What do they know

The Cap enjoys the seaside very much, as you can imagine. This pic immediately below was taken at the Aberdeen shoreline, where I visited on 13-14th June 2011. It held a certain strange fascination for me. I looked down on these barnacles, waiting for the water to wash up on them.

They would live, reproduce and die, oblivious to the world around them, or the complexity of the heavens above, or that someone was looking down on them.

Their lives are so simple compared to mine. “Would I trade places with them if given the chance?” I wondered.

My thoughts were interrupted by a splash of water against my feet.

I retreated. I walked and looked around. What a view.

And I thought of my life in the same way I looked upon the lowly barnacle. And then I thought, “There is so much up there that I don’t know about, so much I will never know about.”

I was motivated to publish this by Leonard Susskind, a renowned physicist who probes the deeper nature of reality.  He’s been called the bad boy of physics. In essence he was recently said that reality may forever be beyond the reach of our understanding. See Scientific American 2011-06-22. In a sense there’s nothing new in that. But somehow that sobering thought resonated with my experience of the barnacles. They too were limited in  ‘understanding’ the reality around them.

What do they know – is also to ask ‘what do we know’.

Suicide sticks

The following has been deep in my ‘substrata’ for months. It went deep because a colleague with an IQ of 147, opts to smoke cigarettes. Besides the IQ the person is exceptional in other ways. Quite unexpectedly this morning as I got the computer I launched spontaneously on this that I write now. I know that is the best way to let my thoughts connect with my finger tips.  You know this is coming from the heart. President Obama is given my attention later. And there’s a surprise.

If you’re a smoker and you’re sure that it is your choice to smoke cigarettes or use tobacco products, and you know all the ‘yarn’ about the dangers of smoking, kindly move on – you’re just one of the millions of the most ignorant, stupid and delusional people on this earth. If you got this far, you’re expecting this to be another lecture on the hazards of smoking. Move on now – the quicker the ignorant, stupid and delusional kill themselves the better for the human race! I think we all can agree on that one – even if you know you don’t fit my categorisation of you.

Someone reading this just thought “But lots of very intelligent people – doctors, judges, world leaders – who smoke tobacco products, surely they’re not stupid”. To which I would reply, “Stupidity and intelligence are quite often good bed fellows”. In fact my definition of stupidity includes being intelligent enough to know and assess risks (in general or specific) and in the face of high risk either rationalise persistent actions, ignore or ‘cover’ the risky behaviour. Well – yes, that covers ‘ignorance’ as an ‘attitude’ as well. Yes – President Obama falls into my definition. Doctors don’t really need to tell President Obama to stop smoking – get real – he knows the risks!

Here’s the surprise!! No lecture on the risk of tobacco products! That’s it! It would be a waste of my time and yours. It’ll become more obvious as to why soon.

I now simply give you my conclusions that there are two main kinds of stupid people on this earth

1. The first type is the one who doesn’t know of the risks, doesn’t have the wherewithal to assess the risk and merely follows the ‘herd’ blindly – over the proverbial cliff. But mind you this group is often exposed to some information on the risks, so they rather present as not knowing. In other words they lie to themselves.
2. The second type as I’ve mentioned above is the seemingly intelligent who knows of, or has the mental wherewithal to assess the risk but opts not to assess the risk, or having identified the thing precipitating the risk, does nothing to reduce of avoid it and is simply not bothered.

One way or the other I think anyone in the above groups eventually comes to a knowledge that they are killing themselves slowly.

But what if you’re a smoker and you genuinely do not fall into the above two groups of stupid people. Then there is some small hope for you. You’re not stupid – but you indulge in an act of stupidity. Yes – you know your actions (or inactions) do not fit. You worry – even silently to yourself – that you need to stop. That’s good but there is a risk that you move into and out of group 2 above.

I have no friends or close acquaintances who are smokers. Those smokers who would be inclined to closely associate with me would have a very hard time. Why? Because nearly every time I meet them I’d nag them to stop smoking. And the other thing of course is that the Cap has a slow tolerance of stupid people. Eventually those who smoke and attempt to seek my companionship will find that they avoid me. You see I’m easier to avoid than a cigarette!! In the toss up between me and a cigarette – I lose. I don’t believe that one of a pair of true friends would sit silently and allow the other to kill themselves, in such a stupid way.

So it’s a funny old world – innit? A fag is a smoker’s best friend. Fags provide comfort and death – I don’t.