Flight Risks

It seems like FAA officials are going to have to step up their game-theory perspectives as we grapple with the cascading effects of flight risks and counter-measures. There is no way to make self-reporting more attractive to pilots when risk-aversion would have any issue lead to grounding; there is no way to lock out the bad guys from the cockpit without also running the risk of locking out the good guys; there is no way to address the asymmetrical risk of armed pilots without arming the rest of the flight crew, thereby creating the distributed risk of firearms on aircraft; and, ultimately, there is no way to balance the risk between actors if two or more of them are in collusion. Ultimately, we have to accept that we put our lives in the hands of others, and no amount of screening or monitoring or other, clever counter-measures can replace an instilled sense of morality that would have caused Andreas Lubitz to overdose on sleeping pills to end his suffering rather than taking the lives of 150 people along with his. This apparent, growing trend of murder-suicide (sometimes, killing to be killed) is quite disturbing. It is as if people want to be remembered, no matter how.

Fundamentally Similar, Systematically Different

Every time I spend time with a curious mind in an outdoor setting, I eventually point out how people, monkeys, dogs, cats, mice, etc, are basically the same pattern with different implementations - i.e. same skeletal structure, same organs, same major functions, implemented at different scales with other, systematic differences that are essential for the survival of the mammal in question. The similarities extend down to the most fundamental building blocks of life, DNA, where humans have a 100% overlap amongst themselves, with differences only in the sequence of genes, a 98% overlap with chimpanzees, a 92% overlap with mice, and, at the further end of the spectrum, an 18% overlap with the common garden weed! The similarities extend down to the very building blocks of matter, where the only difference between elements in the periodic table is the number and configuration of subatomic particles (protons, neutrons and electrons) in their atoms, where these subatomic particles can be broken down into sub-particles (quarks, leptons, etc), and where, I would imagine, these sub-particles can be broken down into even smaller particles - where does it end?!?! Very nearly all of the elements in the universe owe their existence to the nuclear transmutation of hydrogen and helium by different types of stars, where helium and hydrogen originated from the big bang and account for 98% of the mass of ordinary matter in the universe today. How is that for common? We can all easily conceptualize how 2 identical computers, made of identical components, running identical operating systems, can play uniquely different roles in the world based on their software, but the analogy is a bit more perplexing once it is extended to human beings versus the rest of the animal kingdom, and sometimes versus other human beings - i.e. if not for the single, lethal bit set in Jeffrey Dahmer's software, he was, otherwise, just like the rest of us. But the reality is that, from the smallest particles of matter, to the fundamental building blocks of life, to more observable manifestations, most everything is fundamentally similar and only systematically different, and this is true across a wide range of more abstract instincts, behaviors, ecosystems and organizations. This should not detract from one's assessment of their uniqueness in the world, because it is the soul over the software over the hardware that makes all living things unique: the spark of life that turns elements into compounds into a living being; the ethereal force that cannot be decomposed into particles. Understanding our non-uniqueness at an atomic, chemical and biological level is, indeed, the most salient way to grasp our uniqueness at a more fundamental level beyond the purview of science. This is precisely why philosophy embraces science and spirituality: the former can only take you so far, and the good news is that the latter is completely up to you in terms of choice, interpretation and positivity. 

Teachers

They say “those who cannot do, teach”, but, on the flip side, when the expert (or prodigy) is unable to teach their field of expertise to someone, it may be due to the very thing that makes them the expert to begin with: they have assimilated the foundation to the point where they no longer need to think about it, and, therefore, are unable to decompose it into its original, teachable parts. You may experience this if you ever have to teach or write about your own expertise, and you may experience this is a more negative way if you ever have to learn from an expert that has not grappled with this beforehand. So we could say “those who cannot teach, do”, which sounds unfair, very much like the first quote.