The Special Edition...
Philosophizing on the Frontlines
I am sorry for disappearing for about a month. I was expecting to be busy in March, before the war started. These days I am busy keeping my family safe and happy between sirens instead.
It’s unrealistic for me to comprehensively describe the crazy life we’re living right now, as I am a whimsical thinker and writer. As usual, I’d rather capture something I think not many people are thinking right now, as it has the best chance of proving to be mentally sticky. Well, here it is.
Thinking you have it all figured out is the single best predictor for disappointment in life in the best case scenario, or annihiliation in the worst.
Twelver Shi’ism is a creed of Islam that predicts the future: The “Mahdi” (messiah) will return one day, following a big war, and make life a paradise for true believers. If you think this is childish, unsophisticated, and naïve, you are a healthy human being. But this kind of belief is understandable if your culture grew in a region where life, in general, is short and bitter.
An Ayatollah is an infallible true believer. He can’t be wrong in his decisions, which makes for a very poor learner. A Shaheed (martyr), is someone who believed in Muhammad’s Allah so devotedly, that death is the best thing that could’ve been his lot in life. Again, this is a serious impediment in the way to learning.
The person who navigates with utmost, unshakable confidence will be lost as soon as any unforeseen change is made to the way.
Donald Trump is borderline dastardly. He is out there to make a buck; to win an award he covets; to profit generally for his own sake. I don’t like the man on a personal level, but he is something we usually think of as bad, that is actually very good in evolutionary terms: Donald Trump is an OPPORTUNIST.
Opportunists don’t live life like they know what the future holds. They are the opposite of ideologues. They are keen observers of reality, knowing that life holds opportunities that come and go as fast as the blink of an eye. They are learners who are far more likely to evolve in terms of what they know, which depends on what their focus in life is (Trump’s focus is on things I personally consider ultimately worthless).
When Trump says “we’ll see in two weeks”, he means it. He’s looking at opportunities that he proactively creates by being a shaker of the cultural snowglobe. If he’ll see one he likes, he’ll go for it.
For this reason, Trump is what the world needs even though I wouldn’t want wish it on anyone to be like him in most respects. But in one respect, he is the antidote to any worldview based on ideology — the kind that leads to big wars that should’ve been small wars.
Just as I can look at the tribal cultures of the Middle East and find, among the violence, rigidity, and oxheadedness, beautiful qualities like unwavering loyalty to family, so I can find the good in Trump’s mode of living. After all, life isn’t black and white.
If you had any doubts, the IRGC are crushed. What got them crushed is their inability to evolve fast enough, and they are in good company — the company of anything that got extinct before them, be it a culture or a species.
I’m sitting here between sirens knowing that my demise could come at any momemt - that’s just what life is like. But I also know that by being an inquisitive opportunist, an adaptive learner, I am making sure that my demise will happen at a moment I really could not avoid. I am as far away as possible from fearing for my life, because my life has been, and is, fitting with reality. I don’t have illusions.
I guess the point of this post is to connect philosophy, geopolitics, and my own wellbeing. Weird, I know, but hopefully it makes sense nevertheless.
Keep your distance from prophecy, and always be learning. Chances are that you’ll live well for just as long as you could and should.
Your dutiful reporter,
Eyal