The Science Of Decency

Nothing is less fulfilling in life than working towards something you don't believe in. Nurture your soul and your passions. Find what works for you!

Biological lifeforms adapt and change. No standard of beauty has ever existed intrinsically as a standard before it was accepted as such by the individual. A standard is an attribution of regularity to an object or concept. Attribution, however, are subject to its predecessor: mind. Mind is found found in the individual before a collective, so socially accepted beauty is all communicated and accepted attribution. Beauty, by being accepted as such, therefore truly is in the eye of the beholder. To see things with beauty is to give it that beauty. So then, it is possible that if all things have the potential to be ugly, then all have the potential to be beautiful, as well.

Balance exists in the essence of particles themselves, to an extent (positive and negative charges, inside and outside positions, polarities, etc). But mostly, reality's essence contains balance, as the very fibers of our reality have been distinguished from nothingness, and apart from all other permutations. The distinction made between nothing and something comes as a single action, which implies that something is inseparable from nothing, as nothingness is required for something to exist.

Wrap your head around that.

Also, symmetrical beauty is a concept that sprang up with the evolution of eyes, not of core elements, themselves. Inherently, by elemental design, nothing is greater than one another because it has two equally constructed sides. The streams and mountains of this earth are asymmetric. Think about this: Trees have existed for as long as we have, and are asymmetric. So is it a product of higher intelligence that symmetry becomes appealing? Even molecular and organic configurations are asymmetric. Nature hasn't made perfectly visually symmetrical objects due to the influence of an ever changing, dynamic, and chaotic system. So, even the outward appearance of symmetry will be just a vague impression of the fallacy that is so-called "symmetrical beauty". Some particle configurations, especially when manifested by (nano-) technological means, are symmetrical in appearance. Formed in and by a universe that is asymmetric in nature (oh the chaos!)... are these particles truly symmetrical? Perhaps for a moment. Asymmetry, in that moment, shouldn't lose it's appeal because of the temporary nature of configuration.

Trust me, it's there. See "The Bandwagon Blues" for a little bit on the subject of perceptual differences. Also, try to think about personal responsibility. No spoiler here because this one is really important.

If there must be a time for peace, and a time for war, then when will those times be? I have found that it is helpful for cohabitation if we establish the standpoint of peace with regard to the social state of peace, and war with regard to the social state of war. In other words, enjoy the peace we have, and constantly battle against the concept of war. When we do this, we choose to sustain peace as a goal and focus our destructive tendencies on breaking down the barriers which cause violence and hardship. Yes, it is true that everyone is different, and interpersonal war is inevitable. However, choosing to engage in violence between individuals shows that the choices are being made for violence and suffering, in lieu of embracing our inherent differences. If war is unavoidable, the constant push for peace and defense against war should make enacting the times of conflict an uphill battle. Also, this concept is supplemental to any clear and present need for self-defense. Looking out for oneself is of course a desire to maintain the life, a choice for peace in conflicting times. What's even more extreme is that the dead can not change their ways, so killing over ideologies is a one-way judgment. Living people can control their own repentance. Living people can see the light in your, and their own, actions. Living people will hear your passion better than dead people can. Living people can make the choice to change. How little patience is too much patience, anyways?

Doing so helps others feel secure by allowing them to manage and use their own intellectual, and physical resources. There is no need to put an unnecessary burden on others if you don't have to! It is also okay to gracefully accept gifts and hospitality. Preparation is key! Balance is healthy!

Human kindness must start somewhere. Start human kindness with itself: human kindness...and end it there, too! Compensation can become monotonous. When kindness regularly becomes a “give-then-get” action-reaction situation, it can soon be expected to get from others when you give. When it is expected, it turns into a “give-to-get” situation. In other words, kindness can slowly, and unintentionally transform into a transaction. Kindness has no price. If we reap what we sow, to give freely is to reap the reward of seeing others prosper as well as ourselves, by sowing a kind action. Also, when you show some kindness, others will find it easier to value you more positively, resulting in a stronger bond between people. This feedback is a fringe benefit of being awesome.

Pleasantries often get swept into the "routine" category. By reapplying them in a more conscious manner, they lose the stale atmosphere of "going through the motions" and become more what they aspire to be: a push (or blessing) for maintaining positive interpersonal cohabitation.

Depth of forethought has the potential to greatly enhance the compliment to be more meaningful. It also can make the compliment a little more outstanding and conscious. This enables it so that you can feel like you, too, appreciate the depth of both the compliment and what it is you are complimenting.

By not reinforcing the behavior in any way, the behavior receives no resistance, therefore, the force applied gains no merit. This will send the message that their behavior was not effective in eliciting a response. However, this can cause the activator to potentially escalate their actions, if they feel that what they are doing isn't enough to get the reaction they desire. This also may be perceived as passive aggressive. However, you are in control of how you react to situations, as well as whether you act on the situation.

Punctuality with accuracy is honesty, circumstantially. Though circumstances should be treated as such, and left to patience and understanding, it is nice to have some oversight and follow-through with regards to punctuality.

Enhancing your understood values regarding physical entities can make communicating them a notable amount more efficient. This is essentially eyeballing something and doing more calculations with small math rather than less calculations with big math. It will work easier for some and make it more difficult for others. I grasped small math very easily as a child and it supported this idea for me.

Having a great vocabulary (vernacular, lexicon, knowledge base of words) refines your ability (power, push [bad], moxy, mojo) to articulate your feelings, requests, and explanations. Practicing being your own thesaurus (word-book thing) develops flexibility in your vernacular, leading to more practiced options (options by itself instead of "practiced options", choices, pieces [bad, but close]) when the time is right. Sometimes you will have found the right word in the original sentence. If that happens, don't fret, just congratulate (praise, cheer on) yourself.

White lies are lies, too. Telling a white lie could reinforce bad behavior, sending the recipient further towards a negative situation. Honesty, no matter how small it may seem, gives the recipient real, and applicable data, in which they can use to better themselves.

Reason comes from our attachment of purpose to action. When we release this, we can step back and see the true interconnection between any function and any purpose. This is done through comparison between what it means to attach purpose and what it means to not attach purpose. The logical distance between the two outlines the actions required to bridge the gap. That logical gap is usually mapped by some sort of goal we wish to achieve with that object. For example, if a wine glass is generally placed on the right side, it may be because the person drinking that wine is right-handed, and its general position constitutes ease of access. The ease of access is the goal, where the position is the means of function. The purpose is defined as having it on the right side (instead of the left), because it would fulfill the goal.

Doing this can help you better align your actions, great and small, to your overall goals. By examining each action in full, you are allowing yourself to gain oversight, and subsequently make available discretion regarding the variables which each action manipulates. If something is found unfit, or only partially fit to achieving overall goals, the oversight allows adjustable involvement, if the user calibrates his/her actions to the particular variables which are desirable. Try mapping out a walking path differently, so that errands could be run more efficiently. You use this concept by changing your actions to better reflect a new purpose.

Knowing how a company frames and sells their product can arm you against the subtle psychology used in many advertisements. It has been one of the most useful things I have ever learned. Knowing how the companies have framed their products has kept me from frivolous spending on many occasions, because I remember what light in which I have been told to see the product. Then step back and think practically. Do you need this item? Is the purpose of this item consistent with the path of life you choose to take? There is no wrong answer, so long as it is honest. It has also clued me in to many of those times when I felt like someone was only trying to give me one side of the story, or only telling me what they think I want to hear. It helps to get in the habit of exploring options because we are less easily misled by being practiced when the time comes for it to be necessary. Care and discretion is highly recommended when developing and applying this tip in social scenarios.

1. We can't change what happened, but we can look back on it and use our present knowledge to provide for ourselves a more efficient solution. If ever a problematic situation presented itself again, the active retrospection will benefit by providing for us a solution in memory. Don't feel bad if you find something better, or you felt like something you did was “stupid”. You can't blame yourself then for the knowledge you have now (this is explained more in tip #24).

There is simply no indirect correlation between an action and its immediate results. Throwing salt over your shoulder can make the dinner of the person behind you a little more bitter (and make that person a little less comfortable!). Knocking on wood is not much more than noise. If the universe (esp the part about our living conditions) depended on the relative position of salt at any given time, or the availability of knuckle-to-wood contact, I think that it might be more prominently expressed, like our desire for food. Instead, let's make our own luck by being efficient where we can.

Entertainment television spreads information in moderate amounts. Music grounds us in rhythms and can speak messages through lyrics, rhythms, and melodies. Competitive sports exercise our mind and body. Not all entertainment is unproductive.

Daydreaming is the near-sterile, quarantined test-center of the mind. Think about how you would react to situations you've never come across. Even if the daydream seems somewhat trivial, you build information about topics that may be related to these concepts in the future. This strengthens future efficiency by supporting possibly supplemental connections. It doesn't hurt to put the energy forth and invest in your future, even if you're not quite sure of the payout.

Coping with death isn't easy for some. Though, know and remember that even individual cells die to make way for new ones. People as a whole die when the cooperation of the cells can not resist the flow of entropy through the system. The overwhelming flow of entropy through the system could be due to basic chaotic breakdown (cells working to their maximum cooperative potential, but failing to maintain integrity above any circumstantial resistance), disease assisted, or incident assisted (such as an unfortunate life-taking accident).

That which you think is unnecessary is here, and provides an integral part of life: diversity. Diversity is the main ingredient for distinction, and some colors, or concepts really do have their place, like war and peace (see tip #5 on appropriating those two divergent concepts).

What is done is done. The state of "living in the now" was both present then and again now. The absence of a thought in the past is not persecuted by the thoughts of now. No jury should convict you of a crime you could not prevent because the means came too late.

Even the winds change at their own discretion. If we would claim that it blows southwest, but then does not, the chaos is the result of our own shortcomings in micro-climate knowledge. It is because we **can not** know everything that chaos exists, and therefore, we can be wrong. Absolute thinking will probabilistically lead to absolute failure. It does us much good to accept that variables change with the situation, not with our ability to accept and/or understand them. Chances are, we may know a lot, but our powers of perception and logic are limited. Being careful and humble about our knowledge keeps us from being wrong and ill-informed in those situations in which we do find our limitations getting the better of us.

Unthinking nature lives, too. Trees, in particular, are an amazing external source for nature's secrets. Their prominent and recursive fractal figure illustrates, beautifully, the self-recursive format of many living beings' construction. We find relation to this in the relative recursive construction of our torso to limbs to fingers, increasing in relative number of extremities, but reducing in size. The transfiguration of branch to leaf shows the blossoming nature of specialized functions, much like our fingernails. Also, think about the individual pieces which make up a complex fractal image, such as the cells and their interconnectivity to one another. This is important because in order to understand, manipulate, and apply top tier information with clarity, one must understand the foundation which supports it. Explore this on your own and don't forget to thank the trees with a hug. Too far?

Self control is good to practice. Reducing indulgence intake to a grateful minimum (a little bit is good for morale) can save us on resources and bad habits. To have even a little bit of it will aid in future decision making processes, as we open ourselves more to accepting practical things in place of indulgent things.

What is a day? What is a year? With constant change and irregularity in the universe, enabling standards of measurement (which assume the measures will remain as they are) is incorrect. In fact, changes in relative time measurements are occurring right now. Because we can't empirically perceive them, doesn't mean they aren't there. The measurement for a non-metric hour (1/24 of an earthly rotation), might only be changed by a nanosecond every 100 years (I don't know the math, and if I did, it would change anyways), but it is changing. Even still, the earthly rotation isn't perfectly regular around an axis, as there is movement and spin in all directions, all the time, making the notion of time measurement based on a single axis short-sighted, and thus, inherently ineffective. And if something extremely massive body came into our solar system and dramatically changed our rotation or revolution, current measure fails to be accurate. What we can do to maintain some semblance of sanity (as this can be a very core topic to shake up) is remain on what is a “great estimation” of current near-regularity. If you're feeling good about this, celebrate your birthday twice in one astrological week (or month) or celebrate the birthday of another, blatantly disregarding astrological standards. It is a good time to be alive, isn't it?