"Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour."

"An often trivial, diplomatic or well-intentioned untruth."-- definition of a white lie

Not all lies must be bad. Consider the interrogated patriot or the polite man. The measure of a bad lie is by how much harm is done by its deception. In distorting another's reality, do we eventually hurt them or ourselves? Does all our good intent culminate into something terrible? Examine for example someone who lies and says their check is in the mail. Might they, by withholding the check, contributed to some larger bureaucratic mess? And won't the postmark prove that they have only delayed an inevitable late fee? The positive intent doesn't matter if the effect is still destructive. If we cultivate discord unintentionally, we are still the cultivator. It grows into a disease. The chaotic yield would be far more relevant than the untraceable white lies which fertilized the field; no one would look to stop the virus but would cure the symptoms instead.

But this might stray into the realm of karma or the butterfly effect. It seems ridiculous to think that white lies might eventually confuse our lives significantly. But too many small distortions will eventually warp a thing out of shape. We need to give reality occasional relief so it can be itself, or we would be mislead into oblivion. We bend truth for ourselves as well. Lies are the immediate relief from reality, which must be often maintained by truth. Too many lies, and everything disintegrates. 

"Faith, here's an equivocator that could swear in both the scales against either scale, who committed treason enough for God's sake yet could not equivocate to heaven."-- a Porter

Doublespeak and oath-breaking are the types of lies which seem most harmful and unjustifiable. They immediately occur to mind as a direct offense against the neighbor.

I'm unsure if we should measure a lie's poison by its immediate effects. I don't know if I should always trust a white lie's purity, especially if I don't know what exactly a black lie is. I would say we should avoid lying altogether, but this would be impossible and tedious. We cannot rid ourselves of the lie as long as everything else is so bad.

This is a 1950's ad. It is a rare case of conscious opposition to cooking stereotypes. Here, however, it is not switching the roles, saying men can cook and women can't. It is saying women should cook but this one can't. Although the man seems to be comforting the woman, she is portrayed as overly emotional and he as condescending. It's a joke, but it purports the worthlessness of this woman. She didn't burn the beer, because it was the only thing she didn't cook. The intent is primarily to stick the brand, Schlitz, in the consumers mind; it seems not to be marketed to a specific gender (perhaps it was intended to be for women). Though it seems at first a light-hearted twist on gender roles, the tone toward women is destructive.

We are unsure of the man's intentions. Is his action sarcasm, or is he graciously turning the situation with humor? Either way, his comment takes away her power.

Hell!

"Hell" is a widespread concept, a word in ridiculous usage. That "ridiculous usage" refers to both the amount and the strange conceptual usages: "hot as hell", "cold as hell", "hella chill", "hella anything". It's one of those almost-anything kind of words, like many of our dirtiest expletives, an exclamation overused and become commonplace as a word of emphasis. All such words (shocking or routine, depending on the company) must have come from a background of serious oaths, or they would not be used in the manner they are today.

And it isn't just in America that this development occurred, I'm sure. In just about any religion, there is a concept of afterlife (Buddhism is some kind of exception, but there were plenty of nearby religions to fill the culture's empty shoes), and an idea of a penal and painful destination was part of this concept. I don't think its sole American practice to use this foundation of terror in forceful language. However, it does seem weird to us to hear a threat of, let's say, "an endless cycle of reincarnation", or perhaps, "dying without a weapon in one's hand". It would be strange for us to here shouts like, "go down to the deepest grave!" or "may Hades take you". We can only understand the intended intensity in our own culture. "Go to hell!" has plenty of force to it, although it has come to be used in a wide array of occasions, tones, and meanings.

Over time, some of this widespread usage must have corrupted the original image of Hell and the authorial intent of its mentioners. Today, we are confronted by the incredible influences of folk theology: the red faced devil with goat horns and a pitchfork, the Dantean physicality, the idea of Satan's lordship over the sinister realm, or almost any other detail someone could think of. From my admittedly deficient study of the Bible, Hell isn't detailed. There are the Hebrew manuscripts, which refer to "the grave"-- a darkness and absence, as well as the Greek portions-- the "Hades" which smells like sulfur, has that signature blazing torment, and is equally devoid of the deity.

I'm not sure what is meant by the "smells like sulfur" bit. Sulfur, I've heard, smells like a match being lit; it has a musty burning smell. It does not refer to hydrogen sulfide, which would have made "my fresh hell" smell like rotten eggs, nor does it refer to the sulfur compound mustard gas, used in World War Two to incapacitate soldiers. I think the "sulfur" that was meant was just supposed to refer to volcanoes or brimstone or just heat in general ("it smells like a place that burns"), but I can't stop thinking that those other two associations do help describe hell. It is a rotten place of incapacitation. It is an eternality cut off from a rejected presence, a place where we can no longer function, a place rotting from lack of life.

Playing Niccolò Apathiavelli

Of course we're not born without empathy, but it makes sense that empathy levels would go up and down. However, I believe there are innate appearances of empathy. Empathy levels have been linked to neurological disorders like autism and Asperger syndrome in ideas like the empathizing-systematizing theory. Strangely, there is an Empathy Quotient.

Of course, if empathy levels are a major factor in determining the presence of autism, then less extreme levels must be effecting (or not affecting) us constantly. Empathy is the basis of how humans interact. But while empathy levels increase in those with autism, the levels in our youth are collectively going down.

This seems to me like something out of science fiction: “Empathy Levels”. How can we really measure empathy? These levels can only be derived when we analyze how people interact; they cannot be measured by a meter stick. Empathy is the mysterious force behind human socialization. This mysterious aspect makes empathy a disconcerting subject to think about. I feel it’s similar to human contemplation of infinity. Empathy seems an impossible thing to understand completely, yet we are seeing signs of its presence or deficiency. We see its effects, but we cannot master it. This is a frightening thing.

Without empathy, we can no longer be a friendly society. We will harm others because we cannot imagine ourselves as someone else. Ironically, our direct self-focus would eventually harm ourselves.

There is a trend in not caring today, and perhaps emulation of popular figures and principles (e.g., Sherlock, the Honey Badger echoes) has attributed directly to this attitude, but no one is heartless, no matter how much they act. It's true that the actions matter most, not small inner contradictions, but let us not say that people lack empathy. A person may not act on his empathy, or he may pretend he has no feelings, but he is just acting, or being inactive.

I don't believe that collective humanity can be destructively low in empathy. At some point apathetic youths begin to understand other people's feelings, or they don't function well as adults. There is honorable sacrifice to outweigh the selfishness, but we could use some more.

Ascher and Kozol

The essays we read last night addressed awareness of homelessness (Ascher's) or illiteracy (Kozol's): two similar human conditions in that they both deprive their sufferers of common advantages (or, as some might emphasize, necessities). In the process we learned about two distinct types of examples. Ascher, with her law-trained brevity, used her own experiences as examples, applying images in her memory to her consideration of compassion. Kozol used less personal examples (although he includes individual accounts from illiterates, these are not his accounts) to illustrate this humanity of illiteracy. Here follow some of his examples: he opens with a caution label on a can of Drano, mentions menu-reading in multiple instances, and expresses the illiterate's struggle as a parent. For the most part, Kozol expresses generalities but often uses present-tense and specifics, making these examples animate narratives which seem to come directly from distressed individuals.

Although Ascher's essay is more immediate, both have the effect of striking the reader's emotions with detail. Often these details seem irrelevant to the purpose, yet their presence intensifies perception and makes everything in the essay more palpable. Buttery croissants, the moody French woman, the stained blanket; handsome cowboys lighting cigarettes, "a child choking"-- these are some of the specific images which we remember best. These are examples, memorized unconsciously, which link our minds to less internalized understandings.

Kozol is not as subjective, but "Illiterate Society" affects us to compassion with its examples. Ascher does not do so to the same degree. Instead, we are made to ultimately examine our feelings of compassion rather than be captivated by them. Already burdened with the oddities of metacognition, Ascher goes on to contrast the life of the homeless with a Greek play: both teach us compassion if we will watch, yet the homeless "players" can't go home. The play never ends, because these people of misfortune perpetually exist. But Ascher expresses fear of being unaware of this play or the "rags with voices" and the "inarticulate rage". Defending ourselves from these images may be natural, but it is a dangerous irresponsibility. Kozol carries what Ascher hints at into direct cognizance: we need to use compassion to correct the problem.

Most striking is Kozol's dream, expressing the otherworldly feeling of being surrounded by a strange language. Indeed, these illiterates and homeless live in an alien land. It is our duty to help them to a comfortable home.