London, Day 1

The Wells and Campden Baths and Wash Houses of 1888, Hampstead Heath

I arrived in London yesterday and got a room in a guesthouse in Camden Town. It is one of the most threadbare guesthouses I’ve ever stayed in. It reminds me of this place I stayed in Penang, Malaysia on a visa run about 15 years ago. It felt very similar to this, actually - a room that was originally about 20 feet long that was then sub-divided with cheap construction to create 2-3 tiny apartments with only beds in them. No top sheet. No blankets. Just a mattress and a duvet and a bathroom across the hall. Squeaky floors. Thin walls (I can actually hear people farting in the bathroom down the hall with both doors closed). Living!

Legendary Camden Town music venue, The Good Mixer

Woke up jet lagged at an ungodly hour and went into Hidden Coffee here in Camden. It was totally pleasant. Then I headed over to the Barbican to see this exhibit on Postwar British Artists. It was totally and completely depressing. A lot of the folks represented in this exhibition were either refugees from the Holocaust or were deeply affected by the bombings in London, and so all the works were very, very dark. A lot of deeply disturbing paintings and sculpture. I felt like I was going to barf pretty much the whole time.

I’ve been having this really weird feeling all day… a little out of body, having been up for most of the 10 hour flight here, just running on fumes and caffeine. A little delirious, the anxiety creeping up. I have this feeling I might just suddenly lose it… shit myself or puke or explode in the museum or in the streets and make a messy, messy spectacle in the midst of these smartly dressed Londoners.

Next up, the Museum of London, which was also pretty disturbing, but in different ways. For those who have never been, the Museum of London doesn’t really try to give you hard facts about what London was like through the ages—rather it attempts to give you the impression of what happened. So there’s a lot of photos and artifacts and even sights and sounds from the time periods, but it’s a little light on exact events.

You walk through the history of the town, from Roman Londinuim to the modern era. They have exhibits on gladiatorial combat, the Black Plague, the fires, the executions, the wars, the triumphs and the tragedies of the ages. Not sure if it was the vibe from the previous exhibition at the Barbican that set me off, but I was definitely picking up on some darkness there. London is a dark city where a lot of bad stuff has gone down.

Scary children’s toys from the Museum of London

This feeling of darkness all coalesced around the museum’s reenactments of 1800s era London. They had a whole section dedicated to what a pub would look like in the 1800s, what a barber shop would look like, what a pharmacy would look like, what a market would look like, etc… each vignette brought to life by the sounds of people conversing playing on hidden speakers. They did an amazing job with tons of very authentic looking artifacts from that era.

Something about that time was deeply weird to me. The bizarre costumes, the sound montages of people interacting, the horrifying photos of the plagues and the fires, the disturbing children’s toys, the bomb shelters and food rationing, the evidence of Jack the Ripper… I came out positively shook. London is kind of a messed up place where a lot of stuff has gone down over time, and not all of it was good. And that dark undercurrent is still very much there. It’s palpable. When you have all that violence and tragedy that have happened in a place over a long period of time, it has to leave a residue. Just like The Shining… Some places are like people — some shine, and some don’t. In this sense, London is positively glowing.

Anyway, then I went to the Hoop and Grapes, which was a great, ancient pub, nicely updated to be cozy and comfortable. You really can’t beat an old British pub for understated charm.

A Confession

Some would call me a fool for spending so much of my time and energy creating music — thinking about it, planning it, obsessing over it. Some might say I am crazy.

I just listened to some podcasts earlier this week; interviews with Robert Plant and Paul Simon — giants of industry who each had their first hits by age 17. I’m not in the same league as them—probably never will be, but such is life.

I do have something to contribute to the cannon; entries into the lofty and by-all-means weighty tome that we call musicale historie.

Will anyone want to read or listen to the entry I make into said book? Time will tell.

But like it or not, this is my lot in life. To think, to plan, and to obsess over the creation of music. Who can argue with that? It may not be a traditional path, and as as I said, there have been and will continue to be detractors.

It doesn’t make me very much money, which is how the world measures success. But that to me is beside the point.

This is what I’m doing — end of story. I’ll do it as long and as often as I can until the day I die.  Whether it’s in the form of strumming a guitar, playing with synthesizers, or humming into an iPhone, this is what I do and what I will continue to do.

Some may say, “but you’ve never had a hit, and the music you make is strange and abstract. It doesn’t even feature a singer most of the time — how can you even hope to be taken seriously?”

And to that I say: so be it. This is who I am, and this is what I do. I tell stories with sound. Full stop.

Free Yourself

Photo by Milivoj Kuhar

Almost every bad feeling you’ve ever had

almost all the suffering you’ve ever experienced

was the result of attaching emotion and significance 

to some passing thought

that could have simply been ignored

Good Friday

Photo: Christopher Makos

Watched another episode of the Warhol documentary last night. It covered the part of his life when a lot of his friends, and especially his lover, John, got the ‘gay cancer’ in the mid-1980s. The ‘gay cancer.’ For some reason, that sounds so much worse than AIDS. So sad. 

Andy was such a talented artist, and not just for what he created in terms of paintings and films. The whole idea of being a celebrity, and your personality—your personal brand— being the work of art itself is just brilliant. They point out that although some others had done it before—Oscar Wilde, Salvador Dali, Gertrude Stein—but he was the one who really popularized it.

And now everyone is doing it; a pale imitation of it, at least. 

Everyone is seeking their 15 minutes of fame. It comes, then disappears before you even realized it had arrived.

And Warhol started going on these ridiculous sitcoms like The Love Boat, but only appearing as himself. It was like he was injecting himself into pop culture. Kind of elevating these stupid, disposable media products and lampooning them, almost exploding them. A real life person popping up next to Richie Cunningham. Interacting with the artifice. It’s very meta. 

Warhol’s relationship with Basquiat was so sad. They seemed to genuinely love and appreciate one another on multiple levels. An older, established, white artist, and a upcoming, brilliant young Black artist. But then the media got in the way, the critics said some horrible things, and Warhol couldn’t understand everything Basquiat was going through as a young Black man. I think it really hurt them both. Tragic. Especially when you think about what happens next and how they both end their lives.

The death of two icons. Two Sons. Two Saviors of the art world, of our culture.

A quote

Photo: David Becker

“We all have mothers and fathers, and what sweet anguish, sometimes terror, there is in those names... So much of the emotional content of our lives seems to occur before we are before we are 19 or 20, doesn’t it?

After that, we seem like stone walls, mortared together by scar tissue. The whole point is not to be. From all my reading… the main point or challenge is to stay as conscious as possible, absurd as that seems.”

- Jim Harrison, Sundog

A question

Photo: Olesia Bahrii

Could it be that progress is an illusion?

Is all we are now, all we’re destined to be?

Why I directly support artists

Directly supporting artists with as few middle entities as possible is very important to me. There are two reasons for this.

First, I grew up in an era where if you wanted to listen to music or discover new music outside of what was playing on the radio or MTV, you needed to go to a store to search for the physical record, tape, or CD. Maybe I’m just old fashioned, but I still get a lot of joy from the feeling of owning music, even if it is only a file on my hard drive. It brings with it a connection with the artist that doesn’t escape me.

Second, supporting artists directly is the most straightforward way to show appreciation for their art. In an era when audio-visual content—especially music—is viewed by most people as disposable or downright worthless, giving cold, hard cash to an artist feels like a revolutionary act.

You streaming?

Yes, I use streaming services. A necessary evil? I’m not sure they’re necessary, but they’re here and they aren’t going away.

From a listener’s standpoint, it’s the most convenient option. From the artist’s perspective, unless you’ve reached the Taylor Swift level of success, streaming makes sense for helping people discover your music.

That said, I understand what’s going on in the streaming game. It’s a nightmare for artists. Our music is being used for free in order for the Spotify and YouTube’s of the world to rake in advertising dollars. But this is the state we find ourselves in, and IMO it’s useless to stand in the way of progress.

Top 5 Bandcamp Purchases of Q4-2021

Today I’m sharing a few of my favorite purchases over the past few months. View my whole Collection on Bandcamp.

Rhucle - With

Rhucle is an amazingly prolific Japanese ambient artist. I discovered him last year through my new favorite newsletter, Flow State. When someone release 5+ albums a year (not singles -- albums of eight or more tracks each), you start to wonder about the quality of the material someone is putting out. You can’t put that much music out and still retain premium quality, right? Rhucle proved this thought wrong. Everything I’ve heard of his is really nice. It’s one of the most minimal forms of ambient music I’ve heard, but it’s also some of the most sublime. Rhucle is an expert at stripping music back until what’s left is only the essential elements, each of which are irreplaceable to the emotional impact. Of the albums he put out in 2021, this one is my favorite.

Romeo Poirier – Hotel Nota

Belgian artist Romeo Poirier’s music is tough to categorize. The lack of drums or obvious percussion suggests calling it ambient, but the brand of textures he utilizes and arrangement of loops makes it feel more like avant-garde techno. Not quite as aggressive as Barker, but approaching the same overall feeling.

Deepchord – Immersions

I’ve long appreciated Rod Modell’s work, in both his Deepchord and Echospace expressions. Immersions was released in 2018 on the excellent London-based label, Astral Industries, but I only recently picked it up. It’s composed of just two extended tracks, 17 and the 18 minutes long respectively. They feel like two takes from the same patch or arrangement of instruments. Modell’s work here is squarely between ambient and dub techno, being characterized almost entirely by an ocean of swirling synths and delicious undulating noise. No attack. Then from the briny deep arises a chugging 145bpm rhythm… It never fully emerges, the kick sometimes imperceptible, deep beneath the surface, but you feel it.

Truly sublime. Excellent stuff for long flights and late nights.

Pablo Bolivar – Framework of a Dream and Framework of a Dream Remixes

Spanish producer Pablo Bolivar released Framework of a Dream in June of 2021, and an album of remixes in December. Both are worth a spin. I realized last year there is a strong contingency of excellent deep techno producers from Spain and Italy. Bolivar is one of the rising stars of the genre, and a founding member of both the Avantroots and Seven Villas labels, both specializing in ambient and dub techno.

Martin Jarl – Everything You Do is Blue

Another solid release from Jarl. I found him from his previous release on Drift Deeper. This one, on Deep Electronics from the Netherlands, is equally fun, groovy, and chill – exactly the mix of ambient and techno I enjoy.

Meditation soundtracks

Photo by Alexander Schimmeck

I’ve long wanted to create a soundtrack for meditation – something you could use more or less as background music that was timed to allow you to meditate for a specific length.

The attraction of doing this is that it allows you to just concentrate on your meditation instead of checking whether or not you’ve gone past your required time. Sure, you can always use an alarm on your phone, but do you really want an alarm tone announcing the end of your meditation? For those who don’t, feel free to use these soundtracks. I’ve created one that is five minutes long, and one that is ten minutes long. I’ve also made them free downloads on SoundCloud.

Hope you find some utility with these.

Businessfunk

We’ve all seen the Windows 95 launch party, which is incredible in its own right.

But in fairness, the Rolling Stones shouldn’t have been part of the party at all. The rock and roll world was as foreign to Gates and the Boyz as the moon.

What the proud bouncing developers in this video should have been jamming to was “business funk.”

This is truly something special — a genre of Maximum Performance Music I only recently discovered, courtesy of a small link on Datassette’s excellent musicForProgramming website, which is a host of wonderful mixes in itself.

But business funk is something else entirely. Listening to the three mixes, I want to laugh and dance with equal measure. Purportedly compiled from the libraries of several collectors and assembled by Datassette himself, this funky ass music feels solidly rooted in the late 70s and early 80s, with beefy synth brass stabs and hair-tastic guitar solos. There’s what sounds like a whole lot of vintage synths being fully utilized. But there’s also some truly fantastic drum programming that brings it into the modern era,  and shows quite a similarity with Datassette’s brand of electro funk.

Well worth a visit and a listen. Check it out here.

Subtle Knowledge

One of Paramahansa Yogananda’s gurus - Swami Sri Yukteswar

The Vedas are an ancient body of knowledge that were never written down for millennia, only being orally transmitted and directly heard by rishis and their students. 

The over 100,000 couplets composing the Vedas were passed down in word and song in this manner because the holy people studying them understood the superiority of mind over matter. 

Paper and stone are subject to the obliterating effects of time. Memory and the tablets of the heart can never be destroyed. 

“The principles that operate in the outer universe, discoverable by scientists, are called the natural laws. But there are subtler laws that rule the hidden spiritual planes and the inner realm of consciousness; these principles are knowable through yoga.”

— Swami Sri Yukteswar Giri

The ancient yogis knew that matter is nothing more than congealed energy. With practice, they could manipulate it.

Christ, Patanjali, Krishna, Babaji — each knew their life’s trajectory from the very beginning. They lived only to give example that humans can transcend mortality.

Divinity in flesh gives us all something to aspire to — a concrete example of our own potential. 

Just do your shit

Faye Cornish

The lesson of today is: no one really cares.

What I mean is, don’t get all bugged out or fearful about trying something new or different because you’re worried about how it will be received or judged. It really doesn’t matter.

Most people won’t give a shit because they are totally and completely consumed by their own life and what they are doing at that moment and what they are planning to do next. Admit it – this is how you probably operate, as well. You kind of have to just to get anything done. Anyhow, when it comes down to it, the majority of people won’t care about what you’re doing.

 The people who do care will either applaud it, or think it’s meh and carry on with obsessing over themselves.

Those who applaud really are the only people you need to give a shit about. They are potential fans, collaborators, and co-conspirators and therefore should be cared for and respected, or at least are worth having a conversation with.

Just do your shit.

Endless Wanting

Alexis Fauvet

If there is one quintessential aspect that defines what it is to be alive, it’s wanting. Constant wanting. I want, you want, he and she and they want. We all want.

What do we want?

We want pleasurable things and enjoyable experiences, of course. We want safety and happiness for ourselves and our loved ones, and at the same time we want to move away from suffering and boredom and pain.

Much of our lives and the events that make them up can be sorted into these two categories: moving toward pleasure, and moving away from pain.

The issue, of course, is that no sooner do we acquire that pleasurable thing or experience, than we are bored by it. The pleasure that it delivers is fleeting, and in a matter of weeks or days or even seconds after we get that thing, we move on to want something else.

And so the cycle continues… endlessly.

“The warmth of the sun feels wonderful on your skin, but soon it becomes too much of a good thing. A move to the shade brings immediate relief, but after a minute or two, the breeze is just a little too cold. Do you have a sweater in the car? Let’s take a look. Yes, there it is. You’re warm now, but you notice that your sweater has seen better days. Does it make you look carefree, or disheveled? Perhaps it’s time to shop for something new. And so it goes…”

— Sam Harris

You need only be in the presence of an infant for a few moments before you observe the constant oscillation between joy and sorrow that washes over their features from minute to minute. In truth, as adults we’re subject to the same ceaseless tides, but we know how to control our outer form so as to hide the oscillation (for the most part). But that does nothing to stop this constant wanting, wanting, wanting. Something new. Something different. Something pleasurable. Something fun. Something to look forward to on the weekend.

It’s exhausting, when you think about it. And yet that is who we are at our core—wanting beings, motivated to satiate our thirst for pleasure and to flee from pain, suffering, and boredom.

How do we opt out? We can’t really. But there are things that help.

One of the most conducive practices, I find, is meditation. There are many forms, but the one that I find most helpful is to sit comfortably and close your eyes. Breathe slowly and evenly. Begin to repeat silently in your mind a mantra or mind tool to capture your attention and let your mind relax. I find the most useful mantra is “let go.” Just silently say “let go,” to yourself, and while doing so, let go of the ceaseless thoughts that naturally arise in your mind. Be a rock in the river of thought.

Don’t try to stop your thoughts -- that is a futile task. Acknowledge them as they arise, but don’t engage. Just let them drift away.

When you find yourself engaging with a thought, don’t get frustrated--that’s a natural occurrence. Just calmly disengage. Let go of the thought and return to the mantra.

How does this help with the constant desiring that we inevitably experience? I find that meditation—this act of disengaging from our thoughts and concerns—is very similar to the disengagement that we need to employ with our desires. Instead of constantly looking forward to that thing or event or time in the future that will “make everything better,” you can try to enjoy the present. Be in the now.

Find the simple pleasure in what you’re doing now, like reading a blog post, educating your mind, finding a good piece of advice. Give the gift of your full attention to whatever you are engaged in.

It’s a process, and it will never really be perfect, but I find the more we employ meditative practices like this, the less we are consumed with our desires. It also helps us be more enmeshed in the present moment, as opposed to pining for some moment in the past or future that seems more optimal.

Best of luck with it.  

Brian Eno: Windows 95 Theme Composer

I love that Eno composed the Windows 95 theme. Here’s the backstory which is pretty interesting.

What’s also interesting is listening the original track — both at original speed (4 seconds), and slowed down by 2300%.

Sacred Mountain EPs

This week I’m releasing the first in a new series of singles I’m calling the Sacred Mountain EPs, which will be released between August and October, 2021. Listen now on my Spotify or Bandcamp pages.

Sacred mountains have always fascinated me. I have had some of my most profound spiritual experiences in nature, especially in climbing mountains, and I know I’m not alone.

Since earliest recorded history, mountains have been places where humans went to experience transcendence, probably because they were physically ascending closer to heaven or what we believe to be spiritual worlds.

Mountains are holy places that are feared, revered, and sometimes both.

Mount Fuji, or Fuji-san, is the highest mountain in Japan and one of Japan’s three sacred mountains. It has been a frequent subject of artists, poets, and filmmakers the world over, but especially those coming from that nation.

The ancient samurai used the base of Mount Fuji as a remote training area, and folk tales tell of ghosts and demons roaming the forests surrounding the northwest face.

A shinto cult called Fuji-kō venerated the mountain as a female deity, and encouraged members to climb it. The paths leading up and around the mountain still host multiple shrines, teahouses, and huts dedicated to spirits of the area.

A well-known Japanese proverb suggests a wise person will climb Fuji-san once in their lifetime, but only a fool would climb it twice.

Swinging Doors

I’ve been reading Shunryu Suzuki’s Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind, which is an amazing and very approachable overview of Zen meditation. It’s kind of the perfect companion piece to the book I was previously obsessed with (and can’t recommend enough) — The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle.

I love this passage:

“Our usual understanding of life is dualistic: you and I, this and that, good and bad. But actually these discriminations are themselves awareness of the universal existence.

‘You’ means to be aware of the universe in the form of you, and ‘I’ means to be aware of it in the form of I. You and I are just swinging doors. This is the true experience of life through Zen practice.”

— Shunryu Suzuki

Emotional circuitry: making music in the 21st century

Photos by valentin müller and slim emcee

Is it easier to create music today compared to earlier generations? One could make the argument it is in light of the technology we have at our disposal.  

To begin with, we are no longer restricted to a music studio to record. Mobile technology has made it simple to bring the studio practically anywhere and to record at any time. 

Additionally, for those making electronic music and music with the computer, we now have all sorts of gadgets that make it easier to sound good. Scale filters ensure our melodies hit all the right notes (if we’re playing keys). Quantizers help lock our rhythms to a grid, so no percussion strays out of time. We even have autotune, so singing can be artificially locked into key. 

All this adds up to an easier, more streamlined process of finishing songs, right? Absolutely. 

But are those songs any better than those created by previous generations? Not necessarily. 

While technology has allowed people with little to no musical training to jump in, it doesn’t necessarily mean ‘hits’ are being cranked out any faster than they have in the past. I’m not trying to be elitist or to cast shade on people making music without “proper musical training.” Nothing of the sort. These little technological helpers have lowered the bar of entry to a point where anyone with the will can begin making music with a little self education and an exploratory mindset. This has given an immense amount of people a lot of joy and stress relief. Music is medicine, both for the artist and the listener. 

What I’m trying to get at here is that just because composing and finishing a track is somewhat easier than it used to be with the shortcuts technology affords doesn’t mean you can more easily strike creative gold. 

Yes, technology can give us some shortcuts, but what makes music memorable is rarely what these devices can deliver.

The x-factor that makes music cherished by others is the emotional force behind it. Emotion comes strictly from the human mind — at least it has up until now (that may change in the future). Emotional substance is what lies behind the hooks that grab us and pull us along for the ride.

Emotion is heard most easily in vocal melodies because they use the human voice and language, both of which can readily transmit meaning in an intuitive way. But emotion can be transmitted by any instrument if the musician plays it the right way. 

Sometimes something really simple can have a lot of power. A well thought out sequence of two or three notes in the right placement can transcend simplicity to speak deeply to us.

It all starts with the timbres used and the melodies assigned and deployed with care and feeling. That’s where the magic comes from, and has from the beginning of human creativity - an artist making conscious choices of what they wish to say and how to say it. Sure, technology gives us a few shortcuts, but if emotional resonance is what you’re after, it all starts with you. 

The last generation of human musicians

photo: andrew petrischev

How far away are we from artificially intelligent artists replacing human artists? It’s within our lifetimes, for sure.  Some say it’s as close as five years.

Google’s Project Magenta proved that machine learning/artificial intelligence can study Bach fugues and compose music so similar, musicologists can’t distinguish them from actual Bach fugues. The project has effectively proved that machine learning can study and then replicate the compositional patterns of even the most intricate and learned composers, with a high degree of sophistication.

Startups like Authentic Artists are creating AI-powered, virtual artists, armed with AI-generated music that they can control and that listeners can interact with in virtual environments. 

“We are very intentionally not trying to create a digital facsimile of what already exists... We want to use new tools to create new art, new experiences, new culture. The appeal is that these artists can really be vehicles for collaboration with the audience, so that [audience members] can selectively shape the live show.”

— Chris McGarry, Authentic Artists

I’m all for new creative and artistic experiences. My worry is that once people can’t tell the difference between music created by a human and that created by a machine, it’s a slippery slope to cutting them out of the process altogether.

Think about the fact that Spotify effectively eliminated thousands of working artists’ careers, virtually overnight, by replacing the royalties paradigm with the streaming paradigm. 

Think about the fact that the CEO of Spotify, Daniel Ek, is paid more per year than all the fees the company pays to artists annually—combined. And that Spotify, at 155 million paying subscribers at time of writing, is still losing money most quarters.

I don’t mean to pick on Spotify here (and I hate that I probably sound like that guy from Metallica). I’m simply making the point that if profit and convenience are the driving factors pushing in the music industry forward today—and they certainly seem to have been from the Napster era onward—it’s a very small step to simply pushing those artist fees to an emerging company like Authentic Artists to replicate the style and sound of every original artist out there. 

How many fans would actually care? I hope a great many would… but you never know.

Sidenote: jump to the 1 hour mark of this Mylar Melodies interview with BT for a detailed discussion of this topic - with some potential solutions.

Perhaps music will continue to be a hobby for humans in the future—something we like to amuse ourselves with. But commercially, can humans compete with AI? It remains to be seen. Without a doubt, the era of AI musicians is upon us. 

I’d love to be wrong about this, but I don’t think I am.

How to start when you can't get started

Photo: Kelly Sikkema

I’ve been in a bit of a creative slump recently. It happens to us all. I thought I’d share something I’ve found that helps get the juices flowing.

This is going to sound a little silly but: start by intentionally creating something bad. Just do something random. If you’re a photographer, start by taking random photos. If you’re a musician. just loop some random audio and work it a little or record some random guitar and lyrics. Do anything you need to do to just get started.

This may not sound like much of a strategy, but I’ve found that once you get the ball rolling, it’s a lot easier to keep going. That jump from zero to one is incredibly more difficult than going from one to two. You’re overcoming inertia and giving yourself license to jam.

By giving your creation no intention, you set the standard by which you can actually create something decent, with intention.

Kill the critic. You need to silence that part of your brain that tells you that you need to create something perfect, or it’s not worth creating at all. Get into that experimental mode of creation.

This technique starts you down the path where anything is allowed, nothing is bad, and it’s all just raw material that you’re creating. it’s an incredibly liberating place to be—and exactly where you need to be to generate something interesting. You can always come back later with your critic’s hat on and slash and burn all the crap. But you need to get that crap out of the way, prime the pump so to speak, in order to make way for the good shit.

Plus, if you start by creating something intentionally bad, there’s only one place to go -- up. Let me know how this works for you.

Unplugging from the Simulation

markus spiske

You’ve likely come across the idea online before — are we living in a computer simulation? Perhaps you’ve seen the clip of Elon Musk telling an audience at a tech conference that the probability of us not living in a simulation is “one in billions.”

I never gave it much thought beyond some leisure reading. But I saw The Truman Show for the first time recently, which immediately reminded me of The Matrix—a far darker version of a very similar story. 

For those who haven’t seen either and without spoiling things, both films deal with a hero who through a series of chance events begins to doubt the nature of his reality. He confides with close friends and family about his doubts, and they all poo poo his silly thoughts. The hero then ventures further to find some of those doubts well founded. 

The films ask the same question philosophers and scientists have been asking for years—how ‘real’ is what we call reality? Is what our senses pick up all there is, or might they deceive us? What’s to say our waking lives are not a vivid dream, or perhaps a very convincing computer simulation? 

For some, these are silly questions—of course we’re living in reality! The difficult part comes when one tries to prove that. 

Early ponderings

Plato is probably the earliest person to raise these question in Republic with the Allegory of the Cave. 

Imagine a group of prisoners chained in a cave, facing a blank wall. There’s a fire behind them and puppets used to cast shadows onto the wall they face. 

For the prisoners, the shadows are reality. It’s all they may ever know. But their reality is untrue. 

Suppose one prisoner escaped. They would see the fire was not sunlight, and the figures on the wall were shadow puppets. If they left the cave, real sunlight would hurt their eyes because they wouldn’t be accustomed to it. They may wish to return to the safety of the cave where things were dark and familiar.

How can a person who knows more return to the old ways? 

Powerful computers of the future

While Rene Descartes and many others have touched on these themes since Plato, Oxford University philosopher and author Nick Bostrom brought the argument into the modern age with “Are you Living in a Computer Simulation?,” a paper he wrote in 2003.

The argument goes like this: 

1. Anyone with even a passing awareness of computer games can see how far we’ve come from early Atari games in a very short period.

2. Assuming any rate of progress at all, Bostrom poses it’s likely our descendants will have extremely powerful computers able to run very realistic simulations. Simulations indistinguishable from reality.

3. Those simulated worlds would be populated by simulated beings.

4. How can we prove we are not one of those beings, dwelling in one of those simulated worlds?

It’s a very difficult thing to do.

michael dziedzic

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

— Arthur C. Clarke

Where this leads

If we assume this argument is correct, there are numerous reactions one could have, among them: 

• If this reality is a simulation, does anything I do really matter?

• Am I the only “real” being in this simulation, or are there others?

• If there aren’t other “real” beings, do I have license to behave immorally?

Sadly, things have already gone in this direction.

In 2003, a teen with undiagnosed mental illness became obsessed with The Matrix. Thinking he was living inside a simulation, he decided to shoot and kill his adoptive parents with a shotgun. The trial spawned what’s now called The Matrix Defense.

Some have made the point that simulation theory is merely a 21st century spin on religious ideas, some of them quite ancient — our relationship with a higher power, living within its Creation, etc. A new film explores these themes — I’m curious to check it out.

Conclusion

When it comes down to it, even if it’s true, does it matter if we are living in a very convincing simulation? 

Only if we realize that this is as real as it gets. As far as we know, this reality is all we have. But there’s a very good chance a lot more is going on than what our senses tell us. 

For Jeff Tweedy, Writing Songs IS Finding Meaning

Great podcast here: Malcolm Gladwell interviewing Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy about how he writes songs, supporting his recent book on the same topic. 

Like a lot of artists, what stitches Tweedy’s songs together is intuition — linking the seemingly random events of life; drawing together the themes to create a tapestry that somehow makes sense to him. This bit at the end really jumped out at me.  Jump to about 40:00.

As Tweedy mentions, often, we are too busy, stressed out, and worried to actually observe what is going on around us. We have a million things vying for our attention, and many times, they succeed in distracting us from our immediate reality. 

But when we do take the time and make the effort to actually see and experience reality, it’s often telling us a strange, fascinating, and beautiful story. 

That story is being told  all the time —  we just need to stop what we’re doing and pay attention.

I’ve always believed we as humans are meaning-seeking creatures. We need to make sense of the world we live in.  We need to let our brains do that — to find the meaning. Meaning makes sense to us — far more sense than randomness and ambiguity and chance. We’re designed to do that.

So don’t be such a nihilist, ok?