Idealogy Compatibility Test

To the politically minded,

    Sometimes I feel like many people haven't thought much about their ideals but just adopt them because "they sound good." In their true nature, they probably are good but oftentimes they are twisted or not properly taught and so people use them in ways that actually act against them. Here, I will give a list about some of these Ideals and discuss them.

Censorship: What this means is the ability to effectively control what someone else will see. People tend to think of this as a violation of Free Speech, which it certainly can. On the other hand, if you don't allow for any censorship, then you forfeit any right for arguing against anyone using profanity or hate speech. The ideal of proper censorship is that it encourages good things, especially for children as they are in their formative years, while also limiting offensive or distracting material. Hence, censorship is not evil in itself but can be used for evil.
     Consider this analogy for censorship. Your child is a plant in your garden. As it is your garden, you have the full right and duty to determine how it is raised. You can ask for assistance and pay a gardener or you can let anyone do whatever. If you leave the plant unattended and free for anyone to dump whatever they think is good, you will undoubtedly get something toxic that will kill the plant, undoing all the good stuff people and you put in to help raise it. A plant requires a lot of good water an nutrition, but it only takes some bad water to kill it. Another thing about censorship is that it can take bad water and filter out all of the bad stuff so the plant only receives what is good.

Free Speech: This comes under fire a lot due to hate speech, profanity, and art. Something to consider is the thought behind Free Speech or rather Freedom of the Press. First off, not everyone has a right to know everything otherwise we would have to give away our Intellectual Properties, Defense secrets, as well as social security and privacy information to our enemies and the world. The idea for Freedom of Press is that the government cannot force the press to publish lies. So when the media does publish lies on their own, especially with rumors, that is a violation of the nature of that freedom. I would argue further that the construing of words from people to incite rage where there shouldn't be is also a violation (such as done with headlines concerning Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas' recent dissent).
    Speaking of the dissent, that is the proper ideal of Free Speech. Free Speech is meant for people to speak their mind freely to bring up their concerns and ideas for action. All efforts to suppress such expression (such as by labeling it "hate" when it isn't, or construing a headline to make it appear negative) is an evil practice of censorship. This is because the true motivation is not really the care of the people, but that the people agree with you, even though you may be wrong. Free Speech is to allow other people to express their ideas in an environment so that people may reason if they are good or not. People have a right to express their concerns as that is how we learn what is important to them and how even if our goal is good, the method toward getting there is evil.

Summary: Proper practice of Censorship and Free Speech are compatible, but only if you live up to the ideals of both. Construe either and you have a contradictory understanding.


This ends part one of my explanation of ideologies. Hopefully this helps you obtain peace in understanding how these work together. Next time maybe I'll discuss Science and Faith and hopefully that will also resolve so many misunderstandings and illogical debates.

N. D. Moharo

Concerning Hate Speech

To the easily outraged,
    What is hate speech? It appears that if we want to censor something or someone these days, we claim it's hate speech. If someone were to point out that the Confederate flag never meant "We hate blacks!" but instead that "The United States receive their power from the States," I'm certain someone would claim to be offended and then classify that point as Hate Speech. Unfortunately, such claims are actually misuses of Censorship. Now censorship is not evil in itself (more on that another day), but it does get misused often and the classification of "hate speech" is a prime example.
    Let's consider the nature of hate speech. It is composed of two words, "hate" and "speech" which means it requires those two together in order to exist. While speech is present in most cases, the "hate" isn't. I recall reading on the media the outrage over a Nobel Prize winner for his "sexist" remarks about women in the lab. When I dived into it, I didn't see anything about hate, just what he had learned from personal experience. Does his personal experience mean it applies globally? Not necessarily, but rather than dishonor him, shouldn't we have tried to let him continue his work in an environment where he can work best? Everyone is distracted by one thing or another. Some scientists can love rock and roll to keep them focused (think NCIS), while others need complete silence. What does that mean? They are incompatible working together. As for the "sexist remarks," they merely corresponded to the taboo about dating a coworker and how creating those situations can cause problems. Because romance involves two parties but often is only one-sided, it shouldn't be hard to realize that it can be a problem. I could go on about this but I am beginning to digress.
    Back to that thing about the Confederate flag, I would argue the outrage people have over it would be better classified as hate speech than those who want to keep it (unless they fall under the group that believes it actually does express hatred). How bad is it? People today have become so single-minded that they refuse to acknowledge the other side's points and concerns. Why are we so focused on a flag that has no power to incite hatred in the people who know its real meanings instead of why a shooter was filled with hate in the first place? If a shooter went into a church, mosque, or synagogue holding a rainbow flag and began to shoot everyone, would gays surrender their rainbow flag to never be used or flown again? The original meaning of the rainbow was "Peace" (and has been since almost the beginning of recorded history) but if we focused on it like the confederate flag, we would forget that. I can tell you that there have certainly been a lot more hateful violence committed under that rainbow colored flag than the media will care to admit.

     Perhaps we should discuss what the word "hate" means. It is not merely disagreeing or disliking someone. Did you know that you can love your enemies, those you disagree with, and those you do not like? You can read more about that in my letter on impatience. Hate is the antonym for love. Just as Love desires what is good for someone else, hate desires what is evil for someone else. It must be realized that this desire is solely from the source, not the target. An expression of eliminating all blacks (like Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood) would be fair to call "hate speech". A commentary that most black men are in a bad situation because of their focus on gangs instead of studying cannot be classified as "hate speech". First off, the former example is an expression of desire while the latter is a commentary which is not expressing any desire but pointing out what appears to be a fact. The sad thing is today's society tends to attack things like the latter which are attempts to figure out the truth and make progress. When we use our power of "Censorship" by deeming it "hate speech" and attacking the person who said it, we not only make it difficult to address the problem he is trying to convey but we also show that we are truly a hateful society.

With Love,

N. D. Moharo

The Nature of Impatience

To the impatient,

    If you are like me, being told to "be more patient" is not really helpful. In fact, it's pointless and counterproductive. Why? Because it doesn't tell you anything about how to do so. Allow me to rectify to situation and explain what I have realized to be the causes of impatience and the keys to dealing with it. As some wise man said a long time ago, "Knowledge is the key to victory."

    I did a Google and Bing search on the word "impatient," and they define it as "having or showing a tendency to be quickly irritated or provoked." I will actually disagree with this as it inaccurately covers it. After all, it can be a single occasion where you are impatient, meaning it's not necessarily a tendency. What the definition did get right is that it is provoked, and that is what we will deal with today.

    Something I figured out a while back is the level of impatience a man will have will correspond to how important he feels his time is at that moment. Hence, a man who feels like he can go faster will be upset being behind a car that is going the speed limit. The next thing I discovered is that it also arises when feeling wronged. And so the man driving the speed limit will grow impatient at the man behind him who is honking because he is going the speed limit. Therefore, I suggest the two root causes of impatience are the perception of wasted time and feeling wronged.

    I pondered whether or not wasted opportunity would be a cause, however, that could actually be either "waste of time," "feeling wronged," or both. If you missed a green traffic light, you would be upset possibly because you have to sit and wait for a few extra moments when you are in a hurry or your effort was wasted and so you feel wronged, even more so if you missed a light because you stopped at the previous one or allowed someone to cut in front of you.

    So what are the keys to dealing with this? How do you become more "patient"? In this case, the root of patience is a combination of three things: Humility, Love, and Acceptance. Is it a coincidence that a good mother has these things in abundance? The same internet searches for "Humility" return the definition of "a modest or low view of one's own importance; humbleness." I will agree with this definition as it complements the point I made earlier about impatience linked with importance. If one does not view himself as too important, then it's easier for him to be patient.

    Likewise, the true definition of love (which Google completely misses but which Disney's Frozen hits spot on) is "putting someone else's needs before yours" or as I have said before, "to will the good of another, even at your own expense." This is why the greatest act is said to be "to lay down your life for a friend." Note that this is very different than the romantic notion of love which instead seeks your own pleasure. Seriously, who thinks that they want to date solely to make someone else happy? There is far more love from the people who refuse to date out of respect for someone else (and therefore refrain from cheating or adultery). This also explains the link between love and humility as it is far harder to love someone else when you consider yourself more important. The more humble you are, the easier it is to love everyone, including the poor and your enemies.

     The last key is acceptance. Something happened, and you can't change that. The only thing you can do is try to avoid it in the future. As a society, we focus too much on what we can do that we try so hard to control everything, including our sex and genetics. The problem about this thirst for power is that it can never be satisfied. We need to learn that there are some things beyond our control, and it's better that we never try to overcome it. If you learn to grow in these three things, then your patience shall increase.

    For my last point, I will argue that there are certainly some cases where it is okay to be "impatient." If you are able to do it respectfully, it is in your control, and all other methods have failed to convey the true urgency of the situation (one that is not selfish such as preventing a murder), then you may have a right and obligation to be upset with someone. However, if it is a case of oversleeping and running late for a meeting, that is not an acceptable excuse for being rude and driving poorly.

With love,

N. D. Moharo

A Possible Sister Blog concerning Gaming

    A long time ago, you might recall I wrote a few pieces about video games. I like to play video games and I consider them very useful for gathering insights for philosophy. However, this week's major video game conference, E3, has shown had bad the community can be at times. On the other hand, it's also useful to be able and see the good writers who are able to keep a cool head and thoroughly analyze things. Hence I came up with an idea
     I want to make a site, beginning small with a blog, that features cool headed writers to share their opinions and even reviews. I'm still thinking about the details of how it will work but I think it will be nice to see of a bunch of blog posts that are able to give well-founded opinions not based on rage. If you want to participate in this idea or have suggestions, leave a comment below.

Pondering the Five Proofs for the Existence of a God

To the Religious and Atheists,
    "There is no God" is a claim I philosophically can never claim. For all I know, that could be true, but as I pointed out in my essay about A Higher Power Through Technology, it can't be proven. It is far easier to prove that there is such a thing as a god than there isn't. The most famous of these are the Five Proofs which actually don't make the claim that the god(s) they are about is the same that different religions claim to exist. I will describe a quick summary but this is actually more to prep for my next "letter" in which I will speculate based off a few premises.
     So each of the Five Proofs concludes with "and this is what we refer to as a god." The capital "G" God is what I would refer to as the One that encompasses all five of the proofs but that itself requires some extra logic to connect them all. The first proof is the idea of motion and how nothing in the universe is able to move without having some start. Even in our bodies there is movement when we are still and perhaps that is the best explanation for why we can "stop" and move freely. So in that sense, the idea of a god is the "First Mover" which by definition means it is the first thing that causes motion. Yes, people ask "but who moved him?" but that is an invalid question as it goes against the definition of First. Perhaps the best explanation for understanding this concept is the one I gave in the essay I shared above.
    The Second proof is similar to the first one but is described as the Cause of All Things. After all, the one who puts everything in motion is not necessarily the creator. For example, someone can create a game, but I'm the one who starts it by pressing "play".
    The Third proof is the presence of miracles. Miracles by definition cannot be explained by science and there are still events that fit that criteria such as incorruptible bodies and instant disappearance of 20 pound tumors. Does this mean I believe the world was created in 7 days as described in the Bible? No, because our definition of a day back then revolved around the rising and setting of the sun which did not "exist" until like the 4th "day" according to that same Bible. Hence that was obviously literary (unless the concept of "day" refers to a "day in god's time" which is technically possible). However, I cannot wholly accept the theory of evolution without at the same time accepting the concept of a god because of how we evolved. The big question I have is "Why in the world where all organisms originated from a single cell would 'evolve' into something that requires two of us? Why would we do that especially for a species that takes 9 months to procreate and then years before we are even able to survive on our own?" We may control the earth now, but it certainly didn't start that way.
    The Fourth proof was the concept of a perfect good (or various degrees of things). This requires a few premises such as that "Evil is the absence of Good." I recall this as dependent on the fact that we can put things in order of goodness like the freedom of speech is better than an ice cream cone. While there are things that are subjective, there is a general order of goodness in the world. This proof also uses the premise "One cannot give what one does not have (or at least has the potential to give)" and since there is various degrees of goodness, there must be a highest good and proof calls that "what we refer to as a god."
    The Fifth I needed to look at Wikipedia to recall. But after I saw it, then I could see how it would made sense. I will just copy and paste what I found there

• Many things in the universe may either exist or not exist and are all finite. Such things are called contingent beings.
• It is impossible for everything in the universe to be contingent, for then there would be a time when nothing existed, and so nothing would exist now, since there would be nothing to bring anything into existence, which is clearly false.
• Therefore, there must be a necessary being whose existence is not contingent on any other being or beings.
• We call this being God.

     So I actually originally thought the Fifth proof was that there is Order in the Universe. That may be more linked to the Fourth one I relayed but it is something to ponder. If there is no order, then everything should be in chaos and not exist. But since there is an order to things such as the Laws of Physics that we still have not perfectly understood, there must be a being outside of the universe with the power to establish an order. So yeah, I think my analogy about technology actually really helps explain all of these "proofs."
      Now something I will point out is that I don't think any of these can prove that the ultimate superior being we collectively call "God" is the next level up, just that it is very reasonable that there is one. This is because we could theoretically create a virtual world that has the capacity to create their own stories and virtual worlds. This is the interesting thing about infinite because it can go one direction, but it can also have a start.

N. D. Moharo

The Secret of Loneliness

To the Lonely Hearted,
    I think I just realized the cause of loneliness. Loneliness isn't the feeling of being alone but rather the feeling of not having anyone close to talk with. This is why Facebook, though has the potential to cure it, usually actually makes it worse. It grants this idea that it should be easier to communicate with friends, but you begin to doubt how close your friendship is when you don't see replies. Because of this concept that Facebook makes it easy to communicate, the more so that it that not seeing a reply hurts. That doubt is the seed that you can't find anyone who truly cares. When you look at the number of "friends" it's made worse because the higher the number, the more you think that you have failed to find someone close. Even more so is when you see that number decrease.
    This is also the reason why people tend to feel lonely without their love interest. It's because that person tends to become the "close one" and depending on the level of intimacy, it's hard to match. Perhaps that is another reason why breaking up is so hard to bear and why some people turn suicidal in such a case. It's not a question of bi-polarism but rather the betrayal and mental closure. So what can we do to make things better? It's a actually as simple as letting a friend know that waking you up at 3 in the morning may be annoying, but you'll do it anyways. That's when you show that you do care.

With Care,

N. D. Moharo

P. S. As for the people who really don't feel like they have anyone to turn to, go ahead and leave a me a comment with an email address to communicate with.  I believe it is set up so that it requires moderation before it gets posted. Hence no one but me should be able to see it. I can't guarantee since I haven't seen any comments yet to test this theory. Just realize I normally only log in about once every two weeks, though I will do more if I find the need. I'm personally one of the people who cares about anyone who needs help. I think it's a requirement if you want to be an ideal friend.

Twitter Plans

Hello Everyone!
    Some of you may have noticed I started a Twitter account. In some respects, I was using Facebook like a twitter account by occasionally posting thoughts I had as well as links to my new blogs. However, I started to feel like Facebook was not the right place to post so often. While I will still post links to my new blogs, I've decided Twitter was better for doing more frequent posts. The only thing I am not a fan of is the 180 character limit. I had in my plan to start tweeting riddles but I'm not so sure if that would be a good idea or not. It might just be that I'll post the riddles on Facebook and leave the Tweets to daily quotes and ideas.
     Yes, I do hope that Twitter does in fact help attract more attention to my two blogs. However, I also see it as the other part of my goals for having this blog in the first place. One, I can communicate more easily with others. Second, I post quick and simple ideas as soon as I have them instead of developing to what I feel is appropriate for a blog. Third, it hopefully makes it easier for me to find other thinkers to help me develop new or old ideas. So if you want to follow me, you can find me at @ND_Moharo . Don't be afraid giving me suggestions on who to follow either.

N. D. Moharo