Implicit Bias/Unconscious Racism

Everyone is a racist.

No, really - it's been scientifically proven. (For some examples, check out this article, and also this article.)

Even liberal activists who would never consciously or purposefully utter a racist slur or generalize groups of people; even people who belong to minority groups themselves - everyone is prey to implicit bias and unconscious racism. We subliminally pick up on stereotypes portrayed in the media, or inherit knowledge of those stereotypes from others around us, and they sink in to our subconscious. We would never admit them aloud; we often don't even know they're there at all - and if we do (temporarily) know, you better bet we pretend not to.

For example, the stereotype that black men are inherently more dangerous or threatening than men of other races. Most of don't believe that's actually true at all, and will explicitly and publicly denounce such stereotypes as misguided at best, horribly racist at worst. But how many times have those same people kept a bit more distance between themselves and a stranger who happens to be black than they would an identical stranger with lighter skin? It's not a behavior that we even realize we do, but we do it. If we were to be confronted with the reality of this implicit bias that's just manifested itself, we might deny it, or try to make excuses.

This article has a great definition of implicit bias: "Implicit bias refers to the attitudes or stereotypes that affect our understanding, actions, and decisions in an unconscious manner. These biases, which encompass both favorable and unfavorable assessments, are activated involuntarily and without an individual's awareness or intentional control. Residing deep in the subconscious, these biases are different from known biases that individuals may choose to conceal for the purposes of social and/or political correctness. Rather, implicit biases are not accessible through introspection."

It goes on to say that implicit biases are pervasive: "Everyone possesses them, even people with avowed commitments to impartiality such as judges." Furthermore, "the implicit associations we hold do not necessarily align with our declared beliefs or even reflect stances we would explicitly endorse."

Another great article (yes, one that I already linked above - but it's just that good that it warrants linking again) takes that last idea even further, and says: "We bury [implicit bias] deep in the subconscious in layers of denial to protect our social reputation. We might explicitly deny our internal reactions, but implicitly we follow their whispered mandates."

The real problem is that implicit bias can be just as dangerous as explicit bias. You don't have to be an uber racist, vocal neo-Nazi/alt-right/white supremacist type for your racism to harm people. You don't have to intend harm to cause it.

If you're not on board with me so far, the rest of this post is not for you. This post is for people who are open-minded, self-reflective, and willing to admit things that might make them uncomfortable. I am also making other assumptions about the type of person you are - namely, that you're generally tolerant and "woke," and that you don't want to be racist (or that you want to find a way to be as least racist as it is possible to be). You also already understand what implicit bias is, how harmful it can be, and that everyone has some of it (including yourself). If that sounds like you, keep reading.

In my unprofessional opinion (but as someone who has given a fair bit of thought to this, in an abstract way), here are some things that we need to focus on in order to dismantle some of the implicit, unconscious bias we have:

1) Recognize where your personal implicit biases lie. This isn't easy, because they're not biases we actually believe in, or ones that we're usually aware of. But when something from your subconscious "breaks away" into your awareness, take the time to acknowledge it. Did you just catch yourself crossing the street when a black man approached? Were you describing a scene you witnessed to a friend and heard yourself referring to a non-white by race - where you didn't see any reason to indicate the race of the white people in your story? Did you have a nightmare where a stranger was invading your home, or threatening your family - and this dream villain was the only person in the dream of another race? They don't even have to be "negative" associations - maybe you found yourself asking your Asian friends to be study partners for an upcoming math test, or wanting to be picked to be on a team with the tall black kids during a pick-up game of basketball.

Whenever you recognize a moment of implicit bias coming forward like that - don't ignore it. Take the time to acknowledge what happened, to self-reflect and unpack where that gut reaction came from and if you've ever had a similar gut reaction in a similar situation before. Maybe even write it down. Keep a list, or write a journal entry. If you feel comfortable talking to your friends about it, ask them if they've had similar experiences. Follow the train of thought and extrapolate how your snap judgment could have been harmful to the others around you who witnessed it - especially if it was a seemingly inoccuous bias, or one that could be spun in a positive way (i.e. "All Asians are smart!" or "All black men are good athletes!"). Even "positive" stereotypes like these are harmful - because they lump everyone together to make incorrect assumptions, thus alienating anyone of those groups who doesn't fit the idea of what a member of that group should be good at, and because they might attribute a good quality to a group at the expense of other groups. If all Asians are inherently smart - does that mean other races are inherently dumber?

2) Don't shame yourself. This can be difficult for a lot of us (if the rather small sample size of me and my perfectionist friends and family are any indication). We don't want to be racist, and then we witness ourselves thinking racist thoughts. Even if they are something we had literally no conscious control over, we might find a way to blame ourselves for our mistake. We feel guilty and ashamed. This is understandable. You might even argue that it's the proper reaction - because if we recognize it was wrong, and that we are to blame, we're more likely to fix it, right?

Actually no. In my experience, the more we shame ourselves for something, the more likely we are to bury it and insist that it's not a problem. The shame makes us feel bad, so we avoid reflecting on it or doing anything to take concrete steps to make sure it doesn't happen as often - which then means when we inevitably slip up again, we'll be even more ashamed, and so on, until we've created a shame circle that just gets worse and worse and spirals us into depression or anxiety. Furthermore, the harsher we are on ourselves, the harder it is to see the positive attributes we have, and the harder it is to have confidence in ourselves to change. If we focus only on the negatives and beat ourselves up over our shortcomings, over and over again, everything will start to seem impossible - and once you're in that defeatist mindset, it's really hard to find the motivation to work toward any positive change. We might also start to believe we don't deserve to succeed in that positive change - we get stuck in this mindset of, "I said/did a bad thing, and that makes me a bad person, and as a bad person I am not capable of being a better person, or deserving of being seen as a better person, and anyone who forgives me for my mistakes is being too nice to me, nicer to me than I deserve."

3) Don't pass the buck, either. It's decidedly unhelpful to get stuck in those shame cycles mentioned above - but it's equally as unhelpful to try washing your hands of the whole thing. You alone are not to blame - but as a society, as humans, we are. It's a collective effort, and that means we're all a part of the problem - and the solution. The trick is to find a way to balance these two responses. You have to recognize your (probably minuscule) part in contributing to systems of oppression and discrimination and make efforts to change, while at the same time allowing yourself to be imperfect.

I think the best way is to approach it as a learning opportunity. It might sound silly, but it will probably help if think of yourself as a friend you're talking to, or even a young child who just needs a bit of guidance. I know I'm always quicker and harsher to pass judgment on myself than on others, and I bet some of you are too. If you overheard your good friend say something that sounded surprisingly racist, would your first instinct be to disavow that long, solid friendship? Probably not. You would assume she "didn't actually mean" what she said, and ignore the problem. Even better, you might gently talk to her and figure out if she realizes what she said and how bad it sounded. Similarly, if you saw a child have a reaction that clearly came from implicit bias (i.e. trusting a white stranger more than a black stranger), it would be a better idea to talk to him about his behaviors and thought processes than to let the opportunity for learning pass, just because you know he "didn't mean it."

So when you recognize yourself falling into prematurely labeling people or making assumptions based on stereotypes, call yourself out on it and face it head on. Allow yourself the luxury of being human (all humans make mistakes sometimes), but still make sure to think through what happened and reflect on what a better response might have been instead. Soon enough, you'll find yourself being more aware of implicit bias - which in turn will make you more likely to recognize it before it happens, and to start correcting for it so it doesn't happen as much.

4) Don't shame other people. Maybe you're more likely to judge others harsher than yourself. In that case, treat others with the same respect you allow yourself. Accusing someone of acting in a racist fashion is not going to put them in a receptive mood to really self-reflect and figure out what happened or why. If you want to talk to someone about examples of their implicit bias you've witnessed, think long and hard about the best way to do it. Maybe bring it up at a later date, or be prepared to offer some examples of times you had a similar reaction and then immediately regretted it. You can bond over your shared mistakes, and come up with some solutions of what you could have done or said instead.

5) But also don't let other people get away with implicit bias. Remember how I said you have to find a balance between allowing yourself to make mistakes/forgiving yourself for the mistakes you do make, yet still taking responsibility for your inadvertent racism? Same goes for other people. They might need some (gentle) assistance in realizing they've said or done something racist - and you might be the only one in the room to notice this fact. If you don't speak up, the perpetrator and the other people in the room who witnessed it might never recognize that something problematic even happened. You don't have to make a big thing about it - and in fact it might be a better idea not to (see point #4, above). It can be as simple as saying, "Did you realize you started walking faster once that black man turned the corner and came into view?" or "I know you didn't mean that the way it came out. What did you actually mean to say?" You'll help them be more diligent in observing their own slip-ups, and make sure everyone around you knows that you won't stand for racist behavior, whether it was intentional or not.

In a similar vein, if someone says a racist joke, don't laugh. If you find yourself laughing inadvertently, make sure you follow up with: "I'm only laughing because that joke actually made me really uncomfortable - and not in a good way." If someone starts defending their joke ("It was just a joke; I didn't mean it" or "I didn't make it up myself; I'm just repeating it"), ask them: "Would you have told that joke in mixed company?" If they wouldn't say the joke in front of a black person, for fear of offending them, why would they think it's okay to say the joke in front of white people? We should all be offended when we hear racist comments - not just the comments that apply to our race.

I know all of this advice is "easier said than done." Don't expect to recognize every time some of your implicit bias shows, or to feel comfortable pointing out when someone else's does. Allow yourself to understand that this - like so many things in life - is a learning process. Progress is going to be gradual, and maybe not even noticeable. You're going to make the same exact error in judgment at age 60 that you did at age 20. This doesn't mean you're failing. It just means you're human. They're called implicit and unconscious biases for a reason. You're not aware of them until it is too late, and because they're embedded into our unconsciousness they're also really hard to successfully eradicate them - and keep them out. Don't expect yourself to be better than everyone else. You will not reach an unattainable level of "racistlessness." Literally everyone is a racist. That means that you're not exempt from the problem. It also means that you're not exempt from the solution.

If we all just put in a little bit of effort to be more aware of the things we do and say, and to be kind to our fellow human beings, wouldn't this world be a much better place?

Travel Bucket List

Well, I've finally done it - I've posted photos from all of the places I've traveled to.

(At least, all the ones I've traveled to since 2005, when I got my own digital camera and started organizing my photos on the computer. Somewhere there are photos of other places I've visited - but they were trips I took with my family in elementary school and middle school, and either I didn't take the photos myself or I otherwise don't have easy access to them in digital form.)

My point is, that I am all out of source material to post about. I am far from out of source material to use in artwork - very few of the photographs I've posted on this blog have actually been made into drawings or paintings so far, and I still have a lot I could work with for future works - but as for photographs to sort through and post here, my digital folders have run dry.

It's been a long time since I've traveled anywhere or had a "vacation" to speak of. My husband and I join his family in Virginia Beach every year for a week, so we do have that. But rarely do I take photos on that vacation, since we stay in the same place and go to the same beach that we do every year. I've already taken those photos; there is no need to take photos of the same things again.

Lately I have been trying to capture "local" moments. I take photos of the plants in my own front and back yard, or in my parent's or grandma's yard, or at nearby parks, or the landscaping and gardens along Main Street, or the Detroit Riverwalk, or other lovely local places - even supermarkets and local nurseries that have bouquets and potted plants for sale. I have also made a list of gardens around Michigan that might be fun to take a "day trip" to photograph some weekend; maybe one day soon I'll start in on that list.

But the fact remains that it's been a while since my husband and I have traveled anywhere; we certainly haven't traveled internationally since our honeymoon, which was almost five years ago now (!) - not counting Canada, of course, which we did drive through on a short road trip to upstate New York for a wedding. For a while, I was crossing the Atlantic every couple years. I went to France in 2005, I studied abroad in Switzerland/Italy/Greece in 2008, I joined my husband's family on a cruise to Spain/France/Italy/Croatia in 2010, and my husband and I honeymooned in Greece in 2011. But since 2011, we haven't left Good Ol' North America.

We went on an extensive road trip in 2012 - but we crammed it all into a week, so we hardly had time to really settle in or look around in any one place for more than a few hours. We drove to upstate New York for the aforementioned wedding - again, crammed into a weekend. We've driven to see my husband's family near Chicago, Illinois several times over several weekends. And we go to Virginia Beach for a week every year. But that has been the extent of our Married Life Travels so far.

Part of the reason we haven't traveled much has to do with finances. I wasn't working for much of that time, or only working part-time, and my husband was not getting paid enough working as a high school teacher. We also had little time to travel - even though he got summers off as a teacher, he had to do a lot of prep work for the next school year and was often taking summer/evening classes to work on his two Masters. We also prioritized buying a house over travel, investing money and time in our house in Rochester Hills - adding landscaping, getting a new roof and new siding and new installation. And then we got a puppy - which made traveling even harder.

I don't know when we'll plan our next big trip, but that doesn't stop me from dreaming. For the longest time France was my biggest item on my Travel Bucket List; then, once I visited France, it was replaced with Italy. I wanted to see art, and the cities that saw so many important art movements and nurtured so many artists. Now that I've been to the Mediterranean three times (!) those are no longer priorities.

My current Travel Bucket List is as follows -

IN NORTH AMERICA:

1. New York City. I've never been! And for someone who is into looking at art museums and who loves live theater, this is an obvious travesty.

2. Harry Potter World. My husband and I have been talking about making a trip down to Orlando to see the Harry Potter World for ages. One of these days it'll happen!

3. Holland, Michigan. It's only a few hours away, but I have yet to make it to Holland during its renowned tulip season! This could even be a little weekend trip and is totally doable - if the husband and I just schedule it right for peak tulip color. Think of all the floral photo opportunities!

4. Hawaii. Not exactly North America, perhaps, since it's way out there in the Pacific. And I am a little concerned about the Burn Factor. But maybe the heat/sun wouldn't be so unbearable if it was a winter trip? I'm sure they have lots of lovely gardens to see out there!

5. San Francisco & Vancouver. Cities on the Pacific that I've never visited.

6. Philadelphia. My family went on a road trip that included Pennsylvania when I was in middle school - but the stops we made were only for Pittsburgh (to see a friend), Hershey Park, and Gettysburg. We missed Philly!

7. Stratford, Ontario. I have been several times to this little town with a Shakespearean-inspired theater, on field trips in high school. But high school was ten years ago, and some day I would like to return to see another play.

INTERNATIONALLY:

1. The U.K. & Ireland. I've covered the Mediterranean pretty well, but haven't been to Northern Europe. I would love to visit England, Ireland, and Scotland - for the nature, the landscapes, the gardens, the castles, London, and yeah - perhaps a tour of Important Harry Potter sites, as well. :)

2. The Netherlands. For the same reason I always wanted to visit France and Ireland, I'd love to visit Amsterdam and check out it's art museums and art history.

3. Eastern Europe: Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Poland. Yes, I have already been to Switzerland - but it was only Zurich, and it was for only two days. My father's ancestors came from a little German-speaking town in Switzerland many many generations ago, but it would be kind of cool to go see it anyway, though I know nobody there. I bet there are also some lovely landscapes and castles and gardens around near the Alps. Similarly, I'd love to see Germany. I've only been to the Frankfurt airport; I'd love to explore Munich or Berlin. My uncle recently took a river cruise down the Rhine and his photos looked really beautiful. I know Germany has some great forests and castles and charming towns. And while I'm in the area, might as well check out Vienna, Austria, or maybe Budapest, Hungary... All the non-Mediterranean cities I haven't visited yet.

4. Sweden, Finland, Norway. Some sort of Fjord cruise would be really beautiful I bet. I know next to nothing about these countries and what there is to do for a tourist, but if I cross off England, Scotland, Ireland, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Hungary, and Poland... somewhere in these three Scandinavian countries would probably be next on my list.

5. Spain. I have been to Barcelona, it's true. But Spain's a pretty big country, with other big cities to explore and plenty of interesting art history.

6. Russia, Turkey, Morocco. I've considered these places before, but don't know if I'll ever actually make it there. I'd love to see some of the major cities, like St. Petersburg, Moscow, Istanbul, Marakesh - the places I always see on TV, with the awesome architecture and colorful marketplaces. But I'm also a little wary to travel to places that aren't exactly the most politically stable/safe and friendly toward American tourists, especially when said American tourists known very little about the countries. Maybe if I did enough research and looked into exactly what I would like to see (and the best ways to do so), I could make one of those trips work out some day.

I realize all/most of these are in Europe... And I am not against traveling to Asia or Africa or South America some day. I just know so little about the world outside of North America/Europe that I haven't learned anything that has really sparked my interest to want to travel there yet. It's Western bias, I know; but I spent semesters upon semesters being fed anecdotes and histories and slides of artwork from the Western world and getting excited about all there was to see. I find that I get the most out of a trip if I know something of it's history; if I know what I'm looking at. And even if I were to find a way to easily/safely explore Asia or Africa or South America (i.e. with a local guide, or at least someone who spoke the language and/or knew the area and what things I should be looking out for), I still wouldn't really understand what I was looking at.

And also I am super pale and burn easily, so the closer something gets to the equator, the more I'm Not Sure if I actually want to travel there. Southern Italy and Greece were already bad enough for my poor skin... ;)

Why on earth should that mean that it isn't real?

This post is going to be a continuation of yesterday's post about mind-body dualism, so you may want to start there if you haven't read it yet.

As I said yesterday, though part of me is swayed by the scientific proof of monism - the idea that everything is built out of one category of substance (atoms, molecules, chemicals, cells) - I am ultimately too enamored with the idea of dualism to suspend belief that there is a second, incorporeal substance also at play in nature. We are not just bodies, but bodies and minds (or souls, depending on how you want to label it).

I acknowledge that I am, to some extent, governed by my chemicals and hormones and neurons and all of the other building blocks that create and multiply and manipulate my cells, or communicate between them. I even understand that when I dream at night I am in actuality at the mercy of coincidences and firing neurons; that what I choose to interpret as a story, with colors and faces and emotions and conflict and resolution, is not created or influenced by a separate substance (my mind, my soul, my intuition, creativity, inspiration, a collective unconscious I'm tapping into, or anything spiritual like that) but by the same category that maintains my blood circulation and digestive tract: Atoms. Molecules. Things that science can observe and quantify and explain (or are working toward observing, quantifying, and explaining).

But I care about those stories I dream, or the stories I come up with in the daytime and attempt to put to paper, or the subjects I want to draw or paint - and to write or create art the way I want to, I feel like it diminishes it to think of it through the lens of monism.

Sure, I am able to see color because of the way my eyes work and the cells that make up my eyes; I am able to hold a paintbrush because of the cells in my hand; I am able to retain muscle memory and things I've practiced and learned in school for the best techniques to use because of the cells in my brain. And to some people - the scientifically minded, the monists - this is more than enough, and they can find excitement and inspiration in the idea that everything comes down to essentially one thing, or that everything is born from essentially one thing, and that any differences we see - at the molecular or macro level - are just different rearrangements of the same basic substance.

Good for them! I'm not knocking monism. It's just not how I think of things, and I don't see the value (and in fact see negative consequences) in retraining myself to think of the world that way. I could persuade myself if I really wanted to. I definitely see the reasoning and the merits. But I don't think it matters to my life, and because it is not my gut reaction, I fear that it would take away something of who I am to try to dissuade myself of my belief in dualism.

I am an artist, and a writer. I like looking at art, and reading books. I like writing poetry. I like listening to music. I like being creative. I like thinking of myself as a body and a soul, and other people as a body and a soul. I like imagining that there is this creativity or inspiration that ebbs and flows and visits us and abandons us and takes us on journeys and sets our hearts on fire. I like dreaming; I like trying to influence my dreams in the moment of the dreaming, and I like interpreting them after the fact. I like sitting around and thinking and philosophizing. I like asking 'what ifs'.

I like thinking of my emotions, my mood, my intuition, my dreams, my creativity, my art, my writing, as a separate entity. Something to conquer or challenge or accept or adore or avoid or manipulate or mold or cherish or abhor. Something that is unique to me, but also something that is similar to what everyone else has and experiences - a collective pool that we all dip our toes into once and awhile, and dive into even rarer still. Something that is sometimes out of our control - which is frustrating at times but beneficial at other times. Something that is separate from my physical body and will exist in some form after my body dies.

I don't think my soul will go to heaven or hell because I don't think those are actual places. But I am open the idea of reincarnation. I like the idea of the ancient goddess, where we are all birthed from the same womb, live physical lives, and then are returned to that sacred womb to be reborn into another life (with or without knowledge of previous lives). That doesn't mean I believe in a goddess, or a specific womb that exists. I just like the imagery of it. The Neo-Platonists had a similar idea - this Oneness that we all come from and return to. It's actually almost monist sounding, right? We are all essentially the same thing, born from the same substance, made of the same substance, and return to that substance when we return. But I think of it in a dualist way.

There's this spiritual substance (spirit, soul, mind, unconsciousness, etc.) - let's just call it Substance 1 for the sake of simplicity. And this substance is unquantifiable and unidentifiable and really hard to understand or know or label - because that's kind of the point of it. We can only feel it - in our guts, in our hearts, in our minds. We can't touch it with our hands, or see it or hear it or taste it or smell it or observe it in any way. It's extrasensory.

I like to imagine that we are that substance, at our cores. If our bodies ever ceased to exist, or if we were in a transition state between bodies, we would still be Substance 1. It's our emotions, our collective unconscious, the stuff of dreams, our creativity, our childish sense of wonder, our pleasure, our pain, etc. When we are on earth it is encased in a body, which is a different substance (Substance 2). It has to be a different entity, because it can be observed with our physical senses. We can see and feel and taste it. We can study it under a microscope. It gets hurt or sick, and we watch it heal (or not heal). It is observable, in a real, quantifiable way. It can be categorized and labeled. It can (more or less) be understood.

So we start as Substance 1 and end as Substance 1 (if we do indeed end). We still have access to Substance 1 while we are encased in Substance 2 (our bodies), because we are always Substance 1, whether or not we are at the moment connected to Substance 2.

Of course, at any given moment we can understand, we are connected to Substance 2, because that's the only way we can understand or acknowledge or interpret or observe things at all. I have no proof that Substance 1 exists before/after/outside Substance 2 at all. Perhaps it doesn't. I like to think it does, but it hardly matters (to me) if it actually does or not. I would not act differently in this life if I knew for certain that my soul would or would not extend past by body's life, so it makes no difference.

The point is, that I am drawn to thinking of myself this way, for better or worse. It is so engrained in me to believe that there is some essence to me that is more than just the sum of my bodily parts that I have to think it is a belief I would hold dear regardless of whether or not I had been brought up Christian and taught to believe that we all have souls and which go to Heaven or Hell when our bodies die. I was drawn to color and art from a young age. I loved stories and reading. I have always been drawn to fantasy. I have always put more significance on my mind than my body. It didn't matter what was happening in "the real world" if I had another world I could escape to in my mind.

And I think that, is essentially, why I would really have to talk myself into monism. Because I like Substance 1 better; I could never discard it in favor of Substance 2. And it doesn't make sense to me believe there isn't a Substance 2 - indeed, I would be way too scared to pretend Substance 1 is the only substance. While I like Substance 1, I also often keep my distance from it. It's unreliable. It's mysterious. To believe only in Substance 1 (and thus ignore the "real" physical world) would be to lose all control, lose anything tangible to grab onto, and, essentially, to go insane.

So Substance 2 must exist - it is the rock in the flowing stream of Substance 1, the tangible, sturdy, steady thing to grab onto. And I want Substance 1 to exist - because it's the flowing stream, and more interesting. And so I am a dualist.

But I also call myself an "atheist."

Being an "atheist" doesn't mean I'm not spiritual, in my own way. It doesn't mean I don't like sitting around philosophizing. It doesn't mean I don't believe in something by faith alone. The "something" that I believe in through faith alone, however, is not capital-G God, nor any other god or gods of any organized religion on this planet. There is no Creator. There is no Destiny. There is the Human Experience, and the Soul, and the Collective Unconscious, or something along those lines - but I vacillate between whether or not I think this other Force, whatever it is, has any sort of semblance of control over me and my actions, or even any understanding of me, or anyone else, or itself. Perhaps it is just Nature, going through its cycles as it does; and I am just a part of it, a cog in its incognizant machine.

I even (as you can see with these last two blog posts), debate with myself on the issue of my dualism. Do I actually believe there are two substances - mind and body - or do I just really want there to be two substances, because it's a more interesting story, and one that I am immediately drawn to?

So I call myself an atheist because I do not align with any modern religion or its beliefs, and I do not one anyone to get the impression that I do, or that I could be persuaded to. Calling myself an agnostic, I think, is not strong enough to get this point across. But really I would identify myself more as an apatheist - because not only do I not believe in god, but it really doesn't matter to my daily life if god does or does not exist - or even if there are one or two categories of substances in the world.

From the Wikipedia article, Apatheism

I like thinking about such things in the abstract, but have no real motivation to come to any sort of concrete conclusion. I'm fine with sitting in the corner and imagining the world I want to imagine, with its mind and body separation. It suits me. It doesn't really matter if it's "real" or "true" or not, because it's true to me. And even if someone could prove to me that God exists (or doesn't exist), or that everything I hold dear about my "essence" is really just nothing more than neurons firing in my brain or the chemicals and hormones in my body fluctuating their levels to influence my emotions or mood - it wouldn't matter. I would still make art. I would still feel things. I would still write. I would still go on pretending that what is in my mind is important and real - because that's what makes me feel like me, and I think it's what makes me good at the art and writing I do.

I've rambled on about all this long enough. I'll end here with a favorite quote by J.K. Rowling:

Mind & Body

I'm not an expert on philosophy by any means.

I took one "Intro to Philosophy" course in college, which built on the pretty solid foundation I acquired with my high school humanities classes. I also took a course that was cross-listed between the Women and Gender's Studies department and the Philosophy department; it focused primarily on philosophical manifestos written by second-wave feminists (with the occasional first- and third-waver thrown in) on the topics of privilege and oppression, as they relate to gender. Since college, I've read a few books on philosophy - both as research for the novel(s) I've been writing and as a sort of general interest project. These have been mostly compilations of Major Points philosophers have made (as explained by contemporary philosophers or humanities professors who know how to write clearly and concisely), and not the actual, historical texts that, while I'm sure offer more insight and nuance, also require a lot more brain power to parsing and comprehending than I have time to devote.

So in bringing up one of the Big Topics philosophers have debated for today's post, I'm not trying to convince you, or persuade you, or educate you - if you want to know what the Famous Philosophers have said on such things, you're best doing the research and reading yourself. I'm only explaining what I believe - because it "feels right" to me.

From Wikipedia

The debate is this - are there two types of substances in the world (body and mind, or body and soul, depending on how you want to phrase it), or is there only one substance?

The "body" would be anything we can see or understand in this physical world that we live in. Our physical bodies, with its hands and feet and brain, made up of atoms and molecules. The physical building blocks of life, and the things that we interact with everyday.

The "mind" or "soul" would be something unscientific and incorporeal.

Christianity defines this as our "soul" - the spirit that lives inside everyone, which persists before the body and after the body's demise. This is why murder is a sin - because you're not just killing cells, but cells that are (or were) attached (at least temporarily) to a unique, God-created soul. Christians also believe that this soul continues after the body dies - and goes either to hell or heaven (or purgatory), depending on deeds and misdeeds, what or who you believe in, and what sect of Christianity you're looking at.

Other religions and spiritual ways of thinking define this substance in other ways. Souls can be thought of as being reincarnated - inhabiting one body until that body dies, and then inhabiting another body in another life.

Some say that animals or plants also have such "souls" - and therefore certain animals (or all animals) are off-limits to farm, slaughter, and consume. Many vegetarians or vegans who choose their diets on moral grounds make such arguments.

Others might think of this incorporeal substance as something less connected to an individual person or animal, but something that just kind of floats around and inhabits each of us at different times. Intuition. Fate. Destiny. The ability to communicate in extrasensory ways (mind reading, ESP, etc). Creativity.

In her book "Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear," Eat Pray Love author Elizabeth Gilbert talks about creativity and inspiration as kind of this mythical, spiritual thing. It gives us ideas and sometimes a passion to see that idea through, but it is up to us to take that opportunity when it comes, pursue other opportunities if an idea is not actively knocking on our door, and learn how to be creative without relying on inspiration to guide us every step of the way. Similar to an athlete or musician "being in the zone," artists and writers are capable of creating things they didn't think possible, things that sort of momentarily seize them and take them on a journey over which they have little or no control. But you don't find that "zone" without putting in lots of effort and practice and opening yourself up to such experiences, and you can't rely on that creative spark to always be around.

The ancient Romans thought of this as a "genius." A person was not a genius, he had a genius - a little elf or sprite or guide or fairy or however you want to think of it - who came around and helped occasionally. (Females didn't get geniuses... there was another word for their helper friends; but I don't remember it at the moment.) This would also fit under the idea of this "mind" or "soul" - some otherworldly spark that we can't see or ever fully understand, but that is there and occasionally able to be tapped into a bit, or connected to us.

Whether we have the ability to connect with such incorporeal things or whether we have to wait for those substances to hook up with us is a matter of belief - and would get into another question of Free Will vs. Determinism.

I would also like to point out that many (most) people who believe in some sort of incorporeal substance don't believe in all of those examples that I listed above (or others). Many would find the idea of creativity as a gremlin that gifts inspiration as sort of hokey. Many Christians can easily believe that they have a soul but that animals and plants do not (and are thus perfectly willing to eat all sorts of meat). Historically, there were many groups who even believed that not all humans had souls, or that not all humans had equal souls - that men were inherently created by God to be better than women, or for whites to be inherently smarter or more powerful than blacks or other races. Now, we think such things are ridiculous (racist, sexist, elitist, horrible), but that wasn't always the case. The idea of what this non-body substance might be vary vastly from culture to culture and person to person, as well as throughout time.

But a lot of people believe in something. They believe there is something out there - whether God or gods, Fate or Destiny or Fortune, a person's individual soul, or occasional creativity, or just some other underlying thing that connects all of us mystically/spiritually, like the Human Experience, or the Collective Unconscious, or whatever.

Then there are others who don't believe there is anything besides the body. That any emotions or moods we feel, any ideas we come up with or feel like we've been gifted, any extrasensory understanding we think we may possess, any uncontrollable Force that guides us or hurts us, whether indiscriminately or consciously and deliberately - all of these things are still the same substance. Dreams are just neurons firing in the brain. Religions are just systems based on stories we've created to explain we don't (yet) understand. Everything comes down to chemicals and molecules - how those atoms interact with one another to form plants, and animals, and humans, and human emotions and moods and inspiration and dreams. Pure science.

That is not to say that all scientists cast out all spirituality and believe that there is only one substance - the body. Some scientists are religious. Many undoubtedly believe in souls. Several even say that studying science has brought them to the conclusion that there must be something more - some Divine Creator who designed all of the intricate systems of cells and chemicals that are increasingly observable with the advent of new and better technology.

But pure science is, by definition, based only on that which can be observed or experimented with. Even if individual scientists may yet believe in another substance - mind, souls, spirits - the discipline as a whole does not give that idea much (if any) credence.

From Wikipedia

With the continued new technology that is being invented and perfected, I think this belief in only one substance (monism) is gaining steam. There is observable proof that drugs and medicines can alter the chemicals in our body and change our emotional state. Or give us purpose and direction and inspiration where depression or chronic pain or some other illness took it away. Or help us see an "alternate reality" or a "different plane of existence." Or increase our likelihood of nightmares and vivid dreams, just by increasing or decreasing the way our cells communicate in our brains or altering hormone imbalances. (I am not a scientist, so my terms/explanations may be off. But you catch my drift.)

Indeed, what proof is there (what proof can there be?) that another substance exists? The only thing that can be cited is that many humans feel like more than just a body - they feel like a soul, too. Many humans want or need to believe that part of themselves will transcend their bodily deaths, or that some things are out of their control and cannot be explained. And science can account for this, too - I'm sure some explanation can be crafted for while so many of us feel this to be true, something about neurons and chemicals and other things that I haven't studied and don't understand. Maybe we believe we're more than firing neurons because our firing neurons fire in such a way and light up the parts of our brains that have us believe that.

But I'm not a scientist. I'm an artist and a writer. I grew up Christian. And though I can shake the idea of God, and deny organized religion, I cannot shake the idea of a soul. I have to be more than just molecules. There has to be something about me that is unique and special that molecules could not recreate somewhere else, in someone else. It's perhaps egotistical to think, and very likely wrong. But the idea of dualism - two substances, the mind and the body, which work (or don't work) together in harmony and which are ruled (or rule) slightly different sets of laws - is too important to me, as a creative person, to give up.

Science may scoff, but many philosophers would agree with my assessment. There is a mind and a body. It is (to me) the more exciting and fun and desirable explanation, and it is (for now at least) the one I'm sticking with.

EMU Symposium (2008)

Yesterday, I discussed the lucky circumstances for how I was allowed to, as a college student, basically get paid to create whatever art I wanted to. I also described the theme I adopted for that first Undergraduate Symposium I participated in back in 2007 - self portraits.

The following year, still working with that same drawing faculty member, I took the idea of "self portraits" in a slightly different direction. Instead of depicting my face ad nauseum in different media, I focused on my subconscious - my dreams.

Similarly to how I copied text from my journal onto the poster I displayed next to my wall of self-portraits in 2007, in 2008 I copied text from my dream journal and displayed these fragmented written descriptions of my dreams next to visual depictions of them.

I'll admit - this was the year I put the least thought into the symposium. I was still deciding what I wanted to concentrate in at Eastern Michigan University, and was deciding between drawing and watercolor. I let most of the year go by without any planning, and then, at the last minute, threw some things together. I was a little disappointed in myself - I had all this "free money" in my name in the art department, and I hadn't come up with any good items to purchase with it.

It was precisely because of that 2008 "dud year" that I thought hard about what I wanted to do for 2009. I knew I wanted to study abroad, so I decided to combine that desire with the symposium. In 2009, I would create artwork for the symposium that was inspired by my study abroad trip; in this way, I got my scholarship fund to pay for part of that trip. (I'll show pictures from that symposium tomorrow.)

Here are some images of the art I created for my 2008 "Dream" theme.

I went through my dream journal and found all instances of a brand name that appeared in my dreams. I then created a hand-drawn/painted collage of the logos of those brands.

Drawing/painting

The next image is another drawing - this time a "collage" in metallic gold pen/marker of abstract roses. This was inspired by a terrifying dream I had in which I was attacked by a strange man and woke up in a hospital bed to see that my legs had been tattooed up and down with gold roses that were only visible under certain lights.

Drawing

Finally, this last image is a drawing/painting/collage I created based on another specific dream. There were (adorable) fuzzy little aliens who had landed in Ann Arbor, Michigan, causing a riot. To escape, I had to run from the blazing inferno Ann Arbor had become, across a river (which does not exist in real life), to the safety of my own college campus - Eastern Michigan University, in Ypsilanti. Television screens floated in the air around me as I ran.

Drawing/painting/mixed media collage

In addition to these 18"x24" pieces of artwork, I drew a few smaller (cartoonish) images that were also inspired by dreams, and printed up "flyers" that mimicked flyers found in my "Riots in Ann Arbor Dream."

Fuzzy Alien Poster

"Whale Plane" Watercolor

"Red Monster" Watercolor/Drawing

"Beer Tree" Colored Pencil Drawing

To clarify - when I say 2008 was my "dud" year, I don't mean I had nothing to show at the Symposium. I mean only that I felt I hadn't made the most of my scholarship money, because I hadn't planned anything in advance to spend that money on.