Philosophy of change

Recently I involuntary got involved in a religious debate (yes, again). My observation of how my counterpart argued became apparent pretty quickly. Change, is bad. Now, we should further define change in this particular context. Change, as in changes made to laid down principles or things considered to be facts.

If you become a part of a doctrine, a book that rigidly defines good and bad, your habits and your afterlife. You get the feeling of certainness, at least when it comes to these things. Certainness feels good, doesn't it? You can stop worrying about these specific issues, because they have been taken care of. This observation upon religion is not new, but what are the consequences?

Any change made to these principles or any element that might cause your principles to change is now causing you to feel less certain. Can god exist if we have evolved from microbes? Can my morale be justified if we are not created? Asking those questions hurt, I know, I have been there. You are faced with what seems to be two options, to abandon your principles and become a "devil", someone with no morale or certainty or to shut your eyes, perhaps even work against these "forces". For these "forces" must truly be "evil" if they tempt you to doubt? Even though they make no such claims.

But I see it in another light. I see change as good. My opponent brings up things such as Einstein proving that the ether is not a necessity. That it is indeed possible that science is wrong and that it _will_ change. I agree, I wholeheartedly agree that science will change and I think that most likely science is wrong. Wrong of course means not in perfect harmony with the physical world. Theories will change in accordance to future observations.

But my opponent and I don't agree upon change. I think that change is good, I don't think that the claims of science are rigid and forever true. Instead, they will change, but most likely for the better. You proved me wrong, thank you, thank you for allowing me to discard what was faulty and move on. To me, change is good, change is the very essence of living. I strive to pass something on, not what I learnt from those before me, but what I learnt, verified and tried to take further. This goes both regarding morale and knowledge. For how else can my children be wiser than me? I am the rope, humanity is the rope dancer.

Stallman, the return

This is going to be a long one, bring a cup of tea and get reading.

Richard M Stallman (I will refer to him as Stallman from now on) visited KTH back in 1986 and held a famous lecture. At that time he and FSF also received a considerable amount of money from KTH as a thank for producing useful software for the university, 5000 USD I believe.

Last Tuesday he was back, this time it was not due to the computer club (in which I am a member) but by the union "Unionen" (it means "The union" in Swedish. Yes, I know, it's a terrible name).

Now, how does yours truly get into this mess of free software gurus, unions and university staff? You see, back in 1996 Stallman received an honorary doctors title from KTH, but he didn't attend the ceremony. I know one of our elder professors (he's a nice chap and I have helped him out in the past, I also look up to him as a teacher, but don't tell him ;) ).

The day before Stallman arrived I didn't know if I was to attend the lecture or not, after all, I pretty much know Stallmans opinions on software and I had a deadline that Wednesday. Then, out of nowhere comes an email and I am asked if I can help out with some things just before Stallman arrives and during the lecture. The next morning when my friends woke up I asked whether or not it was alright for me to take three hours off and help out at the lecture. They said that it was alright and I informed my friend the professor that I could help him with what he wanted and bring my camera in-case KTH wanted pictures. I also asked for three of the posters KTH had made for the event, you will learn more about those later.

Now, before we proceed you should know the following. When being awarded an honorary doctors title you receive a hat, it's a symbolic thing really. Because you don't really get to keep the hat.

FSFE (FSF in Europe) was to bring Stallman to KTH at roughly 17:15, so I was there at 16:30. F1 which is the largest lecture hall at KTH had half it's seats taken at 17:00 and we counted an approximate of 700 people (probably more) when the doors closed. It was packed, people in the stairs, I have not seen that many people in a lecture hall before. At ~17:00 Stallman arrived. Meeting him was a strange feeling, he looks like a hacker, talks like a hacker and certainly behaves like a hacker. He's very very frank, no "excuse me" just "I don't hear a word what you are saying." if you didn't speak up well enough. It took a while for yours truly to adapt from his usual very humble and nervous self. I should mention that I did not greet him or anything, picture me as the man in the background waiting for something to do, like bring this or that. My dear professor took care of all the official business.

Stallman wanted to prepare before the lecture (and plug in his laptop), so he was lead into a lecture room near F1. Unfortunately there was to be a lecture in German, so he had to leave in a hurry and was lead into the lecture hall before the huge crowd. He just relaxed, plugged in his laptop and a water boiler and waited for the clock to turn 17:30. I took the opportunity to take some photos, as you can see below. I also managed to talk to the photographer from Computer Sweden, he pointed out something about "Well, I prefer to use natural light sources, when he noticed my flash". I thought "Well, why not?" and switched from my normal zoom to my much more light sensitive 50mm lens and tossed my flash into the bag.

After being introduced by a representative from Unionen, Henrik Eriksson (the professor I mentioned earlier) took the stage.

Ironically, the best shot I got is probably the shot of him. Not one of the ones I took of Stallman, well well, I am still an amateur photographer. First Henrik asked how many that were present back in 1986, I spotted two people raising their hands, there couldn't have been more than 10. Henrik then explained how all went well that day back in 1996, cannon shots were fired (Stallman pointed out "But they missed me!" and grinned) at the doctors ceremony but no Stallman was there. After reading the text which explained why Stallman received the title of honorary doctor at KTH another professor approached him and placed the hat on his head.


Now, that's a picture that you won't see every day. For more images see my dA account, since this blog post is supposed to be more of a story, not a set of images.

Henrik then reclaimed the hat, he also mentioned that it quite looked like a magicians hat and that there probably were rabbits in it. Stallman the made a quick sprint, grabbed the hat and mimicked petting a rabbit, the crowd burst out in laughter.

Now, the main event. Stallman was to speak for roughly an hour and half. For those who don't know Stallman, he's about as radical as you get when it comes to software. You don't think software is politics? That software isn't closely related to the state of our society? Well, Stallman does, and he will tell you.

The speech was exactly what I expected from Stallman, he presented his view on how all software was to guarantee four freedoms for it's users. He made jokes now and then about software vendors and Bush. The only thing that surprised me was that he often pointed out that "Just because mentioned Microsoft as an example, don't think that this just applies to Microsoft, all proprietary software vendors are capable of doing this and many do". He also made an interesting remark about piracy, "When people ask me what I think about piracy, I say, burning ships is very bad", this made the crowd burst out into laughter once more.

To be honest, you can find a ton of better sources than me on Stallmans views so just read one of those instead of my interpretation. Instead I will present some points he made.


*Four freedoms of software and how the GPL guarantees them.
*How freedom of software guarantee a free society without unjust control.
*The GNU project and how it was like back in the good old days.
*How GNU/Linux is split into separate camps due to all the distros and this potentially stops what he wants to achieve with free software. He want users to care about what they are using, not just to go for "Well this works"
*How attitudes like Linus Torvalds hurts the movement since he won't side with the philosophy of the GPL.
*And more...

Personally, I agree with him on some of his views, for example that free and open source software might benefit our society in many ways. But in just as many ways I disagree with his views. I am happy for what he has done, but I won't stand beside him. His views are in many ways a religion, good and bad, it's all there.

The aftermath is Swedish papers has been very much about Stallman being paranoid. He mentioned a lot of things about cellphones being able to track you, programs spying on you, credit cards etc. etc. I agree that it might sound like he is all afraid of being tracked, but I think the answer is much more reasonable. Stallman is a freedom fighter, a radical one. He wants people to have, in a way, an ultimate power over their devices. He wants them to be able to choose whether or not they want someone to know anything about them. It's a philosophical stand, not a statement of some paranoia. I was once told that you should never rush to the conclusion that someone is stupid if there is a more rational conclusion, and although I am not a Stallman expert this very much seems to be the case here.

Afterwards, Stallman stayed and wrote autographs in exchange for a 30 SEK donation to the FSF. I got one for free on one of the posters which I handed to another Stacken member. He promised to put it on the wall in the computer club room. What ever you say about Stallman, he has been influential and probably will be for the years to come. For good or for bad? I guess we won't know for sure for at least another 20 years.

Is God dead?

Idling in the web I read the following about a Norwegian trying to prove that God doesn't exist.

-"Our project is nothing less than proving that God doesn't exist. In each program I will commit a deadly sin in a new country. ... If God doesn't react by the end of the series he is declared dead."

Well, I wouldn't care if God was dead. But this Norwegian clearly know nothing about how to prove that God doesn't exist. Any believer might just as well say "He chose not to act". In order to falsify the existance of God you need God to be falsifiable. Otherwise it's like beating someone capable of changing the rules of the game while playing.

An example of this. Say that I have constructed a device that can detect with 100% accuracy if God is within a 25m radius. I start the device and it says that God is not within 25m. I claim that this is a proof that God doesn't exist. How ever, any believer might simply say "You can't detect God if he doesn't want to be detected." or "He wasn't there at the time, since he doesn't want to proved, he wants to be believed.". Thus, any godly being can't be proven to not exist. Any attempts at doing this are futile and therefore should be ignored. It's better to spend our time at tasks that may lead to results that benefit us, rather than to chase ghosts.

Article in SvD (In Swedish)

Pro-life?

I just can't understand how you can be Pro-life and debate that life is sacred and all. Then go home and just eat a piece of meat and don't think about how you just choose to kill a living being. A living being, very well capable of more "living" than a foetus.

All lives are not equal, that's just the way it is. We don't value strangers as much as friends. We'd rather see the entire Nazi party hanged in 1933 than to let them live and cause the killing of millions of innocents. Not considering everyone and everything equal is not a sin, it's natural, and human. Do the quiz below (the parents agree in the case of foetus abortion below, so the choice is entirely yours, which is more sinful?), don't tell me that you have a hard time deciding on which lives to spare. If you do, you are the one who is having a problem with your ethics, not me.

Note:
I should have included, a man and a man as number six, but I was busy trying to draw something that vaguely resembled the text. I am not an artist in any way.

Bibles in hotel rooms

Scandic hotels in Sweden decided to remove the bible from all their hotel rooms about a month ago. This caused the Swedish church along with several smaller churches to call a boycott against Scandic. The reason for removing the bibles was, according to Scandic, the lack of drawers. Instead they were to offer bibles, Korans and other holy books in the lobby. That you might bring to your room.

The whole thing led a hectic debate between those who were happy about the decision (see Swedish Humanist association) and the ones who thought that the bible ought to be there (see the Swedish church, other Christian groups in Sweden, but no non-Christian groups) due to tradition and the spiritual need of those who end up in the hotel rooms. Some even claimed that it's was terrible of Scandic to keep the porn available but not the bible.

I am a member of the Swedish Humanist association so what I write is probably not to the liking of members of any church, but I want to reflect upon the matter. I have no interest in whether or not the bible is the word of god but try instead to focus on whether or not you can (from my point of view) morally justify bibles in hotel rooms. Now, on to my analysis.

First of all, Sweden today has several cultural minorities represented, Muslims, Buddhists and so on. Why should Christians have the right to push their holy book into the living room of others? I have tried to justify this, but the only fact that is slightly relevant is that Sweden has been a Christian nation is not an argument in favour of keeping them. History is important, but why should we not take into account the changes in recent years? Why did not any Muslims complain? One might wonder.

Secondly, why should a chain of hotels force a bible into the bedroom of their customers? Are the customers not capable of bringing their own holy books? Do Scandic want their customers to read the bible? Should we force ideals and laws upon people and not leave it up to them to decide what to read for leisure? I would certainly feel uncomfortable to find Mein Kampf in my drawer when I checked into a hotel. Hell, I want the Communist Manifesto, the Koran and all other holy books in a private library in my hotel room! That would at least be fair. Or perhaps... why not let people go down to the lobby and make an active choice on what to read?

Lastly, I was rather annoyed by the claims of the porn offered on the TV to be a problem. There is an important difference between the porn and the bible. I choose to bring the porn into my room, if I want to see it, I order it. The bible is there whether I want it to or not. If you don't want to watch any porn, fine... just go down to the lobby and bring a bible instead? Perhaps they will even care to bring it to your room for a small charge? Or watch God channel for that matter.

Today, I found that Scandic will keep the bibles. A pity, I liked the way things were going. Now a bunch of fundamentalists have once again proven to prevent people from making active choices when it comes to their view on life and all that it brings.

Link to the latest SvD article (in Swedish). You can find links to the older articles in the series from the list inside the article.

The execution of Saddam

I'll try to make this short, I do in no way claim to know the answer to "how do we please those that the bastard made to suffer?".

How do you best bring justice to a man whom has done so much "bad" that all punishments are insufficient? What is it that such a man fear the most? Death? I seriously doubt that Saddam had any real "fear" of death. It would be a quick end for him, and he'd leave a ton of conspiracies and legends for his fanatics to breed on. Killing that man serves his own ends, especially if you make the executioners wear black hoods and look like a bunch of thugs. Is that the look of a just deed?

Now, let's instead focus on what would have been a proper punishment? In my opinion he should be kept locked up, so tight that he couldn't lead any outside movement, face all charges. For who has dealt justice for the Curds? For the people of Iran? The people of Kuwait? And so on. Would you like a serial killer to skip the trials of his later victims? I say not. We should not only have sought to kill Saddam in his physical form, but also the myths surrounding him. So that we made sure that the truth of his reign and his deeds were known and available to his followers and enemies. His black print placed properly and truthfully in history. Since now, they live on. And what better way to punish a man than to face his own deeds? For if there is no god, who will make him face his own deeds but we mortals?

Hogfather

I took the time to see Terry Pratchet's Hogfather, now that I am on holiday. I must say that it was far beyond my expectations. Having seen just about enough of the cartoon version of Soul Music, I expected Hogfather to be just as bad. Transferring Pratchet's books to the screen seemed to me an impossible task, you can't have that many jokes, puns, comic reliefs etc. etc. in a movie... not unless you change it, without ruining the whole thing. I thought it to be impossible, I was wrong.

Hogfather is a dark story. Well, just as dark as it the book I guess, the Discworld is not known to be a nice place after all. I must say that I was impressed by the screen work and the special effects that made it all the darker. But in all this darkness are the characters, Pratchet newer fails when it comes to creating peculiar characters and bizarre settings. Seeing the wizards, death and all the others on the screen was not horrible. I very much enjoyed it, nicely woven into the dark fabric and a just as cryptic plot as always when it comes to Pratchet, it kept me etched to the screen for 3 hours.

And the ending... wow... I will only mention that I didn't expect that much "good" philosophy. At least it was among the things I least expected. All in all, not the best I have seen this year, but well worth watching. But skip the end of part 1 where they spoil half the fun of part 2 by showing what to come, I wish I had.

Hogfather was aired on Sky one, if you can't see it on air, you ought to get it by other means.

Am I Evil?

People with faith seem to have a need to point out if something is evil or not. For example, Hitler was evil, Mother Theresa was kind hearted and so on. This of course requires the need of an absolute moral values that exists without the need of individuals to decide whether or not a given action is evil or not. Why is that?

I have a hard time understanding how such a construction would be possible, impossible if there is no god of course. Then he would simply say alakhazam and there would be some link between every action and a set of specified values. But let us assume that there are no values, no good or evil. What would be the consequences?

Some people with faith claim that in such a case all of man would fight among themselves in an endless turmoil, making nothing but carnage and that all good things in life come from the all mighty god and his values passed on to man. I don't think that this is the case, I would rather say mankind is very much capable of taking a set morals at any given time given a number of circumstances. How do people with faith explain all the evil in the world today? Are the people who do "bad" doing it conscientiously? Do they strive towards doing wrong because they are "evil"?

I'd rather explain it by simply stepping beyond good and evil, they do "bad" because we see what they do and compare it to our morals and say that it is bad because we don't share their opinions and views. Hitler was just as human as any believer or disbeliever for that matter, given the circumstances that surrounded him I am convinced that any of us would have made similar reasonings and taken similar actions.

We are no better than any of those we see as "evil", but we have the chance to understand how they became "evil" and by doing so we might even learn what it really means to be human.