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Posted by moses @ 12:46 • , , • 0 comments


I think this is a problem that people in such a small country like Singapore don't often appreciate.

When you move to a new place, you don't know anyone and you have to build your life anew. In a large country where there actually are different towns and cities, that is, where moving would count for something. But that's fine—you just have to work on it. The trouble is if it's temporary. Then it's simply going to get torn down again. And when you get back (if you do go back), you don't know anyone anymore either.

The problem can be set up and compounded by two things: The fact that you are moving to a different country with a different culture, and the fact that your original country is a deeply impersonal place. That way, you'd be a stranger everywhere.

But we don't have to complicate things that way. We can say something about the uprooting itself. When you uproot yourself, you set before you the task of building a new life. A new network, a new schedule, new habits, a new lifestyle (to a certain extent). But the normal assumption is that this is a task of some permanence. You rebuild. You don't normally rebuild to tear down again.

So I'm in a rare enough position.

But for me there is yet another dimension to this: Leaving my hometown (which isn't where I originated), I felt that I had begun to build a life of my own, and it was good. Losing that has an impact.

Maybe I'm just sensitive. Maybe this also has to do with the fact that I left my hometown having lost almost all connection with the people around me.

Nevertheless, I think one thing is true: They say you must know your roots, but the truth is you mostly need to grow them. Where you are, that's where you need to plant. There is no home where you don't have much to hold on to.

And that will never make it into one of the National Day anthems.

David's Sling

Posted by moses @ 01:34 • , , • 0 comments


It's the small things that sometimes trip up the giant.

For big problems, there are big answers. In the case of arguments against theism, for example, there is the problem of evil, which many theologians have spent much time answering. Whether or not they succeed entirely is quite beside the point here. The fact that there are substantial answers would suffice to keep theism afloat.

For small problems, however, the big answers often can't fit. Or they might simply be unable to cover every small problem.

Let's consider the notion of intelligent design. Why would there be any great imperfection (such as the existence of suffering) in the world if it was designed by an all-powerful and benevolent God? Well, a Christian might answer, God has a plan—perhaps we need to experience these large imperfections in order to grow spiritually.

But let's take a small problem. Let's say we ask why many of us continue (long after our less evolved ancestors) to grow extra teeth when our jaws might be too small to accommodate them. Would it not be absurd to say, as the answer to such a question, that "God has a plan" or that "It is because we have fallen into sin"?

To give a big answer to such a small problem would indeed strike most people as ridiculous. God planned human beings' teeth issues so that they would grow spiritually? This problem is a consequence or perhaps a punishment for falling into sin?

I suspect, therefore, that most believers would, owing to its lack of magnitude, simply shrug the problem off. However, it does not go away, and after we've accumulated enough of such problems we begin to build a strong case against intelligent design: If intelligent design is true, why do so many small imperfections exist that are clearly too trivial to serve a larger cosmic purpose?

You can't even neatly package some of these small problems as part of the larger problem of suffering—a major flaw can exist by design, but the existence of many small disconnected flaws can only point to carelessness or the lack of deliberation. The meaning of 'intelligent' would thereby become lost if one still insists that intelligent design is true regardless.

So, ultimately, a cosmic scheme involving a deity with a plan simply isn't good at coming up with explanations for small factual phenomena; although it's always tentative, science can.


Emphatically lacking

Posted by moses @ 12:10 • , , • 0 comments




Human, all too human—that describes the best of us.

Again we must talk about the foolishness of what I call 'feel good talk', the kind we console ourselves with and which makes human society sound rosier than it is. To that end, people talk about empathy, about the ability to put yourself in others' shoes as an important ingredient in social interaction and in winning love and respect.

What they seem to forget, however, is the fact that you are a person too, that you have your own perspective and sometimes your own (valid) reasons for doing things the way you do. What use is having empathy when, the moment there is disagreement, you might as well not have any in the eyes of others?

And disagreements are inevitable. As I've mentioned, you are your own person, and you view the world from your particular perspective. There is a necessary 'I' that fundamentally shapes how you interact with your surroundings. Given the uniqueness of each individual, there is bound to be instances where points of view clash.

So what happens then? Very often, we'd find that even with a lot of empathy we can't avoid conflict. It is often not enough, in personal matters, that others know that you respect their points of view. They want you to agree with them wholeheartedly. Otherwise, you are a bad person, or at least one lacking in empathy.

We see, therefore, that many people don't understand empathy. They understand it only from the point of view of themselves.

Ah, so it turns out that the problem is recursive. We are trapped in this unending loop of "me, myself and I", even when it comes to what is supposed to be about understanding others.

We are so hopeless we can hardly believe it. Even the people closest to you may, after a period of separation, be so detached to your fate that you might not have been able to imagine it had you tried to before being separated.

And, again, this stems from the fact that each of us only sees the world from each of our own particular perspective. Moreover, there is only so much information that we can process and consciously act on at any point of time. Once we are removed from some kind of stimuli, we will often fail to pay attention to the associated things.

I think it takes a great mind to be able to rise above such failings, or even to be aware of them. Hence, for the most part in this life, Michel de Montaigne's saying comes to mind:

"O my friends, there is no friend."