Binary thinking is an oxymoron.
May. 21st, 2008 02:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
qcontinuumOOC: Posted to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
theatrical_muse, today.
Prompt 230: Black and white.
What's wrong with purple?
Or red. I'm actually quite fond of red.
Prompt 195: What makes someone a hero? What makes someone a villain?
The label on the action figure, mostly.
No, seriously. These questions are meaningless. What is a hero or a villain? I have been called a demon for forcing the population of a world to save themselves from a supernova. I have been called a god for showing up and doing some entertaining party tricks. If the difference between a demon and a god is so ridiculously hard to find, how are you supposed to define the difference between a hero and a villain?
There is no black and white, no good and evil, no hero and villain, because these are all binaries, and we don't actually live in a binary universe. No, really. Just because those pixels on your screen are ones and zeroes doesn't mean the entire universe works like that. There's on, off, all of the range between on and off, and "doesn't have a switch", as well as "won't answer the question" and "the question is stupid". Mathematically this is how the universe works:
1
0
.00017
NULL
Unknown
Mu
Mu, as you may recall from the last time I talked about it, is Terran Japanese for "your question is too stupid to be answered." The classic "mu" questions contradict themselves obviously, such as "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" Since a clap requires two hands, the contradiction is obvious. But "When did you stop beating your wife?" "Why are you such an asshole?" and "What makes a person a hero or a villain?" all fall in the category of questions that make an assumption and bake it into the question so there's actually no way to answer correctly except to say "Your question makes no sense." I never *started* beating my wife, therefore I cannot have stopped. (Technically, in fact, I never had a wife. We call each other *companions*, not spouses.) "Why are you such an asshole" assumes that I *am* an asshole. Well, okay, in fact this question is perfectly accurate when applied to me, because I am actually an asshole, but the point is, the question isn't asking "Are you an asshole", it assumes you are and moves on to why. So if you aren't, there is no way to answer it.
"What makes a person a hero?" assumes there is such a thing as a hero. What *is* a hero? The ancient Greeks thought it was a person who performed great deeds, and "great" was defined as "above ordinary human level", so a person who raped, murdered and sulked in his tent a lot was considered a hero because he was invulnerable and pretty much unstoppable in war. The 20th century Americans thought a hero was a guy who played sports really well, *or*, a guy who went to foreign countries to shoot at other people for no particularly good reason except he'd been told to. If you save the universe, and your species, and your entire ship, you're a big damn hero. But what if in order to save the universe you have to knowingly sacrifice an innocent person? Two? Three? what if they're kids? What if they cry and beg you to save them, but you throw them out the airlock anyway, because the alternative is someone eats your entire ship? Then are you a hero?
"Villain" is even worse. Are you a villain if you are defending your hometown against invaders who came in, started dropping bombs for no reason, and who rape and murder 14 year old girls? Well, in the eyes of the invaders you might very well be. Are you a villain if you routinely beat your child senseless? If you belong to a species that thinks child abuse is an A-OK way to toughen them up to be Strong Warriors as adults, then no, apparently you're not. The Cardassians are never villains because every single damn one of them has an excellent rationale for why he or she did what he or she did for the Good Of Cardassia, and never mind that they all contradict each other. *I'm* a villain. Except when I'm a hero. Depending on who you listen to, and if you're talking to members of the Q Continuum, depending on what I've done this week and how they feel about it.
I don't like binary thinking. It's an oxymoron. The moment you go binary, *you are no longer thinking*. You are computing, and you can't compute the universe. I don't like the idea that "black or white?" is a question that can possibly make sense outside of the context of "I have only one kind of ink, what color should I make the picture and what color should the background be?" I mean, whatever happened to green? Purple? Chartreuse? Lemon yellow? Salmon pink? Burnt sienna? Ultraviolet? How can "black or white" be a question? It assumes those are the only two choices, and even beings that can only see in on/off see more colors than *that*, because grey exists.
theatrical_muse, today.Prompt 230: Black and white.
What's wrong with purple?
Or red. I'm actually quite fond of red.
Prompt 195: What makes someone a hero? What makes someone a villain?
The label on the action figure, mostly.
No, seriously. These questions are meaningless. What is a hero or a villain? I have been called a demon for forcing the population of a world to save themselves from a supernova. I have been called a god for showing up and doing some entertaining party tricks. If the difference between a demon and a god is so ridiculously hard to find, how are you supposed to define the difference between a hero and a villain?
There is no black and white, no good and evil, no hero and villain, because these are all binaries, and we don't actually live in a binary universe. No, really. Just because those pixels on your screen are ones and zeroes doesn't mean the entire universe works like that. There's on, off, all of the range between on and off, and "doesn't have a switch", as well as "won't answer the question" and "the question is stupid". Mathematically this is how the universe works:
1
0
.00017
NULL
Unknown
Mu
Mu, as you may recall from the last time I talked about it, is Terran Japanese for "your question is too stupid to be answered." The classic "mu" questions contradict themselves obviously, such as "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" Since a clap requires two hands, the contradiction is obvious. But "When did you stop beating your wife?" "Why are you such an asshole?" and "What makes a person a hero or a villain?" all fall in the category of questions that make an assumption and bake it into the question so there's actually no way to answer correctly except to say "Your question makes no sense." I never *started* beating my wife, therefore I cannot have stopped. (Technically, in fact, I never had a wife. We call each other *companions*, not spouses.) "Why are you such an asshole" assumes that I *am* an asshole. Well, okay, in fact this question is perfectly accurate when applied to me, because I am actually an asshole, but the point is, the question isn't asking "Are you an asshole", it assumes you are and moves on to why. So if you aren't, there is no way to answer it.
"What makes a person a hero?" assumes there is such a thing as a hero. What *is* a hero? The ancient Greeks thought it was a person who performed great deeds, and "great" was defined as "above ordinary human level", so a person who raped, murdered and sulked in his tent a lot was considered a hero because he was invulnerable and pretty much unstoppable in war. The 20th century Americans thought a hero was a guy who played sports really well, *or*, a guy who went to foreign countries to shoot at other people for no particularly good reason except he'd been told to. If you save the universe, and your species, and your entire ship, you're a big damn hero. But what if in order to save the universe you have to knowingly sacrifice an innocent person? Two? Three? what if they're kids? What if they cry and beg you to save them, but you throw them out the airlock anyway, because the alternative is someone eats your entire ship? Then are you a hero?
"Villain" is even worse. Are you a villain if you are defending your hometown against invaders who came in, started dropping bombs for no reason, and who rape and murder 14 year old girls? Well, in the eyes of the invaders you might very well be. Are you a villain if you routinely beat your child senseless? If you belong to a species that thinks child abuse is an A-OK way to toughen them up to be Strong Warriors as adults, then no, apparently you're not. The Cardassians are never villains because every single damn one of them has an excellent rationale for why he or she did what he or she did for the Good Of Cardassia, and never mind that they all contradict each other. *I'm* a villain. Except when I'm a hero. Depending on who you listen to, and if you're talking to members of the Q Continuum, depending on what I've done this week and how they feel about it.
I don't like binary thinking. It's an oxymoron. The moment you go binary, *you are no longer thinking*. You are computing, and you can't compute the universe. I don't like the idea that "black or white?" is a question that can possibly make sense outside of the context of "I have only one kind of ink, what color should I make the picture and what color should the background be?" I mean, whatever happened to green? Purple? Chartreuse? Lemon yellow? Salmon pink? Burnt sienna? Ultraviolet? How can "black or white" be a question? It assumes those are the only two choices, and even beings that can only see in on/off see more colors than *that*, because grey exists.
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Date: 2008-05-21 06:12 pm (UTC)OOC: He insisted.