time for the bus...
To follow on from the previous post, let's introduce the bus...
There's this hypothetical bus, you see... And on it are (let's say) twenty six hypothetical people...
It pulls up at the next stop, and I get on looking really angry and contemptuous as I yell at the top of my voice, "You're all a pack of wankers!!!"
One person gets really offended and demands an apology; another looks bored, yawns, and returns to reading the paper; another rushes at me and punches me in the face; another breaks into tears and exclaims that I am a rotten bastard, and how dare I; another starts laughing uncontrollably; another calmly inquires if I have ever considered seeking therapy; another gets on his mobile phone, rings the police saying there is a dangerous maniac on the bus; another asks me if I would be so kind as to explain how I arrived at my assessment; etc., etc.
One event, twenty six different "experiences"... Was I responsible for each of those experiences? Did they learn anything from their experience? Did twenty six people "learn" twenty six different things? And if I was not responsible for their experience, who was?
To cut to the chase... Who is responsible for our feelings and emotions? Who is responsible for decisions and actions we make based on those feelings and emotions?
To cut even further to the chase... What do we mean by "responsible" anyway?
There... that'll teach you to read this blog, ya pack of wankers!!!
There's this hypothetical bus, you see... And on it are (let's say) twenty six hypothetical people...
It pulls up at the next stop, and I get on looking really angry and contemptuous as I yell at the top of my voice, "You're all a pack of wankers!!!"
One person gets really offended and demands an apology; another looks bored, yawns, and returns to reading the paper; another rushes at me and punches me in the face; another breaks into tears and exclaims that I am a rotten bastard, and how dare I; another starts laughing uncontrollably; another calmly inquires if I have ever considered seeking therapy; another gets on his mobile phone, rings the police saying there is a dangerous maniac on the bus; another asks me if I would be so kind as to explain how I arrived at my assessment; etc., etc.
One event, twenty six different "experiences"... Was I responsible for each of those experiences? Did they learn anything from their experience? Did twenty six people "learn" twenty six different things? And if I was not responsible for their experience, who was?
To cut to the chase... Who is responsible for our feelings and emotions? Who is responsible for decisions and actions we make based on those feelings and emotions?
To cut even further to the chase... What do we mean by "responsible" anyway?
There... that'll teach you to read this blog, ya pack of wankers!!!
posted by The Editor at
2:29 AM
11 Comments:
I love the smell of rampant individualism and responsibility in the early evening...
Actually, my only question was "why 26"?
Don't tell me, I'm working on it.
I don't think I'm peddling individualism in this post, Phil.
Merely posing some questions (both specific and rhetorical.)
Care to try to respond to any of them?
I'd have taken the empty cab sav bottle and hit you with it, in a non-violent fashion.
Like the new look, very spiffy.
jahteh, Blogger made me do it..."
Q1: Were you responsible for each of those experiences?
Yes..if you allow that your actions caused them in the first place...if mean to ask Were you responsible for the nature or quality of the experiences?...then, no. You are responsible for the initial actions but not necessarily for the re-actions which are really the responsibility of the those that re-acted.
Q2: Did they learn anything from their experience?
Possibly? Who knows? That's subjective and depends on what you mean by "learn".
Q3: Did twenty six people "learn" twenty six different things?
In my opinion, if by "learned" you mean "acquired a new perspective", then those that "learned" each had a unique learning experience.
Q4: And if I was not responsible for their experience, who was?
Same as first answer. We each "own" our experiences. I would say you were responsible for provoking an experiential change in the others...but the nature of that experience is owned by the others.
cus, welcome to this whacked-out blog.
Q1> How did I _cause_ their reaction? Please define "cause". If I did not cause their reaction, how did I cause their "experience", which, as I see it, is completely dependent upon their reaction.
Q2> I would say that they were responsible for eclecting whatever "learning" they obtained from their "experience".
Q3> This question was rhetorical and was meant to lead the reader to the conclusion that our "experience" is our "story" about our reaction. Without any reaction, there is the event and an unemotional, rational evaluation of the event. eg. "Gerry came onto the bus and screamed angrily and irrationally at all and sundry, and I am rather puzzled but unaffected by this, as it had nothing whatsoever to do with me."
Q4> How can I be responsible for "provoking" something for which someone else is responsible?
thanx for the welcome...I happen to like and admire whacked-out anything; especially that which is intentionally provocative :)
Now, in response to your most recent queries:
Q1> How did I _cause_ their reaction? Please define "cause". If I did not cause their reaction, how did I cause their "experience", which, as I see it, is completely dependent upon their reaction.
You'll note that I prefaced my earlier response with 'if you allow that'...which was to indicate that I realized the next terms were subject to definition,...and since you are now explicitly asking me to define "cause", I proffer the following:
In the temporal or sequential arena; a cause is that which antecedes (and has direct correlation to) an effect.
More simply perhaps, that which produces a consequence
I mean to say that your action established a sensate connection between you and the others on the bus; You being the initiator/sender, they, the reactant/receivers.
If everyone on the bus had been deaf there would have been no consequential communication created by your actions and no experience caused. But since you report reaction to your communication, the reaction had a cause and you were responsible for it. No?
In that sense that I would say that you caused their reactive experience.
Q2> I would say that they were responsible for eclecting whatever "learning" they obtained from their "experience".
Yes. I would concur you cannot be held accountable/responsible for the nature or quality
of their experience(s). That is a separate issue.
Q3> This question was rhetorical and was meant to lead the reader to the conclusion that our "experience" is our "story" about our reaction.
Agreed. I just felt to flesh the idea out in my earlier responses.
Q4> How can I be responsible for "provoking" something for which someone else is responsible?
Because of the communication you established in the first place. They are responsible for the nature of their reactions. But their reactions irrespective of the nature aspect were a response to a sensate stimulous for which you were responsible.
Your post was a response to (even if the scenerio is purely hypothetical) their response; jsut as we now are communicating our reactions to each other's responses and thereby making a circuit of causes and effects.
No experience is an island. :)
cul, if you like the intentionally provocative, you'll like it here.
I quiver with excitement already... ;-)
Now, down to tin tacks:
Q1> Sounds a bit like "post hoc ergo procter hoc" Suggested reading: this and this
Noise A causes reaction B? Nah... If that were true, all twenty six would have had reaction B. If you get vastly different reactions, then it is obvious that noise A is not the cause. Maybe a catalyst, but not the cause.
I made noise A and they (illogically?) associated
noise A with some emotion-filled event in THEIR past (for which we will assume I was not present or responsible) and beCAUSE of (big fat clue here) their past emotion-filled "experience", they had reaction B. My making noise A was merely a catalyst, not the cause.
Q4> Disagree, old chap... the REAL CAUSE is unresolved crap in their past. Their STORY is that I caused it. The truth is that I had nothing whatsoever to do with that which was the REAL cause of their reaction, namely, their past "experience". Proof: If I had not triggered their reaction, sooner or later someone else would have. Always they blame the catalyst and never the true cause, their own past unresloved issues. If/when they resolve these issues, they no longer have the reaction for which they so disingenuously blamed me.
By blaming the catalyst, they get to walk away scot-free of any responsibility for what they did.
It's a puerile case of "you made me do it, you made me do it, you made me do it" kind of childish excuse for avoiding responsibility for one's own shit.
We see it in the modern "justice" system all the time. They plead "diminished responsibility". It's a total crock of shit.
This will all stop when I become Dictator Of The World. And when I do, I'll start with America... ;-)
typo: procter should have read propter
I hear you and agree with most of what you just said.
I can accept your term "catalyst" as a substitute for "cause" in the sense that I was speaking to the issue, but as I mentioned in my last post, the "nature" of their reactions is a separate issue from the matter of causation.
Anyhoo, onward.
Noise A causes reaction B? Nah... If that were true, all twenty six would have had reaction B.
Not at all. A single cause can have a multitude of effects, like the wave produced by dropping a pebble in a pond, the wave front can interact with many different objects on the surface of the pond in many different ways; it can even interact with things off of the surface, such as an observer.
But I get your point.
Before I go any further I'm going to take you up on those suggested readings.
Back soon...but before I take my leave...
Why are the tacks tin?
I've never heard that expression before.
cul, I said the real cause for their reaction was unresloved shit in their past. Have you nothing to say about this?
You still seem to be giving them an "out" for saying "you made me do it". Did I really make them do it?
And what of responsibility?
Who is responsible for their reaction?
And what do we mean by "responsible" anyway?
Tin tacks? Read this.
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