Andy Latham: Stacking
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I'm about to build an argument. An argument of a philosophical nature. An argument of a philosophical nature in the unassailable safety of monologue! And I'm going to perform this feat with far less wisdom than I – and I suspect you – wish that I had. This deficiency is going to form the foundation of my argument, while at the same time encouraging you to regard it with no particular weight. I urge you to both take my advice and don't.
Astrophotography is something I used to dabble in during my youth. I do mean dabble because I was blessed far more with curiosity than the finances to do anything with it. Taking photos of things in space is hard with the salary of the family car washer. A hopelessly inadequate camera held up to a bargain basement telescope on a rickety tripod, looking through British clouds is what an optimist would call “pissing into the wind”. But needs must, and little Andy was pleased with his blurry photos of a tiny, vaguely orange blob that his astronomy book assured him was Jupiter. What I wanted to see though, as I'm sure you'd agree, is stripes.
Luckily, in astrophotography, there's a well-known (and more importantly, free) concept called ‘stacking’. This involves lining up lots of photos of the same object and digitally summing them. If a detail exists in the same place on more than one photo it will be enhanced. If a detail is just random noise that differs from photo to photo it will get subdued. The result is, in my case, a slightly less blurry blob...with stripes!
Images from Astroshoot
Andy, what on Earth are you talking about? Well, stacking is what we should all be doing in our daily lives. Let me explain. We are learning machines, sometimes trying to comprehend and reconcile our relationship with a seemingly harsh and uncaring Universe that is indifferent to our very existence, and sometimes learning the didgeridoo. Whatever it is, we submit ourselves to the wisdom of others. And we like to believe that while we lack this wisdom ourselves, we nevertheless have enough about us to discern the gospel writers from the snake oil salesmen and the Neanderthals. I assure you that we do not.
Advice comes in many forms, and rarely is it accurate. Even the greatest of teachers are prone to error, biases abound in every subject, and agendas (sometimes subconscious) coat everything with a thick, sticky layer of propaganda. So we must be careful where we get our information from then, right? We have to be discriminatory over what we spend our time reading, yeah?
NO! These are the last things we should do.
Take your Einsteins and your Platos and your Attenboroughs and your Gospel writers and Mick from down the pub, and stack them. They might not always seem to be talking about the same subjects, but deep down everyone is really. The subject is everything. Stacking requires you to figure out how to line them up like the blurry photographs of Jupiter. It’s about having the openness to absorb the sources with more joy than prejudice and giving none dominion. The dark recesses of your brain will take care of the rest without you even realizing it and will occasionally hit you with lovely epiphanies when you’re out walking in the countryside and there’s no bugger around to tell them to. If you can make the alignment happen, the important stuff leaps out at you and the noise of error, bias, and agenda fades away. Single sources might be better or worse than each other, but the stack is greater than them all.
You will end up with a philosophy that differs in some way from all the philosophies you have read. And in some way or another, it will be inaccurate. But it will be a step closer to the truth. And armed with your own ideas, rather than reciting scripture, you will be substantially more interesting to talk to!
I offer these words of unwisdom as things of far less value than the stack that I hope they end up in.
