Is There Grandeur In This View Of Life?

One of my all-time favorite lines which constantly reminds me of my insignificance is the last paragraph of Darwin's Origin of Species:

"It is interesting to contemplate an entangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and dependent on each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us. These laws, taken in the largest sense, being Growth with Reproduction; Inheritance which is almost implied by reproduction; Variability from the indirect and direct action of the external conditions of life, and from use and disuse; a Ratio of Increase so high as to lead to a Struggle for Life, and as a consequence to Natural Selection, entailing Divergence of Character and the Extinction of less-improved forms.

Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher animals, directly follows. There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved."

If I translate Darwin's lines into my current state of mind:
Darwin is saying there is beauty in Max passing away. Is it really?

These past few days, while going for small walks with Neo, I saw the same people who looked at Max with pitiful eyes just a few weeks ago, now look at Neo with a sparkle in their eyes. Unconsciously our brains biased towards sensing grandeur in this view of life.

I pretend to be that "impartial spectator" of Adam Smith and observe things as "it is" as they unfold while walking with Neo. Few of those people immediately subsided their sparkle when they looked at my eyes. Maybe, they sensed me missing Max. No matter how hard we try, one cannot be an impartial spectator; the observer affects the observed.   

We are creatures living at a micro-level of this grandeur. We are part of this beauty and terror.  We are incapable of being an impartial spectator and observe while living inside it. The only truth we comprehend is that there is no beauty nor terror anywhere else in the universe as we know. It is just a vast empty space for eternity.

If I translate Darwin's lines again with this perspective:
Max came from a lineage of a single-cell organism and I happened to come from the same lineage. Then after millions of years, we evolved into a different mixture of complex cells and then thousands of years later, against all odds we found each other and spend our lives together. Then one day, last month Max was gone. In a brief time, I will be gone too. All this was just one micro-level story that unfolded for just an infinitesimal time. Trillions of such stories had unfolded before and trillions are unfolding now and trillions will unfold in the future.

I have to admit that Darwin was right although I miss Max. There is indeed grandeur in this view of life since this is the "only" view of life we know in the entire space and time. One thing we can do is work towards eliminating terror and start giving beauty more chance.

In the end, I think one can find one's significance hidden in the phrase - "dependent on each other in so complex a manner". I found mine.

Morality, Complex Systems and AI!

Bruce Stering says it brilliantly what I wanted to say for the past few years!

These are the people who think philosophy is some abstract paragraphs in old books and never understood that this whole enterprise was designed as a simple guide to help people to live a good life (beyond themselves). We are living in a classic halo effect - designing a deep reinforcement algorithm (which they never do) doesn't make one capable of being entrepreneurs for morality.

So I don’t mind the moralizing about AI. I even enjoy it as metaphysical game, but I do have one caveat about this activity, something that genuinely bothers me. The practitioners of AI are not up-front about the genuine allure of their enterprise, which is all about the old-school Steve-Jobsian charisma of denting the universe while becoming insanely great. Nobody does AI for our moral betterment; everybody does it to feel transcendent.

AI activists are not everyday brogrammers churning out grocery-code. These are visionary zealots driven by powerful urges they seem unwilling to confront. If you want to impress me with your moral authority, gaze first within your own soul.

$6M Super Bowl Ad To Thank The Vet Who Saved His Dog From Cancer

I will write more about Max's cancer, his myriad of treatments and his oncologist later but this is heartwarming news - I am not alone!

Max was almost 14 years but this dog Scout is only 7 years old. I am happy for Scout and his dad David who refused to give up based on some mindless survival probability.

Max was given 8 weeks but he went to survive for almost 2 years.  We are so used to putting dogs down so quickly just because its an inconvenience. We need to stop using these euphemisms and instead use the word "kill". Maybe, that would stop a lot of mindless killing.



His dog was given a month to live. But the owner, who couldn't accept that prognosis, is now thanking the veterinary clinic that saved his beloved pet by taking out a $6 million Super Bowl ad.

David MacNeil's 7-year-old golden retriever, Scout, collapsed in summer 2019, and a veterinarian told him the dog had cancer and one month to live, according to NBC Madison, Wisconsin affiliate WMTV.

"There he was in this little room, standing in the corner... and he's wagging his tail at me. I'm like, 'I'm not putting that dog down. There's just absolutely no way," said MacNeil, who is the founder and CEO of WeatherTech, an car accessories company.

He took Scout, who serves as his company's unofficial mascot, to the University of Wisconsin School of Veterinary Medicine.

The dog had a one percent chance of survival, but doctors at the veterinary school treated Scout with aggressive chemotherapy and radiation that nearly eradicated his tumor.

MacNeil was so grateful he took out the ad, a 30-second spot called "Lucky Dog" that opens with Scout running on the beach and tells the story of his survival.

The spot encourages viewers to donate to the veterinary school's research.

Good Bye Clayton Christensen

Once again Cancer was the culprit. He might have inspired Steve Jobs with his book Innovators Dilemma but for me, his single insight on how to look at questions changed the way I see and behave with people.

You’ve probably heard it said that someone can’t be taught until they’re ready to learn. I’ve heard it said that way too. It makes sense, and my experience tells me it’s mostly true. Why though? Why can’t someone be taught until they’re ready to learn?

Clay explained it in a way that I’ve never heard before and I’ll never forget again. Paraphrased slightly, he said: “Questions are places in your mind where answers fit. If you haven’t asked the question, the answer has nowhere to go. It hits your mind and bounces right off. You have to ask the question – you have to want to know – in order to open up the space for the answer to fit.”

Thank you, sir, for your great insights. That insight will stay with me until I perish. Tell Max I miss him and I love him if there is something more out there. 

Amor Fati - Stoic Exercise 3 of 3

This is Part-3 of how Stoic exercises that helped me (Part-1 on Premeditatio Malorum and Part-2 on Memento Mori).

Premeditatio Malorum and Memento Mori are easy ones for me to practice. The whole idea is to imagine from a subjective point of view on how objective it would feel when it happens (no question - it will happen). Being a human - the masters of imagination, it naturally came to me and practice didn't seem like practice.

Amor Fati as Ryan Holiday describes:

When we accept what happens to us, after understanding that certain things— particularly bad things—are outside our control, we are left with this: loving whatever happens to us and facing it with unfailing cheerfulness and strength.

It is the hardest exercise for me to follow since here one has to go from an objective standpoint into imagining a subjective point of view that might never happen. In other words, one has to consciously practice self-deception when one is emotionally weak.

How can I see anything positive in Max leaving me? The truth is there is none. And having read and loved so much on Robert Trivers mostly unknown and underrated research on self-deception makes it even worse.

Most people would see the positive thing in his passing (a quintessential "proven" human ways to delude oneself after the loss of their loved one) stating one or all of the these:

• Max is not hurting anymore and he is in a better place now - whatever that place is supposed to be; the best place in the universe for Max was always Home. I am not sure what that better place is. 
• I don't have to suffer with him anymore and use my time now productively - my time revolved around Max and without him, I don't grasp the concept of time. I am living inside David Eagleman's research on timewarp and perception of time which creates a fourth dimension inside the brain. Time has stopped and it has slowed down since Max.
• Everyone has to go one day; it is the rule and reality of life - knowing this doesn't make the loss any more bearable or insignificant. 
• And multitudes of other social "dances" - drinking, finding god, sex, being with friends, going on a vacation, reading, finding oneself (whatever that means) and other self-indulging mindless acts to help the brain forget the reality. These are convenient excuses to live inside the self-centered world masquerading as self-pity and grief. 

There was a time in my life when I had nothing - absolutely nothing and then Max came into my life. I am so glad that I didn't kill myself before meeting him. We had an ordinary life filled with beauty and wonder for 13 plus years. I cannot ask for more.

And now, I have everything but Max is not around.  These ironies of life are what few wise men have written and warned us for thousands of years. I am grateful that I was lucky enough to read and understand a few of their wisdom.

There is absolutely nothing positive about losing Max and I cannot delude myself into thinking otherwise. I saw Max take his final breath... he was struggling and finally, he stopped breathing and went into eternal stillness. Maybe, I have to keep breathing until it stops and until then, do whatever little I can do leave this world a little better place than the one I inherited.

There is a beautiful monologue by Tom Hanks in the movie Cast Away - "I Have Ice In My Glass":



I really don't need the tide to bring me a sail. I have already had more than a lion's share luck when the tide bought Max when I was just 31 years old. I don't want nor wish for another one. It would be absolutely selfish of me to ask for more. It's about time I start giving back.

So the positive and objective things now that Max is not around are that I can breathe. I can walk. I am healthy. I have food. I have water. I have not one but three therapists. I live in the most powerful country with all the best comforts possible than any other time in history. I am so grateful for all of that.

And most importantly, I have lessons from Max on how to live and how to die. That is the greatest gift I got without even wishing for it. Now, all I have to do is keep breathing and not forget how grateful life has been to me.

I am not the first nor the last to feel these sorts of pain. Albert Camus went through worse (and to make things even worse, he was in bad health):

In the depths of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.

And that makes me happy. For it says that no matter how hard the world pushes against me, within me, there’s something stronger – something better, pushing right back.

To discover that invincible summer, one has to emote with reason and reason with emotions outside of self and their self-centered families. No doubt, Max taught me well to survive in an eternal winter with no summer in sight.

In The Unbearable Lightness of Being Milan Kundera observed a fundamental truth we all ignore:

Mankind’s true moral test consists of its attitude towards those who are at its mercy: animals. And in this respect, mankind has suffered a fundamental debacle, a debacle so fundamental that all others stem from it.

I just need to keep breathing and help undo that fundamental debacle in whatever small ways possible to eliminate animal suffering.

P.S:

In Antifragile, Taleb observed a natural state of Amor Fati:

The excess energy released from overreaction to setbacks is what innovates!

That applies to different situations. To be precise, that applies to bad things that are caused by other humans. 

But Albert Camus once again showed us a path which goes beyond Amor Fati: 

Should I kill myself, or have a cup of coffee?

[---]

The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.

How Good It Is To Be Us !

When Henry David Thoreau died at the age of 44 in 1862 his mentor Ralph Waldo Emerson gave one of the worst eulogies in history: 

There was somewhat military in his nature not to be subdued, always manly and able, but rarely tender, as if he did not feel himself except in opposition. He wanted a fallacy to expose, a blunder to pillory, I may say required a little sense of victory, a roll of the drum, to call his powers into full exercise. It cost him nothing to say No; indeed, he found it much easier than to say Yes. It seemed as if his first instinct on hearing a proposition was to controvert it, so impatient was he of the limitations of our daily thought. This habit, of course, is a little chilling to the social affections; and though the companion would in the end acquit him of any malice or untruth, yet it mars conversation. Hence, no equal companion stood in affectionate relations with one so pure and guileless. “I love Henry,” said one of his friends, “but I cannot like him; and as for taking his arm, I should as soon think of taking the arm of an elm-tree.”

It was a pity that Emerson choose such harsh words; history will never forgive him. Thoreau had his faults but he didn't play the social games that Emerson embraced often.

One of the heartfelt and beautiful tributes I have read in recent memory was by Christopher Hitchens's wife Carol Blue (as an afterword in his last book Mortality):

Offstage, my husband was an impossible act to follow. 

At home at one of the raucous, joyous, impromptu eight-hour dinners we often found ourselves hosting, where the table was so crammed with ambassadors, hacks, political dissidents, college students and children that elbows were colliding and it was hard to find the space to put down a glass of wine, my husband would rise to give a toast that could go on for a stirring, spellbinding, hysterically funny 20 minutes of poetry and limerick reciting, a call to arms for a cause, and jokes. “How good it is to be us,” he would say in his perfect voice.

My husband is an impossible act to follow.

I miss his perfect voice. I heard it day and night, night and day. I miss the first happy trills when he woke; the low octaves of “his morning voice” as he read me snippets from the newspaper that outraged or amused him; the delighted and irritated (mostly irritated) registers as I interrupted him while he read; the jazz-tone riffs of him “talking down the line” to a radio station from the kitchen phone as he cooked lunch; his chirping, high-note greeting when our daughter came home from school; and his last soothing, pianissimo chatterings on retiring late at night.

I miss, as his readers must, his writer’s voice, his voice on the page. I miss the unpublished Hitch: the countless notes he left for me in the entryway, on my pillow, the emails he would send while we sat in different rooms in our apartment or in our place in California and the emails he sent when he was on the road. And I miss his handwritten communiqués: his innumerable letters and postcards (we date back to the time of the epistle) and his faxes, the thrill of receiving Christopher’s instant dispatches as he checked-in from a dicey spot on some other continent.

The end was unexpected. At home in Washington, I pull books off the shelves, out of the book towers on the floor, off the stacks of volumes on tables. Inside the back covers are notes written in his hand that he took for reviews and for himself. Piles of his papers and notes lie on surfaces all around the apartment, some of which were taken from his suitcase that I brought back from Houston. At any time I can peruse our library or his notes and rediscover and recover him.

When I do, I hear him, and he has the last word. Time after time, Christopher has the last word.

"How good it is to be us!" 

That's exactly how I felt those 13 plus years Max and I shared in a dreamland. I miss his wet nose, I miss his naughty eyes filled with life, I miss kissing his shiny coat, I miss biting his pink lips, I miss him giving me that big hug, I miss everything about him. I am so thankful that he was in my life and teaching me how to live and how to bid goodbye.

I love you - it was so good to be us!

My Therapists

They might look small but they have this scarce power to change their mind for good when it's needed. Most humans are incapable of this because of their self-induced arrogance.

I saw world differently for the first time in my life through Max's eyes. Now, these guys and gal under the giant shadow of Max are helping my little grey matter.

Meet: Miss Fluffy - In front of her, John Stuart Mill would look like Stalin's surrogate and contemporary libertarians would be indistinguishable from North Korean prison guards. 

She must be from the same lineage as Montaigne's cat. 

Meet: Mr. Garph (as in Garfield) - This little Buddha can instantly make Tibetian monks feel like barbarians dancing for rap music. Serenity would scream in his company. 

 

Meet: Neo - He thinks he is right out of Greek Mythology. He has the capacity to chew this planet Earth from one end and come out from the other side. 

The "Why" Question

But the idea that we can rid ourselves of animal illusion is the greatest illusion of all. Meditation may give us a fresher view of things, but it cannot uncover them as they are in themselves. The lesson of evolutionary psychology and cognitive science is that we are descendants of a long lineage, only a fraction of which is human. We are far more than the traces that other humans have left in us. Our brains and spinal cords are encrypted with traces of far older worlds.

[---]

Anyone who truly wants to escape human solipsism should not seek out empty places. Instead of fleeing to desert, where they will be thrown back into their own thoughts, they will d better to seek out the company of other animals.

A zoo is a better window from which to look out of the human world than a monastery.

- John Gray, Straw Dogs: Thoughts on Humans and Other Animals

In simplistic terms - To know thyself, it is better to live with animals than meditate since meditation is probably going to confabulate our own self centered and biased thoughts.

John Gray is one contemporary philosopher (or otherwise) that I completely agree with at a fundamental level. Maybe, I have to re-read and read him more but nevertheless, he is grossly under-rated.

Why did Max and I have this bond? I am sure, if someone psychoanalyzes me enough they can find spurious correlations with my childhood, relationships, genes, and other cultural-social-economic factors.

I think the simplest answer is we both shared an ancestral past, shared a peaceful present, and we subconsciously knew about our shared future destiny.

This applies to each and every one of us.

The only credit I get is that I didn't just ruminate and ponder on this fact but lived by dedicating time and effort. Time and effort was only dedicated to Max and nothing else. Period.

In 1563, the death of his close friend Étienne de la Boétie deeply affected Montaigne.

It has been suggested by Donald M. Frame, in his introduction to The Complete Essays of Montaigne that because of Montaigne's "imperious need to communicate", after losing Étienne he began the Essais as a new "means of communication" and that "the reader takes the place of the dead friend". (source)

And Montaigne wrote a beautiful answer to this "Why" question:

"If you press me to say why I loved him, I can say no more than because he was he, and I was I."

Max and I at a cabin in Catskills during the summer of 2015

Play was the "purpose" of life for 13 plus years

Laughter was our language, Joy was our sense and Peace was our dwelling

World was beautiful with Max by the side

And We became "One"

    Colors of life might fade & perish but nothing can do us apart

                                                                                    In this ordinary life - beauty happened & wonder thrived

Crying

If you hold back on the emotions--if you don't allow yourself to go all the way through them--you can never get to being detached, you're too busy being afraid. You're afraid of the pain, you're afraid of the grief. You're afraid of the vulnerability that loving entails. But by throwing yourself into these emotions, by allowing yourself to dive in, all the way, over your heard even, you experience them fully and completely. 

[---] 

Same for loneliness: you let go, let the tears flow, feel it completely--but eventually be able to say, " All right, that was my moment of loneliness. I'm not afraid of feeling lonely, but now I'm going to put loneliness aside and know that there are other emotions in the world, and I'm going to experience them all.

[---]

I give myself a good cry if I need it. But then I concentrate on the good things still in my life. I don't allow myself any more self-pity than that. A little each every morning, a few tears, and that's all.

I read that advice from Morrie (Tuesdays with Morrie) about 20 years ago.

I am an emotional creature (who isn't?) to begin with but emotions have engulfed me even more since Max left.

I have never had any shame or any sort of apprehension for crying (sans self-pity) but I never knew that I could cry spontaneously at any given moment - when I see his photos, when I kiss his ashes good morning, when I kiss his ashes good night, when I tell his stories to Neo,  when I visit his vet, at work,  while walking, while driving, in bed, in shower and now even as I type this.

But as Morrie had said - when we are in grief, a good cry is what we need. There is a reason why evolution has given us (and all other creatures on this planet) so many emotions. Each one serves multiple purposes.

There is no medicine in the world that can help us than our own tears when in emotional pain.  A good cry clears my mind. It helps me focus on what to do next. It helps me reflect on the beautiful moments in the past. And most importantly helps me let "it" flow in the present moment. Without this process, I cannot make any good judgments nor any decisions.

To put it bluntly - I feel lighter when I cry. It helps to float but not sink in pain. The process repeats. I don't for how long. The process will repeat as long as it takes since I am going to miss Max for eternity or till the end of my life whichever comes first.

Old news is that psychopaths to slaughterhouse workers lack or control their emotions but the new news is that if one controls their emotions (as the society preaches), one hasn't experienced nor used some of the fundamental tools that our body and mind has provided us with.

To add to  Pascal's quote:

All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.

Plus, man's inability to emote freely and constructively which helps him go beyond himself and his family to aware of it's insignificance and how much suffering he causes because of that in the world. 

Reinhold Niebuhr said it more eloquently :

Ultimately evil is done not so much by evil people, but by good people who do not know themselves and who do not probe deeply.

I felt liberated when I read neuroscientist Antonio Damasio's groundbreaking book Descartes' Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain and his brilliant insight into "Somatic Marker Hypothesis":

What worries me is the acceptance of the importance of feelings without any effort to understand their complex biological and sociocultural machinery. The best example of this attitude can be found in the attempt to explain bruised feelings or irrational behavior by appealing to surface social causes or the action of neurotransmitters, two explanations that pervade the social discourse as presented in the visual and printed media; and in the attempt to correct personal and social problems with medical and nonmedical drugs. It is precisely this lack of understanding of the nature of feelings and reason (one of the hallmarks of the "culture of complaint") that is cause for alarm.

[---]

Emotions and the feelings are not a luxury, they are a means of communicating our states of mind to others. But they are also a way of guiding our own judgments and decisions. Emotions bring the body into the loop of reason.

Today, it's been a month since Max passed away. I am not I without you, my love.

"From Prison to Python" - Shadeed Wallace-Stepter

After this point, I started meeting with Jessica pretty frequently, and she began to tell me about the open source community. What I learned is that, on a fundamental level, open source is about fellowship and collaboration. It works so well because no one is excluded.

And for me, someone who struggled to see where they fit, what I saw was a very basic form of love—love by way of collaboration and acceptance, love by way of access, love by way of inclusion. And my spirit yearned to be a part of it. So I continued my education with Python, and, unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get more tutorials, but I was able to draw from the vast wealth of written knowledge that has been compiled by the open source community. I read anything that even mentioned Python, from paperback books to obscure magazine articles, and I used the tablet that I had to solve the Python problems that I read about.

[---]

Then, on August 17, 2018, I got the surprise of my life. Then-Governor Jerry Brown commuted my 27-years-to-life sentence, and I was released from prison after serving almost 19 years.
But here’s the reality of my situation and why I believe that programming and the open source community are so valuable. I am a 37-year-old, black, convicted felon, with no work history, who just served 18 years in prison. There aren’t many professions that exist that would prevent me from being at the mercy of the stigmas and biases that inevitably accompany my criminal past. But one of the few exceptions is programming.

- More Here

10 Weeks & Already Drawn Towards Sisyphean Task's

Max was extremely... I mean extremely picky about choosing his toys.

And obviously, that resulted in many unused (and untouched) toys.

Now, Neo is living in the middle of a jackpot of unused Max's toys (Max's favorite and used toys are already in the memory capsule).

Neo is drawn to this HUGE dinosaur toy. I bought it for Max when he was around 3 or 4 years old, he sniffed it once and never touched it for over 10 years.

Now, this little guy loves this toy which is double his current size and weighs almost his current weight.

I think this is a small window into the future on how different this guy will be from Max.

And Garph watches this spectacle with astonishment :-)

Memento Mori - Stoic Exercise 2 of 3

This is Part-2 of how Stoic exercises that helped me (Part-1 covered Premeditatio Malorum).

Meditating on this gave Max and me the courage and power for almost 2 years to live these lines from the classic Meat Loaf song:

And I would do anything for love, I'd run right into hell and back

There is no way on earth we could have pulled it off without the help of those wise men who lived before us.

Hitchens during his final months in the hospital wrote in his last book Mortality:

Only OK if I say something objective and stoical: I am remarking that a time might come when I’d have to let go: Carol asking about Rebecca’s wedding “Are you afraid you won’t see England again?” Also, ordinary expressions like “expiration date”… will I outlive my Amex? My driver’s license? People say— I’m in town on Friday: will you be around? WHAT A QUESTION!

I never looked at death through these mundane and ordinary eyes before I read those lines in 2012.

In 2015, Max had a growth on his toes and the vet was worried about Melanoma. It took almost 2 weeks for all the tests to come back and dismiss it as benign. During those 2 weeks, his ear cleaning liquid ran out and the vet gave me a big bottle. As soon as I saw that the question that came to my mind was - will Max outlive to finish the contents of this bottle? Just now, I checked the date on the bottle - 08/13/2015. He lived for four more years but didn't outlive the bottle. Now Neo, Fluffy, and Garph are using its contents on a weekly basis.

I started seeing materials in my life through this lens; if all goes well, I might have to buy only one more car in my lifetime, I might have to change carpet only more time in my house, I wouldn't need to buy new bed ever, no new house, I might spend roughly 1000 hours with my family (i.e., if I live till 80) and so on and on.

This mindset has helped me now to say it aloud that I am not regretting spending enough time with Max. Even making the decision of bringing Neo home (just 4 days after Max passed away) was based on this. I am 45, if all goes well when Neo, Fluffly, and Garph are ready to go,  I will be close to 60. Who knows these guys would be my last dog and cat in my life. And I don't want to regret not being without experiencing life through their eyes.

Memento Mori was (and is) the easiest thing I followed. I took to these beautiful sentences from Montaigne and instilled inside of me that now it feels innate.

If you don't know how to die, don't worry; Nature will tell you what to do on the spot, fully and adequately. She will do this job perfectly for you; don't bother your head about it.

That sentence sounds contradictory to Memento Mori but it's not. No one is capable of thinking about death constantly. I see, Memento Mori as a struggle between virtue and vanity. How to be virtuous when we all know its all vain and how to sprinkle vanity when the body feels strong and virtuous (or more complicated term for this is "catalepsis" which was coined by Martha Nussbaum -  "a condition of certainty and confidence from which nothing can dislodge us.”). Some days the former take the forefront and somedays the latter but most days, I hope to get a balance between both.

To quote Hitches again on how body dissipates slowly in front of our eyes:

It’s normally agreed that the question ‘How are you?’ doesn’t put you on your oath to give a full or honest answer. So when asked these days, I tend to say something cryptic like, ‘A bit early to say.’ (If it’s the wonderful staff at my oncology clinic who inquire, I sometimes go so far as to respond, ‘I seem to have cancer today.’) Nobody wants to be told about the countless minor horrors and humiliations that become facts of ‘life’ when your body turns from being a friend to being a foe: the boring switch from chronic constipation to its sudden dramatic opposite; the equally nasty double cross of feeling acute hunger while fearing even the scent of food; the absolute misery of gut-wringing nausea on an utterly empty stomach; or the pathetic discovery that hair loss extends to the disappearance of the follicles in your nostrils, and thus to the childish and irritating phenomenon of a permanently runny nose. Sorry, but you did ask… It’s no fun to appreciate to the full the truth of the materialist proposition that I don’t have a body, I am a body.

I have seen Max's body go from a beautifully shiny and healthy bundle of joyful life into bare-bones in a matter for a few months. Every one of our final destiny is to watch our body dissipate. No one can escape this. If this doesn't make us all more humble, kind, caring and stop immersing ourselves in a self-centered world then I don't know what would.

    Max with Graph on August 14th, 2019. Around September, his body slowly went downhill.

So all this memento mori, stoicism, reading, mindfulness et al., was it worth it when the rubber hit's the road?

Having immersed in memento mori for years, I still haven't come it terms with Max not being around. It feels like I am still practicing life after him and it hasn't actually happened. In a weird way, practice and reality have overlapped. I hope that this false hope lasts.

English translation of one of my favorite Tamil song goes like this:

For all of us,  good times are guaranteed in our lives, 

Even for the “have-nots”,  bad times will change and progress is guaranteed in this world.

Why do we dwell in unwanted questions and unattainable dreams, your day will come, all things will be in your hand’s reach.

So, why do you unwantedly suffer now? believe in a better tomorrow,

On our earth, all we souls have innumerable desires, not one but more than thousands of needs...

Buddhists have been warning us about desires for thousands of years. I did heed to their wisdom. I think I have tamed a lot of my wants, desires, and needs over the past 13 years.

But.. yes there is always a but - since Max came into my life, I had two desires. Honestly, I didn't have any other and most likely, will never have more desires for the rest of my life.

Desire 1 - I wanted Max to take his final breath in this house where he grew up, played and lived happily for almost 14 years. I didn't want him to be killed by some lethal injection in a faraway place by a vet. I always wanted him to die a peaceful and natural death by my side in this house.

The desire was almost lost last October in those terrorizing 5 days. A miracle did happen. Max had miraculous turnaround on the fifth day and he was ready to go home. His eyes were full of sparkle asking me to get him out there and take him home. He loved home more than any other place on earth - the same as his dad.

On December 20th, when no one was home except Max and I, he took his last breath by my side in the place he loved most - home.   I am so grateful that one thing I desired and dreamt for so many years finally came true. Forget my desire, I know he wanted to be home when took his last breath. I cannot explain, I just know.

Desire 2 - I want to take my last breath in this same house where Max grew up, played and took his last breath. I want my head on his little pillow and covered in the blanket he had before we took him for his cremation. I have this beautiful dream that it will be true someday. That is only remaining desire. I can only hope I would be as lucky as Max.

To state the obvious - Yes,  the meditations on Memento Mori not only helped Max and me but also bought both of us a miracle to make this desire come true (plus the effort of many other people who helped Max along the way. I am grateful for each and every one of them).

A natural question arises when time tested methods like Premeditatio Malorum and Memento Mori works so well then why most people don't even know about it leave alone practicing it? I think the answer lies in these wise words from Pascal:

All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.

P.S:

I have avoided quoting any classic Stoics (Montaigne is an exception) and focus on contemporary people who meditate on Memento Mori. 

There are many others I left out. Last lines of Nassim Taleb's AntiFragile is a good example:

The glass is dead; living things are long volatility. The best way to verify that you are alive is by checking if you like variations. Remember that food would not have a taste if it weren’t for hunger; results are meaningless without effort, joy without sadness, convictions without uncertainty, and an ethical life isn’t so when stripped of personal risks.

I am not here to live forever, as a sick animal. Recall that the antifragility of a system comes from the mortality of its components— and I am part of that larger population called humans. I am here to die a heroic death for the sake of the collective, to produce offspring (and prepare them for life and provide for them), or eventually, books— my information, that is, my genes, the antifragile in me, should be the ones seeking immortality, not me. 

Then say goodbye, have a nice funeral in St. Sergius (Mar Sarkis) in Amioun, and, as the French say, place aux autres— make room for others.

And even someone like Naval Ravikanth reflects on this:

We’re not really here that long, and we don’t really matter that much. Nothing that we do lasts. Eventually, you will fade. Your works will fade. Your children will fade. Your thoughts will fade. These planets will fade. This sun will fade. It will all be gone. There are entire civilizations which we remember now with one or two words. Sumerian. Mayan. Do you know any Sumerians or Mayans? Do you hold any of them in high regard or esteem? Have they outlived their natural lifespan somehow? No. I think we’re just here for an extremely short period of time. 

A great review of Hitchens's book captured the essence of it brilliantly:

If, as Montaigne famously said (by way of Cicero) “to study philosophy is to learn to die,” Mortality is a crash course in lived philosophy, without benefit of abstraction or metaphysical speculation.

Robert Triver's theory of self-deception (more on that some other time) is grossly undervalued and misunderstood; it is a groundbreaking insight into the human condition and explains why we don't reflect on the upcoming death periodically. 

Note: There is purely bullshit talk by Yuval Harari (I am a big fan of his book Sapiens - which is based on history and not 'predicting' future) with Daniel Kahneman titled - Death Is Optional and Peter Theil with his misplaced optimism (and exceptional linguistic skills) is working on "cures" to live forever. 

I rather, ask them to first try to design artificial blood from ground up (don't kill pigs for this); we depend on donors for this even today. These are complex systems, you cannot tackle them with optimism, pep talks and trillion dollars but only with humility. I will be impressed if some of these silicons valley hedgehogs can cure a common cold. 

By sheer coincidence, a dog named Max (an Australian Shepherd) gave blood transfusion to Max on 10/02/2019 which saved his life. I am eternally grateful for that Max and nurse Kathy who is Max's mom.

Parfit's Mistakes in Moral Mathematics

Derek Parfit is one of my favorite philosophers; Max's 2019 holiday was based on his book On What Matters

I have huge respect for him but even such an amazing human can make mistakes because of lack of any emotional connection with animals.

This a fascinating piece on him - a quasi bio of him:

"Like my cat, I often simply do what I want to do." This was the opening sentence of Derek Parfit's philosophical masterpiece, Reasons and Persons. He believed that it was the best way to begin his book because it showed something important about people. Often we are not as special as we think we are. For instance, when people simply do what they want to do they appear to be utilizing no ability that only people have. On the other hand, when we respond to reasons, we are doing something uniquely human, because only people can act in this way. Cats are notorious for doing what they want to do, and the sense of proximity between a cat and its owner pleasingly heightens our sense of their similarity. Hence, there could be no better way for this book to begin.

However, there was a problem. Derek did not, in fact, own a cat. Nor did he wish to become a cat owner, as he would rather spend his time taking photographs and doing philosophy. On the other hand, the sentence would clearly be better if it was true. To resolve this problem Derek drew up a legal agreement with his sister, who did own a cat, to the effect that he would take legal possession of the cat while she would continue living with it.

Clearly, he didn't live with any animals (which I didn't realize until I read this piece) but like many people he went on to stereotype animals based on pure subjectiveness (this is no ordinary human bein but this is from a master of objectiveness):

Perhaps Derek's deepest held belief was that, contrary to much of popular opinion, there are objective facts about what we ought to do. This is what he meant when he talked about ‘reasons', and it was the recognition of these facts, either intellectually or merely by the application of common sense, that he saw as setting people apart. A cat cannot help its carnivorous ways, and it cannot help but follow its instincts to hunt and to kill, even if it no longer needs to. However, people understand that our actions can produce suffering. Once we become aware of this we seem to face a choice. Either we make a conscious attempt to dismiss this fact (animals don't really suffer, nothing we can do could reduce the amount of suffering in the world) or we feel we ought to change our behaviour, for instance by becoming vegetarian or giving money to charity.

It's just amazing that a person of his caliber can make such a simple and profound mistake. With absolutely no experience, he draws conclusions about the cat that it has no control over its instincts (to be clear, I happy that he understands that animals do suffer).

I have lived with Fluffy and Garph for a while now and I can objectively state that they never do anything just instinctively. As a matter of fact, I call Garph, the little Buddha. Well, you don't have to live with cats to know this. A rudimentary national geography documentary can explain that cats (and even reptiles) don't kill because of just "instincts". They do only when they are hungry and need something to eat. Otherwise, they leave their prey alone and they don't hurt them. I repeat they don't meaninglessly hurt or kill other animals unless they are threatened or hungry. 

Humans are the only creatures which kill for pleasure (hunting, sport), kill for gluttony (farm factories), kill to discover "cure" even when they "believe" animals are very different than us (animals testing even of depression medications like Prozac) and multitudes of other meaning-less suffering and slaughter. 

There is something fundamentally wrong with us. The first step for moral progress is to accept this fact and start from this baseline to move forward. But it seems like we continue to live in a myth of human exceptionalism with a delusion that our senses and brain captures exactly how the universe is. 

My other favorite philosopher (or rather one of my all-time favorite human being), Montaigne  in Essays has more realistic and humble view of his cat:

When I play with my cat, who knows whether she is not amusing herself with me more than I with her.

[---]

In nine lifetimes, you'll never know as much about your cat as your cat knows about you.

We need more Montaigne's now more than ever.

First Shower

I was 31 when Max took his first shower; the cutest photo of him ever! It is one of my favorite pics of his.

This was taken on 06/05/2006 - you can see from his looks, he wasn't happy about the whole shower thing. He made a fuss about the whole process :-)

I still have that cute green little towel; time-capsuled until I kick the bucket. 

Now, I am 45 and 14 years later, Neo took his first shower on 01/12/2019. Surprisingly, he was ok with whole process. He didn't know what was coming before he entered the shower but he is didn't make a fuss. He didn't sit still like Max did post-shower. 

Walking...

I haven't walked in the park or any place which Max and I go for weeks now. Even before he passed away, he wasn't able to walk for close to 10 weeks.

Today, Neo took a short walk in the park where Max and I walked a thousand times over the years...

Trying to conscious of me missing Max shouldn't affect Neo's puppy-hood.

Ad Astra

"The enemy up here is not a person or a thing. It’s the endless void."

Ad Astra is the first movie, I saw after Max passed away. It's slow and Brad Pitt looks tried but I think that's the point of the movie. Unlike all other "searches for ET" movies, this one is close to reality and probably, that's why the movie didn't do well at the box office.

As far as we know, there is no other life anywhere in the Universe (I am writing this being a big X-files fan but "wishing" and "imagination" is quite different than reality) and if someone is stupid enough to drop everything on earth in search for something they imagined, then they will be disappointed at their end of life. Tommy Lee Jones's character is a paragon for a lot of past, present and future addicts.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with scientific enquiry but not at the cost of the only place in at the universe which supports life.

There is so much we don't about the life of earth - deep oceans, ocean bed, earth core, other non-human-Animals, our brain,  cancer, our emotions and I can go on and on. Read the book A Astronauts Guide to Life on Earth by Chris Hadfield and Packing for Mars by Mary Roach to understand how lucky we are.

"He’d captured strange and distant worlds in greater detail than ever before. They were beautiful, magnificent, full of awe and wonder. But beneath their sublime surfaces, there was nothing. No love or hate. No light or dark. He could only see what was not there, and miss what was right in front of him."

Indeed, we are creatures who miss what is right in front of our nose.

Those Lines on Grief & Grieving

Aysha Akhtar's book Our Symphony with Animals: On Health, Empathy, and Our Shared Destinies is one book that I connected with completely. It was like someone else writing my own thoughts (but she more courageous to visit farm factories which I don't think can ever do).

Here is a quote from the book which I read last summer when Max was still active and even playing frisbee regularly:

We laugh together and cry alone. Grief is even lonelier when an animal dies because it's less valued that grief over the death of another human. Sociologists, psychologists, and psychiatrists have been slow to appreciate the impact of loos of an animal. An animal's death can cause poor sleep, missed days from work, significant distress, and depression. Among those who lose animals they deeply love, the extent of their grief is similar to that of those mourning the death of a cherished person.

That quote has so much truth to it. I would even add that it is worse than the mourning of the death of a human being since this special bond is beyond language and purely at an emotional level. When I read it, I was angry. I knew, what was coming. I knew, what to expect from all the people around me. I was convinced that I will burn in fury when the time comes.

There is so little understanding about the human and non-human animal bond that it made me sad. Loving kids, parents, and spouses are natural - we are evolved to do that. There is nothing, absolutely nothing special about it. As a matter of fact, if someone doesn't have that evolutionarily driven love then there is something wrong with that person. In the best case,  one will be a social pariah and at worst, one will be labeled a psychopath.

I was honing that quintessential human trait of argumentative skills mentally over the months whenever I saw Max having a bad day. I simply couldn't comprehend how people put so much passion and emotions into random, subjective and outside their control matters like the stock market, religion, politics, sports and miss something so beautiful right in front of their nose.

But on December 20th when Max passed away, those argumentative skills and that beautiful-true lines on grieving did not matter anymore. And I don't think it will matter for the rest of my life. If someone doesn't understand that leave alone experiencing that special bond in their lifetime then I can only feel sorry for them.

I called it a "Double Qualia" problem.

How can you explain what it feels like to see a red rose? That is a Quali Problem.
But Double Qualia Problem is how can you explain what is to feels like to see a red rose when you even haven't seen any red rose?

That is what people miss in their lifetime.

Ellie Arroway played by Jodie Foster's in the movie Contact (based on Carl Sagan's novel) in front of the Senate hearing committee:

Senator: You come to us with no evidence, no record, no artifacts. Only a story that, to put it mildly, strains credibility... Are you really going to sit there and tell us that we should just take this all on faith? 

Ellie Arroway: Is it possible that it didn't happen? Yes... As a scientist I must concede that. I must volunteer that. 

Michael Kitz: [raises voice] Then why don't you simply withdraw your testimony and admit that this journey to the center of the galaxy, IN FACT, NEVER TOOK PLACE!!?? 

Arroway: Because I can't! I had an experience... I can't prove it, I can't even explain it, but everything that I know as a human being, everything that I am tells me that it was real! I was given something wonderful, something that changed me forever... A vision of the universe that tells us, undeniably, how tiny, and insignificant and how ... rare, and precious we all are! A vision that tells us that we belong to something that is greater than ourselves, that we are not — that none of us — are alone! ... I wish I could share that. I wish, that everyone, if even for one moment, could feel that awe, and humility, and hope! But ... that continues to be my wish.

And that is exactly how I felt during those 13 plus years with Max. I was given something wonderful and special. Now that Max has passed away but larger parts of those feeling, vision and amazing beauty survived inside me. And I will continue to feel and preserve it for the rest of my life.

I had to write about this although I know most people wouldn't change their minds on animals. Everyone felt sorry and sympathized with me when I lost Max. Many people, felt pain when Max was suffering. But none of them actually made any effort to understand the bond leave alone understanding what it means to lose it. Life doesn't simply go on as usual after that.

It is embarrassing to watch some people struggle to interact with me during this rough period. It's plain embarrassing since these humans never nurtured their emotions to go beyond themselves. 

I miss Max every second of the day and understanding grief doesn't matter since it is not going to bring Max back. But, I want to document it because in future things should change. Future generations should be more aware of love, pain, joy, and every other emotion does cross species boundaries.

I hope, this changes after our lifetime and let selfless open-mindedness flourish in the future generations.

Premeditatio Malorum - Stoic Exercise 1 of 3

Premeditatio Malorum is the Latin word for the premeditation of the evils and troubles that might lie ahead. This was something very easy for me to do. Basics of biology and rules of organic life on this planet made me practice this constantly to enjoy normal and ordinary days with Max.  Even Daniel Kahneman wrote lengths about the importance of negative bias (which has the roots for our loss aversion trait).

Premeditatio Malorum was something Seneca wrote about in lengths:

What is quite unlooked for is more crushing in its effect, and unexpectedness adds to the weight of a disaster. This is a reason for ensuring that nothing ever takes us by surprise. We should project our thoughts ahead of us at every turn and have in mind every possible eventuality instead of only the usual course of events… 

Rehearse them in your mind: exile, torture, war, shipwreck. All the terms of our human lot should be before our eyes.

And we all know what happened to Seneca but what we don't know is what went through Seneca's mind when he was forced to commit suicide.

Thinking of negative events before happening does not mean constant rumination and sinking in the quagmire of future realities of life. But it is to keep that small voice in the back of the head alive, reminding me of what matters most in life and what to put the time and effort on. It is as simple as it sounds. Like anything else in life, it can be developed by practice.

Even after 13 years of practice of premeditation of evil, I wasn't even close to ready to lose Max. I can only ruminate and wondering what would have become of me if I didn't practice? But nothing in the world would have prepared me for losing Max.

It did help me is those 18 plus months in which Max lived with Cancer. Nothing else mattered - job, finances, relationships and everything else under the sun. My brain put my habits and routines on hold without any effort. The focus was on getting more of the most scarce thing in the universe - time. Mind was focused on squeezing every extra millisecond with Max without making him suffer.

Thank goodness for so many people and their efforts; he survived more than 18 months with cancer.  I don't think, my mind and body would have worked in symphony without any effort if I had not practiced premeditatio malorum constantly.

As far as everything else during those 18 months and even during Max's puppy days to prime of his adult life, premeditatio malorum helped me focus on what matters - Max!

There is a beautiful reply by Joseph Heller of Catch-22 fame which was immortalized by Kurt Vonnegut:

Joseph Heller, an important and funny writer

now dead,

and I were at a party given by a billionaire

on Shelter Island.

I said, “Joe, how does it make you feel

to know that our host only yesterday

may have made more money

than your novel ‘Catch-22’

has earned in its entire history?”

And Joe said, “I’ve got something he can never have.”

And I said, “What on earth could that be, Joe?”

And Joe said, “The knowledge that I’ve got enough.”

Not bad! Rest in peace!

The knowledge that I've got enough is something I got from Max. It's such a beautiful feeling when the body and mind - emotionally and intellectually agree on something.

I have no regrets about not spending enough time with Max. Every day, every hour, every min of the past 13 years was planned accordingly so that I could spend more time with him. There is no way, I could have said I have no regrets when Max is not around if not for this powerful stoic exercise.

Thank you for all those wise men who have the sense to document and pass on this wisdom.

Max at the emergency room in October 2020 - those dreadful four days and the miracle on the fifth day.

Neo

Homecoming on 12/24/2019; four days after Max passed away. Neo is 8 weeks old.

Life is so rare in this universe plus there is this thing memento mori; I don't want to waste precious time without a dog. In this limited life, we don't get to interact with many non-human animals leave alone opening the life to be symbiotic with them.

My bond with Max is unique and I spent the prime of my adult life with him - my 30's and half of my 40's with him.

Yes, these guys will always be in the huge shadow of Max and there will be an eternal vacuum without him.

Moral Luck Of Max Coming Into My Life

Moral Luck is a famous paper by Thomas Nagel and the following lines sum it up nicely:

This is true of murder, altruism, revolution,  the sacrifice of certain interests for the sake of others almost any morally important act. What has been done, and what is morally judged, is partly determined by external factors. However jewel-like the good will may be in its own right, there is a morally significant difference between rescuing someone from a burning building and dropping him from a twelfth-story window while trying to rescue him. Similarly, there is a morally significant difference between reckless driving and manslaughter. But whether a reckless driver hits a pedestrian depends on the presence of the pedestrian at the point where he recklessly passes a red light. What we do is also limited by the opportunities and choices with which we are faced, and these are largely determined by factors beyond our control. Someone who was an officer in a concentration camp might have led a quiet and harmless life if the Nazis had never come to power in Germany. And someone who led a quiet and harmless life in Argentina might have become an officer in a concentration camp if he had not left Germany for business reasons in 1930. 

I always said since Max was young that everything good in me is because of Max and I still say the same. The entity of self (whatever that means) that I am now would have been drastically different if not for Max. The future choices (good ones) will be purely be biased by my time spent with Max. I had the pleasure of immense "Moral Luck" to spend 13 years with Max. I am eternally grateful for that time. I would gladly pick any day of those 13 years to be with him in an eternal Ground Hog Day.

Waking Up

Kissing Max is the first thing I did for 13 years. Then we followed a ritual until I left for work. That ritual went chaotic since his body slowly got consumed by cancer. But kissing him was there until the last day. 

Now, I kiss his ashes which is devoid of everything he was. The mornings are empty without him. It is scary to count how many mornings would I have to face for the rest of my life. 

There is a famous quote on suicide:

The person who completes suicide dies once. Those left behind die a thousand deaths, trying to relive those terrible moments and understand … Why?

The worst thing in life missing someone who you love and knowing you will never see them again.  Max didn't commit suicide but I feel the pain that some wise humans had written about thousands of years ago. 

Albert Camus said it so eloquently: 

But in the end one needs more courage to live than to kill himself. 

Max had one of the most powerful eyes. I have seen his body weaken and never fully recovered but his eyes showed that power of life until the am of this last day. Maybe, my courage might come from that remembrance of his beautiful eyes. 

Maximus and Me

Life without Max is not something I was prepared for. The truth is I don't know how to live without him. We are adaptable creatures but knowing just this fact makes one self-ware of the process of adapting. I don't know if its the curse of knowledge or if its just pain reality.

Years ago, sitting with Max when I started this blog, little did I know that I will be reading one of the most favorite blog posts about Emotional Intelligence with another puppy.

Our motivations are largely emotionally driven. Negative emotions push us to face and act on those things that make us most uncomfortable. Positive emotions allow us to enjoy success and give us energy to meet new challenges. But negative emotions inspire us to make changes. 

Misery is perhaps the most creative force in our lives. Seldom do we make major changes in our lives without considerable emotional pain. Each negative emotion comes complete with an intuitive guide to action. Anger pushes us to stand up for ourselves and speak up when we’ve been treated with disrespect. Fear makes us hyper-vigilant to potential danger and readies us to duck or run away if needed. Sadness makes us review over and over again what we’ve lost. That ruminative search is for the knowledge to compensate for our loss [as well as reassess its meaning and purpose. Ultimately, such learning leads us with the wisdom to understand our lives from a new perspective and make our actions more adaptive.] Guilt reminds us of our responsibility in the errors we make and motivates us to work to understand our mistakes and learn how to avoid repeating them.

It is no secret that I am full of pain and it hurts immensely knowing that I will not see Max ever again, I will not smell him, I will not able to kiss him, I will not be able to feel that wet nose and there is nothing I can do about that. One day, I will perish too. But before that time, how can I use the lessons learned from Max and my negative emotions to do some little good for what I received so far in my life. I am immensely grateful for 13 years with Max, life could have taken me in so many different directions but yet, by sheer randomness and chaos of life bought Max and me together. I am grateful for that chance and time.

Will I learn to live without Max? It doesn't matter. We still breathe the air dinosaur breathed millions of years ago. I will breathe the same air Max breathed, I might be able to smell him occasionally since olfactory memory is the mother of all memories and I will see him in my dreams. We are masters of creating subjective realities and I might have to create one to fuel further living.

My pain is pain. There is no point in trying to find a "cure" for it.  This emotion was innate to serve a set of purposes. It is serving its purpose in this pinnacle of a moment. I have to let it flow as long as the current let it do so. And this very emotion might be the key source. What matters most is what I will do in this journey of life without Max before I perish to express some sense of gratitude? This is not searching for the purpose of life but rather an obligation.

I love you, Max. I miss you. I miss you so much.