I was playing basketball at the campus last night. The court is actually atop a kind of bar, right outside the main building. It was probably around 8pm, so dusk was setting in and there weren't many people about, mostly those heading home.

As the laws of physics dictate, once in a while your shot comes in at an angle such that the friction is sufficient and your ball gets caught between the rim and the glass/board, stuck. This is no big deal, it's happened to everyone lots of times. As a kid, you can't reach up there so you have to improvise. If you have a second ball you can hit the ball that's stuck and dislodge it. Or you can find something else to throw up there. Or you can climb the basket. Or you can fix your bike next to it and reach up from the seat. There are all kinds of possibilities.

Last night, before I had decided what to do, a guy came up the stairs, approaching me, threw down his backpack, muttering something in Dutch with a smile, and jumped for it. It was quite the shocker. Then he said "I saw from down below that your ball got stuck". First he used his super vision to see, then his super leap to get up there. I was amazed. And just like that, hadn't asked him or anything, didn't even have a clue what was going on when he came up the stairs. I mean if he'd been right there, sure I would have seen it coming. But he wasn't even in the vicinity. And yet he both saw it and decided to help out. Fantastic.

If you're wondering why he could reach it and I couldn't, it's because Holland is a country of giants.

I've never read a philosophical argument before I started Plato's The Republic. The book is basically one long argument, it's quite interesting. Socrates is debating (or explaining, rather) his thoughts on justice to his friends. That's the core of the argument. From there on, he touches on a plethora of other issues, all of which is tied together to fit his rather succinct argument.

For the most part it's quite straightforward reading, you just have to make sure you have a clear understanding of the terms that are used, because they are meant in the full capacity of their meaning. In parts, especially when he explains what is good, it's harder to follow and it takes some concentration.

What strikes me about this kind of argument is that it could easily be criticized on its lack of completeness. I suppose it is inevitable that if you want to pursue a philosophical argument, then you have to agree to accept certain claims in the argument to be completely true, even though you wonder if you could find counter examples. This is what Socrates's friends do, they accept every claim to be true in its full meaning, even when sometimes I don't necessarily support that conviction.

Plato writes with a great mastery of expression. He repeats things once or twice, for ease of recollection, but never more than that. He always uses words exactly to their meaning, never having to digress to explain something that could have been said in one word. This kind of succinctness (but at the same time broad enough to follow easily, not cutting too much) is quite remarkable to witness.

In terms of practical results, Socrates describes facets of man, like justice, wisdom, knowledge, and how they interrelate. He uses many comparisons to sketch the similarities between a just man and a just city. These characteristics of man are examined on the scale of a city, and then applied to man. In this way he describes different forms of government, and the perfect form of government (and by implication - of man).

It's a book that contains a great richness of thought, knowledge, and wisdom. So for a complete appreciation I believe it should be digested and analyzed piecemeal.

There is no better starting point for learning than to be a child. Actually if you had known, you may have been quite stressed. You have all the potential and you haven't made one single mistake yet. Can we make it a flawless game? Kids need a lot of guidance. They know nothing, and they are about to learn everything.

When you're a kid your parents will guide you in all sorts of ways. They will try to shape your behavior, whatever it may be in its most natural, unfeathered form, to something they believe is correct with respect to the society they live in. They tell you to respect people, to be nice, to shake hands, to say goodbye when you leave, to be unselfish, to not abuse people's trust in you, and so on. These are all very simple rules, and you will choose at some point which ones you are going to follow. It's entirely up to you.

But that was then, you aren't a child anymore. What have you decided? Do you have it all figured out, or do you think you could use some more guidance? Do you think you've outgrown that kind of influence? Would it be possible for someone to exert an influence on you that would make you behave more good or more evil?

I believe that studies have shown that people are very susceptible to outside influence. I also feel this to be true from experience. But one thing in particular that has concerned me for a long time is how it is that people decide to be decent and to what extent to be decent.

This is something that's very easy to observe, because wherever they are people they are exhibiting what is their standard of decency to that particular situation. And I believe we have a general standard as well, that covers every eventuality, to which we refer in cases of uncertainty.

What I'm implying here is that there is a range of behaviors we allow ourselves. You will allow a different standard when you're fighting with that guy at work you just positively hate (and you're being attacked), compared to when you're dealing with your parents.

Another point to consider is group influence. It isn't just the person you are dealing with that is affecting your decisions on how to behave, it's also people around you. Just being an observer already attunes you to the standards of interaction that are the norm in this environment. Observing one conversation between two people has a direct influence on your next conversation with someone from that same group.

Eventually, through all of these influences, we set the bar for ourselves somewhere. And I feel the urge to ask where and how. Why are people so classless sometimes? Why do they laugh at the most base jokes?

Every person has their standards, but people, if they can co-exist, tend to balance each other out, to fit into the social context. So if you think racist jokes are bad, and your coworkers love them, the only way you'll fit in is if you'll accept them, at work. It's also very clear to me that people, as a group, can choose to raise their standards or to lower them. One person's choice affects the next, but if one person or part of the group decides to move the bar, the rest tend to follow.

Influence is possible, but is it a good thing? This goes back to the very well established question of whether it's right to influence people because we know what's best for you. Are you an adult who makes all of your own decisions or do you need some guidance yet? Without that influence people will work out the balance among themselves. And that outcome tends to be fragile. An influential person (without any conscious effort to influence the group), a person people pay attention to, can tip that balance up or down.

Of course, if I were more serious in any of my endeavors I would actually research the subject at hand instead of just plainly talking about it. I would grab that relevant book in sociology or group psychology or whatever the exact term is, read the conclusion and say "so that's the way it is". But that would be denying myself the satisfaction of being able to figure out something for myself, even if it is a well established scientific truth since 1873. :P

The main police station in town is right near my house. That doesn't bode well, does it? Apparently not, because first my bike gets stolen, now someone thought it would be fun to steal the valves off of all the bikes parked in the area, so my rear tire is completely flat and there's no way I can inflate it. And since I'm not a bike mechanic with a stash of spare parts, and it's a holiday, I can't get it fixed until Tuesday.

There's scum on the block alright.

I wouldn't be surprised at such a thing in Poland, you hear about this crap all the time. But just when you think you live in a civilized country...

Statistics is not exciting. It's not something that makes people giddy. It's a dull, mundane discipline. But... it's useful, very useful. Because statistics allows you to see truths that that naked eye (by which I mean the mind without using any special method) doesn't. And the reason I say it's useful is because statistics is a field that deals almost exclusively in application. There isn't really that much to gain from statistics as a mathematical field in of its own, it's the ability to apply this method widely that makes it powerful.

When you learn statistics you explore examples like what is the probabiliy of winning the lottery. It's a contrived example really, because I imagine there isn't a wide correlation between those who play the lottery and those interested in learning statistics. But what you find out is just how oblivious those people are about the fact that there is no chance in hell they will ever win the lottery.

But there are more interesting truths you can derive with statistics, like accurate predictions about who's going to win the election, with 50 million voters, by only polling 1000 people. Now that's pretty impressive, I'd say. Of course, a lot of people dismiss statistics as just manipulating numbers to suit your end. And that's true. But it's a very shallow view on statistics, which is a lot more than that.

Because statistics deals fundamentally with examining relations between things. And that is a very general idea you can apply to lots of scenarios. And what's more interesting: probability. We tend to accept the theory that if something has happened, there is a chance it will happen again. Probability is no more than a formalization of this idea. If you are late for class 9 times out of 10, then chances are, by the sheer virtue that history tends to repeat itself, you are going to be late next time. Of course, it's just a prognosis, it doesn't determine the outcome.

And this is where I think people dismiss probability as being some kind of useless game. Because the thing is that according to the physical models we have of our world, there is nothing definite about anything. It's all probability. When you drive under a bridge, you don't know for certain that the bridge isn't going to collapse and smother your car. Now the chemical qualities of the materials used to build this bridge are such that the probability of collapse is very small. The bridge will probably stand for at least 100 years. But there is nothing certain about this. And yet it's good enough for us to trust, isn't it?

So why isn't it definite? When you buy a hard disk, you're hoping that the disk won't crash on you and you'll lose all your data. Why do you have this fear? Because hard disks are known to crash, sometimes they break. And if on average one disk in 1,000 breaks within the first year, then you know that yours may break. Why do you know this? Because you believe that something that's happening won't just stop happening for no reason, you believe there is a certain continuity to events. So if the design and production of hard disks is such that 1 in 1000 breaks, then you know that there's a chance of 1:1000 you'll be replacing yours. But why is this true? Does the prognosis now determine the outcome? No, it doesn't. Instead, the probability represents a truth about the present. That is to say it's not some product of guesswork and wishful thinking we hope will come true, it's a truth. What determines the outcome isn't a guess - it's the present situation.

If you slide a pencil off your desk and it drops to the floor, you will not be surprised. And if you repeat this experiment, you will not be surprised to learn that it happens every time. Does that mean you can be certain that it always will? Probably. On the other hand, if you sit down to dinner everyday, and occasionally (let's say once a year) you spill your drink, can you be certain that there will come a time in the future when you'll again spill your drink? No, not really. In the first case, you can confirm the same outcome every time, there isn't even one example to the opposite. In the second, it happens very rarely, and so it's hard to say whether it will happen again, and if so when. Both are scenarios with a certain probability.

So how useful is probability in predicting the future? I haven't done a lot of air travel in my life, but in the last few years with vacations and moving abroad it has picked up. And I have never been late for a flight. Just like with the pencil. Could I say that if I've been on 30 flights and I've dropped the pencil 30 times, the probability of being late for my next flight is the same as the pencil not dropping? No, because the underlying conditions are much different. The only thing affecting the pencil is gravity, and we know gravity is pretty reliable. What it takes for me to get to the airport on time is timing skills, as well as public transportation being on time. So if I've never been late, and I know that the bus is 10 minutes late one time out of say 100, I know that sooner or later I may be on the bus that happens to be late. So essentially, every time I make it on time (approaching that 100th trip), I know that next time I'm more likely to be late than I was this time. That is to say, I anticipate that 100th occasion to happen.

Of course, the probability of missing the next flight is a lot more complicated than just determining how likely the bus is to be late. Perhaps they switched buses to a new model that's more reliable. Perhaps everytime I take the bus it has just undergone maintenance (and is less likely to break down right after maintenance than it is otherwise). Anyway, I still have to get to the bus in the first place. Perhaps the cops decide to close down the block and send me a on giant detour. Perhaps my knees give out. Perhaps I was playing sports the day before and injured myself, slowing me down. Perhaps I slip and injure myself on the way to the bus. Perhaps the machine at the airport that prints boarding cards runs out of paper just when it's my turn. Perhaps the security people decide to pull me over for an hour long check because they're bored. There's a huge amount of probabilities that enter into the calculation. One or multiple can make me late for the plane. The only thing I [probably] know for certain is that there is no certainty.