REFLECTIONS

26-SEP-1999.

FANTASY

If you think you're better than other people,
then it's hard to like yourself.

You incorporated many of your parents' ideals
and values while you were still a child.

For example, if your parents didn't like thieves,
then you don't like thieves.

Part of you is a thief.

26-SEP-1999.

When a "Force of Nature" is Not Logical

Children frequently use switching sides as a fighting tactic in an argument, like a sudden jujitsu move. However, simply reversing sides leads to a whole textbook of informal fallacies. The syllogisms listed here incorrectly take a sufficient condition for a necessary condition. In the expression,

IF "Something is true" THEN "This follows."

"Something is true" is called the ANTECEDENT.

"This follows" is called the CONSEQUENT.

When a mother tells a child, "If you don't wear your sweater outside, you'll catch a terrible cold," you are DENYING the ANTECEDENT if you ask something like, "Well, then, if I just stay inside all day, you mean I won't catch a cold?" (You stupid mother!) In this situation the mother should recognize the child is DENYING the ANTECEDENT and respond ambivalently,

"—Way beyond!"

Alternatively, if the mother repeats, "If you go outside without your nice new sweater on, you really will get sick," you are AFFIRMING the CONSEQUENT if you say something like "Well, then, if I just plain get sick, will that mean I've already gone outside without my stupid sweater?" (You stupid mother!) The mother would be well advised to admonish the child cheerfully with something like,

The main thing to notice here is that without extraordinary practice, people really don't have a chance to perform lexical analysis on the fly. However, you can begin to notice where this kind of trouble comes from, and from that understanding, make an immediate response.

First, begin to notice that most logical confoundment comes because a person suddenly switched sides exactly the way a child would — They regressed and said something childish (without adult logic).

Perhaps you, or both of you, become a "force of nature" (in discussions of sex or of having a baby). Then if one of you says something like, "I'm not going to talk to you unless you're being logical," and the other says something back, like, "So, you'll never talk to me again?" try to see beyond all this, that you'll both be back on the street again as rational human beings earning an honest living.

Then you can immediately (and poetically) respond, "—Very different."

In sex and in love, two people regress together, have fun, then shimmy into two separate adults again. Try to see this as an enjoyable process rather than as fertile grounds for a fight.

Second, begin to notice that most people do not provide adequate "establishing shots." In cinematography, this is done by first showing a general scene from way back (establishing a context), then moving or cutting in for fast action or for close-ups. In much of modern communication, people are not skilled in establishing a frame of reference. They "just say things."

One day a complete stranger said to me, "Is your arm better?" Seeing this as a logical challenge, I immediately responded, "—Much better!" but had no idea what he had been talking about until twenty minutes later. He had forgotten to establish the shared memory we had of me walking my dogs in Berkeley's Aquatic Park, when, whoosh! his Frisbee had sailed close by, and how I had yanked my arm back into my sleeve, like a turtle, as if the disk had sliced it off! He and all his friends had laughed, and we had continued our separate ways.

Now, for one thing, there were four of them, who were behind me, so I hadn't noticed any one of them in particular. Next, they were in the company of their own camaraderie, so they had probably been regressing (into childhood happiness). And finally, I had been walking at a very different speed from them, and in a different direction. Nothing was really wrong with my arm.

So I had nothing, really, to help me remember when two weeks later this stranger said, "Is your arm better?"

Always keep in mind that when communication breaks down, one or many of you are probably regressing, and there's nothing wrong with that. It's just sometimes you have to be an adult.

04-SEP-2007.

As follows

CODE WORDS: arm, 'cause, chase, cheese, damage, defensive, diapers, dining, early, feeling, finish, fires, freeway, from, generalize, getting, illegitimate, immature, inside, light, lights, morning, outsourced, peyote, plain, poison, politically, quiz, reward, ruin, seem, short, sometimes, stereotyping, surprises, taped, there'll, thinker, third, times, using, witch