Tom: No one’s stopping you…. ;)

Yeah, but you’ve got links to Randi and Skeptics – totally cool in my book!

Damn, now I wish I didn’t have a sex blog, so I could link to cool sites like that.

I think a lot of the (what I precieve as) anger from ultra conservatives about things that are outside their worldview comes from this unhealthy (and incorrect) assumption that everything is “either or.” Just completely IMHO, but there you are.

Shermer goes into the next steps as well, when discussing how to make a moral or ethical decision. I don’t have the book in front of me, but IIRC, he lays out three or so “principles” to sort of ask yourself before making that decision.

So once you’ve got a handle on the concept that, ok, not everything is black and white, and you are then faced with a decision, you go through a couple thought experiments. First, is the sort of “golden rule” concept — would I like this if someone else did this to me. Recognizing, of course, that not everyone’s got the same likes and dislikes, you should then go on to ask yourself “what would this person say if I asked them first?” He calls this the “ask first” principle, and I think it might be more helpful than the “golden rule” principle. I think there’s a third “thought experiment” that you can go through, but like I said, I don’t really remember, and I don’t remember where I cleaned the book to!

I guess my whole point about “fuzzy logic” was just conciousness raising. I think the more we can remember that we don’t HAVE to define things as “either-or,” the better off we’ll be, and the better decisions we may be able to come to. Like you said, it’s not the sum total of what we need to think about, but it can be very liberating to remember that nothing is black or white.

Humans get themselves into a world of trouble looking at things in black and white, it seems. … Shermer’s idea, one that I really like, is to use fuzzy logic to think about life’s problems.

Fuzzy logic is a helpful tool in such situations, but I believe it is still an oversimplication of the issues people face. Moving from the belief that propositional logic (good versus bad, superior versus inferior, etc.) can solve questions of morality or belief for you (here’s why it can’t, by the way) is a good first step, and fuzzy logic can certainly help people to start and understand the necessity for allowing gradients into their view of the world. That being said, I’m not sure how different a statement such as “this is 0.7 fantasy and 0.3 reality” would actually help when ultimately your brain must choose one and only one action to take at any given time. Humans are horrible at multitasking. And the point remains that 0.7 of one thing and 0.3 of another is still often more than 1 combined-thing when put together in a way formal logic still has not found a way to measure.

Did that make any sense? I’m afraid I, too, have just woken up and didn’t have any coffee yet. :)

I’ve been thinking a lot about this concept lately, after reading Michael Shermer’s “The Science of Good and Evil,” which discusses being ethical and moral without god (waves to fellow atheist Bitchy). Humans get themselves into a world of trouble looking at things in black and white, it seems. Hawk or Dove. Left or Right. Liberal or Conservative. Pro or Con. The problem is, that the world and human experience just isn’t black and white, this or that. Even something as simple as “straight” or “gay” turns out not to be, well, simple.

Shermer’s idea, one that I really like, is to use fuzzy logic to think about life’s problems. So for example, instead of being “0″ or “1″ straight, you would be some “fuzzy” percentage — 0.4, say, or 0.9, or 0.1. The more I thought about it, the more this seemed like a rational way to look at things. It is intellectually as well as emotionall satisfying, and allows you to deal with concepts such as “well, I’m against killing, except for in self defense,” or indeed, in BDSM, the ideas of “soft” limits. There is no internal contradiction when you realize that black and white is bullshit.

Did that make sense? I just got up and haven’t had any coffee yet.

Anyway, I just wanted to say I’m having a great time poking around all the intelligent BDSM blogs around. Following links has really been fun for me these past few weeks, and has led to a whole new appreciation of what I like to do in bed :) So thanks everyone for the great discussion. You can check out my blog, but it doesn’t discuss sex so much — just atheism, science, and personal crap :)

Exactly! To each their own is not dismissal of other people’s preferences, nor is it about ignoring them. It’s about celebrating those differences together. It’s really not that paradoxical, but many people just can’t seem to grok the concept.

“I loved this post.“

Thanks, M.T. :)

I loved this post. It’s hard to point to specifics. I think I’m so in love with my own submisive boyfriend right now that it’s just leaking out onto every other submissive male.