Steve Jobs, Ursula Le Guin, and Schrodinger's Cat

I just made a discovery that has left me shaking my head in astonishment.

A week or so ago there was a thread on Facebook that began with a presentation of what were purported to be Steve Jobs’ final words.  Those words were advice of the kind we hear in mid-June in graduation speeches.  He said he’d been caught up in the pursuit of wealth and success, and only later realized that love, family, and spiritual values were more important.  Touching but conventional thoughts.

In the thread that followed, people pointed out what, according to his family, were Jobs’ actual final words:

“Oh, wow.  Oh, wow.  Oh, wow.”

So a few days ago I read a short story by Ursula Le Guin titled “Those Who Walk Away from Omelas.”  It is a brilliant, eight-page story that everyone should read and think about.  Reminded what a brilliant writer she is, I picked up a collection of  her short stories and began reading.  I came to a story titled “Schrodinger’s Cat.”

Since no dufuses or uneducated lowlifes are likely to be reading this blog, I will assume some familiarity with the concept of Schrodinger’s Cat:  the box, the pistol that may or may not fire depending on the random action of a photon, and the quantum possibility that the cat is either dead or alive or both.

So let me quote a short passage near the end of the story:

            “The cat is in the box,” I said.

            “The cat is in the box,” Rover repeated in a whisper, falling to his knees.  “Oh, wow.  Oh, wow.  Oh, wow.”

            There was silence then; deep silence.

We know Jobs was a brilliant guy who was surely meditating on his imminent passing.  Did he ask himself what death was in quantum physics terms?  Had he read and been moved by LeGuin’s story, and did he recall it at the end? 

I wouldn’t mind making a profound literary reference as my final words.  This one will be hard to match.

A Beginning to 2017

A Start to 2017

How can I have a blog and not say something about the presidential election?  Here are a few observations:

·       The Republican party’s Hate-Hillary campaign was so successful it will be a case study in future public-relations courses in business schools.  How did they keep the focus so well on essentially trivial issues—Bengazi, email servers—and have her policy ideas ignored by the media?  (Bengazi trivial?  Let’s see:  Mideast crisis, bad info, wrong administrative decision, four Americans killed, the administrator lambasted.  Another Mideast crisis, bad info, wrong administrative decision, four Americans killed—and then about five thousand more Americans killed.  Waiting for the administrators to be lambasted.)

·       Why do about 48% of voting Americans want a vulgar, unethical casino developer to lead them?  I believe it’s because he said a couple of things in a blunt, simple style they wanted to hear.  Stop immigration, deport Muslims, stop mollycoddling gays. These statements in the debates resonated with many.  What their vote tells me:  they really don’t care that much about the personal morality of their leader, or his qualifications for administering a complex organization. 

·       What will happen? 

o   My funds are doing well because the market thinks corporate taxes will be cut, taxes on the rich will be cut, and regulations that limit corporations from polluting and otherwise ripping us off will be eliminated.  Later, when the world adjusts to America’s erratic behavior, not so well.

o   The improvements in American social justice will be suspended for several years.  The increase in awareness of injustice will not. 

o   Every American is a blend of selfishness and compassion, me included.  The populist surge has brought us to a period of selfishness.  Maybe after a few years of this we’ll feel a little ashamed of ourselves, and a period of compassion will follow.

o   I wonder if Trump will become bored silly with the endless, unglamorous, mind-boggling detailed daily decisions of the presidency, and will hand it off once he can say “been there, done that.”

o   Obamacare:  Republicans may cancel it, but too many Americans have benefitted because for the most part it does what it was intended to.  They’ll bring it back but call it Republicare so they, not Obama, get credit.

·       I hope I’m not in the position two years from now of saying, “You fools, you brought this on yourselves.”   As Europe said when it learned what we’d done to ourselves on election day, “Good Luck with that!”

Topics for future 2017 blog posts:

·       How did the warming of the earth’s temperature get from an issue of scientific evidence to an issue of religious belief?

·       What is the future of sports as the ability to enhance physical performance continues to develop?  Or is the issue of the enhanced athlete only the forward edge of the issue of the enhanced human?

• How will I get my novel, A Mindful Act of Vengeance, published

The Lotus Factory and the Goodwood Revival

Seattle the Day After the Loss

An odd and unusual experience.   Conversations are brief.  People acknowledge to one another what happened, but no-one wants to dwell on it.  The talk moves quickly, almost with relief, to daily business.  I heard a guy at the gym this afternoon say he’s spent the whole day trying to stop himself from imagining over and over the play they should have made.

Are You a Superstitous Sports Fan?

Leon Berman is the host of “Shake the Shack,” a Friday night rockabilly radio show on KEXP I listen to as I drive to volleyball.  Last night one of his co-hosts pressed him to talk about his Seahawks pre-game rituals. (Sunday the Seahawks play Green Bay for the NFC championship.)  Leon’s family has held Seahawks season tickets since 1975.  He was genuinely reluctant to discuss the rituals, but admitted they were pretty OCD, and included things like not only wearing the same clothes, but putting them on in a precise order, and not only cooking the same brand of sausages for breakfast but aligning them in an exact pattern in the pan.  These, he admitted, were just the tip of an all-day iceberg.

Where does the belief that these rituals influence events come from?  You could say it’s an arrogant belief in one’s power:  if I do certain things associated with my team’s victories in the past I can help the team win by repeating them.  Baseball players in particular seem to do this regarding their individual performance: wearing the socks they wore the day they hit for the cycle.  But I think it’s not arrogance, it’s fear.  Our team wins an unexpected victory, and we think about all the circumstances surrounding the game, including what we did that day.  We begin to fear that if we don’t make our small contribution to those circumstances, the team may lose.  We recreate the details of the pregame period as a ritual, motivated not by arrogance and optimism, but by a sense of obligation and fear.

Do I have Seahawk rituals?  No.  And yet, when I think about my behavior….

I tend not to watch games from beginning to end.  I have the game on in the TV room and pop in from time to time to watch in small chunks, maybe five minutes. Okay, here it is.  I seem to believe that whether I’m watching or not influences the game.  But it can go either way.  If the Hawks do something good while I’m watching, I feel I need to stay at the set so more good things will happen.  If the other team marches down the field for an easy TD, I feel my presence is a negative influence that day and I leave the room hoping my absence will reverse the game’s direction.  I’ll pop back twenty minutes later to see if I’ve been successful….

Nothing rational about this other than an insight into how primitive religions were formed.

The Cheap Toilet Paper Fallacy

An article a few days ago in the New York Times talked about why Crohn’s disease isn’t much talked about.  People suffering from Crohn’s disease always have to know where the toilets are.

I don’t have Crohn’s, but I understand.  I only run on routes where I know the locations of the toilets.  I’ve had difficulties being a world traveler.  When I sit around a hotel room nothing happens.  When I get up and go exploring in a city, it’s time.

This has given me a certain, I won’t say expertise, but familiarity with the toilet paper supplied by a variety of public institutions.  I’ve visited many of those institutions while running and cycling in the greater Seattle area.

Seattle Parks, for instance.  Their TP is light and flimsy.  It probably costs half what more substantial paper costs.  That’s a poor economy.  Let’s say at home I tear off good quality TP in four-sheet lengths. Do I tear off eight at a Parks potty?  No, more like twelve, or let’s face it, sometimes you just grab a wad instead of sheets.  One consequence is that the rolls have to be replaced much more frequently, and that means more labor.  Any cost accountant who thinks a savings in paper supplies is not offset by increased labor costs should be doing something else.

Related sidebar:  I’ve been gluten-free for going on two years.  I’m doing it because my wife is gluten-sensitive.  I’m not.  It just makes menu-planning easier.  I do miss the currant scones and  tuna sandwiches on good rye.  But I’ve discovered a benefit that keeps me away from wheat.  That sudden need to find the potty?  It’s calmed a bit.  I have more time to search.  Enough of a benefit that today I mostly stay out of the bakeries I used to love.

Nietzsche and the Digital Abyss

Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster.  And if you gaze long enough into Google, Google will gaze back into you.