My version of Camus' The Plague would be wild orgies in the streets as people really and truly attempted to live: Life is Short.
My wife said life is short to me last night. I spent years wasted in engineering school jumping through endless flaming hoops thinking, "Life is short. Life is short. LIFE IS SHORT!!!! Arrgggghhhhh!"
It is short and sometimes it's well and true and good to remember this. Other times it's a saying used to justify being a crap person. It becomes a question at times of having fun verus being moral. And my wife says, "there is an edge you can walk between the two."
The question, especially with regards to the moral outrage which at times consumes me, is: Where exactly is this edge? How do we determine where the edge is?
To answer we have to know just how short is it really? This life?
But we don't know the answer to that. What we end up doing, is deciding it's different lengths depending on the situation.
My 'The Plague' would take the Life is Short concept to where it is clear just how absurd a saying it actually is.
Camus' The Plague was instead a stodgy, stolid... boring story because he was attempting to write about a solution to The Absurd with a capital 'A'. His solution being something like the protestant work ethic without the protestantism. I don't agree with him.
More exactly his solution is a choosing of atheism and deciding to not bother thinking about a certain rather extremely important part of the future (your eventual nonexistence) as opposed to adopting mysticism, which would mean adding something to yourself (adding creativity, magic, etc).
He says you can't go the route of mysticism because then you've abandoned logic and made everything truly meaningless.
I think I don't agree. The reality is that it's not such an all or nothing venture. It is questions of degrees. Both with thinking to the future; of your eventual nonexistence. And going the route of mysticism; believing in an afterlife instead of beleiving this life is a futility.
The reality is that we all pretty much do a bit of both to varying degrees. (I think we are all being highly mystical in a number of ways that most atheist do not recognize as mystical.) I can not say that Camus is absolutely wrong. But my preference is to add (to myself) instead of subtract. I would rather add some magic to reduce The Absurd instead of just not thinking about The Absurd. Because I exist to the extent I think.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Morality versus Fun
Walking down the road. On the left is a slaughter house. Not only can you hear the screams, you can see stuff going on if you look in the windows. On the right is a restaurant with an outside section; people are out eating their dinners and having a great time. Music is playing loud enough to drown out the screams. The people are laughing and facing away from the left.
This life is short. One must focus on the positives. And the ham is succulent today.
The man on the cliff with the telescope looking down through the clouds here and there seeing the numerous inhabitants below stretching out to infinity; he watches them treat one another awfully. They live by eating each other's flesh. Would they otherwise die? He doesn't know. Clouds always get in the way soon enough and it's impossible to relocate the vast majority once they've been lost. For eating each other they have a little implement which pulls chunks out of each other's flesh. They're bodies are covered in scars. Do they eventually run out of flesh or does it grow back? He has no idea. He is very far away with a very powerful telescope and just catches bits and pieces of the action here and there in between the cloud cover.
What is strange is that they have the same plants down there that he has up here and he's found that they plants are nutritious and filling. He has never seen any of them eat a plant though.
When they doze (and they never go further than dozing) the majority will pair up in twos and sleep in a sitting position leaning against each other's backs. This way they have no blind side. Unfortunately even the majority in these relationships can't really trust the other. He has often seen one take an extra hefty chunk out of the other who then laid on the floor and writhed in agony as the other ran off to eat.
For years and years he has watched. Who put this telescope up here anyway? It upsets him so to watch them. Why does he keep looking? What is it that he thinks he'll find?
Oh how the people of the plain smile when they meet one another. But invariably the flesh implements flash. He watches and is still often shocked. How can this be? As many times as he's seen it before?
What is strange is that they have the same plants down there that he has up here and he's found that they plants are nutritious and filling. He has never seen any of them eat a plant though.
When they doze (and they never go further than dozing) the majority will pair up in twos and sleep in a sitting position leaning against each other's backs. This way they have no blind side. Unfortunately even the majority in these relationships can't really trust the other. He has often seen one take an extra hefty chunk out of the other who then laid on the floor and writhed in agony as the other ran off to eat.
For years and years he has watched. Who put this telescope up here anyway? It upsets him so to watch them. Why does he keep looking? What is it that he thinks he'll find?
Oh how the people of the plain smile when they meet one another. But invariably the flesh implements flash. He watches and is still often shocked. How can this be? As many times as he's seen it before?
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
...my stupid back. My father-in-law was having something similar but then eventually one day he got out of bed and instead of the pain going away it got worse. He's scheduled for back surgery now. If the same happens to me I guess I'll be ruined. My new career will be ruined, etc. I'm not getting any better. I'll get out my old inversion machine today.
Anyway up again early because the pain was too much. This all happened because I was helping someone get to their bedside commode and they surprised me by not using their legs at all. They literally lifted their legs off the ground at the same time that it turns out they had very strong arms. It was like a 180 pound baby monkey wrapped around me, holding on to my neck.
I once deadlifted 465 pounds but, exactly doing that sort of thing originally weakened my back and 180 pound baby monkeys just aren't a good thing these days.
This also partially depends on whether or not they feel inferior/threatened or superior/not threatened by you. Of course best of all if it's neither. Neither is harder though. The reality for example at work is that people talk bad about one another behind their backs. I don't. (Well except for what little I just said in this blog about a coworker being effeminate and not well read, etc. But I think that's OK because it will never have any ramifications upon him.) But there we are with lots of talking bad about people behind their backs (which I actually speak out on whoever's behalf, even though it could cause people in turn to not like me). Add in the unoccasional firing and to really truly get out of thinking of people as potential threats would seem not so easy.
Anyway if you feel superior or at least equal and/or unthreatened then someone being unhappy isn't such a bad thing. You can even respond by feeling the need to be happier then you'd normally be; to try to cheer them up. For some people the very fact that you seem unhappy makes them feel superior no matter your relative intelligence level. Well maybe not exactly. But something that amounts to the same.
Unfortunately if they feel inferior to you at the same time that they see you're unhappy then they'll really dislike you. They will feel that they cannot be happy in your presence. That to do so would mark them as a really stupid person and that as they are inferior to you they really ought to just mirror your mood; at least until they can get away from you, which they'll be doing as soon as possible.
So then those are the people who "suck". I guess.
So then:
An inferior will mirror unhappiness.
A threatened will mirror unhappiness.
An inferior will see happiness as a show of dominance/a threat.
A threatened will see happiness as a threat.
A superior can do whatever they want. If they're nice they can try to cheer you up by being happy when you're sad. In which case it will just backfire if the other person in turn feels threatened by you or feels inferior. It will just look like dominance to them.
If a superior wants to be unhappy, they'll of course do so. And the inferior will want to run far away from your mood dominance.
If you manage to be unthreatened by one another (as rare as that is) then you both can actually just be.
So then how can I make all people never feel threatened by me? What magic trick can I do? Like Lynch's high pitched nasal voice. I can't imagine people feeling very threatened by him. He is rare though.
Anyway up again early because the pain was too much. This all happened because I was helping someone get to their bedside commode and they surprised me by not using their legs at all. They literally lifted their legs off the ground at the same time that it turns out they had very strong arms. It was like a 180 pound baby monkey wrapped around me, holding on to my neck.
I once deadlifted 465 pounds but, exactly doing that sort of thing originally weakened my back and 180 pound baby monkeys just aren't a good thing these days.
I'm happier then I've been in the past and gee whiz, people like happy people better. The bastards.
No really. They suck for that.
This also partially depends on whether or not they feel inferior/threatened or superior/not threatened by you. Of course best of all if it's neither. Neither is harder though. The reality for example at work is that people talk bad about one another behind their backs. I don't. (Well except for what little I just said in this blog about a coworker being effeminate and not well read, etc. But I think that's OK because it will never have any ramifications upon him.) But there we are with lots of talking bad about people behind their backs (which I actually speak out on whoever's behalf, even though it could cause people in turn to not like me). Add in the unoccasional firing and to really truly get out of thinking of people as potential threats would seem not so easy.
Anyway if you feel superior or at least equal and/or unthreatened then someone being unhappy isn't such a bad thing. You can even respond by feeling the need to be happier then you'd normally be; to try to cheer them up. For some people the very fact that you seem unhappy makes them feel superior no matter your relative intelligence level. Well maybe not exactly. But something that amounts to the same.
Unfortunately if they feel inferior to you at the same time that they see you're unhappy then they'll really dislike you. They will feel that they cannot be happy in your presence. That to do so would mark them as a really stupid person and that as they are inferior to you they really ought to just mirror your mood; at least until they can get away from you, which they'll be doing as soon as possible.
So then those are the people who "suck". I guess.
So then:
An inferior will mirror unhappiness.
A threatened will mirror unhappiness.
An inferior will see happiness as a show of dominance/a threat.
A threatened will see happiness as a threat.
A superior can do whatever they want. If they're nice they can try to cheer you up by being happy when you're sad. In which case it will just backfire if the other person in turn feels threatened by you or feels inferior. It will just look like dominance to them.
If a superior wants to be unhappy, they'll of course do so. And the inferior will want to run far away from your mood dominance.
If you manage to be unthreatened by one another (as rare as that is) then you both can actually just be.
So then how can I make all people never feel threatened by me? What magic trick can I do? Like Lynch's high pitched nasal voice. I can't imagine people feeling very threatened by him. He is rare though.
Monday, February 23, 2009
It's David Lynch on twitter. Really. What's so interesting about the weather?
David Lynch speaks in a way that I can't imagine anyone feeling threatened/inferior by him. People may not remember what we say but they remember how we make them feel and Lynch must at least make people feel relaxed. I bet this was a crucial quality to his fame. So much of commercial art is about networking and how well you talk to people.
I work with a guy who's been accepted to a film school in Hollywood. I could see him being maybe somewhat successful. At least making a living somewhere within it. I wouldn't say he's very intelligent. He's not well read. He didn't know any of my favorite directors. (He didn't even know who Lynch is.) He doesn't watch foreign films because he can't stand reading subtitles. He found a paper of my writings that fell out of my pocket. (I almost always carry a paper and pencil to write ideas on.) Everything about it flew over his head; including the very idea of writing ideas down on paper...
But still he could be successful because he's 6'5", effeminate, looks sort of like Drew Barrymore and won't make anyone feel inferior.
He's nice enough for the most part. His opinion of me is divided though. On the hand I'm very relaxed and nice to him and everyone. On the other hand I make him feel inferior. Short of just seeming dumber I don't think there's anything I could do about that. Maybe if I adopted some ridiculous way of talking; high and nasal like Lynch or maybe just something effeminate like him. Or maybe a country twang. Maybe if I had no legs or was badly disfigured from burns.
Smiling at him only makes it worse. That really shows dominance.
There is perhaps a way forward but it's related to things mostly outside of my control. Have been slowly getting happier and happier at work. I think it's infecting others. Got pulled to another unit today. Me and a bunch of 20 something women. Poor me. I'm happier then I've been in the past and gee whiz, people like happy people better. The bastards.
No really. They suck for that.
-
I find country music funny in how there are so many songs in which the singer seems to be boasting about how humble he is. I wouldn't suggest anyone ever bother pointing this out to a country music fan though.
-
Wonderful picture on the back of the paper yesterday of a man holding a dead bobcat which he shot. It's bobcat hunting season apparently. I didn't even know there were still bobcats in the area. I've never seen a live bobcat in the wild in my life. I doubt he's going to eat it, but I'd like to force him to. It weighed 30 pounds. My one cat is not too far short of it's size. How strange to see someone proudly holding up a large dead cat by it's back feet in the paper.
-
When I walk into a room at a party I look for whoever's alone and looks awkward and I go talk to them. Because I can't have a good time if there's someone else there who's just alone and not having a good time.
-
S at work has such an unhappy look on her face; like she's been psychically wounded. I wish I could take a picture. It's sort of beautiful yet achingly sad. Not just a normal unhappy look. I want to get that look off her face. What can I do though? The main problem is I think tied into her not having a boyfriend. Like hardly ever in her life. I'm very friendly with her. Borderline inappropriate I guess.
-
My friend's husband of 17 years moved out to live with one of his 20 year old doctor students. Despite teaching people to become doctors I had always thought him truly a doofus. At least he wasn't an arrogant doofus I suppose. He was always properly inferior to me at least. (Of course I had at the time tried everything I could think of to get him to relax and not feel inferior.) So, I don't know. The poor guy has no friends. He's got an extremely compartmentalized mind; out of touch with his amygdala I guess. He's probably getting tweaked and tweaked by it and has no idea what to do. It's telling him: "Something is missing in your life! You're unfulfilled!" And so then, it's been screaming this at him for who knows how long and finally he's gone off and done the usual and found some other lady to sleep with. A devout christian of course.
His wife and three children left behind. And she's totally lost the power balance there; still willing to take him back; even while he's still off having his fun.
One wonders how people manage it exactly; doing that to one another. And at what point you recognize a stupidity so great that you just use force to try to hold it in check instead of reason. (sigh) But perhaps that is exactly what our society as a whole did in response to so many people like him...
A bit of swinging shouldn't be such an awful thing but as it's really hurting his wife here it is just awful. I think ultimately one must have a small scope of mind where instead of infinity and choosing the game of pride in being moral as the only game really worth the bother, his scope of mind is piddly and focused on short term fun. A bit of fun with some young lady.
Maybe my revulsion is ultimately tied into the lack of eternal thinking? Like he's just some crude creation, like an insect, that will soon cease to exist and with no control follows the direction of it's crude genetic code.
His wife is boring but nice. Like a stepford wife. Barbie doll good looks. Not exactly something to be someone's everything. But definitely not tormenting him in any way.
David Lynch speaks in a way that I can't imagine anyone feeling threatened/inferior by him. People may not remember what we say but they remember how we make them feel and Lynch must at least make people feel relaxed. I bet this was a crucial quality to his fame. So much of commercial art is about networking and how well you talk to people.
I work with a guy who's been accepted to a film school in Hollywood. I could see him being maybe somewhat successful. At least making a living somewhere within it. I wouldn't say he's very intelligent. He's not well read. He didn't know any of my favorite directors. (He didn't even know who Lynch is.) He doesn't watch foreign films because he can't stand reading subtitles. He found a paper of my writings that fell out of my pocket. (I almost always carry a paper and pencil to write ideas on.) Everything about it flew over his head; including the very idea of writing ideas down on paper...
But still he could be successful because he's 6'5", effeminate, looks sort of like Drew Barrymore and won't make anyone feel inferior.
He's nice enough for the most part. His opinion of me is divided though. On the hand I'm very relaxed and nice to him and everyone. On the other hand I make him feel inferior. Short of just seeming dumber I don't think there's anything I could do about that. Maybe if I adopted some ridiculous way of talking; high and nasal like Lynch or maybe just something effeminate like him. Or maybe a country twang. Maybe if I had no legs or was badly disfigured from burns.
Smiling at him only makes it worse. That really shows dominance.
There is perhaps a way forward but it's related to things mostly outside of my control. Have been slowly getting happier and happier at work. I think it's infecting others. Got pulled to another unit today. Me and a bunch of 20 something women. Poor me. I'm happier then I've been in the past and gee whiz, people like happy people better. The bastards.
No really. They suck for that.
-
I find country music funny in how there are so many songs in which the singer seems to be boasting about how humble he is. I wouldn't suggest anyone ever bother pointing this out to a country music fan though.
-
Wonderful picture on the back of the paper yesterday of a man holding a dead bobcat which he shot. It's bobcat hunting season apparently. I didn't even know there were still bobcats in the area. I've never seen a live bobcat in the wild in my life. I doubt he's going to eat it, but I'd like to force him to. It weighed 30 pounds. My one cat is not too far short of it's size. How strange to see someone proudly holding up a large dead cat by it's back feet in the paper.
-
When I walk into a room at a party I look for whoever's alone and looks awkward and I go talk to them. Because I can't have a good time if there's someone else there who's just alone and not having a good time.
-
S at work has such an unhappy look on her face; like she's been psychically wounded. I wish I could take a picture. It's sort of beautiful yet achingly sad. Not just a normal unhappy look. I want to get that look off her face. What can I do though? The main problem is I think tied into her not having a boyfriend. Like hardly ever in her life. I'm very friendly with her. Borderline inappropriate I guess.
-
My friend's husband of 17 years moved out to live with one of his 20 year old doctor students. Despite teaching people to become doctors I had always thought him truly a doofus. At least he wasn't an arrogant doofus I suppose. He was always properly inferior to me at least. (Of course I had at the time tried everything I could think of to get him to relax and not feel inferior.) So, I don't know. The poor guy has no friends. He's got an extremely compartmentalized mind; out of touch with his amygdala I guess. He's probably getting tweaked and tweaked by it and has no idea what to do. It's telling him: "Something is missing in your life! You're unfulfilled!" And so then, it's been screaming this at him for who knows how long and finally he's gone off and done the usual and found some other lady to sleep with. A devout christian of course.
His wife and three children left behind. And she's totally lost the power balance there; still willing to take him back; even while he's still off having his fun.
One wonders how people manage it exactly; doing that to one another. And at what point you recognize a stupidity so great that you just use force to try to hold it in check instead of reason. (sigh) But perhaps that is exactly what our society as a whole did in response to so many people like him...
A bit of swinging shouldn't be such an awful thing but as it's really hurting his wife here it is just awful. I think ultimately one must have a small scope of mind where instead of infinity and choosing the game of pride in being moral as the only game really worth the bother, his scope of mind is piddly and focused on short term fun. A bit of fun with some young lady.
Maybe my revulsion is ultimately tied into the lack of eternal thinking? Like he's just some crude creation, like an insect, that will soon cease to exist and with no control follows the direction of it's crude genetic code.
His wife is boring but nice. Like a stepford wife. Barbie doll good looks. Not exactly something to be someone's everything. But definitely not tormenting him in any way.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
..........
..........
...
There are hundreds of millions of people with internet access and if They existed that would have been The Place where They would have gone. With that incident it became clear that They just don't exist. And thus there is truly no hope for this world.
This is the knowledge I most can't live with. This is the awful truth I have discovered which the dreamers of the past were blissfully unaware of. With it all hope is destroyed.
Because I am as strong as fuck I continue on. But with no actual reason to do so.
..........
...
There are hundreds of millions of people with internet access and if They existed that would have been The Place where They would have gone. With that incident it became clear that They just don't exist. And thus there is truly no hope for this world.
This is the knowledge I most can't live with. This is the awful truth I have discovered which the dreamers of the past were blissfully unaware of. With it all hope is destroyed.
Because I am as strong as fuck I continue on. But with no actual reason to do so.
Friday, February 20, 2009
So I had a job interview today for my brand new profession of nursing. I got the job. It was some nice interviews. Not like in enginnering; just as the work has been enjoyable while the work in engineering sucked. It comes down to the people and engineers are kind of... eh people. Cold, I suppose would be a nice way to put it. Or then maybe primarily just male. Women can be nicer I guess, at least to men so my younger sister who's also a nurse says. Unless they're women in science/engineering, in which case they sometimes tend to overcompensate and try to be even bigger dicks then the men.
I've had some awful job interviews in the past.
The HR lady who first interviewed me today, my god how can anyone stand to do that for a living. LOL, what an awful job. Pretty much everyone you have to deal with is nervous. I assume they interview a few people everyday as the hospital is very big. My empathy couldn't handle all those poor nervous people. I would morally object to it. Also really couldn't stant rejecting some people who get more nervous I guess in the interview and don't do as well, although right now I suppose they take most people.
Teaching is similar in that my empathy couldn't stand it. Had a big fight with my parents who said I ought to go teach college at least instead of getting a new profession. Along with the fact that I've always hated engineering and that I couldn't ethically teach students for a profession for which there aren't hardly any jobs left; as America doesn't hardly make anything anymore, there is the problem of failing people.
The correct way for it to work is on the job training with whatever hierarchies are necessary based on how well they do the work. This idea of instead slapping people in college for years that can then end up totally wasted if they get a 74.4% in a class is stupid. It's unnecessary to take The Games of life and make them so cutthroat. We could instead just be civilized with each other. It's not necessary for people to have to always feel like they're on the chopping block.
It should in almost all situations be on the job training; starting at the lowest position and working your way up. College disgusts me. And I've spent a decade in it making good grades. The majority of degrees are ultimately just jumping through flaming hoops like a performing dog. Hardly anything is actually learned of use. With nursing even (and it's far better than most degrees) I could have learned everything I'll need to know within a few months.
College mostly just shows the ability to take crap.
The way people handle it, is they tell themselves it's the best possible system. And that they must simply adapt. Perhaps they don't have the imagination? Perhaps they're too weak to stand realizing the truth.
I know it's an awful system. I reject it.
---
While I'm at it, I wish that most restaurants had a serving line/buffet style arrangement instead of waiters/waitresses. Two days ago I went out to eat at a nicer place and my waiter was a guy I went to high school with. He's must be 38, and he's now working as a waiter. Pretty nice guy. Looks like he's about 25 still so I almost didn't recognize him. I didn't know him well. I remember a day playing basketball with him when I was 16; trying to do every dunk he could think up. He was confident enough I guess with himself that he didn't adopt the usual nauseatingly super cool attitude that is so usual amongst teens, which among other things would mean pretending it's nothing at all that this 16 year old white guy could do most of the dunks Jordan was doing at the time.
Anyway it was awkward. I could sense he felt slightly awkward meeting me as a waiter, perhaps a little embarrassed. Then he forgot our drinks and we just didn't say anything.
I don't understand why most restaurants don't just have a serving line. Do people like to be waited on? I hate it. Paradoxically I always liked/like serving/taking care of others.
-----
Polystom
At the end of this book it references a website:
http://polystom.com/
But it's just empty. It's good that it's just empty I suppose. Gives it a sense of mystery I guess and more importantly doesn't make the guy seem as fixated as he suddenly appeared to be about this idea at the end that I really didn't find all that interesting.
The strange turn it took at the end which it claimed this site talked about in more detail was, eh, not such a good turn. Didn't seem to have much relevance to what came before. It was entertaining though. But the first 75% of the book had a bit of interesting stuff, somewhat light I guess, concerning psychology/sociology. And then it suddenly takes this turn which amounted to a variant of the philsophical question of 'how do we know we really exist?' It managed to make what had come before seem irrelevant and ultimately meaningless.
Even worse, I thought he was showing good discipline with regards to this slave type society to mention it matter of factly. For the most part he wasn't preachy about how awful it was. He sort of just mentioned the situation in passing from the POV of Stom, whom just isn't really concerned about it, which was I thought a neat way to write it. (Although then there is the skinning device and how he finally becomes somewhat changed by war, etc.) But then at the end he posits that the vast majority of people are just simplistic programs who matter a lot less anyway, lol. Which, not saying this actually tells us anything about the author, but it could funnily look like the actual reason he managed to be so reserved, so dispassionate in describing the social system is that he was actually thinking of them as if they really were less than human. Which if he was planning the seemingly nonsensical final turn from the very beginning, it does take away from what I thought was some kind of good restraint on his part in how he wrote the first 75%.
But it really reads like the ending kind of was slapped on. Like he wrote the first half with no idea at all what the ending would be. From Dusk Till Dawn comes to mind. I guess it's nice to be unpredictable...
I enjoyed reading it more than the "serious" literature I've been trying to read lately.
I've had some awful job interviews in the past.
The HR lady who first interviewed me today, my god how can anyone stand to do that for a living. LOL, what an awful job. Pretty much everyone you have to deal with is nervous. I assume they interview a few people everyday as the hospital is very big. My empathy couldn't handle all those poor nervous people. I would morally object to it. Also really couldn't stant rejecting some people who get more nervous I guess in the interview and don't do as well, although right now I suppose they take most people.
Teaching is similar in that my empathy couldn't stand it. Had a big fight with my parents who said I ought to go teach college at least instead of getting a new profession. Along with the fact that I've always hated engineering and that I couldn't ethically teach students for a profession for which there aren't hardly any jobs left; as America doesn't hardly make anything anymore, there is the problem of failing people.
The correct way for it to work is on the job training with whatever hierarchies are necessary based on how well they do the work. This idea of instead slapping people in college for years that can then end up totally wasted if they get a 74.4% in a class is stupid. It's unnecessary to take The Games of life and make them so cutthroat. We could instead just be civilized with each other. It's not necessary for people to have to always feel like they're on the chopping block.
It should in almost all situations be on the job training; starting at the lowest position and working your way up. College disgusts me. And I've spent a decade in it making good grades. The majority of degrees are ultimately just jumping through flaming hoops like a performing dog. Hardly anything is actually learned of use. With nursing even (and it's far better than most degrees) I could have learned everything I'll need to know within a few months.
College mostly just shows the ability to take crap.
The way people handle it, is they tell themselves it's the best possible system. And that they must simply adapt. Perhaps they don't have the imagination? Perhaps they're too weak to stand realizing the truth.
I know it's an awful system. I reject it.
---
While I'm at it, I wish that most restaurants had a serving line/buffet style arrangement instead of waiters/waitresses. Two days ago I went out to eat at a nicer place and my waiter was a guy I went to high school with. He's must be 38, and he's now working as a waiter. Pretty nice guy. Looks like he's about 25 still so I almost didn't recognize him. I didn't know him well. I remember a day playing basketball with him when I was 16; trying to do every dunk he could think up. He was confident enough I guess with himself that he didn't adopt the usual nauseatingly super cool attitude that is so usual amongst teens, which among other things would mean pretending it's nothing at all that this 16 year old white guy could do most of the dunks Jordan was doing at the time.
Anyway it was awkward. I could sense he felt slightly awkward meeting me as a waiter, perhaps a little embarrassed. Then he forgot our drinks and we just didn't say anything.
I don't understand why most restaurants don't just have a serving line. Do people like to be waited on? I hate it. Paradoxically I always liked/like serving/taking care of others.
-----
Polystom
At the end of this book it references a website:
http://polystom.com/
But it's just empty. It's good that it's just empty I suppose. Gives it a sense of mystery I guess and more importantly doesn't make the guy seem as fixated as he suddenly appeared to be about this idea at the end that I really didn't find all that interesting.
The strange turn it took at the end which it claimed this site talked about in more detail was, eh, not such a good turn. Didn't seem to have much relevance to what came before. It was entertaining though. But the first 75% of the book had a bit of interesting stuff, somewhat light I guess, concerning psychology/sociology. And then it suddenly takes this turn which amounted to a variant of the philsophical question of 'how do we know we really exist?' It managed to make what had come before seem irrelevant and ultimately meaningless.
Even worse, I thought he was showing good discipline with regards to this slave type society to mention it matter of factly. For the most part he wasn't preachy about how awful it was. He sort of just mentioned the situation in passing from the POV of Stom, whom just isn't really concerned about it, which was I thought a neat way to write it. (Although then there is the skinning device and how he finally becomes somewhat changed by war, etc.) But then at the end he posits that the vast majority of people are just simplistic programs who matter a lot less anyway, lol. Which, not saying this actually tells us anything about the author, but it could funnily look like the actual reason he managed to be so reserved, so dispassionate in describing the social system is that he was actually thinking of them as if they really were less than human. Which if he was planning the seemingly nonsensical final turn from the very beginning, it does take away from what I thought was some kind of good restraint on his part in how he wrote the first 75%.
But it really reads like the ending kind of was slapped on. Like he wrote the first half with no idea at all what the ending would be. From Dusk Till Dawn comes to mind. I guess it's nice to be unpredictable...
I enjoyed reading it more than the "serious" literature I've been trying to read lately.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
I've heard worse noise. Free virtual synth (rez from ugoaudio one of so many out there) and some drum wav files I found online. Not a penny but for the 40 dollar reaper. (And a powerful computer with plenty of rendering.) viva la virtual socialism!
Actually it would be nice if someone attempted at least a virtual experiment in socialism.
It requires the author to be "dismissed," once and for all, so as finally to come into existence, to be, to "assert itself as thing without author and without reader." What Blanchot dismisses here, with an irrevocable gesture, is not just the author, but the mirage – so stubborn, though – of a “communication” between the writer and the reader. The writer is alone, irremediably alone ("Khalvat dar anjoman, solitude in the crowd," posits one of the eleven rules of the Naqshbandi Sufis: that is the solitude of Kafka, again, never alone enough and yet always infinitely alone). Vain hope of writing with a wish to be understood, or of establishing any kind of human fraternity with the other; cruel disillusion of anyone who writes with the expectation of a response, an echo. The writer writes as Giacometti wanted to sculpt: so as to bury the sculpture (as Genet tells us), and "not so that it could be discovered, or else much later, when he himself and the memory of his name have disappeared. Would burying it be to offer it to the dead?" wonders Genet, thus putting his finger on this obvious fact: the writer, the artist does not communicate with the reader or the spectator, he communicates with death; the death of others (Foucault) or else his own death, always yet to come but beyond which he necessarily situates himself in order to write. The writer: the one who is always already dead. The reader, on the contrary, lives, and thanks to him the book, "unburdened of its author," lives too: the book, the text leaves the world of the dead, whence it comes (or comes forth rather?) to participate in the things of life. And that is how the noli me legere of the book gives way to the Lazare, veni foras of the reader, the reader who nonetheless, unlike Christ, accomplishes no miracle, but simply, by his free and innocent reading, his "light yes" offered with a smile, shows (and sees) that language too lives, with its own life.
http://this-space.blogspot.com/2009/02/reading-by-jonathan-littell.html
Hmmm, what was it I was thinking? Oh, no. I was thinking of personally thinking of every story told from the point of view of it being a hell. Secretively or openly. This doesn't necessarily mean pitchforks and lots of screaming. More like how Sartre's Hell is Other People play wasn't really any more or less a hell than the average story really. And was better than lots of people's actual lives.
Was a way to get beyond my issues with not liking pitting people against one another. Writing as if already dead is something else entirely. But perhaps useful.
Right this moment is an actual moment to spend writing. I've had a back issue where sleeping is causing my back to hurt. I went to bed early tonight (9pm), by morning I've no choice but to get up because my back is hurting and getting up (so far) has made the pain stop. Today though it started hurting too bad at 3AM.
But I don't feel quite sufficiently dead enough to really write.
----
http://www.strindbergandhelium.com/
I'm a sort of Strindberg. Although nowhere near like I appear here actually. But still...
I'm very lucky in that my wife is a sort of Helium. Very lucky all around in the wife I have.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Some things I love about that song are that I have no idea what the time signature is. At most points within it I can't tell where in the song I'm at despite many, many listens. I couldn't tell you if it follows the typical stanza, stanza, verse, etc format. I have not a clue how any noise was made. (Well, reverb and distortion obviously...) I love that it's a wall of just about undeciperable noise. I can hardly understand a word said. Actually in just linking it I did unfortunately read a few of the words and that lessened the song slightly. Is it repetitive? Doesn't seem so but I can hardly tell. And I don't want to analyze to find out. I love not knowing about it. My conscious mind is clueless about that song while my unconscious is all over it.
Whatever happened to that guy in A Clockwork Orange, Roddy McDowell I think his name was? I don't know. And I don't want to know. I really really liked him as an actor and I don't want to find out he died of a drug overdose or whatever in the world positive or negative. I like not knowing.
Here and there it is nice to not know things. Just a matter of picking stuff that isn't important...
I want to write music like the SP's Knowhere. (Except the song title is stupid, hate plays on words in titles.)
But, it will be hard to not know the time signature, etc if I write it. Not impossible but hard. Biggest problem is that voice. Before I started I thought surely with sufficient distortion, etc any voice could manage rageful vocals. I think I was wrong. But I'm hoping I just haven't found the right distortion yet. Finding the right distortion seemed to really help my drums. I've thrown every effect at my voice. But maybe I just need some different version of distortion, etc.
One thing is there is a metallic edge to it in there that I would guess they used an extremely quick delay of 5 to 10 ms. I've noticed that over and over again on his vocals. More pronouced on Remission. Barely noticeable here but important. I can sort of get that sound but again, perhaps I need some other version of it? Have tried to affiliated with Reaper. Would have thought delay was pretty much the same from one to the next but I don't really know.
(Sigh) I think I sounded better just singing into a fan as a kid though then I've managed with any effects I've used so far.
Also wonder about hardware effects. But the one hardware distortion I bought completely unimpresses me.
One thing to do is start with vocals and then put a song around it. Because the vocals are the least potentially flexible thing.
Eh. Perhaps that will be the next purchase. But just about everything I've bought I've found wasn't any better than something for free. Exception being East/West orchestra I guess. Which still is a pain to shape the expressions correctly. Thinking of getting out my trumpet instead for something I was working on.
Whatever happened to that guy in A Clockwork Orange, Roddy McDowell I think his name was? I don't know. And I don't want to know. I really really liked him as an actor and I don't want to find out he died of a drug overdose or whatever in the world positive or negative. I like not knowing.
Here and there it is nice to not know things. Just a matter of picking stuff that isn't important...
I want to write music like the SP's Knowhere. (Except the song title is stupid, hate plays on words in titles.)
But, it will be hard to not know the time signature, etc if I write it. Not impossible but hard. Biggest problem is that voice. Before I started I thought surely with sufficient distortion, etc any voice could manage rageful vocals. I think I was wrong. But I'm hoping I just haven't found the right distortion yet. Finding the right distortion seemed to really help my drums. I've thrown every effect at my voice. But maybe I just need some different version of distortion, etc.
One thing is there is a metallic edge to it in there that I would guess they used an extremely quick delay of 5 to 10 ms. I've noticed that over and over again on his vocals. More pronouced on Remission. Barely noticeable here but important. I can sort of get that sound but again, perhaps I need some other version of it? Have tried to affiliated with Reaper. Would have thought delay was pretty much the same from one to the next but I don't really know.
(Sigh) I think I sounded better just singing into a fan as a kid though then I've managed with any effects I've used so far.
Also wonder about hardware effects. But the one hardware distortion I bought completely unimpresses me.
One thing to do is start with vocals and then put a song around it. Because the vocals are the least potentially flexible thing.
Eh. Perhaps that will be the next purchase. But just about everything I've bought I've found wasn't any better than something for free. Exception being East/West orchestra I guess. Which still is a pain to shape the expressions correctly. Thinking of getting out my trumpet instead for something I was working on.
One more time, but with feeling!
I listen with microphones and a 20 pound mini puma from thighs to ear adding his loud purrs to the music.
Holding a cat is like holding a sophisticated amoeba. It's like holding a piece of our roots; remembering the animals that to a large extent we still are. This one acts as if he's got siamese in him. But I bred him because his dad was so smart. (Yes, I know the proper vegan stance on breeding but among other things (don't entirely agree with it) I wasn't vegan back then.) I picked out his dad from a litter because he sat there looking so intelligent. It is an ability we have from an evolutionary standpoint to be able to see to some extent what people are and this cat looked so smart. And most certainly one can (or at least I can) look at an animal and tell about how smart they are. I guess (apparently) not everyone is as good at this. I love to do it. Seeing and contemplating the intelligence in the eyes of animals gives me a strange thrill. Why? (The mystery? Love of intelligence. Love of our animal roots, etc.)
This one (Loki) is so talkative and loving. Loki loves his cat tv (bird feeders) and tries to talk to the birds just like his dad did. He loves hard and then leaves you alone.
I love how he and his mom and sister remind me of our distant roots. But I hate that they're carnivores. Vegan cat food just isn't perfected yet. As of now cats do need meat to survive.
I've chased chickens around a coop to be slaughtered. They know to run. I remember clearly looking a caught chicken in the eyes. It was afraid. That's enough to know. Cows and pigs much more so than chickens. They have personalities. They feel pain.
I think about what I'm doing when I eat. The less you think, the less you exist. I ate meat for 30 years ridiculously thinking it was necessary for good health and that whole time I felt a little disgusted with myself. I know full well what it is to be a meat eater. It's about not thinking. The key to it is to be oblivious, to be stupid, to simply have a big blank spot where your understanding would be. And that blank spot is more disgusting and revolting than the corpses touching your lips. When I realized I didn't need to eat meat or boob juice or chicken periods I was so happy. There was no, "Gee, this might be hard, better make it a gradual process." The process was instant and permanent. (Well except for a bit of boob juice here and there in chocolate etc as being 'pure' would be a pain in the ass where I live.)
It is still the most happiest thing in my life. I don't have to kill anyone (well OK bugs here and there incidentally, etc) in order to continue living myself. How wonderful. How awful when I thought otherwise. I literally had the anguish as in the Anne Rice vampire books.
But still I must turn a piece of my mind off too; as I don't know a single vegan in my real world. So focusing on just how empty people's minds are would just be torturous; especially when they see me, when they see that not only do I not look like I'm about to keel over but that I most likely could kick their ass with one arm tied behind my back. Like politics, it is ultimately beyond the pale.
In politics you can be shocked and morally outraged over and over and over again and eventually, what are you accomplishing?
What makes a Chomsky continue on?
Morals are ultimately utilitarian/consequentialist in nature. IMO they are self interest with some degree of long term forethought. We attempt to predict the future. We attempt to foresee the consequences and on that basis we decide the most moral action. But then of course it's impossible to actually predict the future. The biggest problem of all is knowing how much future there will be. Furthermore actually calculating the most moral action could be very complex from day to day so although the basis of our moral codes are consequentialist, in our day to day living we end up following what looks more like an absolute code.
And with respect to this absolute code, when we 'do the right thing' we can then feel pride with ourselves for having done so. We can feel good about ourselves. We can feel that we've played the game well.
Someone like Chomsky must feel such pride in himself. And so he just keeps repeating the same stuff over and over again. Not much has actually been accomplished but as he sees it, there's not much else he can do.
If I were prominent as political gadfly like Chomsky perhaps I'd do the same. But some of these other people with their little leftist blogs which I skim here and there. It's harder to see what keeps them going. What keeps them so shocked and all. At some point I would think they ought to stray back to consequentialism... instead of being 'deontologial'. All that being shocked isn't changing anything. People keep on treating each other with the same indifference as they do to animals.
Keeping it deontoligical I guess you can continue to feel pride for 'doing the right thing'. Step out to the bigger consequentialist picture and the only reason left I can think of is just feeling pride about being erudite and knowledgeable.
Neither does much for me. But although I'm curious why they bother and don't do so myself and thus (obviously) think it wrong (but not closemindedly), I'm still glad someone is. Personally talking about imperialism in whatever it's guise has become beyond the pale to me though, for the most part.
Beyond the pale in the sense of being a moral outrage overload I suppose. I prefer to be morally outraged about things that aren't so obvious. Because with being less obvious you can at least entertain the hope that people just haven't yet understood it, and once they do, then instead of the indifference they've shown with veganism and politics (veganism just straight up indifference for the vast majority and for politics, too indifferent to ever go beyond the TV and other media owned by the billionaires to hear a different point of view) then maybe (not!) they'd actually change.
I listen with microphones and a 20 pound mini puma from thighs to ear adding his loud purrs to the music.
Holding a cat is like holding a sophisticated amoeba. It's like holding a piece of our roots; remembering the animals that to a large extent we still are. This one acts as if he's got siamese in him. But I bred him because his dad was so smart. (Yes, I know the proper vegan stance on breeding but among other things (don't entirely agree with it) I wasn't vegan back then.) I picked out his dad from a litter because he sat there looking so intelligent. It is an ability we have from an evolutionary standpoint to be able to see to some extent what people are and this cat looked so smart. And most certainly one can (or at least I can) look at an animal and tell about how smart they are. I guess (apparently) not everyone is as good at this. I love to do it. Seeing and contemplating the intelligence in the eyes of animals gives me a strange thrill. Why? (The mystery? Love of intelligence. Love of our animal roots, etc.)
This one (Loki) is so talkative and loving. Loki loves his cat tv (bird feeders) and tries to talk to the birds just like his dad did. He loves hard and then leaves you alone.
I love how he and his mom and sister remind me of our distant roots. But I hate that they're carnivores. Vegan cat food just isn't perfected yet. As of now cats do need meat to survive.
I've chased chickens around a coop to be slaughtered. They know to run. I remember clearly looking a caught chicken in the eyes. It was afraid. That's enough to know. Cows and pigs much more so than chickens. They have personalities. They feel pain.
I think about what I'm doing when I eat. The less you think, the less you exist. I ate meat for 30 years ridiculously thinking it was necessary for good health and that whole time I felt a little disgusted with myself. I know full well what it is to be a meat eater. It's about not thinking. The key to it is to be oblivious, to be stupid, to simply have a big blank spot where your understanding would be. And that blank spot is more disgusting and revolting than the corpses touching your lips. When I realized I didn't need to eat meat or boob juice or chicken periods I was so happy. There was no, "Gee, this might be hard, better make it a gradual process." The process was instant and permanent. (Well except for a bit of boob juice here and there in chocolate etc as being 'pure' would be a pain in the ass where I live.)
It is still the most happiest thing in my life. I don't have to kill anyone (well OK bugs here and there incidentally, etc) in order to continue living myself. How wonderful. How awful when I thought otherwise. I literally had the anguish as in the Anne Rice vampire books.
But still I must turn a piece of my mind off too; as I don't know a single vegan in my real world. So focusing on just how empty people's minds are would just be torturous; especially when they see me, when they see that not only do I not look like I'm about to keel over but that I most likely could kick their ass with one arm tied behind my back. Like politics, it is ultimately beyond the pale.
In politics you can be shocked and morally outraged over and over and over again and eventually, what are you accomplishing?
What makes a Chomsky continue on?
Morals are ultimately utilitarian/consequentialist in nature. IMO they are self interest with some degree of long term forethought. We attempt to predict the future. We attempt to foresee the consequences and on that basis we decide the most moral action. But then of course it's impossible to actually predict the future. The biggest problem of all is knowing how much future there will be. Furthermore actually calculating the most moral action could be very complex from day to day so although the basis of our moral codes are consequentialist, in our day to day living we end up following what looks more like an absolute code.
And with respect to this absolute code, when we 'do the right thing' we can then feel pride with ourselves for having done so. We can feel good about ourselves. We can feel that we've played the game well.
Someone like Chomsky must feel such pride in himself. And so he just keeps repeating the same stuff over and over again. Not much has actually been accomplished but as he sees it, there's not much else he can do.
If I were prominent as political gadfly like Chomsky perhaps I'd do the same. But some of these other people with their little leftist blogs which I skim here and there. It's harder to see what keeps them going. What keeps them so shocked and all. At some point I would think they ought to stray back to consequentialism... instead of being 'deontologial'. All that being shocked isn't changing anything. People keep on treating each other with the same indifference as they do to animals.
Keeping it deontoligical I guess you can continue to feel pride for 'doing the right thing'. Step out to the bigger consequentialist picture and the only reason left I can think of is just feeling pride about being erudite and knowledgeable.
Neither does much for me. But although I'm curious why they bother and don't do so myself and thus (obviously) think it wrong (but not closemindedly), I'm still glad someone is. Personally talking about imperialism in whatever it's guise has become beyond the pale to me though, for the most part.
Beyond the pale in the sense of being a moral outrage overload I suppose. I prefer to be morally outraged about things that aren't so obvious. Because with being less obvious you can at least entertain the hope that people just haven't yet understood it, and once they do, then instead of the indifference they've shown with veganism and politics (veganism just straight up indifference for the vast majority and for politics, too indifferent to ever go beyond the TV and other media owned by the billionaires to hear a different point of view) then maybe (not!) they'd actually change.
As to the last it's not necessarily true about the evil god being the cause of current anxiety. But it sounds neat.
It is an anxiety loop with the amygdala getting continously tweaked that unfortunately gets going in so many people eventually I think, perhaps. It might be related to "refusing" to the play The Game. This because just look at history, endless absurdities/atrocities; refusing to take part in The Game is a matter of morals.
But actually you're stuck playing it whether you like it or not, so it's a matter of just playing it well or very badly. If you accept The Game, I think you can probably handle the potentially anxiety causing stuff much, much better along with being far more likely to be wealthy and "successful".
And then what one can do is play it well right up to the point of seemingly "winning" and then stopping just short of the finish line... for some reason. What reason? You stop running right before you've "won" and find it so so hard to take another stride forward. Is it morals? Is it the "evil god"?
I reminded of Poe's The Scyth of Time; his manservant not being able to take the last step to the top floor of the clock tower. I was less conscious last I read that story. My interpretation back then though was similar to the above.
It is an anxiety loop with the amygdala getting continously tweaked that unfortunately gets going in so many people eventually I think, perhaps. It might be related to "refusing" to the play The Game. This because just look at history, endless absurdities/atrocities; refusing to take part in The Game is a matter of morals.
But actually you're stuck playing it whether you like it or not, so it's a matter of just playing it well or very badly. If you accept The Game, I think you can probably handle the potentially anxiety causing stuff much, much better along with being far more likely to be wealthy and "successful".
And then what one can do is play it well right up to the point of seemingly "winning" and then stopping just short of the finish line... for some reason. What reason? You stop running right before you've "won" and find it so so hard to take another stride forward. Is it morals? Is it the "evil god"?
I reminded of Poe's The Scyth of Time; his manservant not being able to take the last step to the top floor of the clock tower. I was less conscious last I read that story. My interpretation back then though was similar to the above.
Monday, February 16, 2009
The last post titled "True Self", the idea of Spock, the Kurt Russell character in The Soldier, Gilgamesh in this play, the idea of living as if in a never ending war, and perhaps stocism in general: how are they related? How are they different? How valid are they? To what extent are they awful things? Clearly to some extent, as in that play for example, clearly Gilgamesh has gone too far.
I think the "average" person spends maybe 5 years of their life feeling like they're on the chopping block. Well perhaps more, maybe 10 or 15. For a number of reasons I won't relate here I've spent the last 24 straight. That is why I've been some kind of stoic. Ah, such things beyond trying to explain. Feeling like The Other in a society that kills The Other combined with capitalism and then something far, far worse in the beginning that began a negative mental loop I suppose. Possibly within the next year I will get off the chopping block for the entire rest of my life. Very possible so much of this will just be crap then to me. I'll look back on it and just feel bad about having felt bad. And otherwise perhaps be speechless.
----
I slept wonderfully this last week. Dunno why. Things I did different included some situps, and didn't eat any chips. Only had the tylenol pm twice last week then stopped. Did have a partial serving of Nyquil, just for ticklish throat that was making me cough in bed. Felt euphoric yesterday. Everyone else hates work so much while I love it. It's this final semester of a decade worth of college that annoys me. Now, mainly just fatigue as I've been doing this way too long. Knowing that I can still ruin my life. I can flunk a test I have tomorrow and be ruined. It gets old. And that combined with a few other things manages to usually keep a few ingrained negative loops running, resulting in a constant war mindset.
Nothing a bottle of wine won't cure.
---
I created an evil god that wanted to kill me to stop me from killing me. Now I have no desire to kill myself but that god is still there.
I think the "average" person spends maybe 5 years of their life feeling like they're on the chopping block. Well perhaps more, maybe 10 or 15. For a number of reasons I won't relate here I've spent the last 24 straight. That is why I've been some kind of stoic. Ah, such things beyond trying to explain. Feeling like The Other in a society that kills The Other combined with capitalism and then something far, far worse in the beginning that began a negative mental loop I suppose. Possibly within the next year I will get off the chopping block for the entire rest of my life. Very possible so much of this will just be crap then to me. I'll look back on it and just feel bad about having felt bad. And otherwise perhaps be speechless.
----
I slept wonderfully this last week. Dunno why. Things I did different included some situps, and didn't eat any chips. Only had the tylenol pm twice last week then stopped. Did have a partial serving of Nyquil, just for ticklish throat that was making me cough in bed. Felt euphoric yesterday. Everyone else hates work so much while I love it. It's this final semester of a decade worth of college that annoys me. Now, mainly just fatigue as I've been doing this way too long. Knowing that I can still ruin my life. I can flunk a test I have tomorrow and be ruined. It gets old. And that combined with a few other things manages to usually keep a few ingrained negative loops running, resulting in a constant war mindset.
Nothing a bottle of wine won't cure.
---
I created an evil god that wanted to kill me to stop me from killing me. Now I have no desire to kill myself but that god is still there.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
True self
Another spurious post
I would strive to the existence of my true self. A self that isn't controlled/defined by the random happenings of my mundane life. I would like to say my actual life doesn't matter at all and has nothing really to do with Me. To do this means retreating into imagination. Imagining everything. All the positive and negative things which can/do happen to people. Imagining them happening to me. So then if some horrible event does indeed happen to me, I handle it like it's nothing. So then no matter the people I'm stuck associating with or not being so lucky to associate with...
It's just an ideal. It can't ever truly be reached. But one can try. And so I feel mostly insulted at the idea that mostly random events in my life have played any role in shaping me.
Where I live, who I know, who my parents are, what few people live here that I have anything in common with... It all doesn't matter. Or I wish it didn't, of course to some extent it does.
But to the extent that I see it does, I can then deal with it and make it otherwise. The problem is the endless things which are influencing me that I don't realize are influencing me. So I'm a lot like my stepfather, but just concerning the things I haven't paid sufficient attention to...
There are writers I would like to think cannot merely be contextualised by their times, but seem to contextualise it in turn; writers who do not simply belong to history, to the great procession of events, but who send history strangely off course. Writers, then, that come at me from another angle - that are not part of the world and the account of the world I recognise.
I would strive to the existence of my true self. A self that isn't controlled/defined by the random happenings of my mundane life. I would like to say my actual life doesn't matter at all and has nothing really to do with Me. To do this means retreating into imagination. Imagining everything. All the positive and negative things which can/do happen to people. Imagining them happening to me. So then if some horrible event does indeed happen to me, I handle it like it's nothing. So then no matter the people I'm stuck associating with or not being so lucky to associate with...
It's just an ideal. It can't ever truly be reached. But one can try. And so I feel mostly insulted at the idea that mostly random events in my life have played any role in shaping me.
Where I live, who I know, who my parents are, what few people live here that I have anything in common with... It all doesn't matter. Or I wish it didn't, of course to some extent it does.
But to the extent that I see it does, I can then deal with it and make it otherwise. The problem is the endless things which are influencing me that I don't realize are influencing me. So I'm a lot like my stepfather, but just concerning the things I haven't paid sufficient attention to...
The Absurd
The Absurd is when through perfect logic and perfect memory we realize that life is meaningless and futile. This is with respect to the finality of death and perhaps also with the results of successfully "defeating" the unconscious.
The absurd, with a small 'a', I'm defining as when outside of the above universal concerns we realize that our actions are nonsensical/illogical. This absurd though may very well be part of a necessary reaction to The Absurd.
I'm defining absurd in general here as something that doesn't make you laugh. Humor is that which we find unexpectedly wrong. The absurds are too serious to really be so unexpected to the vast majority of people. The exact situation of the absurd may in one sense be totally unexpected but we classify it as a thing which on some level we are expecting as a possibility; that class being the breakdown of that which makes life have meaning.
('have meaning' versus "nonmeaningless"?)
Thinking too fuzzy to say for certain at the moment.
----
With respect to Campbell's Monomyth. What percentage of aspiring writers are would-be hero's of that myth? 5%? 95%? Depends on how mono it is?
---
In some ways I wonder if in general these associations of the likes of Campbell or say Zizek just go ridiculously too far. Are we really learning anything? I mean, I can then read some simple little thing and my mind can then jump to endless meanings but then, well, what? It adds a great richness I suppose; a whole nother level of understanding... And it seems to give a template which makes a lot what seemed maybe random not actually so random.
----
It is something other than the antihistamine and anti-inflammatory properties of tylenol pm at least partially. Two days in a row and I was still still swimming in mud at 2PM.
The absurd, with a small 'a', I'm defining as when outside of the above universal concerns we realize that our actions are nonsensical/illogical. This absurd though may very well be part of a necessary reaction to The Absurd.
I'm defining absurd in general here as something that doesn't make you laugh. Humor is that which we find unexpectedly wrong. The absurds are too serious to really be so unexpected to the vast majority of people. The exact situation of the absurd may in one sense be totally unexpected but we classify it as a thing which on some level we are expecting as a possibility; that class being the breakdown of that which makes life have meaning.
('have meaning' versus "nonmeaningless"?)
Thinking too fuzzy to say for certain at the moment.
----
With respect to Campbell's Monomyth. What percentage of aspiring writers are would-be hero's of that myth? 5%? 95%? Depends on how mono it is?
---
In some ways I wonder if in general these associations of the likes of Campbell or say Zizek just go ridiculously too far. Are we really learning anything? I mean, I can then read some simple little thing and my mind can then jump to endless meanings but then, well, what? It adds a great richness I suppose; a whole nother level of understanding... And it seems to give a template which makes a lot what seemed maybe random not actually so random.
----
It is something other than the antihistamine and anti-inflammatory properties of tylenol pm at least partially. Two days in a row and I was still still swimming in mud at 2PM.
Saturday, February 7, 2009
I want to write of The Absurd and perhaps absurdities scattered throughout our way of life in general, of utopia and the faults within our social systems and our DNA.
Referring to the previous post this Artaud fellow sounds... I want to use the word absurd (language isn't sophisticated enough or I'm not) but it is a different thing than what I just referred to above so I'll say ridiculous. Similarly Spurious and myself and for that matter Kafka in his blog. All seemingly ridiculous. But the thing is they're all setting their sights very high.
---
Every night we sleep and forget, we are then reborn anew. To the extent we sleep like crap this process doesn't correctly take place. Not only do we physically then feel like crud, not only are we mentally tired, but we haven't forgotten.
In one sense not forgetting can mean seeing The Truth a little bit too clearly. In another it means stuck in seeing things the same way. Because we haven't forgotten we aren't so able to approach the problem from another direction, thus we might only spin our wheels.
Through insomnia we can feel like shit and thus we are spurred to creativity. Through pain (not too much though or the wrong kind...) we are spurred to find a change, we are spurred to creativity.
But really insomnia is a lousy way to go about it; as our minds are weakened. We may have forgotten with good sleep but our minds just work better with good sleep.
I've had insomnia a good bit of my life. I would like to defeat it once and for all. Going to start taking Tylenol PM more often. Was just taking it maybe twice a month. Supposedly it's no big deal to take it every night. I won't quite go that far but i shall start taking it much more often. Also will do a few other things. Blueberry smoothies used to put me to sleep...
Had a serious withdrawal from sleeping pills 18 years ago and have very seriously wanted to make sure that never happened again. Tylenol PM though is just some acetaminophen and dipenhydramine.
I'm curious what role inflammation can play in insomnia and histamine. Supposedly the sedative effect of dipenhydramine has nothing to do with it being an antihistamine. Not convinced. It has seemed that taking a massive load of antioxidants has helped me sleep in the past...
Referring to the previous post this Artaud fellow sounds... I want to use the word absurd (language isn't sophisticated enough or I'm not) but it is a different thing than what I just referred to above so I'll say ridiculous. Similarly Spurious and myself and for that matter Kafka in his blog. All seemingly ridiculous. But the thing is they're all setting their sights very high.
---
Every night we sleep and forget, we are then reborn anew. To the extent we sleep like crap this process doesn't correctly take place. Not only do we physically then feel like crud, not only are we mentally tired, but we haven't forgotten.
In one sense not forgetting can mean seeing The Truth a little bit too clearly. In another it means stuck in seeing things the same way. Because we haven't forgotten we aren't so able to approach the problem from another direction, thus we might only spin our wheels.
Through insomnia we can feel like shit and thus we are spurred to creativity. Through pain (not too much though or the wrong kind...) we are spurred to find a change, we are spurred to creativity.
But really insomnia is a lousy way to go about it; as our minds are weakened. We may have forgotten with good sleep but our minds just work better with good sleep.
I've had insomnia a good bit of my life. I would like to defeat it once and for all. Going to start taking Tylenol PM more often. Was just taking it maybe twice a month. Supposedly it's no big deal to take it every night. I won't quite go that far but i shall start taking it much more often. Also will do a few other things. Blueberry smoothies used to put me to sleep...
Had a serious withdrawal from sleeping pills 18 years ago and have very seriously wanted to make sure that never happened again. Tylenol PM though is just some acetaminophen and dipenhydramine.
I'm curious what role inflammation can play in insomnia and histamine. Supposedly the sedative effect of dipenhydramine has nothing to do with it being an antihistamine. Not convinced. It has seemed that taking a massive load of antioxidants has helped me sleep in the past...
Friday, February 6, 2009
Thursday, February 5, 2009
In part I was so dismissive of Freud when younger because I thought analyzing dreams was dumb. For me at least when I was younger they were almost nothing but junk. Just random junk and I was quite sure of it. Now that I'm older that isn't the case. Now they make sense and relate very much to my actual life. When younger I could tell people my dreams and it was just some silly humorous thing. Now, my dreams clearly relate to what I really think and here and there I feel I probably ought to be careful what I say, although usually I'm not anyway.
The vast majority were random junk when younger probably because I was so not normal. I do remember a few neat ones here and there. I still have two dreams songs I wish I could finish recording some day. I remember a reoccuring one (clearly not just random and meaningless) of having a "zit" on my hand and squeezing it and the entire contents on my hand and wrist coming out leaving just a hollow shell. And that I was just a zombie with regards to this development. This caused no reaction, no emotion.
I could control my dreams often and I had a lot of sleep paralysis. I'd usually mistakenly think I had successfully jerked out of the paralysis and was now awake. A few times I then dreamed/imagined going to the bathroom and realized I was still paralyzed in bed after I pissed myself. The imagining in sleep paralysis is far more vivid then in a dream.
I rarely have sleep paralysis anymore although I did just have it two nights ago. I thought I heard someone jiggling the front doorknob. And that has actually happened before (extremely drunk college student at 4AM) not to mention I've watched the empty house across the way get broke in to. So I thought I heard the doorknob jiggling (thinking it maybe the angry guy cattycorner from us who's dog just mauled the ten year old girl's face next door (8 stitches) whom we stole the kitten from before he managed to kill it from neglect) and I tried to wake myself up but was stuck in SP. I rocked myself slightly back and forth and finally jerked out of it.
Now my dreams are usually pretty normal. I could see analyzing them. (Would be easy to do.) Although still plenty probably don't have much meaning and an intelligent and self aware person shouldn't have to rely on dreams to make sense of their thoughts, IMO.
The vast majority were random junk when younger probably because I was so not normal. I do remember a few neat ones here and there. I still have two dreams songs I wish I could finish recording some day. I remember a reoccuring one (clearly not just random and meaningless) of having a "zit" on my hand and squeezing it and the entire contents on my hand and wrist coming out leaving just a hollow shell. And that I was just a zombie with regards to this development. This caused no reaction, no emotion.
I could control my dreams often and I had a lot of sleep paralysis. I'd usually mistakenly think I had successfully jerked out of the paralysis and was now awake. A few times I then dreamed/imagined going to the bathroom and realized I was still paralyzed in bed after I pissed myself. The imagining in sleep paralysis is far more vivid then in a dream.
I rarely have sleep paralysis anymore although I did just have it two nights ago. I thought I heard someone jiggling the front doorknob. And that has actually happened before (extremely drunk college student at 4AM) not to mention I've watched the empty house across the way get broke in to. So I thought I heard the doorknob jiggling (thinking it maybe the angry guy cattycorner from us who's dog just mauled the ten year old girl's face next door (8 stitches) whom we stole the kitten from before he managed to kill it from neglect) and I tried to wake myself up but was stuck in SP. I rocked myself slightly back and forth and finally jerked out of it.
Now my dreams are usually pretty normal. I could see analyzing them. (Would be easy to do.) Although still plenty probably don't have much meaning and an intelligent and self aware person shouldn't have to rely on dreams to make sense of their thoughts, IMO.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
'I had always wanted you to admire my fasting,' says the Hunger Artist. 'We do admire it,' says the impressario who employs him. 'But you shouldn't admire it' - 'Well then we don't admire it,' says the impressario, 'but why shouldn't we admire it?' - 'Because I have to fast, I can't help it.' - 'What a fellow you are,' says the other, 'and why can't you help it?' - 'Because I couldn't find the food I liked. If I had found it, believe me, I should have made no fuss and stuffed myself like you or anyone else.
Kafka, The Hunger Artist
The utopianist rejects the actual world and searches for a better one in part because he just can't enjoy this one. He focuses on long term thinking, on the too far future, because he can't enjoy the here and now. But it doesn't make his endeavors necessarily a waste of time. It doesn't make his product necessarily invalid.
My music definition
As to music then, there is where the beats fall. Like on 1, 5, 9, 13. Most simply 2 squared, 4, 8, 16, 32. Not necessarily that simple but something that is predictable. In fact it's best if it becomes something that your unconscious is predicting, not your conscious. That your unconscious starts knowing what's going to happen while at the same time it's complex enough that your conscious can't, becomes a strange sort of thing. Like being magically lucky.
That's not quite right. It's not a matter of whether or not it's your conscious or unconscious doing the predicting. It's a matter of your conscious not getting bored at the same time that your unconscious is doing this predicting. This successful unconscious predicting of the future can be a good feeling in and of itself.
Then there is vibrational frequencies which divide into each other as whole numbers. This goes to thoughts of prime numbers and nonprimes, the understanding of how some numbers belong together. That the vibrational frequency of a sound is also a product of the vibrational frequencies of some other sounds.
And it's not like this is occuring in the conscious mind. The conscious mind can't count out the oscillations per second of each sound. Somehow the unconscious puts it together and understands consonance and dissonance.
Unconsciously predicting the future and recognizing sounds that go together are both math.
Then there's synethesia. Every single sound should (again basically unconsiously) suggest a living creature or some event which occurs in nature, which occurs "naturally." Every single sound should be a symbol for something Real.
Like the basis of language is more or less synethesitic(sp). Where people can guess with 95% accuracy which word means ugly versus beautiful in languages they don't know. We all have synethesia. Just most only have it a little. Daniel Tammet then being an example of a lot. The first 1000 numbers each being symbols of something Real in his mind. Each with personalities, colors, graphs, etc tied to them. I tie graphs to them like an engineer would. Phone numbers are hilly landscapes.
Dogs and cats make themselves quite clear to humans through the noises they make because we share synethesia.
And so it's a sort of pretend natural world but including fantastic creatures that don't necessarily really exist, (and how sad, how pitiful to only listen to guitar, drums, vocals music endlessly) combined with finding order (as opposed to chaos/no meaning/nothing) combined with successfully predicting the future. A fantasy world where you can predict the future and see the how it all makes sense, all fits together. All occurring unconsciously.
And the sounds which represent creatures move in ways that tell us what they're feeling, etc. And the violin says one thing and viola replies with something that is relevant, etc.
That's not quite right. It's not a matter of whether or not it's your conscious or unconscious doing the predicting. It's a matter of your conscious not getting bored at the same time that your unconscious is doing this predicting. This successful unconscious predicting of the future can be a good feeling in and of itself.
Then there is vibrational frequencies which divide into each other as whole numbers. This goes to thoughts of prime numbers and nonprimes, the understanding of how some numbers belong together. That the vibrational frequency of a sound is also a product of the vibrational frequencies of some other sounds.
And it's not like this is occuring in the conscious mind. The conscious mind can't count out the oscillations per second of each sound. Somehow the unconscious puts it together and understands consonance and dissonance.
Unconsciously predicting the future and recognizing sounds that go together are both math.
Then there's synethesia. Every single sound should (again basically unconsiously) suggest a living creature or some event which occurs in nature, which occurs "naturally." Every single sound should be a symbol for something Real.
Like the basis of language is more or less synethesitic(sp). Where people can guess with 95% accuracy which word means ugly versus beautiful in languages they don't know. We all have synethesia. Just most only have it a little. Daniel Tammet then being an example of a lot. The first 1000 numbers each being symbols of something Real in his mind. Each with personalities, colors, graphs, etc tied to them. I tie graphs to them like an engineer would. Phone numbers are hilly landscapes.
Dogs and cats make themselves quite clear to humans through the noises they make because we share synethesia.
And so it's a sort of pretend natural world but including fantastic creatures that don't necessarily really exist, (and how sad, how pitiful to only listen to guitar, drums, vocals music endlessly) combined with finding order (as opposed to chaos/no meaning/nothing) combined with successfully predicting the future. A fantasy world where you can predict the future and see the how it all makes sense, all fits together. All occurring unconsciously.
And the sounds which represent creatures move in ways that tell us what they're feeling, etc. And the violin says one thing and viola replies with something that is relevant, etc.
I really like to do creative stuff but at the same time am a sort of anti-artist. I'm an anti-artist aspiring artist. It's maybe very clear from some pictures of my biological parents. My mom looking like Roger Waters met a woodland elf. My father... ugh. Very much an anti-artist. A creature of war and sex. Mere survival. No silliness.
And in me then this contradiction. This person who appears to be a cold logical engineer type who appears to think like that but whom actually really dislikes engineers, really dislikes that sort of work and really prefers artistic stuff. But then when trying to be artistic is so blocked by his mind that in part is anything but mystical in it's workings.
I need to document everything that bothers me in fiction writing. All the stuff that makes it "work." That ultimately I can't do myself because I either find it silly or a dishonest gimmick, etc.
It's a strange sort of thing. I really would like to understand it inside and out. It's a lot more complex than music. Music seems to be mainly math and synethesia. Writing is life.
And in me then this contradiction. This person who appears to be a cold logical engineer type who appears to think like that but whom actually really dislikes engineers, really dislikes that sort of work and really prefers artistic stuff. But then when trying to be artistic is so blocked by his mind that in part is anything but mystical in it's workings.
I need to document everything that bothers me in fiction writing. All the stuff that makes it "work." That ultimately I can't do myself because I either find it silly or a dishonest gimmick, etc.
It's a strange sort of thing. I really would like to understand it inside and out. It's a lot more complex than music. Music seems to be mainly math and synethesia. Writing is life.
Monday, February 2, 2009
What is it about schizophrenia that causes so many with it to refuse to face what they have?
Something to do with making them feeling that they would then be invalid maybe. That so much of their life experiences, so much of what has given their lives meaning probably wasn't even real. That they actually aren't special. It was just a defective mind and they do have drugs for that...
You would have to face that more or less your whole life had just been a charade. And that you aren't actually up to the task of truly overcoming the outside forces that plague you, that actually it's just you. And you can be easily labeled and dismissed. That in fact you're not even all that unusual really.
I've been wondering about me in this regard. I don't have schizophrenia but I seem to have a lot of little unusual things, or at one time did. Been wondering if they make many of my present thoughts invalid. I think they don't. All they've really done is nudge me towards casting a critical eye in a certain direction. The fact that I have casted my eye in certain directions might suggest I've certain issues, but it doesn't seem to have much bearing on the final conclusions I come to. I utterly face how wrong I may be. And how unfortunately right the established way of doing a given thing may ultimately be. I really am pretty damm openminded.
The fact that my eye has been cast in certain directions probably at least partially as the result of a bunch of what could be called "issues" doesn't make me invalid.
Like Aspergers? Just a shade maybe? I don't know. Maybe a little. Aspergers is a problematic thing to me though that in the description of it some of it just sounds like being an eccentric and interesting person. When I go on about The Fake Smile though I wonder if that shows some issues with understanding emotions. That I'm bothering to look further into such a thing because it doesn't come so innately to me as it does others. But then, perhaps it's just that I really do like to ask why so much more than normal. Because I do, definitely.
Whole host of other little things that all in all... eh. It only somewhat directs the line of inquiry. And nothing wrong with that. Maybe a lot of time wasted thinking about futile issues. Reinventing the metaphorical wheel. A waste of time. Too Far Future. But that's already understood.
If one is happy then they just conform and don't question so much. (Usually.) If one isn't, (because one way or another they've got issues), then they question the established order of things.
But then one can be perfectly happy and yet be compassionate and see that this world is treating so many horribly, and see that there is such potential for so much more happiness and on that basis also question the established order of things.
One can be a bit of both. In either case it only means asking why. There is nothing invalid in doing that. If your conclusions to such questions are just assertions without any logical chain of reasoning, then there's a problem.
Anyway, the fake smile. In most of my life I've not felt like smiling upon meeting someone. As opposed to aspergers it's really just that I wasn't in a good enough mood to want to smile. Then also I don't like my smile. Me going on about aspergers is mostly just an example of me being quite willing to look at potential faults in myself, then me being all that unusual really in how I interact with others.
Lately I have been genuinely wanting to smile when I see people. So I'm getting old and happy I suppose.
Something to do with making them feeling that they would then be invalid maybe. That so much of their life experiences, so much of what has given their lives meaning probably wasn't even real. That they actually aren't special. It was just a defective mind and they do have drugs for that...
You would have to face that more or less your whole life had just been a charade. And that you aren't actually up to the task of truly overcoming the outside forces that plague you, that actually it's just you. And you can be easily labeled and dismissed. That in fact you're not even all that unusual really.
I've been wondering about me in this regard. I don't have schizophrenia but I seem to have a lot of little unusual things, or at one time did. Been wondering if they make many of my present thoughts invalid. I think they don't. All they've really done is nudge me towards casting a critical eye in a certain direction. The fact that I have casted my eye in certain directions might suggest I've certain issues, but it doesn't seem to have much bearing on the final conclusions I come to. I utterly face how wrong I may be. And how unfortunately right the established way of doing a given thing may ultimately be. I really am pretty damm openminded.
The fact that my eye has been cast in certain directions probably at least partially as the result of a bunch of what could be called "issues" doesn't make me invalid.
Like Aspergers? Just a shade maybe? I don't know. Maybe a little. Aspergers is a problematic thing to me though that in the description of it some of it just sounds like being an eccentric and interesting person. When I go on about The Fake Smile though I wonder if that shows some issues with understanding emotions. That I'm bothering to look further into such a thing because it doesn't come so innately to me as it does others. But then, perhaps it's just that I really do like to ask why so much more than normal. Because I do, definitely.
Whole host of other little things that all in all... eh. It only somewhat directs the line of inquiry. And nothing wrong with that. Maybe a lot of time wasted thinking about futile issues. Reinventing the metaphorical wheel. A waste of time. Too Far Future. But that's already understood.
If one is happy then they just conform and don't question so much. (Usually.) If one isn't, (because one way or another they've got issues), then they question the established order of things.
But then one can be perfectly happy and yet be compassionate and see that this world is treating so many horribly, and see that there is such potential for so much more happiness and on that basis also question the established order of things.
One can be a bit of both. In either case it only means asking why. There is nothing invalid in doing that. If your conclusions to such questions are just assertions without any logical chain of reasoning, then there's a problem.
Anyway, the fake smile. In most of my life I've not felt like smiling upon meeting someone. As opposed to aspergers it's really just that I wasn't in a good enough mood to want to smile. Then also I don't like my smile. Me going on about aspergers is mostly just an example of me being quite willing to look at potential faults in myself, then me being all that unusual really in how I interact with others.
Lately I have been genuinely wanting to smile when I see people. So I'm getting old and happy I suppose.
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