How about this: "The apple suffered from cruel treatment after it was placed in the pantry".

Does the above statement sound reasonable? If not, why not?

No. As I alluded to before, an apple is not a being, it is a part of a being. It is no more a living being than, say, an ovary is a living being. Removed from the tree, it begins an inevitable, unstoppable decomposition that occurs whenever living tissue is removed from the being that is its source of life.

It would be likewise unreasonable to say that a removed ovary suffered cruel treatment after it was placed on a tray for dissection.

I have a very high regard for the famous scientific journal Nature, but this is one of the rare cases in which I am going to have to disagree with them. In my opinion, they are using the word "sense" much too loosely.

Plants have photoreceptors that respond to light, and human eyes have photoreceptors that respond to light. As part of this response, the human brain does its job; it senses the light.


As far as our old friend the apple goes . . .

Can a living apple tree experience emotion, the way that many animals do? Let me point out that I am not talking about the complex emotions that humans experience, but very, very simple emotions that we see evidence of other animals experiencing. I'm talking about simple fear or sorrow. Is there the slightest hint that any plant can experience anything remotely resembling such a thing? I say not, because it seems clear to me that no plant has even the simplest form of consciousness.

Experience tells us that we can be kind or cruel to animals. We cannot be kind or cruel to plants. We can give them water and sunlight and nutrients, or we can chop them to pieces; but there is no way in which we can cause them to feel happy or sad.

Yep. And we are a composite of our beliefs. So to change ourselves we need to change our beliefs, which is all we know. Except it amounts to piddly little puddles.

Meanwhile our egos soar higher and higher. We can destroy the world, so screw you Shiva. We can create God in our own image, so screw you the unnameable thingy. We're this close to figuring out the Grand Unification Theory, so screw you creator.

And we are wallowing in our own filth. Hello bacteria in a petri dish.

It's so easy to do this. You know, take the cynic's view. Ancient as those high-faultin' Greeks (like Balzac in the Music Man). It's also easy to go running to scripture, poetry or literature. It's harder to live.

It's way harder to live and to love. I'm not talking romantic love either. That just sucks. Sometimes it hurts so good, but it's just dust in the wind ( )

Regarding the idea of sensing and experiencing something, I've got an electronic switch that senses light. It turns the electrical lights on at dusk and off at dawn.

So . . . is it alive?

We have created robots that can play the piano.

Are they ALIVE?

Um, no. Machines don't live. They can't love, and not in the romantic way either. That is being a machine. Reproduce at all costs, eh? After all the mechanics are stripped away, what's left is actual love. That's cool.

"You must understand that seeing is believing, but also know that believing is seeing. "
- Denis Waitley
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We would do well to be rid of most of our beliefs for many are a false substitute for the truth. Indeed, belief is a defect of human nature that is perpetuated by the fallacy of our perceptions. The fallacy operates similarly in every sphere of inquiry where the issue is in doubt; it is a form of mental blindness that is inextricably bound in the human psyche. The truth, which is generally seen, will nevertheless not be recognized unless one is able, at least for a moment, to suspend belief. It is the difference between sight and perception - the difference between what the eye sees and the mind’s eye perceives - the difference between what is true and what we perceive as true, though false. Still, we persist in believing that things are ordered as we perceive them; when in truth what is perceived to be the cause may not necessarily produce the effect. Denis Waitley was right when he said that believing is also seeing, but it is nevertheless doubtful that what we are seeing is true.

Wrong. You sense through your sensory organs, Victoria. With these organs you receive stimuli. You respond to these stimuli. Plants have photoreceptors, humans have photoreceptors. Plants sense light, humans sense light. Plants respond to light, humans respond to light.



I've already stated that they can't. I've already explained that 'suffer' is not an emotion. There is not one definition of the word to indicate that it exists as an emotion. I don't feel suffering. I, as a human being, may feel grief... and that is suffering... the experience of feeling that particular emotion. But a plant can experience distress, can't it? It can undergo distress.

Spiders have a central nervous system... are spiders capable of suffering?



Cruel and kind are ethical considerations. While these are ways of inducing or not inducing suffering, these are not the only ways that suffering occurs. Just because you can't be cruel or kind to a being doesn't mean it is incapable of suffering. I've already illustrated that suffering is not a vice. Kindness may be a virtue (and a form of respect) and cruelty may be a vice (and a form of disrespect), but suffering is neither 'good' nor 'bad' in the context of virtues and vices.

Everyone has emotions; it is part of being human. Indeed, there is hardly a moment in our lives when we are not affected by our personal feelings in one way or another. We live on a sea of emotion - swept along on its currents, blown about by its winds, buffeted by tempests of passion. Even the sage, barefoot in the sand on his solitary island, feels the gentle lapping of its waves.

“Every increased possession loads us with new weariness.”
- John Ruskin
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For my birthday, I received a rare antique watch. It is very beautiful, and very expensive; it even keeps time. It is known as the “philosopher’s watch.” It has only an hour hand on a blank face without numbers or markers to indicate the hour; the idea being, I suppose, that a philosopher really doesn’t care what time it is exactly. The maker is anonymous; Dutch, I think. Looking at it, I wonder how many owners it had in its history, what became of them; and the thought has given me pause to reflect on the value we place on our possessions.

There are some things that by their uniqueness can only be possessed by one to the exclusion of all others. Even so, such things are really held in trust, as it were, for the benefit of others; while the burden of possessing and maintaining the property falls solely on the owner; and, considering the responsibility, one might well wonder if the privilege of possession and pride of ownership is worth all the trouble. There is a wonderful scene in the movie Charade where the character played by Audrey Hepburn suddenly realizes that the postage stamps are the solution to the missing money following her husband’s murder; and she goes rushing through the Paris flea market to the stall where her nephew had traded the stamps. The old collector was expecting her, and tells her the tortured history of the rare stamps on the letter, which he knows better than the scars on his hands. But he knew that the rare stamps were never meant to be his: "For a few moments, they were mine; that is enough," he says, and gives them back to her.

Yep again. We can only know for sure that we doubt that we know anything at all. That little paraphrase of Descartes sums it up, but it is entirely worthless in the practical world. Having belief in gravity helps people in the mountains from falling off high places into hard rocks. There's a practical belief.

Now maybe some kind of Zen master can fly down on the wings of faith. I'd like to see that, but would I immediately believe it to be true? That's being too trusting. Think I'd like some scientific proof that no tricks were being pulled to create an illusion.

Anyway, lots of our beliefs are fluid and can change with rather slight adjustments in thought. For example, I finally believe that I'm a freelance writer. It only took five years of work on this to switch from being an unemployed systems administrator. Five years might seem like a long time, but the belief in who one is professionally gets pretty darn entrenched over decades in the profession.

Then there were a couple of fairly lengthy tech gigs to pull me back into the old belief. Well, this last time I came to the belief that I'm sick of corporate shenanigans. Ergo, I am a freelancer.

Could go on for volumes on all the other beliefs that have been modified over my lifetime, but that would get pretty boring. The most interesting one though was how very small my hometown appeared after returning from a three-week motorcycle trip when I was 18. It changed a world view tremendously from provincial to cosmopolitan. Still, both are fluid beliefs, but there's some kind of principle that once abandoned, an old belief doesn't seem to come back. That might be something worth writing about.

Your watch sounds very interesting and stimulating for the imagination. Some material things are that way, like books and musical instruments. They let me forget that I live in my head, which is a nice illusion like taking a walk in the country.

You are an author? I was under the impression that your ilk live constantly in your heads, and never leave. True innovation takes place inside the fecund crevices of the imagination.

Take pride in your illusive habitation! The mind is the only home worth having!

Alfred Korzybski said: “There are two ways to slide easily through life: to believe everything or to doubt everything. Both ways save us from thinking.” Surely, for some, to have faith may be a good thing; but one need temper it with a good amount of scepticism.

Sometimes it's good to revisit what one thinks is true too. I'll go to a music analogy, been studying that stuff to various degrees of concentration for 45 years. Once in a while it's good to get right back down to the basics and rethink music from the C major scale on up. A recent exercise like this revealed to me several assumptions I'd earlier made that simply are not true.

What's that worth? I don't know now. But it was interesting and entertaining. That's got to be worth something. I'll put this in my personal virtues column, maybe pleasure into the vices column. Except pleasure is OK in my book, so maybe not.

Regarding faith, those who have it strongly and honestly impress me. Not many of those types around, but once you meet one it's a treat. My partner in life's adventures, Lydia, is like this. Spooks the Dickens out of me at times. I've known a couple others over the decades too, both were good friends, top notch.

There's something to give thanks for this day. Been a very lucky dawg.

Heh, as an aside and since I'm thinking about music right now, we came across a collection of Christmas CDs last night. The only good one is by Etta James and her band, or maybe it was a munged together band. Whatever, jazz and moldy old carols go together like, um, green eggs and ham. She can *sing* and those people can *play*

It is unwise hold too firmly to one’s views. Indeed, it is the mark of an unbalanced mind that cannot entertain the ideas of others. Every fool is firmly convinced, and can stand no argument to the contrary no matter how wrongheaded his judgment. A wise man is flexible in his thinking; he is steadfast in his will, not his mind. There is always more than one side to things, and a balanced mind weighs them both.

First let me say what I don't believe. I don't believe that God has given us a moral compass that always points "true north." If others want to believe that, I won't argue with them here.

What humans have is a set of evolutionarily derived tools and tendencies that support living in groups. One of them is a mechanism for enforcing reciprocal altruism (you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours.) There's a great deal of evidence for this. Babies who haven't yet learned a language can understand the difference between helping and hindering, and prefer helpers. In a famous experiment called ultimatum game, most people will punish a fellow subject who proposes a division of money that seems unfair, even though rejecting the offer costs the punisher money. This kind of behavior requires a certain level of cognition (I hope nobody will insist plants are capable of it), but it's not unique to humans:


We tend to be less vigilant in turning this moral eye on ourselves, but normal people do have a conscience that leads them to feel guilty when they've done something wrong. People who are deficient in this are called psychopaths or sociopaths. There's obviously something wrong with them, and the best explanation is a disorder of the moral sense.


Please provide a source for your claim that over 90% of "pro-war Conservatives" belive that killing Muslims is something "ok." If they really believed that, there would be loud calls for nuking Iraq, since American troops could then be brought home safely and Iraqi lives don't matter anyway. (I suspect you'll find a fringe group of people who would agree with that monstrous proposition, but it's nothing like 90%.)

So your example's pretty far from perfect, but it's true that people draw lines that include some beings and exclude others from their moral circles. Peter Singer's been talking about this for years. (See The Biological Basis for Ethics, adapted from his book The Expanding Circle.)

There once was a man who prided himself on having the best of all that might be had in the world - a great mansion, the finest furniture, the costliest carriage, a wife the very envy of beauty, the most fashionable clothes, everything - but, even so, he was not satisfied, and was constantly searching for something better, something else that he could have. How much better he should have been had he taken the same trouble to improve his character.

The best times of my life have been while struggling with money, so that means this lifetime has been rich with best times. The love is deeper and truer, the struggles honest and honorable, there's no time to get sick and no energy for remorse.

Used to think the pie-in-the-sky thing, along with the-rich-are-actually-suffering idea, were nice fairy tales invented for the masses of exploited people. Now I see the truth to both notions. Took a while.

Goes back to the ancient advice that if one wants to know truth, give away all the riches, preferably to the poor. Live by the bowl of the beggar. I've not been there but close. For a couple of summers I played street music for tips, and that was the primary income. Quite humbling but also thoroughly rich with experiences. Even had a homeless couple throw a few coins into the tip can, this from doing Greensleaves with a feeling. Had the lady in tears. Gave them a tape of recorded stuff in return, oh what the heck.

A second career in music started, so the gigs went inside the bars and the crowd became a bunch of drunks, just like the first music career. So I quit and went back to the street. That led to a gig in an art gallery. Real good tips there, then another in an ice cream parlor. Pulled in $15 from one table upon doing a guitar arrangement of Johnny I Hardly Knew Yeh, part of which was used in a beg-for-money commercial (piano for that, different guy). No royalties from that though, oh well. Maybe it'll help shorten a war. It's just an arrangement, an interpretation. Mine had a lot more modulation in it and drama , did kinda borrow the Smoke on the Water riff, not the rhythm.

"The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls" - great Simon and Garfunkel lyric from Sound of Silence.

He enters this world in the same manner of all born of woman: ugly, helpless, and gasping for his first breath. He is a marvel of novelty; but his infancy and childhood are filled with the usual discoveries, and his mishaps are only the expected stumbles and falls that normally follow one’s first steps. And even his misfortunes - when he broke his arm, and later when his parents were divorced - well, such is not an uncommon occurrence in life.

He places average in school; and while he is fair at sports, he is not good enough to make the team. He is shy with girls; and he grows up, not incompetent, but a little clumsy with women. (He wishes now, secretly, that he had more of the social graces.)

As a young man, he struggles to make his way in the world, but succeeds only in falling into the niche afforded by chance opportunity rather than a career carved out by his own ambition. He might have been a doctor, or a lawyer, or who-knows-what - even President of the United States! - he reflects wistfully over a beer at the local bar at the end of another dull day at work.

Still, there are life’s compensations. His children (whom he dotes on excessively) are his pride and joy. His boy playing in Little League, and his little girl in the school ballet; but they perform pitifully, and their progress is disappointing. He worries at the cost of their education; and, looking gloomily at the stack of bills, wonders how he will ever afford to send them to college.

He goes to a class reunion, but only a few people remember him. “What have you been doing all your life?” someone asks. What’s-his-name is the head of a company, and so-and-so has made a million in the stock market. (It seems that everyone has done something but him.) He wishes he had taken another course, but it is too late for that for it is already time to start thinking about retirement.

He reads in the obituary column that someone he knows has died; and, for a moment, he imagines seeing his own name printed there, but there is nothing after it. It is as though he had never lived.

There are some self-righteous persons who would place themselves in judgment over their fellow wayfarers in life. They are the self-proclaimed paragons of virtue; and though they would be hard-pressed to account for themselves, they are nevertheless quick to condemn others. Hell hath no greater fury than their scorn! Still, one cannot help but be suspicious of those without sin who cast so many stones. The Scriptures teach: “Judge not, that ye be not judged.”