Greater>Than Clothing

I majored in Philosophy in college, so forgive me for this little conceptual digression. On the heels of the recent comment bonanza, a few more interesting “x>y” comments trickled in. A clever young man named Diego chimed in with “nothing is > god”. That statement seems simple at first, but as I thought about it more I became less and less certain that I understood it.

I’ll take Diego’s quote at face value first. I think he means it as a statement of faith: “There is nothing greater than God”. Indeed, for religions that conceive of their gods as omnipresent, it’s almost trivial. If God is everywhere, then of course nothing could be “greater” (read “bigger”). Even if we take “greater” to mean “better”, this reading still works. It’s hard to be better than an omniscient and benevolent deity.

But what of Diego’s mysterious non-capitalization of “god”? I’ll bet it’s a typo or a simple oversight, but what if it was intentional? Thinking about this, I realized that using a negative statement (nothing) in conjunction with “>” puts you on semantically shaky ground. If nothing is greater than god, does that mean that god is less than nothing? And if something is less than nothing, does that mean that it is not simply nonexistent but rather a net negative? Perhaps this is a way of expressing the nihilist’s view of God as a broken promise.

So, it seems that the statement works as intended if and only if the opposite statement can also be made: “god > nothing”. I can’t think of another sentence in English that could coexist so peacefully with its own negation. Can anyone?

Far be it from me to inject commerce into such an interesting theological puzzle, but I can’t help but think that this could make a great t-shirt experiment. How would the average person interpret a t-shirt that had a blank space, a greater than symbol, then the word “god”? It could be like a religious Rorschach test; what you think it means depends on your preexisting associations with the concept. I wonder…

Anyway, thanks for the puzzle, Diego. You packed quite a conundrum into three words and a symbol.

I have what you could call a cold-start problem here at Greater>Than. It’s hard to talk about what the company does, because it hasn’t really done all that much yet. I’ve been spending more time working on the company than I have working in it. Some would say that’s the right place for my efforts in the beginning, and I would agree, but honestly it’s just a tad frustrating that I run a company that doesn’t yet have any products.

I was out the other night and had occasion to tell an acquaintance about the company. She was encouraging, but threw me a little with her well-intentioned query as to why I wasn’t wearing any of my stuff. When I have something, I assured her, I’ll be wearing it every day. I’m looking forward to being able to both show and tell.

Toward that end, I’ve commissioned two designs. Ultimately, I don’t want to be the sole idea generator; I want Greater>Than to be a design catalyst, supplying a positive, rewarding environment in which designers can express themselves. First, however, I need to get the idea out there. Step 1: blog. Status: you’re looking at it. Step 2: prototypes. Status: In progress.

I looked at a bunch of print shop websites trying to find one that seemed like it would be a good fit for Greater>Than Clothing. I liked what I read at the Mammoth Printshop site, and started an e-mail correspondence (it helped that they list Johnny Cupcakes as a client - I dig a lot of their stuff). Mammoth does commissioned design work as well, so I sent them some descriptions to see what they thought and to gauge whether they could execute them for me. I liked the discussion; their responses made me feel like they knew exactly what I was looking for. Plus, the fee seemed reasonable, so they got the business.

So, the first two Greater>Than designs are in progress, potentially as I write this, which is very exciting for me. Stay tuned for the design descriptions I sent. I’ll post them as part of my effort to “show my work” (something I always got dinged for in middle school math classes).

Greater>Than Clothing received several highly original and inspiring “G>T’s” in rapid succession recently (that’s what I call ideas expressed in the form x>y). This blog is still young enough that I get excited about every comment I get, but these were especially fun, as they were posted by a gaggle of enthusiastic (and optimistic!) middle school students. They happen to belong to one of my mother’s classes at Gavilan View Middle School in Salinas, CA. Thanks for being such an enthusiastic Greater>Than booster, mom. The word of the day is “nepotism”, kids.

Their ideas universally display a tremendous positivity; they are child-like in the best possible sense, yet they contain a lot more wisdom than I remember having at that age (actually, I think I might still be trailing in the wisdom department). Reading them made me feel like a jaded old man. Unfettered creativity and joyous collaboration are pillars of my vision for this company, and I’m going to look back at these comments when I need to recapture that initial start-up optimism. Here they are in G>T form:

• Generosity>Competition
• Giving>Taking
• Dignity>Popularity
• Sportsmanship>Winning
• Beauty from the inside > Beauty from the outside
• Celebrating life > Mourning death
• Looking towards the future > Regretting your past

You’ll also find these on the G>T’s page, and you can see their original context in comments in these previous posts (highly recommended).

Thank you Eddie, Tan, Alex, Cecilia, Sherilyn and Ashley!