To be born into modern human civilization is both a great privilege (for the safety and opportunities it provides) and a rather absurd thing (because of the sheer volume of bullshit you\u2019re fed, for a range of reasons both intentional and otherwise). <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’m writing this essay to try and make sense of all of that. Why do we live in an age of such unending bullshit? What is my place in Bullshit-ville?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Consider first the life of most humans for most of time, before schools and supermarkets and 9\u20135 jobs. It was nasty, brutish, short. Violent. The main concerns were food, sex and physical safety. People typically lived in small groups and had no concept of government, bills and so on. Groups must\u2019ve had leaders- usually fathers, patriarchs, chief hunters, etc. Physical strength would\u2019ve mattered a lot more then than it does now. Violence would\u2019ve been a natural way of settling disputes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Violence is still a tremendous feature of our everyday lives, but it\u2019s not so obvious any more. Force itself isn\u2019t necessary- what we use most of the time instead is the threat<\/em> of force, typically monopolized by States. Before States we had tribes and villages, which consolidated into kingdoms. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m not a historian, so my understanding of this stuff is a little vague\u2013 there were hunter-gatherers up until about 4,000BC, then there were pastoral nomads (\u201cbarbarians\u201d) and sedentary folk (\u201ccivilised\u201d). There\u2019s a bunch of interesting details (and complexity) about how civilisations basically formed around resource-rich areas\u2013 typically rivers, where they could grow food. There\u2019s some bickering about how exactly that happened, but that\u2019s not what I\u2019m interested in here. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The fact is that people started settling down one way or another\u2013 and when people were born into settlements, that would become the world they knew. When you grow up farming or practicing some trade within a settlement, it becomes a lot harder to make an exit decision\u2013 to pack up and leave town because you hate the place. [1]<\/p>\n\n\n\n At this point I think it makes sense to talk more about my context. I\u2019m a Singaporean born in 1990\u200a\u2014\u200awhich means that I was born into a miracle story, and I have no personal experience of how miraculous the story is. I was just born into a world that was clean, neat, tidy, orderly, where there a reliable rule of law, where things get done, bad guys get apprehended, people in charge are generally honourable and good. <\/p>\n\n\n\n My parents\u2019 generation experienced one of the greatest improvements\/increases in quality of human life in the history of our species\u2013 sometimes called \u2018from third world to first\u2019. Some people here would start talking a lot about Lee Kuan Yew and his achievements, or about colonialism, and so on. That\u2019s been covered pretty extensively so I\u2019ll skip that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n V: On rereading the above, I realize that I’ve left out some pretty important things about how violence is abstracted\/veiled in SG today. Will want to add.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Suppose we posit that for the purpose of this essay, modern civilisation began with the industrial revolution and printing press and so on. (I know this glosses over the entire Roman Empire and all sorts of important things\u2026 I’ll try to figure how all of that fits in later.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n Let\u2019s jump forward to, say, the birth of America. America had a very violent beginning. It involved a lot of guns. It\u2019s very difficult for me as a young Singaporean to appreciate the American love of guns, but I suppose that’s because guns were a huge part of American history while a non-concern in Singapore’s. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In comparison, Americans tend to struggle to understand Singapore’s draconian attitude towards drugs. Well, it’s history again: Singapore used to be basically an opium den in the 1800s (the nickname then was Sin-Galore!), and we have some sense about how China was brought to its knees by the British with opium, so we have some cultural baggage there. (Personally I think we could do with some relaxing, but I\u2019m not representative of the average Singaporean. The point is that different peoples with different histories have different attitudes about things, in ways that may not be immediately obvious.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n V: There’s probably more stuff about SG’s history with drugs that I’m missing. “our perception of opium and drugs is primarily colored by victorian morality”. Also China’s history with opium isn’t straightforward. Nothing is ever straightforward…<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Between 1776 and now\u2013 America had slaves, where humans literally owned other humans by force, bought and sold them like cattle, raped them, all sorts of horrible things. And then there was a civil war, and 620,000 people died. In contrast, about 6,000+ Americans died in Iraq (more would\u2019ve committed suicide, and gone home maimed and wounded), but consider the order-of-magnitude difference there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n (Digression: By the way\u2013 about 400,000+ Americans died in WW2, and 27,000,000 Russians died. Can you imagine 27 million dead bodies? About 3\u20136m of them died from famine and disease, which is basically all of Singapore. It\u2019s hard to imagine.)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n I guess the point I\u2019m trying to make is\u2013 it\u2019s easy for a young Singaporean born into relative peace and prosperity to overlook the fact that our species is violent and destructive. (One of the most salient anecdotes from LKY’s autobiography is his description of Chinese Singaporean heads on pikes outside Cathay cinema.)There have been so many atrocities even in fairly recent times\u2013 WW2, Vietnam, Korea, the killing fields in Cambodia. The situation in Syria right now. People say things like \u201cOh, it\u2019s never been better!\u201d and that\u2019s a good thing, but it\u2019s hard to be too paranoid about the state of our species. It still sucks to be a black person in America, the aftershocks of slavery aren\u2019t done yet. And kids are still getting shot every day. And people die in car accidents every day. And we have crappy diets and sedentary lifestyles (that we feel guilty and ashamed about, which seems to make it worse), and it\u2019s just a whole lot of death and suffering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I can\u2019t say \u201ccivilisation is more bad than good\u201d, or \u201ccivilisation is worse than the alternative\u201d, because obviously we have a whole bunch of great things. Fewer people die in childbirth and from early childhood diseases and stuff than ever before. Life expectancies are going up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But I think the point I\u2019m trying to make is that the world we\u2019re living in isn\u2019t quite good enough. We can and should do better, for ourselves and our children and so on because life is precious and fleeting. And every day when I go to work I sit in a comfortable office surrounded by colleagues I enjoy\u2013 I do go through a shitty commute to get there, suffering along with thousands of other people who\u2019re subjected to the same thing\u2013 but it\u2019s probably better than anything my parents or grandparents endured. <\/p>\n\n\n\n And every day I get to look out the window and see many instances of my grandfather toiling in the sun and rain, working hard in difficult conditions so that his grandchildren might someday enjoy the privilege of middle-class guilt and maybe write blogposts about it to make sense of his thoughts and feelings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ___<\/p>\n\n\n\n [1] This has changed more in our globalised era\u2013 while there\u2019s more paperwork, I could theoretically leave Singapore, my hometown, and go live somewhere else. But that doesn\u2019t feel like a very real option to me, and probably because I grew up never having entertained that prospect seriously. I was born pledging allegiance to a flag, singing a national anthem, doing involuntary military service\u2026 and grew up eating the food, speaking the language\u2013 to migrate somewhere else permanently would be rather tedious, and I think people from sedentary cultures are generally uncultured to be tedium-averse, or novelty-averse. I not sure. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Let\u2019s try to quickly summarise what the previous post was saying.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Righto. That about sums it up. Let\u2019s move on. What am I trying to say with all of this?<\/p>\n\n\n\n I appreciate that life is longer than before, but I don\u2019t like that it\u2019s bureaucratic and byzantine and full of bullshit. And I’m trying to figure out how to live well in such a time. (Rereading this now, I suppose folks like Seneca and other thinkers of the past have grappled with their versions of this.)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n I would like to be grateful for all of the gifts, privileges and opportunities that civilisation provides me (which are things I love), but I\u2019d also like to inoculate myself against bureaucracy, needless complications and bullshit (which are things that I hate).<\/p>\n\n\n\n I guess to do that I need to understand why things are the way they are\u2013 and I have to strive to do this as objectively and neutrally as possible, without bias. I need to understand the cause-and-effect relationships that underly these things, and figure out the actions that I should take to build a better life for myself (however I choose to define that).<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m scanning through a summary of Thomas Hobbes\u2019 Leviathan now\u2013 I don\u2019t know anything about either Hobbes or Leviathan, but the phrase \u201cbrutish and short\u201d has stuck in my mind for a long time and it turns out that it was Hobbes who coined it, to describe the unfavourable situation of pre-civilisation\u2013 the \u201cwar of all against all\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I like what I\u2019m seeing so far\u2013 Hobbes didn\u2019t like that his predecessors appealed to the \u201cgreatest good\u201d or \u201csummum bonum\u201d\u2013 the variability of human desires meant that there could be no such thing. I intuitively agree with this. He did however believe that there was a \u201csummum malum\u201d\u200a\u2014\u200aa greatest evil, the fear of violent death. This I\u2019m not so sure about. I\u2019m inclined to agree that it\u2019s probably legitimate\u200a\u2014\u200aas I said in an earlier post, I come from a privileged, sheltered background where I\u2019ve never had to fear my own violent death. So at best it\u2019s still just a hypothetical thought experiment, rather than a real fear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hobbes argues\u2013 and I have to agree\u2013 that there can be no industry or productivity in an uncertain environment, where everyone fears that all might be lost at any instant. That sounds legitimate. We work and save money because we believe that the value of money will hold over time. History has shown that this isn\u2019t always the case, and that hyperinflation and anarchy are real things that can descend upon a previously orderly community or context.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn the state of nature nothing can be considered just or unjust\u201d<\/em>\u200a\u2014\u200athis is true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOne ought to be willing to renounce one\u2019s right to all things where others are willing to do the same\u201d<\/em>\u200a\u2014\u200athis is a prescriptive appeal to social contracts. It would be nice if everyone agreed to this, but in reality not everyone does. People like situations that are designed to favor them\u2013 heads I win, tails you lose. (Yeah apparently people used Hobbes to try to tell black people to be patient and well-behaved during the civil rights movement)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Hobbes goes on to describe how a State should be like\u200a\u2014\u200ahow it should establish, enact and enforce laws, preside over disagreements. Interestingly, he favoured press censorship and restrictions on the right of free speech if they promoted order over chaos. In this regard it seems Singapore is more Hobbesian than the USA, which priorities the separation of powers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Interesting. Hobbes lived from 1588 to 1679, and published Leviathan in 1651. <\/p>\n\n\n\n (Digression: Some historical context\u2013 Japan was under the Tokugawa shogunate at the time, and there was a failed uprising by a number of ronin. The Taj Mahal was completed 2 years later. China was under the Qing dynasty. Louis XIV was King of France, crowned in 1654, and Ferdinand III ruled the Holy Roman Empire. Oliver Cromwell is a significant dude. Saturn\u2019s largest moon Titan is discovered in 1655, by the same dude who\u2019d then invent the pendulum clock. History is so much more interesting that current affairs.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Okay wait, so why did Hobbes write Leviathan again? Apparently his mother went into labor prematurely upon learning that the Spanish Armada had set said to attack England, and Hobbes wrote \u201cfear and I were born twins together\u201d. So I suppose he wrote it in fear that people wouldn\u2019t uphold a decent State? Yep\u2013 he wrote it partly as a response to the political turmoil of the English Civil Wars. He was a Royalist\u2013 a person who supported King Charles I. He had been developing his philosophy of political and natural science for a long time before\u200a\u2014\u200amaybe a couple of decades. Which makes me wonder about what might be stewing in my mind that I\u2019m not fully aware of, that I would write if I were triggered.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So I spent a bunch of time reading up about Thomas Hobbes and about 1650s history. I guess there were civil wars and stuff going on at the time. The French Revolution would probably happen not too much later\u2013 well it would be 130 years later, from 1789 to 1799. And then Napoleon showed up. Hm, and this was after America declared Independence. Interesting. <\/p>\n\n\n\n (Digression: I guess the big lesson for me here is that the history of States is far more complicated than I realize. But I think it\u2019s necessary to figure out the big picture anyway, leaving allowances for inaccuracies and so on. And now I\u2019m in a rabbithole reading and learning about the French Revolution, which is actually pretty interesting.)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n But let\u2019s get back in focus on what I wanted to figure out\u2013 which is, what is the source of bureaucracy, unnecessary complication, bullshit? Why is it such a prominent feature of our modern times? Can we do anything about it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n A quick recap\u2013 I\u2019ve been thinking about the context that I live in, and the history that has lead to this context, and how it shapes my thinking and my life. I\u2019m reminded of David Foster Wallace\u2019s joke at a commencement speech<\/a>, about an old fish greeting younger fish with \u201cGood day boys, how\u2019s the water?\u201d, and then one fish says to the other, \u201cWhat\u2019s water?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Water in my case is modern civilization\u2013 the physical spaces, the technologies, the ideologies, the media, everything. I\u2019m also thinking now about Paul Graham\u2019s essay What You Can\u2019t Say<\/a>, and how he talks about moral fashions, and how we inherit them, and how they can prevent us from thinking certain thoughts altogether.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I relate to Paul. I want to be able to have freedom of thought. I want to be able to be free in every way that is afforded to me\u2013 or at least I say that because I think that will lead to a happier life for me, with more pleasure and more enjoyment and more fulfilment and all of those good things. <\/p>\n\n\n\n (on hindsight \u2013 is ^this actually true, though?)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n I outlined that there are things about modern civilization that I love\u2013 and I don\u2019t need to talk too much about those things because that part is easy to rant and rave about\u200a\u2014\u200aand there are things that I hate. And the things that I hate are (to name a few) bureaucracy, unnecessary complexity and bullshit. And boredom, I suppose, though boredom is a luxury and a privilege compared to living in fear or worry. Let\u2019s focus on the earlier bits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I chose bureaucracy as an antonym for brutish\u2013 I was thinking of Hobbes\u2019s phrase \u201cbrutish and short\u201d as a descriptor of life in pre-civilization. I was trying to figure out the inverse of that\u2013 long, obviously, but what\u2019s the inverse of brutish? I came up with \u201cbureaucratic\u201d\u2013 and I was delighted to find out that the word\u2019s etymology is rooted in \u201cdesk\u201d. And that sums up a lot of the transition, I think. We\u2019ve gone from being wild to being desk-bound. We\u2019ve gone from playing in the streets to playing in santized playgrounds, staring at iPads all day and whatnot. <\/p>\n\n\n\n (Displeased with the “staring at iPads” line \u2013 unimaginative, and unintentionally cues a “kids these days” image. Not what I’m going for. Will rephrase.)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n I don\u2019t think of myself as an iPad hater. I love technological tools. I love my Macbook and my Android phone, and I\u2019d quite like an iPad too though I can\u2019t quite justify the expenditure right now. But the point I think is that we\u2019ve gone from living primarily in our bodies to living primarily in our heads (Ken Robinson has a great riff on this<\/a>, re: how our education systems have been modelled after the Industrial Revolution and the Enlightenment and so on\u2013 that math is somehow definitely more important than dance, for example.Strength coach Elliott Hulse also has some fun thoughts on this<\/a>. And in a more grim sense, if we go back to David Foster Wallace’s water speech, he points out that people who shoot themselves almost invariably shoot themselves in the head.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m not going to say that dance is more<\/em> important than math, but dance is<\/em> important. Diet is important. Exercise is important. Flirting is important. Movement is important. Hiking is important. We seem to have, in our eagerness to evolve or progress in some way, thrown out a bunch of things about ourselves that made us who we are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n (Define important. I think I mean “important to human welfare”, or flourishing.)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Okay I\u2019m being a bit vague and grand here, I should be more precise. What am I trying to say here? We cut out a lot of things from our lives in an attempt to make things more tidy, more organized, more legible, easier to account for, easier to measure and so on. Standardized tests. Standardized everything. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Again I probably don\u2019t fully appreciate how powerful and empowering standardization must\u2019ve been for a lot of people. It would\u2019ve brought them out of poverty, given them dignity, so on and so forth. I\u2019m writing all of this under the blanket of security and wealth provided by all the sacrifices that people made before me, and for this I am grateful. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But I still want to understand how exactly we got to byzantine, bureaucratic bullshit-ville, so that I can navigate it better. My main way of dealing with BBB is to be angry, or sarcastic, or absurd, to call it out, to complain about it, to laugh at it, to find other people that I can laugh at it with. But it doesn\u2019t make the problem go away. BBB stucks around after I\u2019ve made fun of it. So I need to change my approach if I want to have less of it in my life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some tentative thoughts: <\/p>\n\n\n\nMy life is unusually violence-free and that’s\u2026 odd<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
History of man = History of violence<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Could we do better?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Part 2 <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\n
“Please don’t screw up this civilization thing, because the alternative really sucks.”\u200a\u2014\u200aThomas Hobbes, probably<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Part 3 <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Life went from “brutish and short” to “long and bureaucratic”<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Byzantine, bureaucratic bullshit-ville<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n