Senna reviewed

A man and his car. A rain-soaked race track. Calm hands, moving the steering wheel of the Toleman TG 184, navigating it in perfect accordance with the specifications of the extremely narrow circuit.

It is the Monaco Grand Prix in 1984, Ayrton Senna's first Formula One street race, and iconic for a number of reasons, but mainly, because Senna, the rookie, managed to catch up to his later nemesis Alain Prost, and even passed Niki Lauda for second, despite being in a less competitive car and starting from "unlucky" position 13.

It's the prologue to the documentary film Senna (2010), directed by Asif Kapadia (The Sheep Thief, The Warrior). You may wonder, I do so myself to be honest with you, how it happened, that I, a woman with no interest in sporting activities whatsoever, Carpal tunneling my way in front of the Playstation as exercise, managed to be smitten with a sports documentary, a ferocious sport at that, with a high likelihood of contestants eventually crashing, burning and dying (not naturally in that order) after driving in circles for hours.

The most important characteristic of Senna is, that it is not as much a canticle to racing, as it is a well directed character piece about a very complex, inconsistent man. The documentary portrays Senna as a devout person, quietly determined, even noble offside the tracks, and yet quick tempered, delusional and ruthless when things didn't go his way as to the standards of the competition.

The film consists of both family home videos, interviews with friends and family, and archive footage of races Senna participated in, including spectacular onboard recordings from Formula One. With so much video material at his disposal, Kapadia as good as traced Senna's whole life, from his early beginnings with go-cart racing to the heights of his success in F1, capturing those frosty moments of conflict behind the scenes as well, especially with French FIA president Jean-Marie Balestre. The Soundtrack is alert, in short pursuit, oppressive and haunting, and well attuned to the moving pictures - and the editing hands of Chris King did nothing short of brilliant work, underscoring the pieces of a tumultuous life.

I think it's one of those rare documentaries, that manages to combine both, the spectacle of a dangerous sport, with the consistency of a firm narrative, creating a moving portrayal, both mentally, and physically moving the audience forwards, towards the inevitable end, Senna's fatal accident in 1994 on the Imola circuit.

I would recommend this remarkable documentary, especially to an audience who isn't already a fan of the Golden Age of Formula One. Senna's story is a moving, dramatic tribute to a man and his passion, a fast-paced lifestyle, the ever-present frenzy for success, and the complete incapacity to untie from the addictive threads of danger.

It's Evolution, Baby

Every pet owner knows the drill: you get yourself a new dog, cat, or any larger domestic animal, and not only do you delouse, deworm and vaccinate them, you also have them castrated. This prevents them from procreating their own illegitimate children and furthermore turns them into even more pleasant companions. For though troubles like certain red flags of fertility disappear, and welcome changes in behavior then occur, as soon as we have them fixed. Male cats have been proven to be less aggressive and exploratory, and also less generous in the matter of urine distribution.

Just think about what would happen to your average human male if some extreme feminists had their way...No more urinating on the toilet seat, but also: say goodbye to space travel!

Celebrity amongst endangered species: polar bear Knut († 2011)

Anyways, the strange irony of castration is, that while for one, we choose our domestic companions for certain reasons, maybe because we notice possible aesthetic or behavioral advantages in some, that others in the litter lack, on the other hand, by castrating them, we exclude them from passing their agreeable DNA to a next generation of similarly adorable, docile felines or canines. We prohibit them from the laws of natural selection by superimposing a human selection.


It is quite natural that humans take over the reigns of selection for other species - it's what the dominant species always does. Breeding and factory farming are the variables for the survival of pigs, chickens and cows - certainly not for the individual but the species as a whole. But we finetune the conditions and make sure their survival benefits us most of all.


Even wanting to save certain endangered species from extinction while letting others die without further notice (because they are not as eye-pleasing as a panda bear or as majestic or popular as the white whale; thank you for that, Herman Melville) has a random edge to it and a perverted sense of morals. We caused their endangerment. Why do we pity only a few of those specimens? What about the Micro Frog Or the Mexican Walking Fish? They always seem to slip our minds when talking about endangered species. Are they not worth saving? Granted, they never were amongst the dominant species, or at any point a danger to us, but does that make a difference? Do we have to have respect for them to deem them worthy?

Highly endangered Mexican walking fish, a bizarre freak of nature

Whales used to be a dominant species, with about 50 million years of existence, and an estimated 30 millions of those years being the kings of the ocean, providing a long and unchallenged reign of terror, until we came along and made their living space accessible.

We relentlessly drove them towards extinction as we do with all other species, destroying their habitat as we breathe, eat, but most importantly live. That is all it takes, us, living. As long as we are here, there will be a fierce competition over territory. For now, we have the upper hand. It seems to ease our conscience immensely, to "save some whales" or put Knut in a picture frame above the fireplace. He was cute!

Critically endangered Micro Frog is driven out of his natural habitat

It's not anbody's fault, we didn't make the rules. Unfortunately in nature, there is no "happy co-existing".
It just doesn't work like that.









Unlocking new areas could possibly even up the playing field a little and give others a chance to catch up.
We may lose the fight though, in a different environment, to species more adapt to their surrounding or ones more technically advanced.

But are we mentally prepared for the consequences? The new king of kings may very well be some kind of mutated virus, erasing us from the face of the earth without remorse or at least saving two of every kind beforehand. Because sadly, that's just how it works.

Sam Harris: Free Will Revisited

Sam Harris' new book "Free Will" is coming out next week, and it has already stirred a passionate debate amongst believers and non-believers all over the world. The subject Free Will versus Determinism, while being a topic of conversation ever since the dawn of mankind (or let's say: the times of Marcus Aurelius), still is the recipe for turmoil. I already read horrible comments on Facebook, things I'd like to forget as quickly as possible. The loudest of the bunch are as expected the ones who oppose Harris thesis of Free Will being an illusion. They tend to believe other things to be true, like heavenly guidance for example - and don't seem to have any problem accepting these ideas, while all those others, supplying a more solid scientific backbone are quickly ruled out as "suspect". I don't get it. 

Why do we have such problems accepting the concept of Determinism, when it is there in front of us, showing its teeth?

Sam Harris' book is called Free Will

Firstly, there is something you have to know about me: I once was a firm believer in Free Will as well, fiery at times, and the feeling endured, until my years at university crushed all my metaphysical hopes and dreams. Confronted with the scientific method, I felt like I was hit with a powerful antidote, thus pulling me out of a haze. The coffin nail for the whole concept was an advanced seminar in philosophy - it was called Towards a Theory of Thinking. It covered everything and everyone from Descartes' dualism to David Hume's compatibilism to Daniel Dennett's intentional stance, and it highly shattered any hope in Free Will that may have been left at that point. 

As the realization first kicked in, I remember fighting back (how dare they..!) but when my attempts to deny the whole thing failed, I surrendered. Does it sound completely lame if I tell you that it changed my life for the better? And that it, on further reflection, actually freed me immensely?

Determinism comes to terms with the vital parts of the human condition, and while it may not make us feel like the glorious climactic scene of a stage play called "Creation" at first, I think it's much better to accept the facts than to hope for the conveyed comfort of an illusion.

I feel liberated, because knowing what I am and am not accountable for in life is a great thing. Doing things "right" isn't my accomplishment, but to the same extent is doing things "wrong" not my fault either. I know, this will repel all those people who believe in (legal) culpability, guilt and a penal system that wants to punish wrong-doing more than it aims to protect the general public from those who do. But what does that say about us? 

We'd like to think that we are morally responsible for choosing the "right" thing, we want to be rewarded for not violating the law, implying that all those criminals in jails consciously decided to violate laws. I don't think so. And here come the church bells: There is no indication for active decision-making in the brain. It looks like what we perceive as moments of choice are already pre-determined selections, not offered by the conscious part of our brain. The reason why the decision between pizza or pasta feels free, is because our conscious minds buy in the pretense of choice. It feels free to us. But it's, again, not our conscious selves deciding what to eat - it's blood sugar level, hormones, nutrient agents, force of habit and a myriad of other factors we don't even know about - because they don't make an appearance on our mental horizon.

What does it matter? We will always want the things we "chose", regardless of how they originated or who chose them, the "will" part remains intact. To my conscious self, there is no difference in telling how the decision came into being. 

"Toto, I have a feeling we are not in Kansas anymore."

Our reward-oriented brain is the one that thrives to blame and punish other people's infringements - and indirectly rewards its own "conformity" (again, not an achievement) by doing so - carving in stone what is right and wrong in the process. If we could change our view in judging right and wrong not as universal moral choices, but societal agreements on how to behave - to preserve the right to live amongst society - we would be at a much more human level. But to get there, we must first of all, be willing to accept that certain things we want to believe about ourselves are not true.

 "I cannot take credit for the fact that I do not have the soul of a psychopath." (Sam Harris)

Allow yourself to think about this for a minute or two, and don't worry, even if you find yourself being

• ...afraid of offending the bearded guy upstairs by thinking outside the book.
• ...sad, because there is no praise for something we have no influence on.
• ...liberated, because there is no scolding for something we have no influence on.
• ...angry, because our conscious self is not in charge.
• ...unimportant, because the mind is not a metaphysical enclave within the body.
• ...offended, because I wrote this post.

Trust me, that's all completely normal. :)


Sam Harris "Free Will" on Amazon