Censor

What you see and what you do determine who you are physically. Your brain is shaped by these choices. Lab rats that are separated into groups of varying environments - ranging from solitary confinement to large cages with objects and other rats to interact with - are then dissected and their brains measured. Those from the enriched environment have larger cortexes that normal, and those from impoverished environment have smaller cortexes. At any age the brain can expand, and if a rat is moved from one cage to another the brain responds accordingly. Another study subjected mice to 5 hours of loud rock and immobilization, and then measured a decrease in dendrite count.

When I was twelve I knew this. (I had slightly unusual reading habits.) I was selective with what music I listened to. I didn't go to concerts or dance performances if I could avoid it. If forced to go, I would usually mutter that the volume was too high and that the beat overwhelmed the melody. I covered my ears and waited for the event to close. Yet when I chose the music, I listened to it a lot. I did not know why I did, but with music such a large part of my life, I determined that it all would be flawless and pure. The music I listened to was Classical, Celtic, Electronica - in all cases instrumental. Language is flawed and arbitrary, so it was not permitted.


In high school I preferred science to the humanities, and Math to English. So I favored the precise use of words anytime they had technical application. Speed is measured by a speedometer, but velocity is not. Velocity is a vector; it is speed with a direction. If a car has a GPS it can measure velocity. Momentum can refer to a sequence of successes, but is truly the product of mass and velocity. English is so arbitrary, but these refined and precise definitions eliminate some of the confusion. Once these words become part of the vocabulary and you start using them in the most correct usage, physics problems become more obvious.

Hence after passing a few vehicles on a crowded highway, my father said "Keep going, you have momentum."

And I reply: "Yes, but the truck coming the other way has more."

I don't like passing. I actually don't like driving either. It always comes to the situation of waiting for priority or checking to see if the way is clear. Then the way is open if I don’t wait too long - have I already waited too long? Yes, but only because I stopped to ask the question. Hesitation kills the opportunity. One should find an optimal path, but figuring it out takes time. The optimal path cannot be followed if it requires the use of time already spent figuring it out. This is vacillation (when not applied to electrical circuits, where the meaning is subtly different). You could say I avoid pressure, but remember that pressure is a plane normalized vector of force over area - unless you are referring to static pressure, which is a scalar instead. Let's just say I don't want to be rushed, nor do I want to test my reflexes.

Stress is applied to an object, and the object strains in response. So stress is external, and strain internal. The same amount of stress can apply to two objects, and yet the strain will vary according to the strength and durability of the two objects. That is the physical definition. Strain also is a psych term, though in that case, stress is usually used. I don't know if this is deliberate. Strain should be the real problem, but stress is external and therefore more easily studied. Strain is the feeling of being overworked, or having too much to worry about. I am a bit prone to anxiety. This would mean that either my habits have a tendency to let things accumulate until the strain is so great that I fail, or it means that my tolerance for stress is low. I would have less strain if I could accept less than ideal solutions.


In England I met Elder Hosch. He listened to music for another reason; he tried to like all possible types of music. He introduced me to Muse. Their music is technically good, but their style requires a very specific taste to enjoy. His philosophy is this: that music allows you to talk to anyone and find at least one song or style in common. So he has a wide library of music that he is familiar with.
After returning to the states, I found a new website called Pandora. Pandora was a symbol for curiosity. They had indexed their collection of songs according to a fixed set of metrics, giving a measure of how closely related two songs are. They compared it to DNA, calling the system the Music Genome Project. And with this, they created an internet radio station that would play songs that you liked based on what ones were close to ones that you approved and avoiding ones similar to ones you disliked. The point was to help you find something new, but with a better hit rate than complete chance.

The classical songs I knew were not in the system, and I did not know any famous bands, the latest popular music I knew was old by the time my mother was in college. So I tried things that other people liked, such as BNL and the Eagles. I made a few stations where I would take a specific attribute (breathy female vocalist lead) and apply fierce selection pressure in favor of that attribute. I would collect really strange songs such as Pi (about the famous number close to 3.14) or the one with the chorus of 1001 1001 0110 (it is a love song). These are some of the strange, obscure, and wonderful things I discovered.

I bought some music and had a fairly good collection of songs when I permanently and irreversibly deleted everything on my hard drive. Yes, it was an accident. I tried to reverse the damage but it was too late. (It wasn't exactly everything on the drive, just my user folder, and so only anything that mattered was lost.) And so here is the parable of the burning house. If my house was burning, I would think of all my stuff, and would be almost at tears to decide what was worth saving and what should be left to the flames. The best decision is to save my life and the lives of others in the building, but there would still be regret for things left behind. Only after the ashes had cooled down and I had tried to get on with my life would I realize what things have the most value. This is the same situation I was in, and I found that I missed my music the most. It took a few months of searching for my scattered backups, but eventually I recovered all but 3 songs.

Now I don't have a strategy for selection of music. I listen to whatever I like and don't worry too much about what it is exactly. Looking back I cannot pinpoint when my attitude changed. It probably happened in England. A missionary takes no music with him, and once on the mission does not waste time. Therefore my last day home was spent listening to a stack of Fresh Aire CD's. Now I don't listen to them as much.

My library is large and unorganized. Two of my favorite songs are political, but I haven't spent the time to figure out what exactly they protest. (I am guessing that I diametrically oppose their views) I have a song that compares love and attraction to target seeking systems in missiles. And the one about veal. Yeah, some of it is weird. I am no longer the purist of my youth. The only holdover is that when I write, the music has to be without words, and when I draw it has to have words. I figure there is no reason to overload my language centers when using them, nor any reason to let them rest when not.


But why do we listen to music? There is no logical reason that one sequence of tones should be more desirable than another. Why don't we just listen to white noise, or something spewing from a pseudorandom number generator? I still have no answers. All I know is that you tend to like songs that you listen to, and you tend to listen to what you like. So you want to be comforted by the familiar, but at the same time surprised by the unknown. There needs to be some structure or it makes no sense, but not too much or it is boring. It is almost structured enough to be sending a message, but not anything that can be decoded. It seems to be some emotion or other intangible, indescribable concept, crystallized.