“I do not understand; I pause; I examine”

Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592) has been recognized as one of the most significant philosophers of the 16th century. Born into a privileged family and raised during the period of the French Renaissance, he was educated in a private boarding school where all his lessons were taught in Latin. Because of his family’s great wealth, he was free to devote the first half of his life to jobs serving the public sector; including volunteering as a legal counselor, advisor to King Charles IX and mayor of the town of Bordeaux.

In 1571, at the age of 38, he retired from public life to his estate, where he isolated himself from all social and family affairs so that he could dedicate his time to reading, meditating, and writing. It was in his castle’s round library room – which contained more than 1,500 books – where Montaigne probed his mind and produced two highly influential books titled simply Essays; which he published in 1580. Montaigne wrote that “I am myself the matter of my book“, and his stated goal was to describe humans, and especially himself, with utter frankness.

Some of the key topics Montaigne explored in his various essays include:

• Mankind’s dangerously inflated claims to knowledge and certainty
• The assertion that there is no greater achievement than the ability to accept one’s limitations
• The problem of trying to locate truth in commonly accepted ideas that are false or unexamined – especially since many things we held yesterday as articles of faith today we know as fables.
• The importance of freeing ourselves from outside influences, customs and opinions
• His belief that the best path to understanding truth is by a careful exploration of one’s own body-and-mind.

Montaigne believed that the self, even with all its imperfections, was the best possible place to begin the search for truth, even though our identities can’t be defined as a stable thing because it is always changing. The most obvious example to him was the struggle of living with the infirmities of a human body. “Our bodies smell, ache, sag, pulse, throb and age regardless of the best desires of our mind“. It is only in acceptance of these traits that we can remain faithful to the truth of one’s being.

Montaigne isolated himself while writing his Essays but maintained the importance of maintaining contact with the outside world of other people and events because one can learn much that is useful from others. He described human beings as having a front room, facing the exterior street, where they meet and interact with others, but also with a back room where they are able to retreat back into their interior private self to reflect upon the vagaries of human experience and consider how it impacts their intimate identity.

Montaigne was refreshingly different from other philosophers and academics of his day who believed that their advanced powers of reason were a divine gift that gave them mastery over the world and a happiness that was denied to lesser educated creatures. He mocked those philosophers who were proud of their big brains and his writings come across as wise and intelligent – but also as modest and eager to debunk the pretensions of learning.

He wrote of his fellow academics and philosophers: “On our highest thrones in the world we are seated, still, on our arses” and, “…in practice, thousands of little women in their villages have lived more gentle, more equable and more constant lives than us.

He mocked books that were difficult to read. He found Plato boring and just wanted to have fun with books. “I’m not prepared to bash my brains out for anything, not even for learning’s sake – however precious it may be. If one book tires me, I just take up another“.

[note: I must admit that this sentiment makes me feel somewhat better about my decision to hold off reading the notorious difficult novel Ulysses by Irish writer James Joyce].

Montaigne was honest about the limitations and usefulness of his own intellect and attacked his prestigious academic friends for studying difficult things that were not useful to our lives.

“Difficulty is a coin which the learned conjure with so as not to reveal the vanity of their studies. Intellectuals would prefer you to study other people’s books way before we study our own minds. If man were wise, he would gauge the true worth of anything by its usefulness and appropriateness to his life”

I can’t help but wonder if Montaigne’s admiration for the working class – and life’s simple things – stemmed from the decision his humanist father made to leave him for three years when he was a small boy in the sole care of a peasant family in their town, in order to “draw the boy close to the people, and to the life conditions of the people, who need our help“.

Whatever the reason for his modest and humble personality, Montaigne comes across as one of the world’s first examples of a tolerant mind; a breath of fresh air in the cloistered and snobbish corridors of 16th century academia. He became an inspiration and encouragement to all those who felt put-upon and patronized by the arrogance of self-proclaimed clever people.

Montaigne tells us that each one of us is richer than we think. We may all arrive at wise ideas if we cease to think of ourselves as unsuited to the task just because we haven’t been classically trained or happen to lead an ordinary life.

The inscription Montagne had placed on the crown of the book shelf in his library was “I do not understand; I pause; I examine“. He had the inscription placed there to remind him of the limitations of his own knowledge and to caution him about the dangers that can result when one hastily forms opinions without careful consideration of all the facts.

Too many people today, especially since the advent of social media – which allows anybody to pass themselves off as experts – form their beliefs by adopting commonly accepted ideas or by making broad generalizations. Outside influences and political talking points trigger knee-jerk reactions from those who fail to take the time to study all sides of a topic – or to consider what is the truth and what is morally just.

It would be refreshing if more of us today, before forming our opinions, would like Montaigne, acknowledge the limitations of our knowledge, admit that we don’t fully understand a topic and then take time to examine all aspects of the issues in question using qualified experts in the field as our guides.

The danger of operating a society with uninformed or half-informed subjects was identified as early as the 2nd century by the Roman writer Publilius Syrus who said that it is “Better to be ignorant of a matter than to half know it“.

Today there are so many competing sources of information, where anyone with a computer can offer their uninformed opinions. Few people check the credentials of writers or the authenticity of the facts, and foreign actors can easily spread misinformation along via unregulated social networks.

The next time we are asked to form an opinion or make a decision about subjects we do not fully understand, we would do well to follow the sage advice of Montaigne: Do not let somebody else speak for you and do not fall prey to the pressures of biased outside influences. Instead take a moment to pause, study all sides of the issue, consult qualified experts and sources, and endeavor to reach true understanding.

If you can summon the conviction and discipline to do this, then you will be able to take solace knowing that even though you can not govern external events, you at least govern yourself.

Is it not better to see yourself truly, than care about how others see you?

When I was 10 years old (in 1970), I was part of a play group of six boys that spent their days roaming about the small Massachusetts town where I grew up. We would hang out together after school, on weekends and during school vacations doing the things that interest most boys of that age – building tree houses, camping out, riding bikes, playing sports and pulling pranks on one another.

I remember the TV networks began broadcasting a weekly television show in 1972 that quickly became the favorite topic of conversation among my group of friends and an endless source of inspiration for our role playing activities.

The show was called Kung Fu and it  followed the adventures of a Shaolin monk named Kwai Chang Caine. He was born to an American man and a Chinese woman in mid-19th century China, but was orphaned as a young boy. The Shaolin Monastery took him in and trained him to become a priest and martial arts expert.

In the show Caine is seen traveling from town to town throughout the American Old West in search of his half brother. Each episode shows him dealing with difficult people and situations armed only with his spiritual training and his skill in martial arts. Flashback scenes specific to the moral dilemmas he faces in each episode are employed to recall specific lessons that were learned by Caine during his childhood training at the monastery.

There inevitably comes a point during each episode when he is forced to call upon his martial arts training to defend himself or others, even though he was taught to avoid violence whenever possible, and to use it only as a means of self-defense – or as a last resort to protect the weak and vulnerable,

Those fight scenes were what my group of friends enjoyed the most. We would watch each episode religiously and then spend the following week looking ridiculous trying to re-enact the fight scenes with one another while mimicking the martial arts moves that were displayed.

Over time I began to see there was something else beyond those superficial fight scenes, that made me to start to question the way that I looked at life and how a man should conduct himself. It was the first show that exposed me to the wisdom of other cultures, the ugliness of racism, the practice of non-violence and the value of all life.

The admirable qualities of the man that was portrayed in this show were polar opposite to the qualities that were being promoted by other shows of the time. The American heroes like John Wayne and Clint Eastwood were depicted as loud, prideful, violent and self-destructive. Kwai Chang Caine on the other hand was a different kind of protagonist; one who is strong but quiet, humble, peaceful and harmonious.

Those childhood memories came flooding back to me because I happened to be scrolling through my Netflix movie options and noticed that the Kung Fu TV series had recently been added to their roster of streaming options. I thought it might be enlightening for me to watch the shows again, 46 years later, to see what further insight I could gain.

I am finding that each episode imparts some bit of new wisdom or truth that speaks to me. In the most recent episode I watched it was a flashback scene at the monastery in which Caine is found to be showing off his fighting prowess to the younger students. He is blindfolded, yet adroitly fends off three attackers.

While he is in the midst of the battle, his Teacher comes upon the scene and when the fight is over questions Caine’s motives for the martial arts demonstration. Caine explains that he was simply seeking to test himself, but after further questioning admits what he was really trying to do was impress the group of young students. His master rebukes Caine by saying:

    Is it not better to see yourself truly, than care about how others see you?

That question jumped out at me as one that we all should ponder given the ubiquitous nature of social media in our lives today and the seeming competition among friends and acquaintances to relentlessly craft a social media narrative that depicts lives filled with perfection and happiness.

My wife and I have acquaintances who seem to be miserable, because whenever we see them we hear them speak about their troubles or lament the injustices they have had to endure. Yet if we happen to go online and read their Facebook postings we see only positive images of an idyllic life alongside messages about how good their life is. There is a disconnect – they are obviously not happy, yet they want the world to believe they are.

It seems to me that our lives would be better served if we took all the effort we spend trying to perfect how others see us and spent that energy instead on trying to see ourselves truly. Seeing yourself truly requires focusing on the inner life – not on the relentless demands that are imposed on us by the outer life.

The outer life is all about managing how the world looks at me (my body, my home, my possessions, my intelligence, my job, my family, my followers) – we try to impress a whole universe of people who only judge us based on what they see with their senses. The inner life on the other hand, is about how I look at myself – my private thoughts and values, emotions, fantasies, spiritual beliefs, my capacity to love and my sense of purpose.

The outer life is visible and public while the inner life is invisible and private. As human beings we are naturally “show-offs” and tend to focus on things that will improve our outer life; things like studies, degrees, job positions, fame and money. We believe that if we are successful in our outer life then we will be happy and content.

Today’s culture does little to value or nurture our inner lives. We keep much of our inner life hidden from others, even those to whom we are closest. Some people don’t even acknowledge their inner life because it can be difficult to answer internal questions like who am I, what do I believe, what is my purpose, how should I change, what do I regret, what do I want my future to look like?

But if we become absorbed by our outer life and fail to cultivate our inner life, we risk becoming blind to the the things that give life ultimate satisfaction and meaning. Spending time on the inner life can refresh us and make us feel more balanced so that we will make wise outer life decisions that are in harmony with our inner life thoughts and beliefs.

I am often guilty of focusing too much on my outer life at the expense of my inner life. I give too much thought to the materialistic demands of my outer life and care more than I should about how others see me. I do not spend enough energy trying to see myself truly.

But I do make a concerted effort to include activities in my schedule every week that help me focus on my inner life and take my mind off of the outer life distractions that drive most of our days. That is why I take time to write this blog on the life examined and why prayer, meditation, church, contemplative walks, reading poetry, listening to music and being out in nature are important contributors to my well-being.

It is those activities that refresh me and I recognize that when I fail to do them, my life becomes unbalanced. I hope you find a way to be your true self always so that you will, as the Shaolin monks say, “…never fear thus to be naked to the eyes of others.”

“It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity”

I recently completed watching the brilliant science fiction themed television series Black Mirror on Netflix. The episodes were chilling and had me wondering how society will manage to maintain its humanity and compassion in the face of ever-increasing advances in technology.

All of the Black Mirror episodes deal with life in the near future – showing us the potential impact and unintended consequences that new technologies could inflict on our society if they are misused. The series name “Black Mirror” is a reference to the ubiquitous black screen surfaces that stare back at us while we fixate on our smartphone, tablet, television and personal digital assistant devices.

Each episode in the series is independent of the others and can be viewed in any order, similar to the iconic Twilight Zone television series created by Rod Serling. Black Mirror episodes differ however in that they are longer, darker and more focused on contemporary themes related to unease about our modern world.

The show’s creator Charlie Brooker said he wanted Black Mirror to focus on the side effects of technology and highlight the areas between delight and discomfort where it resides. The show touches on important ideas – the false way we sometimes present ourselves online, our growing addiction to virtual lives and even a touching exploration of grief.

Below is a brief synopsis of each of the episodes in the series along with a list of the important issues they raise about how technology could be used in the future:

National Anthem – A beloved princess and a member of the British royal family is kidnapped and held hostage. Her freedom is guaranteed on one condition: The prime minister must have sex with a pig, live on national television.

This episode highlights the increasingly tenuous grasp governments have controlling the information they want to disseminate to the public because of the uncontrollable power of social media, viral videos and internet leaks. Other issues raised are rules for how to effectively deal with terrorists who target celebrities, how all political decisions are being driven using real time popularity polling data and the difficulty of being a responsible journalist in the age of instant communication.

Fifteen Million Merits – Set in a bleak future, where most of society must cycle on exercise bikes to power their surroundings and earn currency called “Merits” that can be used to buy food from vending machines or watch shows from giant television screens. The only way out of being a caged rat on an exercise wheel is to trade-in your merits to enter the talent game show “Hot Shots” (similar to X-Factor) where the winners can escape by choosing to become part of the national entertainment industrial complex – or the attractive ones can choose, under the influence of a drug called ‘compliance milk’, to become stars on one of the national porn channels.

This episode raises the potential danger of technology being used by governments and industries to enslave the people and highlights society’s trend toward glorifying the false and superficial at the expense of the real.

The Entire History of You – Shows a society where most people have computerized ‘grains’ implanted in their skulls recording everything they do – allowing them to play back their memories in front of their eyes or on a screen for all to see. We watch a marriage unravel as a husband forces his wife to play back scenes from her past.

This episode explores the effect body camera technology and memories uploaded to the cloud could have on relationships when it becomes impossible to keep secrets anymore.

Be Right Back – As a woman mourns the sudden death of her boyfriend in a car accident, she learns of a company employing artificial intelligence that can create a hauntingly accurate replica of him, first as a phone app, then as an actual body using synthetic flesh; his personality and likeness created from the output of all his social media communications, emails and everything he ever tweeted or instant messaged or filmed himself doing on the internet.

This episode exposes the limits of artificial intelligence in replacing the human spirit and raises the question about what should happen to our online ‘presence’ after we are gone.

White Bear –  As punishment for a horrific crime, a woman must relive the same nightmare every day (and go through a painful memory wiping process at the end of each day). She is forced to navigate a brutal, merciless world, filled with horrifying imagery, before an audience who pays to secretly watch her suffer.

This episode shows the tendency in society to dress up the humiliation and punishment of others in the name of entertainment and wonders if it is possible to sympathize with someone whose crime was unforgivable.

The Waldo Moment – The comedian behind a blue cartoon bear named Waldo comically interviews politicians and other authority figures – making fun of their hypocrisy and the corrupt political system. As a joke his producer decides to have Waldo run for election to become the town’s member of Parliament. The joke begins to take on unexpected proportions as Waldo’s popularity begins to gain traction with the public.

This episode comes close to reflecting the reality of recent elections across the world that feature cartoon-like anti-establishment candidates who try to win elections by appealing to disaffected voters using social media channels to spread populist messages that play to the fears of the populace and divide the voting public.

White Christmas – Three interconnected stories show a “communication facilitator” who applies psychological based technology in the not too distant future to help desperate men pickup girls, train newly created artificial intelligence slaves and manipulate criminals to confess guilt to crimes that they have committed.

This episode imagines the chilling ways technology could be used in the future against the cracks of human weakness and how such an uncaring world would destroy any possibility of mercy and peace for its citizens.

Nosedive – Paints a picture of a world where all people are judged by their social media rating. Society’s status and benefits accrue to the members that have the highest rating, transforming every encounter with others into an exercise in false playacting, as disclosing your true emotions could negatively affect your “score” – which all people can see instantly by wearing special contact lenses.

This episode warns about the danger of a society becoming overly obsessed with their social media ratings and how developing technology can drive humanity to indulge in its shallowest impulses. It is a little eerie as we can see China experimenting today with using social media ratings as a means to control and encourage good behavior of the people.

Playtest – We witness a video game company testing games using new technology which allows the program to have access to the user’s brain – as well as the deepest and darkest fears of their minds.

This episode shows how the arms race between video game manufacturers to develop ever more realistic and adrenaline producing products could have deadly consequences to those who become exposed to them.

Shut Up and Dance – A hacker who has compromising electronic evidence on  a group of guilt-ridden online users blackmails them into performing a series of increasingly dangerous crimes to avoid having their secrets exposed.

This episode exploits one of the most pervasive nightmares of the modern age: what if someone’s watching you at your most vulnerable? And what if they have it all on videotape?

San Junipero – The minds of the dead or near dying have an option to live alternative versions of their younger selves forever in a simulated reality of their choosing.

This episode shows the hopeful ways that technology could be used in a humane way to ease the passing of those nearing end of life – merciful palliative care designed for no greater goal than easing the suffering of others. But does that mean we would lose the value that comes from accepting that suffering is an essential part of existence?

Men Against Fire – When a future society determines that its soldiers on the front line have difficulty hunting and exterminating the enemy because they look too much like them, they invent new technology that when implanted into their soldiers makes the enemy appear as vile, horrific mutants called “roaches”.

This episode raises the concern about how technology could be misused over time to perfect state-sponsored murder, strip people deemed “undesirables” of their humanity and turn soldiers into remorseless killing machines.

Hated in the Nation – The collapse of the bee colonies forces the government to create hundreds of thousands of mechanical bee drones whose purpose is to help pollinate the country’s crops. Unknown to the populace, the military includes cameras in the bee drones so they can be used secretly to help the national security agencies spy on suspected criminals. A hacker manages to gain control of the bee army and turns them into killing machines that first target hated public figures – before revealing that the ultimate target is all the people spouting hate speech on the Internet and thinking they can hide behind online anonymity.

This episode shows one scenario where the technology that is designed to protect us instead turns against us and how the pressure of hate speech from anonymous online forums can have bad consequences.

Collectively these stories paint a grim picture of technology running amok and bringing out the worst in human nature. It’s a perspective that technology is a trap and is going to change us all for the worse. After all, we are the race that built the atomic bomb and Albert Einstein, the man whose genius helped to make it a reality, expressed his own concern when he wrote:

“It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity”

But I do not see technology as the enemy. I spent my entire adult career in the high technology field, inventing technologies that manufacturers could use to test their circuit board electronics and ensure that they were defect free and reliable. I was on the front lines during the birth of the personal computer, the world wide web, cell phones and smart phones, cloud-based computing and self-driving vehicles. I have witnessed up close the positive impacts these technologies have had on our society.

Technology is not inherently evil, but just like anything else it can be misused and abused if we are not careful to regulate how it can be used in a way that protects people from getting hurt. Robert Pirsig, the author of Zen and the Art of Motorcyle Maintenance captured this sentiment when he wrote:

“What’s wrong with technology is that it’s not connected in any real way with matters of the spirit and of the heart. And so it does blind, ugly things. Humans are needed to put the brakes on it”.

So, I encourage you all to watch the Black Mirror shows and then go out and do you own part to help put the brakes on technology use that crosses the line.