Utilitarianism

So, a couple of weeks ago, I was at a friends place and amid all of the fun and crazy things that were going on in the pool and all over the place, I decided to play a couple of board games. Many people, mostly Americans, know it as checkers, however I prefer to call it by its British name, draughts. The modern day version of the game is quite old actually, with the English author William Payne writing a book about the board game in the year 1756. However, 257 years is actually not a long time when realizing that around the year 3000BC, yes, more than 5000 years ago, in the city of Ur in Ancient Mesopotamia, there were already games similar to modern day draughts, and they were played on the same kind of board as the one used in draughts. Well, nobody was actually there to confirm all of this but archaeologists are quite sure of the remains that they have unearthed.

While playing the second or third game, it dawned on me that there is no better definition of the phrase "for the greater good" than most of the strategies used in this game. This thought occurred to me when I had to kill a couple of my own pieces in order to be able to kill the opponent's pieces and eventually win the game. But the need for strategic decisions such as this one do not only occur in a simple board game, whether its just a business decision, a personal decision such as abortion or divorce, or a strategic decision to be taken by a general during a war. But is it justifiable to sacrifice a little for the greater good? 

In ethics, this approach is called Utilitarianism, and it theorizes the fact that the course of action that maximizes happiness and reduces suffering the most should always be chosen when faced with an important decision. This idea has always been in the heads of basically everyone and always seemed to be the most logical path to follow while trying to make a sound decision, rather than acting rashly in the spur of the moment. But it was Jeremy Bentham ,with his long silvery hair as seen in his portrait on the right, and his book titled "An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation" in the late eighteenth century, and then followed by John Stuart Mill and his articles in Fraser's Magazine in 1861 that actually started exploring these theories and the philosophy behind them. 

But is utilitarianism in itself acceptable as a modern way of thinking and making decisions? Along the years, several arguments have been made that it depends on the sacrifice in the particular situation that determines whether its morally acceptable to sacrifice and what for the greater good. Of course, the thought in itself, the sacrifice of something (or someone) for the greater good is remarkably noble. But should there be a limit for what one should be ready to sacrifice in order to obtain this greater good? Of course there should be! It was John Stuart Mill himself who, even though he had an extremely ridiculous hairstyle, said that "If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he... would be justified in silencing mankind." And in my opinion, that summarizes all of the ethical implications of the argument, that even though it is for the greater good, even if it is one man against the rest of mankind, his opinion is still valid and not even one human being should  be sacrificed, for that human being has the same fundamental rights as all of the others.

And that is the limit, or boundary, that we were looking for, regarding that to sacrifice or not for the greater good. It is the involvement of another human being, especially when his or her life itself is at stake, that even though for the greater good, we are still exactly the same kind of human beings like the one in question, and if we do not want anyone or anything to judge us and have control over us, then we should not judge, or have control over the actions, or life, of someone else.

Procrastination

When I was writing the first post in this blog, I was really determined that I will do it regularly and that I would always post within a time-frame not longer than seven days. However, here I am, and it has been eight ... eight days since my last blog post! I am quite disappointed by myself, but to be honest I had a lot to do ... a meeting with my tutor regarding my thesis, an entire weekend out and also, ended up giving a tour around Sliema when some Indian friends came over to visit on holiday. But then again, I have to admit ... yep, I was procrastinating.

But come to think of it, this is not the first time that I, or any of us, have procrastinated. The entire exam period at the end of every semester, everyday at work, and even what it took me to write today's post (oops sorry), are very clear examples of procrastination. While procrastinating, randomly scrolling through meme after meme on the various sites one can find on the web, I realized that its not only me, but most of the students around the world, and actually, it is most of the people everywhere.

But what is that compels most people to leave for later what they could do now? First of all, we first have to understand the proper meaning of procrastination. Three leading psychologists defined procrastination in the Journal of Educational Psychology as a counter-productive, needless and delaying activity. Following that, in 2007, Steel reviews these definitions "to voluntarily delay an intended course of action despite expecting to be worse off for the delay", although I'm quite sure that everyone reading this blog already knew this definition and does not really need these three geniuses (or not ??) to tell them so.

However, back to the question at hand, these psychologists also tell us that procrastination is, apparently, due to low self-esteem and anxiety issues and that the area of the brain responsible for all of this is the pre-frontal cortex, in layman's terms, the foremost part of the human brain. Similarly, students work harder and better, or in my case, only, when a deadline is fast approaching. Since short term memories fades faster than long term ones, many students end up studying at the last minute to ensure that they would not forget the details.  This is actually called the Student Syndrome, and sadly, it is a derivative of procrastination.

Anyway, I am no psychologist but I do know that I procrastinate sometimes. "Procrastination is the thief of time", say the English. And as much as I'd like to disagree with them, I honestly cannot. However, I think that there is a cure to procrastination and this is actually really really simple: self-control and determination. So lets do this together ... quit wasting our time and go do something useful ...

... in 3, 2, 1 ... lets go!

Somebody Save Me

Somebody saaaaaaaaaaaaaave meeeee ... the refrain to Remy Zero's song, "Save Me" or as most people know it, the Smallville theme song. Only recently I started watching this ten season long, award winning television series. For those who have never heard about it, it is about the life of a teenage Clark Kent, before he accepted his destiny and became the famous Superman, that nowadays we all know about. But we all know that this was not the first portrayal of Clark Kent/Superman in media. The original Superman was developed by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster in the late '30's. It was in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1938, that these two high school students came up with the idea of this legendary superhero, that seventy five years later would be still considered as one of the greatest cultural icons of the 20th century.

However, seventy five is not that old for a superhero. The first actual superhero is more than a hundred years old, and was the idea of the long haired, moustached French dude shown on the right ... in front of that archaic blue "car". In 1911, Count Adolphe d'Espie (moustache guy), which for some random reason preferred to go by the name of Jean de La Hire, came up with the idea for Nyctalope, an artificially hearted crime fighter, who could see in the dark with his eerie eyes that had colour shifting irises.

But what drove these superheroes to popularity? In the 1930's, the economies of most countries in the world were being beaten to a pulp by the great depression. Poverty, hunger, and a lack of hygiene, one can only imagine the toll all of this had on the general population of the day. And so the people looked up to the superheroes of the day to some consolation. Superman, Batman, Captain Marvel ... and many more ... superheroes were sprouting from everywhere.

Following the great depression, came the second world war. With the threat of the enemy bombs falling on your heads-unless one lived in the US-and much more, the general population was affected on a psychological level ... and the need for simple tales about good triumphing over the evil enemy easily drove the popularity of superheroes, especially those fighting the Axis Powers, such as Marvel's Captain America, through the roof!


Nowadays, more than seventy years have gone by, and I believe that superheroes will retain their popularity for this same reason. The hectic lifestyles we are living in our century, are surely unhealthy both for the body and the mind. And in the midst of deadlines and upcoming projects and expenses ... why not go relax and watch the Avengers save New York from an alien invasion or the Man of Steel save Earth from being turned to Krypton by Zod ? Go ahead ... chill and let them save you !

Carpe Diem

In the English language, there is quite a significant amount of proverbs and sayings, out of which a really interesting one has always fascinated me. I'm sure you all heard of it before ... "great minds think alike". It emphasises the coincidence when two people have similar thoughts passing through the narrow pathways within the grey and white matter in their complicated and usually messed up heads.

But lets rewind the clock a little bit, a couple thousand years ago, a civilization, which undoubtedly one cannot deny that they did have a great mind, were the Romans. The Romans, who left behind them amazing contributions to geography, politics and language which are still being enjoyed in today's society. Among others, some of these contributions include roads (which I really wonder how we'd manage without them), the senate structure in many modern democracies and last but not least, the huge influence the now dead, Latin language left in modern day languages such as Italian, French, Spanish ... and even English. 

"Carpe Diem"... these are the words found in a Roman poem written by Quintus Horatius Flaccus (the ancient Roman, nerdy version of naming someone Horace). These words literally mean, "Seize the Day" ... and what good ol' Horace was trying to say to us, was to do everything we could today in the attempt to have a better future, and not leave it for tomorrow, for nobody knows what's in store for us tomorrow. 

And yes, the English were right! As they say, great minds do think alike, and two thousand years later, our generation comes up with the infamous "YOLO" (which nearly drove me to insanity with excessive overuse last year, especially over the social media). You only live once ... well there's no denying that, but I think that deep down, the true meaning of this newly coined phrase, is exactly as what Horace tried to say two thousand years ago, that since we do not know tomorrow's opportunities, we shouldn't leave for tomorrow any experiences, which will help us achieve a better future, that we can have today. 

So go, my friends, and as good ol' Horace said ... 

... seize the day! 

The day before ...

And this is it ... like the majority of the bazillion university students living their boring lives on this planet, the more things I have to do, the more time I waste on trivial nonsense. And since tomorrow morning I've got a university examination, which actually I reeeaaaalllly hope to get through quite decently, instead of studying what am I doing? ... yep, you got it ... wasting time on my first blog post ever.

But, lets think about it for a minute, is it really a waste of time? After several hours of studying, I honestly NEED to do something else rather than continue looking at boring equations and formulae (eugh, they suck), which I doubt that I'll ever use when I graduate. And instead of watching some random TV show or playing some random game on the Internet, from both of which I will gain nothing, I decided to sit down, and write something. Writing ... it has crossed my mind quite a couple of times but I never actually had the patience to sit down and actually do it. But here I am now ... on my laptop, typing all of these random thoughts that are currently crossing my mind. Its actually quite healthy, considering the amount of people that visit a therapist just to talk about whats going on in their lives and heads, why not write instead of spend a small fortune at a shrink's practice? So I guess, after all, there is something to gain from the activity.

Back to the sad reality ... I have to study ... hopefully tomorrow I will not sit there, just staring at the exam paper with a blank expression on my face trying to understand whether the writing on the exam paper is Chinese or actually something that I am supposed to understand. Ohh crap ... I nearly forgot the entire point why I am writing all of this, and drifted off in my thoughts ... 

... Welcome to my blog.