Philosophical corner 3

I have decided to make this a reoccuring event in my blogging; the philosophical corner-assignments I mean. (As always the most recent language I have heard to the instance of me writing affects the language used; in this case the clinical language of Dr. Brennan. I take great pleasure in observing this linguistic adaptation that does not appear to affect my spoken language at quite the same rate as it does my written. I take slightly less pleasure in the fact that this sometimes makes my longer-stretching writings appear the patchwork of several distinct schitzophrenic personalities; I work hard on preventing this.)

So.
Assignment:
* You discover the secret basement of a highly influential and credited doctor (or some other likely profession). The person in question is conducting highly advanced medical experiments on people, quite a far distance outside the safe ring of law-abiding research. They are as immoral as they are painful to the subjects. You know neither the researcher or the subjects personally. The reseracher can provide proof that the result he receives can be the solution to a great problem; say the cure for AIDS, and that it cannot be done any other way. (The term "proof" is to be considered as not beyond doubt, but very, very nearly so, for whatever unrealistic reason.) The researcher can also provide proof of that there is a method of erasing the subjects memories after the research is done, so that none of the traumatic experiences will remain; they will go about their lives as if nothing happened.

Will you:
A) Leave it as it is; this is none of your business.
B) Allow it to continue, but demand to be kept "in the loop" to observe that things actually happen as the researcher says it will.
B) Alert the police.
C) Demand something in return of letting the researcher continue; be it money, credit for the cure of AIDS or whatever else.
D) Leave it as it is; clearly a foolproof cure for AIDS is worth a few people wether they remember or not.
E) Demand the researcher quit and release the subjects but do not alert the authorities; maybe this brilliant mind could think of a different way to do this.
F) Offer to take the subject's place; you would at least be a willing sacrifice for the cure.

Please answer before reading the following.





Would it make a difference to your answer if one or several of these statements were true:
*A close friend or relative of yours is carrying the HIV virus.
*The cure is not for AIDS but for a special resistant infectious virus currently spreading worldwide, like the plague.
*The subject group are children.
*You know the researcher well; a friend or relative.
*A friend or relative of yours is in the subject group.
*You work in law enforcement.

The point with philosophy, as far as I see it, is to understand the world by understanding yourself. Be honest with yourself. Eh, and also, philosophy needs to be discussed, because it's all about perspective and sometimes we tend to get stuck in one unless shoved around a bit by others. That is part why I'm doing these corners! Awesome, huh? ^^

Mini-Games Recommendation

Some of you might remember that little strategy game I played over Midsummer, with win95 graphics, capturing land to build bigger guys to murder the little guys. It's called Slay, and I found the page containing it and some other awesome games concerned more with gameplay than graphics made by the same guy. Seeing as I could easily imagine paying $5 for Slay, I bought the pack of 13 games for $30. But there's also demos of all of them, including the Slay one I played all Midsummer. Here's the link:



I've tried Rats before and it's hilarious and awesome. I'll try the others now and let you know, but I think with names like Football-o-saurus and Mother of All Battles, it's rather promising :) These are great for filling those twenty minutes before catching the bus, or waiting for food to be cooked, or for those not quite as serious as to put down three hours a day on WoW :P Easy, fun and demanding absolutely nothing from your computer other than that it possesses a screen, mouse and keyboard. So enjoy!

Kick me

I went back to my parents' place for summer thinking it could be a new beginning of sorts. I haven't been writing much. Since I decided to take school seriously enough to not fail the courses, and began playing Left4Dead with not just the intention of having fun but also to become good at it, alongside trying to keep up with cooking, cleaning and general chores, my days filled up rather well. On top of that trying to be social once in a while, and for intellectual golden stars reading books at open moments like when visiting the bathroom. And then accidentally stumbling upon an excellent PSP game called Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness did not help. Do I have too high expectations on what to manage day-to-day?

Okay, so going home was going to give me a new start. Away from Left4Dead, and not having to do all those chores anymore, as well as having a valid reason for being very unsocial, left me with no pressure and a perfect opportunity. What did I do with that opportunity? I started playing WoW.

Cue ironic laughter.

I bet Shakespeare didn't have to deal with those distractions. I'm willing to sacrifice a lot for a writing career. Money, time, cooked food, social life, even love life. But apparently, my gaming needs tops all of that. And behind all this I can't help but feel that I'm stalling. I'm making all these excuses to not write. "I should cook more seriously." "I haven't visited my friends in a while." "I have time to play one more round." "I should be outside to get a tan."

Writing used to be the core of my life, the time when I felt best about myself. It didn't change. Did I make it change? Did I fall into the trap of leading a "normal" life and lose that magical link to the other worlds? No. Not yet in any case. But I need to stop. I need to leave this "normal" crap. I need to sit down and write, no excuses. Because in the end I think I'd rather die poor and alone, then never channel these worlds where they won't die with me.

One thing I know for sure; I can't have both. Maybe it's time to make a priority list and stick to it.

Philosophical corner 82

Let me activate my students; here's an Assignment:
Define yourself with as few words as possible so that at any point in history and at any point in the universe one could single you out as an individual. No need for extra words, like, if you identify as "Swedish person" I will assume that "human lifeform" is included. Once you've boiled yourself down, look at it from a different angle. If you identified yourself from nationality and religion, for example, could you identify yourself in some other way like interests or internet nicknames or whatever. Is there more than one finite definition of "you"?

Assignment two, building on Assignment one:
What would you want on your gravestone? Would your family name be enough? Would you want your professional title or your home town added? Would you be satisfied if your spouse had his/her whole name but you were added to the stone as "his/her spouse *first name*"? Would you want a quote from the bible or otherwise? Would you want to be buried with anything?

The Value of Communication

On the note that the moment I step inside the doors of my childhood home, I become the witness of the always ongoing, pointless battles between my brother and my parents, that seem to stem from both side's complete inability to understand and respect each other, and grows ridiculously worse at their other complete inability; to communicate with one another in a sensible manner. I would blame this mostly on my father and brother, which makes sad connotations to gender, but I know that my own literacy is only a flaky illusion; when it comes to serious and heartfelt matters, I become just as stumped for words as my father.

Can I estimate how much people actually say what they're thinking, on a grand scale average? Not much. How many times of these would they even be able to put words on what they're actually thinking? Half maybe? Meaning a lot of times, people wouldn't be able to say what they're thinking because they don't know how. Why?

Communication is the solution of all things. Not just exchanging words, because that in itself is pointless and often more harmful to the cause than helpful. But exchanging ideas, thoughts and emotions, through all means of communication from a slight change in a small muscle above your eye to yelling at the top of your lungs. Those we communicate best with; those that understand us best, become the people we like to surround ourselves with. This leads me to another thought:

Once you have all the facts, you can make a solution. Communicating means providing everyone with all the facts so that they together can work out a solution. Making peace with someone won't work until he admits why he's mad at you, making love to someone won't work until you've show who you are.

I won't butt in too much in the conflict here at home. A mediator might possibly have helped them, but I'm not a mediator, I'm a daughter and a sister. It's not as bad as it might sound, I will add, but I'm endlessly frustrated by the pointlessness in their endless fighting about every single thing. I hate conflicts because they're like that moment when you step into the water the first time a warm summer; it's too cold but it will get better. Some people just get stuck in that first moment, and that makes me sad.

News and Previews

Dunno what this is, or where it came from, but if someone does make a game from it, I think I'd like it.

Also, another thing to distract me from studying; BlankIt (a webcomic). Great art and not too much text, so quick to read and fun. And not that I'm a pedantic browser of the gigantic webcomic world, but I haven't really seen anything like it this far. And have you noticed that reading the comments for webcomics are as fun (and somethimes more fun) than reading the comic in itself? Not this one though. Despite the infinite lolness of internet voyeurs, the comic does manage to one-up it most of the time.

Between my mail (that is my starting page), Loverboy's comment, the Nightflyer's dream, Athela's recollections, and my roomie chasing a thieving cat around the apartment, I have completely forgotten what deep wisdoms I was going to share with you when I opened my browser. Yay.

My mail also told me that the universe has set its sight on teaching me that effort and outcome are completely unrelated, which I would have thought a stupid lesson, but if that's the way the world really is... With other words, I got a VG on my Grammar test. I should be happy, but deep down a big churning "what!?!" distracted me from the joy and celebration.

And don't forget, tomorrow's Mother's Day!

Artificial Intelligence

There are so many things I wonder that begin something like this:

I wonder what people would do if X happened,
or
I wonder if it would be possible to make people do X if you did X,
or
I wonder if Love's school politics would actually work on kids,

and many more like it. But human experiments, aside from being a tad bit difficult to organize without time, money and say, expertise, are highly immoral and make people upset. And I see the sense of this.

But! If we actually manage to create artificial intelligence on the same level as the human mind, then we can do all these experiments and finally find out what...

... wait.

Dammit.

The Single Mind

Late night, friends just left after a friend-intense day. Been feeling tired and uninspired and uninspiring this week. It's been the kind of week when one goes around with the intense feeling of that something should somehow be different, and a vague idea of that that something is oneself. Maybe it's chemical imbalance, hormones, weather, maybe my star is in perfect alignment with the moon or my totem animal has had an accident in bed.

Yet I don't want to sleep. Bad times like these I'm always most reluctant to go to bed, and I don't sleep as well when I do. Maybe, like a parent having lost his child in the forest, I cannot go to rest before I find that something that is missing. I wonder if not getting immersed in something, forgetting everything and being able to stop staying on my toes, might give me back the strenght I need to search properly. But that gets harder with every year, month and day I gain. Like a clock ticking down towards a time when there will be no sleep. Or maybe eternal sleep.

I hear soft music coming from somewhere far away, and my first thought is that it's the chanting of an Imam.

Swenglish

I will always remember the time my mother tried to tell our guests from the Netherlands that it was carrot cake she was offering them. (Very tasty carrot cake.) She thought long and hard and then declared it "parrot cake".

In that spirit, I found these other funny quotes from when swedes have found the wrong words.

And I remember I read recently somewhere; What do you think a swede means when he says; "There are a lot of easter-lilies in my rabbit"?




... and the cat just climbed my shoulder (like a parrot) and is licking my hair fevrently... -_-

"Dear Diary"

I should start a diary.

Every entry would begin; "This is what I would tell you today."

I would write it in a way so that I kept the recipient in mind, as if it was a conversation, or a monologue.

And who are "you"? One and many. Known and unknown. Named and unnamed. Flesh and concept. One day I imagine you might become one, and known, and named. But maybe not. For now, you're all these things, and more.

"You" are what makes me not alone.

Thank you.

The felt knowledge

I want to know the world.

See, the only way to understand people is to know them, slowly, over time. Seeing them in different situations, learning when they lie so that you can get to the truth. Peeling off one layer at a time until you one day realize that in any given situation you can predict, no, you can feel what this person would do. And then the deed is done. You know someone.

Normal social situations are stressful because I have no whish, no desire whatsoever to reduce people to what they seem in such shallow come-togethers. In these situations they are merely part of the decor, obstacles that I interact with with the same enthusiasm as I interact with a toaster. Not until I know I will meet them often or have met them often, do I translate them into humans and begin breaking them down into what they really are.

I can't know everyone. I wish I could, I wish I had the time and energy to meet and know and break down and understand every single human; it is fascinating, and an exhilirating pleasure to realize that I have reached the goal with even just one. And also always a disappointment because the objects of my fascination never seem to understand the greatness of it. But it is great. And it's impossible. So I pick them carefully, like choosing the right book from the library, and some are chosen for me. And the rest I have to leave as decor, as toasters.

Such a waste of humanity and me.

Scuttling

I seem to be making a habit of not blogging, but it's as if time is disappearing. Generally, also, truth is that time is disappearing. According to our concept of time as a linear path, I have statistically now put 25% behind me, at the very least. My life expectancy can be seen as slightly on the good side of neutral, since I don't smoke or drink and keep a reasonable weight, but there are things I could do to increase the odds, like excercise more and stop abusing salt.

And I'm just a student. Once I get a job, more time will disappear. A partner, a bigger place, maybe a pet, a kid... where's the time for all this? Other things would have to go. Games. Maybe writing. Visiting faraway people. I would buy shit wherever it's closest, because it's more important to save time than money, but with money one can save time. There's never enough of either.

Feeling like I have an abundance of time is maybe the biggest luxury. No stress, nothing poking at you, no sense of wasting time that you could have done something better with.

Where am I going with this? Well, that's just the question. Where am I going? What's waiting for me down the end of that path, and is it really worth all this scuttling about?

An Answer

I read ShadowWolf's last post and was going to write a comment, but the comment grew into more of a kind of blogpost of its own, and I realized it was something I wanted to share not just with ShadowWolf, but my friends, and most importantly I think, the entire world. So there, exhibitionism ahoy, sorry SW. This is what I wanted to say about what you wrote:

Logical people like you and me, we feel that when we do something haphazardly or badly, the world would notice and punish us. This is how our brains are programmed; this is what makes sense. But the world doesn't. I've been so frustrated so many times because I've fucked up, I've been lazy, I've done wrong, and absolutely nothing happens. On the contrary, because we have some skills we consider basic and completely bland but that in all honesty not all people have, we are often praised for things when we would in fact deserve to be reprimanded. And this fucks with our heads, be sure that it does. It turns our worlds upside down, and gives a feeling of, what now? If it's this easy, then why try? If no one can appreciate the difference between something thrown together overnight and something I've put my soul in, then why do it?

Several people have addressed this before. I've read texts about it written by teachers, psychologists and the occational layman like me. We expect the world to give us the feedback we need. But those of us who do well, whether just above average or true geniuses, are expected to take care of ourselves. At least here in Sweden. And some do. Some manage to give themselves the motivation, or they find that some things are worth doing for the pleasure of doing it right. For me, that is writing fiction. I could spend my life writing a single text, simply for the pleasure of doing it perfectly. Sadly, that doesn't apply to anything else in my life, and thus, I've always been sleeping and cheating and lazying my way through school. No one's punished me, but of course it has consequences, like bad studying skills and difficulties motivating myself with anything, as well as a very unclear sense of what I actually want or not, since I never had to work for anything. But anyone who's read psychology knows that that kind of slow-acting consequences score very low on the scale of feedback that actually teach us behavior.

Some people know how to handle us. There are other us:es in grown up teacher-version out there. I have a strong resentment towards them when I meet them, because they actually force me to make an effort, but in the end it is good for me. The times I don't just roll over and give up as soon as an obstacle appears, even if I know I could get over it. But I wish there were more, and I wish I'd met them sooner, and I wish someone had spoken to me about this when I was younger.

My advice is as simple as it is difficult; confront the teacher. Question why it is good, admit you put no effort in it, ask if that shows. And if he says it doesn't ask why. By asking you show you actually want to know and am prepared for critizism. And it might be a wake-up call for him to keep a keener eye on you. But it's hard, because it means making an effort to make others expect more, and for me at least, that's willing suicide according to my inner instincts. No more lazying.

The second reason to do that is that, like a friend told me, sometimes we think things about ourselves that we subconsiously project onto the surroundings. I believe people always see my limp very clearly. I believe people think I'm too fat, and I believe people think I dress badly, and I believe people think I speak too low and unclear. If you pick out the "people think" part, you might have the actual truth. I don't know. But sometimes, we believe something so strongly that we're convinced everyone else thinks the same. So confront him, tell him you want the critizism, question how he thinks you could possibly grow as a writer if people hold back on you. Tell him you're not shy and fragile. Show him what you expect of him. If he can live up to it, he might. If he can't, well, there's a lot of teachers that can't, which is sad, but has to be lived with.

All this, because we expect or want people to understand us. Someone told me when I was writing instruction pamphlets; assume people are idiots and spell it out. Idiots are nice and gullible and frustrating as hell, but they can be educated. And if they're still doing it wrong after you've explained everything clearly, then they're not idiots; they're ignorant. Which is like being an idiot without the nice and gullible.

Update xxyy

Been a while, huh. My life lately has been food, Team Fortress 2 and the fascinating Left4Dead. I seem to have forgotten this blog, which is odd, don't think I've ever done that before.

Today is sunny sunny. I'll try for a tan this year, but I say that every year. Sunbathing is so very very boring, and the sun is so very very warm and uncomfortable. It's the same with the sun as with relationships, alcohol and a lot of other things. I don't actually like it or want it, but some part of me that belongs to the great hive-mind of humanity does want it and like it because it thinks it's supposed to. So there's some kind of drive to go after it, although I know I'll be disappointed.

I'm dieting. Bad stuff. I'll go through with it because I've said I would go through with it, and once I've done that, no matter if I lost any weight or not, I'll have a huge bag of chips. What dieting is good for, however, is erasing any shard of guilt or shame for shoving candy down my throat, because being without it has me realizing that yes, it is worth it.

But I'll try making diet-ok orange mousse tomorrow, and maybe that'll put a stop to my unproportionate cravings for Euroshopper chips.

A Simple Joy

One of my interests that rarely comes into play anymore is that of reading; books I mean then, because I read comics all the time, and I think we would need a different word for that. Because it's different from reading, yet on the same value level. Anyway. Books is another of the subjects where I rarely say anything; like with boys, and my writing, and also schoolwork, which often makes the sharing of such things difficult. Communication is rather a necessity of sharing, sadly. I think I choose not to speak because sometimes more information is less good. Sometimes sharing things with words break them. So I bide my time looking for a better way, sometimes it shows up.

I'm just filling out this blogpost to be of reasonable length. What I wanted to write here was:

Lee Child - the Jack Reacher novels.

Simple as that. I could write a 5-page essay about why or how or what, but I think you understand.

The Alphabet Song

Time to break form and do something silly. I get sudden inspiration during some of my walks, sometimes for the best poems ever, sometimes things I forget soon afterwards, and sometimes... sometimes things like these come to me without any effort... :P

The Alphabet Song
A is for Anarchy,
B it is for Blood,
C is for Carrie White,
D the Devil's hood.
E is for Extacy,
F is Famine's breath,
G stands for Griseliness,
and H's the last in Death.

I is for Eye sore,
oh, I got that wrong
J is for Jabberwook,
oh, what a silly song.

K's first in Killing spree,
L's a Lamia,
M is the Madman's dream,
of Necrophilia.
O is for Opium,
P is Pedophile,
Q has gone out of town,
in R for Reaver style.

S is for Cyanide,
oh, I got that wrong,
T is for Terrorist,
oh, what a silly song.

U is the Underworld,
V for Vatican,
W is so very Wrong,
and X is all that's banned.

Y is for Why, why why,
oh, I got that wrong,
Z is for inbred Zwine,
it's time to end this song.

The Butterfly of Troy

I've had lots of thoughts to blog about, but without even a hint of easy access to a computer those get lost in the vastness of space and time.

Watched Troy last night. It's not quite as painful as watching Tristram and Isolde was but that moment when Hector walks out to meet Achilles, or the moment when Paris says "Father, burn it!" about the Greek's wooden horse, it still cuts to my bones. Because I'm a person who likes to fix things. And to watch others' mistakes, to know the humongous consequences of those mistakes, pains me.

In the case of Troy they mostly make those mistakes because of honor or because of religion (except selfish Achilles, who does them of stupidity), and then they're easier to bear. In Romeo and Juliet they make them because of youth and love, and it makes me disgusted with them. In Tristram and Isolde they make them at the wicked twist of chance, because of the tiniest circumstances and the goodwill of some, selfishness of others. Because of humanity and nature, you could say. So I watched until the pain got too great and I turned it off. I had to. My mind was imploding of sadness, and of fear for those tiny, tiny circumstances being the founding ground of life-altering decisions. The flapping of butterfly wings in Africa, that becomes the storm here.

I see these butterflies, and at times, the pain of their consequences becomes too great for one mind to handle. So I close my eyes. But the butterflies keep flapping whether I see them or not... and they're lucky to not have the brain tissue to care about the responsibility.

Picking up on K

Watched the documentary about dog breeding that Kristin has linked. And let me tell you. If The Sims didn't convince you, this is actual, real life proof that humans, on no level, should ever be given the powers of the gods. That show-version of German Shepherd isn't a German Shepherd, it's a real, man-made mutant freak of nature, and it has to suffer from it. And give me a gun and let me shoot the bitch that thinks putting down healthy puppies because they miss the right fur mutation on their backs is perfectly sensible. Mutations are mutations for a reason; they have no evolutionary advantage so they never become the standard. Until we start fucking with them and produce animals who by all rights should all be put down at birth out of compassion. No. Give me a working dog or a mix.

I saw the awesomest dog, on that note. Head shape and tail like a (healthy) shepherd or a spitz, (sharp, I mean) but size like a Saint Bernhard. And white. I wonder what it was? It looked very fluffy and cozy. If those are mixes or sensible animals I would want one. Although it would probably fill up an apartment real good :P

"You can become an archangel or a serial killer without anyone noticing, but everyone will tell if you're missing a button."

-E.M.Remarque (not perfectly quoted, but I don't remember)