Analysis of harmful events

* There might be less harm, regret, resentment, pain and hate were our judgements and conversations more objective, ethical, analytical, empathetic and imaginative, less self-righteous and blaming.  We could start by recognizing that actual events are caused inextricably by antecedent determinants, then by attempting to identify determinants of regrettable events, then by imagining alternative determinants that might have steered the cause-effect chain to a less regrettable outcome.  Cool analysis would diminish harmful revenge and repeats of regrettable events.  This counterfactual thinking is how humans and other animals improve their futures.
* Freddie Gray’s death in custody of Baltimore police can be a case study.  The six arresting police officers have been charged with 2nd degree murder.  This wouldn’t have happened without the riots.  The riots might not have happened without the fiery speeches by black leaders and not without recent deaths of other black suspects.  The police would administer milder street justice were they not frustrated by repeat offenders, noncompliant suspects and disrespectful populace.  The populace would be more respectful and appreciative of police could they imagine their neighborhoods without police hence ruled by remorseless bullies.  Rap culture probably plays a role in the disrespect.  The demography, unemployment, disaffection in black enclaves can be attributed to 400 years of slavery, racism and neglect by entitled Euro-Americans, recently also automation and outsourcing.  The 1970s opportunities for reconciliation were squandered by blacks and whites.
* All of the above dynamics might be less  toxic were it possible to share economic activity more rationally among tribes (ie races, religions, geographic locations, languages).   Access to employment is a necessary component of dignity and contentment.  The self-reinforcing advantage of technological superiority needs to be dampened.
 * The diagram below is a crude attempt at the analysis espoused herein.  What is missing?  What is erroneous?  If it's too small, click on it.

A disturbing doctrine

 * Determinism is the irrefutable doctrine that: Every event and condition, including every thought and action, is an inevitable consequence of antecedent events and conditions. A corollary is that every evil act in the past, present and future was caused by conditions at the beginning of the universe. Regret, melioration and evolution are links in the cause-effect chain, which should gradually diminish avoidable harm. * Determinism slips from our minds when we are riled by another's misbehavior, but it should enter contemplations of history and justice, when analyzing the dynamics of harm, when seeking to identify significant causes of regrettable events. * Resentment of Andrew Jackson by Native Americans (Albert Bender, Tennessean Mar 15), should dampen Jackson’s apotheosis. Bender’s condemnation might be less vitriolic had he recognized that we all are tribal, ie we evolved with a drive to acquire and expand for our ourselves and our kin, or had he recognized that Jackson’s acts of ethnic cleansing (and genocide) were destined at the beginning of time. * In moments of reflection, we Euro-Americans (beneficiaries of tribal success) should be more modest even humble, considering that the land we occupy and resources we exploit were stolen pristine from Native Americans. To that we could add our treatment of Africans and Mexicans. We might give due credit to our resource advantage over economic competitors throughout American history. Can my tribe be satisfied enough with less pride?
* * Addendum: It's interesting to consider the validity and implications of determinism; but I suspect that the best, noblest, most accomplished, most generous, most admirable people ignore or reject determinism. It interferes with ones sense of purpose, value and meaning.

Of cells, people, tribes, nations and tumors

 * Healthy animal cells submit to signals bridling their acquisitive and reproductive drives, so as not to become tumors.  A society is analogous to an animal most of whose cells resist bridling and create tumors in every organ.  That is, most individuals of a society seek wealth, power and offspring.  Eventually, every normal family or clan is a tumor to the society.  A corporation is a super tumor, required by law to acquire and expand, and this is often augmented by political corruption.  Likewise every tribe, religion and nation is a tumor to the neighboring tribes, religions and nations, especially where resources limit prosperity.  These tumor-like behaviors are directed by primitive drives in the brains of all animals.  Perhaps it should be said that a society is analogous to the collection of microbes in every ounce of fertile soil, all producing antibiotics to kill unrelated microbes.  All of the above is in service of respective DNAs.
 * European tribes exploited, displaced and/or dominated their neighbors for centuries.  They colonized distant lands cancer-like.  Now, non-European tribes formerly colonized by European tribes are metastasizing throughout Europe.  Russia is pushing into Georgia and Ukraine and is eyeing Baltic states.  Israel is a permanent tumor to Palestinians and various middle-east peoples.  Anglo-America expanded tumor like throughout today’s US, first stealing from and eradicating natives, then stealing from Mexicans, much of this fortified by slavery.  Now Latin-Americans are metastasizing back.  Whites and blacks are still unreconciled.  ISIS is dominating and displacing inhabitants of Syria and Iraq and parts of Africa.  Longstanding borders suddenly seem arbitrary as incompatible tribes find themselves bound in sovereign/subject relations.
 * Observers of the above dynamics typically cheer for or justify whichever side of a conflict resembles them most, not necessarily the side that is more ethical or deserving.  There is much to regret about the competitive gerbil wheel that humanity is on.  It is associated with gratuitous pain, harm, fear and waste of resources that should be kept for future generations.
 * Civilization attempts to bridle those primitive drives that perpetuate conflicts between individuals, between tribes and between nations.  Some of us contemplate a more satisfactory civilization, one based on evidence, reason and noble aspirations.  It should be fun to discuss that civilization’s specifications and the path to it from that which we have.  What about agreement among leaders of all kinds and everywhere on the need for self-restraint of acquisitive and reproductive drives?

Appeal of Jihad to Western Muslims

* In his Mar-1 Letter to the Tennessean Editor, Mark Goldstein  rants against a Jan-24 Saritha Prabhu Tennessean column that discussed factors enhancing the appeal of Jihad to Muslim youth.  He begins with a dismissive caricature of her column.  The rest of his letter is a series of rhetorical questions the expected answers to which associate Islam with violence.
* It is indeed shocking to find that some young people in the 21st century would be attracted to a group that beheaded and burned alive its helpless prisoners most of whom were never its enemies.  It is discouraging that young people in our midst would join in ethnic cleansing aimed eventually at us.  Such disrespect for and intolerance of those judged as infidels is incompatible with a civilization worthy of the name.
* Goldstein seems too opinionated for an objective or curious reading of Prabhu’s column.  Perhaps he has forgotten the turmoil of the adolescent mind, the antisocial fantasies that bubble up, the pleasure of mischievous company, the remoteness of eventual life satisfactions, the pain of indolence, the minefield of temptations–and, for a Muslim kid, the addition of special restrictions and humiliations.  These conditions with the provocations listed by Prabhu can account for numerous Jihadist choices.
* We could all use some modesty, considering that adherents to every monotheistic religion have engaged in religiously justified atrocities.

   *   *   Addendum:
* Prabhu listed the following provocations:  1) Iraq invasion, 2) Abu Ghraib, 3) Gitmo, 4) Drone strikes in Afghanistan, Yemen, Pakistan seen as indiscriminate (and cowardly), 5) Palestinian suffering (and hopelessness), 6) Specific disrespect of Islam.
* To that one could add:  7) The Crusades,  8) 1953 CIA overthrow of duly elected government in Iran, 9) Our national pride in "Shock and Awe", 10) Guarantees by our government to protect autocratic regimes in the middle east and elsewhere, 11) Hateful treatment of Arabs/Muslims in our popular culture (films, TV), 12) Unemployment in Muslim enclaves in western countries.

Some thoughts evoked by Vanderbilt Rapes

Psychosocial dynamics of rape:
* An animal’s brain is endowed with primitive drives promoting voluntary-motor functions to enlarge the animal’s DNA footprint.  These drives are steered and restrained by cortical processes in and about the frontal lobe, influenced by information on expected risks and rewards.  The bridling of primitive drives involving social interaction is the essence of civilization.
* Sixty years ago, a pious friend remarked that the sex drive needs extra constraints because it’s so strong and potentially harmful.  It clouds the mind and impairs judgement.
* Western culture has now largely abandoned the mating mores that developed over 3000 years.  By age 20, a guy has had 10 years of dirty jokes and video-pornography, designed to erode romance of mating and respect for women.   Hooking up with a different partner weekly isn’t condemned.  College students are getting inebriated and silly early on a Saturday afternoon, hoping to get lucky with somebody before morning.  Other pressures include fear of missing out (FOMO) and desire to belong and be included.  Sports stars may have groupies.
* In that mix, there is a significant probability that, on a given Saturday night, a guy too drunk to consider the legalities and a girl too drunk to consent will do something defined as rape.  When that happens, what would be appropriate punishment?  Would it be just?  Would it be practical?  What else should be done?  More restrictive campus rules?


Mind in a deterministic universe:
* Determinism is the doctrine that all conditions and events (physical and mental) at a given moment flow inextricably from prior conditions and events.  There is an unbroken cause-effect chain from the beginning of time to the present.  Determinists would recognize a society’s right to detain harmful individuals for safety and punish them for deterrence, but they should not indulge in self-righteousness.  Individual learning, recorded history, scientific discovery, laws, mythology and all responses of life forms to inputs are part of the cause-effect chain.
* Accordingly, the Vanderbilt rapes resulted inevitably from conditions and events at the beginning of time.  Our wish that the rapes had not occurred can translate into policies to diminish future rapes.  Reaction to experiences so as to promote favorable ones and avoid unfavorable ones feels like free choice, though it is determined.
* The brain has many synapses and the mind is tumultuous, so we review many possibilities, make many decisions and take many actions that defy simple explanations and seem to be free expressions of ourselves.  Our system of justice is based on that sense of free choice, agency and responsibility.  But the tumult of a moment is determined by tumult prior to that moment -– according to determinism.


Are sins unbridled primitive drives?
Deadly sins:   wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy, gluttony
Commandments:  Honor your father and your mother.
You shall not murder,  commit adultery , steal, 
bear false witness against your neighbor, covet.

Ferguson trauma

*   Recent events in Ferguson unfolded inexorably against all hope like a Greek tragedy.  If one accepts scientific determinism, then the entire saga is seen as the inevitable consequence of conditions before the Wilson/Brown encounter.  Nevertheless, I can't help considering several "what ifs" that might have altered the outcomes.  Societies sometimes improve by considering what ifs.

*   What if the racial mix of the Ferguson government and police were more like that of the population?  What if the police wore video cameras?  What if teenagers were more civilized, ie more respectful of people, laws, culture?  What if people were less tribal, specifically less racist?  What if more effective riot-control methods had been deployed?

*   What if citizens better understood the need for law enforcement, the consequences of insufficient law enforcement, the probability that with millions of armed police on duty during any day there will be a tragic action by a police officer--justified or unjustified?

*   What if all witnesses agreed with Wilson as to the sequence of events during the Wilson/Brown encounter?

*   People don't riot to protest cars or hospitals though 35 000 people are killed per year in auto accidents, and 100 000 people are killed per year by medical mistakes.

*   What if Al Sharpton and other civil rights leaders had stayed away or had urged objective examination of the evidence rather than victimhood and protests?

*   What if you were the patrolman encountering Michael Brown on the street that day?  Would the outcome have been better?  What if you were the grand jury, would you have found convincing evidence to indict officer Wilson?  What if you were the teenager encountering Wilson on the street that day?

*   Can riots be prevented by more justice?  What reforms would increase justice enough to prevent riots?  Are needed reforms possible without riots?

Gospel Supplement

Below are links to YouTube presentations of Gospel Supplement songs
1 Amazing grace
2 Angel band
3 Back to the cross
4 Beautiful isle of somewhere
5 A beautiful life
6 Beyond the sunset
7 Bringing in the sheaves
8 Church in the wildwood
9 Come Thou Fount
10 The darkest hour is just before dawn
11 Down by the riverside
12 Drifting too far from the shore
13 Dust on the Bible
14 An empty mansion
15 Farther along
16 From the manger to the cross
17 Gathering home
18 Give me the roses
19 I’m going to make Heaven my home
20 Gone home
21 Great speckled bird
22 Green pastures
23 Have you someone
24 He took your place
25 Hide me rock of ages
26 Hide you in the blood
27 Highway to Heaven
28 His fields are ready for harvest
29 Hold to God’s unchanging hand
30 How beautiful heaven must be
31 How firm a foundation
32 I feel like traveling on
33 I saw the light
34 If I could hear my mother pray again
35 I’ll fly away
36 I’ll meet you in the morning
37 I’ll sing for my Lord
38 In the garden
39 It is well with my soul
40 It won’t be long
41 Jesus hold my hand
42 Jesus Savior pilot me
43 Just a closer walk with Thee
44 Just a little talk with Jesus
45 Just over in the glory land
46 Keep on the sunny side
47 Kneel at the cross
48 Last mile of the way
49 Leaning on the everlasting arms
50 Life’s railway to Heaven
51 Lily of the valley
52 Lord build me a cabin in glory
53 Lord lead me on
54 Lower lights
55 Mansion for me
56 Gathering flowers for the master’s boquet
57 Mother’s Bible
58 My Jesus I love Thee
59 Near the cross
60 Where we’ll never grow old
61 O how I love Jesus
62 Old country church
63 Old crossroad is waiting
64 Old rugged cross
65 Old-time religion
66 One Christmas eve
67 One step more
68 Pass me not
69 Peace in the valley
70 Power in the blood
71 Precious memories
72 Road trip
73 Rock of ages
74 Shake hands with Mother again
75 Shall we gather at the river
76 So happy I’ll be
77 Softly and tenderly
78 Standing by the river
79 Standing on the promises
80 Sweet by and by
81 Swing low
82 Precious Lord take my hand
83 Think of the home over there
84 This world is not my home
85 Though your sins be as scarlet
86 Tramp on the street
87 Trust and obey
88 Unclouded day
89 I’m using my Bible for a roadmap
90 Victory in Jesus
91 Washed in the blood
92 Were you there
93 What a friend
94 When He calls
95 When Heaven comes down
96 When I get to the end of the way
97 When the roll is called up yonder
98 When the saints go marching in
99 Where could I go
100 Where the roses never fade
101 Where the soul never dies
102 Whispering hope
103 Who will sing for me
104 Will the circle be unbroken
105 Wings of a dove
106 When they ring the golden bells