An Echo Of Milton Glaser's 10

For the original, see "Ten Things I Have Learned", by Milton Glaser

1 You can only work for people that you like.

This depends on what you mean by work, but it seems like the key word here is "for". I prefer "with". It's possible to work for almost anyone, but possible only to work with those whom you trust, admire, feel comfortable with, and are inspired by. And then it isn't work anyway.

2 If you have a choice never have a job.

There is a quick test for job security. If someone can walk up to you any day, at any time, and say "You're fired", then you have a job. If you have a job you can lose it. And in this case it's worse, since any random drone can take it away. Go back to item one, look at it, and try to find the place and the people that make you want to sing.

3 Some people are toxic. Avoid them.

Think about it. Are you spending your time with people who are sore losers, and also sore winners? Are they obsessed with fear, hate, and greed? Toxicity always revolves around those qualities. Toxic people focus on the past and fear the future. They're always gnawing on an old bone and growling. There is no hope, and never even a feeling of freedom. Being with them is being in prison.

4 Professionalism is not enough or the good is the enemy of the great.

To the novice anything is possible, but to the expert, at best, only one thing is. I've worked with people who defined professionalism as being what clothes you wore, or even better, the act of wearing a tie. Professionalism in its best sense spins off of what people do but never inspires their actions. Procedures are for drones. Policies define broad guidelines within which humans can be human and use their own judgement.

5 Less is not necessarily more.

Sometimes less is only less. Sometimes more is only more. It's best to start by knowing what you are doing and what you need to get done. Then you can add or delete to sharpen your point.

6 Style is not to be trusted.

Style is like professionalism. It comes from the work but doesn't create the work. If style was really important then there would never be a new style. Styles would be immutable. Style is a byproduct of creativity and simply falls out. Not everyone can create a style or even follow one, and anyway it is a result of reflection and analysis and not inherent.

7 How you live changes your brain.

This is subtle but obvious. The only requirement is to pay attention and then you'll see it happen. Until I began photographing with transparency film did I not notice how blue shadows are. That was years ago, and it's still with me. If you aren't a photographer or a careful painter you won't see this. The same applies to any creative endeavor. It takes constant work to be creative, and then after some while it continues to take effort, but the paths are well known.

8 Doubt is better than certainty.

I remember hearing Anne Lamott say that the opposite of faith is not doubt but certainty. Certainty equates to hubris. Hubris equates to aggressive stupidity. Stupidity is not good. Doubt is a gentle guide which can lead one to unexpected and wonderful places. Doubt is better than certainty. Any day.

9 On aging.

It doesn't matter, as Glaser says. Noting matters. We're all dead. Cemeteries are full of indispensable people. Even if age did matter, what are you going to do about it? Really. Stop to think for a while and you realize that life itself is horrific. No matter who you are or what's going on, you get to this conclusion. The next step is to ask yourself what you're going to do about it. It doesn't matter. You can go on and see what happens next, or not go on. You'll get to the "not go on" soon enough no matter what. No one really knows what life is or if it's got a point. The universe does not care. If it cared then everything wouldn't be eating everything else. Did it ever occur to you what a huge waste it is for one animal to be eaten by another, or for millions of plants to be eaten before they reproduce? The universe doesn't care. It's overflowing with waste and loss. Therefore it must not be waste and loss. Somehow. Or else we have no clue at all. I don't think we have a clue. It doesn't matter. This is a rich place. It can throw us away, all of us, and never notice.

10 Tell the truth.

Lie to others and you are lying to yourself. Lie to yourself and you are lost. Therefore do not lie. There will be trouble because of the truth, but trouble is all life is anyway. It's idiots all the way down. Euripides: "Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish." Right?

Torture Me Efficiently

"If you do what you did then you'll get what you got."

I saw that first defined as an ancient Air Force proverb. It's been other places too, in slightly different wording.

It also shows up as a definition of insanity, as in if you repeat something and expect a different result then you are nuts. Same thing.

I used to keep hearing about so and so being a success. Or whether you'd be a success to do this versus that. Also stupid.

There is no Success with a capital S. It's a description of accomplishment, not a place, not a condition. There is no success without being successful at something.

To talk about being a success in business makes no sense. Which business, when, where, how long, with whom? And other constraints. All needed. Then maybe we can talk.

Lately, as in the past few years, there has been talk of leaving Iraq, Afghanistan, or wherever, upon success. Like it's at the end of some road and all we have to do is keep driving. Keep doing this, and then we'll see it one day, in the future, somewhere, and that will be it. Until then keep doing the same things over and over.

So who was it that was water-boarded 183 times in one month? How do you call that interrogation, "enhanced" or otherwise? And what do you suppose you are doing? Just going through the motions.

Imagine eating ice cream. Imagine eating a pint of ice cream. Imagine eating a pint of ice cream every day. Imagine eating a pint of ice cream every day for a month. Imagine eating a pint of ice cream six times a day every day for a month.

Anything done that frequently for so long is pointless. Even eating ice cream.

So on the other hand people are now debating endlessly at every location about whether torture works. This is another pit of stupidity. You notice that no one, at all, asks whether torture works for one particular thing and one particular time on by or for one particular set of people.

There is no such thing as works or not works.

This is a dense knot of pointless stupidity all around, especially on the side of those who claim that torture does not work. This is so obvious that no one is even addressing it.

The point is that torture works or no one would do it.

How often do you walk on the ceiling? Why not? (I think you don't.)

The answer is that it's too much work given the result. Not useful. Torture is the same. Except that it has useful results. In other words it works.

Just not for what people are silently thinking of when they debate it.

Torture is excellent punishment.

What could possibly be more satisfying than digging out someone's eyes? Or [insert your favorite horrible thing here]. No trial, no lawyers, no judges, no laws, no oversight, no wait. Grab a body and relieve yourself by dismantling it. Instant gratification. Makes you feel morally superior right away. ("What do you think would happen if THEY had captured YOU?")

Obviously. So let's do it here, now, to get back at THEM. Damn straight. Before they even have a chance to get close to us.

Torture works as punishment.

Torture is also exquisitely effective at generating confessions. No, this is true.

Take any person whatsoever. Within 12 hours you can make that person confess to at least 12 different things, maybe more. This is so efficient that it's even obscene. So efficient. See, what you do then is up to you.

You can pick which one of those confessions fits the crime you need to punish (or keep going until the right confession pops up). You can save all of them and wait until the right crime comes along. Hey, you already have the perpetrator. No sweat. No fuss. No muss. No effort needed.

Or - and this is really genius - you can take the confession even if it doesn't match any crime at all, and punish based on that, since the confession has uncovered the crime.

Bingo. You win in any of three different ways. You can even punish the same person for multiple crimes, or apply those confessions and their matching punishments to other people that happened to get named in the process.

Or torture them too, to show your superiority. To demonstrate rightness. To make the point that you can. If you want to. And you do.

Go ahead and let your moral outrage loose. Lay on more of the same techniques as punishment. Dump the body, mail it back to its family, use it as fertilizer in your garden, stick it on a post. It all works, and you are so much better off than if you had one of those fancy legal systems with the tail fins and government regulations stuck all over it.

And yet people go on and on about whether torture works. Barking idiots. Have them come by for a visit. We'll show them what works.

The Mattias I Would Be If I Could

Life can be fun. Especially when the fun comes unexpectedly.

Today while looking for something to illustrate the idea of "backpacker" I found Mattias Adolfsson.

I don't know much of anything about him except that once again I wish I could draw, maybe paint, or at least had decent color vision.

Lacking those qualities, I'll have to appreciate them who got 'em.

Mattias Adolfsson: "Freelance Illustrator living in Sweden with Wife and two daughters. My pen is a Namiki Falcon fountain pen, with this I use American eel from noodlers ink, for coloring I use Watercolors."

References:

Mattias Inks, the blog
Buy Handmade Prints at Etsy.com
Web site
Flickr sets
On the Behance Network
Spraygraphic Interview with Mattias Adolfsson