Poor thing.
Lovely news, however! I am now running Ubuntu 6.10, Edgy Eft, on my 160 GB hard drive. Sweet. I actually got the disc (I had to buy it through linuxCD.org since um downloading was not a possibility and 6.10 is pretty old; much faster shipping than I expected, very awesome) three (?) days ago and have been learning it ... relatively quickly, I think. Maybe I'm giving myself too much credit, but you know. I can do that.
I'm actually trying to get the clock to stop telling me it's the wrong time of day (for example, it thinks it's around noon instead of midnight :[) right now... mostly I'm messing up super-simple stuff, you know? And I haven't had to use the terminal at all, which ... is still rather intimidating. Totally GUI so far, though, man.
Basically my computer is full of joyful weeping unto Hosannah, yanno, and I wanted to share. :3
4.11.2008
3.30.2008
The Shores of the Atlantic, III
Static. A long, agonizingly long beep of the kind played before severe weather alert announcements. More static.
Silence.
We took things for granted. We took sound, color, taste, smell for granted. We took for granted the vibration of speech...
We took hope for granted. The list of things I have lost is infinite and none more important than another. Time in my perception has passed and the colors of tropical birds have the same value as a woman in my bed. Time as a general consensual reality has ceased to exist, and there are no tropics anymore, or women.
I have a difficult time appreciating the birds, though.
3.28.2008
The Shores of the Atlantic, II
There was not what there should have been, what humanity had been sure there would be for millenia. It was quiet. It was swift. It was in broad daylight.
It was not supernatural or divine. There was no judgment, no "reason." You could almost say it was ironic - only mankind ever believed in a reason for anything, Nature just closed her eyes as she moved a molecule this way or that and hoped for the best. You could say that, if you existed, and if it wasn't just unfair instead of ironic.
Not that technicalities in diction matter now.
Once, people believed in ascending to Heaven body-and-soul. That is almost believable now, if not for the fact that they descended, those with or without souls.
Once, all people migrated naturally - later actively - to rivers and streams for sources of water, and rivers and oceans for trading.
Eventually we would flee them, albeit in vain.
Despite all my rage, blah blah blah.
I have the most horrible feeling that my plan to put happiness into the world by being happy is a complete failure.
And I want to say, to hell with the world! It's all about you and me, baby, but I can hardly conceive even believing that. And it doesn't matter that the apostrophe is in the wrong place when rape is even existing. It doesn't matter that I'm lonely when people are beating the hell out of their pregnant handicapped roommates. What I want to do doesn't matter. People are starving, dying, bleeding, and praying for ...what, again?
Miss America, please outline your wish in more detail. "I wish for world peace" doesn't really cut it. "I wish for equality in finances; the human right to not have the crap kicked out of you to be honored; clean water for the whole planet; that people would get off their lazy asses and clean some of the litter in the park up more often; dignity in death; respect for your elders and those younger as well; no more insane young people killing everyone in sight; for human beings to live as we ought and not to survive as though we're still animals in the trees. I wish not for love and happiness for all but the basic human right to not be waterboarded for an oil war to be respected, for more adoptions from African countries, for less attention to be paid to what celebrity is in rehab this weekend and more to what dictators are blowing up what sect of their population the same weekend."
Not so much about the attention part, I suppose. I hate talking. I am so tired of talking about "the issues." No war! Okay, we've settled it, we hate war. Hey, wait, why's this war still going on? Well, sweetheart, because our lovely representative political offices are currently held by a bunch of bought-and-paid-for idiots who don't care that children are slowly - and not so slowly - starving to death as long as they can glut themselves on things human beings shouldn't even eat (like excessive amounts of anything at all). We can't make up our minds about abortion! Well, get over it, because Roe v. Wade is already in place and is morally sound. Our economy is crumbling and we can't do anything about it! Maybe we should direct our violent natures to more useful things than stupid, broke college and high-school kids and mallrats - I'm pretty sure your Congressman voted in favor of the law that did blank to your blank and thus made you homicidal and not that neighborhood prep, whose assholicness is negotiable since you're the one putting bullets into him.
In conclusion, there is no conclusion. Vote, boycott, march, buy pins or shoelaces or whatever your cause calls for as a group action. Slavery and rape and slaughter and ignorance still exist - there are a million Causes to choose from and multiple Campaigns in each cause. I'm sure you can find something you care about more than whoever's winning American Idol.
And I want to say, to hell with the world! It's all about you and me, baby, but I can hardly conceive even believing that. And it doesn't matter that the apostrophe is in the wrong place when rape is even existing. It doesn't matter that I'm lonely when people are beating the hell out of their pregnant handicapped roommates. What I want to do doesn't matter. People are starving, dying, bleeding, and praying for ...what, again?
Miss America, please outline your wish in more detail. "I wish for world peace" doesn't really cut it. "I wish for equality in finances; the human right to not have the crap kicked out of you to be honored; clean water for the whole planet; that people would get off their lazy asses and clean some of the litter in the park up more often; dignity in death; respect for your elders and those younger as well; no more insane young people killing everyone in sight; for human beings to live as we ought and not to survive as though we're still animals in the trees. I wish not for love and happiness for all but the basic human right to not be waterboarded for an oil war to be respected, for more adoptions from African countries, for less attention to be paid to what celebrity is in rehab this weekend and more to what dictators are blowing up what sect of their population the same weekend."
Not so much about the attention part, I suppose. I hate talking. I am so tired of talking about "the issues." No war! Okay, we've settled it, we hate war. Hey, wait, why's this war still going on? Well, sweetheart, because our lovely representative political offices are currently held by a bunch of bought-and-paid-for idiots who don't care that children are slowly - and not so slowly - starving to death as long as they can glut themselves on things human beings shouldn't even eat (like excessive amounts of anything at all). We can't make up our minds about abortion! Well, get over it, because Roe v. Wade is already in place and is morally sound. Our economy is crumbling and we can't do anything about it! Maybe we should direct our violent natures to more useful things than stupid, broke college and high-school kids and mallrats - I'm pretty sure your Congressman voted in favor of the law that did blank to your blank and thus made you homicidal and not that neighborhood prep, whose assholicness is negotiable since you're the one putting bullets into him.
In conclusion, there is no conclusion. Vote, boycott, march, buy pins or shoelaces or whatever your cause calls for as a group action. Slavery and rape and slaughter and ignorance still exist - there are a million Causes to choose from and multiple Campaigns in each cause. I'm sure you can find something you care about more than whoever's winning American Idol.
3.20.2008
Covington's new architectural mindblower. Let me show you it.
Image from Archidose, who ... got it from somebody else.
That, my lovelies, is in Covington. I remember reading about it last year when my family was going to move to the Cincy metro area (which I will apparently be doing on my own after I have degrees and a small dog and drink coffee at regular hours) and I also remember thinking, "Wow, I hope they have plans for more huge-ass buildings to match it."
Well, the degree of matching really depends on the angle of the picture you take of the building. Obviously the website is going to have some more flattering photographs, so there you are.
In the vein of greed, those condos are gorgeous inside, with a great blend of modern (post-modern? I know nothing about precise classifications) and traditional. And I want the Pinnacle.
3.19.2008
The Shores of the Atlantic, I
Upon reflection, perhaps recording my thoughts is not the best of ideas. Also upon reflection, perhaps it doesn't matter. Perhaps I will stumble upon the thoughts of another's, thoughts far more profound than mine.
Regardless, I write.
When everything was normal I did not believe who you are to be defined by anything other than what the people you loved thought of you.
There is no one left to judge me. I am no one. I am nothing. My name, age, medical information - nothing.
No one is left to care.
Whatever remains of me, that is all that is left of sentient conscience. For once, in a bitterly laughable way, the world and I are on the same page. Devoid of soul and thought. Devoid.
The Void...
Once, I know, there were colors. When they existed, their favorite place was right here in New England.
Vibrant means nothing now.
Neither does desolate, really. I was never a wordsmith; perhaps one should have survived to name this place. On the shores of the Atlantic, that cold forbidding sea, the world swallowed up the happiness and warmth of you and me. Children might sing that in generations to come, if there were any children to sing.
Or any generations to come...
I don't know his name, but I think he's writing me.
3.18.2008
A Useful Post in Which I Speak of Websites &such
In light of goowy.com's future being rather uncertain, a post.
I've had my Gmail and LiveJournal accounts since 2005. I've had a few before then, but these are the ones I've kept. I like the names, I like all of the crap that accumulates over the years. Granted, some of the e-mails and posts seem a little odd to me a few years later, but that's only to be expected.
LiveJournal first.
Almost every friend on the internet I have I met through LiveJournal. Three close friends from it feels like a million years ago through ai_made_us_cry, a community where we hated new "greenday" with every fiber of our beings. Another through an Emo Boy community, which admittedly hasn't been much more active than said anti-Green Day one. And now that I'm not being such a lurker, this Fullmetal Alchemist community has brought me quite a few friends - not close ones, but "hey! I know & like you, let's talk<3" kind of friends.
And the point of all this is that I love my LiveJournal experience. I have for years. So when I see things like this news post, I start to worry. Strikethrough 07 was something pretty awful, and my only internet access at the time was fifteen minutes away at the library. The Adult Content notice is a new annoying feature (especially as I am a few months shy of eighteen and much into fanfiction) but removing basic, ad-free accounts and then telling everyone? Nice.
I feel as though I knew I had cause to worry when LJ was sold to some year-old Russian company.
Now! In more recent ... years, months, I stumbled across www.goowy.com, a Flash-based webtop with e-mail client and "widgets," the former of which I simply forwarded my Gmail messages to and the latter of which come in really, really useful. Did I mention that it's gorgeous, which is why I prefer it over everything else? It also has games and probably some other things. Oho, where can you sign up?
Well, you can't. AOL acquired Goowy, announced February 3rd, and on the homepage as of the 17th of March new accounts are no longer an option and the explanation is scant. Moving Goowy to AOL's webmail client? What does that mean for users? I went to the forums wanting clarification, and I kind of found it.
Well, you know, I was just assuming AOL would be HOSTING the gorgeous webtop I've had since November or December, but ... that's a valid assumption, too, I guess. Thanks for, uh, clarifying that and such.
So, needless to say, I need a plan for if/when Goowy goes under. I begin one. Well, I certainly don't want to go back to ugly old Gmail's interface except to compose messages (and yes, it is rather ugly in comparison to Goowy); my friend tells me AOL's got free accounts now! Oho! Well, I like their interface, and they are the ones who own Goowy now, so maybe ...
Except they won't let me begin with a number. I'm certainly not going to be songlyrics@aol.com or televisionshow@aol.com or anything. I don't have personalized default e-mail addresses, no sirree! So I look for other free e-mail clients, which is how I found Goowy in the first place, hoping and praying I'll find something as gorgeous and easy.
I haven't, and I probably won't. So back to Gmail itself instead of forwarding everything for the time being.
But that's only one problem solved. Until recently I was never really into RSS feeds, you know, I only keep tabs on a few websites and they don't update every hour. I'm not a newshound or an avid blog-reader. I have my friendslist on LJ for that, basically, and a few MySpace blog subscriptions. However, I need a way to keep up on Blogger posts from blogs I care about, like my friend's art blog and ... well, a college I was intensely interested in for a long time. From there I subscribed to some other feeds, like my favorite webcomic and NPR news. Yes! News! I wanted to know what was going on with new research!
Now I'm sure you see my problem here... yes, all of that is on Goowy's webtop. Very pretty, you know, very simple. Now I need, augh, a "real" feed aggregator. Well, that's simple enough, I think - I'll go find one!
Oh yes, very simple - if you're the kind to just download the "best" thing out there... which I'm not.
So what now? Well, let's read what other people are saying about it. From there (one post, actually, which is here), I was sent along my merry way to see about Omea Pro and Newzie.. Well, I don't need all of those extra features with Omea Pro, so I figure I'll just download the basic Omea Reader. Haha, sir, no, you can download it but TO NO AVAIL! For you have not the .NET framework (which I admit I know less than nothing about except the following) which you must have Windows XP to download!
What? Crap! I only have 2000! Thanks, Microsoft! There goes Omea. I make a sad face.
Which out of the two, leaves, obviously, Newzie. Newzie's website design is, in my opinion, functional but kind of lacking in aesthetic luxury, so I'm reluctant to download, but like I said - it looks functional. And when I download it, it isn't gorgeous, but it's pretty enough to suit my girly tastes. And it ... doesn't say anything about requiring .NET, but like I said, I know less than nothing about that so I suppose if it does, well, I'll cry. And try to do things about it like get older versions.
And maybe, if it comes down to it, just use my browser.
I've had my Gmail and LiveJournal accounts since 2005. I've had a few before then, but these are the ones I've kept. I like the names, I like all of the crap that accumulates over the years. Granted, some of the e-mails and posts seem a little odd to me a few years later, but that's only to be expected.
LiveJournal first.
Almost every friend on the internet I have I met through LiveJournal. Three close friends from it feels like a million years ago through ai_made_us_cry, a community where we hated new "greenday" with every fiber of our beings. Another through an Emo Boy community, which admittedly hasn't been much more active than said anti-Green Day one. And now that I'm not being such a lurker, this Fullmetal Alchemist community has brought me quite a few friends - not close ones, but "hey! I know & like you, let's talk<3" kind of friends.
And the point of all this is that I love my LiveJournal experience. I have for years. So when I see things like this news post, I start to worry. Strikethrough 07 was something pretty awful, and my only internet access at the time was fifteen minutes away at the library. The Adult Content notice is a new annoying feature (especially as I am a few months shy of eighteen and much into fanfiction) but removing basic, ad-free accounts and then telling everyone? Nice.
I feel as though I knew I had cause to worry when LJ was sold to some year-old Russian company.
Now! In more recent ... years, months, I stumbled across www.goowy.com, a Flash-based webtop with e-mail client and "widgets," the former of which I simply forwarded my Gmail messages to and the latter of which come in really, really useful. Did I mention that it's gorgeous, which is why I prefer it over everything else? It also has games and probably some other things. Oho, where can you sign up?
Well, you can't. AOL acquired Goowy, announced February 3rd, and on the homepage as of the 17th of March new accounts are no longer an option and the explanation is scant. Moving Goowy to AOL's webmail client? What does that mean for users? I went to the forums wanting clarification, and I kind of found it.
I think it is fair to assume, based on the note on our home page, that we will be transitioning users away from goowy, which is to say that we will not be maintaining the environment for the long term.
Well, you know, I was just assuming AOL would be HOSTING the gorgeous webtop I've had since November or December, but ... that's a valid assumption, too, I guess. Thanks for, uh, clarifying that and such.
So, needless to say, I need a plan for if/when Goowy goes under. I begin one. Well, I certainly don't want to go back to ugly old Gmail's interface except to compose messages (and yes, it is rather ugly in comparison to Goowy); my friend tells me AOL's got free accounts now! Oho! Well, I like their interface, and they are the ones who own Goowy now, so maybe ...
Except they won't let me begin with a number. I'm certainly not going to be songlyrics@aol.com or televisionshow@aol.com or anything. I don't have personalized default e-mail addresses, no sirree! So I look for other free e-mail clients, which is how I found Goowy in the first place, hoping and praying I'll find something as gorgeous and easy.
I haven't, and I probably won't. So back to Gmail itself instead of forwarding everything for the time being.
But that's only one problem solved. Until recently I was never really into RSS feeds, you know, I only keep tabs on a few websites and they don't update every hour. I'm not a newshound or an avid blog-reader. I have my friendslist on LJ for that, basically, and a few MySpace blog subscriptions. However, I need a way to keep up on Blogger posts from blogs I care about, like my friend's art blog and ... well, a college I was intensely interested in for a long time. From there I subscribed to some other feeds, like my favorite webcomic and NPR news. Yes! News! I wanted to know what was going on with new research!
Now I'm sure you see my problem here... yes, all of that is on Goowy's webtop. Very pretty, you know, very simple. Now I need, augh, a "real" feed aggregator. Well, that's simple enough, I think - I'll go find one!
Oh yes, very simple - if you're the kind to just download the "best" thing out there... which I'm not.
So what now? Well, let's read what other people are saying about it. From there (one post, actually, which is here), I was sent along my merry way to see about Omea Pro and Newzie.. Well, I don't need all of those extra features with Omea Pro, so I figure I'll just download the basic Omea Reader. Haha, sir, no, you can download it but TO NO AVAIL! For you have not the .NET framework (which I admit I know less than nothing about except the following) which you must have Windows XP to download!
What? Crap! I only have 2000! Thanks, Microsoft! There goes Omea. I make a sad face.
Which out of the two, leaves, obviously, Newzie. Newzie's website design is, in my opinion, functional but kind of lacking in aesthetic luxury, so I'm reluctant to download, but like I said - it looks functional. And when I download it, it isn't gorgeous, but it's pretty enough to suit my girly tastes. And it ... doesn't say anything about requiring .NET, but like I said, I know less than nothing about that so I suppose if it does, well, I'll cry. And try to do things about it like get older versions.
And maybe, if it comes down to it, just use my browser.
3.08.2008
We all live in fantasy "realities."
It just might happen that the degree of fantasy deviating from the cliche of a collected reality differs.
No man is an island, true enough, but we are all alone nonetheless. Perhaps we dream of bettering our finances; perhaps of strengthening our emotional connections fictional or existent. Some of us dream of God, some of fame. We dream in numbers and colors and grammatical syntax.
The sheer amount of things a human being can dream of, pine for, is overwhelming. This in part helps to shelter us; we instinctively hide in a fortress where we choose what to think about, more or less, and simply follow life from there. We are more than aware of other modes of existence and other realities and most of us care, but care is irrelevant.
This is the reason for fiction, and this is all the justification I can stomach coming out of my personal fantasy for.
No man is an island, true enough, but we are all alone nonetheless. Perhaps we dream of bettering our finances; perhaps of strengthening our emotional connections fictional or existent. Some of us dream of God, some of fame. We dream in numbers and colors and grammatical syntax.
The sheer amount of things a human being can dream of, pine for, is overwhelming. This in part helps to shelter us; we instinctively hide in a fortress where we choose what to think about, more or less, and simply follow life from there. We are more than aware of other modes of existence and other realities and most of us care, but care is irrelevant.
This is the reason for fiction, and this is all the justification I can stomach coming out of my personal fantasy for.
2.26.2008
"Teens losing touch with historical references"
sauce
One thousand, two hundred students surveyed and suddenly all high-schoolers are idiots. Granted, quite a few high-schoolers are, but nonetheless, I hardly think such a survey is valid. Perhaps reviewing certain demographics for ACT, SAT and different state's standardized test-scores would reveal more positive statistics.
My fondness for surveys is waning, and in light of the fact [of an opinion!] that it was never present to begin with, well. Tiny little surveys being taken seriously seems to be quite popular; I wonder if surveys have always been so misleading as they are recently?
Among 1,200 students surveyed:
•43% knew the Civil War was fought between 1850 and 1900.
•52% could identify the theme of 1984.
•51% knew that the controversy surrounding Sen. Joseph McCarthy focused on communism.
In all, students earned a C in history and an F in literature, though the survey suggests students do well on topics schools cover. For instance, 88% knew the bombing of Pearl Harbor led the USA into World War II, and 97% could identify Martin Luther King Jr. as author of the "I Have a Dream" speech.
One thousand, two hundred students surveyed and suddenly all high-schoolers are idiots. Granted, quite a few high-schoolers are, but nonetheless, I hardly think such a survey is valid. Perhaps reviewing certain demographics for ACT, SAT and different state's standardized test-scores would reveal more positive statistics.
My fondness for surveys is waning, and in light of the fact [of an opinion!] that it was never present to begin with, well. Tiny little surveys being taken seriously seems to be quite popular; I wonder if surveys have always been so misleading as they are recently?
Oh God, that can't be my destiny.
I refuse to let my life be like one of those short stories in The New Yorker. I grow up to be some miserable 30-something and all the men in my past who fucked me over emotionally or psychologically come back to apologize and blegh.
Live in a windowy cabin out in Wyoming or something with a dog I don't show much emotional attachment to with three-sentence descriptions of my therapy sessions with a woman as cynical as myself...
And then I find out 4/5ths of the way through the story that I have an illegitimate half-brother living in South Carolina who's in debt up to his ears and could really use the financial assistance of his half-sister who so happens to be a renowned textbook author...
The story ends with a really, really subdued "this would be heartfelt if it were a film" scene where I've made a passive decision to give my half-brother some few thousand dollars so he can take care of his wife and two young boys, one of whom is some kind of genius and is enrolled in a fancy boarding school for young geniuses based on his merit alone.
You know, to be honest I'd rather have a more Star Wars-based life. The Force would run strong within me and I'd be a bad-ass Jedi and maybe I should pick something I know more about, but I don't really care as long as I don't end up in some passive, Valium-reduced short story.
Live in a windowy cabin out in Wyoming or something with a dog I don't show much emotional attachment to with three-sentence descriptions of my therapy sessions with a woman as cynical as myself...
And then I find out 4/5ths of the way through the story that I have an illegitimate half-brother living in South Carolina who's in debt up to his ears and could really use the financial assistance of his half-sister who so happens to be a renowned textbook author...
The story ends with a really, really subdued "this would be heartfelt if it were a film" scene where I've made a passive decision to give my half-brother some few thousand dollars so he can take care of his wife and two young boys, one of whom is some kind of genius and is enrolled in a fancy boarding school for young geniuses based on his merit alone.
You know, to be honest I'd rather have a more Star Wars-based life. The Force would run strong within me and I'd be a bad-ass Jedi and maybe I should pick something I know more about, but I don't really care as long as I don't end up in some passive, Valium-reduced short story.
2.23.2008
In Which the Entry is Only a Few Hours Later than the Previous One
A few minutes ago I awoke from a dream along the lines of this:
I was a young man in a medium-sized downtown looking for a bookshop, or a deli (my hunger knows no dream boundaries!). While walking I was musing and suddenly I was neither gendered nor in a world I knew; I was, in fact, looking at a much more refined version of this:
Care to take a guess at what that is? HOW I SAW THE UNIVERSE! SKFJDKFJKBLH!
Not only that, it was very, very funny. The universe was built of galaxies that followed each other around because they blindly trusted that they were *supposed* to all stay together, that the universe and subsequently themselves would fall apart and die pretty horribly [I think it was akin to starving] if they didn't cluster like that. Those little diamonds are what the universe kept trying to inhabit, but that space legally [o, laws of the universe] belonged to Zeus, who kept telling them it's all right, the universe is expandi-, no, no, come on, stay out of there!
Hah, what a decidedly different dream from my normal ones... the rest was all about pop culture, and "emo" singers with skinny legs.
I was a young man in a medium-sized downtown looking for a bookshop, or a deli (my hunger knows no dream boundaries!). While walking I was musing and suddenly I was neither gendered nor in a world I knew; I was, in fact, looking at a much more refined version of this:
Care to take a guess at what that is? HOW I SAW THE UNIVERSE! SKFJDKFJKBLH!
Not only that, it was very, very funny. The universe was built of galaxies that followed each other around because they blindly trusted that they were *supposed* to all stay together, that the universe and subsequently themselves would fall apart and die pretty horribly [I think it was akin to starving] if they didn't cluster like that. Those little diamonds are what the universe kept trying to inhabit, but that space legally [o, laws of the universe] belonged to Zeus, who kept telling them it's all right, the universe is expandi-, no, no, come on, stay out of there!
Hah, what a decidedly different dream from my normal ones... the rest was all about pop culture, and "emo" singers with skinny legs.
In Which the Date of the Entry is 02.23.08
The Math Gene, Keith Devlin. Whoa. I really dig this book. Rather informative although ... the math really is beyond me :\ I'm just hoping that reading *about* it will help me understand the mindset I need to be in to do arithmetic WHICH IS SOMETHING Devlin claims mathematicians cannot do well, either. Ho ho ho!
How To Be Alone, Jonathan Franzen. I'm not very far into this book, I just checked it out today, but I really like Franzen's insight so far. I'm looking forward to the rest of the book.
The Riddle of Joy, G.K. Chesterton and C.S. Lewis. I'm only two, well, they're not really chapters, into this one, but I'm excited about it as well. C.S. Lewis is an author I've been trying to get into [and by trying, I mean thinking about and then forgetting :x] besides, uh, Narnia. Which incidentally I did rather like as a child. I've never heard of Chesterton, though, but apparently Lewis liked him so... I'm hoping to find something in this, I suppose.
As well as The Tale of Genji - which I am really not liking much, by the way, how boring and nothing much happens and when something DOES happen it's in an absurdly subdued way - and the Aeneid. A copy of which I had as a kid and tried really hard to understand, but, well. It was over my head. Plus the copy I have right now is translated super-awesomely easy to read; I think the copy I had before was Penguin Classics. I'll have to look into the translatioooons.
Oh! Greek Art by John Boardman came in the post yesterday HURRAH~
Bookmooch is fantastic. I wish I had money for postage...
How To Be Alone, Jonathan Franzen. I'm not very far into this book, I just checked it out today, but I really like Franzen's insight so far. I'm looking forward to the rest of the book.
The Riddle of Joy, G.K. Chesterton and C.S. Lewis. I'm only two, well, they're not really chapters, into this one, but I'm excited about it as well. C.S. Lewis is an author I've been trying to get into [and by trying, I mean thinking about and then forgetting :x] besides, uh, Narnia. Which incidentally I did rather like as a child. I've never heard of Chesterton, though, but apparently Lewis liked him so... I'm hoping to find something in this, I suppose.
As well as The Tale of Genji - which I am really not liking much, by the way, how boring and nothing much happens and when something DOES happen it's in an absurdly subdued way - and the Aeneid. A copy of which I had as a kid and tried really hard to understand, but, well. It was over my head. Plus the copy I have right now is translated super-awesomely easy to read; I think the copy I had before was Penguin Classics. I'll have to look into the translatioooons.
Oh! Greek Art by John Boardman came in the post yesterday HURRAH~
Bookmooch is fantastic. I wish I had money for postage...
2.16.2008
More Human Than Human
source
Those boosts they're talking about have nothing to do with intelligence, programmed or otherwise, on the part of the machine. They have everything to do with human intelligent manipulation of atomic particles.
"The nanobots, he said, would "make us smarter, remember things better and automatically go into full emergent virtual reality environments through the nervous system"."
No, the nanobots will be programmed to tap into parts of our brain ALREADY IN EXISTENCE. THEY WILL NOT "MAKE" US DO ANYTHING.
And how is it even conceivable that we are PHYSICALLY CAPABLE to perform at maximum potential? How is it that the natural forces behind evolution didn't know what they were doing?
How is it that we have forgotten what defines a human being? What does define a human being? Supposedly it's the ability to think in abstract terms, but that's disputed and probably disproved in a number of areas.
Perhaps just a degree of advanced advantage over the other animals in abstract thinking...
The only way that "human level" artificial intelligence could honestly be matched is if we compiled in-depth maps of billions of brains around the globe and based AI on that. Do we have the means to build a brain from the cells up?
Am I the only one seeing the ridiculousness of predicting science, anyway?
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS AN INTELLIGENT MACHINE.
Those boosts they're talking about have nothing to do with intelligence, programmed or otherwise, on the part of the machine. They have everything to do with human intelligent manipulation of atomic particles.
"The nanobots, he said, would "make us smarter, remember things better and automatically go into full emergent virtual reality environments through the nervous system"."
No, the nanobots will be programmed to tap into parts of our brain ALREADY IN EXISTENCE. THEY WILL NOT "MAKE" US DO ANYTHING.
And how is it even conceivable that we are PHYSICALLY CAPABLE to perform at maximum potential? How is it that the natural forces behind evolution didn't know what they were doing?
How is it that we have forgotten what defines a human being? What does define a human being? Supposedly it's the ability to think in abstract terms, but that's disputed and probably disproved in a number of areas.
Perhaps just a degree of advanced advantage over the other animals in abstract thinking...
The only way that "human level" artificial intelligence could honestly be matched is if we compiled in-depth maps of billions of brains around the globe and based AI on that. Do we have the means to build a brain from the cells up?
Am I the only one seeing the ridiculousness of predicting science, anyway?
2.04.2008
The Melancholy of America Modernia
"The more cultivated a person is, the more intelligent, the more repressed, then the more he needs some method of channeling the primitive impulses he's worked so hard to subdue. Otherwise those powerful old forces will mass and strengthen until they are violent enough to break free, more violent for the delay, often strong enough to sweep the will away entirely. For a warning of what happens in the absence of such a pressure valve, we have the example of the Romans. The emperors. Think, for example, of Tiberius, the ugly stepson trying to live up to the command of his stepfather Augustus. Think of the tremendous, impossible strain he must have undergone, following in the footsteps of a savior, a god. The people hated him. No matter how hard he tried he was never good enough, could never be rid of the hateful self, and finally the floodgates broke. He was swept away on his perversions and he died, old and mad, lost in the pleasure gardens of Capri: not even happy there, as one might hope, but miserable. Before he died he wrote a letter home to the Senate. 'May all the Gods and Goddesses visit me with more utter destruction than I feel I am daily suffering.' Think of those who came after him. Caligula. Nero.
He paused. "The Roman genius, and perhaps the Roman flaw," he said, "was an obsession with order. One sees it in their architecture, their literature, their laws - this fierce denial of darkness, unreason, chaos." He laughed. "Easy to see why the Romans, usually so tolerant of foreign religions, persecuted the Christians mercilessly - how absurd to think a common criminal had risen from the dead, how appalling that his followers celebrated him by drinking his blood. The illogic of it frightened them and they did everything they could to crush it. In fact, I think the reason they took such drastic steps was because they were not only frightened but also terribly attracted to it. Pragmatists are often strangely superstitious. For all their logic, who lived in more abject terror of the supernatural than the Romans?
"The Greeks were different. They had a passion for order and symmetry, much like the Romans, but they knew how foolish it was to deny the unseen world, the old gods. Emotion, darkness, barbarism." He looked at the ceiling for a moment, his face almost troubled. "Do you remember what we were speaking of earlier, of how bloody, terrible things are sometimes the most beautiful?" he said. "It's a very Greek idea, and a very profound one. Beauty is terror. Whatever we call beautiful, we quiver before it. And what could be more terrifying and beautiful, to souls like the Greeks or our own, than to lose control completely? To throw off the chains of being for an instant, to shatter the accident of our mortal selves? Euripedes speaks of the Maenads: head thrown back, throat to the stars, 'more like deer than human being.' To be absolutely free! One is quite capable, of course, of working out these destructive passions in more vulgar and less efficient ways. But how glorious to release them in a single burst! To sing, to scream, to dance barefoot in the woods in the dead of night, with no more awareness of mortals than an animal! These are powerful mysteries. The bellowing of bulls. Springs of honey bubbling from the ground. If we are strong enough in our souls we can rip away the veil and look that naked, terrible beauty right in the face; let God consume us, devour us, unstring our bones. Then spit us out reborn."
-Julian in The Secret History
Now aside from the technicalities I disagree with [such as the Romans finding their release in things like warfare and ... perverse sexual deviance and not in eventual madness; Julian's reasoning of the Roman persecution of Christianity - it's more likely that it was the Christian denial of other gods presented a more political front] the whole thing has to be viewed from another perspective. Julian is talking about bacchanals, where basically the Greeks got wasted and went insane for short periods of time. He compares their repression of the primitive to our repression of the primitive and I don't think that's totally valid in the case of modernity. Ancient and modern architecture, literature and laws only vaguely resemble each other. Compare our [in my opinion, rather ugly] skyscrapers and suburban houses to the Greek Parthenon, the Roman Pantheon; our trashy crime and romance novels to the Homeric epics and Dante's Divine Comedy; our laws which are more restrictive in every sense and much less democratic than the ancient Athenians would have allowed. It's easy to see from all of this that the repression of modern times is different; more resigned to its lack of release than in antiquity, perhaps. What is the likelihood that this is due in part to Christianity? Christianity and time. Christianity, in its development, has taught us to cultivate certain traits in ourselves and our children early on. Early Christianity was just as violent as the area in which it developed - Rome. Christianity as a doctrine [not necessarily the followers' "secret hearts" so to speak] has developed into something more loving, caring, and - depending on your perspective - something duller than its roots.
Christianity has a quiet, sad resignation in its culture. There is little joy to be found in most of its branches; either sadness, ordinary discontent or, in the case of some denominations, very ugly hatred [cough: westboro baptist church]. In this it is reminiscent of the early religions; little comfort - emotionally, anyway - was to be found in worshiping the gods and goddesses of archaic religion. Few Christians find real, solid comfort in God. This spills into the American culture to create an even more melancholy aspect of our country; in essence, our lives suck. We and those around us find little comfort in one another [lack of common courtesy, I believe, is a cause of the lack of real happiness in our personal relationships], the government [although this has, if you pay attention to the country's history, never been much of a comfort anyway], our popular culture, and now the leading religion in America is unhappy with itself. We work too hard and don't get enough in the way of reward. We have little to nothing in the way of money, love, or happiness. Thus, our repression is similar to that of the ancients, but the differences must be noted.
If only because our repression produces nothing worth noting by our descendants in twenty generations...
1.31.2008
1.31.08.
It's the new year, hurrah. Two thousand eight years since the death of the man that inspired such beautiful art.
Something I will never understand about the new year is why it begins in the middle of winter. Nothing is new but the numbers and dates; the weather certainly doesn't change.
I just got a BookMooch account yesterday [brknee] and so far I really like it. Soon I'll send out my Terry Pratchett book and hope more people request some other ones... I need points. I found a book I want to request but I'm waiting awhile until I do so; while I wait I'm browsing as well and I'm looking for books on Hinduism. Hence the inspiration for this post, because...
While looking through this list of which Hinduism is listed as a topic, I see an awful lot of those self-help religious books, and a few New Agey books as well. Self-help books I can tolerate the existence of all right, but I need an outlet to express my hatred of the New Age mentality. Some Wikipediac lines on New Age:
Now, my first issue with New Age is the complete essence of it: globalization. I abhore globalization in every form, least of all when applied to religion and spirituality. A global religion would render regional cultures and their subsequent religions [or vice-versa] totally irrelevant. New Age, drawing on certain beliefs of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Celtic religions may appear at first to uphold these religions, but it does just the opposite. Picking and choosing from different religions renders them all irrelevant because they all have doctrines stating "This is the way." As far as Hinduism goes, the quote that is used to justify this massacre of religions, "One truths, many paths," is probably less understood than they think. Hinduism itself has a number of different paths within its own Vedic and Hindu teachings. In the Bhagavad-Gita, Krishna re-iterates to Arjuna time and time again that his path is that of the warrior, and each caste has different duties and obligations. Krishna talks about different yogas, not different religions. With much the same attitude Christ uses to say that marriage is below the priesthood, Krishna emphasizes that he is the incarnation to worship, but he is an incarnation of Vishnu, a god with many incarnations. Krishna is Vishnu and Vishnu is Krishna; extend this to other Hindu deities and ____ is God and God is ____. Follow the Vedas and Upanishads and Krishna. All religions state something to this effect: "This is the way," "This is the truth," or, to quote Mr. Christ, "I am the Way and the Light, there is no path to the Father but through me." Every religion has a base of This Is The Absolute Truth, and for good reason; if its followers do not believe it to be the truth, why would they be followers?
My second issue is really one of taste and aesthetics. New Age is ugly and vulgar. New Age is like the Dollar Store shelf for religions. It has vulgar "Native American Indian" artwork - Realistic representations of women in the sky with stars in their hair and wolves howling at them from a mountain is not traditional or real Native American Indian artwork -, Egyptian idols that mean absolutely nothing as they are not idols in a true sense, and the art and music is all vulgar because it means nothing. Religious art is religious art is religious art and without a solid religion there is no meaning to the art; it's a useless handicraft. I suppose "the universe" quite enjoys having useless handicrafts stored in its space.
My third real problem with New Age is that it's the single most PC spirituality in existence. There's nothing less offensive [except perhaps to a Christian or Islamic fundamentalist] than, "Well, you go your way and I'll go mine and we'll both end up just fine." New Age says, "Hey, we're all fine and equal and whatever you believe is great, let's just respect everybody and get along happily." That isn't the essence of religion. The essence of religion, as I keep saying, is We're Right and You're Wrong, which usually translates to Believe This Or It's On. Religious wars exist for a reason. Usually these wars are, admittedly, a personal vendetta of the ruler of the people, but the people don't fight unless given a reason. The reason may not be true, and it may not even be valid, but The Masses believe it to be both and so fight for it.
In conclusion, the Universe dislikes New Age and so do I.
Something I will never understand about the new year is why it begins in the middle of winter. Nothing is new but the numbers and dates; the weather certainly doesn't change.
I just got a BookMooch account yesterday [brknee] and so far I really like it. Soon I'll send out my Terry Pratchett book and hope more people request some other ones... I need points. I found a book I want to request but I'm waiting awhile until I do so; while I wait I'm browsing as well and I'm looking for books on Hinduism. Hence the inspiration for this post, because...
While looking through this list of which Hinduism is listed as a topic, I see an awful lot of those self-help religious books, and a few New Agey books as well. Self-help books I can tolerate the existence of all right, but I need an outlet to express my hatred of the New Age mentality. Some Wikipediac lines on New Age:
- Spiritual beings (e.g. angels, ascended masters, elementals, ghosts, and/or space aliens) exist and will guide us, if we open ourselves to their guidance.[20]
- Feminine forms of spirituality, including feminine images of the divine, such as the female Aeon Sophia in Gnosticism, are deprecated by patriarchal religions.[1][2]
- Children are being born today with a more highly developed spiritual power than earlier generations[26][27]
Now, my first issue with New Age is the complete essence of it: globalization. I abhore globalization in every form, least of all when applied to religion and spirituality. A global religion would render regional cultures and their subsequent religions [or vice-versa] totally irrelevant. New Age, drawing on certain beliefs of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Celtic religions may appear at first to uphold these religions, but it does just the opposite. Picking and choosing from different religions renders them all irrelevant because they all have doctrines stating "This is the way." As far as Hinduism goes, the quote that is used to justify this massacre of religions, "One truths, many paths," is probably less understood than they think. Hinduism itself has a number of different paths within its own Vedic and Hindu teachings. In the Bhagavad-Gita, Krishna re-iterates to Arjuna time and time again that his path is that of the warrior, and each caste has different duties and obligations. Krishna talks about different yogas, not different religions. With much the same attitude Christ uses to say that marriage is below the priesthood, Krishna emphasizes that he is the incarnation to worship, but he is an incarnation of Vishnu, a god with many incarnations. Krishna is Vishnu and Vishnu is Krishna; extend this to other Hindu deities and ____ is God and God is ____. Follow the Vedas and Upanishads and Krishna. All religions state something to this effect: "This is the way," "This is the truth," or, to quote Mr. Christ, "I am the Way and the Light, there is no path to the Father but through me." Every religion has a base of This Is The Absolute Truth, and for good reason; if its followers do not believe it to be the truth, why would they be followers?
My second issue is really one of taste and aesthetics. New Age is ugly and vulgar. New Age is like the Dollar Store shelf for religions. It has vulgar "Native American Indian" artwork - Realistic representations of women in the sky with stars in their hair and wolves howling at them from a mountain is not traditional or real Native American Indian artwork -, Egyptian idols that mean absolutely nothing as they are not idols in a true sense, and the art and music is all vulgar because it means nothing. Religious art is religious art is religious art and without a solid religion there is no meaning to the art; it's a useless handicraft. I suppose "the universe" quite enjoys having useless handicrafts stored in its space.
My third real problem with New Age is that it's the single most PC spirituality in existence. There's nothing less offensive [except perhaps to a Christian or Islamic fundamentalist] than, "Well, you go your way and I'll go mine and we'll both end up just fine." New Age says, "Hey, we're all fine and equal and whatever you believe is great, let's just respect everybody and get along happily." That isn't the essence of religion. The essence of religion, as I keep saying, is We're Right and You're Wrong, which usually translates to Believe This Or It's On. Religious wars exist for a reason. Usually these wars are, admittedly, a personal vendetta of the ruler of the people, but the people don't fight unless given a reason. The reason may not be true, and it may not even be valid, but The Masses believe it to be both and so fight for it.
In conclusion, the Universe dislikes New Age and so do I.
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