I am a twenty-three year old male that is currently living in Montreal. I would describe myself as an eccentric self loathing, depressed human being. I dropped out of high school when I was sixteen. I never had a job. I only leave my apartment when I have to. I am currently on medication for depression and social anxiety disorder. Fortunately I was able to make a substantial amount of money from selling things on EBay and making some wise investment decisions. Unfortunately I spent most of the money that I made in a futile attempt to find happiness. I have reached a point where for the first time in my life I am having real financial difficulties. I think the money that I was making in the past was the only thing that stopped me from killing myself. I don’t know how much longer I am going to be alive; therefore I decided to post this letter on the I love philosophy.com forums. I would like to communicate with individuals that have something in common with me. I would also like to educate or influence the people that are reading this; especially teenagers in high school.What you see below are some of my opinions on four different topics.
EMBRACING THE IGNORANCE OF HUMANITY
Like the title says ignorance is the root of all evil. I could write a whole book on this topic but I don’t have time to do that so I am only going to write about three things, traditions, the concept of good and evil, and gods.
TRADITIONS- For some reason human beings love irrational traditions. People are still engaging in traditions that are thousands of years old. We love to live like cavemen. I am talking about things like male and female circumcision. Female circumcision may be much worse, but the idea of cutting of a peace of a boy’s penis as a part of some five thousand year old tradition just sounds stupid to me. Unfortunately I had a Jewish pediatrician that convinced my parents that it would reduce the chances of me getting penile cancer; therefore I will never be able to experience sexual pleasure the way an uncircumcised man would experience it.
Another irrational tradition that human beings love is monogamy. I am not going to say much about monogamy because I am sure that most of you have already heard about the 50+ percent divorce rate in different countries around the world therefore I only have two things to say. If you are in a monogamous relationship and your partner cheats on you, you deserve exactly what you get. In my opinion the happiest couples in the world are people that are in committed open relationships.
GOOD AND EVIL- In my opinion the concept of good and evil are just products of evolution. It all depends on which side you are on and what rank you have society. We are no different than a pack of wolves or a group of monkeys. Dominant males and females have the privilege to commit more acts of violence than the lower ranking individuals. In other words the violence is justified. Whenever I watch the news and I see the U.S.A fighting Al Qaeda or the Palestine’s fighting the Israelis I don’t see good on one side and evil on the other side. I see ignorance and stupidity on both sides. Some people like to think of good and evil as a positive force and a negative force or good karma and bad karma. I see it as logical and illogical behavior that is passed on in your genetic code and your culture from generation to generation. Let me explain what I mean. Imagine that an illogical act was committed over a thousand years ago in a small village in Africa, Asia, or Europe. Perhaps someone was raped or murdered. That single illogical act can cause a chain reaction that could lead to the misery and deaths of millions of people. Stress, malnutrition, and a lack of knowledge can impair the health of parents and their children. This information is then past on in their genes in the form of genetic flaws like cancer, diabetes, and even asymmetrical faces which can reduce the chances of having a good sex life. That is why I believe that everyone deserves exactly what they get. People are suffering today because of the mistakes that people made in the past. And the people of tomorrow will suffer because of the mistakes that we make in the present, unless we are willing to change the way we think and live.
GODS- I also believe that the concept of god is a product of evolution. I call it the triangle philosophy. The dominant person is at the top of the triangle with the lower ranking people at the bottom. Sometimes I wonder how much people on this planet have been killed in the name of a god. Some Muslims love to kill people for Allah. In the past Christians killed people for the Lord Jesus Christ. If you go back even further you will find people that sacrificed humans to make their gods happy so their crops would grow. I just can’t believe that we are living in a world where educated individuals believe that there is a god in the sky. People are actually still teaching creation in schools all around the world. The argument that many religious scientist make is that human beings could never have evolved from single celled organisms, even though the evidence of evolution is all around us. Some scientists that do believe in evolution prefer to go back even further to the big bang. Who or what created the big bang? How can something be created from nothing? It must be god. My answer to that is it does not matter how much we have evolved or how much we will learn in the future. There will always be things that we will not know. My philosophy is, if I can’t see it, taste it, hear it, smell it, or touch then it does not exist. In the twenty- three years that I have been alive I still haven’t heard a word from a god. If people need something to believe in they should focus on Buddhism, extraterrestrials or string theory.
MEDICAL SCIENCE
Medical science has come along way during the past hundred years. Unfortunately it has not come far enough because of capitalism and religious and ethical reasons. In this topic I will focus neuroscience and genetics.
Neuroscience- I am impressed with the progress that neuroscientist have made during the past twenty-five years especially in the fields of neurophysiology and cognitive neuroscience. In my opinion the only field of neuroscience that has not progressed that much is psychiatry. I won’t even waste my time writing about the good old days when people were being electrocuted and lobotomized for no reason. I am not satisfied with the way most psychiatrist are trying to treat depression. One problem that I have is the amount of people in North America that are on antidepressants. Writing a prescription for someone that is depressed is the first thing that most psychiatrist do. In my opinion antidepressants should only be used as a last resort.
The second problem that I have with psychiatry is psychotherapy. The physical act of handing over a hundred dollars or more for an hour of a doctors time made me even more depressed than I was before I went into the office. There is nothing that a psychiatrist or a psychologist can tell me that I can’t learn from a book. Another thing that people need to know is, if there is something that you want to remain confidential keep it to yourself or get someone to sign a confidentiality contract. I had a friend that was a psychiatrist. He is now deceased. He told me everything about his patients. We would have long discussions about the different disorders and problems that his patients were living with. Some people are good at keeping secrets and some people are not. So I would advise people to be careful the next time that you go into a doctor’s office to bare your soul to someone that you have never met before in your life. However, I will admit that psychotherapy can be a good alternative to taking antidepressants if you can find the right doctor.
The third problem that I have with psychiatry is doctors that are focused on keeping suicidal individuals alive instead of giving them some pleasure or trying to give them a reason to want to live. I think psychiatrist need to teach their patients more about neurophysiology and neurochemistry. They also need to develop new techniques for treating their patients. I also believe that an assisted suicide should be a part of psychiatry. It would involve putting a patient in a comfortable environment, and giving them an injection of heroin or some other narcotic to give them pleasure. The second step would involve giving them a sedative to put them to sleep. And finally dose potassium chloride to stop the heart.
GENETICS- I don’t have much to say about genetics other than the fact that people have to stop using the word race to describe what they are. And geneticists have to stop thinking that eugenics is a bad thing. It is time for us to start creating better human beings. We can no longer depend on symmetry and healthy skin to decide if a person has good genes or not.
VIRTUAL REALITY
Virtual reality is the most important topic in this letter to me, because what I desire more than anything else is to escape reality. I hate this world and I hate my body. To me virtual reality represents an escape from my body and the ignorance of humanity. My obsession with virtual reality began when I was a teenager in high school. Back in 1994 I can remember computer scientists all around the talking and writing about the virtual reality that we would get to experience in the year 2000 and beyond. Back in the mid 90’s computer programmers were designing video games that were more realistic for consoles like the 3DO. They were not the best video games ever made but they were different than the mass produced juvenile crap that is being made today. I can remember playing realistic full motion video games in the past and enjoying the feeling of getting lost in a virtual world even though the games were not in 3D. By 1999 I realized that the virtual world that I was hoping for was only a dream in my head. That is when I slipped into a deep depression. Movies like the Matrix and Vanilla sky only made things worse for me. It made me feel like the computer programmers around the world were teasing me. I watched as companies like Microvision developed head mounted displays that have incredible resolution. Between 1999 and 2002 I spent at least $50,000 on hardware and software in a futile attempt to get a realistic virtual experience. I get so angry whenever I read or watch television and I see all of the incredible technology that is being developed for the U.S military. Why can’t someone use the technology that is out there to give people a peaceful or fun virtual experience? It would not be so bad if I could at least go to an IMAX theater and watch a good movie on a dome screen. I would be willing to pay $100 or more to see a movie like The Cell or Requiem For A Dream in IMAX 3D. For some reason most people can’t see the possibilities of virtual reality. I am going to write a small list of things that I believe should exist now and in the near future.
-
In the present- A virtual reality entertainment center in some large North American cities where people can go to watch real movies on IMAX dome screens and play high quality 3D video games in a private room on dome screens that are about 60% to 75% smaller than your average dome screen. I also believe that people should be able to make money from playing video games. Imagine walking into a room and seeing a large dome screen and a formula 1 racing car. You proceed by sitting down in the car and selecting an option that is appearing on a small screen on the steering wheel of the car. You then proceed to chose to race nine people that are doing the same thing that you are doing. Each person pays a fee to play the game and they all decide to wager $100 on the race. The prize structure would be 1st place $500, 2nd place $300 and 3rd place $200. That is just one example of the many possibilities of wagering money on video games. It would be much healthier than gambling in a casino or playing video lottery machines in a bar because each wager would be based on skill not luck. And the players that are making bets would get the same rush of dopamine that most gamblers get without having to deal with the ridiculous odds in casinos. You would be able to play games that involve strength, speed, timing, and intelligence. For example, imagine playing a game like track and field that involves pushing one button to build up speed. If the best human beings can push a button ten times in a second. How many times do you think a person would be able to push a button in 9.79 seconds? (The world record for the hundred meter dash) Wining or losing money would all depend on your physical or mental abilities.
-
In the present- High-tech luxury apartments in some large North American cities that would include the same smaller versions of the IMAX dome screens that I wrote about above. Imagine watching 3D television and performing most of the activities that I wrote about above. These apartments would be very expensive. They would probably cost $100,000 a month or more but I would be willing to spend that much if I could afford it.
-
In the near future- A computer program that can be your friend, teacher, or sexual partner.
-
In the near future- A computer program called that is called What Do Desire? Imagine a computer program that is as realistic as the matrix. You simply have to tell the computer what you want to experience and you can live out almost any scenario that you can imagine.
-
In the near future- I also believe that virtual reality could be used to reduce deviant desires like pedophilia. (Real pedophilia not cultural pedophilia)
THE SOLUTION TO ALL OF OUR PROBLEMSExistence is information and perception. Information in the form of energy, subatomic particles, atoms, molecules, planets, stars, and carbon based life forms like us. Perception in the form of programmed reactions to the information that we receive through our five senses. You might have heard the phrase one rotten apple destroys the whole pack. Imagine that the world is a bag with five good apples in it and one rotten apple in it. The rotten apple is a representation of all of our cultural problems and our genetic problems. You can’t remove a small piece of the rotten apple and not expect the bacteria to spread. That is the problem with the world. We are not willing to do what it takes to get rid of the whole apple. Your problems are my problems and my problems are your problems. We are all connected. I am convinced that there is a way for human beings to coexist in peace. I can imagine living in world were the only misery that people would feel is the misery that they choose to feel. A lot of people are doing things to try to make the world a better place but they are not doing enough. Medical doctors have to realize is that a panacea is not going to come in the form of a pill or a serum. That is what the pharmaceutical companies out there would like doctors to believe. Unfortunately the solution to the problem is much more complex than that. Intelligent rational human beings have to get together and start a movement. Neuroscientists have to work together with computer scientists to improve our cognitive abilities and gain better control over our amygdales. (Read The Age Of Spiritual Machines by Ray Kurzweil to understand what I am talking about) Geneticists have stop worrying about ethics and do what ever it takes to make life better for human beings. Liberal open minded politicians in every democratic country around the world have to work together to give people more privileges and to help scientists speed up the process of evolution. People around the world also have to be willing to make a slow process from capitalism to socialism. People have to be willing to abandon most of their old traditions.
I believe that I have the right ideology to solve most of mankind’s problems, but what I believe is irrelevant because I don’t have masters’ degree or a PhD. And I don’t have the money or the motivation to change the world. All I can say is that we have to stop being controlled by our emotions. The universe has blessed us with a large prefrontal cortex but very few people actually use it the way they should. Especially the orbitofrontal region and the dorsolateral region. I can only hope that a few people out there will be influenced by what I wrote.
