Directory of Lost Causes (By Quentin S. Crisp)

You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone

I'm moving. My room currently looks as though it has been invaded by a particularly vindictive burglar. Soon I will be gone, but before that happens this room has to look pristine. So I'm very busy, in the very melancholy and stressful way that moving makes one busy. So, if you're waiting to hear from me, well, that's probably why you haven't heard from me yet.

The other day I popped into a certain second-hand bookshop in London, because I happened to be passing, and I said hello and was given a nice cup of tea. I'm generally a conversationally disadvantaged person, but after a while a conversation with one of the staff got underway, about the way in which many writers are known only for one or two works when they wrote a great deal - this had been prompted by the fact I'd noticed a volume by M.P. Shiel on the shelves, with a title I had never heard of. I think it was something like Lord of the Ocean. On the same shelves I noticed a copy of The Pillow Friend by Lisa Tuttle. I remarked that Lisa had written the introduction to my next book, and there was some discussion then of her work. I took the book of the shelf and looked at the price. It was twelve pounds, which, to someone like me, is a lot of money. I had read Lost Futures and Memories of the Body by Tuttle, and enjoyed them both very much, but I had not read this.



Eventually, I decided it was time for me to ramble on, as Robert Plant might have said, although not to find the queen of all my dreams, but to find lunch at a nice greasy spoon. I looked at the copy of The Pillow Friend I had placed back on the shelf. What the hell! I thought. This books wants to be read, and it wants to be read by me. I took it to the front desk and laid out the cash.

Then I left the shop. As I was walking down the road I saw another of the staff from the shop coming my way. Apparently he had just come from a late lunch himself. He stopped on the pavement and we chatted for a while. He spoke about the state of the book business. "The bookshop is dying," he said, "Publishers, bookshops and writers are all finding it hard to survive at the moment, because no one really wants to pay the kind of money for books that will keep them going." He spoke of how the Internet has driven book prices down, how bookshops have been closing one after another. Then he asked me how I was doing. As if to prove him right I told him that I was moving, because I can no longer afford to live in London. He commiserated with me and asked what I am going to do now. This is a question I have been asking myself. How will I continue to survive? I really don't know. At least, anyway, I will have a roof over my head. But who would want to be a writer now, when the world of books, and perhaps the world itself, is coming to an end.



We went our separate ways. I popped into an Ecuadorian greasy spoon and ordered a vegetarian full English breakfast, for my late lunch. I looked at my new purchase. I have got into the habit of reading so many books at once that I have instituted a policy of not starting any new books until I have finished reading a certain number, so I thought it would be a while before I could start reading this. But then I thought, what the hell, this book wants to be read, and it wants to be read by me, so I opened it and started reading.

There are few things in my life of which I am proud. I'm not proud of the fact that I'm socially inept, or that I've never had much money, or that I am so judgemental of people, or that, like a baby, still-born, or a beast with his horn, I have torn everyone who reached out for me, or that I have consistenly failed to seize the day (despite the fact that I should obviously be immensely proud of all these things). But if there is one thing I am proud of, it's the fact that I have never compromised in my writing. If I succeed at this, it will have been entirely on my own terms, and I will be able to count it a true victory. But I haven't succeeded yet. I am not recognised by the world as a writer sufficiently that I don't have to give any further account of myself. I have to justify my existence by doing other work, too. Some writers are able to work full-time and still write wonderful stories. In fact, I'm fairly sure that most of them simply have to. I honestly don't know how they do it. Having tried this myself, I have nothing but the utmost respect for such people. Unfortunately, I don't seem to be one of them. I remember now when I was in Japan, I had a conversation with a girl there that has proved highly prophetic. She asked what I would do when I returned to England. I said that I supposed I would have to work. She replied that she couldn't imagine me working. "Sugoku maipeesu na kanji," she said; "There's an incredible 'my own pace' feel about you." I have been working - but I am reminded very often that I do the work much slower than everyone else. I do really seem to be on a different time-track. My current work - a decision I made in order to make it possible for me to write - is part-time. But it does not pay my living expenses.



The future looks extremely uncertain to me. Perhaps I shouldn't be so proud of my lack of compromise in my writing. I actually think I'm incapable of compromise. And without compromise, the likelihood of me being able to make a living is reduced drastically. I sometimes think that my writing will be sufficiently recognised to support me the very moment that my miserable existence comes to an end. You know, death is a great career move and all that.

Speaking of death, these days I try to remind myself as often as I can that I could die at any time, so I'd better be satisfied with my life just as it is. Some people might anticipate another clause to that sentence: "I'd better be satisfied with my life just the way it is, or change it now." But the truth is, I don't really think I can change my life; I just don't seem to be a carpe diem sort of person. Or rather, I think the only possible way for me to change my life is through contemplation of death and acceptance. In fact, usually when I think of death, I feel ready to go. I feel like, yes, I did it my way, even if I have totally fucked things up. However, one thing keeps me going. I still haven't written enough. It's not to do with quantity so much, though partly. I just know that I haven't acheived my full potential in my writing yet. My brain truly is teeming, and my ideas for stories seem as numerous as stars in the sky. And one day, I feel, I will write something that magically comes off the page like nothing that's been written before. Perhaps I will never get there, but I do think that I am getting better and better as a writer all the time.



I think that in some ways I used to be more tolerant of what I see as bad taste. Now it seems to me criminal and corrosive. To vote for trash with your money is just one of the many ways to make the world a worse place. I would like to discourage it. For myself, I don't see the point of reading a book that's too popular. (I don't mean to imply that everything popular is trash, though that seems to be the general rule.) For instance, J.K. Rowling has enough readers already. She doesn't need me. I want to make sure that those endangered works are kept from extinction by having a home in the consciousness of one more human being - me.

Anyway, this is just a status report, really. You'll miss me when I'm gone. There are people I'll miss, too. There are, in fact, certain people I miss right now. I hope we get the time to get together. I hope that we can reflect on the fact we could die at any moment and still feel satisfied with who we have been and who we are.

This article is interspersed with Youtube clips that have been amusing or otherwise fascinating me lately.

Transhumans - Robots in Disguise

Well, I've only just got out of bed, but I have a lot to do today, and, since I haven't received any new e-mails, I thought I might use this time to continue my ruminations on John Harris' quest for immortality, bio-ethics, and what I have learnt is called 'transhumanism'.

I haven't really got anything planned, so all of this will be a kind of jotting of notes to marshal my thoughts.

First of all, immediately after I'd written my last post on the subject, I hated it. When I tried to analyse why this should be so, it seemed to be a kind of self-consciousness about it, an almost self-imposed distance between the authority of my target - John Harris - and myself, which I nonetheless attempted to close. It was that attempt to close a self-imposed distance, I think, that made me cringe. Of course, the distance is not entirely self-imposed; I'm sure that Harris would describe himself as an 'expert' on something or other and use every opportunity that academia, science and so on furnished him with to pull rank on those with whom he disagreed. He speaks with the idiom of authority. Perhaps what I hated about my entry was that I was using that idiom - or an uneasy version of it - in order to attack that idiom. Actually, I'm not sure how else it is to be done. This is the game of 'being taken seriously' that I referred to.

However, it also occurred to me that (and this is something that the likes of Harris often take advantage of) language often creates the illusion that two different things referred to by the same word are the same thing. I identified a desire on my part to be taken seriously in order that I might be able to challenge the 'being taken seriously' of Professor John Harris. When I thought about this, however, it seemed to me that, yes, I do want to be taken seriously, but in quite a different way to John Harris. My impression is that he is in the game - as are most or all so-called 'experts' - of being taken seriously in a hierarchical manner. This is vertical 'seriousness', and it is quantitative. For instance, someone might say, "I have an IQ of 180, and therefore my intelligence is higher than yours, and therefore what I say goes." Quantitative = vertical = hierarchical. I would like to be taken seriously in a qualitative way. What does that imply? That implies that I'm human, with human qualities and feelings, and therefore would like to be treated with respect. I invite anyone to savour the 'quality' of anything I say and experience it for themselves, not to accept my vertical authority. This kind of qualitative 'seriousness' is immensely important if we are to avoid human atrocities. As I have said before, such atrocities are made possible when people are treated in a quantitative rather than a qualitative fashion. What happened in the Nazi extermination camps was a result of human beings stripped of their qualities, no longer seen in terms of irreducible qualities. They were 'not taken seriously'. Their persecutors held the hierarchical authority of quantity that is the same as that which John Harris holds, and which is the same that he propagates when he smugly speaks about having not a single spiritual cell in his body. In this connection, it's interesting to note that, when he's contemplating the possible problems of immortality, he considers it in mathematical terms. Why should it matter, he asks, if no new people are born (if everyone is immortal) if the number of human years lived is the same (though shared between fewer people)? Thankfully, he does decide, after all, that the 'renewal' brought about by new people being born is desirable, but the mathematical consideration seems typical of the tenor of his thoughts.



John Harris has already foreclosed on any possibility of the spiritual (quality) in life. What is his idea of immortality? It seems nothing more than a quantitive extension of numbers in a life-span. 120 is necessarily more desirable than 80, because it's a higher number. This really seems to be the way he thinks. He will be able to fit more in to a longer life-span. He will be able to have a longer shopping list. He will be able to play more rounds of golf. Is this the best that the dynamic duo of science and materialism can offer us? It really seems to be. We will extend your life, and you will be able to do more. And we will call this "immortality" even though it's not, because we don't want to think about the fact that we will still inevitably die. In fact, we don't really want to think about anything except our longer shopping list. Is this a mature and wise way to sculpt a future for human beings?

I've said before - and had it thrown back in my face sometimes - that the whole aim of science is control. I don't find this to be an admirable aim. John Harris would appear to be of the transhumanist movement. I quote from the Wikipedia article on that movement:

Transhumanist philosophers argue that there not only exists a perfectionist ethical imperative for humans to strive for progress and improvement of the human condition but that it is possible and desirable for humanity to enter a post-evolutionary phase of existence, in which humans are in control of their own evolution. In such a phase, natural evolution would be replaced with deliberate change.

Humans in control of their evolution! What does control mean? Control implies lack of union. There are two things here - what is controlling, and what is being controlled. And what is it that is being controlled? Answer: nature. Actually, I see this as an impossible and disastrous project. The thing that is controlling is the ego, the conscious mind, and the conscious mind is much slower and clumsier than the unconscious (nature). In a sense, none of this matters, because it's like some freaky, hilarious and sinister puppet show, in which the puppets vow to control not only the hands pulling their strings, but the whole world on which those hands are contingent. Nonetheless, it's a phenomenon that will be cataclysmic for us humans, and I'd rather see it averted while there's still time. Do musicians think about what note they have to play next? No. If they did, they'd totally fuck up the tune. They let the unconscious mind, the memory in their body, take over. For humans to want to try and 'control' their evolution, is like a musician thinking, "Okay, I'll play B-flat next. Now, I'll play a G, but hold it a bit longer." Etc. It's not going to work.

At this juncture, I'd like to note that, if I recall correctly, I read in a book called, In the Beginning Was the Worm, about the 'discovery' of DNA, some idea that biology and physics have in some way swapped roles. Traditionally, biology (the organic science) was seen as the one in which there was greater unpredictability, and physics as the one with immutable, logical laws. At some point in the twentieth century this situation started to reverse. Now biology is all about immutable rules, and physics is embracing ideas of uncertainty. I know which I prefer. I don't have the book to hand, but I remember that one member of the Watson-Crick DNA team in particular was adamant that everything in the universe must be predictable, that given sufficient data, every outcome must be knowable, that all life is, therefore, mathematical. Personally, I can't think of anything worse than a totally known, totally predictable universe, but that was actually the ideal for this highly influential individual. That was his holy grail. Control. Traditionally the forces of order are seen as good and the forces of chaos as bad. I'm on the side of chaos in this one. Here, order is totally soulles and oppressive.

On the subject of DNA, I was interested to note that, just after I wrote my last entry on bio-ethics, the papers were full of James Watson's idiotic racial comments, which have apparently led to him being asked to retire. Hmmmm. I feel like I want to take a step back here and approach this one leisurely. The target is too easy, and I don't want to play some facile race card here. I quote:

The eminent biologist told the British newspaper he was "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours -- whereas all the testing says not really."

Okay, he's not specific about what testing. Are we talking about IQ tests here? I think he could have been a bit more circumspect in what he said. If Africans have scored on average lower in such tests what this proves is that Africans score on average lower in IQ tests (if that). To immediately assume that a difference in intelligence has been demonstrated is, anyway, reckless. So, I don't immediately think that Watson is racist. I think that he's probably arrogant and stupid, and believes that his position as a scientist means he can say whatever he likes. Okay, actually, he's obviously at least a little bit racist, or else why jump to such a conclusion when his scientific training should tell him not to jump to conclusions? (I have slightly ammended this view in the comments section here.)What interested me here, though, is that these are the words of the co-discoverer of DNA, of someone known for his work in the field of genetics. I would like to posit here that scientific theory is not - as many would like us to believe - ideologically neutral, that it springs from something within the people involved, that it is, in brief, a projection. What is the cultural meaning, then, of DNA? Something that mathematically determines what life is? That turns life into a computer? Into a quantitative hierarchy, so that one living thing can be quantitatively better than another, so that it can be quantitatively enhanced? Watson has also given his approval to a world in which, through genetic intervention, "all girls [are] pretty". Yeah, sounds at first like an old man's joke, doesn't it? But when you consider that this is an eminent scientist working in the field of genetics, this takes on a distinctly sinister complexion.

Would it be good if we rid the world of all ugliness and deformity? Maybe we would then spare people suffering. I remember - I believe it was the disabled actor Nabil Shaban - talking about people who suggested eliminating deformity before birth. His (I believe rightly) furious response to this was, "What these people are saying is that I should not exist." (Might not be verbatim.) I am also reminded of Ian Dury's rousing declaration that I seem to remember was on the cover of the single Spasticus Autisticus, but unfortunately, I can't seem to find the declaration online. Maybe later. Anyway...



There is something a bit Nietzschean about the transhumans. Nietzsche, of course, famously wrote that "man is something that must be overcome". Interesting that Nietzsche, too, should be linked with the Nazis. Actually, I have some sympathy with Nietzsche's sentiment, but it's as if the transhumans have taken all the interesting bits out of the Nietzschean idea, and are determined to become superhuman in the most shallow way possible. Nietzsche was talking about a kind of spiritual transcendence, an evolution through death of the ego (please do correct me if I'm wrong, I'm speaking from my memories of Thus Spake Zarathustra). The transhumans, on the contrary, want to avoid any kind of death (and, I expect, especially of their egos). I have used this metaphor before, but if Nietzsche was proposing evolution the hard way, then that could be compared, for instance, to winning someone's heart. How do you do that? It's not an easy or clear-cut thing. The answer of the transhumanists is to use rohypnol. Easy. It gets results, yeah (the usual scientific boast), but are these really the kinds of results you want?

In describing humans in terms of machines, and saying that the only way forward is technological advancement, what the transhumanists are doing is actually emulating robots. Robots are their role-models. But not mine, I have to say. It's as if something in them simply can't believe in the qualitative experience, that should be avaiable to everyone, of humanity.

Labels: James D. Watson, John Harris, transhumanism

Calling Marcus Moore

I've resisted doing this for some time, but I am haunted by the memory of a certain friend with whom I lost touch some time after he emigrated to Australia. I've Googled him with very limited success, and he doesn't appear to be on MySpace. Marcus, if you're reading this, please get in touch with me. If you don't want to (or can't) contact me via the Internet, things will still reach me from the old postal address you know. Also, if anyone out there knows of Marcus Moore and can put me in touch with him, or vice versa, please do so. Just some detail to make sure you have the right Marcus Moore (if you know one). He moved to Australia in the early Nineties (from the UK). There, I believe strongly, he became involved in the world of comics. On the Internet I have found a comic called DeeVee, edited by one Marcus Moore and one Darren White. I believe this to be the very same Marcus Moore, international man of mystery. He also appears to have worked with Eddie Campbell on the Bacchus series of comics. The Wikipedia entry for Bacchus mentions Marcus Moore, and the name even has a hypertexst link. However, it seems to be linked (I believe erroneously) to a baseball player of the same name.

If it's true that everyone on the planet is connected to every other person by no more than six degrees of separation(apparently the evidence for this is not actually very strong, though it's an appealing theory), then the chances of someone who knows Marcus (or Marcus himself) reading this should be high.

Anyway, I shall perhaps find out.

Spooky Kabuki in Susuki

Well, I'm going to leave the bio-ethics theme for a while and probably come back to it later.

I am currently writing a novel called Susuki, which is the sequel to my forthcoming novella, Shrike. Shrike is to be released by PS Publishing in mid-2008. Unfortunately, the fact that Susuki is a sequel to Shrike does not guarantee its publication. Publishing is an incredibly precarious and dilatory business, which, if you are prone to feelings of anxiety and suspense, can become a kind of water torture. I suppose that you probably don't have such problems getting things published if you're not actually a writer, by which I mean, if you're a celebrity. Apparently the novel Crystal by 'glamour model' Katie Price has "outsold the entire Booker shortlist combined". My source for this information is The Observer, which gives a facetious list of ways to write a blockbuster a la Katie Price:

Don't read books. It's a waste of time. Katie Price admits that she doesn't bother with fiction. Or non-fiction, for that matter. Although occasionally, she might dip into a bit of 'true crime'.

Employ a ghostwriter. Only losers write their own books. But make sure that you don't give them any credit or mention their name. A former journalist called Rebecca Farnworth is the actual 'Katie Price' in question and has, so far, written two autobiographies and two novels, with another autobiography and two further novels on the way.

Etcetera.

In this way the whole publishing industry becomes enslaved to people who don't care about literature or books. Do Katie Price's 'readers' actually read books? I doubt it very much. It's as if some conservationist body were somehow hijacked by golfers who decided the best way to save the rainforest was to turn it into a huge golf course. It's as if I managed to buy a football team and decided that it would be a vast improvement to the game if the players stopped kicking some stupid ball around and instead trained to become kabuki actors, giving performances of famous kabuki plays every time they came out onto the pitch (actually that would be great). It is the death of books, on which theme I might write more later. (I would like to add here that while previously I was quite indifferent to Katie Price, now I am more biased towards the idea that she should put on any top ten list of Britons who must immediately be assassinated.)

Anyway, on to happier things, to wit, my current novel, Susuki. I'm not going to say what the novel is about, not before the novella to which it is a sequel has even been released. I will say that I probably make greater use of my background in Japanese studies in this novel than in anything I've written previously. I've also had to do more research for this than for anything I've previously written, since there are certain sections that might be called historical. I usually try to avoid research, mainly because I don't have the budget for it. I think it's a fact that few readers grasp that writing a novel is a bit like making a film. If you don't have a big budget, you will be less able to invest in the kind of research that produces a spectacular epic spanning centuries. You will be making a low-budget film with unknown actors, limited sets and locations and so on, and the script and acting had better be pretty good. This is because, if you're not making a lot of money from writing, or you're not independently wealthy, you just don't have the time to do the kind of research you'd like to. The analogy falls down a bit in one conspicuous sense - even an independent, low-budget writer can come up with amazing special effects, and actually often does special effects better than the big studio writers.

This time, however, I have already done a significant amount of research - botanical, meteorological, cultural, literary, historical, etcetera - and intend to do a great deal more. Even if I bankrupt myself doing it, which, believe me, is a distinct possibility. All that despite the fact I cannot hope for a readership the size of that maestro Katie Price. Yes, indeed, only losers write their own books. So, in today's post, I just thought I'd share with you something rather special. It's a piece of research I did that informs one particular paragraph of the novel, and it is in the form of a film clip. This might give you some idea of the kind of things that are preoccupying me in this novel. Ladies and gentlemen, please enjoy famous onnagata Tamasaburo dancing in the role of Sagi Musume, the Heron Maiden:



You can watch an interview with Tamasaburo here.

Recently, I also discovered this rather interesting thing on the Internet. Writer Yann Martel is sending a book every week to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, partly, it seems, because he believes that the Canadian government does not sufficiently value culture. Now, if only I could get Katie Price's address, perhaps I could set up a website called, "What is Katie Price reading?" What would be the first volume I sent her, I wonder? Any suggestions?

Labels: kabuki, Katie Price, my latest fucking novel

Getting Serious

Time is running out.

Why do I write?

Because I know I will die?

Maybe.

I was thinking of writing you readers an e-mail today, in other words, not writing about anything in particular, but writing about my recent news and preoccupations, that kind of thing. The thing is, I feel as if I really need someone in particular to write to in order to do that. I could tell you that I've been rediscovering Kate Bush over the last couple of days, or that I've decided that my inner self is actually a dead ringer for the Phantom of the Opera:



But without focusing on one thing in particular, or having some linking theme, it might all be a bit boring.

So, maybe I should go straight on to the next actual theme that has been brewing in my mind, which comes to you courtesy of Professor John Harris.

I remember reading somewhere - but I've forgotten where - someone commenting that Nagai Kafu (one of my favourite writers) could have been a great writer IF ONLY he'd been able to take himself seriously. I actually think Nagai Kafu was a great writer. I like the fact that he seemed to consider himself a bumbling amateur in the realm of letters, that he deliberately sabotaged a lot of his own works, that he left them in irregular shapes and so on.

In the book The Little Prince, there's an episode in which an astronomer from Turkey gives a lecture on some new asteroid he has discovered, only to be scoffed at and mocked by the Western astronomers who are his audience; they are unable to take him seriously because he is not wearing a suit and tie. Later he comes back with a suit and tie and delivers the same lecture to great applause.

If you want people to believe in the asteroid you've discovered, you've got to get them to take you seriously.

This leads me naturally to the question, why do I hate my blog? Is it because I cannot take myself seriously? In other words, do I hate it because I think that I'm an idiot and therefore cringe at the thought that my opinions are seeing daylight? The answer is yes. So, why do I allow those opinions to be read? Why not delete them? I suppose I feel like I don't want to censor myself. I don't really want to be taken any more seriously than I deserve to be. I feel like people can fairly competently decide for themselves whether I should be taken seriously or not, without me donning the prose version of a suit and tie in order to hoodwink them. And maybe I don't deserve to be taken seriously at all. What is that, anyway? Being taken seriously, I mean? It somehow suggests someone with no sense of humour. Lack of humour is lack of self-awareness and reduces one immediately to cariacature, and cariacatures are, as we know, impossible to take seriously. Therefore anyone who is 'taken seriously' is immediately, as my rendering of that phrase suggests, a person in inverted commas only, and not to be taken seriously at all... We could go round and round with this one - my desire not to be taken seriously is really a desire to be taken seriously since I know or think that only those who are not taken serioulsly can be taken seriously. To stop us getting dizzy with this spinning, for now at least, perhaps I should say that refusing to act in such a way as to be taken seriously is actually a continual abdication of authority. Maybe even that explanation won't suffice to stop the spinning, but it will have to serve for now.

So, I don't want to be taken seriously. Why would I want that? Oh yeah, to persuade people about the asteroid that I've discovered...

To take oneself seriously, to persuade, for instance that infanticide might be okay (an opinion championed by Professor John Harris) must take an enormous amount of confidence, it seems to me. To do so publicly, at least - to crusade. Can I imagine myself in the position of Professor John Harris, talking to assemblies of people and to newspapers about how infanticide is quite acceptable (in some cases)? I find it difficult. Surely, I think, such a degree of confidence borders on the sociopathic? Does John Harris have no sense of responsibility? One would hope that he did have, being, as he is "a member of the British Medical Association's ethics committee".

Do I feel a sense of responsibility, then? Is that why I hate my blog? I suppose, yes, it is. But aren't I taking myself a bit seriously feeling all responsible about a mere blog? Hmmm, interesting. Maybe I am.

If I were to extend that sense of responsibility, I would say that I have a duty to comment upon those things that I think are wrong.

I've been reading up on Professor John Harris. I've just read a lecture he gave on immortality. He asked his audience to challenge him with difficult questions. It doesn't look like they did a very good job of it. Professor John Harris appears to be very articulate, persuasive and funny. He makes immortality - acheived through genetic tampering - sound very attractive and reasonable. However, although I found his speech very interesting, and well-made, I am not persuaded. I am tempted now to aspire to be taken seriously - as this man is - simply in order to challenge what I believe to be a pernicious influence in society. I've decided to use John Harris as a kind of mental punchbag to get my thoughts in order. There are a number of questions I must ask myself, and the first of them, which I may come back to, if I don't abandon this project altogether (that is, if I decide early on that the answer to the question is 'no') is, "Is it a good thing to be taken seriously?"

What's the most serious a person can be taken? Serious enough to be rendered immortal, perhaps?

Let me fire off a few warning shots to warm up.

Well, for starters, Harris' whole enterprise for immortality (even though at the moment he's only laying the 'ethical' groundwork) is based on a lie. I find immortality to mean (according to the Oxford Dictionary) "living forever", but this is not what Harris is proposing, not even what he is able to propose. What is actually envisaged is a kind of theoretical immortality in that the cells of the body do not degenerate, but continue to regenerate. This, as Harris says, does not render the individual invulnerable. In other words, you can still die of just about anything; all you've done is eliminated death through general wear and tear. And this is the 'most optimistic' scenario. In fact, immortality might only mean an extension to one's life. Do I have an objection to extended life? I'm not sure yet. However, the lie of the word 'immortality' sends a warning signal to me. The Professor is not facing up to something here. Death will come, Professor. It will come, however postponed. You would like to postpone it forever, I know, but you do not think that is a possibility. So, you will simply put off what you are afraid of for as long as you possibly can. This postponement is the basis for your entire argument, as if the slight gain of longevity and the waving about of the word 'immortality' can put paid to the spectre of death. Not sure I want to be on Captain Harris' ship when it sails. Didn't want to inspect that gaping black hole in the bottom of the good ship Immortality, did he?

Anything else?

I think there is something else. There is, to me, something about the genetic modification of human beings of the aspect of a final solution. It is a final solution by stealth, creating a master race perhaps without bloodshed, but with at least some of the underpinning assumptions and attitudes behind the attempted final solution of the Nazis. This is an impression and an instinct; it's possible that I may modify this view later, if I continue with this 'project'. However, in support of that view at this moment, a quote from Harris on when infanticide is acceptable:

It is well-known that where a serious abnormality is not picked up - when you get a very seriously handicapped or indeed a very premature newborn which suffers brain damage - that what effectively happens is that steps are taken not to sustain it on life-support.

What Harris is talking about is the elimination of genetic stock (read 'the killing of human beings') that is not 'pure'. I myself do not pretend that this is a black-and-white issue, but Harris' bias here is clear - towards a genetic super-race, if necessary at the price of killing. How is the killing of a human being justified? Usually mathematically, by utilitarian means - the greatest good for the greatest number of people (or maybe just for the 'greatest people'). To reduce humans to quantities it is necessary to strip them of qualities. How are they stripped of qualities? Through the philosophy of materialism. As Harris happily says of himself, "I know that there is not a spiritual cell in my body."

Well, I might continue this theme later.

Labels: bio-ethics, immortality, John Harris

Wake up, Huw Edwards

I suppose I should be used to the fact, by now, that the human race is insane, but manifestations of that insanity continue to stagger me. I was watching the BBC News just now, and there was a story about the fact that the Northwest passage has opened up because of unprecedented Arctic melting. There was the expert, who has been monitoring the ice melt, saying how astounded he was, because he would not have foreseen anything like this for at least another ten years according to the current models of climate change, and what does the story then focus on? Is there suddenly an urgent questioning as to why this has happened? Is this used as a cue to enquire into how models of climate change are constructed, examine the fact that the official model necessarily relies on very conservative estimates in order not to appear alarmist, and so on? No. The issue is not mentioned at all. Huw Edwards goes on with his commentary in a trance of normality. He is talking about the competition amongst different countries to be the first to use the newly-opened route for commercial purposes. He and all the BBC crew, in their spotless suits and TV make-up suddenly shrink before my eyes to contemptible puppets. They are unconscious. They are hypnotised by money. The next news story is about people worrying because they might not get the bonuses they wanted. Then it's football.

Wake up, Huw Edwards! Wake up, BBC! Wake up little puppets buried in your suits and your TV careers!

Words of Advice for Young People

If Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen) by Baz Luhrmann is your favourite song, I suggest that you read no further, since I intend now to rip it to pieces. Apparently the song is based on an essay called "Advice, like youth, probably just wasted on the young", written by Mary Schmich. I don't know anything about that. I only know that I hated the song when I first heard it (not entirely inappropriately, just before my graduation), and I still hated it on Wednesday night when it came over the speakers of the pub at which I was attending a poetry gig.

Ladies and Gentlemen of the class of ’99
If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be
it. The long term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by
scientists whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable
than my own meandering
experience…

Right, start as you mean to go on, with a nice, patronising opening line. Are you sure that no studies are going to overturn the findings on sunscreen? You're sure about that, now?

I will dispense this advice now. Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth; oh nevermind; you will not
understand the power and beauty of your youth until they have faded.

The power and beauty of your youth? My youth was mainly spent collapsed in a darkened room. There was never, unfortunately, any power and beauty in my youth, though I suppose there might have been if I had actually killed myself and prevented the fading effect mentioned. This is basically an admonition not to waste your youth. So, tell me, exactly what is there that you can do in order NOT to waste your youth? Nothing. It goes, that's all.

I'm actually interested in the consoling power of art, and I don't think consolation comes from people saying, "You should have done it like this." Or even, "You should do it like this." Especially not if that "this" is something both vague and impossible, like not wasting your youth. I remember the usual speech from people sitting behind desks at the front of class, you know, "You've got your whole life ahead of you." Which always made me think, "Yeah, and soon I'll have it all behind me, like you, you fuck, which is why you're standing in front of class telling me this, and can I please go and slash my wrists now?" And, of course, I was right.

Art, however, has the consoling power to make age seem less important. Consolation is, necessarily, a sad thing, but if you're reading a book, or looking at a painting, the chances are that you are alive and therefore in dire need of consolation. Media that focus on youth, such as pop music, produce icons who either need to die young or who sell-out or fade out. Art in its broadest sense, however, can make an icon out of William Burroughs with a Zimmer frame.

But trust me, in 20 years you’ll look back at photos of yourself and
recall in a way you can’t grasp now how much possibility lay before
you and how fabulous you really looked….

Yeah, thanks. I suppose it's not too late to slash my wrists now.

You’re not as fat as you
imagine.

But still pretty damned fat.

Don’t worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying is as
effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing
bubblegum.

This is so wise it makes me want to vomit. Now I'm worrying about how much I worry about things and how that's going to solve none of the problems that I envisage. Anyway, isn't this whole song designed to make you worry about everything?

The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that
never crossed your worried mind; the kind that blindside you at 4pm
on some idle Tuesday.

SEE! I told you. What is this thing that's going to blindside me on Tuesday? Christ, I'll probably be knocked down by a car and brain-damaged for life or something. At 4.00 pm? Right. I'll make sure I stay in my room, under the blankets, at 4.00 pm on Tuesday.

Do one thing everyday that scares you

Getting out of bed scares me. Especially after knowing that I'm going to be blindsided. I don't need to bungee jump, mere consciousness is enough to bring me out in a cold sweat. Besides which, this song is beginning to get decidedly MOTIVATIONAL. Please spare me. As an alternative to motivational lyrics, I would propose the following from Morrissey's Maladjusted: "Still I maintain there's nothing wrong with you/You do all that you do because it's all you can do."

Sing

There's a bit in Great Expectations where Miss Haversham invites Pip round to play with Estella (secretly plotting for Pip to fall in love with her so that Estella can break his heart as part of Miss Haversham's revenge against the male sex), and she places a number of toys before Pip and commands him to play, and suddenly, although he felt like playing just seconds before, he loses all the will to do so.

Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts, don’t put up with
people who are reckless with yours.

I think you basically have to be reckless in order to get anywhere near someone's heart. But is this is literal advice, for surgeons and their patients, then I agree... wholeheartedly.

Floss

I never got the hang of flossing. Interesting that the American preoccupation with perfect teeth should come out in this song.

Don’t waste your time on jealousy;

While I agree that envy is a waste of time, it is, apparently, central to my psyche, according to the enneagram, on which index I have been diagnosed as a 'romantic' or 'individualist'. The dominant emotion of our lives - and I am in no position to deny this - is not something like love, but envy. Everyone else has something we don't have. Sure enough, excepting people with extreme life-challenges, such as having no limbs, I think I'd rather be anyone but myself.

sometimes you’re ahead,

When? When was this? Tell me.

sometimes
you’re behind…the race is long, and in the end, it’s only with
yourself.

With myself? Then I really can't win. I'm doomed.

Remember the compliments you receive, forget the insults; if you
succeed in doing this, tell me how.

Hahaha. Very cheeky.

Keep your old love letters, throw away your old bank statements.

I've heard somewhere that you're legally required to keep all financial documents for five years (in the UK). Maybe I'm wrong. In any case, I've never in my life been able to keep track of any piece of paper that comes into my possession. It's hardly a matter of throwing them away. I wish I could find them in the first place.

Stretch

See. I told you. Motivational. Now we're on to the aerobics.

Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your
life…the most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they
wanted to do with their lives, some of the most interesting 40 year
olds I know still don’t.

I know. I've just never been able to do it. That makes me less interesting and a failure at the same time.

Get plenty of calcium. Be kind to your knees, you’ll miss them when they’re gone.

Oh no! Am I going to be kneecapped on Tuesday at 4.00 pm? Is that what's going to happen? Is this a threat? "You'll miss your kneecaps when they're gone, pal!"

Maybe you’ll marry, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll have children,maybe
you won’t, maybe you’ll divorce at 40, maybe you’ll dance the funky
chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary…

Que sera sera/Whatever will be, will be/The only certainty/Is decay towards death... Etc.

Que Sera Sera, incidentally, is possibly the most disturbing song ever written.

what ever you do, don’t
congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself either – your
choices are half chance, so are everybody else’s.

So I'm half-responsible and half at the mercy of random injustice? I'm not sure either if that's true, though it might be, or how it helps me to know that. Don't congratulate myself too much? When does it become too much? I'm not sure I've ever congratulated myself, actually. I'm confused now.

Enjoy your body,

Having a complete stranger tell me to enjoy my body makes me feel a bit weird. It's not just that I keep thinking he's going to say, "Because no one else will!", it's also the sensation of someone invading my private space, so to speak, standing a bit too close.

use it every way you can

…

Steady on, old chap!

don’t be afraid of it, or what other people
think of it, it’s the greatest instrument you’ll ever
own..

!!!!

Dance…

You know, one thing I really dislike about this song is the way it's punctuated with these exhortations, in a slightly breathy voice, as if they're meant to be uplifting, poignant and sexy all at once. It's like someone inexpertly blowing in my ear.

It's like all these pop songs telling you to respect yourself, express yourself, be yourself. No, I don't want to be myself, thank you very much. For an alternative to this emetic tendency, please refer to David Bowie's Quicksand: "Don't believe in yourself/Don't deceive with belief/Knowledge comes with death's release."

even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room.

Yes, dance on your own, in front of the mirror, with a hairbrush for a microphone, singing, "Last night I dreamt/That somebody loved me/No hope, no harm, just another false alarm", and then collapse into a sobbing heap on the floor.

Read the directions, even if you don’t follow them.

Why are you telling me this?

Do NOT read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly.

That's perfectly true, actually. They always make me feel extremely ugly.

Get to know your parents, you never know when they’ll be gone for
good.

Now we're getting maudlin.

Be nice to your siblings; they are the best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future. Understand that friends come and go, but for the precious few you
should hold on.

I feel like we're entering personal territory here. The advice is redundant. It either applies, and you already know it, or it doesn't apply. In any case, it's not the kind of thing I want to be reminded about by Baz Luhrmann in that patronising drawl of his.

Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and
lifestyle because the older you get, the more you need the people you
knew when you were young.

We're really getting boring now. See above.

Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard;

I'd love to live in New York City and hang out with my good friend Sarah Jessica-Parker. Can anyone get me a green card?

live
in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft.

Yeah, that would be great, too. If anyone in Northern California is interested in a marriage of inconvenience (for them) then I'm up for it.

Travel.

Yeah, yeah, travel broadens the mind and all that. It's also a bit of a luxury. Seriously, I think it's about time we started to at least consider the benefits of not travelling around so much.

Accept certain inalienable truths,

Inalieable truths? Inalienable truths? Is there such a thing?

prices will rise, politicians will
philander, you too will get old, and when you do you’ll fantasize
that when you were young prices were reasonable, politicians were
noble and children respected their elders.

I'm not sure I'll ever get so misty-eyed that I'll believe politicians used to be noble.

Respect your elders.

Very clever. I like it. Straight after saying that old people think young people don't respect their elders, there's this sanctimonious exhortation to respect your elders. There's a real serious moral core to this song, then, you can tell.

Don’t expect anyone else to support you.

Everyone is supported one way or another, but some of us get a better deal.

Maybe you have a trust fund,
maybe you have a wealthy spouse; but you never know when either one
might run out.

Or maybe you're homeless on the streets, but don't expect people will always be throwing you coins.

Don’t mess too much with your hair, or by the time you're 40, it will
look 85.

Well, you could always shave it off and get a wig. In fact, I'm all for wigs, the more ostentatious, the better.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but, be patient with those who
supply it.

Ahahaa! You cunning dog! All this time letting us think you were some pious, patronising, tedious old git, and there you go at the end with a nice little touch of irony. Ha ha! Be patient with those who supply it. Yes, very good. I get it. That means you, doesn't it, because if anyone's got this far into the song without vomiting or stabbing themselves, then they really have been patient.

Advice is a form of nostalgia,

Fuck! That's pretty fucking gnostic!

dispensing it is a way of
fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the
ugly parts and recycling it for more than
it’s worth.

Hmmm. Nice bit of self-deprecation. A little bit mawkish, a little bit barbed. Still managing to maintain the smug, wiser-than-thou, strangely sentimental weariness of the overall tone.

But trust me on the sunscreen…

Just when you thought you'd successfully resisted the urge to vomit, here comes the 'clever little twist' at the end, like a knowing wink. Or like fingers down your throat.

Now that I've spent so much time with the song, getting to know it, it feels like an old friend. Still, I prefer Burroughs' Words of Advice for Young People. Basically, though, advice is crap.

Labels: Baz Luhrmann, Mary Schmich, Sunscreen song