I see no reason to segregate scientific and technical posts from humanistic ones. In my life, scientific concerns mix with ethical ones, and they shade into a philosophical interest in the nature of cognition and the nature of people. Doing science is as creative as writing fiction, and I get inspiration for both from the same gods.
You will find little here on current politics. I'm activist, but in causes not symptoms. Experience in martial arts shows me that the sure way to lose is reactivity; but if you stay cool and remember your training and what you're there for then you achieve goals and, when conflict is unavoidable, you fight and win. The idea of the liberal arts I was brought up in is that broad understanding of cultures and ideas gives you deeper, better goals -- making success more likely and more satisfying. Negatively, the hysteria since 9/11 shows how a country frightened and reactive can destroy itself more than an enemy can. I'm trying to contribute by changing the terms of discourse. See 
One fact shouldn't require special mention; but -- given the nature of the society in which I've grown up and lived -- it often does: namely that I'm gay. You'll see it in some posts and in some links below. I'm proud of being gay and do not hide; more about this on the 
For more in this series, please see Translation — “Tao Te Ching.”
Tao Te Ching—
The Classic about Ways And Instances
by Lao Tzu
(Translated, with comments, by William P. Coleman)
Chapter 3
Not raising up distinguished individuals, so people contend less;
not prizing hard-to-get goods, so people steal less;
not displaying objects of desire, so hearts are less troubled
— this is the sage’s way of ruling.
He empties their hearts and fills their stomachs.
He weakens their ambitions but strengthens their bones.
He always keeps them from knowledge, from desire,
and he prevents the wise from daring to act.
He acts without acting;
and then nothing is out of place.
| < — Chapter 2 |
Chapter 4 — > |
my comments:
At first sight, this chapter seems harsh, tyrannical. It might advocate a sort of benevolent despotism to deprive people of their individual liberty.
Of course, there are those who would think that’s a good thing — that individual self-expression is a delusion Westerners have and Easterners are blessedly free of. I think this is hogwash, both as a value judgment and as a cultural oversimplification. There are also those who think that’s what Plato taught in The Republic, and who approve. I couldn’t support that point of view.
I don’t know. I wish I understood.
I do know this. There’s a certain basic illusion about life. People are frantic to struggle, to make sure they don’t miss out on getting what they want, to keep people from stopping them. In my own life, though, that hasn’t been the problem. My unhappiness has been caused by going after things I didn’t want and, much more, by failing to go after the things I did, and do, want. It’s taken me most of my life to figure out what I want. It’s as if I’d taken delivery on a new VCR, but it was only years later, almost at the end of its useful life, that I got a look at the owner’s manual and figured out how to use it. Who knew?
Perhaps I could understand this chapter if I could see it as a commentary on how to help people figure out what they want — and avoid futility. Rather than what it seems: like advice about how, in the name of higher ideals, to dishearten people from having what they need.
It’s hard to get a clear picture.
I do know another thing. My piano teacher and my voice teacher — not to mention, of course, my Tai Chi teacher — are constantly after me to stop letting my intellectualizing interfere with my playing — to let the spirit within me actualize itself. A painter friend tells me the same thing my piano teacher does: that you paint with your hands — or, rather, that it’s your hands that do the painting. In other words, “He weakens their ambitions but strengthens their bones?”
For comparison, I’m including the translation by Lin Yutang, which I always love and respect, even when I disagree:
3. Action Without Deeds
Exalt not the wise,
Prize not rare objects,
Shut out from site the things of desire,
Therefore in the government of the Sage:
So that the people may be innocent of knowledge and desires.
And the cunning ones shall not presume to interfere.
Tags: Ancient China, Lao Tse, Lao Tze, Lao Tzu, Laotse, Laozi, life, Lin Yutang, Tai Chi, Tao Te Ching, Taoism, The Classic about Ways and Instances, thought
