Precisely, Imprecise

I have spent more than a considerable amount of time thinking about the philosophical link that exists between ideas and documents. These two things are often seen as synonymous, in the way that one of the first things you think about when someone mentions ‘books’ is ‘smart’ or ‘knowledge.’

We consider that everything that is worth thinking about is already written down in a correct way. This keeps a lot of people from writing. I’d argue that it also keeps people from thinking. If everything there is to know is already out there, why think more?

This is also why people trust everything they read. They think that if it’s written down, especially by someone with a degree or any credential higher than theirs, then it must be true.

The thing is, ideas are so hard to grasp. There is not enough words. There is not enough precision in those words. And the more abstract the concept, the weirder it is to communicate. One may, for example, read a logical entry out of a scientific journal in which a particular process is described in great detail and there may be very specific numbers and graphs accompanying the phenomena. One leaves thinking they understand the behavior of said process and is therefore more knowledgeable of the world. In reality, what was just described to you in such great detail is merely a snapshot of reality at a particular instance. Perhaps one that resembles more instances, but hardly one that occurs exactly the same way every time.

The more detailed you try to be in describing a broad truth, the less broad you become. It is in imprecision, I believe, that universal truth lies. Things occur one way, sometimes. Another way completely, other times. Things are wacky and out of order most times. And we don’t know why. This is also very true with people. How does one capture the true essence of a man? Psychology has delved tirelessly into expressing fundamental truth through so many approaches that physical scientists scoff at the idea of it being labeled a science at all. Again, in the search for truth, there comes imprecision.

Personally, when it comes to the search for truth, I think the arts got it right. I’d like to think of people as poems. Abstract, surreal, ugly fucking poems. People thrive in contradiction. In emotional outbursts that betray that which we have identified so closely with our intelligent existence. We do not make sense, and to embrace it, is I think is a pivotal step towards embracing and understanding ourselves.

At the risk of sounding anti-intellectual, I think we should ditch documentation. Or rather, we should ditch the idea that logical documentation can in any way support the truth, for the truth is bigger than logic. I am talking about laws and theory. I am talking about mathematics and formula. These documents can represent repeatable trends, a approximation that may aid our attempts at prediction, but not downright truth.

As humans, we should take in both art and math. Two tools for understanding the world. Precision to measure the precise, imprecisely. And imprecision to tackle the imprecise more precisely.

If this all sounds fucking weird, I know but bear with me I’m getting somewhere. In the immigrant community, there is word that is so precisely imprecise, it has nearly driven us to the brink of insanity. Fucking ‘illegal.’ It is a concept that nobody really fucking understands, yet it’s one that is thrown around so commonly, if you were to question it’s definition, you would be met with dumbfounded expressions and the suggestion that you need to go back to school, or ‘read more.’ Illegal, some would say, would mean unlawful. If taken logically, to call person illegal, would mean to call that person’s existence, ‘unlawful.’

Obviously, a person’s existence cannot be lawful. There needs to be a qualifier. If it is not illegal for the person to merely be, perhaps it is illegal for the person to be here. Again, however, is it not merely that they are here, but that they are here without first asking the government for permission. The government would also have to grant the permission so there’s that. At the end of this seemingly logical line, you would get to conclusion that, it is only okay for you to be here if the government has granted you permission to be here. The question then becomes: who has permission?

The law says that anyone born in u.s soil is not an illegal. This includes all u.s citizens. All rapists, p

edos, thieves, killers, and committers of every sort of crime you can or cannot imagine. These people have the government’s permission to be here.

If you were not born in u.s soil, there are also ways you can qualify. You can ask nicely, and if you are the best of the best and can wait 5, 10, sometimes 15 years, maybe they’ll say yes. You can have parents that were born here but had you elsewhere. You can marry someone who was born here. You can prove that you will die or starve if you are not given permission to be here. You can get harmed in specific ways while being here without permission. You can also come here with the permission of staying only for a little bit and then not go home, and then apologize and marry someone who was born here. And lastly, if you did come without permission, you leave for ten years and then ask for permission.

Notice, the government doesn’t just throw you in jail for being here without permission, they sort of work with you. There’s even ways they’ve set up so that you can pay them taxes. It’s all a big mess. It doesn’t really make sense. I fucking hate trying to make it make sense. I prefer to see it all as poetry.

People call us illegal, like we are a verb. Like our existence is us doing something wrong. In that way, we are soulless and preventable. We are a mistake that is being made. That is why they ask the government to correct us, and that is why we are not really addressed as humans, or asked to plead our case. If we were, perhaps the conversation would be different.

Illegal to me, however, is an adjective, a way of being that is in opposition to what the government wants. The U.S government and anyone who has ever picked up a history book knows the long history the u.s has had in exploiting it’s Latin American neighbors. Taking as much as they can from foreign countries, and draining them of its resources. Making the homes of many humans virtually uninhabitable, and ridden of corruption and instability.

In that way, us being here is the unfortunate side effect. But in the reactive way that a verb behaves, but in the way that qualifies an existing noun, turning us from victims (n). into Illegal (adj.). Border crossers. Untamed. Undefeated. Unruly. I like to see myself that way.