The Fig, the Olive and the Peaceful Land: Stories from Cananga Tree (11)

"A teacher was teaching the Theory of State, asking his students, 'When was the president said to be a good gardener?'
'When he knew how to address the grass-root issues!' answered one student.
'And why didn't the president trust trees?' the teacher asked.
'Because they're always shady,' another student responded.

"Business owners often face various fears and challenges, there are three common fears that entrepreneurs and business owners encounter: fear of change. Change can be intimidating. Our brains are wired to resist it because it threatens our status quo. However, embracing innovation and advancement is essential for business growth. To overcome this fear, recognize that change is inevitable and seek ways to adapt and harness it. Second, fear of failure. The fear of failure can paralyze us. We worry about embarrassment and losing everything. Instead of dwelling on failure, consider these questions: Will you regret not taking this opportunity in 10 years? If you fail, what’s the worst that can happen? Having a backup plan can boost your confidence and encourage you to try new things. Third, fear of not knowing enough. It’s normal to feel like you don’t know everything. Everyone has blind spots, and seeking knowledge is a sign of growth.
On the broader side, States, like individuals, experience various fears that can shape their behavior and decision-making. There are three common fears that many states grapple with. First, fear of failure. Whether it’s a failed policy, economic downturn, or military defeat, this fear may lead states to play it safe, avoid taking risks, and prioritize stability over innovation. Second, fear of success. Surprisingly, success can be intimidating for states. Achieving success often brings increased visibility and responsibility. States may worry about maintaining their newfound status, managing higher expectations, and dealing with potential backlash from other nations. Fear of success can sometimes undermine the very achievements they strive for. Third, fear of Uncertainty about the future. They fear unexpected events, geopolitical shifts, and emerging threats. This fear drives states to invest in intelligence, diplomacy, and military preparedness to mitigate risks and maintain stability.
These fears are not universal, and each state’s specific concerns may vary based on its unique circumstances and historical context," said Cananga while looking at Monas's obelisk, built to commemorate the struggle for Indonesian independence. Will it also be leased to third parties along with other state assets? Indonesian government has spent a lot of money to finance its politics, so is there still money left for its people? They say people don't like these three things: empty skulls, empty barrels, and empty pockets. And still, Mother Prithvi is having a hard time.

"Indeed, the Indonesians keep on struggling in paradoxes, wrote an Indonesian press figure, Sabam Leo Batubara. The struggle was to realize the goal of establishing 'Negara Kesatuan Republik Indonesia' (the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia; NKRI), i.e. one homeland, one nation, and one unified language. The NKRI also aspires to make all the nation's children, without exception, become prosperous, peaceful, and advanced, to obtain justice, and to gain protection to acquire a sense of security. But the realization is still in struggle. The struggle is full of paradoxes.
On one side, paradoxes are fun, says R. M. Sainsbury, in most cases, they are easy to state and immediately provoke one into trying to 'solve' them. Sainsbury defined a paradox as an unacceptable conclusion derived by apparently acceptable reasoning from apparently acceptable premises. Appearances have to deceive since the acceptable cannot lead by acceptable steps to the unacceptable. So, generally, we have a choice: either the conclusion is not unacceptable, or else the starting point, or the reasoning, has some non-obvious flaw. A paradox is a situation or statement that seems impossible or difficult to understand because it contains two opposite facts or characteristics. It’s like a mental puzzle that challenges our intuition and logical reasoning. Many paradoxes raise serious philosophical problems, and they are associated with crises of thought and revolutionary advances.
One of the hardest paradoxes to handle is also one of the easiest to state: the Liar Paradox. One version of it is the Pinocchio paradox, which arises when Pinocchio says 'My nose grows now'. Imagine someone saying, 'What I am now saying is false.' Is what he says true or false? The problem is that if he is telling the truth, then he is lying. But if he is lying, then he is telling the truth. This creates a contradiction. This paradox is said to have 'tormented many ancient logicians and caused the premature death of at least one of them, Philetas of Cos.' Fun can go too far.

On the other side, paradoxes are serious. Unlike party puzzles and teasers, which are also fun, paradoxes raise serious problems. Historically, they are associated with crises in thought and with revolutionary advances. To grapple with them is not merely to engage in an intellectual game, but is to come to grips with key issues.
Paradoxes come in degrees, depending on how well appearance camouflages reality. Let's take a look at the Barber Paradox. Imagine in a certain remote Sicilian village, approached by a long ascent up a precipitous mountain road, the barber shaves all and only those villagers who do not shave themselves. Who shaves the barber? If he does, then he does not (since he shaves only those who do not shave); if he does not, then he indeed does (since he shaves all those who do not shave themselves). The unacceptable supposition is that there is such a barber–one who shaves himself if and only if he does not. The story may have sounded acceptable: it turned our minds, agreeably enough, to the mountains of inland Sicily. However, once we see what the consequences are, we realize that the story cannot be true: there cannot be such a barber or such a village. The story is unacceptable. This is not a very deep paradox because the unacceptability is very thinly disguised by the mountains and the remoteness. The deeper the paradox, the more controversial is the question of how one should respond to it.
Some paradoxes collect naturally into groups by subject matter. The paradoxes of Zeno form a group because they all deal with space, time, and infinity. Zeno, an ancient Greek philosopher, proposed several paradoxes related to motion. One of them involves Achilles and a tortoise. Achilles gives the tortoise a head start in a race. By the time Achilles reaches the point where the tortoise started, the tortoise has moved a little farther. Achilles then covers that distance, but the tortoise has moved again. This process repeats infinitely, suggesting that Achilles can never catch up to the tortoise.

Let us then consider an old story. Theseus had a ship. When a plank rotted, it was replaced, and thanks to the repair the ship remained in service. After a while, none of the original planks were left. Likewise for the other kinds of parts of the ship—masts, sails, and so forth. Did Theseus’ ship survive? There was a ship in continuous service, and we incline to hold that this is indeed Theseus’ ship, much repaired. But suppose that someone had kept the rotted planks and other parts and then reassembled these into a (possibly unseaworthy) ship. Does this have a better claim to be the original ship of Theseus? There is vagueness of some kind here. The question is: is the ship itself vague, or does the vagueness end with the word 'ship,' leaving the ship itself uncontaminated?
In short, if you replace every part of a ship over time, is it still the same ship? Even though all the parts have changed, but still, we consider it the same ship.

There is another paradox called the Moral Paradox. Suppose that crimes of a certain category (e.g. car-jacking) are eliminated by prescribing an extraordinarily severe penalty (e.g. death). The penalty is so severe that it is 100 percent effective as a deterrent: car-jacking (or whatever crime we consider) never occurs, and so is never punished (so the prescribed severe penalties are never in fact imposed). It seems that we are forced to make conflicting judgments about this imaginary situation:
Good: A crime has been eliminated. There are no bad side-effects: no carjackers are executed (which might indeed be unjust), for there are no carjackers.
Bad: A crime has been associated with a punishment of unjust severity. This makes for an unjust society. Even if injustice is a means to a good end (crime reduction) it is still unjust and should be condemned.
Both views are reasonable; but as they conflict, it appears we cannot hold both. It may be objected that the imaginary situation is unrealistic, and so need not be taken seriously: we cannot be expected to have consistent judgments about such situations.

A most curious thing about common views of morality is their deep ambivalence: many people cherish morality as a basis for laudable moral behavior, while many other people deprecate it. According to Saul Smilansky, it is important to note that while the elucidation of such value achievable by moral behavior involves taking account of subjective components, we have to set some objective standards for what we will consider as having moral value. If any trivial moral conformity would grant one high moral value, then the issue would make no sense. When we speak about high moral value as an achievement, we are, then, referring to matters such as stealing oneself to do the morally good thing, even when there are very good self-interested reasons not to follow morality.
Laudatory views hold moral behavior to be the highest achievement of civilization, the hallmark of humanity’s superiority over other species, the measure of one’s worth as compared to others, and the like. When people act morally, and in particular when they follow the moral code for its own sake, sacriﬁcing self-interest, they are said to be most deserving of admiration. As in so much else that concerns morality, this idea ﬁnds its strongest expression in Kant. Utilitarians, too, hold the widely shared view that true moral action bestows great value on people, particularly when they act morally in demanding situations.
Deprecatory views of morality, by contrast, perceive morality as a burden, at best an unfortunate social necessity that obstructs the pursuit of more interesting and important matters. How good it would be if morality did not require sacriﬁces if one’s projects were not constantly interrupted by external moral requirements, and if social needs that today make exacting moral demands could be met with only limited recourse to such demands.
Whether we hold the laudatory or the deprecatory view of morality has far-reaching implications. If we consider morality the crown of humanity, we will see many issues differently than if we see morality as essentially a nuisance. A major difference between these two views will emerge as we consider the idea of ordering society so that our lives rarely involve demanding moral behavior. At issue here is not the implausible notion that morality in the limited interpersonal sense can simply wither away, but rather that morality might become such that most people, as they currently are, would not ﬁnd its constraints taxing.

Finally, The saying 'When money talks, one seldom checks the grammar' carries a powerful message. In a world where the influence of money often overshadows other considerations, this saying highlights that when someone has significant wealth or financial power, minor imperfections in language or etiquette tend to be overlooked. A book is disappointing if the author does not state and argues for the truth as he or she sees it. On the other hand, no one should believe what the author saying without first carefully considering the alternatives. Be very skeptical about the proposed solutions. So, while money may speak loudly, wise decisions are important. Let’s continue learning and making informed choices!

We've finished this episode and will continue in the next episode. Bi 'idhnillah."

Cananga then serenading,

It's not about the money, money, money
We don't need your money, money, money
We just wanna make the world dance
Forget about the price tag *)