Daybook 5.

Employment.

In the past (say before about 1960) there used to be (in this country here, the UK) lots of semi-skilled jobs which averagely capable people could do. Things like light assembly factory jobs. But now it seems like there are only two sorts of jobs. Highly skilled ones such as: technical, medical, legal that sort of thing. And very low skilled such as cleaning and distribution. Nothing in between. All that is now done elsewhere.

The personal and the political.

Which comes first? The rules saying how we can behave towards each other. Or how we actually do behave? So in the capitalist system people behave less pleasantly (in terms of economics at least) towards each other than they do in a socialist system. Do they do that because they are living in a capitalist system where the rules say they are permitted to behave like that? Or is it the other way round, meaning the rules say that capitalist type behaviour is allowed because that’s how people already behave. If it’s the latter then a top down political revolution won’t achieve anything. You can’t change how people behave by changing the rules. If you want to change how people behave you have to do it from the bottom. Although I have got no idea what methods you would use to do that. Maybe you could learn from examples in history where this actually happened. For example Christianity or the change in people’s attitudes to sex and drugs during the 1960s. Neither of these things was top down legislated for. Something like this could happen again in the future. For example what if in the next few years people just lost interest in being wealthy. Like they got bored of it and became interested in something else instead. Like writing poetry. And so wealth disappeared together with wealth disparities. So: a less capitalistic society.

Wartime.

Is war a war between whole populations? During the World Wars could someone from Britain still (as a private individual) have gone to Germany for a holiday? I mean aside from the fact that both sides would be thinking that maybe this person is a spy.

Alcohol.

Why is alcohol often judged by the behaviour of alcoholics? For example the Temperance Movement advocate abstinence not moderation. Which suggests they are judging alcohol by the state of alcoholics, the ones who drink to excess. Food isn’t judged by the behaviour of gluttons, so why should alcohol be? (This point might apply about other drugs too.)

Sex.

Religionists might deny it but they do often argue that people should not engage in sexual activity purely for pleasure. The argument is that the purpose of sex is conception so therefore it is wrong to do sex for pleasure only. Sex should only be procreational not recreational. But, to be consistent, those religionists should also object to eating for pleasure. Eating should be nutritional and not recreational.

Surveillance.

People don’t like being observed and kept a track of all the time. But in a (future) perfect surveillance society I would be able to surveil the people doing the surveillance. For example I would know who is watching me and why. Of course all that is unlikely to happen. Even now websites are keeping a track of what I do on the internet. And even though they store that information on my computer in the form of cookies. Even then I still can’t read those to see exactly what they are saying about me!

Knowledge.

The Victorians (or whoever else it might be) realised paintings were often of naked people and so covered up the relevant bits. Paintings which up to then people had not even thought of as being of naked people. This is rather like the way Adam and Eve suddenly realised they were naked when they hadn’t thought of themselves as being that up to then. (These two things overlap in cases where paintings are actually of Adam and Eve.) Does all of this mean the Victorians had suffered some kind of Fall akin to the Biblical one?

Sense perception.

What if someone possessed a sense that you don’t possess. Then you might wonder what it’s like to have that sense. What it ‘feels like’ to have that sense. So, I can imagine a blind person thinking what it would be like to have the sense of sight. But let’s say that the blind person could, using their other senses, navigate the world in exactly the same way as a sighted person. Imagine their hearing was good enough to receive sound from any object near enough to see. And they responded to them in as accurate and discerning a way as a sighted person. Then, if you hold to the psychological theory of behaviourism, you will say that their experience would not be any different from a sighted person’s. I mean even ‘internally’. Because a sense is just the behavioural manifestations of having that sense. And nothing more than that.

Success.

Talent (talent, skill etc) and hard work alone are not sufficient. There are certain other attributes which are required. Which can be broadly referred to as “having the right attitude”. Being able to get on with people. A certain sort of personality. Even things like punctuality. … These are the kind of attributes which used to be got by the process of (what used to be called) ‘character building’. If you don’t have the character that ‘character building’ builds then it doesn’t matter how talented or hardworking you are. … Or, as is often stated in employment advertisements, the “ability to prioritise work”. You might be very clever but not have this particular talent. You should acquire this first before you waste time acquiring any others. But formal education doesn’t teach these kinds of things. Another example might be the skill of finding employment. Doesn’t matter what you’re good at if you’re not good at finding a job.

Critical.

It happens sometimes that an artist produces something they think is good but the critics don’t like it. Does the converse ever happen? An artist produces something that they don’t like but the critics love it?

Real life.

Sometimes I wonder what real life is like. So close yet so far away! I don’t know enough about what the things around me are. Or where they came from. Or who all these strange people are. This society and economy is not transparent enough! Goods and service appear as if by magic. I need to see their arising but I can’t. Neither is it clear to me how people deal with each other. What the rules are in this regard. 

Perspective.

I don’t know what I’m like. I don’t have enough perspective on myself. I want somebody to interrogate me to find out what’s going on. The problem with this is that, as they do this, they will slip into being critical. Expressing an opinion about what things I am doing wrong. I don’t need them to do that though. I can do that myself.

Writing it down.

Write it down so that you don’t forget. This sounds like sensible advice. But writing isn’t a substitute for memory is it? If I write down what Jack’s address is then to recall it I need to find the piece of paper I wrote it on. If I have remembered it in my head then it is just there when I want it. I don’t have to perform any finding process at all. (Which goes to show that saying “the memory is like a filing system” is nonsense. It clearly isn’t.) ... The other thing is that if we are using writing as a comprehensive substitute for memory then that is just going to make our memory worse. Rather like if I used a wheelchair to get around when my legs were fine. After a while my legs would stop being fine. They would wither away from disuse.

Rules.

I don’t like the rules that nobody follows. On the bus it says press the bell and do not get up out of your seat until the bus has stopped. Not only does nobody follow that rule but if they did the driver would be annoyed. If you waited till the bus stopped and then got up from the back seat of the top deck! Keeping the driver waiting all the time it took you to get down and to the front.

Confusion.

It is winter and I am wearing a jumper or jacket to keep warm. Someone sees this and asks “are you cold?” and I answer “no”. Because I am not cold due to me wearing a jumper. But my answer seems wrong. I feel like I should be saying: “yes”. Is that the fault of the questioner? Should they have asked: “were you feeling cold when you put that jumper on?”. But that is a daft question for slightly different reasons. Obviously I was cold otherwise I wouldn’t have put the jumper on. Either way, the question is a stupid one.

Education.

The government say they want to have everyone highly educated and skilled so that then they can get good jobs and earn good money. Ideally everyone should have a university education, they say. I had a stupid question about this which was: if everyone is educated and skilled then who will do all the jobs that don’t require very much education and skills. Like: who will empty the bins or mop the floors.

Slavery.

Wanting machines that do all the work is just another manifestation of the desire to enslave somebody. To have somebody/something servile towards which to have a feeling of superiority.

[Compiled 18 January 2016]