Dog Wisdom, Cat Insight, Pet Profundity.

Here's a lesson for the moment from most of our pets these days. They're not worried about tomorrow, or next week, or next month. They're just fine sheltering in place. Social isolation isn't a big deal. They know how to get their rest right now for any excitement or challenge to come. They respond well to kindness and give us human beings all of it that they can, and more than we likely deserve. When they're happy, or content, they wag it clearly. And: They know how just to be.

Now, don't worry, I'm a philosopher and I already know all the rejoinders in the minds of some readers that will begin with the ever useful word "But," and then detail all the many differences and disanalogies and responsibility asymmetries and obvious dependence relations between diverse domestic species and us that make them, as readers, resistant to a little whimsical reminder or two from the world of the pet. But ... to anyone who thinks that way, I'd recommend you just go out onto the porch and lie down a bit and take a nap, Ok? Good boy. Good girl.

Patience

"Patience is a virtue." Almost Everyone's Mother.

Why is patience a virtue, or strength? Well, let's think about what an impatient person does. He or she feels an inner tension, a stress, perhaps even a form of anxiety. He's agitated. She's frustrated. And often filled with questions: When? Why is it taking so long? How can I speed this up? What do I have to do to get this pot to boil, this person to answer me, this opportunity to gel, or to get this problem fixed? What? How? Why? When?

Meanwhile, the patient person is at peace. She's going with the flow. He's content with the pace of things, while still perhaps ambitious, and he's quietly confident in the future.

And these characteristics of patience are all good and desirable things, right?

So why is it so hard to be patient, and so easy to be the opposite?

And there's also a deeper question in the neighborhood, isn't there?

Maybe what I characterized above as the opposite of patience is really just one version, a subjective, boiling pot of emotions that creates nothing but inner pressure and discontent. Isn't there another cluster of responses available for the person who isn't just fine to wait? I have in mind, action, persistence, determination, creativity, and more action. And aren't those all good things, as well?

So here's the real question. When is it best to take action, or more action, in pursuit of your desires or dreams, and when is it best to wait patiently? It's never best to just stew with frustration. We can all agree to that. But when is patient waiting perhaps just not the thing you need, but action instead to create the near term future that you want.

The easy answer from 40,000 feet is that there's no general answer at all, except that knowing when to be patient and when to act requires wisdom, or genuine discernment. And that answer, while true, gives us no help here on the ground, day to day. Is there a better answer available?

Tune in tomorrow.

Yeah, be patient.

Today.

What Is It To Exist?

Today, let's just get wild. Let's be spooky. Let's dig deep.

I just got this email, which I quote with a big blush, since it's so nice, but it asks a very deep question, and asks it well. It will also give you an idea of the sort of emails I get that don't fit into the "how to run a company, build an exceptional career, or deal with daily life" genres, but that can keep someone awake at night.

Dear Dr. Morris.

I am a joyous follower and admirer of you and your work, both philosophical and otherwise. I think you are a wonderful human being, and a great philosopher and writer. As such, I am led to ask you a very deep and pressing question, and share with you a problem I've encountered dealing with it.

Questions: What exactly does it mean for something to exist? What is existence itself?

I asked thus because yesterday I was in a conversation with a friend, and he proposed that the only things that actually exist are those that meet these criteria:

1. Occupy space and time,

2. Be detectable by natural means,

3. Have some energy signature of sorts.

I tried thinking of objections to those criteria but was blank. The only such I offered was God, and abstract entities, which he said were the only things his criteria ruled out. (He's an atheist). So the question is, should existence be limited to things that meet those criteria, and if not, why not? And can you please provide a substantiative working definition of the term.

Thanks for sparing your time. Regards,

Shawn Wilson

MY ANSWER, PART ONE:

Hi Shawn! Thanks for your kind words! Let me get back to you later today.

But a quick initial consideration: My first thought is that your friend seems certainly adamant that, among the realities of the world, among the things that exist and with which we have to do are his own Three Criteria for Existence - for, surely, if they didn't exist, we wouldn't have to worry about them! But then, for them to exist, in accordance with their own demands, they must:

1. Occupy space and time,

2. Be detectable by natural means,

3. Have some energy signature of sorts.

Oops. There's an obvious problem here. Understanding that we're dealing with criteria, or requirements, which are intellectual things, rather than ink on paper, words in the air, or pixels on a screen, they seem to fail their own requirements for existing. And that's quite odd, isn't it? It's what philosophers call self-defeating, and therefore not possibly true.

More later! Tom

SECOND REPLY, HOURS LATER:

Hi again, Shawn.

One definition, from a theistic perspective would be this:

(A) To exist is to be an absolute creator or a creation.

Simple. But of course, your friend won't like that. Yet, that's no criticism of the definition itself, is it?

A more abstract philosophical conception would be this:

(B) To exist is to participate in causal or other metaphysical relationships.

An even more abstract definition could be this:

(C) To exist is to be differentiated in some way from nothingness, where that differentiation consists in something more than a mere contingent and fanciful conceptual configuration (ruling out such things as magic blue dragons in my backyard and kiddie-story unicorns  existing in the same sense as cars and dogs, and just by being conceived).

Clearly, these are tests that even current members of Congress could all pass with flying colors. And none of these definitions confines existence to the ordinary physical entities with which we're familiar, like tables, chairs, cars, dirt, and shoe laces. They don't rule out God, or spiritual beings, or abstract objects like numbers, or qualities, or intellectual conditions like themselves.

The challenge to your friend is to show how his criteria are superior to all of these. And he'll face a simple problem: He can't. Moreover, none of these criteria suffers the self-defeating problem that his three-fold standard confronts. They satisfy their own demands. They are generous and yet not vacuous. They're intuitive, and not prejudicial as to what wonders there might be that we have not yet even imagined. I hope this helps.

I want my ontology, or conception of what exists, to be, in principle, as broad and inclusive as this amazing, surprisingly rich reality in which we live. I want to acknowledge that love exists, and opportunity, and potential, and the soul - not just material things like grass and rocks and atoms. And no one has ever given me a sufficient reason to shrink my philosophy to fit the view that natural science alone gives us the inventory of reality.

Existing ... in your debt for a good question, I am

Your Philosopher,

TVM