Friday, February 11, 2005
Expected States of Development
I watched Kinsey. Wow. What a movie. I didn't even think they had sex in the 50's, but apparently, some people even had really good sex. Apart from all the discussion on sex behavior one of the most interesting points raised in the movie was what is "normal". Because Kinsey was a taxonomist and also a statistician he firmly believed that to study something you needed to collect data, A LOT of it, and split it into categories and characterize it by the numbers. So this guy collects the sexual history of 10's of thousands of people and compiles it into a book (and here). So now that we have all these categories it is natural to look back and check out which categories are the most popular. Even more so, let's call one that "normal" behavior.
Wait.
That last statement may have been sarcastic, or maybe it's facetious, I'm not actually that good with words (I like analogies better, or is metaphors?). Ok I looked up all those words. My previous statement was both a little facetious and sarcastic and it is definitely analogies I like.
So the point is that normalicy is defined in many ways as the average or mean, or the most popular event of a random variable (like the speed of cars down a street). Where it gets hairy is when normal morphs into *expected* or even as far as *MORAL*. It may be normal for humans to have sex, but that doesn't make it moral. Furthermore, it my not be normal for girls to have sex with stuffed teddy bears, but that isn't immoral either (is it?). Because I'm a fan of my toolbar dictionary I like to look things up. Moral: "of or relating to principles of right and wrong in behavior "
So there you have it. is right or wrong? what's interesting about morality is that it is mostly a personal thing. It develops from the early childhood in the form of decideding on issues that are black and white and self-centered and then develops as you get older into more abstract concepts like what actions do to other people and society as a whole. However, it is the "mores" that gives us so much greif. These are the "normal moral attitudes" of a group. Mores (pro nounced More-ayes: too much dictionary time...) truly are the average beliefs of a group (although sometimes are biased by the leaders). So when it comes to sex, we look to the mores to define our own behaviour, rather than perform our own moral test of right and wrong.
So to get back to my original point (the title of the blog) I'll review what I've said (albeit maybe not well):
I don't believe that normal is always an appropriate measure.
Nor is popularity.
Sex is underrated and not talked about enough.
Go see Kinsey.
Those arguements aside, there clearly are things that are normal (statisically high chance of happening), such as growing old. And (I think) becoming entrenched in your battles (tilting at your windmills). So what I realized the other days is that my issues in life may be morphing into Quixote's windmills. Am I going ot get old and starttalking about how grand it would be if people could just talk about sex (without feeling guilty) and have an economic system that doesn't measure itself by growth alone?
Wait.
That last statement may have been sarcastic, or maybe it's facetious, I'm not actually that good with words (I like analogies better, or is metaphors?). Ok I looked up all those words. My previous statement was both a little facetious and sarcastic and it is definitely analogies I like.
So the point is that normalicy is defined in many ways as the average or mean, or the most popular event of a random variable (like the speed of cars down a street). Where it gets hairy is when normal morphs into *expected* or even as far as *MORAL*. It may be normal for humans to have sex, but that doesn't make it moral. Furthermore, it my not be normal for girls to have sex with stuffed teddy bears, but that isn't immoral either (is it?). Because I'm a fan of my toolbar dictionary I like to look things up. Moral: "of or relating to principles of right and wrong in behavior "
So there you have it. is right or wrong? what's interesting about morality is that it is mostly a personal thing. It develops from the early childhood in the form of decideding on issues that are black and white and self-centered and then develops as you get older into more abstract concepts like what actions do to other people and society as a whole. However, it is the "mores" that gives us so much greif. These are the "normal moral attitudes" of a group. Mores (pro nounced More-ayes: too much dictionary time...) truly are the average beliefs of a group (although sometimes are biased by the leaders). So when it comes to sex, we look to the mores to define our own behaviour, rather than perform our own moral test of right and wrong.
So to get back to my original point (the title of the blog) I'll review what I've said (albeit maybe not well):
I don't believe that normal is always an appropriate measure.
Nor is popularity.
Sex is underrated and not talked about enough.
Go see Kinsey.
Those arguements aside, there clearly are things that are normal (statisically high chance of happening), such as growing old. And (I think) becoming entrenched in your battles (tilting at your windmills). So what I realized the other days is that my issues in life may be morphing into Quixote's windmills. Am I going ot get old and starttalking about how grand it would be if people could just talk about sex (without feeling guilty) and have an economic system that doesn't measure itself by growth alone?
