B-Sides

A debate about which I have never understood much is that between those who are proponents of logic, and those who espouse emotion. Generally speaking, women have made the case for emotion to me as a valid tool of rhetoric and argument. I definitely find merit in the idea, but haven't really given much thought to the idea as I have, until now, mostly dismissed the idea. Let's explore the concepts and origins behind both ideas and try to draw some conclusions.

Logic is the foundation of modern thought. Classical western thought, pioneered by a bunch of famous Greek guys, revolves around the idea of logic as the means by which we can find meaning in this world. If one's argument doesn't follow logically, it is deemed to be invalid and worthless. Classical thought further separates things and ideas into categories to make them easier to understand and classify accordingly for our own purposes. Whether or not this entire method of though has practical backing in reality, the method is sound. We can see clearly how if one condition is true, another must also be true and vice versa. Logic also has a sort of quasi-religious status under this theory, denoting man as the "rational animal." We are not animals like dogs and cats because we have the ability to reason. Without any logic or reason, we would live in chaos and society would simply not exist.

Emotion as a tool of rhetoric, has been largely discredited by those who have held power historically. It has been demonized as a method by which one can manipulate the hearts of susceptible individuals. It is the best friend of cult leaders and propagandists alike, for its ability to sway the minds of those who believe with only their hearts without taking reality into proper consideration. However, because emotion has been abused and looked down upon, does not make it an invalid or useless tool. Indeed, I would argue that without emotion, life would hardly be worth living. The reason for which we need logic beyond mere survival is deeply rooted in emotion. We, as children, use our emotions as excuses for our actions without a second though. But when is emotion a valid argument for why, and when is it something that works against us? Emotion is a product of our primitive mind and often complex, confusing, and seemingly random. Any one event or stimulus can produce a wide array of emotions from different people. Does that make emotion any less valid of a thing? Should we second-guess all feelings before we act upon them? The answer seems to be "it depends."

The most beautiful irony of emotion and its analysis is that attempting to cut it into pieces and categories so that we can dissect and understand it the way classical thought would have us do leads only to frustration. If logic is digital, emotion is surely analog. While it makes the world a harder place to live in, not all matters can be boiled down to a few lines that dictate risk, behavior, and consequences. It's an interesting critique of our society to note that we have collectively decided that it is more important to fit all matters into "yes/no" questions rather than attempt to take them case by case. This is largely, I believe, for efficiency. The reason I'm delving into society is because for me (and I suspect anyone else reading this), your entire way of thinking and frame of reference is shaped by our society. Can you imagine living in a society that has no rules written down anywhere? Perhaps a society that doesn't differentiate between scholastic subjects? The only real difference between math, science, art, literature, and music is that we slapped different names on them and invented different ways of thinking about them. In reality, they're all related and intertwined. Scholars know this, and it's the reason for which you were forced to get a "well rounded" education.

What I find fascinating is that delving into emotion as a valid means of argument has led me to the entire foundation of our society. It seems unimaginable to think that our society has so wholeheartedly rejected such an obviously valid method of perception. I believe that there can be marriage between both methods of thinking, and that while some things are best thought out, ignoring our emotions and the reasons for which we find life sacred would be a huge mistake.

Quiet of Mind

Music is probably the least understood thing on the planet. We study it much for its composition, prose, format, flow, and enjoyment in addition to scientific measurements like the physics of sounds and acoustics. What we don't really study or particularly understand is what it actually is, why we love it, and how it can affect us in the ways that it does. I saw a video once that I wasn't able to find for this posting that displays how clearly all people understand music scales intuitively across the world, regardless of their background. Why?

What's more, music is a drug. There's no doubt that music can completely change your mood, your thinking, or what you do. Music, while it may have become butchered and corporate in an relative sense, completely engulfs and surrounds us to the point at which it is so omnipotent that we often fail to realize its presence at all. Rarely do we focus on the music in the background of a store, television show, movie or possibly even a car when we intentionally turned it on. We get lost in it, and it's lost on us.

The key question is, and this might be getting too technical, how can a combination of sound waves affect us more than more concrete physical stimuli, and why? Music may be translated for processing by our brain via neurotransmitters, but that's merely a means of signal transduction and not at all a novel chemical process. Why can certain sounds and combinations of sounds produce varying feelings? Even if we can understand the pathways, it still doesn't follow that we can understand the evolutionary purpose of such a mechanism. Certainly music may be a tool for bonding, but it seems rather far-fetched that early man's survival hinged on the concept of being able to make and enjoy music. What's more, other creatures besides humans display enjoyment of music, which implies that such an evolution would have taken place at a relatively early point before species differentiation. Yet, there couldn't have been music on primitive earth! The notion of actually enjoying sounds other than those that are not too shrill or intense (which we sometimes do anyway), is completely baffling as far as I can tell from a scientific perspective. Then again, I'm hardly an expert.

Music is whatever we make of it, and rarely do people share the same tastes, but we ought to appreciate the power music has and share our love of it with others. It's a shame how many music programs have been cut from school in favor of other subjects that are no more important in any educated person's experience. One thing that we can be certain of is that love of music is deeply encoded in our genes. We ought not take such an amazing facet of our reality and treat it as a matter of minor importance. A world without music, to me, is the same as a world without color.