i was listening to a radio show that just happened to be talking about single-payer health care the other day. i don’t remember getting much out of it, as i try and keep up with news stories these days, but facts just seem to sink into my brain without really leaving a mark. i feel like most stories revolving around hot-button issues i listen to go like this:

1. things are unjust.
2. they would be more just if only _____.

that’s about all i get out of it these days. and yet i soldier on, hoping for a moment of realizing something i hadn’t expected. and that happens just enough to keep my interest, so lucky for me. but i broadened my scope a little bit since i was seeing all moral points from a simple two step program. the ability to worry about such problems is a consequence of not having to worry so much about our physical well-being, and having nothing but our minds around to keep us entertained. a luxury, in a sense. problems arise, but this giant glob of humanity keeps pushing on. it’s not like an asteroid threatens our planet or something catastrophic like that.

i feel i can just look at the issue of single-payer health care and think “if this is the best idea we got, then if it isn’t serving us now, it will eventually serve us until we find some better idea to fill the void.” and this could basically be applied to any idea. questions of moral implications of ideas aside (which will be another fun future topic), this is what it boils down to. ideas are pretty easy to spread around (especially with things like the internet), but to have them understood, integrated, and acted upon takes much more time. but in the end, majority will rule, until enough people decide another idea is better or that the previous idea was lacking in something. this system can be gamed of course, but that’s an inherent part, not a flaw. it would be static otherwise.

so we got ideas, we use em’ (with or without morals), and then we justify them. then maybe some new information comes in, and some ideas change because of it. if we’re lucky, we can write this information down and go back and check on it. this is where i should probably make some snarky existential comment like “rinse and repeat” or “dem’s the breaks”, but really, that’s not the point. did i have one in the first place? i’m not sure, details like this normally work themselves out. i think there’s a million variables here, but just like any system it can be simplified down to the main components, and then maybe you can understand it a little better when the nuiances do arise. use your arsenal of ideas to try and hammer out more, or deal with the ones you have? i love you, rhetorical questions. i answer you with my soul.

i think the point i originally set out to explore is how universial ideas are, yet so silly at the same time. ideas are ideas, and we assign value to them. then we apply them to our day to day lives, and maybe it spreads out far enough to influence a larger amount of people. then more information comes in because of these ideas leading to revisions and newer, better ideas. and then….what? all of this leads to repeating itself off to infinity, which may not be a bad thing. that’s why we need more questions to appear out of answers and not vice versa. we would be screwed as a glob if we ran out of things to question.

what the hell else would we do with our consciousness?

you’re conscious, what better things would you do?

i answer you with my soul.