We Know Nothing

Nothing - Nic; Photo by Jaroslaw Pocztarski

My Hero says:  My major hobby is teasing people who take themselves & the quality of their knowledge too seriously & those who don’t have the courage to sometimes say: I don’t know…”  I say, on this blog - “…goofiness is important, it reduces the probability of b.s.“   

Only difference is, I don’t think I’ve ever read anything by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, aka “Hero”, that suggests that moment of doubt, the moment of saying “I don’t know”.   And when I say I’m trying to reduce the chance of b.s., I’m first and foremost talking of reducing my own b.s.  I suspect that’s not Taleb’s starting point.  But I’m going to fantasize that on reading this he will crack a perfect joke, take himself down a notch, and remain My Hero.

In fact, my own viewpoint aligns with My Hero’s.  That is, an awareness of ‘not knowing’ is the right starting point for much analysis or action.  Unfortunately,  being told that one doesn’t know more than one knows can seriously disturb many a machismo and ego.

I’d like to interlace Disney & that 2002 web phenomenon “Hot-or-Not”, to illustrate.  With my own perverted sense of weekend relaxation, I spent one Saturday standing outside the downtown Disney store in the rain, holding posters of Winnie (leaking paint) and protesting the sacking of sweatshop employees in Disney’s factories in Bangladesh.  It was a a complicated case.  A contractor was found to have violated some labor laws in his subcontracted factory, so Disney peremptorily closed off the contract, resulting in all the employees losing their (already miserable) jobs.   

I had struggled with the case.  There were many complexities, not least of which was the contradiction between Disney following it’s ‘ethical’ guidelines to justify a move that resulted in real terms in even more damage to the workers than the initial violation.  Was it as simple as Disney giving itself a checkmark for following it’s ’socially responsible’ principles hoping that no one dug around to see that it’s scorecard in real terms had just gone even more negative?  Or should I be considering the corporate viewpoint, of the spirit “but what’s a good well-meaning company to do?”  Sarcasm aside, though, I do have some sense of how hard it is to toe the line of a principle you’ve set yourself especially as it’s ramifications play out in a complex society.  For example in this case, was it more important for the company to send a strong message to its’ other contractors, which in the longer run would be beneficial to workers everywhere? (Just for the sake of argument – I’m not assuming that this was truly Disney’s consideration – and there are in fact some much better alternatives).

After thinking about it, I decided that even though I couldn’t balance all the possible pieces of this puzzle to land on a comprehensively supportable course of action, I should still join my couple of friends to protest Disney.   My philosophy, that we generally operate with an incomplete understanding of all the factors at play especially for distant scenarios, was a starting point.  Against this backdrop, I felt it eminently sensible to put in a pitch with what what was likely the statistically underrepresented side  – the side of the sacked workers. 

There are many such situations where I feel that supporting the underrepresented side is justified, even if the scenario seems complex, when the impact may be severe along the axes of health, food, shelter.  Disney didn’t need my help at all.  By being silent, I was in effect supporting Disney, not the workers.  Somewhere someone would adjust all the parameters and make decisions that would impact the scenario.  Me, I could do my bit to just ensure that those whose voices aren’t heard as often get a bit of support.  If you think of all the time that you’re spending not acting and contributing to the statistics (noise included) of the default, then a few times of standing in a crowd protesting the other side just can’t be wrong. 

That evening, through some random connections, I ended up hanging out with the guy who founded ‘Hot or Not’ and found myself explaining my day’s activities and my rationale.   But Hot (Not) was not only unconvinced by the rationale for my actions but also grew steadily angrier.  It became apparent to me that for someone who had just convinced himself that he was smart beyond the norm, having just recently been catapulted into sudden fame and perhaps even fortune, what I was justifying was in turn pulling the rug out from under his rationalized sense of his position in the world.  It was obviously upsetting to his sense of self that I was putting the weight of my personality behind a world view (similar to My Hero’s dare I say) where his newly proven smarts could never be sufficient or perhaps even useful.  I guess when your future wealth may depend on the profound and quantifiable metric, ‘degree of hotness’, you can’t bear to hear about how it may actually be less useful than something unassessed, something immeasurable at it’s core.

San Francisco Perfection

Last Saturday, fried from computer screen adoration (you know, when it’s you and your screen and you’re glued to each others eyes…) I finally broke free. 

It started ominously – a drive to the office to pick up papers at 7am on a Saturday morning.  But Spring was upon us and the views of the bay and city in the morning sun finally had their way with me.  I called Marco to check if he was at the Alemany Farmer’s market.  There’s no better way to start a San Francisco Saturday than at the peoples market (then; today).  But for once, Marco wasn’t going.  As I arrived at our block, I couldn’t turn towards home.  Instead, I found myself continuing to drive and ended up on Geary, racing into the Pacific Ocean.  The day only got better:

• The first peek of the Pacific from Geary, rolling downhill to Loui’s Diner and the Sutro Bath ruins. If I wasn’t in a motoring mood, eggs, steak and hash browns with a view to ochre mud stumps and a raging ocean would have been the call.
• Turn off into the park with the top open to take in the colors and smells of springtime, our brooding gnarled california trees and turning a corner, the sudden view of stoic bison, unreal in their mass and stillness.
• Over the bridge to Old Oakland.  Lemon riccotta pancakes at Cockadoodle Cafe, talk about politics surrounded by refreshing color after (it’s true) mostly white San Francisco.
• Dropping Anirvan back to Berkeley and had to extend the conversation as we often must.  But this time, a Berkeley tradition – sitting on the Shattuck median (an 8 ft mound of dirt and grass) with cars puttering by on either side, under a ‘don’t sit on median’ sign. Berkeley gets plus points for this urban rendition of hanging out in a meadow.
• Driving back into the city with a favorite view of San Francisco (from the Bay Bridge) on display for longer than usual as I crawled through Saturday afternoon traffic.
• Quick dinner at Out the Door under the SF Shopping Center with the girls and Marco to provide the sole, slammingly dressed, male counterpoint. Marco can do orange & pink, together - no more need be said.  For food, the brightest, most unexpected salad I’ve ever eaten, Grapefruit & Jicama salad.
• Mosey on over to 111 Minna for what started a little slow (it was a fundraiser for lawyers after all…) but with a favorite DJ from old times spinning dub and then the live action of Sukhawat Ali Khan and friends, it was raucous.  On this night, the art included Amal’s photographs relaying stories of taxi cab drivers. 
  Maneesh (afore-mentioned DJ) said – ‘reminds you of Azaad days, doesn’t it?’  Minna, now more standard fare as a hipster art and music joint, used to be smaller in the day, and Saturday nights often included a collective of DJs (‘Azaad’) spinning South Asian-influenced dub, beats, hip-hop, trance and drum n bass.  Took me back.  Time for a party.

Sutro Bath Ruins. Photo by: the tahoe guy