It’s common to think of time as though it were a medium one travels through in the same way one travels through space–as in, you can travel one meter through space, or you can travel one second through time. Popular science education reinforces this idea by telling us that time is just another dimension, like the three spatial dimensions of up/down, left/right, and front/back. Yet there seems to be a weird exception in that we can only travel through time in one direction at a constant speed, whereas we can travel through space in any direction and at any speed we like. What if that weren’t the case? What if time’s seeming constancy were simply a technical limitation that someday we could solve? What if we could travel in either direction through time, just as we can now travel through any direction in space? This is the “science fiction” conception of time travel, and although it’s an immensely fun idea that has enjoyed huge popularity for over a century, it rests on a false analogy: time “travel” is a complete misnomer. The seemingly one-way nature of time, and its interconnectedness with space, are foundational to our conception of what it means to “travel” somewhere at all–without them, the term becomes meaningless. Continue reading
What Is the Purpose of Government?
This essay is a follow-up to a previous piece I wrote on the topic of Objectivism.
The role of government should be as small as possible–otherwise the friction of the necessary bureaucracy would just be a waste. But how small is that? Some hold that the only true function of government is to protect its citizens from the use of force through the military and the police; hard-line Objectivists sometimes advocate for the complete or near-complete elimination of government except for these duties. Yet I think this attitude is too narrow: military and police are one necessary function of government, certainly, but might there be others? To understand what government’s role should be, we must first understand why large-scale organizations and bureaucracies, including governments, exist at all.
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The “Real World” Fallacy
The American institution of public schooling is considered one of our greatest strengths–but why? What is the purpose of schools, and why do we force our children to attend them? The response you’ll most often hear is that school prepares our students for the task they must all ultimately undertake of being successful, responsible adults–that’s what we usually mean by the term education. Yet there is an odd contradiction implicit in this attitude: if the purpose of education is to prepare children for the “real world”, then why do we need schools? It’s generally understood that the schools themselves are not the “real world”, so they must necessarily be artificial worlds: invented realities designed to shelter our children from the responsibilities of adulthood until they are “ready” for them. It is no great secret that experiential learning is by far the most effective kind, yet the fierce irony of preparing our children for the “real world” by sequestering them from it entirely goes apparently unnoticed. This idea of preparing our children to be adults by treating them like anything but–what I call the “real world” fallacy–is a perfect encapsulation of everything that is wrong with our current way of thinking about school, education, and children in general.
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The Philosophy of “Atlas Shrugged”
The ideal “from each according to ability, to each according to need” continues to be held as an unquestionable good, despite repeated failures to make it a reality. Even if this ideal is in fact impossible to attain (due to human nature, poor planning, or the corrupting influence of other cultures), we should still strive for it–or so the thinking goes. But what is it that makes this ideal so desirable? “From each according to ability, to each according to need” paints a picture of a world where everyone’s needs are met: a utopia. But what if there were a different way to achieve that world–one which takes advantage of our basic human nature, rather than trying to “improve” it? A world in which those who give the most to society receive, rather than sacrifice, the most in return? The Objectivism of Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged suggests an alternative path to utopia: it suggests that “from each according to ability, to each according to need” may not only be an impossible ideal, but also an immoral one–and that the creation and “selfish” exchange of value is not just the best way to get yourself ahead, it is ultimately the truest possible act of respect, charity and compassion a human being can perform.
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BREAKING NEWS: Obama Actually Muslim, Osama Actually Jew
In our top story today, CIA officials earlier revealed that an extensive, top-secret investigation has concluded that Barack Hussein Obama, the 44th president of the United States of America, not only was not born in the U.S., but is in fact a Muslim extremist who hates America and everything it stands for.
“This was shocking for all of us,” says Zeke Retagent, the CIA operative in charge of the investigation. “But the deeper we dug, the harder it was to deny. There’s no doubt about it–Barack Obama is a terrorist bent on destroying everything this nation holds dear.”
In what some may consider even more shocking news, investigation into what is now being called the “Obama Conspiracy” revealed that Osama bin Laden, long reviled as the founder of al-Qaeda and the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks, is in fact a devout orthodox Jew who had nothing to do with the attacks.
“He was really just a scapegoat,” says Retagent, whose investigation uncovered irrefutable evidence that Osama was forced at gunpoint to take responsibility for the attacks. “Obama was the real mastermind, he orchestrated the whole thing. 9/11, the recession, school shootings, the budget crisis, YouTube comments–all Obama’s ideas, brought to fruition through careful planning and a diabolical, systematic undermining of the U.S. government from the inside out.”
When faced with these charges, Obama gave an inspirational and eloquent public denial that was nevertheless soon drowned out by the hisses and boos of the furious crowd. His call for an “appeal to reason, prudence, and common Human sense and decency” came shortly before the crowd broke through the protective police barrier and secret service agents, trampling the man to death. Reports from the scene indicate that in his last moments Obama showed his true colors, shouting “La ilaha illAllah!” (“there is no God but Allah”) and “Damn you infidels to Hell!” When asked why he had ignored Obama’s moving denial and attacked, one man on the scene replied, “Yeah, Obama was pretty good at giving speeches. So was Hitler. You think that’s just a coincidence?”
Soon after Obama’s address it was revealed that Osama bin Laden, long believed to have been killed in a covert U.S. operation (one that dramatically boosted the president’s approval rating), was actually being held in a secret detention facility as leverage to ensure the continued cooperation of al-Qaeda. Osama delivered an official address apologizing for falsely taking responsibility for the attacks on the World Trade Center, claiming a “shameful weakness in the face of death”. He also indicated he harbored no ill will towards the American government, and advocated for a peaceful reconciliation. The alleged terrorist organization al-Qaeda, which was non-violent until Obama militarized it, will return to its former operations of charity work, education advocacy, and weekly Torah readings at their local community center.
The charges against Obama have naturally engendered suspicion against his staff, particularly the now-acting president Joe Biden, who was sworn in soon after Obama’s disastrous statement. According to Mr. Retagent, however, “none of the evidence so far points to Biden. As far as we can tell, Obama was acting alone.” Retagent stressed that the investigation was ongoing, although he went on to say “We don’t really expect to find anything. I mean, come on–his name is ‘Joe Biden.’ That’s about as un-Muslim as it gets.”
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Lockhart’s Lament
I’ve mentioned this essay in one of my previous posts, but I think it’s worth calling special attention to. You should read this essay if:
- You loathe mathematics
- You adore mathematics
- You’re indifferent to mathematics and don’t see what all the fuss is about either way
Lockhart uses a clear and witty style to describe what he considers the biggest problem with contemporary mathematics education: namely, the complete lack of mathematics. A lot of his points are equally applicable to all areas of education, not just math! It was a real eye-opener for me when I first read it, and I hope it will be for you, too.
P.S.: The original link appears to have been taken down, so I’ve replaced it with a different one. This is the link where I first found it.
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“I Am Not My Government”
What are you most likely to hear from a citizen’s mouth when their country does something unspeakable? What is an American most likely to say when other countries hold Americans accountable for actions of war; torture; colonialism; corruption; and secret, nationwide, warrantless spying on their own citizens? “I am not my government. As an American citizen, my government may do bad things, but that doesn’t make me a bad person. I don’t endorse their actions.”
What would Thomas Jefferson do if he heard an American citizen speak these words? What would John Adams or Alexander Hamilton say? How would any of our founders respond? They would declare the American experiment an abject failure.
To say “I am not my government” is a rejection of the fundamental premise of a constitutional republic. To say “I am not my government” is to refute the ideal that we are a government BY the people, FOR the people. To say “I am not my government” is an admission of defeat; a tacit surrender of idealism to the harsh “practicalities” of a nation ruled not by people, but by money.
Money is not evil. But money, in itself, has no value. True value–as in values–comes from ideas, not printed slips of paper, and it is this value that was meant to be the real currency of exchange of our nation–it’s why the sharing of those ideas was considered important enough to be protected in the very first amendment to our Constitution. Ideas, true values, come from individuals, not from corporations. To surrender your stake in your government as an individual is to surrender a government of value, and replace it with one of fraud.
An America whose citizens must say “I am not my government” has failed its citizens. An American who says “I am not my government” has failed their government. A nation of people who admit “they are not their government” needs a new government.
Let’s start over. The founders of our nation could never have foreseen the scale of globalization nor the pace of technological change that are the cornerstones of our generation. Thomas Jefferson believed the Constitution should be rewritten, from scratch, for every generation. Our government has been run on more or less the same document for over two hundred years, and its age is beginning to show. We need a new one.
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Are We too Harsh on AI?
The search for true AI has been a long, slow, and bumpy one, and the more years pass it seems the slower progress has become. And yet, maybe we are being too harsh on our computers. We expect our AIs to know everything, to do everything, perfectly, as soon as they are switched on. Isn’t that a little unfair? More importantly, isn’t it a little misguided? In our search for the “perfect solution”, are we actively discouraging approaches that could lead us to machines that are truly intelligent? Humans, after all, are neither perfect nor omniscient, nor are we born knowing everything. In fact we are born knowing very little: most of the qualities of human intelligence that make it a desirable thing to replicate–such as language, creativity, and perception–are things we have to learn how to do, not things we are born with. There is even evidence that such fundamental aspects of perception as object permanence and visual closure must be learned! Continue reading
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Play vs Prop: Games, Videogames, and Why Videogames Aren’t Games
What are games, exactly? It’s a tired question in the videogames industry, but it’s tired mainly because nobody has been able to agree on an answer. Many game designers are fed up with the whole debate and find all the semantic squabbling rather pointless, yet I think it’s telling that the debate persists. No other medium causes such confusion–everybody knows, and can easily identify, a book or a film or a sculpture or a painting. Videogames, on the other hand, are more ambiguous. Take Feed the Head, for instance–is it a game? Is it a toy? Is it something else? This is not a deliberately experimental work meant to push the boundaries of definition, this is a relatively modest (though delightful and admittedly surreal) work of simple entertainment. What about David Cage’s Heavy Rain? Is it a game, or is it an “interactive film”? Is there a difference? What about SimCity? Its own creator, Will Wright, attests that SimCity is a “toy”, not a game. Does this make other simulation games toys as well? And what does that mean for the toys? Could a toy, typically associated with the frivolous play of children, ever be art? Could one use a toy to tell a story, or convey emotion?
GDC 2012 – The Rise of Games, the Birth of a Universe
What are games?
For many years now, that question has driven me to learn everything I can about the medium, to travel and meet as many people as I could find who shared my passion, and to refine my own ideas so that I could express them more clearly. This has been my passion, my dream, ever since I was a kid: to see games mature and fulfill the tremendous potential that I could sense even in the early days, when I was still too afraid of losing to do anything but watch my friends play. Last year, I went to the GDC to try and find others who shared this vision–and, more importantly, to find others who shared my vision of what games could become, what the miraculous technology of computers could make them. I came away impressed and inspired, but also let down–what I saw was a commercial world where even those trying to break out of the mold were still thinking in limited terms. They saw games as systems, collections of rules to be built and exploited. They saw the advances of science and wondered how we could use them to make our games more popular, more engaging, more fun. They saw other media and wondered how we could incorporate them into ours in order to strengthen it, to make it more than itself. But few were asking the questions that I felt most deeply, and fewer still had any answers. None were to my satisfaction. True, there were some saying we shouldn’t emulate other media, that games’ strengths stand on their own. And there were some saying that games could tell stories, that they could be artistic, that they could be used as a tool to comment on important issues and enhance the way we live. But it didn’t seem to have occurred to anyone that maybe games were the art form we shouldn’t be emulating. No one was saying that maybe, perhaps, video games could be meaningful without telling stories, that they could be beautiful without being artistic, that they could be useful without being treated as mere tools.
This year, I saw much of that change. The industry, and those who work in it, are beginning to realize that games can be beautiful, useful, meaningful, and inspirational for their own sake, not in service to some other medium or purpose. We are coming into our own as a medium of expression and power, and we are doing it not by becoming better at incorporating other media into our own, but by becoming more confident in the knowledge that our medium can stand on its own, without help from any other. That is a marvelous thing, and if that was all I got to see in my lifetime I would be a very lucky man.
As it happens, however, that is not all. We, today, are witnessing the rise of not one, but two art forms. The first is a medium that has existed for millennia, that has shaped and sustained cultures the world over, that helps define who we are as living and learning creatures. This is the medium of games, and it is a wonderful medium, and it deserves to be recognized.
But.
There is a second medium that is coming into its own, and this medium is so new and confusing it does not yet even have a name. This medium is strange and wonderful and huge–it is a medium with at once more power and more scope than the medium of games, capable of infinite expression. It is a medium so broad, in fact, that all others ultimately fall under its shadow–just as the seas flow into the ocean, just as all mountains are rooted in the earth. It is a medium conceived by the algorithm, birthed by computers, and now being raised by game designers. This is the medium that gives me shivers and permeates my dreams; this is my passion, this is what I wish to see. I don’t want to be a game designer, really–there are already thousands of wonderful games in the world, and millions of people making them, most of them far better than me. What draws me is the vast, uncharted places beyond games, the places that the computer has only recently made visible, has just barely made traversable. I want to design for this new medium, where there are no precedents and no expectations. After all, a poor path through the wilderness may nevertheless be remembered if it is the first–and this wilderness is so frighteningly vast, one almost cannot help but be the first simply by taking a few steps in.
So that’s where I’m going. With a handful of other brave explorers, I’m going to start making tracks into this wilderness, searching for secrets in the jungle. Care to join us?
In Search of Secrets 