Greg Krehbiel

The wisdom to bite your tongue

by Greg Krehbiel on 7 May 2012

There’s an interesting passage in the third Hunger Games book where Katniss remembers a song her dad taught her that has, to put it mildly, a pretty weird message to it. It’s about a dead guy calling to his love to meet him at the tree where he’s been hanged.

Katniss reflects on the song and recalls that when she was young she thought the author had to be the worst kind of creep.

The older Katniss — still in her teens, but aged by experiences none of us will (may it please God) ever have — doesn’t want to judge the guy any more. She’s been through times where she thought it would be a mercy to end a life, so she’s a little less sure of her ability to judge somebody else’s situation. At least without knowing more of the facts.

Experience is supposed to make you broad-minded. At least that’s the story we keep hearing.

I don’t think that’s the case at all. Experience can also make you quite narrow.

Just this weekend I heard a guy from Nigeria tell me about the problems in his country. I could easily have come away from the discussion confirmed in the belief that Muslims are a curse on the planet and should be eradicated for the sake of the future of humanity.

It’s not experience that broadens your mind. Sometimes experience just confirms your prejudices. What broadens the mind is the willingness to get out of your own perspective and see things the way somebody else sees them.

Recently I heard a story about a man’s path to engagement. On a certain level it was a very nice love story, and on another level it appalled and offended me.

But who am I to say how love grows, or where it comes from, or the right path to a healthy marriage? The preacher says …

There are three things that are too amazing for me, four that I do not understand:
the way of an eagle in the sky,
the way of a snake on a rock,
the way of a ship on the high seas,
and the way of a man with a young woman.

The first three aren’t quite as mysterious as they were in Solomon’s day, but the fourth is still inexplicable.

21 comments  ::  What do you think?  ::  2012-05-07  ::  Greg Krehbiel

Greg Krehbiel

The Horton Norton

by Greg Krehbiel on 6 May 2012

Have you heard of the Norton grape? It’s a local grape that — unlike most domestic grapes — is supposed to make a passable wine. I do a bad job growing grapes in my backyard, so if there’s a local grape that can make a good wine, I’d like to know about it.

I got the Norton wine from Horton vineyards, in Virginia. (You have to scroll down a bit on this page to see it.)

My wife put some Norton in one glass and some Syrah in another. I had no idea what to expect, so I wanted to taste it against something I knew decently well.

It was obvious right off the bat which was which. The Norton reminds you of concord grapes, both in the aroma and in the taste. It’s somewhat sweet and has a wildness to it. I’ve heard it would go well with game, which makes sense to me. (I had it with meat pie.)

If I was a colonist and this was all I could drink, I would be content. But it’s not a variety I’ll be stocking the cellar with.

 ::  What do you think?  ::  2012-05-06  ::  Greg Krehbiel

Greg Krehbiel

Grouchy thoughts

by Greg Krehbiel on 6 May 2012

• If you’re going to be speaking in public, keep this in mind — unless you’re really talented with words, cliches are probably better than your impromptu thoughts. Also, most of the people at the event aren’t particularly interested in your inner life.

• Whoever invented the idea of the moving camera (as used, for example, in the Hunger Games) is an idiot. When you run through the woods, the images don’t jump up and down like that. The moving cam is less realistic, not more.

• Tom Brokaw gave an excellent reply to somebody who was complaining that the anchor position on various Sunday TV shows has always been given to a white male. He characterized it as “a slowly rising pool of talent.” Eventually there will be minorities with enough experience and talent to get the job, but it will take a while. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised.

 ::  What do you think?  ::  2012-05-06  ::  Greg Krehbiel

Greg Krehbiel

Hunger games in the U.S.A.?

by Greg Krehbiel on 5 May 2012

I recently finished the first and second books in the hunger games series. They’re fun books.

The basic message is that a tyrannical government keeps 12 districts in check by starving them and humiliating them. The main form of humiliation is requiring them to submit one boy and one girl each year to an arena-style death match.

Then everybody watches it for entertainment. Yeah!

It’s fiction, of course, but there are parallels in real life. For example, we’re learning more and more that football is very dangerous. It’s not just ACLs and hamstrings. The signs are that repeated trauma to the head is causing far more damage than anybody had thought. Some recent suicides have highlighted the problem.

So far, the NFL has been pretty responsible about this, IMO. They’ve been changing rules and have been spending a lot of time and money trying to keep players safe. From everything I’ve heard and read, they’ve been doing exactly what they should be doing. Three cheers for the NFL.

But what if they weren’t? What if we knew that players were risking their future for our entertainment? Would we continue to watch? Would we allow people to get their brains bludgeoned for a few hours of distraction?

I’m not so sure. The NFL seems to be doing the right things (so far as I can tell). But what about professional wrestling, or boxing?

Do we really care if these people are condemning themselves to brain disorders, or spinal injuries, or other debilitating problems — just so we can have something to watch on TV?

How different is that from the arena-style death matches in the Hunger Games?

I’m not against sports in any way. I think sports are a very good thing for individuals and for society. And I’m pleased with the way the NFL has been handing the head trauma issues.

But moral pressure needs to be applied to other sports — to the sponsors, the organizers, and the consumers — to make sure that we’re not asking people to harm themselves for our pleasure.

And we, as consumers, need to have our own standards.

I’m somewhat interested in mixed martial arts myself. I used to take martial arts, and we did some of the same stuff you see in those matches.

But I’m appalled at how violent they are. It’s not sport when you’re beating somebody senseless with bare knuckles. That’s just plain evil, and people should be ashamed of themselves for supporting it.

People invent all kinds of excuses for this. “They chose that lifestyle,” and “this is their chance to make it big,” and “nobody’s forcing them to fight.”

I think the excuses are flimsy and we need to apply a better moral sense to the entertainment we watch.

4 comments  ::  What do you think?  ::  2012-05-05  ::  Greg Krehbiel

Greg Krehbiel

That vs. which, far vs. fur

by Greg Krehbiel on 3 May 2012

I try not to engage in grammar police stuff because this is the internet and correcting grammar is somewhat rude. Furthermore, although I was a professional editor for many years, it’s not like it’s my thing. Grammatical and spelling mistakes don’t bother me that much, and I don’t spend tons of time editing my own posts.

But there is one thing that kinda bugs me, and I’m going to post it just to get it out of my system. I think it bugs me because it’s closer to a logical mistake than a grammar mistake.

“That” introduces an essential clause. “Which” introduces an inessential clause.

So, if I have two cars, a red one and a blue one, and one is parked in the driveway and one is on the street, I could say “My car that is parked in the driveway is old.” The phrase “that is parked in the driveway” is essential because “My car” doesn’t specify which one.

I could also say, “My red car, which is parked on the street, is dirty.” The phrase “which is parked on the street” is not essential because I’ve already specified which car — the red one.

One other thing that confuses me. “Farther” refers to distance, while “further” means “in addition to” or “to a greater extent.” But for some reason you don’t say “You’ve gone too fur.”

7 comments  ::  What do you think?  ::  2012-05-03  ::  Greg Krehbiel

Greg Krehbiel

Benedict v. the secularists

by Greg Krehbiel on 3 May 2012

Msgr. Pope reports and comments on recent statements by Benedict XVI to local bishops.

Benedict says the church is to …

… proclaim a Gospel which not only proposes unchanging moral truths but proposes them precisely as the key to human happiness and social prospering.

I find Benedict’s statement interesting because of the confusions some secularists seem to have about religious views on morality — as if religious people propose moral rules that have nothing to do with promoting human happiness.

Some secularists want to define “morally right” as “things that bring the most happiness and cause the least suffering.” The problem is not necessarily with that definition, but with (1) how you determine what those things are, (2) what you allow to be considered as a source of happiness or suffering, and (3) to what degree humans get any special consideration.

In the debate over contraception, for example, the church believes that true human happiness lies in acting in accordance with our nature and not trying to thwart or trick or cheat it. (I realize there’s plenty of ground for dispute over whether the church’s teaching follows from that.)

To the secularist, whether there is “a” human nature — rather than, for example, distributions around a mean — is a matter of dispute. Furthermore, while it’s important to take human nature into account as a fact to be reckoned with, it is ultimately an accident, and it’s silly to look to it as some sort of guide for moral rules.

Along those lines there is the problem of what the religious person and what the secularist will admit as evidence.

For the religious, it’s not unreasonable to believe that “everything means something,” and that since God created the world and our intellect, we can discover truths about ourselves and our moral obligations by reasoning things out.

For the secularist, “nothing means anything.” Our minds happen to do some things well because that helped our ancestors survive, but there’s nothing more to it. It’s not like our minds are a guide to anything, or that the world is a clue to a higher moral reality.

So the religious person and the secularist can agree that moral rules should promote happiness and alleviate suffering, but as soon as you start to work on it they go in different directions.

 ::  What do you think?  ::  2012-05-03  ::  Greg Krehbiel

Greg Krehbiel

What the 1% do for us

by Greg Krehbiel on 2 May 2012

Here’s a really rich guy explaining why we need really rich guys. It’s a long article, but fairly interesting.

The Purpose of Spectacular Wealth, According to a Spectacularly Wealthy Guy

I think this is the heart of his argument.

“It’s not like the current payoff is motivating everybody to take risks,” he said. “We need twice as many people. When I look around, I see a world of unrealized opportunities for improvements, an abundance of talented people able to take the risks necessary to make improvements but a shortage of people and investors willing to take those risks. That doesn’t indicate to me that risk takers, as a whole, are overpaid. Quite the opposite.”

11 comments  ::  What do you think?  ::  2012-05-02  ::  Greg Krehbiel

Greg Krehbiel

Rationally naked?

by Greg Krehbiel on 1 May 2012

What is the “rational basis” for laws against public nakedness?

Seriously? Who is “harmed” by public nudity?

If a bunch of people from one of those clothe-less Amazon tribes decided to come to America, and they wanted to walk around naked all the time, on what grounds would we tell them they can’t?

Or what if we discovered that some small group of people have been chafing under our clothing requirements and just don’t feel right unless they’re naked? Who are we to impose our wishes on them?

You can come up with all kinds of scenarios. But we seem to have no problem telling people they have to wear clothes, apparently for the simple reason that we prefer it that way.

Our preference trumps the other person’s freedom.

Unless you’re willing to say that laws against public nakedness are wrong, you have to say that society has a right to restrict people’s choices for pretty shabby reasons — just because we want to — because we have some sort of instinct or feeling or prejudice on the matter.

(I am not in favor of public nudity.)

4 comments  ::  What do you think?  ::  2012-05-01  ::  Greg Krehbiel

Greg Krehbiel

Catholics try to blow up bridge

by Greg Krehbiel on 1 May 2012

Five Catholics arrested for trying to blow up a bridge in Cleveland.

Ooops. Did I say Catholics? Sorry, I meant Fundamentalist Bahai.

Or … maybe they were Muslim.

In any event, they were certainly theocrats of some kind. Unfortunatley, all we know from the story is that they were anarchists. Of course that seems odd, but … it must be some anarchistic strain of fundamentalist something, right? They couldn’t possibly be atheists, because the only violence they ever do is the kind done with dice in Dungeons and Dragons.

6 comments  ::  What do you think?  ::  2012-05-01  ::  Greg Krehbiel

Greg Krehbiel

What’s an “umwelt”?

by Greg Krehbiel on 1 May 2012

Here’s an interesting read.

Who’s in charge — you or your brain?

That’s the title of the page, and it raises an interesting question. Is there a distinction between “you” and “your brain”?

The title of the article is “The brain… it makes you think. Doesn’t it? Are we governed by unconscious processes? Neuroscience believes so – but isn’t the human condition more complicated than that? Two experts offer different views”

I didn’t know that neuroscience could believe anything. You learn something every day, I guess.

And to answer the question in the title of this post …

We don’t have a strong grasp of what reality “out there” even is, because we detect such an unbearably small slice of it. That small slice is called the umwelt.

4 comments  ::  What do you think?  ::  2012-05-01  ::  Greg Krehbiel