Sunday, July 11, 2010
Blissful Counterstroke
Some people that we meet are out of this world. They have ideas that are unprecedented and could never be defined by any sort of stereotype. This type of person grooves on their own ego- his or her persona is much less important than the substance behind it. They're the ones in the non-conventional outfits, the ones who are outspoken, the ones who are hard to talk to at all. Each generation has many of these types, the outer circle of conformity if you will, that harnesses a variation in lifestyle and cultivates innovative ideas. You can probably think of one or two from your high school.These are the people you would call nut jobs, odd balls, spacey, nerdy, out-of-the-box, crazy, loony, mad...
No, I'm not talking about hipsters.
While the entire world may never take them seriously, or disregard them as nuisances to society, we must realize that lunatics indeed are what propel our society forward. Evolutionarily speaking, we need variation to become better as a whole. This does not just apply to biology, but to the human psych as well. If we did not have out-of-the-box thinkers such as Einstein, and that dude that thought the Earth was the center of the universe (Copernicus, that nut!), we might as well be stuck living in the renaissance.
Without that first person to say, "Hey I've got this crazy idea!" and then belch it out to everyone they know, starting primarily with the aunts and uncles who raise their eyebrows at each other ("Did our sister really raise this child?"), the idea can never develop into a possibility. Someone must first believe that time travel is possible in order for society to catch on and study and search for a way to achieve it. A discovery begins with the lunatics and ends with the geniuses.
At first it will be an insane thought, like dark matter or negative energy. It will grow into a speculation, and then a great question. The question will make people think, and those people will try their best to answer it. As society gets more advanced, the question becomes easier and easier to decode. The question is within the grasp of reality. Finally, when the answers start pouring in, that's when everything changes...
once again. We've been through it before, and each time it changes the way we live. Every technological advancement started from one person who thought of something no one else has before, and that's always bound to bring criticism. However, instead of criticizing, I believe we should nurture these people's ideas, feed their heads and help them bring far-out ideas to life. We should support the impossible.
Lunatics unite! I'll listen to your ideas if you listen to mine...
Guess what!
The sun is 8 minutes old by the time we see it. So technically, every single moment of our lives we are looking at the past.
Saturday, July 3, 2010
The American What?
The 4th of July celebrates the freedom of America. It reiterates that with hard work and sacrifice, we can all achieve our goals and ultimately reach "the American Dream"-- living in the suburbs, having congenial neighbors, and showing off your new-age-sleek kitchen appliances. We dedicate this holiday to the people who have made our democracy possible, who allow us the freedom to move up in our capitalistic society and skyrocket from rags to riches, much like those on America's Got Talent.
However.
While every nut on the planet thinks that moving to America will give them equal opportunity to that beacon of light--the American Dream--they are disregarding the fact that every other nut here wants the same exact thing. If there were a race, metaphorically speaking, and there were a couple of people in it, one's odds of winning are pretty high- and even if one does not win, he or she is at least guaranteed a top 20 finish.
On the other hand, in the American race, we are caught up in a stampede of bare white legs, some fat and some thin, some slightly darker or harrier than others, and there is hardly any room to run, or even breath, when there are also those shirtless foreigners in the race with short-shorts and sweatbands, and everyone is pushing everyone else...one in the race must wonder how anyone will ever win when everyone is so damn close to each other!
Those who opt for the less popular race--the ones who strive for daily short term goals instead of chucking their entire lives into the belly of the American Dream Monster--those are the ones who actually succeed in this country. The ones who are more concerned with the journey and the ones who believe that getting there is all the fun, those people find happiness. The ones who don't give a shit whether or not they're prosperous, as long as their lives have meaning and substance and love and...love...they have accomplished something.
I believe we must be in a happiness slump, an America that is never satisfied because no one ever wins, an America that feels entitled to rags to riches and is always disappointed when it doesn't happen. An America that swims in excess. An America that consumes instead of trying to understand why they're unhappy.
An America trapped in the belly of the American Dream Monster,
and the only way to get out is to win America's Got Talent.
However.
While every nut on the planet thinks that moving to America will give them equal opportunity to that beacon of light--the American Dream--they are disregarding the fact that every other nut here wants the same exact thing. If there were a race, metaphorically speaking, and there were a couple of people in it, one's odds of winning are pretty high- and even if one does not win, he or she is at least guaranteed a top 20 finish.
On the other hand, in the American race, we are caught up in a stampede of bare white legs, some fat and some thin, some slightly darker or harrier than others, and there is hardly any room to run, or even breath, when there are also those shirtless foreigners in the race with short-shorts and sweatbands, and everyone is pushing everyone else...one in the race must wonder how anyone will ever win when everyone is so damn close to each other!
Those who opt for the less popular race--the ones who strive for daily short term goals instead of chucking their entire lives into the belly of the American Dream Monster--those are the ones who actually succeed in this country. The ones who are more concerned with the journey and the ones who believe that getting there is all the fun, those people find happiness. The ones who don't give a shit whether or not they're prosperous, as long as their lives have meaning and substance and love and...love...they have accomplished something.
I believe we must be in a happiness slump, an America that is never satisfied because no one ever wins, an America that feels entitled to rags to riches and is always disappointed when it doesn't happen. An America that swims in excess. An America that consumes instead of trying to understand why they're unhappy.
An America trapped in the belly of the American Dream Monster,
and the only way to get out is to win America's Got Talent.
Friday, July 2, 2010
A Cosmic Laugh
Everyday I ride my bike down to the sailing beach. Oneday, as I was cruising across the park to south beach, a bird came swooping down out of nowhere and attacked my head with both of its little feet, leaving my hair in a mess and a sore spot on my head.
The next day, there was a sign posted at the sailing shack:
I guess I wasn't the only one. Nowadays, I hear about bird attacks all the time at the beach, but only to those riding bikes.
I suppose I'll never escape.
There is a contest to see who can come up with the best new BP logo, and the entries were equally sad as they were hilarious, for example:
http://www.logomyway.com/contestView.php?contestId=1746&utm_source=Triggermail&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=TTP+|+Still+Leaking%2C+Still+Pissed+%28BP%29
Lighter fluid + ligher + pavement = fun
Jung Pyo Hong
Vrno
Rex Ray
What if...
Everything we know is already in our heads. We experience life to discover these things, and each time we remember something, it seems as though we are learning it for the first time.
or,
Instead of our personalities being molded by the experiences we have and what we believe to be truth, it is actually molded on the experiences we DON'T have, and what we think is true but is actually falsehood. For example, those things people choose NOT to tell you, or that experience that is still a mystery to this day. If you knew those truths, you would be a different person, given that our brains are changed by each new moment.
Olaf Hajek
Jan Dunning
Mimile Ung
Vincent Tolinet
Oh btw
There are more chickens than people in the world.
And I've never seen paper like this before!
Below is a piece of writing that is a little extraordinary--a little out of this world--that I wrote a few days ago, for no reason in particular. Let's just say it's not usual, but it's perceptive.
"boy did things catch my eye tonight. like i'd be talking to someone like i normally would, but then something-----would catch my eye, and there would be energy beyond my focus, in the form of a moving branch or smallest bug or you know those spider webs that glint in the sunlight?? everything of course is in a spinning vortex of life all around us that we cannot see when we are so focused on our own lives... but the molecules, they're mooooving and grooooooving concurrently with our perceptions that are somehow trying to slowwwwwww shit down, make sense to us, trying to make sense out of these molecules so we have a least the littlest chance to predict what will happen to us...
and today, alone in the humming buzzing warm sugar coated evening, walking in diluted shadows
nothing was opaque
everything had light shining through it, and when i mean everything i mean even your thoughts, like if you had two thoughts and you put them next to each other there would be a ray of light glistening through the cracks, like no matter what the thought is there will be light, and infinite possibility, behind it-
and where did that glistening spider web go? and who will see it next? but just because there isn't someone to see the spider web does not mean it doesn't exist.
and where does sound go when time passes by? there should be a giant filing container of all the sounds that ever have happened, and you should be able to open it and hear an egg being cracked over someone's head, whenever you flyin' felt like it-
that filer would be awfully convenient for the person who does not appreciate sound when it's actually happening. so maybe i shall continue on my merry way, mooovin and groooovin through all this molecule shilt, and enjoy it as it's happening, so that i will never miss the luxury of a sound-filing-system"
A recent article discusses how technology literally gets into our heads-
Lighter fluid + ligher + pavement = fun
Jung Pyo Hong
Vrno
Rex Ray
What if...
Everything we know is already in our heads. We experience life to discover these things, and each time we remember something, it seems as though we are learning it for the first time.
or,
Instead of our personalities being molded by the experiences we have and what we believe to be truth, it is actually molded on the experiences we DON'T have, and what we think is true but is actually falsehood. For example, those things people choose NOT to tell you, or that experience that is still a mystery to this day. If you knew those truths, you would be a different person, given that our brains are changed by each new moment.
Olaf Hajek
Jan Dunning
Mimile Ung
Vincent Tolinet
Oh btw
There are more chickens than people in the world.
And I've never seen paper like this before!
Below is a piece of writing that is a little extraordinary--a little out of this world--that I wrote a few days ago, for no reason in particular. Let's just say it's not usual, but it's perceptive.
"boy did things catch my eye tonight. like i'd be talking to someone like i normally would, but then something-----would catch my eye, and there would be energy beyond my focus, in the form of a moving branch or smallest bug or you know those spider webs that glint in the sunlight?? everything of course is in a spinning vortex of life all around us that we cannot see when we are so focused on our own lives... but the molecules, they're mooooving and grooooooving concurrently with our perceptions that are somehow trying to slowwwwwww shit down, make sense to us, trying to make sense out of these molecules so we have a least the littlest chance to predict what will happen to us...
and today, alone in the humming buzzing warm sugar coated evening, walking in diluted shadows
nothing was opaque
everything had light shining through it, and when i mean everything i mean even your thoughts, like if you had two thoughts and you put them next to each other there would be a ray of light glistening through the cracks, like no matter what the thought is there will be light, and infinite possibility, behind it-
and where did that glistening spider web go? and who will see it next? but just because there isn't someone to see the spider web does not mean it doesn't exist.
and where does sound go when time passes by? there should be a giant filing container of all the sounds that ever have happened, and you should be able to open it and hear an egg being cracked over someone's head, whenever you flyin' felt like it-
that filer would be awfully convenient for the person who does not appreciate sound when it's actually happening. so maybe i shall continue on my merry way, mooovin and groooovin through all this molecule shilt, and enjoy it as it's happening, so that i will never miss the luxury of a sound-filing-system"
A recent article discusses how technology literally gets into our heads-
“The person and the various parts of their brain and the mouse and the monitor are so tightly intertwined that they’re just one thing,” said Anthony Chemero, a cognitive scientist at Franklin & Marshall College. “The tool isn’t separate from you. It’s part of you.”
Chemero’s experiment, published March 9 in Public Library of Science, was designed to test one of Heidegger’s fundamental concepts: that people don’t notice familiar, functional tools, but instead “see through” them to a task at hand, for precisely the same reasons that one doesn’t think of one’s fingers while tying shoelaces. The tools are us.
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