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Arranging to Save the World

Chris Farmer RSS / 25.03.2014. u 10:45

The universe is out of whack. We know it.

And it is all out of our control. Earthquakes quake. Weather squalls. Clouds cumulate. What can anyone do to combat this? Human fallibility on the other hand creates a whole new set of wrong-angle situations - trains derail, airplanes get lost over Malaysia, fanatics get elected to positions of power, armies roll in, and someone wears a red shirt with yellow striped pants.

True story. I have seen that guy.

The question, therefore, is not why all this happens or what we can do (no reason and nothing), but why we ALL do not have obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) or Compulsive Disorder Obsessive (arranged alphabetically).

People make fun of us. They say we are sick. They say we are dysfunctional. But the universe is out of whack, and the only thing we can do is set to rights the things over which we have at least a modicum of control.

So we go about straightening pictures, adjusting refrigerator magnets into symmetrical patterns, closing doors, turning off lights, and checking to see if we closed the doors and turned off the lights. Twice. When the universe is out of whack, what else can be done?

By creating order, we are acting against the Prime Mover who is (let's face it) sloppy in his/her/its work. The Prime Mover like the big picture. He likes to try out "what if" scenarios. He is infinitely curious about stuff. What if that mountain suddenly crumbled? What if those six boats hit each other in open water? What if people were given the choice of their leaders?

Humans are particularly interesting to the Prime Mover, because they will do things that defy explanation - and yet they will explain. One could argue that the Prime Mover made them that way. But he also peppered the world with the OCD in order to try to make it right. To bring order to chaos.

We are the last bastions of asserting control over the uncontrollable. We do not believe in chaos theory. We see patterns, and we strive to restore them.

I believe that the Prime Mover believes he is "artistic". He feels that it is not important to conform to rules or follow any guidelines. He wants to be free to express himself. He colors outside the lines. He thinks outside the box. He pushes the envelope. The OCD do not argue with that, but we counter with a different approach. Give him differently drawn lines for coloring. Bigger boxes. More flexible envelopes.

The real problem which we OCDians face is that, at times, the effort to fight the askew can overwhelm us, leading us to forego our own lives in the struggle to make the universe adhere to its own pattern. This is the real menace - not OCD per se, but OOCD.

Obessive Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

While the universe remains out of whack, OCDians must find a (perfectly symmetrical) balance between maintaining order on a macro level (my neighbor's house), on a micro level (my desk), and at the same time find a way to lead a normal life. This is by no means easy. Bu if we do not, the mass of people will discount our efforts at perpendicularity, orthogonal rectitude, and dendroid unicoherency as the product of an unwell mind.

We straighten pictures from a sense of duty. We are massively misunderstood creatures, we OCDians. We work to make YOUR world a better more orderly place. If the Prime Mover is an artist who flaunts the rules, doesn't that imply that there ARE rules? If we break with convention, we need conventions. And who best to safeguard the rules and conventions but us?

We cannot rewhack the universe. But we can manage our corner of it.

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Komentari (7)

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a_jovicic a_jovicic 11:34 25.03.2014

Entropy

Well ... maybe Prime Mover is much more organized than we expected ... Imagine two of his "creations" ... Earth crust and water. Looking isolated its entropy is very high (have tendency to go in any direction) ... but combined, is almost totally predictive (at least you can be pretty sure where rain fall will end, even which path it will "choose" ). Just we need to explore each of components and collect enough data.

Off course ... it doesn't mean that we just need to adapt ourselves to his "creations" ...

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

George Bernard Shaw
Chris Farmer Chris Farmer 11:48 25.03.2014

Re: Entropy

Here's to an unreasonable life lived reasonably!

jinks jinks 14:39 25.03.2014

...

Maybe the cause of the change (induced by the Prime Mover, as you suggested in the blog ) partially lies in the fact that PM presumes that any current knowledge about the world, or any current model of the world or any of its components, is by default incomplete and consequently erroneous.
workaholic workaholic 12:12 25.03.2014

OCD

As an OCD sufferer fighting the devil for the last 8 years, I beg to disagree. I'm sure the world would not be a better place if we all turned obsessional. And it is a known fact that OCDians are the ones who constantly ask "what if" and are constantly desperate because they are unable to control anything. I think we would all just end up being desperate
Chris Farmer Chris Farmer 16:00 25.03.2014

Re: OCD

Point taken.
jednatanja jednatanja 20:18 25.03.2014

Well

just like the treatment for phobia consists of exposing the patient gradually to the thing or being he fears the most, a good treatment for an OCD sufferer would be living and working in Serbia. Other great exposure is unruly toddlers, really anything that shatters your routine. Unless you are an air-traffic controller or surgeon, most world would not be so upset if you you did not deliver perfectly.
workaholic workaholic 21:45 25.03.2014

Re: Well

I live in Serbia, I have toddlers and I'm not a surgeon. Thank you for this glimpse of hope

Arhiva

   

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