O, human beings

Human beings weld a great deal of power: we have the capacity to exist as self-aware, intelligent, logical creatures. That state, however, sits at the end of a very long contiuum on which a person can choose a spot. “That really is what it is to be human,” in the words of Captain Jean-luc Picard, ” to better ourselves—to endevor to be [sic] better.” We have the innate ability to choose (pre-destination and the whole fourth dimension, cause-effect, space-time thing aside).

O, how wont are human beings to renege on these powers! A mental paradox arises when one recognizes others that waste their potential as a free entity—do we languish over their loss and chide them or do we celebrate human choice, the choice they have made? Not all situations result in such a philosophical paradox, as sometimes, the choice violates other premises like morality. “Thou shall not steal,” is such a premise. Choosing to steal is wrong in our society as it violates another individual’s right to property. Returning to the original paradox, without a good choice to celebrate, we can chide that person for turning their back on human inginuity and logic.

Having established that I can rightfully say woe to theives, I must protest the action that took place in my driveway yesterday evening. I will state out front that I live in a quiet, small neighborhood on a not-so-busy street. That said, having returned home from a number of errands, I left my window down in my car given the temperatures in the high 90s (F) during the day. Oblivious, I left my beloved iPod (gasp!) in the center console, out of the way where I normally keep it while in the car. I forgot about my car window and didn’t even think twice about the iPod until I went searching for it this morning only to discover my center console ajar and my iPod gone.

When one loses a valuable piece of technology, it is a sad day for all geeks and futurists, but having the iPod lost no, egregiously stolen from under my nose sends hate boiling through my arteries. A torrent of emotions overcame me—grief, despondence, and despise riding my body like a roller-coaster. Some punk kid is now in possession of l’Orchestre (French for orchestra), my iPod’s name. Will I ever see it again, can I catch the wasteful and immoral human being who committed this travesty? Probably not.

I have my iPod’s serial number at home, so I plan to post it to a few web sites on the off chance that it might turn up on some corner of the web like eBay. Now I must figure out what my car and house insurance deductibles are, hoping they are not higher than the $400 price tag.

Why must people fritter away their unrealized aptitude by making such a poor choice? I could hope whoever has engaged in such behavior is at least remorseful, but I doubt it—such people (and not to generalize) go to all ends to squander their humanity. An even bigger tragedy than the loss of my iPod indeed.

[update] For the record, my iPod’s serial number is, err, was U2320HCVNLW, a 3G 15 GB iPod.