On The Jews And Chinese

The Jews are purported to be unusually successful. Perhaps disproportionately so. They are industrious and thrifty, which are sometimes attributed to their unusual success. Yet, it seems that the Chinese share such values, and are never reported to be quite as successful. By success I mean things like becoming rich, holding fine professions, being awarded Nobel prizes (excluding Obama, if he were Jew). At risk of sounding racist, I think there is (on average, perhaps, though I have no precise idea of where the true average lies) one key difference between the two peoples: their attitudes towards education.

For a Jew, education is an end in itself. It is valued by its own virtue and seen as something worthy to be sought. Self-improvement, intellectual inquiry, formal education are all seen as family treasures. Even the religion-culture encourages intellectual discussions as to the nature of the religion itself. There is also a willingness to take risk, to try out an opportunity when it presents itself. Combine this with the business savvy from generations of commercial enterprise, and you have a winning formula.

Chinese, on the other hand, are also a trading people. They work hard and are thrifty. However, education is a means towards an end. And that end is economic gain. If it comes to the crunch, between obtaining more formal education/self improvement/performing intellectual inquiry and getting the butt out there to earn money, it seems that earning money wins hands down. The culture itself is not largely in favor of intellectual inquiry. The business savvy of past generations counts for little, because it has become allowed to stagnate. There is little motivation for risk-taking, because that would adversely affect stability and in all likelihood damage the income stream.

True, exceptions do exist, whereby there are unsuccessful Jews and highly successful Chinese. However, blind chance would have it that the Chinese and their incredible population would have likely churned out some incredible successes. Yet, by proportion, this is not so. In the presence of a Jewish attitude towards learning in general, the learned person is by far more likely to be able to spot opportunities in the first place, followed by the willingness to take risk. That is an approach that can lead to success. For a Chinese, however, even if the opportunity is spotted, chances are that it would not be attempted unless it's a sure-win situation (which tends to wind up as a scam, instead).

Twilight

I will be upfront. I do tend to like vampire novels...and am biased towards urban fantasy in general. Twilight seems to be really popular. It's a vampire story. Nice. And then I actually read Twilight. Someone please tell me...how could a cookie go so wrong?

I have nothing against romance stories. Vampire/human romances? Ok sure. A bit dodgy, but passable. Vampires that walk in sunlight but have superpowers...now that sounds suspiciously like overpowered thinbloods with the abilities of Anne Rice's Marius. I begin to frown. And then the entire novel reads like a long drawn out love-swoon. Fail.

Romance I can tolerate. But when romance becomes sufficiently overbearing that every page seems to be the reminisces of a schoolgirl high on love (which it is), I begin to seriously doubt just how deep this story goes. Allow me to summarize: Gal meets amazing vampire dude who totally blows her mind, mind stays blown, mind stays blown, mind stays blown, bad-guy shows up, vampire dude does a superhero, mind stays blown, mind stays blown... etc.

Of course, perhaps the vampire dude isn't gona be quite as lovestruck. It does make sense, to a large extent. But no...unfortunately it was a mutual love at first sight situation. Frankly, unless you're positively nuts about a long drawn out lovestruck scene, I'd say skip this book entirely. I'd say our vamp was really only vampire in name, and nothing more.

Suicide

Suicide is a very touchy subject amongst humans, and there are some seriously heavy duty taboos surrounding it. In most societies, willfully killing another human is wrong except in very specific circumstances like an execution. Otherwise, it's murder. This would seem consistent, if killing someone might be allowable under the law and only under the law while it is absolutely forbidden elsewhere. War is probably allowable by law. Probably.

Now comes the idea of euthanasia. Killing a person to put them out of their misery is certainly unacceptable by that definition. They have not committed a crime, and really do have a right to live. Fair enough. However, the definition of killing is somewhat skewed. By definition, killing can be done through willful action or inaction. For example, if I encountered someone drowning in a well, it would probably be criminal for me to just let him die. It does seem worse, though, if I was the one who tossed him in in the first place.

Strangely enough, the same reasoning does not appear to hold true in the case of withholding treatment from a terminally ill patient. It has become euthanasia lite to just let someone die without medical care, while it remains criminal to give them a lethal injection. Yet if someone were actually conscious, it would likely be more torturous to let them waste to death (perhaps from thirst and starvation?). The common line drawn between the acceptability of withholding treatment is when the body is unable to sustain itself. However, is that not the case for any poor person, who is unable to get food for itself?

What Is Evil?

It is an intriguing question as always, about the definitions of good and evil. As established earlier, it is difficult to know for sure what is beneficial and non-beneficial. However, it seems to be agreed upon that knowledge is key to actually having intent, and that intentionally desiring non-beneficial things on others is quite unacceptable.

The problem here is that perhaps there is no specific definition of good or evil within an act: It is a matter of whether there is intent, and if the intent is malicious or benevolent. Therefore, the ignorant entity may well be performing acts that are highly harmful to others, but the ignoramus will be neither good nor evil given that state of perfect ignorance. Likewise, the entity is incapable of being good by performing beneficial acts.

Taking this further, it can be asserted that someone with absolute knowledge has the potential to do good or evil. Given that the outcomes of the actions are fully known, every action or inaction will be a result of some intent and thus that entity will be capable of absolute good or evil.

Of course, in reality, no individual is likely to be perfectly ignorant or knowledgeable. This may be a case to assert that while entities may have largely good or evil intentions, no single entity is likely to be purely good or evil. But it is possible to be quite ignorant and dumb about things.

Studying Instincts

When it comes to explaining the instinctual/subconscious motivations of human behavior, it is tempting to try to assign a purpose to them. For example, one can easily point out that aggression is a survival mechanism. It seems to make sense, of course, in the context of other similar aggressive conducts that result in observably beneficial outcomes. Those conducts are, however, often observed in animals.

The thing about these hidden motivations is that they are effectively a blank slate for projection. Can instinctual motivations ever make sense in a rational human framework? Indeed they can, but only through references to what already makes sense. The mapping is unfortunately imprecise at best, and quite possibly completely wrong at times. Instincts are by their nature inexplicable not just because humans are largely ignorant of their little nudges but also because their natures may not map directly to reasonable sensibilities.

It may be unsatisfying to say that we simply do not know what reasons lie behind instinctual motivations, yet it may be equally unsatisfying to harbor the distinct possibility that what seems like a perfectly reasonable and proven hypothesis turns out to be simple projection. As they say...it seemed like a good idea at the time.

A Vampire's Rights

It would be interesting to consider, hypothetically, what a vampire's rights would be like. There are some considerations. For one, a vampire is clearly ex-human, in that it is a dead human creature and most certainly has different characteristics and needs from your average human. Yet, those needs will make consideration of a vampire's rights quite interesting, as treating one just like a dead person would be clearly insufficient seeing as this particular dead person happens to be walking (or flying, or floating, or scampering) around like a living creature.

The easy solution, as seen in Dracula, would be simply to regard vampires as a menace that should be eliminated. As such, they'd probably be classed as a sort of rather dangerous vermin. However, if one were to try to engineer rights to afford integration of vampires into human society, things get considerably more complicated. That would mean that vampires are to be granted the same rights and responsibilities accorded to humans: the right to live without harm as long as one does not harm others.

Another basic consideration would be sustenance. As a vampire feeds on blood (presumably not exclusively human blood), that would count as the food source. The right of access to food does not actually exist in many societies: in fact, they are quite content to starve those who cannot afford food. Economics would dictate that vampires likewise be required to pay for their food.

Lodging is even more critical for a vampire than a human, seeing as vamps have a fatal sun allergy. Even if economics dictate that they pay for their homes the way humans do, they'd at least need a coffin to keep them alive. Survival as a basic right, after all.

Confucian Corruption

Confucianism and the Chinese practice of holistic relationships (guanxi) were probably formulated with the best of intentions. Unfortunately, in practice some aspects of them can produce the worst of results. In one discussion on the concept of justice, it was asked what would should be done, should one know that one's father has committed murder. The response to this, as famously known, was to hide the father and not hand him up for the murder. This stresses the importance of filial piety, yet also emphasizes a very distinct "inner circle" that is most certainly developing nepotist tendencies and has a very real potential for harboring injustice.

In guanxi, relationships are viewed holistically. That is, if someone is your teacher, that person remains your teacher regardless of context. That someone will be treated as a teacher even at the swimming pool, the gym, at work, as a client and so on. Likewise, a parent will always be treated as a parent regardless of context. In short, following these aspects of the philosophies in this way results in a situation where it is in fact right and good to shield parents (and to a somewhat lesser degree, close relatives) even when they demonstrate corrupt behaviors. While it is said that the gentleperson leads by example and thus brings others towards goodness, it is also said that the children should not contradict their parents.

This potential for corruption further festers especially when guanxi's system results in a sense that there is no conflict of interest when people from two different organizations start providing one another preferential treatment. It is recognized that such preferential treatment exists in all societies by virtue of simple interpersonal relationships, but it is another matter when this treatment becomes somewhat socially sanctioned.

One problem with the way some organizations are run seems to stem from a partial implementation of the Confucian philosophy. While respect and deference are maintained, the justice component seems to have been overlooked. Deference without justice seems to be a pretty good starting point for corruption to fester within organizations that maintain such lopsided arrangements.

Alice In Wonderland

Twisted. Just the way I like it. Imagine a Vorpal sword wielding, grown-up Alice in a fantastical Wonderland after the whole child-Alice saga. There you have it...Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland. I must admit that I was initially intimidated by the awful reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. After all, they do tend to be right about when a movie is good. Fortunately, that does not necessarily hold true when they declare that movies suck.

One thing that I do recall a friend saying is that Hollywood has a tendency to turn every story into a battle epic with a romance in it. This Alice is no exception. Yet, as someone who had read the original stories, it was indeed a refreshing twist on the classic tale. Alice is now all grown up and has gone back to Wonderland, albeit one that has seen better days. Not to mention the fact that she does not actually remember what she did there the last time she came. Of course, then we have the Hatter as a rather pathetic figure in need of a rescue, while hinting at some romance brewing with him and Alice.

True to his skill, Johnny Depp manages to play a Hatter that is really quite Mad. I dare not say that Hathaway did quite as good a job of being the White Queen. Yet, it is amusing to see the greatly feared Jabberwocky being slain by a sword that refused to go snickerty snack. There is little I can say that would not spoil the movie experience, save that this is one twisted tale that I did not regret seeing...in 3D, no less. 7.5/10

As a side note, it seems that "3D" has become the latest blanket excuse for massive price hikes in cinema tickets. I think the cinemas may well price themselves out of the market before piracy manages to pull off that feat. By the way...why is a raven like a writing desk?

Horn And Halo

The horn and halo effect is often an interesting phenomenon within human societies. In-groups are ascribed good values, while out-groups are ascribed negative ones. The effect is quite salient especially when it comes to racial minorities.

It works something like this: a person makes a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes from sooner or later, so that's to be expected. However, if the person is from a majority race, the mistake is attributed to an isolated fault. At most, that particular person is faulty, while the majority remain pretty decent in comparison. Yet, when the person is from a minority, the fault may become ascribed to that of their entire race. That entire race is stupid, or lazy, or (insert negative value here).

Perhaps the horn/halo effect is an offshoot of human xenophobia. Racial minorities are most certainly different, and there is greater pressure to start understanding them as quickly as possible than one would have to for a majority since one is likely already steeped in the majority culture. Generalizations may be a convenient way to come up with that understanding. However, there is also the fear of the unknown and suspicion of newcomers. That creates an additional tendency to ascribe negative attributes to minorities, in an attempt to err on the side of caution.

Overall, this is just laziness. Whether the xenophobia is a matter of nature or nurture, it would still be incumbent upon the majority to deal with the differences as they would with any other person, rather than taking the easy way out and breezing through evaluations of people. Easier said than done, apparently.

The System Honeypot

Sunk cost can be used to great effect. When considering the pricing of items in camera systems, it is readily apparent that a low entry cost can easily attract a large following. Beginners are a lot happier to plonk money down for a cheap unit than an expensive one, obviously.

Then comes the 2-year itch. Some never feel it, some give up and others just can't seem to stop upgrading. Time to ditch the beginner's model and work on something better. What's important then is the next tier, whereby a close upgrade will be desirable and another close upgrade and so on. Of course, to top it all, there needs to be a highly desirable but extremely out of reach aspiration tier.

Of course, this means that there needs to be multiple tiers with routine upgrades, forming a fairly gradual ladder to the top. What's best about this pricing method is that the sunk cost simply builds and builds. First it looks pretty small at a thousand or so, then a few hundreds sink in...and soon we're talking thousands of dollars invested. The sunk cost becomes the shackles that hold users within a system. However, it's also essential to make sure the ladder works fine, or the honeypot will lose its stickiness.