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Model of the World
Mar. 10th, 2011 06:59 pmSo my classes have been aimed at improving my model of the physical world. That is, directly (by teaching me how the world works) and indirectly (by showing me how to use tools which offer more information on how the world works) the simulation of the world in my head has been refined and now better approaches some theoretical consensus of objective reality which seems to map pretty closely to observable outcomes.
The scope of this model is pretty broad. It covers a great deal of the world: the sky (not astronomy, but some climatology), the ground and the bits that make it up (geology, which is the study of the more-or-less solid bits: how they formed and what they're doing and what makes them up and how to recognise them; earth science, which is the study of the loose bits at the top and how they move and what *they're* doing and how they formed and how to recognise distinctive parts of them and what that means), and this funny layer in between which contains a number of biotic elements (plants, animals, soil, water to an extent) and some of the processes involved (like fire). The tools at my disposal range from imap (which is an incredible tool) to statistical analysis to digging a hole and putting a bit of dirt between my teeth or noticing the shape of pebbles or a hillside. Some are very low tech or just very old and unappreciated tech; some are very high tech.
This doesn't mean I don't make errors in how I think about the natural or physical world. It means I am more likely to be right in the first place, more likely to think to check my assumptions, and more likely to know how to check those assumptions against the world effectively.
At the same time in the last couple of years -- let's call it three or four -- I've been making a lot of progress on refining my model of myself. I'm admitting to things, like my very strong drive for multiple partners, my need for certain kinds of independence, my better flourishing with certain kinds of food and sex and friends in my life, my sub-superhuman limitations on some hands and my nearly limitless capacity on others, and my ambitions, all of which are not necessarily convenient for me but which allow me to live a better life as myself. And I am myself. Not much I can do about that; I evolve, but I don't evolve unless I am unfolding in a direction which draws me.
This doesn't mean I don't make errors in infusing my life with meaning and joy. It means I am more likely to be right in the first place, more likely to think about a course of action, and more likely to know how to check that it's the best course of action for me. And like everyone, of course, sometimes I am just indifferent to the correctness of a course of action.
Then-- you know, the world has a human element. You know this; you're part of it. Today I'm having trouble with that human element. I have no consistent model for it. I have been learning how to make and keep friends and how to choose kind and caring lovers; meanwhile bad things happen to little girls in the states and to women in Canada and everything in-between and is to a certain extent condoned by this human element. My home country makes a mockery of democracy, etc and my adopted country isn't much better and sometimes seems plain crazy but at least, you know, isn't engaged in an all-out war with itself on my reproductive health with a side of making women in some places into Handmaid's Tale-style incubators and here too and all that sort of thing.
I don't know if it's that I'm becoming better at dealing with these other things in my life and so this human element is a problem by comparison, if we really are living in the end of times as was suggested in a comment on the post below, if I need an outlet for adversity, I could put a million possible explanations in here and it wouldn't change that I just don't know. I don't know if things are getting worse or better. I don't know if they will ever directly affect me, though I expect so. Any way you look at it, this portion of my world is a jumble and I don't know how to order, organise, and empower myself around it. I am tempted to flee, but there are people in my life I love too much and I have some sense of responsibility.
I'm going to put a cut here because the meat of this post is my musing about my sexuality, rape in the real world, consensual rape play, and how I feel about all this stuff, and people have kindly taught me that they appreciate the ability to avoid that sort of thing.
( Read more... )
There's nothing more to write.
The scope of this model is pretty broad. It covers a great deal of the world: the sky (not astronomy, but some climatology), the ground and the bits that make it up (geology, which is the study of the more-or-less solid bits: how they formed and what they're doing and what makes them up and how to recognise them; earth science, which is the study of the loose bits at the top and how they move and what *they're* doing and how they formed and how to recognise distinctive parts of them and what that means), and this funny layer in between which contains a number of biotic elements (plants, animals, soil, water to an extent) and some of the processes involved (like fire). The tools at my disposal range from imap (which is an incredible tool) to statistical analysis to digging a hole and putting a bit of dirt between my teeth or noticing the shape of pebbles or a hillside. Some are very low tech or just very old and unappreciated tech; some are very high tech.
This doesn't mean I don't make errors in how I think about the natural or physical world. It means I am more likely to be right in the first place, more likely to think to check my assumptions, and more likely to know how to check those assumptions against the world effectively.
At the same time in the last couple of years -- let's call it three or four -- I've been making a lot of progress on refining my model of myself. I'm admitting to things, like my very strong drive for multiple partners, my need for certain kinds of independence, my better flourishing with certain kinds of food and sex and friends in my life, my sub-superhuman limitations on some hands and my nearly limitless capacity on others, and my ambitions, all of which are not necessarily convenient for me but which allow me to live a better life as myself. And I am myself. Not much I can do about that; I evolve, but I don't evolve unless I am unfolding in a direction which draws me.
This doesn't mean I don't make errors in infusing my life with meaning and joy. It means I am more likely to be right in the first place, more likely to think about a course of action, and more likely to know how to check that it's the best course of action for me. And like everyone, of course, sometimes I am just indifferent to the correctness of a course of action.
Then-- you know, the world has a human element. You know this; you're part of it. Today I'm having trouble with that human element. I have no consistent model for it. I have been learning how to make and keep friends and how to choose kind and caring lovers; meanwhile bad things happen to little girls in the states and to women in Canada and everything in-between and is to a certain extent condoned by this human element. My home country makes a mockery of democracy, etc and my adopted country isn't much better and sometimes seems plain crazy but at least, you know, isn't engaged in an all-out war with itself on my reproductive health with a side of making women in some places into Handmaid's Tale-style incubators and here too and all that sort of thing.
I don't know if it's that I'm becoming better at dealing with these other things in my life and so this human element is a problem by comparison, if we really are living in the end of times as was suggested in a comment on the post below, if I need an outlet for adversity, I could put a million possible explanations in here and it wouldn't change that I just don't know. I don't know if things are getting worse or better. I don't know if they will ever directly affect me, though I expect so. Any way you look at it, this portion of my world is a jumble and I don't know how to order, organise, and empower myself around it. I am tempted to flee, but there are people in my life I love too much and I have some sense of responsibility.
I'm going to put a cut here because the meat of this post is my musing about my sexuality, rape in the real world, consensual rape play, and how I feel about all this stuff, and people have kindly taught me that they appreciate the ability to avoid that sort of thing.
( Read more... )
There's nothing more to write.
