Prepared, Unprepared

"Effective altruism" can be broken down into two words, "effective", and "altruism". Similar words are "effectiveness, effectively" and "altruist, altruistically".

Effectiveness is better served by preparation. Perhaps to maximize effectiveness, it seems like we should be maximally prepared.

What about altruism? Desiring to be effective makes sense if you are an altruist. So it makes sense to be prepared. But how do you know, for sure, that you're prepared? Can you always be prepared, or are there situations where you may be unprepared, or know that you are unprepared? So part of altruism is to risk lack of preparation and endure the consequences.

Lack of preparation tests and confirms your altruism, your alignment with doing good for others. If you pass the test and are confirmed, your altruism may be strengthened.

Repentance is something we are always capable of doing, and which we are always unprepared to do. (That is a nice sentence to present without context, but I will explain:) Whatever component of what you're doing that is you sinning, is something you're 100% capable of not doing. And you get no help from anyone or anything in ceasing to do it, or else it would not be you who was ceasing to do it. The way we contribute to other people's salvation (or the opposite) is by presenting temptations, or anti-temptations, choices which they face entirely on their own resources.

Book Review Preview: Warranted Christian Belief by Alvin Plantinga

See also the review and postview.

I got my copy of Warranted Christian Belief in the mail yesterday. I have read this book, back when I was college, probably in 2008 or 2009. So I have a vague memory of what it says, beyond its basic premise.

Here are some questions I'm interested in answering:

It could be claimed that Reformed epistemology equally justifies Islamic belief, so how can we tell between Christianity and Islam? This is potentially a very important question, because both of them teach hell. If one of them is right and we don't believe it, we may end up not being saved. Does Plantinga have anything to say that closes off the possibility of other religions being just as justified as Christianity via their own properly basic beliefs?

Another objection: If I have what reasonably enough seems to me to be a properly basic belief in God, and then it goes away (and maybe then comes back, and then goes away, and so on), what should I think about whether God really does exist? Should I trust the beliefs in God when they come? Does Plantinga address this at all?

A question: did Abraham have warranted [not exactly "Christian", but maybe we could say "Yahwist"] belief? We have the benefit of billions of fellow Christians to validate our belief. But he was alone at first. If there was someone like him in our day, we would likely think him to be a crazy person who trusted the "voices in his head". How did Abraham know that he was listening to God? Did he not even really know? The Bible presents him as an exemplar of faith. Should we believe like Abraham? I'm wondering if Plantinga addresses this to any extent. (A side question: what is the Bible's epistemology?)

Here is a question / set of questions that, to be fair, may not need to be answered by Plantinga, for being outside his area of expertise, and that I don't really expect the text to directly address. But maybe after I'm done reading the book, I will have a better idea of what I think the answer is, and I can report it when I do the postview for this book. The question is, to what extent does adopting a Reformed epistemology-based approach to belief incline a person to no longer index themselves to reason, and therefore not feel driven to any of reason's other conclusions, the whole skein of perceptions, intellectual relations, and cause-and-effect in which people live?

Is this an approach to truth that inclines us to weep like Jesus (who was weeping when technically he didn't have to, because of his superior divine knowledge), or more toward a kind of inactivity, or even self-satisfaction? For the portion of the church that has learned that faith is superior to reason in producing belief in God, is there a danger that that attitude produces ineffective, unproductive Christians? Perhaps also Christians who can no longer relate to the people who don't have that faith that's superior to reason. Do we trust reason less when our assurance of salvation no longer comes through it, and thus fail to follow the law of reason which normally forces us to interact with the world?

Can we become intellectually lazy about the nature of God? If belief is something that we can directly access and which suffices for us, do we assume too easily that we understand God, and do not correct our understanding through natural theology or even Scripture study (which are both based in reason)?

I don't think Plantinga would say that reason doesn't matter at all, since he went to the trouble to write a 500 page book that is based in reason, to try to justify taking faith as properly basic. But I think there's something semi-fideist if not fideist about the idea that "it's rational to just have faith through the belief that you have", more so than something like "it's rational to have faith because of [MSLN or something like it, a chain of reasons, reasons like "there's a high likelihood that all that exists is consciousness"]".

Seeing Potential

People can seem like they don't have potential, or aren't real people. But then you see them in the context where they are most truly themselves (e.g., singing a song they wrote). And then you see how they are deep and worth paying attention to.

It's as though the role society wants everyone to inhabit is that of the "typical" person. No dreams, no depth. But people can escape that role by doing what they love.

A parallel to Gell-Mann Amnesia. People are spun to us according to society's narrative (they spin themselves by adopting the roles we elicit.) We sometimes see people's reality, then when the moment is past, we forget.

The Statue Guide

There is a statue which was not made by a human being, which stands in the heart of a certain city. It is 500 feet (~166 m) high and can be seen from miles away.

A young boy saw that statue and saw the life in it. He wanted to go see it, and his parents took him once. He looked up at it from its feet and it didn't look quite the same to him. But he believed in it, and touched the statue's feet, polished by the touch of other citizens.

From then on, he knew that the statue was for him, and he went about his normal days as a young boy, not thinking too much of it.

He read the newspaper when he had nothing to do after school, and saw that there were blind people who had trouble finding the statue. People tried to give them very good directions, but it turns out that it's hard to give directions to blind people if you're sighted.

This weighed on him. He decided that he needed to learn how to make better directions for blind people to find the statue.

He forgot about this in the short run, but remembered it with his whole life. He found that while a sighted person only needed to be shown the statue from a distance, and told "just find a way to get through the streets -- you'll make it", a blind person had to be told to go from this street to that street -- the city has a lot of canyons cutting streets into pieces, so there's no one or two streets that can get you to the statue. And unfortunately, in this city there are blind people who can't even process the idea of a street and must be told precisely how many steps to take in which direction, orienting themselves to the sounds and smells along the way.

So he knew that what he must do was to become blind himself, and even damage his ability to process streets, in order to enter into the reality of the blind people he wanted to guide to the statue. So he let his eyesight dim, from reading old street maps, and learned to read Braille.

And he worked diligently, as a guide for the blind, proving from Braille maps exactly where the statue ought to be.

He had always been content, as when a boy, to let the statue be off in the distance, but one day he wished to see the statue, to believe in it. So he looked up the route to get from right where he was to the statue, and carefully followed it, avoided getting hit by a car, avoided tripping on the cracks in the pavement.

And he arrived at where the statue ought to be, but he could not see it. Eventually someone led him to the foot of it, and he touched the foot. He could only believe that the rest of the statue was there.

Video Poem: A fly's freedom

I was inspired to write this when I was catching a fly to release outside. My usual technique is to isolate the fly in the room I am in (easy when I'm in my bedroom using my laptop), and then open the curtains on the window, or the window itself so that fresh air comes in. The fly's deepest longing (if I judge by behavior), is to be outside. It will fly to that window even though it is closed, and spend its time there.

The fly doesn't understand how the human world works, and is just trying to do what it knows best. It's actually doing the wrong thing sometimes by staying near the window. If there's a door open somewhere else in the house, it should just find the door and fly out the house. But it doesn't know any better, and just thinks (or acts like it thinks): the appearance of freedom shows where you get freedom.

Sometimes this leads to the death of flies. I used to kill flies when I saw them on the window, rather than catch them and release them. So in that version of the human environment, the desire for freedom, seeking it the best way the flies knew how, led to death. They should have increased their intelligence and flown nearby the front door, so that they could slip out whenever the humans opened it.

But because I am actually a good person with respect to the fly's desire for life and freedom, the environment that I create makes it so that when the fly, unjustified though it may be in assuming this, thinks (or "thinks"), "I will go toward freedom -- it's right there, I can see it -- I can smell the fresh air -- somehow that's the way out", it's actually a trustworthy move for the fly to make, in ways that it does not understand.

I approach the fly with a small glass cup and put the cup over the area on the window or screen that the fly is on. The fly thinks the cup is prison, and it is. It takes off -- some flies more untrusting than others -- flies around inside the cup. Eventually, it lands on the inner surface of the cup long enough for me to quickly pick up the cup and put my hand over the opening. Now the fly is very much a prisoner, and is taken far away from the promise of freedom, through the rest of the house to the door.

I open the door and keep the fly inside its transport, and then step outside and close the door, so that if I release the fly it doesn't go straight back into the ultimately unwelcoming human environment. Then I take it down to the most favorable part of the back yard, near the compost heap, which I assume is where a fly would most like to be, and where I assume it is best to be a fly -- although flies are perfectly capable of getting around, to seek their own best environments. Then I let the fly go. Sometimes it takes a moment to grasp that it is free, or I help it out of the glass cup. And then it flies away.

Because the fly looks for freedom so predictably, I was able to capture and imprison it, and give it true freedom.

An MSLN view: we might have different intuitions about life depending on whether we find ourselves in the presence of a beneficent super-human environment (whatever is beyond human agency and/or our ability to sufficiently mentally grasp), or a negative one. The MSLN assumption is that we should adjust our priors in the direction that there is a being who would be inclined to help us, and might do so. And so if that is true, we should go toward freedom, like a fly trying to escape the spacious prison of a house.

Prophets Make You Trust

1 Kings 17:

1 Elijah the Tishbite, who was one of the settlers of Gilead, said to Ahab, "As Yahweh, the God of Israel, lives, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word." 2 Then Yahweh's word came to him, saying, 3 "Go away from here, turn eastward, and hide yourself by the brook Cherith, that is before the Jordan. 4 You shall drink from the brook. I have commanded the ravens to feed you there." 5 So he went and did according to Yahweh's word, for he went and lived by the brook Cherith that is before the Jordan. 6 The ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning, and bread and meat in the evening; and he drank from the brook. 7 After a while, the brook dried up, because there was no rain in the land.

8 Yahweh’s word came to him, saying, 9 "Arise, go to Zarephath, which belongs to Sidon, and stay there. Behold, I have commanded a widow there to sustain you."

10 So he arose and went to Zarephath; and when he came to the gate of the city, behold, a widow was there gathering sticks. He called to her and said, "Please get me a little water in a jar, that I may drink."

11 As she was going to get it, he called to her and said, "Please bring me a morsel of bread in your hand."

12 She said, "As Yahweh your God lives, I don't have anything baked, but only a handful of meal in a jar and a little oil in a jar. Behold, I am gathering two sticks, that I may go in and bake it for me and my son, that we may eat it, and die."

13 Elijah said to her, "Don't be afraid. Go and do as you have said; but make me a little cake from it first, and bring it out to me, and afterward make some for you and for your son. 14 For Yahweh, the God of Israel, says, 'The jar of meal will not run out, and the jar of oil will not fail, until the day that Yahweh sends rain on the earth.'"

15 She went and did according to the saying of Elijah; and she, he, and her household ate many days. 16 The jar of meal didn't run out and the jar of oil didn't fail, according to Yahweh's word, which he spoke by Elijah.

And here, in 1 Kings 18:

1 After many days, Yahweh's word came to Elijah, in the third year, saying, "Go, show yourself to Ahab; and I will send rain on the earth."

2 Elijah went to show himself to Ahab. The famine was severe in Samaria. 3 Ahab called Obadiah, who was over the household. (Now Obadiah feared Yahweh greatly; 4 for when Jezebel cut off Yahweh's prophets, Obadiah took one hundred prophets, and hid them fifty to a cave, and fed them with bread and water.) 5 Ahab said to Obadiah, "Go through the land, to all the springs of water, and to all the brooks. Perhaps we may find grass and save the horses and mules alive, that we not lose all the animals." 6 So they divided the land between them to pass throughout it. Ahab went one way by himself, and Obadiah went another way by himself. 7 As Obadiah was on the way, behold, Elijah met him. He recognized him, and fell on his face, and said, "Is it you, my lord Elijah?"

8 He answered him, "It is I. Go, tell your lord, 'Behold, Elijah is here!'"

9 He said, "How have I sinned, that you would deliver your servant into the hand of Ahab, to kill me? 10 As Yahweh your God lives, there is no nation or kingdom where my lord has not sent to seek you. When they said, 'He is not here,' he took an oath of the kingdom and nation that they didn't find you. 11 Now you say, 'Go, tell your lord, "Behold, Elijah is here."' 12 It will happen, as soon as I leave you, that Yahweh's Spirit will carry you I don't know where; and so when I come and tell Ahab, and he can't find you, he will kill me. But I, your servant, have feared Yahweh from my youth. 13 Wasn't it told my lord what I did when Jezebel killed Yahweh's prophets, how I hid one hundred men of Yahweh's prophets with fifty to a cave, and fed them with bread and water? 14 Now you say, 'Go, tell your lord, "Behold, Elijah is here".' He will kill me."

15 Elijah said, "As Yahweh of Armies lives, before whom I stand, I will surely show myself to him today." 16 So Obadiah went to meet Ahab, and told him; and Ahab went to meet Elijah.

When you follow the Spirit, you will be led into other people's lives. They have the choice of whether to trust you or not. There is some risk -- in the case of the widow of Zarephath and Obadiah, the risk of death. You sometimes bring with you a confrontation with life and death, just in the course of following God.

Atheistic gods

When we do not believe in God, do not trust God, who is going to save the world? We have to. We have to be God. We have to be good, we have to be effective. We have to be responsible. We have to know best what to do.

This sounds good.

Except that when we do not believe in God, do not trust God, we set up ourselves as gods. We take responsibility for other people's lives, we take over their lives. We interfere with other people's development. We see things from our point of view -- who could be wiser than us? We attack other people's developing points of view and self-trust, attack their trust in God. We insert ourselves in people's lives, as though we want them to worship us, for them to give us glory, so that we can be acknowledged as trustworthy. We want other people to see the error of their ways. We think we have facts, we act like we know things beyond any doubt -- unless someone else can make themselves god over us, beat us down and dethrone us. We do not choose to give glory to the God who doesn't tend to beat us down and dethrone us, the true God.

Book Review: Blanquerna

Blanquerna, was written in the 1200s by Ramon Llull, who was a missionary, philosopher, and Crusade propagandist. He wanted to use philosophy to teach Muslims the truth about Jesus, so he learned Arabic and traveled to North Africa, where he was unsuccessful at some personal risk. He was influenced by Muslim culture to some extent, incorporating Sufi elements in The Book of the Lover and the Beloved. I don't think he should be viewed as a multiculturalist for that. I think he would have viewed the Sufi element as something belonging to Christ originally. (That's a speculation based on the fact that his writing is heavily Christian, he wanted to convert Muslims, and he was in favor of the Crusades. It was more or less the view of Simone Weil about elements she liked in non-Christian religions). But for his time, he was more liberal (or, more Christian in the "My kingdom is not of this world" sense) by wanting to persuade Muslims using philosophy, something which most people in his day didn't think worth trying.

I read Blanquerna over a period of about four years. I was drawn to it because it contains The Book of the Lover and the Beloved, which has short sayings, one for each day of the year. (I read through them that way, which accounts for one of the four years.) The overall book Blanquerna is a story of a young man who wants to be a hermit, but first has to have a career in the church. He ends up being pope. The Book of the Lover and the Beloved I can recommend to most people who would be reading this review (it's in the public domain and can be found online, separate from Blanquerna), but I struggled to get through the rest of the book. The style can be dry and slow. Llull was a philosopher and uses the events of the plot to illustrate ideas and has characters be his mouthpiece. The style and ideas probably seemed more legible to his medieval contemporaries, but were foreign to me. I think it's valuable to spend some time in foreign thought-worlds, foreign writing-style-worlds, and when I wasn't stunned by the process of reading, I found ideas I'm not sure I could find in modern books. One from near the end (Ch. XIII, paragraph 7, of the Art of Contemplation, one of the books involved in the overall story) is, in my words, "In your struggle against sinful habits you experience faith, hope, and love, virtues which help you deal with those habits, so pray for those virtues and the grace to forget the habits." Llull was interested in holiness, not as much a contemporary concern. A point a person could add to his is that acquaintance with God and the virtues is what God really wants for us, not some bare sinlessness. I don't think that means that sinlessness is not essential (I would guess that Llull wouldn't have supported that view), but that there's a positive content to holiness as well as a negative, pruning motion. Another idea that I like I've already posted, his illustration of a man and a woman discussing why he loves her.

The Moth and the Star / The Owl Who Was God

Here is a link to the James Thurber story "The Moth and the Star". It's a story about seeking the unseekable, impractical, almost-non-existent and how that makes you a fool and keeps your body beautiful. The link also includes Thurber's "The Owl Who Was God", which is like a mirror version of "The Moth and the Star".

Apparently, someone set "The Moth and the Star" to music.

I could connect "The Moth and the Star" to gravity and grace. Star-seeking (what the one moth does) is sort of like seeking grace. The bridge lamps (what the other moths seek) are like gravity.

We devour people and crave power in this world, because that's reality. But realisticness isn't always trustworthy.

I don't know if Thurber intended this, but one could contrast the moth, who flies to something impersonal and more or less infinitely far away, with the birds in "The Owl Who Was God", who follow the owl, something personal and tangible and present. Moth contrasted with birds, star contrasted with owl.