in the indefinite future. By that accounting I am now starting out on my third life. There has been two times in my life when death approached me closely and relentlessly - then relented. (That does not count all the foolish high-jinks of my youth.)
Both times I consented to take the actions needed to ward off my fate, although not without thought. Each time there was a price. It was a much higher price the second time. I firmly believe that there are some things worse than dying. The bargain I made with myself in 2018 involves accomplishing a great deal in the duration of whatever reprieve I receive. It may be that that is worse than dying, nor is that the total price I paid.
There are probably half a dozen projects that I would like to accomplish. If I do not say what they are then it is only up to me to beat me on, to apply guilt - whatever it takes to get me up in the morning, to make me productive. Some scientists working on the "Hard Problem of Consciousness" deny that there is a problem ("it's all in your head and therefore irrelevant"). I like Marcus Aurelius and was reminded of that when I saw this article:
https://www.brainpickings.org/2019/05/20/marcus-aurelius-meditations-mortality-presence/?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Fair warning: there are ads in this series of "messages from God".
The Buddhists seem to agree with the "it's all in your head" school of thought. I think that getting on the hamster wheel of the mind ultimately leads to this conclusion. Pure objectivity is so much more appealing and beautiful than accommodating a model of mind that might lead one into empathy, resonance, and eventually the likelihood of crucifixion.
No matter how hard we try we all fall short of the infinite glory of God. It does not matter whether our sin is anosognosia, solipsism, or malice. Naturally the list of sins is not complete (not even the eight deadly sins). We must also recall the "sins of the fathers" and "original sin", which we can now safely identify as at least partially genetic. It is (for me) an open question whether we can be absolved of the genetic component of our sins. Christian thought holds otherwise, yet not absolutely since Jesus died for our sins.
In religion, symbolism IS reality. In the mind, symbolism is meaning, which is the only reality. (This is not the solipsism of the self/ego, but it comes close.) I once wrote that meaning is a relationship between truth and ontology. What could that possibly mean?
Well, back to work.
Both times I consented to take the actions needed to ward off my fate, although not without thought. Each time there was a price. It was a much higher price the second time. I firmly believe that there are some things worse than dying. The bargain I made with myself in 2018 involves accomplishing a great deal in the duration of whatever reprieve I receive. It may be that that is worse than dying, nor is that the total price I paid.
There are probably half a dozen projects that I would like to accomplish. If I do not say what they are then it is only up to me to beat me on, to apply guilt - whatever it takes to get me up in the morning, to make me productive. Some scientists working on the "Hard Problem of Consciousness" deny that there is a problem ("it's all in your head and therefore irrelevant"). I like Marcus Aurelius and was reminded of that when I saw this article:
https://www.brainpickings.org/2019/05/20/marcus-aurelius-meditations-mortality-presence/?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Fair warning: there are ads in this series of "messages from God".
The Buddhists seem to agree with the "it's all in your head" school of thought. I think that getting on the hamster wheel of the mind ultimately leads to this conclusion. Pure objectivity is so much more appealing and beautiful than accommodating a model of mind that might lead one into empathy, resonance, and eventually the likelihood of crucifixion.
No matter how hard we try we all fall short of the infinite glory of God. It does not matter whether our sin is anosognosia, solipsism, or malice. Naturally the list of sins is not complete (not even the eight deadly sins). We must also recall the "sins of the fathers" and "original sin", which we can now safely identify as at least partially genetic. It is (for me) an open question whether we can be absolved of the genetic component of our sins. Christian thought holds otherwise, yet not absolutely since Jesus died for our sins.
In religion, symbolism IS reality. In the mind, symbolism is meaning, which is the only reality. (This is not the solipsism of the self/ego, but it comes close.) I once wrote that meaning is a relationship between truth and ontology. What could that possibly mean?
Well, back to work.
Tuesday, February 5, 2019
Candidate Music for Bob's Memorial
Nothing really deep here. Poor Wayfaring Stranger may be the best choice.
Topology 10 with Howard Schwartz
Being kind is not particularly easy, especially when the object of my kindness turns out to be me. Still, I will say the kind thing. I have always been a dilettante, a dabbler pursuing all the interests that I ever felt without much method. Sometimes, even the smallest amount of dabbling, however, can have a lifelong impact and a deeper understanding of the world.
As a sophomore at UCSD I was hanging out with my roommates looking at potential class schedules for the upcoming quarter when Howie Schwartz discovered the Topology 10 class. I had read the usual topological conundrums about the difficulties of turning a doughnut (or a coffee cup) inside out. I thought that I was clever. It fit a gap in our schedules and it looked like it would be fun without being too challenging. Howie and I signed up.
The instructor had a lot of doubts. Howie and I were pretty far out of our depth. Topology is the sort of math that requires a special combination of in-depth mathematical expertise and geometric intuition. It is as advanced as any branch of mathematics out there and ordinary human beings need every advantage to begin to grasp what is going on. The instructor was not sure that he would even be able to bring a few basic concepts down to our level. The whole class was like an experiment for reasons of his own. We had a lot of fun and we laughed a lot. At one point I acquired an old inner tube and conducted a practical demonstration of what happens when a doughnut is turned inside out.
One fundamental principle is "continuous mapping", i.e. without discontinuities. Is this even relevant to anything at all? It is pretty obvious that any wormhole in space is a topological analogue of a doughnut. A wormhole cannot be continuously mapped to a standard Euclidean flat space, or even a space with a simple curve mapped to it. I cannot go into a lot of detail about this partly due to my ignorance and also due to a lack of space for the little bullshit that I do know.
My little piece of bullshit pops out at strange moments, like when I realized that it is perfectly possible to map an infinite volume into a finite volume [of space]. Is it cheating to use a hyperbolic function? Probably, but I am not operating within a rigorous system here. I live in a world of wonder where wiser and more boring minds prevail. The real point may be that when volumes are remapped and distorted the passage of time is also remapped and distorted. I sometimes see evidence among some science writers that the consequences of this are not well appreciated.
"So time, space, and energy remain these three; but the most poignant of these is time."
There is more than one way to silence someone. There is the actual physical inability to communicate. There is the understanding that what one has to say is totally lacking in interest to the audience. There is the need for decorum/discretion. There is the consciousness that what one has to say will do far more damage than could ever be justified by speaking out. I have spent my whole life not saying much about my work at Boeing. My theories about reality are pretty much equally unwelcome. The majority of the people I have known now exist in little hidden pockets of random memory within me.
Out of kindness, I avoid all expressions of despair. Little by little over the years I have developed a mild form of Tourette Syndrome. My usual vocal tic is a small cry of angst. I started out trying to hide it, but now it is evident. It is always triggered by a memory - a different memory every time. Each little squeak amounts to a digression from what is going on around me. My mind spans the immensity of physical space and all of eternity, yet it is focused on my own tiny little inconsequential life. Sometime the tic reaches intelligibility: a cry for release. Then the "voice within" silences me and soothes with the words "Soon enough, Bob. Soon enough."
I can be patient. I can be kind. I can wait with my hands folded and a small smile on my lips. There is no balm for my wounds, none for which I would pay the price. Why do I cling to the tokens of cause and effect so tightly? Why do I care about "meaning"?
As a sophomore at UCSD I was hanging out with my roommates looking at potential class schedules for the upcoming quarter when Howie Schwartz discovered the Topology 10 class. I had read the usual topological conundrums about the difficulties of turning a doughnut (or a coffee cup) inside out. I thought that I was clever. It fit a gap in our schedules and it looked like it would be fun without being too challenging. Howie and I signed up.
 | |
| One of these people may have been my topology professor. Every one of these people had a story and a life. |
One fundamental principle is "continuous mapping", i.e. without discontinuities. Is this even relevant to anything at all? It is pretty obvious that any wormhole in space is a topological analogue of a doughnut. A wormhole cannot be continuously mapped to a standard Euclidean flat space, or even a space with a simple curve mapped to it. I cannot go into a lot of detail about this partly due to my ignorance and also due to a lack of space for the little bullshit that I do know.
My little piece of bullshit pops out at strange moments, like when I realized that it is perfectly possible to map an infinite volume into a finite volume [of space]. Is it cheating to use a hyperbolic function? Probably, but I am not operating within a rigorous system here. I live in a world of wonder where wiser and more boring minds prevail. The real point may be that when volumes are remapped and distorted the passage of time is also remapped and distorted. I sometimes see evidence among some science writers that the consequences of this are not well appreciated.
"So time, space, and energy remain these three; but the most poignant of these is time."
There is more than one way to silence someone. There is the actual physical inability to communicate. There is the understanding that what one has to say is totally lacking in interest to the audience. There is the need for decorum/discretion. There is the consciousness that what one has to say will do far more damage than could ever be justified by speaking out. I have spent my whole life not saying much about my work at Boeing. My theories about reality are pretty much equally unwelcome. The majority of the people I have known now exist in little hidden pockets of random memory within me.
Out of kindness, I avoid all expressions of despair. Little by little over the years I have developed a mild form of Tourette Syndrome. My usual vocal tic is a small cry of angst. I started out trying to hide it, but now it is evident. It is always triggered by a memory - a different memory every time. Each little squeak amounts to a digression from what is going on around me. My mind spans the immensity of physical space and all of eternity, yet it is focused on my own tiny little inconsequential life. Sometime the tic reaches intelligibility: a cry for release. Then the "voice within" silences me and soothes with the words "Soon enough, Bob. Soon enough."
I can be patient. I can be kind. I can wait with my hands folded and a small smile on my lips. There is no balm for my wounds, none for which I would pay the price. Why do I cling to the tokens of cause and effect so tightly? Why do I care about "meaning"?
Individual Agency
Let us assume that I wish to live forever. This really is a somewhat baseless assumption since I have thought about this and read about this from a variety of angles, including the religious angle. Still, let us make the assumption. Is it possible that eternal (or even mortal) life might not be worth living?
This question has been raised many times, from Hamlet's soliloquy to the many religious visions of hell. We may be approaching a time when we would be able to challenge the aeons on our own terms. That too raises the same question, and several dozen more about continuity of identity. In other words, if every single element of one's existence has been changed or rendered only by equivalence, can we even claim to be the same person? Would we even want such an existence? What is the danger that we would come to represent some agency that is antithetical to who we started out to be?
My view is that the tides and fluxes of life are impossible in the static perfection of eternal paradise. Nor are we allowed (biblically) even the least vision of that "afterlife".
If I were to choose to live on indefinitely, what would be the bare essentials of my identity that I would mandate? It would seem that my bladder is not on the list. There is an extensive list of other bodily organs that are not on the list. Sexual function is also on the chopping block. That is a huge blow for me.
What is left? What I want is the opportunity to contribute to something of substance that is much greater than myself. I do not ask to be allowed to fix/save the world, although I would instantaneously sacrifice everything for that opportunity. I am content to make my corner of the world a little more happy, a little more beautiful.
Since that is the greatest expression of my "individual agency", it turns out that everything is on the chopping block, including my mind and my personal well-being, so long as the sacrifice does not threaten my ultimate goals. Every achievement or salvation has a greater or lesser price. So we find ourselves shopping in the Department Store of Heart's Desire - a marketplace.
I knew someone at work who was deeply involved in a religious organization. At some point he mentioned that his goal was "salvation". I was so stupid as to ask what he wanted to save. The answer, of course, was himself. That seemed pointless to me. Is it even possible to save oneself by starting out with the goal of saving oneself? What about our loved ones? Can our lives have any meaning independently from the meanings in the world around us?
I see my error. I am assuming that salvation has something to do with meaning. I am assuming that if your life is meaningless nothing will change if you never existed. Furthermore, I am assuming that meaning has something to do with the world. I tend to believe that if a meaning is not written in the world's story, then it does not exist.
I suppose that implies (means) that I am starkly materialist - in my funny spiritual way. So if salvation has nothing to do with meaning, as in the meaning of your actions or at least the meaning of your faith, what is the point (meaning) of all these self-improvement exercises? There I go again. For me it all comes back to "meaning" and especially the meanings, from a physical point of view, in the world around us. The perception of truth... The perception of beauty.
42: The answer to life, the universe and everything (*)
Michele's Memorial
In 2018 my cousin Michele MacKinnon Elliott died and a significant part of that side of the family gathered for the memorial service and a social gathering at her daughter's house in northeast Portland, Oregon. During the service various musical selections were played, some of which raised questions in our (Barb's and my) minds. "The Pretender" by Jackson Brown was the most interesting but it turned out to be a favorite of her husband, maybe. I liked "Sweet Caroline", especially when many of those present joined in and sang along for the refrain.
As I now re-listen to "The Pretender" I realize how appropriate it is for a memorial service, especially the opening lyrics. Then I see the second cut on the album, parts of which is the actual version we heard at the service. Both cuts together are the music one only hears with the album at home - never on the radio and certainly never at the memorial service. I could see and feel the pain in her husband at the memorial reception. We carry on but the pain remains.
I loved Michele among the people of this world and among my cousins. Not inappropriately, of course, but as someone who was a pillar in her universe and who certainly never deserved to live as hard a life as she had. I had a special bond with her since we shared a love of books and my love of books was sufficiently indiscriminate to include the romance novels that were her favorites. I can remember knocking off a couple of her romance novels at Crooked River during the time we spent there. Her mother made a point of having me join them more than once on those weekend trips to their cabin at Crooked River.
I can see her in both of her daughters, each in a different way.
Memories...
I could write endlessly about her life and how she was related to me and how I saw her. Much of the relevance of that falls away with the death of her parents and the lessening of the common roots reaching back to Hopkinton, MA. The relevance remains for me but the people reading this blog entry are unlikely to care.
As I now re-listen to "The Pretender" I realize how appropriate it is for a memorial service, especially the opening lyrics. Then I see the second cut on the album, parts of which is the actual version we heard at the service. Both cuts together are the music one only hears with the album at home - never on the radio and certainly never at the memorial service. I could see and feel the pain in her husband at the memorial reception. We carry on but the pain remains.
I loved Michele among the people of this world and among my cousins. Not inappropriately, of course, but as someone who was a pillar in her universe and who certainly never deserved to live as hard a life as she had. I had a special bond with her since we shared a love of books and my love of books was sufficiently indiscriminate to include the romance novels that were her favorites. I can remember knocking off a couple of her romance novels at Crooked River during the time we spent there. Her mother made a point of having me join them more than once on those weekend trips to their cabin at Crooked River.
I can see her in both of her daughters, each in a different way.
Memories...
I could write endlessly about her life and how she was related to me and how I saw her. Much of the relevance of that falls away with the death of her parents and the lessening of the common roots reaching back to Hopkinton, MA. The relevance remains for me but the people reading this blog entry are unlikely to care.
Monday, February 4, 2019
Preparing for Surgery
On January 2nd I went into the University of Washington Medical Center to catastrophically change my life forever. This is not the first time that I have seen changes in my life in such "earth shattering" terms. When I was about six years old medical authorities dragged little Bobby Dunning kicking and screaming from behind a door at the clinic at Barber's Point in Hawaii in order to give him a polio shot. There would not have been such a team of thugs this time to rescue me from myself. Nor did I hide screaming behind a door. The "animal" is not allowed to prevail much in the person that I have become during the sixty-five years since we all lived in Hawaii.
The night before, Barb and I rented a room in a hotel in the "University District" so that we would not face a long drive in traffic on the morning of January 2nd. It turned out that there probably would not have been much traffic because they told the patient to deliver the victim to the facility at 6:30 AM. Lately, I have repeatedly been delivering the victim to various facilities for medical procedures that undermine his health under the theory that the eventual results will be much better. I lay in a bed at the Valley Medical Infusion Center sixteen times while they infused poisons into my veins. There were two other procedures where I lay on a table while teams of experts performed amazing techniques on my body. I am not retired anymore. My career is now medicine.
So Barb and I went to the "Surgery Pavilion" at the UW Medical Center where we were soon ushered into a small cubicle. I was told to remove all my clothes, put on the usual (maximum access) hospital gown and make myself comfortable on the little rolling bed. There I presided over a parade of professionals asking questions and otherwise preparing me for the events of the day. This was not to be considered a minor or even a medium difficulty surgery. I have been informed that it is a technical "tour de force". It takes a very long time, a long working day starting at 8:30 AM.
Two anesthesiologists came in to install an epidural for purposes of controlling pain after the surgery. They had me sit on the edge of the bed and poked me with (local anesthesia) needles as they probed between the vertebrae in my back and ran a tube into the epidural space in my spinal column. I only felt one minor tickle/twinge as they did it.
Later, after the surgery, this was where opioids were infused whenever I pushed a button. I stashed the button and its cable in one of the convenient (maximum access) holes in the chest of my gown. After a few days of rolling around in the hospital bed after surgery the epidural tube came loose and they had to switch back to infusing me with analgesics via an IV. I still had the "port" in my chest, I still have the port in my chest, so they were able to eliminate some IVs and use that device instead while I was in the hospital.
There was more discomfort from itchiness with the epidural than with the IV drugs. The IV drugs I thought were more effective. I also got the feeling that the pain doctors were feeling their way with the dosages on the epidural. I did not experience a lot of pain after the surgery. The worst pain that I can remember felt like gas in my intestines, but they really messed with my intestines so it may have been something other than gas. It is not the missing organs that hurt.
Then Dr. Dash came in with a young man he identified as his "physician's assistant" (with all the correct praise for said person's skills.) They informed me that they were going to use robots to perform the surgery. My faith in technology is such that suddenly I felt much safer going into this procedure. The doctor left and I was shortly afterward rolled down the hallway trailing after them. Barb kissed me goodbye with a surprising intensity before they rolled the bed out of the room. As we rolled down the hallway, I asked the attendant how many operating rooms they had at the UW Medical Center and was suitably astounded by the answer. She also mentioned the number of hospital beds (570). Big Bob had little Bob firmly by the hand as we rolled into the operating room. The sedatives probably helped too.
The operating room was relatively large with a large number of people standing around in it. I mumbled something about robots and they agreed and pointed at huge silvery machines mounted in various corners of the ceiling of the operating room. They said that Dr. Dash would be at the controls and I tried to visual the console and the command and control system involved. It would seem, however, that I was not there for a guided tour of the premises. Things started moving quickly. There is a discontinuity in my stream of consciousness after that.
next: five days in bed at the hospital.
The night before, Barb and I rented a room in a hotel in the "University District" so that we would not face a long drive in traffic on the morning of January 2nd. It turned out that there probably would not have been much traffic because they told the patient to deliver the victim to the facility at 6:30 AM. Lately, I have repeatedly been delivering the victim to various facilities for medical procedures that undermine his health under the theory that the eventual results will be much better. I lay in a bed at the Valley Medical Infusion Center sixteen times while they infused poisons into my veins. There were two other procedures where I lay on a table while teams of experts performed amazing techniques on my body. I am not retired anymore. My career is now medicine.
So Barb and I went to the "Surgery Pavilion" at the UW Medical Center where we were soon ushered into a small cubicle. I was told to remove all my clothes, put on the usual (maximum access) hospital gown and make myself comfortable on the little rolling bed. There I presided over a parade of professionals asking questions and otherwise preparing me for the events of the day. This was not to be considered a minor or even a medium difficulty surgery. I have been informed that it is a technical "tour de force". It takes a very long time, a long working day starting at 8:30 AM.
Two anesthesiologists came in to install an epidural for purposes of controlling pain after the surgery. They had me sit on the edge of the bed and poked me with (local anesthesia) needles as they probed between the vertebrae in my back and ran a tube into the epidural space in my spinal column. I only felt one minor tickle/twinge as they did it.
Later, after the surgery, this was where opioids were infused whenever I pushed a button. I stashed the button and its cable in one of the convenient (maximum access) holes in the chest of my gown. After a few days of rolling around in the hospital bed after surgery the epidural tube came loose and they had to switch back to infusing me with analgesics via an IV. I still had the "port" in my chest, I still have the port in my chest, so they were able to eliminate some IVs and use that device instead while I was in the hospital.
There was more discomfort from itchiness with the epidural than with the IV drugs. The IV drugs I thought were more effective. I also got the feeling that the pain doctors were feeling their way with the dosages on the epidural. I did not experience a lot of pain after the surgery. The worst pain that I can remember felt like gas in my intestines, but they really messed with my intestines so it may have been something other than gas. It is not the missing organs that hurt.
Then Dr. Dash came in with a young man he identified as his "physician's assistant" (with all the correct praise for said person's skills.) They informed me that they were going to use robots to perform the surgery. My faith in technology is such that suddenly I felt much safer going into this procedure. The doctor left and I was shortly afterward rolled down the hallway trailing after them. Barb kissed me goodbye with a surprising intensity before they rolled the bed out of the room. As we rolled down the hallway, I asked the attendant how many operating rooms they had at the UW Medical Center and was suitably astounded by the answer. She also mentioned the number of hospital beds (570). Big Bob had little Bob firmly by the hand as we rolled into the operating room. The sedatives probably helped too.
The operating room was relatively large with a large number of people standing around in it. I mumbled something about robots and they agreed and pointed at huge silvery machines mounted in various corners of the ceiling of the operating room. They said that Dr. Dash would be at the controls and I tried to visual the console and the command and control system involved. It would seem, however, that I was not there for a guided tour of the premises. Things started moving quickly. There is a discontinuity in my stream of consciousness after that.
next: five days in bed at the hospital.
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