We picked it for a book club and instead of discussing the book or choosing another book, or just ignoring the book and playing Taboo like we did the previous month, we, instead, decided to disband the book club so as to not have to deal with it.  Not that Markus’ topic was that poorly designed or inaccurate in nature, but more so because the people who were not explicitly interested in cognition and human development were completely uninterested in the book. That was, not surprisingly, everyone but me.  The problem I see is that his concept would have been revolutionary and controversial 40 years ago, but seems banal now. It’s a duh. But while the topic was not surprising, the specifics he develops and the way he reminds you that evolution is not behavioral determination is the juicy part that I enjoyed.

For me, he underdeveloped the explanation of our cognitive fallacies and consistent misinterpretations, even though this was his entire thrust. It was as if he was still working on proof of concept well after he had us.  Like this:

Markus: You see, it’s like a tree house where you never take down boards, but as you grow up, you continue adding boards and after 40 years you are living in it, but still use a ladder made of sticks to get up to it.

Me: Okay I see what you mean:

Markus: It’s like if you started a recipe and added sugar and pancake mix because that’s all you had, but then you bought some great lemons and a bunch of strawberries and just added them in too, because you can’t take the sugar out of the mix once it’s in.

Me: yeah… I kinda follow.  I think I get it.

Markus: So the brain is this burrito collage, created of sequential computers, with a Ti-99 stuffed with a PS-2 wrapped in a Apple II GS, surrounded in a waffle of a 486 with iMac syrup and artificial whipped Quad Core topping.

Me: mmm…. quad core topping. I’m hungry.

I’m glad it was as short because he did not go into details about how this war or that cultural development or the other white meat came about through the shortcomings of these kluges.  Or maybe he did and I just missed it.  Again… a pamphlet wrapped in more examples than you can shake a stick at… but his examples seemed more along the lines of proving his point than expounding on it, though he did do some nice expounding on how we operationalized these fallacies. I guess I could have just used more time on those and less on him trying to prove what, after Darwin’s On the Origin of Species has been a logical conclusion on the development of the brain.

Even though I had some problems with the outlined method he enacted to argue his point, I found that his writing style was very accessible, fun, and engaging for the most part.  I just kept finding myself saying… ok ok ok I give, I give and wanting to skip ahead a few pages.

0.5) fixie riders like to have things simple because a bike that you can’t strip down and rebuild after 8 beers isn’t a bike worth riding.  I think this is a very valid point.  Not the beer thing, but the fact that if you rely on your bike to get you around, it’s helpful to have it simple. and if you rely on your own skills or those of friends, it’s better to not have complicated things like a derailleur or brake lines to mess with. Just think about an untrained mechanic trying to repair a set of integrated shifters with a bottle opener and a bike tool.  gearless bikes are just so much easier (and cheaper) to build and keep running.

1) People can ride whatever they want and look however they want.  It’s not a car, so I don’t have to ride in their ride. They are biking and that’s cool enough.  Even if their brains get splattered all over the van that pulls out in front of them.

2) No one want’s to be a hipster. Even that dude in the photo wouldn’t call himself a hipster probably. So there is going to be a lot of defensiveness when something like this is posted because it’s going to nail a lot of people’s habits and tag them with the “hipster” identity.  hipsters HATE that.

3) There is a big difference between riding fixed and riding gears.  I liken it to the difference between skis and boards. It’s just a better way to ride (if you don’t have hills or a need to go fast). Skidding is fun, just like skidding out on my BMX bike when I was 6 was fun.

4) It’s not just an image thing, but it is an image thing.  you forgot to mention that you can never peg your pants, strap them, or sock them. You MUST either wear shorts or roll your pants up, no matter how fracking cold it is. Which means, you must wear cool socks.

4.1) The whole messenger thing isn’t about having the only job that keeps you on a bike all day, it’s also about having a lifestyle that involves lots of danger, lots of alcohol and no health insurance.  It’s an image that stands for much more than biking alone. It stands for freedom from social constraints and norms and ideas pushed forward by a “safety at all costs” culture that locks up people who MIGHT so something wrong and requires vaccines for babies, seatbelts on planes, censors on TV, and safety warnings everywhere else.  It’s an image that says fuck it, I’m going to maybe kill myself but I’m not going to live scared. That’s not the problem. That I can get behind. My ire is in the people that may or may not be that guy in the photo. It’s with the people that HAVE health insurance, HAVE tuition money, HAVE good jobs, and DON’T take risks but just want to piggy back on the hipster look. Like with Goth, when you can buy it in the Mall, your little alternative culture is over. With bags (like Reload which is much hipper than TimBuk2) bikes, hats, and spoke cards (btw if you cant make your own bike card… WTF) for sale all over the place, it’s hard to figure out who’s the Cool and who’s the Tool.

3.1) yep were going backwards. I ride fixed. about 40% is for image. I ride with a helmet, lights, 2 brakes, health insurance, and a backpack. I love track stands because you don’t have to get off your pedals ever (and no you can’t do that on geared bikes). I like skidding but use my brakes most of the time because of the knees (it will mess you up good).  And I love the feeling of constantly knowing how much energy I have created.  It’s really something to feel the inertia you generated push your legs around, to kick your legs into neutral and just let them be moved by the energy you stored in the bike/you unit. It’s like riding a motorcycle instead of driving a car.  It eliminates one more separation between you and your movement.

Sure fixie riders can be douche bags, but so can geared riders and NONE of us are nearly as fucking rude as car drivers. I think we can all agree on that.  And, again, going back to the “not living scared” idea, I appreciate real core fixie riders retaliating against shitty drivers.  Sure it creates some hatred for all cyclists, but I really appreciate it when someone get’s their mirror ripped off because they can’t bother to check bike lanes when pulling out or try to squeeze past a cyclists at an intersection.

I think the real point of the article is well taken: don’t follow trends just because you are afraid that you won’t be as accepted into whatever social group you want to be a part of. Do what makes sense. Brakes make sense. a helmet makes sense. a lock in your bag… no wait, the lock in your pocket makes sense. just like the key on your arm makes sense too if you stop every 4 minutes.

hey. ride a bike.