A dying sun waxes and wanes against the horizon but the sunrise never changes. I've been riding waves for so long now that I can't remember what it feels like to sink my feet into solid ground. In a world hell bent on ascending to some imagined apex of satisfaction I find myself always jumping a little lower than those around me, and likewise falling a little harder back to reality. They say time cures all... it doesn't. With every cycle my feet grow a little heavier and the sky seems a little further out of reach. Twelve years ago I could almost touch it, but today it's as though I barely sense its warmth at all.
I can't fathom how much time I've spent testing variables and theories, constantly pulling the sliders in the equalizer of life. It always seemed to me that there should be some golden equilibrium, some perfect balance, that would cover my eyes and supplant my mind back into the clockwork. But I have twisted and turned for years and the sound has stayed the same. Against the highest ascent I still have not learned to lift my foot from the ground. Another sunrise, another sunset. All I can do is envy those who pass by.
But perhaps I lie when I say I've tested every variable, though it certainly feels as if I have. The truth, however, is that there is one key I have yet to place into the lock. It's a solution that I have always kept in the back of my mind but never had the resolve to pursue. Perhaps this was because it was all I had left. When a hundred other keys failed to seduce the tumblers, this was the one ace up my sleeve. It was the last ounce of hope I had left, and I didn't dare risk seeing it die... not even if it meant never knowing its worth. Not even if it meant riding a sinking ship to the bottom of the ocean. But desperation is master of the human mind. Desperation leads us to make decisions we cannot make on our own. To be human is to be desperate. By all means, I am still desperate.
And so I have lit my final match, hoping that it might be the one that reignites a long dead flame. Against a sea of failure I am held afloat by this final prayer. Should it fail... there will be nothing left but to embrace the reality that I am broken and cannot be repaired... to embrace the end before it has arrived.
On a distant horizon the sun has awakened from its slumber, and as does the blade of the guillotine it stands ready to descend and sever the last vestiges of hope. The light it casts is so maddeningly painful that I cannot bear to look into the sky. For all I know hope may have already begun the descent into its final demise, promising one last beautiful sunset before the world turns to black.
I wait patiently beneath a dying sun... waiting for closure... waiting for miracles... expecting darkness.
But today I am alive still, and hope does not yet rest in its grave. I can only hope that means something.
12/22/10
10/29/10
10/27/10
The Burden
I promised myself I would write this. For a long time this date has been marked on my calendar as some sort of beacon across a sea of passing numbers, but now that it's here I find only a loss for words. October 27th was the day I would finally be honest with myself and admit my failures. It was the day I would evaluate my life and plot a course through the twelve paged maps that have not been printed yet. It was also the day I would pardon the last fifteen years and open a new chapter. To say I expected a lot may be an understatement, but to say I expected little may be equally as true. I've made these ultimatums before and they have yet to persist into anything of value. But October 27th was supposed to be different. October 27th was special.
Several months ago I wrote of the butterfly, and the age old saying that its wings can spread a destruction seeded from the smallest if forces. I described items that I have held on to with the utmost secrecy and intimacy, but I only did so in the most vague of terms. In truth I never intended to draw that veil as far as I did that day, and after doing so I never expected to fill in the cracks. But today is October 27th. Today is different.
Many years ago I met a girl online. From the instant I first spoke with her I did not deem her to be someone to whom I had any affinity towards, and certainly we had little in common. She was the type that casts the world an ambivalent eye and proceeds to ignore its rules, quite the opposite of who I was and am. Despite this disregard for authority, she was quiet, shy, never seemed to have a voice of her own. When she did voice herself, she always did so from behind a mask of hardened feelings. Somehow I think I always knew she was hiding something, but whether I could not decipher her secrets or whether I did not care... I cannot remember. Its funny how life erases the details but never takes the image entirely. Sometimes I wish it could.
Her name was Melinda. Months passed and still we knew very little of each other, even though we were associated, vaguely yet closely, by mutual acquaintances. I began to sense that she liked something about me, but in the end I never pursued it. She was still oil and I still water; she was rash and I much too conservative. To be honest I never really thought long on her and she was always just a face in our crowd. Then she exploded. Not literally, but figuratively she poured from every crack in her mask that she could muster. On a night no different from any other, Melinda told me things that I assume she had never said aloud. Behind that bitter facade I saw innocence... I saw beauty... I saw desperation... and I looked right past it.
I want to say I didn't understand the gravity of what happened that night, but I cannot make that lie to myself. Today is October 27th... today the truth knows no bounds. I knew what she was doing, and I knew why she was doing it, but for some reason I didn't care. I have always considered one of my largest flaws to be the tendency to resort to feigned indifference when confronted with the emotions of others. I wall up behind sarcasm and write off things that I know cannot be ignored. On that night I played the same hand that I always do, responding to pure emotions with ambivalence and cheap humor. If I could describe the response I gave her in a single word, that word may very well be cruel. And all the while, a state away there was a girl with a keyboard begging me for some semblance of emotional support, some metaphorical shoulder to embrace, while I did nothing but make light of her darkest and deepest secrets. She went out on an enormous limb that night. I should have helped her down. I threw stones instead.
The next day Melinda did not get on her computer. The following day she was also absent. This was not an impossibly strange event, but nonetheless it was somewhat odd. On the third day a friend of Melinda told me what had happened. On that night, or perhaps it was the following day, Melinda has swallowed a bottle of pills. Unknown to myself, Melinda had liked me for some time. She had expressed herself that night because she thought I was someone who could look past the mask and tell her she was beautiful. Maybe she thought I could save her. I can only imagine how the words I spoke that night must have felt like daggers thrust upon an open heart, each one tearing open wounds she had hoped to close. I bear the burden of hundreds of mistakes I've made in my life, but none are as heavy as the girl I failed that night.
But however badly I may have hurt her, and she doubly to herself, a bottle of pills could not steal her away that night. She overcame them and was left to pick up the pieces. A week or so later I spoke to her, but at that point everything had changed. The feeble bridge she had extended to me that night had been wrecked in a violent storm, and in the aftermath we were left to speak only from across a great crevasse. She was behind her mask again, and I was behind mine as well... still making light of dark things. To a lesser extent, but to an extent nonetheless. Shortly afterward I lost touch with her completely, hiding that night away in the depths of my memory and feeding its intricacies to the hungry beast we call time. Years passed without a thought of Melinda.
Then on a boring day several years later, I began to think of old friends and acquaintances and wonder what hands life had dealt unto them. Like an old yearbook recovered from a dusty shelf, I began entering names into search engines and flipping through pages of false results, searching desperately for that golden link of truth. It was not terribly long before Melinda came to mind. I casually cast her name over satellites in the hope that they might return some iota of relevance. Nothing. Strange, I thought, that someone like her would fail to yield a vein of information. Several hours passed and nothing crossed my path. In frustrated defeat, I gave up, despite the nagging feeling I was missing something.
Another year passed, and I found myself again at this same old habit. Melinda's name naturally came very quickly to mind, as I had not unearthed anything in my prior attempt. An hour or so brought on similar results, and I almost had conceited my search again when I finally found something. A new string of words through a search engine had led me to a MySpace profile, which I quickly noted was not Melinda's. Instead, I found only one reference hidden at the end of the profile. It read "R.I.P.", with a name and a date underneath. The name was Melinda's. The date was October 27th, 2004. My heart sank.
An exhausting and thorough search led me to later uncover the entire story, in its cruel and tragic entirety. From various pieces scattered across the internet, I pieced together the sad tale of a girl who had taken her own life. I read about a girl who was lost. I read about a girl who was depressed. I read about a girl who had friends but still felt she was alone. I found descriptions of the mask I had known, and not the girl I had seen underneath... I wonder if anyone had seen her so clearly. Something tells me they had, but I do not know why they did not succeed where I failed.
Finally, I read about a tragic night in 2004 that I can only hope brought her peace. Every detail cemented itself in my mind and every perspective cast a new light. And though I know what happened, I can only imagine what she went through on that last night... in those final minutes. I have stood on that cliff. I too have looked down and envisioned those last steps. Melinda took them. And though a handful of pills had failed to steal her away so many years ago, on that night a gun had little trouble.
I'm sorry.
Always remember, never forgot,
M. D. R.
October 27 2004.
Several months ago I wrote of the butterfly, and the age old saying that its wings can spread a destruction seeded from the smallest if forces. I described items that I have held on to with the utmost secrecy and intimacy, but I only did so in the most vague of terms. In truth I never intended to draw that veil as far as I did that day, and after doing so I never expected to fill in the cracks. But today is October 27th. Today is different.
Many years ago I met a girl online. From the instant I first spoke with her I did not deem her to be someone to whom I had any affinity towards, and certainly we had little in common. She was the type that casts the world an ambivalent eye and proceeds to ignore its rules, quite the opposite of who I was and am. Despite this disregard for authority, she was quiet, shy, never seemed to have a voice of her own. When she did voice herself, she always did so from behind a mask of hardened feelings. Somehow I think I always knew she was hiding something, but whether I could not decipher her secrets or whether I did not care... I cannot remember. Its funny how life erases the details but never takes the image entirely. Sometimes I wish it could.
Her name was Melinda. Months passed and still we knew very little of each other, even though we were associated, vaguely yet closely, by mutual acquaintances. I began to sense that she liked something about me, but in the end I never pursued it. She was still oil and I still water; she was rash and I much too conservative. To be honest I never really thought long on her and she was always just a face in our crowd. Then she exploded. Not literally, but figuratively she poured from every crack in her mask that she could muster. On a night no different from any other, Melinda told me things that I assume she had never said aloud. Behind that bitter facade I saw innocence... I saw beauty... I saw desperation... and I looked right past it.
I want to say I didn't understand the gravity of what happened that night, but I cannot make that lie to myself. Today is October 27th... today the truth knows no bounds. I knew what she was doing, and I knew why she was doing it, but for some reason I didn't care. I have always considered one of my largest flaws to be the tendency to resort to feigned indifference when confronted with the emotions of others. I wall up behind sarcasm and write off things that I know cannot be ignored. On that night I played the same hand that I always do, responding to pure emotions with ambivalence and cheap humor. If I could describe the response I gave her in a single word, that word may very well be cruel. And all the while, a state away there was a girl with a keyboard begging me for some semblance of emotional support, some metaphorical shoulder to embrace, while I did nothing but make light of her darkest and deepest secrets. She went out on an enormous limb that night. I should have helped her down. I threw stones instead.
The next day Melinda did not get on her computer. The following day she was also absent. This was not an impossibly strange event, but nonetheless it was somewhat odd. On the third day a friend of Melinda told me what had happened. On that night, or perhaps it was the following day, Melinda has swallowed a bottle of pills. Unknown to myself, Melinda had liked me for some time. She had expressed herself that night because she thought I was someone who could look past the mask and tell her she was beautiful. Maybe she thought I could save her. I can only imagine how the words I spoke that night must have felt like daggers thrust upon an open heart, each one tearing open wounds she had hoped to close. I bear the burden of hundreds of mistakes I've made in my life, but none are as heavy as the girl I failed that night.
But however badly I may have hurt her, and she doubly to herself, a bottle of pills could not steal her away that night. She overcame them and was left to pick up the pieces. A week or so later I spoke to her, but at that point everything had changed. The feeble bridge she had extended to me that night had been wrecked in a violent storm, and in the aftermath we were left to speak only from across a great crevasse. She was behind her mask again, and I was behind mine as well... still making light of dark things. To a lesser extent, but to an extent nonetheless. Shortly afterward I lost touch with her completely, hiding that night away in the depths of my memory and feeding its intricacies to the hungry beast we call time. Years passed without a thought of Melinda.
Then on a boring day several years later, I began to think of old friends and acquaintances and wonder what hands life had dealt unto them. Like an old yearbook recovered from a dusty shelf, I began entering names into search engines and flipping through pages of false results, searching desperately for that golden link of truth. It was not terribly long before Melinda came to mind. I casually cast her name over satellites in the hope that they might return some iota of relevance. Nothing. Strange, I thought, that someone like her would fail to yield a vein of information. Several hours passed and nothing crossed my path. In frustrated defeat, I gave up, despite the nagging feeling I was missing something.
Another year passed, and I found myself again at this same old habit. Melinda's name naturally came very quickly to mind, as I had not unearthed anything in my prior attempt. An hour or so brought on similar results, and I almost had conceited my search again when I finally found something. A new string of words through a search engine had led me to a MySpace profile, which I quickly noted was not Melinda's. Instead, I found only one reference hidden at the end of the profile. It read "R.I.P.", with a name and a date underneath. The name was Melinda's. The date was October 27th, 2004. My heart sank.
An exhausting and thorough search led me to later uncover the entire story, in its cruel and tragic entirety. From various pieces scattered across the internet, I pieced together the sad tale of a girl who had taken her own life. I read about a girl who was lost. I read about a girl who was depressed. I read about a girl who had friends but still felt she was alone. I found descriptions of the mask I had known, and not the girl I had seen underneath... I wonder if anyone had seen her so clearly. Something tells me they had, but I do not know why they did not succeed where I failed.
Finally, I read about a tragic night in 2004 that I can only hope brought her peace. Every detail cemented itself in my mind and every perspective cast a new light. And though I know what happened, I can only imagine what she went through on that last night... in those final minutes. I have stood on that cliff. I too have looked down and envisioned those last steps. Melinda took them. And though a handful of pills had failed to steal her away so many years ago, on that night a gun had little trouble.
I'm sorry.
Always remember, never forgot,
M. D. R.
October 27 2004.
10/22/10
Sitting in the Dark
Watching from the furthest peak,
the world looks so small.
I feel I've felt this place before,
I think I've walked these halls.
Sulking in this sunken chair,
a puzzle piece resolves,
a thousand weights my shoulders bear,
but I know I've walked these halls.
The sinking sun sets in,
a familiar truth rises free,
I know I've walked these halls before,
but the truth is I never leave.
the world looks so small.
I feel I've felt this place before,
I think I've walked these halls.
Sulking in this sunken chair,
a puzzle piece resolves,
a thousand weights my shoulders bear,
but I know I've walked these halls.
The sinking sun sets in,
a familiar truth rises free,
I know I've walked these halls before,
but the truth is I never leave.
10/16/10
10/4/10
The Lightness
The world collapses upon itself and my mind wonders how it ever held up. I had sensed a change, a new scent to the otherwise stagnant air, but found only the shallow secrets of who I am. I wish I could say reality swept in quickly and painlessly, but I've walked this road before and know all too well how difficult it is. When the walls came down I had ignorantly and eagerly watched from the sidelines, celebrating the cracks in their otherwise solid foundation. But I found only what I placed inside... a sullen reminder of what this life has become. Perhaps that is all it ever was.
I made a mistake. Days after illustrating the painful toxicity of hope, I went against my own intuition and swallowed it vigorously. Hope is addictive. Hope turns a meaningless conversation into the seed of a flowering miracle. It mutilates a casual smile into something solid and concrete, building faith upon false pillars of trust. And after the collapse, when the floating debris of your dreams have settled, you reflect on your mistakes as if it were some other foolish person who had been deceived. I sat three feet from everything I've ever wanted... I could have reached out and touched it in desperation. In reality, what seemed so close may have very well been a thousand miles away, out amongst the stars in the night sky. They had aligned so perfectly. Hope convinced me maybe I had as well.
The world is a lonely place when hope fails. The most casual of acquaintances serve only to remind one of the disparity between two persons. Where you might have before returned a smile, it becomes an impossibly difficult act to feign. The skies blacken and swoon in even in the brightest hours of the day, casting a shadow everywhere your eyes pursue to avoid it. It is the coldest shadow I've known, but it is one that the sun will eventually purge. When the world collapses it requires a short while to recover. At least. And though you may eventually build the walls back up, hiding your secrets behind painted lies, there are always cracks and holes to remind us what lay inside. There are always the silent whispers of logic seeping from our wounds, reminding us the risk we take with hope.
It is a cycle. How many times have I built these walls? How many times have I covered my scars with fantasies? I've walked this path so many times that I know it by the heart it has broken so freely. The cycle repeats and all I see are the same mistakes I make over and over... the same boulder I've been pushing all my life. I question existence, hope, love, hate, and everything in between. And In the very moment that I decide escape is the only true solution, the winds of change slap me forcibly upon the cheek. I have walked this road a hundred times and suddenly I find myself in front of a fork I've never known before. The world explodes.
The lightness fills my veins and suddenly I breath air through new lungs. Shadows resist and falter against a bubbling smile beats me so brutally that I am left in genuine bewilderment. Tears stream from my cheeks and I realize something so chokingly profound that I cannot breath... I am alive. For the first time in what seems like an eternity I'm watching the world through my own beating heart. It is magical and wonderful and everything my dreams have promised it to be. But it is fleeting. In an instant it leaves me broken on the floor, twisting my mind in a thousand directions at once. I don't understand any of it. I don't care.
I call it the lightness. It is a transient sensation that takes hold of me when I am least expecting it. I do not know, unfortunately, what incites its effects or what prevents its permanency. I do know that I have felt its grasp at least three different times during the last two weeks, each time presenting with different but similar symptoms. To put its effects into words is difficult. I can only describe it as a concentrated euphoria, a natural high that drags me from this weary shadow and opens my eyes. For a moment I feel truly wonderful, and then it is gone. I regress to the shadows and the walls are resurrected from the rubble.
But something has changed hasn't it? There are new stars in the sky and perhaps it is they who can finally lead me from this place. Are they are the key to ascension? Though I cannot cannot know for sure, I find myself looking to the future in desperate anticipation. The winds smell of change... the stars show new constellations... and all of a sudden the addiction begins anew.
I made a mistake. Days after illustrating the painful toxicity of hope, I went against my own intuition and swallowed it vigorously. Hope is addictive. Hope turns a meaningless conversation into the seed of a flowering miracle. It mutilates a casual smile into something solid and concrete, building faith upon false pillars of trust. And after the collapse, when the floating debris of your dreams have settled, you reflect on your mistakes as if it were some other foolish person who had been deceived. I sat three feet from everything I've ever wanted... I could have reached out and touched it in desperation. In reality, what seemed so close may have very well been a thousand miles away, out amongst the stars in the night sky. They had aligned so perfectly. Hope convinced me maybe I had as well.
The world is a lonely place when hope fails. The most casual of acquaintances serve only to remind one of the disparity between two persons. Where you might have before returned a smile, it becomes an impossibly difficult act to feign. The skies blacken and swoon in even in the brightest hours of the day, casting a shadow everywhere your eyes pursue to avoid it. It is the coldest shadow I've known, but it is one that the sun will eventually purge. When the world collapses it requires a short while to recover. At least. And though you may eventually build the walls back up, hiding your secrets behind painted lies, there are always cracks and holes to remind us what lay inside. There are always the silent whispers of logic seeping from our wounds, reminding us the risk we take with hope.
It is a cycle. How many times have I built these walls? How many times have I covered my scars with fantasies? I've walked this path so many times that I know it by the heart it has broken so freely. The cycle repeats and all I see are the same mistakes I make over and over... the same boulder I've been pushing all my life. I question existence, hope, love, hate, and everything in between. And In the very moment that I decide escape is the only true solution, the winds of change slap me forcibly upon the cheek. I have walked this road a hundred times and suddenly I find myself in front of a fork I've never known before. The world explodes.
The lightness fills my veins and suddenly I breath air through new lungs. Shadows resist and falter against a bubbling smile beats me so brutally that I am left in genuine bewilderment. Tears stream from my cheeks and I realize something so chokingly profound that I cannot breath... I am alive. For the first time in what seems like an eternity I'm watching the world through my own beating heart. It is magical and wonderful and everything my dreams have promised it to be. But it is fleeting. In an instant it leaves me broken on the floor, twisting my mind in a thousand directions at once. I don't understand any of it. I don't care.
I call it the lightness. It is a transient sensation that takes hold of me when I am least expecting it. I do not know, unfortunately, what incites its effects or what prevents its permanency. I do know that I have felt its grasp at least three different times during the last two weeks, each time presenting with different but similar symptoms. To put its effects into words is difficult. I can only describe it as a concentrated euphoria, a natural high that drags me from this weary shadow and opens my eyes. For a moment I feel truly wonderful, and then it is gone. I regress to the shadows and the walls are resurrected from the rubble.
But something has changed hasn't it? There are new stars in the sky and perhaps it is they who can finally lead me from this place. Are they are the key to ascension? Though I cannot cannot know for sure, I find myself looking to the future in desperate anticipation. The winds smell of change... the stars show new constellations... and all of a sudden the addiction begins anew.
9/25/10
The Inside Straight
I see a miserable man and shake my head at the irony of the universe. He is penniless, has no education, and is constantly plagued by poor health. At the same time, he has in his possession the one thing I crave more than life itself.
He looks at me and feels similarly disgusted. I am well educated, financially secure, and enjoy amazing health. Though I am miserably alone and indifferent to world, I don't believe he notices. I don't know that he would even care.
And despite the fact we each hold valuable commodities, we understand that the road to misery lay ahead. What a cruel joke fate plays with us. Or perhaps the joke is that we allow it to.
He looks at me and feels similarly disgusted. I am well educated, financially secure, and enjoy amazing health. Though I am miserably alone and indifferent to world, I don't believe he notices. I don't know that he would even care.
And despite the fact we each hold valuable commodities, we understand that the road to misery lay ahead. What a cruel joke fate plays with us. Or perhaps the joke is that we allow it to.
9/24/10
Toxicology
"Alle Dinge sind Gift und nichts ist ohne Gift; allein die Dosis macht, dass ein Ding kein Gift ist."
"All things are poison and nothing is without poison; only the dose makes a thing not a poison."
-Paracelsus, father of toxicology
Hope is no different. In moderation hope it is a powerful panacea against the constant volleys of life's troubles. Hope can fight back tears. It can invigorate the heart with unjust fervor. In some situations, hope is capable of even pulling us back from the fingertips of death itself. A life without hope would almost certainly lead to an abrupt demise, perhaps at the hands of none-other than one's self.
Hope is also a poison. As Paracelsus realized long ago, too much of something is always toxic. The human body is little more than an elegant balance of biochemical reactions, each only a quantifiable distance from disastrous extremes. And even though hope itself is not widely recognized as a biological function (I would argue that it is), in reality it operates no differently. To gorge oneself on hope would be to live to upon the edge of a razor; sway too far in any direction and all is lost.
Acutely, hope leads to rash decisions. One might purchase a life's savings worth of lottery tickets on the merits of hope. Equally disastrous would be to forgo the most sensible of fleeting opportunities in search of a miracle. More often than not, however, hope is instead prone to display chronic symptoms. It incubates and breeds into the slow decay of one's self. One could perhaps describe hope on the mathematical terms of a function regressing to zero, slowly sapping life with every second that passes. As every day of life hangs and falls to back to the Earth, one draws closer to an empty and desolate future. As horrifying as the impatient dehydration of cholera or the insidious grip HIV, hope is a slow-rot of one's existence before his or her own eyes. For some the disease may pass, leaving the broken fragments of what once was a human being. For others, it will consume us whole.
I have consumed hope... we all have. But I consume it as rapidly and desperately as the air I breath. Now I find myself standing on the razor's edge, circling closer and to addiction with every day. The acute stages have come and gone, and every sunrise reminds of their scars. Opportunities lost, time gambled, emotions ablated. But there is still time left. Wounds may still heal. I can still hope.
"All things are poison and nothing is without poison; only the dose makes a thing not a poison."
-Paracelsus, father of toxicology
Hope is no different. In moderation hope it is a powerful panacea against the constant volleys of life's troubles. Hope can fight back tears. It can invigorate the heart with unjust fervor. In some situations, hope is capable of even pulling us back from the fingertips of death itself. A life without hope would almost certainly lead to an abrupt demise, perhaps at the hands of none-other than one's self.
Hope is also a poison. As Paracelsus realized long ago, too much of something is always toxic. The human body is little more than an elegant balance of biochemical reactions, each only a quantifiable distance from disastrous extremes. And even though hope itself is not widely recognized as a biological function (I would argue that it is), in reality it operates no differently. To gorge oneself on hope would be to live to upon the edge of a razor; sway too far in any direction and all is lost.
Acutely, hope leads to rash decisions. One might purchase a life's savings worth of lottery tickets on the merits of hope. Equally disastrous would be to forgo the most sensible of fleeting opportunities in search of a miracle. More often than not, however, hope is instead prone to display chronic symptoms. It incubates and breeds into the slow decay of one's self. One could perhaps describe hope on the mathematical terms of a function regressing to zero, slowly sapping life with every second that passes. As every day of life hangs and falls to back to the Earth, one draws closer to an empty and desolate future. As horrifying as the impatient dehydration of cholera or the insidious grip HIV, hope is a slow-rot of one's existence before his or her own eyes. For some the disease may pass, leaving the broken fragments of what once was a human being. For others, it will consume us whole.
I have consumed hope... we all have. But I consume it as rapidly and desperately as the air I breath. Now I find myself standing on the razor's edge, circling closer and to addiction with every day. The acute stages have come and gone, and every sunrise reminds of their scars. Opportunities lost, time gambled, emotions ablated. But there is still time left. Wounds may still heal. I can still hope.
Broken Constellation
I feel as if I spend my entire life waiting for stars to align, and then every time they do I am the one who is out of position.
9/22/10
9/18/10
The Biological Machine, I
In most popular religious beliefs there generally exists a basic understanding that the "life force" of the human being can be defined as some non-material. Something ethereal. Some invisible being that guides an empty body into the dusk of time. By this understanding we are simply vessels relegated to infect our bodies until a time when we are released. Upon this release, we potentially progress into various afterlife, depending on which flavor of religion you choose to indulge in. But what is this being that holds no mass? What is its motive? How does it coexist with the corporeal world?
I of course speak of the soul. It has many terms but this is by far the most commonly used and widely accepted. It spans the lengths of the clockwork world, allowing each cog to believe that they are not metal wheels but the incarnations of time itself. But how can we justify this idea? How can we substantiate such claims? Is it even possible? The soul is a simple subject with complicated ramifications. First, however, we will examine the purpose of the soul; the soul is simply a coping mechanism of man. We look at the idea of the soul as a vessel to guide us from the end of one chapter to the beginning of the next. We can die on Earth, but essentially cheat death and ascend to heaven as a soul; a body is perishable while the soul is immortal. And this is not surprising, as many if not most religious ideas revolve around the reassurance that something other than an empty void awaits us in the unknown.
But, returning to our question, are these claims justified? Not at all. The life force of humans, as we know, is not some otherworldly component, but rather a concoction of biological events all operating in a self-sustaining display. I live because my cells break down glucose (and other metabolites) with oxygen to create the energy to acquire more of said nutrients. To ignore these metabolic fuels would be to starve or suffocate, effectively ending life. No soul is needed. No operator behind the machine guides my body save for the complex system of neurons in my brain. They are the epicenter of higher thought, and essentially the closest science can come to identifying a soul. But they are still the product of evolution and biology, and likewise need no spiritual explanation. Biology stands on its own foundations without faltering.
posted 9/18/10, written 5/13/10
I of course speak of the soul. It has many terms but this is by far the most commonly used and widely accepted. It spans the lengths of the clockwork world, allowing each cog to believe that they are not metal wheels but the incarnations of time itself. But how can we justify this idea? How can we substantiate such claims? Is it even possible? The soul is a simple subject with complicated ramifications. First, however, we will examine the purpose of the soul; the soul is simply a coping mechanism of man. We look at the idea of the soul as a vessel to guide us from the end of one chapter to the beginning of the next. We can die on Earth, but essentially cheat death and ascend to heaven as a soul; a body is perishable while the soul is immortal. And this is not surprising, as many if not most religious ideas revolve around the reassurance that something other than an empty void awaits us in the unknown.
But, returning to our question, are these claims justified? Not at all. The life force of humans, as we know, is not some otherworldly component, but rather a concoction of biological events all operating in a self-sustaining display. I live because my cells break down glucose (and other metabolites) with oxygen to create the energy to acquire more of said nutrients. To ignore these metabolic fuels would be to starve or suffocate, effectively ending life. No soul is needed. No operator behind the machine guides my body save for the complex system of neurons in my brain. They are the epicenter of higher thought, and essentially the closest science can come to identifying a soul. But they are still the product of evolution and biology, and likewise need no spiritual explanation. Biology stands on its own foundations without faltering.
posted 9/18/10, written 5/13/10
Dreams I
"It is by no means an irrational fancy that, in a future existence, we shall look upon what we think our present existence, as a dream."
-Edgar Allan Poe, via someone I stole it from.
I place "I" in the title of this entry because I know it will be a subject I return to. Of all the odds and ends in this world, dreams are an interest to which I always find myself revisiting in some new light. At times this is brought on by emotions from throughout my day, and at others stimulated directly by my own dreams. Either way, I feel like I only ever make a ounce of progress at a time. Hopefully putting some words on paper will take me somewhere.
Speaking from the mouth of a neurologist, dreams are the rationalizations the mind invents when neurological synapses spontaneously reset during a sleep period. Disconnected from the body, the mind pieces these random bits of memory together and interacts with them as if they were real. An analogy would be a painter who cleans his brushes off by wiping them on a canvas, and then attempts to make sense of the final product. At the same time, however, the events and thoughts of your day are processed and reinforced via a system known as "the Papez circuit". Thus, as I recall it from my neurology courses, dreams are a push and pull between these rogue neural impulses and the information still fresh in your circuit of Papez. This explains a bit, as we often find dreams to be a confusing mixture of our daily lives with random thoughts we cannot explain.
Psychologists, to my understanding, seem to cling to other explanations of dreams. Many believe the dream state is a virtual playground for the repressed memories of one's conscience. I find this a little less convincing, as most dreams seem to not only be things one would not repress, but also things that one desires openly. Imagine you dream of cupcakes falling from the sky while you rollerskate on a lake. Does that mean you're a cupcake-phobe who won't skate near water? These situations tend to convince me to remove faith in the explanations of psychiatrists, whom I've already learned to be undeniably the strangest people you will ever meet. Or at least the ones who teach it.
Other explanations exist as well, but the majority are simple extensions of religion or mythical ideas that I do not accept.
I'm not ready to continue from here, so I'll leave this entry as the stepping stone to others. Perhaps in a future entry I will look upon this these explanations as way I understood dreams, and not how I understand them.
-Edgar Allan Poe, via someone I stole it from.
I place "I" in the title of this entry because I know it will be a subject I return to. Of all the odds and ends in this world, dreams are an interest to which I always find myself revisiting in some new light. At times this is brought on by emotions from throughout my day, and at others stimulated directly by my own dreams. Either way, I feel like I only ever make a ounce of progress at a time. Hopefully putting some words on paper will take me somewhere.
Speaking from the mouth of a neurologist, dreams are the rationalizations the mind invents when neurological synapses spontaneously reset during a sleep period. Disconnected from the body, the mind pieces these random bits of memory together and interacts with them as if they were real. An analogy would be a painter who cleans his brushes off by wiping them on a canvas, and then attempts to make sense of the final product. At the same time, however, the events and thoughts of your day are processed and reinforced via a system known as "the Papez circuit". Thus, as I recall it from my neurology courses, dreams are a push and pull between these rogue neural impulses and the information still fresh in your circuit of Papez. This explains a bit, as we often find dreams to be a confusing mixture of our daily lives with random thoughts we cannot explain.
Psychologists, to my understanding, seem to cling to other explanations of dreams. Many believe the dream state is a virtual playground for the repressed memories of one's conscience. I find this a little less convincing, as most dreams seem to not only be things one would not repress, but also things that one desires openly. Imagine you dream of cupcakes falling from the sky while you rollerskate on a lake. Does that mean you're a cupcake-phobe who won't skate near water? These situations tend to convince me to remove faith in the explanations of psychiatrists, whom I've already learned to be undeniably the strangest people you will ever meet. Or at least the ones who teach it.
Other explanations exist as well, but the majority are simple extensions of religion or mythical ideas that I do not accept.
I'm not ready to continue from here, so I'll leave this entry as the stepping stone to others. Perhaps in a future entry I will look upon this these explanations as way I understood dreams, and not how I understand them.
9/11/10
Eye of the Beholder
"So one last touch and then you'll go,
And we'll pretend that it meant something so much more.
But it was vile, and it was cheap,
and you are beautiful, but you don't mean a thing to me.
Yeah you are beautiful, but you don't mean a thing to me."
-DCFC
And we'll pretend that it meant something so much more.
But it was vile, and it was cheap,
and you are beautiful, but you don't mean a thing to me.
Yeah you are beautiful, but you don't mean a thing to me."
-DCFC
9/8/10
Unrest
"To be or not to be– that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And, by opposing, end them. To die, to sleep
No more"
-Shakespeare
Yesterday's thoughts seemed so well intentioned. They were so simple, trite, and elegant in their assertions. But I could not sleep with a clear conscience despite my best attempts to embrace them. It's hard to tell what I believe anymore. I feel as if I've been avoiding poisoned apples for so long that I've cornered myself into starvation. Why not take a bite? The outcome cannot change.
My heart burns for things I know to be fickle against the great stage of time. Love is a poison I would drink gladly, savoring each drop until my candle grow silent. And all the while my mind recoils the slack in its reins, reminding me of things I would rather not know. This is the battle that rages inside the soul I do not believe in. This is the unrest that siphons away my sleep.
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And, by opposing, end them. To die, to sleep
No more"
-Shakespeare
Yesterday's thoughts seemed so well intentioned. They were so simple, trite, and elegant in their assertions. But I could not sleep with a clear conscience despite my best attempts to embrace them. It's hard to tell what I believe anymore. I feel as if I've been avoiding poisoned apples for so long that I've cornered myself into starvation. Why not take a bite? The outcome cannot change.
My heart burns for things I know to be fickle against the great stage of time. Love is a poison I would drink gladly, savoring each drop until my candle grow silent. And all the while my mind recoils the slack in its reins, reminding me of things I would rather not know. This is the battle that rages inside the soul I do not believe in. This is the unrest that siphons away my sleep.
9/6/10
Zombie
A door closes and I wonder if I am really alive. A hundred wise old men tell me that to breath is to live, but our definitions of life seem as different as a voice and its song. I question if I have ever inhaled the world. I question if I have ever seen the diamond in the dark.
Although I do not anticipate that wishes will bear fruit of the sweetest nature, I found solace in knowing that the seeds of hope are planted in soil too deep to unearth. It is in these fleeting products of the imagination that I place the greatest wager, as to gamble on any other stake would seem far too insignificant. But should I triumph against the odds, should I defy the motion of the world at large, would the winnings afford me any more than an illusion of happiness?
As a child I fantasized of life's great secret. But as all children are prone, I too was guilty of seeing the world through such wonderfully ignorant eyes. "To love is to live!" I coined unwaveringly, basking in the sweet elegance of the phrase. For many years I adamantly followed this mantra, and for many years I was led as straight and true as the most honest of broken compasses. To love, however, I now understand is not to live. Though many who wonder the streets of love still cling to such a wayward guide, I long ago left that path. Love is not the soul. Love is not the morning kiss, nor the melting heart; love is not life congratulating itself on a job well done. I wish with all my heart it was. Instead, science has shown love to be no more than the not-so-romantic matrimony of molecule and receptor. It is Biology that spins the silent truth of love, illustrating flaws and tearing down propaganda from behind closed doors. And though my body pleads a most appealing defense, with the utmost pain I refuse its temptation. I cannot gamble on love... for it pays dividends in a currency as beautiful as it is worthless.
So, I instead place my stake on the smallest corner of life's roulette wheel. The odds? Insurmountable. The payout? Untold. The price...? Absolute. Such is the cost of hope's sweet and fleeting embrace. Hope is all I have now. The great wheel of time hurtles forward upon its axis and I stand idle with an empty gaze towards the future.
I breath without breathing.
I see without seeing.
I love without living.
I hope.
I am the zombie.
Although I do not anticipate that wishes will bear fruit of the sweetest nature, I found solace in knowing that the seeds of hope are planted in soil too deep to unearth. It is in these fleeting products of the imagination that I place the greatest wager, as to gamble on any other stake would seem far too insignificant. But should I triumph against the odds, should I defy the motion of the world at large, would the winnings afford me any more than an illusion of happiness?
As a child I fantasized of life's great secret. But as all children are prone, I too was guilty of seeing the world through such wonderfully ignorant eyes. "To love is to live!" I coined unwaveringly, basking in the sweet elegance of the phrase. For many years I adamantly followed this mantra, and for many years I was led as straight and true as the most honest of broken compasses. To love, however, I now understand is not to live. Though many who wonder the streets of love still cling to such a wayward guide, I long ago left that path. Love is not the soul. Love is not the morning kiss, nor the melting heart; love is not life congratulating itself on a job well done. I wish with all my heart it was. Instead, science has shown love to be no more than the not-so-romantic matrimony of molecule and receptor. It is Biology that spins the silent truth of love, illustrating flaws and tearing down propaganda from behind closed doors. And though my body pleads a most appealing defense, with the utmost pain I refuse its temptation. I cannot gamble on love... for it pays dividends in a currency as beautiful as it is worthless.
So, I instead place my stake on the smallest corner of life's roulette wheel. The odds? Insurmountable. The payout? Untold. The price...? Absolute. Such is the cost of hope's sweet and fleeting embrace. Hope is all I have now. The great wheel of time hurtles forward upon its axis and I stand idle with an empty gaze towards the future.
I breath without breathing.
I see without seeing.
I love without living.
I hope.
I am the zombie.
6/2/10
Contrast
Black is everything. White is nothing. In between, however, lurks the infinite. The boundless shades of grey that span the length of substance and occupy the space from either end of the spectrum. We call this contrast. Defined per the dictionary, contrast is "the difference or degree of difference between things having similar or comparable nature". Defined in our own terms, it's simply the difference between two points. No doubt, it is an idea we are all familiar with. But one can be familiar with an idea and not truly grasp its importance, much the same as we consume food without realizing how profound it is to our existence.
As I observe the world I am reminded constantly the importance of contrast. Prior to last year I had lived exclusively in one of the lushest environments on Earth. For years upon years, I knew nothing save green coastal cities sandwiched between the sea and the mountains. Circumstance forced me to leave the place I called home, however, and I found myself situated in a flat, dry, and water starved terrain that basks in an unforgiving perpetual sunlight. Contrast. In my new location I soon came to acknowledge the lush forests I had left behind. I stepped outside, observed the desert staring back at me, and cursed myself for trading evergreens for cacti. The same idea surfaced with respect to listening to music. Initially I was content with cheap music devices and run-of-the-mill earbuds... I knew nothing else. But a few expensive solutions later (and several hundreds of dollars), and I find myself unable to enjoy music unless played from a quality recording on high end listening devices. Contrast. And these correlations run intricately through my life, and I assume the lives of most. Contrast is in everything. It separates the rich from the poor, the beautiful from the hideous, the intelligent from the simple, and the kind from the cruel. We are all victim to contrast.
But it does not stand idle. It is not a result, rather a cause to much more. Contrast is the force that separates us from another and leads to uniqueness. It gives us importance. Juxtapose the beautiful woman with her underwhelming peer and you not only give credence to her beauty, you create it. Imagine a world in which all were beautiful. What then would be the value of beauty? Or a world in which we were all ugly? Without contrast, physical appearance is unreferenced and inconsequential. But add contrast to the equation and you stratify its worth. The same goes for many if not all other outlets and applications. For an example, let us return to my stay in the desert. This time, imagine I had lived in the desert my entire life and was unaware of any other climate. Would I still be disgruntled with my situation? Of course not. I would be content for no better reason than the idea that I did not know better. But introduce a more agreeable paradise, and I will once again envy the green forests. This is what contrast gives us... importance. Remove contrast, and you will find yourself staring at one simple shade of no importance.
This brings me to closer to the idea which led me to debate contrast. It's an idea most may have even spent some time on before, but nonetheless I feel its important to put into words. It is the contrast between life and death. The ultimate contrast. With life, we see the amazing complexity of mother nature; a living breathing organism fighting the endless forces of entropy. With death, an eternal slumber of nothing; a regression back to the chaotic ways of the universe. But somehow our perceptions of these two dueling forces have been skewed. Most persons view death with fear, sadness, and disdain. They see death as the end of life, and rightfully so, but unfairly cast to it their cruelest glances as they meander ever closer. To them, death is the unfair burden of mortality, the punishment for nature's imperfections. This could not be further from the truth, and these perceptions could not be more unmerited. We must understand that our deaths do not signify the overbearing last page of an enthralling novel, but instead they symbolize the checkered finish line of the longest race.
With death, we receive the greatest gift man can receive... contrast. To live eternally would be to remove all value from life in the same way a beautiful woman is lost in a sea of fashion models. But to die... to die is to put our lives into context. To die is to give value to every decision we have made, every day we have lived, and every emotion we experienced. He who knows how many days he has to live will live each to the utmost and fullest. Each day for that man has a guaranteed value. But unchecked, life would blur to infinity and each day would melt into the last. Every moment would eventually recreate itself over and over until its effect was lost completely. Imagine eating your favorite dish every night of every month of every year. How long could you bear it? Eventually it would drive you maddeningly sick. This is the fate death saves us from. And this is why I am so confused when I see others driven to sadness at the thought of their impending "demise". If you genuinely assess death for what it truly is, you will understand the beauty and purpose it holds. To quote a writer whose name escapes me, "Without death, life would have no meaning". Without death, life would have no meaning... without contrast, the world is a very ugly shade of grey.
As I observe the world I am reminded constantly the importance of contrast. Prior to last year I had lived exclusively in one of the lushest environments on Earth. For years upon years, I knew nothing save green coastal cities sandwiched between the sea and the mountains. Circumstance forced me to leave the place I called home, however, and I found myself situated in a flat, dry, and water starved terrain that basks in an unforgiving perpetual sunlight. Contrast. In my new location I soon came to acknowledge the lush forests I had left behind. I stepped outside, observed the desert staring back at me, and cursed myself for trading evergreens for cacti. The same idea surfaced with respect to listening to music. Initially I was content with cheap music devices and run-of-the-mill earbuds... I knew nothing else. But a few expensive solutions later (and several hundreds of dollars), and I find myself unable to enjoy music unless played from a quality recording on high end listening devices. Contrast. And these correlations run intricately through my life, and I assume the lives of most. Contrast is in everything. It separates the rich from the poor, the beautiful from the hideous, the intelligent from the simple, and the kind from the cruel. We are all victim to contrast.
But it does not stand idle. It is not a result, rather a cause to much more. Contrast is the force that separates us from another and leads to uniqueness. It gives us importance. Juxtapose the beautiful woman with her underwhelming peer and you not only give credence to her beauty, you create it. Imagine a world in which all were beautiful. What then would be the value of beauty? Or a world in which we were all ugly? Without contrast, physical appearance is unreferenced and inconsequential. But add contrast to the equation and you stratify its worth. The same goes for many if not all other outlets and applications. For an example, let us return to my stay in the desert. This time, imagine I had lived in the desert my entire life and was unaware of any other climate. Would I still be disgruntled with my situation? Of course not. I would be content for no better reason than the idea that I did not know better. But introduce a more agreeable paradise, and I will once again envy the green forests. This is what contrast gives us... importance. Remove contrast, and you will find yourself staring at one simple shade of no importance.
This brings me to closer to the idea which led me to debate contrast. It's an idea most may have even spent some time on before, but nonetheless I feel its important to put into words. It is the contrast between life and death. The ultimate contrast. With life, we see the amazing complexity of mother nature; a living breathing organism fighting the endless forces of entropy. With death, an eternal slumber of nothing; a regression back to the chaotic ways of the universe. But somehow our perceptions of these two dueling forces have been skewed. Most persons view death with fear, sadness, and disdain. They see death as the end of life, and rightfully so, but unfairly cast to it their cruelest glances as they meander ever closer. To them, death is the unfair burden of mortality, the punishment for nature's imperfections. This could not be further from the truth, and these perceptions could not be more unmerited. We must understand that our deaths do not signify the overbearing last page of an enthralling novel, but instead they symbolize the checkered finish line of the longest race.
With death, we receive the greatest gift man can receive... contrast. To live eternally would be to remove all value from life in the same way a beautiful woman is lost in a sea of fashion models. But to die... to die is to put our lives into context. To die is to give value to every decision we have made, every day we have lived, and every emotion we experienced. He who knows how many days he has to live will live each to the utmost and fullest. Each day for that man has a guaranteed value. But unchecked, life would blur to infinity and each day would melt into the last. Every moment would eventually recreate itself over and over until its effect was lost completely. Imagine eating your favorite dish every night of every month of every year. How long could you bear it? Eventually it would drive you maddeningly sick. This is the fate death saves us from. And this is why I am so confused when I see others driven to sadness at the thought of their impending "demise". If you genuinely assess death for what it truly is, you will understand the beauty and purpose it holds. To quote a writer whose name escapes me, "Without death, life would have no meaning". Without death, life would have no meaning... without contrast, the world is a very ugly shade of grey.
5/11/10
Life Sentence
You probably don't remember the bars being here when you arrived. They weren't. Or the day the doors and the front gate slammed shut and sealed your fate. They never did. But you can't understand any of this, so you sit quietly inside your cell waiting for that far off date of your release. You are convinced the guards watch your every move, but in reality there is no man in a uniform binding you here. He's simply a rumor you've picked up on from the other inmates. You don't need his keys to escape. You may have even realized this in those fleeting moments in which you examine your prison with a keen eye.
But uncertainty binds you to your cell. The unknown void that lies outside the prison walls is a reality you have never known. With every fantasy you spin about a better life as a free man, you create ten nightmares about the cold world looming beyond your pristine incarcerated life. You simply cannot know. Why leap from the oven and into the frying pan? Life is not so bad, you convince yourself. You have your three meals and a roof over your head... what more could the unknown offer you? In truth, you don't even know how you would survive out there. Did you ever? What was life like before you got here? You can't even remember, or perhaps you've simply been here from the start. It's a whole different world out there... So, you hover in your weathered prison striped suit and serve your time behind the iron bars, behind the watchful guard, behind the closed doors, and behind that big bolted gate. You're in for life, it seems, and this prison will ensure you serve every year you owe.
The truth is, however, there are no bars. There are no guards. There are no walls, and there is no gate. When you entered this place it was an empty field, barren and desolate. Your mind put up these boundaries, and it has hired all the prison guards for no reason other than to contain itself. The bars were not here upon your arrival because they arrived with you, by you. Open your eyes and truly look at this prison you have created. If you stare long enough, search hard enough, you will watch it all crumble and fade. Revel in its destruction. This is you seeing for the first time. This is you realizing that you are not defined by the prison's terms, the prison is defined by yours. And now that you have seized this understanding, there is only thing is holding you back from your escape. These are the striped prison pajamas that cling to you. They are the only facet of the prison that truly exists, and the only shackle that separates you from the unknown. They have been with you since the beginning and they define the end. Cast them off and you are a free man, for better or worse.
Freedom has a price, however. Once you leave this prison, no crime in the world will bring you back to it. The world outside is unknown, and your cell, as confining as it was, was known. Is known. Will always be known. You are on the precipice of freedom and the border of illusion, teetering on the edge of the greatest height. You must stand or jump.
And as I leave you here, on the balance of life itself, do not think of me as cruel. Do not think of me as mischievous. I do not withhold from you the secrets of the universe, nor do I goad you into them. In truth, I cannot take you further than this point because I myself have not trespassed across it. I am on my own ledge. I am in my own prison cell. I too, serve a life sentence.
But uncertainty binds you to your cell. The unknown void that lies outside the prison walls is a reality you have never known. With every fantasy you spin about a better life as a free man, you create ten nightmares about the cold world looming beyond your pristine incarcerated life. You simply cannot know. Why leap from the oven and into the frying pan? Life is not so bad, you convince yourself. You have your three meals and a roof over your head... what more could the unknown offer you? In truth, you don't even know how you would survive out there. Did you ever? What was life like before you got here? You can't even remember, or perhaps you've simply been here from the start. It's a whole different world out there... So, you hover in your weathered prison striped suit and serve your time behind the iron bars, behind the watchful guard, behind the closed doors, and behind that big bolted gate. You're in for life, it seems, and this prison will ensure you serve every year you owe.
The truth is, however, there are no bars. There are no guards. There are no walls, and there is no gate. When you entered this place it was an empty field, barren and desolate. Your mind put up these boundaries, and it has hired all the prison guards for no reason other than to contain itself. The bars were not here upon your arrival because they arrived with you, by you. Open your eyes and truly look at this prison you have created. If you stare long enough, search hard enough, you will watch it all crumble and fade. Revel in its destruction. This is you seeing for the first time. This is you realizing that you are not defined by the prison's terms, the prison is defined by yours. And now that you have seized this understanding, there is only thing is holding you back from your escape. These are the striped prison pajamas that cling to you. They are the only facet of the prison that truly exists, and the only shackle that separates you from the unknown. They have been with you since the beginning and they define the end. Cast them off and you are a free man, for better or worse.
Freedom has a price, however. Once you leave this prison, no crime in the world will bring you back to it. The world outside is unknown, and your cell, as confining as it was, was known. Is known. Will always be known. You are on the precipice of freedom and the border of illusion, teetering on the edge of the greatest height. You must stand or jump.
And as I leave you here, on the balance of life itself, do not think of me as cruel. Do not think of me as mischievous. I do not withhold from you the secrets of the universe, nor do I goad you into them. In truth, I cannot take you further than this point because I myself have not trespassed across it. I am on my own ledge. I am in my own prison cell. I too, serve a life sentence.
4/21/10
4/20/10
The Gemstone Unpolished
Evolution is a remarkable beast. It surrounds us completely and yet to see it distinctly is impossible. It bestows upon us gifts that have allowed us to rise from the inorganic matter of the Earth. From a handful of molecules, evolution was birthed into this world as, truly, an infant. Many believe this infancy was simply a self renewing pool of chemicals, others a primal RNA, and yet others claim we can never know. While man cannot, and perhaps will never, understand how the birth of life itself came to be, we can relish in the fruits evolution has bore. From the primordial ooze we were given the Archaebaceria, the Prokaryotes, and eventually the wonderfully more sophisticated Eukaryotic organisms. Of all her ancient lineages, it is no secret evolution prized the Eukaryotic cell. She embraced the nucleus as the jeweler embraces a wonderful, yet unfaceted, stone. The nucleus bore possibility, wonder, and the potential of a masterpiece. But observe most gemstones and you will find a flaw, whether in the workmanship of the faceting or the stone itself, that blemishes the otherwise perfect. What is the perfect gemstone? What size is it? What color is it? How does it reflect light?
With man, evolution sought to answer these questions. What size? Roughly six feet, give or take, she decided was optimal. What color? black or white, depending on the surroundings. Man is a stone that changes his color to the situation. How do we produce our luster? Physiology is a vast, and utterly amazing field that explains the intricacies of man's facet. So are we not the perfect gemstone? Unfortunately, it is not so simple. Despite the infinite wonder of evolution, the meticulous polishing, evolution is a process that cannot reach completion. Though you may polish the largest blemishes from the surface, there are always smaller ones waiting... spoiling your perfect reflection. We are no different. When her two sons collided, evolution gave both their own weapons and bid them to an internal struggle; as prokaryotic organisms have evolved to invade our bodies, we evolve to remove them. As man breached the twilight of his lifespan, evolution worked meticulously to lengthen it. The problem, of course, is that as I have said, evolution is not a goal it is a perpetual state. It is a function of time, and simply put there was not enough time for evolution to finish her greatest creation. Instead, we have simply come to be a gemstone unpolished, magnificent in so many ways and yet unavoidably flawed. Cancers, viruses, and age all tarnish what evolution worked so hard to perfect. We struggle mightily to finish what she started, but so far our attempts seem so incredibly feeble. How can we possibly hone in our short decades what evolution built in millions of years? How will we ever imitate a heart, a single simple motor, that runs unwaveringly for 100 years? Or a joint capsule that absorbs every step you take with virtually no wear? Perhaps some day, our guided approach will bring us closer to that perfect organism. Until that day, we will remain incomplete... a work in progress. We are the statue half chiseled, the painting half painted, a story without an ending. A gemstone unpolished.
With man, evolution sought to answer these questions. What size? Roughly six feet, give or take, she decided was optimal. What color? black or white, depending on the surroundings. Man is a stone that changes his color to the situation. How do we produce our luster? Physiology is a vast, and utterly amazing field that explains the intricacies of man's facet. So are we not the perfect gemstone? Unfortunately, it is not so simple. Despite the infinite wonder of evolution, the meticulous polishing, evolution is a process that cannot reach completion. Though you may polish the largest blemishes from the surface, there are always smaller ones waiting... spoiling your perfect reflection. We are no different. When her two sons collided, evolution gave both their own weapons and bid them to an internal struggle; as prokaryotic organisms have evolved to invade our bodies, we evolve to remove them. As man breached the twilight of his lifespan, evolution worked meticulously to lengthen it. The problem, of course, is that as I have said, evolution is not a goal it is a perpetual state. It is a function of time, and simply put there was not enough time for evolution to finish her greatest creation. Instead, we have simply come to be a gemstone unpolished, magnificent in so many ways and yet unavoidably flawed. Cancers, viruses, and age all tarnish what evolution worked so hard to perfect. We struggle mightily to finish what she started, but so far our attempts seem so incredibly feeble. How can we possibly hone in our short decades what evolution built in millions of years? How will we ever imitate a heart, a single simple motor, that runs unwaveringly for 100 years? Or a joint capsule that absorbs every step you take with virtually no wear? Perhaps some day, our guided approach will bring us closer to that perfect organism. Until that day, we will remain incomplete... a work in progress. We are the statue half chiseled, the painting half painted, a story without an ending. A gemstone unpolished.
4/18/10
4/16/10
i
At one point or another, high school mathematics eventually exposes us to the nebulous constant known as i. For many math students i is often the numerical equivalent of Schrodinger's cat or relativity; it is a concept that is easy to know but quite difficult to fully understand. How can a cat be both alive and dead? How is it possible to travel back in time? With i we are presented the conundrum of finding the square root of a negative number. That is to say, for the mathematically inept, what number when multiplied against itself will produce a negative number. In short, there are none. A positive upon itself yields a positive, as does a negative. This at one point imposed a frustrating impasse for mathematicians, as many advanced formulas incorporate negative square roots. The solution? An imaginary number, one that by definition does not exist, to hold the place of this defiant expression. As long as one can cancel the two i's out, there is no harm nor foul to an equation, and a real number can be achieved. Truly, i is a useful tool for man to understand and overcome the impossible.
We have not restricted the use of such tools solely to the numbers that construct our physical sciences. In fact, they are all around us. One, however, stands above the rest. It is universally accepted by many to fill an impossible void, all the while never truly existing. As i holds together advanced mathematics, the invention of which I speak is the glue that keeps the world from crumbling at its base. It is god. In a world where existence looms as impossible expression, a figurative X^(1/2)=-Z, god is the imaginary constant that gives us a real number. He, she, or it, allows us to bypass the infinite sea that is existence. You will never see a soccer mom melt down on the side of the road because she has sought to understand the universe. She is able to solve this unsolvable equation because, to be honest, she cheats. God is her i, god gives her a literal and figurative solution. And as long as he is canceled out, as long as his existence is never truly proven, no problem arises. That is to say, because the idea of god cannot be undeniably proven nor disproven, we never truly have to confront his falseness. He simply exists to get us through our problems, a silent guide to lead us blindly through the troubles we would rather not face head on. He is our i. i help us if he is solved.
We have not restricted the use of such tools solely to the numbers that construct our physical sciences. In fact, they are all around us. One, however, stands above the rest. It is universally accepted by many to fill an impossible void, all the while never truly existing. As i holds together advanced mathematics, the invention of which I speak is the glue that keeps the world from crumbling at its base. It is god. In a world where existence looms as impossible expression, a figurative X^(1/2)=-Z, god is the imaginary constant that gives us a real number. He, she, or it, allows us to bypass the infinite sea that is existence. You will never see a soccer mom melt down on the side of the road because she has sought to understand the universe. She is able to solve this unsolvable equation because, to be honest, she cheats. God is her i, god gives her a literal and figurative solution. And as long as he is canceled out, as long as his existence is never truly proven, no problem arises. That is to say, because the idea of god cannot be undeniably proven nor disproven, we never truly have to confront his falseness. He simply exists to get us through our problems, a silent guide to lead us blindly through the troubles we would rather not face head on. He is our i. i help us if he is solved.
4/11/10
Futility
Once you see the world in a different light, it's hard to go back. We are hand fed an outlook on life that is designed not to read between the lines of the universe, but simply to look at the pictures. This is for the safety of both ourselves and the world around us. It is the symphony of clockwork, completely self driven, self motivated, and self preserving. It has erupted from the minds of few to conquer the minds of almost all, and shows no signs of stopping its relentless crusade. It is the psychological moat that encircles our entire world, keeping us from harm while preventing us from freedom. Few attempt to cross its hazy channels. Some make it half way, only to discover that the water is too deep. They usually return, more fearful of the depths than ever. Sometimes they reach the point of no return and simply allow themselves to be cast back with the tide, altogether forgetting or perhaps intentionally escaping that which lies outside their own comfortable havens. Some attempt to cross and straight out drown, desperately attempting to comprehend the bottomless darkness before they are consumed by it. They are a reminder to us all of the Pandora's box we open by attempting to jump from the edge and find our way back.
Then there are those who accept the murky waters. They understand that you cannot cross the channel, you can only exist within it. They realize that success is not reaching the other side, success is simply acknowledging that the other side does not exist. It is an awkward place, to be sure, to find oneself lost in the water. On one side you look to the infinite horizon. It shares no answers, and echoes back only the questions you thrust upon it. On the other side, you see the world you left behind. You see the people who go about their lives oblivious to the moat that protects them from such troubled waters. But they never seem the same from those cold waters. They don't seem to even be real people anymore. They are simply the gears of the clock, each churning his or her own little revolutions, as they power their own little machine. What would you give to go back to that? What knowledge would you desperately upheave from the meticulous scribe that is your memory? Is it better to be a cog in the clock that tells the incorrect time, or the onlooker who knows it runs slow?
Eventually, turmoil turns to chaos, chaos turns to sadness, sadness melts to indifference, and indifference matures to understanding. You understand that in the end we all return to the bottom of life's boundless sea, regardless of whether we turn the clock or attempt to cast stones into its mechanism. The sea does not show mercy to those who attempt to understand it. It simply is. It is the wide mouth of time consuming the victims of fate. It is the empty wave that steals us from the shore. It is the monster that hides in the shadows of our understanding. Man, woman, or child, it marks you from the day you are born until the day you are unborn. And upon that day when your hourglass has lost its last ounce of sand, in an instant time will erase you. For a moment, however, the world will unveil its secrets to your eyes alone and you will weep your final tear as you embrace the fabric of the universe. And in that moment, that fleeting fraction of an instant, you will understand that it matters not in the slightest where you spend your days, whether they are wasted in the sea or relished on dry land. The last thought that transverses your fading mind will explain more than a lifetime of worthless neural impulses...futility
4/4/10
Wait and Hope
“[U]ntil the day when God will deign to reveal the future to man, all human wisdom is contained in these two words,—‘Wait and hope.’”
-Alexander Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo
Wait, hope. Every word ever spoken condensed into two. Dumas understood this over a hundred years ago. But how long can you wait when hope is out of sight on all horizons.
-Alexander Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo
Wait, hope. Every word ever spoken condensed into two. Dumas understood this over a hundred years ago. But how long can you wait when hope is out of sight on all horizons.
4/3/10
Butterfly
It has been said that something as small as the flutter of a butterfly's wing can ultimately cause a typhoon halfway around the world.
- Chaos Theory
It is amazing the profound impact that a simple action can have. They say a butterfly can flap its wings and across the world chaos ensues. Ten years ago a butterfly flapped its wings. Ten years I ignored someone who genuinely needed help and days later chaos ensued. At the time it seemed a trivial act of indifference, something I've done a thousand times over. But we can flutter our wings our entire lives and never know in which instant we threaten the world, surely I had done so before and have done so since. This time was different though. In a moment identical to any of the billions we watch fly before our eyes, I made a mistake which has come full circle to cast my own mind into disarray.
Six years ago the typhoon hit. And while I can't help but call to my defense the countless variables that twisted that simple flutter of wings into a nightmare, I wonder now what my role was. Can I be held responsible for the oscillations that transcend the boundaries of the world unknown to myself? Can I plead ignorance to the violent winds that time has carried forward? Perhaps I should have recognized the signs and held fast, playing the skies with caution instead of carelessness. Or maybe I had nothing to do with the typhoon at all, and simply added an ounce of of movement to an insurmountable force. I'll never know for sure. The damage has been done and I can only speculate from the wreckage. And that is exactly the problem I am facing today.
Ten years ago a butterfly flapped his wings. Six years ago the typhoon hit. Today the sky seems one star darker.
Always remember, never forget,
MDR
- Chaos Theory
It is amazing the profound impact that a simple action can have. They say a butterfly can flap its wings and across the world chaos ensues. Ten years ago a butterfly flapped its wings. Ten years I ignored someone who genuinely needed help and days later chaos ensued. At the time it seemed a trivial act of indifference, something I've done a thousand times over. But we can flutter our wings our entire lives and never know in which instant we threaten the world, surely I had done so before and have done so since. This time was different though. In a moment identical to any of the billions we watch fly before our eyes, I made a mistake which has come full circle to cast my own mind into disarray.
Six years ago the typhoon hit. And while I can't help but call to my defense the countless variables that twisted that simple flutter of wings into a nightmare, I wonder now what my role was. Can I be held responsible for the oscillations that transcend the boundaries of the world unknown to myself? Can I plead ignorance to the violent winds that time has carried forward? Perhaps I should have recognized the signs and held fast, playing the skies with caution instead of carelessness. Or maybe I had nothing to do with the typhoon at all, and simply added an ounce of of movement to an insurmountable force. I'll never know for sure. The damage has been done and I can only speculate from the wreckage. And that is exactly the problem I am facing today.
Ten years ago a butterfly flapped his wings. Six years ago the typhoon hit. Today the sky seems one star darker.
Always remember, never forget,
MDR
3/24/10
Irreversible
Anywhere you go it will find you. In the deepest of depths it will dive with you. At the highest of heights it will mirror your ascent. In the darkest of corners it hides with you. You cannot outrun it, nor will it give up. It will haunt your sleep as easily as your awake and conscious mind. And the harder you try to escape its reach, the tighter its grasp will become.
It is the thought that cannot be unthought. The conclusion that cannot be reversed. The understanding that will always be understood. In a world full of ignorance, sometimes I wish I could steal a little back.
It is the thought that cannot be unthought. The conclusion that cannot be reversed. The understanding that will always be understood. In a world full of ignorance, sometimes I wish I could steal a little back.
3/13/10
1/31/10
Perspective
Everything we experience in this world comes from our own unique perspectives. Whether as individuals or mankind as a race, we quantify the world based on our own standards. I think this is one of the main factors that prohibit us from making large strides in understanding existence. We get about 80 years on this planet, and thus we characterize the entire universe based on viewpoints of less than a century. This is why we go crazy over things like global warming; our sample size is so small that we fail to the see the big picture.
Why?
Is it because we subconsciously reject the futility of our own existence in a massive universe? Or do we simply lack the awareness? Or do we even care?
You start to think about how insignificant you are and wonder what the point to anything is. Meanwhile, the person next to you is caught up in the inconsequential details of life, obsessed with the mundane. Don't they understand? Don't they realize? I don't think they would even if you told them. Before long you start to wonder why you feel this way in a world that feels the opposite? Am I crazy or are they? Or are we both? What can I gain in my 80 years that won't be washed away in another 80, like a footprint on a sandy beach? Aren't we all just footprints? Some are deeper than others, sure, but in time they all fade.
And it's not as if life were easy. On the whole it can seem very daunting, especially for someone in my shoes. What will change that? What can I hope to find that will make me think every minute on this planet is worthwhile? Is there anything? And even if there is, would it really change my mind or merely distract me from the reality of our existence?
What will tip the scales and outweigh the burden of life? I don't think anything will, not for me at least. Yet I continue searching for an answer in the dark, following breadcrumbs, searching for a light switch. And so does everyone else. And none of it makes sense. I have less than 80 years left to find that light switch. Or maybe I have less than 80 until it finds me.
Why?
Is it because we subconsciously reject the futility of our own existence in a massive universe? Or do we simply lack the awareness? Or do we even care?
You start to think about how insignificant you are and wonder what the point to anything is. Meanwhile, the person next to you is caught up in the inconsequential details of life, obsessed with the mundane. Don't they understand? Don't they realize? I don't think they would even if you told them. Before long you start to wonder why you feel this way in a world that feels the opposite? Am I crazy or are they? Or are we both? What can I gain in my 80 years that won't be washed away in another 80, like a footprint on a sandy beach? Aren't we all just footprints? Some are deeper than others, sure, but in time they all fade.
And it's not as if life were easy. On the whole it can seem very daunting, especially for someone in my shoes. What will change that? What can I hope to find that will make me think every minute on this planet is worthwhile? Is there anything? And even if there is, would it really change my mind or merely distract me from the reality of our existence?
What will tip the scales and outweigh the burden of life? I don't think anything will, not for me at least. Yet I continue searching for an answer in the dark, following breadcrumbs, searching for a light switch. And so does everyone else. And none of it makes sense. I have less than 80 years left to find that light switch. Or maybe I have less than 80 until it finds me.
1/30/10
1/18/10
EKGs, the Universe, and me making discoveries that have been already made
So I'm plugging away at some physiology notes last night. EKGs and heart rhythms and the like. Eventually I get to a lecture on the leads and how they are placed on the chest during an EKG. In a nutshell, if the polarization of the heart is parallel to the lead, it will spike up or down depending on direction, but if it is perpendicular the lead will completely miss the current passed through your heart. That's not important though. What is important, is that it got me thinking about how certain measurements can be effectively masked depending on where you measure them from. My initial response to this idea was a question, but to be quite I honest I don't know why. Said question was:
If you walk a day in forest, and at the end of the day return to your original location, is it absolutely necessary to have traveled in a loop?
I quickly decided the only possibilities to be either a) yes you traveled in a loop, or b) the ground followed you, and you traveled in a line. The loop answer intrigued me, because you undoubtedly would move, but never reach any new finish point. And then in a gigantic storm of lightning bolts erupting from my head, I realized that if we apply this thinking to time, everything makes sense. Essentially I came to the following conclusion:
1. The universe is expanding in 3 dimensions, X,Y,Z. Each dimension is analogous to the planes of a 3D graph.
2. The fourth dimension is time. Time dictates XYZ based on a temporal measurement. At any time XYZ will have a specific value.
3. As the universe expands, so does time. Thus we can plot the expansion of the universe as a function of time expanding in unison.
4. At some point the universe will reach its maximum distance from (0,0,0), and will begin to retract.
5. When the universe begins to retract, time will also retract with it. This will cause time to flow backwards.
6. Eventually the universe will erupt again and time will flow forward.
Essentially this explained to me why humans have such a difficult time quantifying the extent of the universe and time. We hear question like "What lies outside the edge of the universe?", or "what came before god?". We ask these questions because we naively see time a finite, forward-only measurement. On our graph, time never follows XYZ according to this line of thinking. Instead it just meanders aimlessly as a ray. Instead, think of time as circular. Think of it as a ball on a string that spins around and around, almost like a bola. If you look at it from the side, you simply see a ball moving back and fourth. This is analogous to how we see it, except our reference point is so temporally small that we see only a fraction of the spin; all we see is the ball moving forward or backward for an infinitesimally small stretch of a revolution. Thus, it appears as the ball is simply moving forward in an infinite ray. Instead, think of time as the picture of the ball from above or below. Its path is a circle that extends away from a point and returns to its origin. I think this is how time works. It simply moves in a circle from the moment the universe begins to expand, to the moment it begins to contract, and to the moment it reaches the start point again.
What does this explain? A lot, I think. If someone asks, "what lies outside of the universe?" don't think of the question in terms of XYZ, think of it in terms of our circular time. In this situation outside the universe corresponds to a point in which time doesn't exist, because it never makes it that far. Thus, there is no outside the universe. Alternatively, "before god" corresponds to before existence, which subsequently means before explosion of the universe. In other words, what happens before a circular revolution of time begins? Simply the end of another revolution. Think about it, it would explain a lot. Unfortunately, my thoughts of single handedly being the first person to decipher the universe were not to be, and a quick google search has shown that the idea has existed for a while. On the flipside, though, I must admit it felt good to put together some pieces I didn't think would ever fall together. Even if I wasn't the first.
It makes me wonder if maybe, just maybe, understanding existence is possible to understand from our vantage point on Earth. Maybe "Lecture 21: Blood Flow Dynamics" holds the next key. Somehow I doubt it.
If you walk a day in forest, and at the end of the day return to your original location, is it absolutely necessary to have traveled in a loop?
I quickly decided the only possibilities to be either a) yes you traveled in a loop, or b) the ground followed you, and you traveled in a line. The loop answer intrigued me, because you undoubtedly would move, but never reach any new finish point. And then in a gigantic storm of lightning bolts erupting from my head, I realized that if we apply this thinking to time, everything makes sense. Essentially I came to the following conclusion:
1. The universe is expanding in 3 dimensions, X,Y,Z. Each dimension is analogous to the planes of a 3D graph.
2. The fourth dimension is time. Time dictates XYZ based on a temporal measurement. At any time XYZ will have a specific value.
3. As the universe expands, so does time. Thus we can plot the expansion of the universe as a function of time expanding in unison.
4. At some point the universe will reach its maximum distance from (0,0,0), and will begin to retract.
5. When the universe begins to retract, time will also retract with it. This will cause time to flow backwards.
6. Eventually the universe will erupt again and time will flow forward.
Essentially this explained to me why humans have such a difficult time quantifying the extent of the universe and time. We hear question like "What lies outside the edge of the universe?", or "what came before god?". We ask these questions because we naively see time a finite, forward-only measurement. On our graph, time never follows XYZ according to this line of thinking. Instead it just meanders aimlessly as a ray. Instead, think of time as circular. Think of it as a ball on a string that spins around and around, almost like a bola. If you look at it from the side, you simply see a ball moving back and fourth. This is analogous to how we see it, except our reference point is so temporally small that we see only a fraction of the spin; all we see is the ball moving forward or backward for an infinitesimally small stretch of a revolution. Thus, it appears as the ball is simply moving forward in an infinite ray. Instead, think of time as the picture of the ball from above or below. Its path is a circle that extends away from a point and returns to its origin. I think this is how time works. It simply moves in a circle from the moment the universe begins to expand, to the moment it begins to contract, and to the moment it reaches the start point again.
What does this explain? A lot, I think. If someone asks, "what lies outside of the universe?" don't think of the question in terms of XYZ, think of it in terms of our circular time. In this situation outside the universe corresponds to a point in which time doesn't exist, because it never makes it that far. Thus, there is no outside the universe. Alternatively, "before god" corresponds to before existence, which subsequently means before explosion of the universe. In other words, what happens before a circular revolution of time begins? Simply the end of another revolution. Think about it, it would explain a lot. Unfortunately, my thoughts of single handedly being the first person to decipher the universe were not to be, and a quick google search has shown that the idea has existed for a while. On the flipside, though, I must admit it felt good to put together some pieces I didn't think would ever fall together. Even if I wasn't the first.
It makes me wonder if maybe, just maybe, understanding existence is possible to understand from our vantage point on Earth. Maybe "Lecture 21: Blood Flow Dynamics" holds the next key. Somehow I doubt it.
1/9/10
Choices
The other day I asked a friend a hypothetical question.
If you had the opportunity to plug into a machine that would generate a virtual world of your desiring (in this case I presented the fictional world of Pandora from the movie Avatar), but by doing so you would only live to the age of 50, what would you do? Any choice would be permanent.
a. Live your own life.
b. Live your own life in the machine.
c. Accept, taking with you the knowledge that your perceived world was false.
d. Accept, oblivious to the fact your perceived world was false.
e. None of the above.
He chose D immediately. I agreed. I find it interesting we both decided that knowing our worlds were false would be less desirable than not knowing. I'm not entirely sure why this is the case. I suppose the perception that said world was not "real" would dampen the experience, but why should we care? What is real? Is reality a finite thing, or is it subject to what we perceive. Is a dream fake and real life real, or vice versa? Or can we know? Does it matter?
What I found most interesting about this little experiment was the conversation afterward, concerning religion. In his religious belief we all go to heaven when we die, and essentially live out our lives in paradise. I asked him why he didn't kill himself and go to heaven. He replied that doing so was a sin that would keep him out. I responded by asking him that if persons of religion truly believed in heaven, why is death mourned and not celebrated. Why does a religious person look at death with fear and not anticipation? My answer is that they don't truly believe. They spend their entire lives living according to some set of divine rules, but can never find any true proof that their devotion is to a real thing. How can someone trust in something that has no form save word of mouth. Is this not the same sustenance of myth? On the other hand, one could argue that for millions of years life has been fine tuned to evade death, and that this phenomenon is simply a byproduct of evolution. It makes sense. But does that mean evolution overrules religion? Does our sympathetic nervous system have more pull than a sympathy to god? Should it? And aren't religion and evolution mutually exclusive ideas?
This idea brought me to another point that I have spent much time thinking about. If our own bodies play such a role in our actions and perceptions, what is man in absence of their effects. Truly, hormones and chemicals rule our lives from behind the scenes. If chemical X or hormone Y varies from its reference range, we cannot help but experience some change in how we operate. A cocktail of all the modulators of human mood exists in perfect balance to maintain us as we are. In reality, they define us. But do they keep us normal, or do they force us to a point where we are more capable of survival. What would man be without these influences? We consider persons suffering from depression the victims of disease because they have a deficiency in some molecule. But aren't they simply less effected by the pull of biology? Do they lack some essential part, or are they less effected by some modulator? Perhaps they see things clearer than we do? What would thought look like in a biological vacuum? I suppose in a vacuum man would think in terms of pure rational and calculated thought. Would he have emotion, or is emotion a result of chemical modulators? I think he would resemble very much a biological computer. His methods would be cold and calculated. They would be devoid of bias or irrational thought. Perhaps he would see religion , with its complete lack of rational evidence, and discard it completely. How would he view existence then? If there is no heaven, would we simply disappear when we die? There is no better evidenced explanation. And finally, which answer to my initial question would a computer choose? I can't help but think he would view life as pointless, irregardless of its appearance. I think he would see existence, as we live it, to be a chore. For this reason I say he picks e and shuts himself down. Is it any wonder then, that many depressed persons choose the same?
If you had the opportunity to plug into a machine that would generate a virtual world of your desiring (in this case I presented the fictional world of Pandora from the movie Avatar), but by doing so you would only live to the age of 50, what would you do? Any choice would be permanent.
a. Live your own life.
b. Live your own life in the machine.
c. Accept, taking with you the knowledge that your perceived world was false.
d. Accept, oblivious to the fact your perceived world was false.
e. None of the above.
He chose D immediately. I agreed. I find it interesting we both decided that knowing our worlds were false would be less desirable than not knowing. I'm not entirely sure why this is the case. I suppose the perception that said world was not "real" would dampen the experience, but why should we care? What is real? Is reality a finite thing, or is it subject to what we perceive. Is a dream fake and real life real, or vice versa? Or can we know? Does it matter?
What I found most interesting about this little experiment was the conversation afterward, concerning religion. In his religious belief we all go to heaven when we die, and essentially live out our lives in paradise. I asked him why he didn't kill himself and go to heaven. He replied that doing so was a sin that would keep him out. I responded by asking him that if persons of religion truly believed in heaven, why is death mourned and not celebrated. Why does a religious person look at death with fear and not anticipation? My answer is that they don't truly believe. They spend their entire lives living according to some set of divine rules, but can never find any true proof that their devotion is to a real thing. How can someone trust in something that has no form save word of mouth. Is this not the same sustenance of myth? On the other hand, one could argue that for millions of years life has been fine tuned to evade death, and that this phenomenon is simply a byproduct of evolution. It makes sense. But does that mean evolution overrules religion? Does our sympathetic nervous system have more pull than a sympathy to god? Should it? And aren't religion and evolution mutually exclusive ideas?
This idea brought me to another point that I have spent much time thinking about. If our own bodies play such a role in our actions and perceptions, what is man in absence of their effects. Truly, hormones and chemicals rule our lives from behind the scenes. If chemical X or hormone Y varies from its reference range, we cannot help but experience some change in how we operate. A cocktail of all the modulators of human mood exists in perfect balance to maintain us as we are. In reality, they define us. But do they keep us normal, or do they force us to a point where we are more capable of survival. What would man be without these influences? We consider persons suffering from depression the victims of disease because they have a deficiency in some molecule. But aren't they simply less effected by the pull of biology? Do they lack some essential part, or are they less effected by some modulator? Perhaps they see things clearer than we do? What would thought look like in a biological vacuum? I suppose in a vacuum man would think in terms of pure rational and calculated thought. Would he have emotion, or is emotion a result of chemical modulators? I think he would resemble very much a biological computer. His methods would be cold and calculated. They would be devoid of bias or irrational thought. Perhaps he would see religion , with its complete lack of rational evidence, and discard it completely. How would he view existence then? If there is no heaven, would we simply disappear when we die? There is no better evidenced explanation. And finally, which answer to my initial question would a computer choose? I can't help but think he would view life as pointless, irregardless of its appearance. I think he would see existence, as we live it, to be a chore. For this reason I say he picks e and shuts himself down. Is it any wonder then, that many depressed persons choose the same?
A Clockwork World
I've had a lot of ideas as to what I would type on this blog. I debated trying to write out a short book in blog-form, but decided not to. The major difficulty in trying to maintain that sort of structure is that I would have to build on subjects with each successive post, and the truth is sometimes that simply is not conducive to good insight. Instead, I'm just going to write about whatever I feel is important/recent/relevant when I come to the keyboard. That way I can take thoughts already in my head and not try to develop them on the fly. Hopefully it will lead to a little more success than my last try.
Lately I've been a little down, and have been having problems focusing on what I need to be focusing on. The onset of this spell was about a week ago when I was coming out of winter break. At some point I think I was mulling over the themes from Avatar, and I came to a realization that James Cameron has essentially created and immersed us in a world that was in so many ways superior to our own. Over and over I read and hear of how people go to see the movie and come out depressed when they remember that they have their own boring lives to return to. It made me realize that our own "happiness" is grossly limited by the shackles of our individual realities. Now, this is nothing new to me and admittedly I've spent many hours exploring the subject before. I guess the underlying difference was that it never really sank in when I debated it in my own head, as opposed to actually falling victim to the idea. Truly, I exited the theater with a cloud of depression over my head, realizing that instead of sleeping in trees I would be staying up at night studying for tests. I couldn't help but ask myself why this was the case and why we stand for it. I can't speak for everyone, but in my specific situation this idea is very disturbing. I began school at about age 5 I believe, and I will finish it when I hit 30. The next 7 years of my life will spent studying and living out of hospitals. I will never swing from the trees of Pandora, nor will I do anything of significance in my little reality. Yet I accept it and struggle through my difficulties, as do those around me. I find myself looking forward to the short hours of the night that I can sleep and, because they are the only way I ever enjoy this life. In a dream anything is possible, and we experience the outer edges of emotions far more often than in real life. This is what I find depressing. Reality. It is the sole limit on the happiness we can achieve in this life. In its absence our minds roam free to explore any corner of the realm of possibility. In its presence we grind through the day like machines. Some day I expect we will find an answer to this problem, as I expect that technology will eventually supersede the limits of what we perceive as real. The movie The Matrix comes to mind. Imagine a world that was completely artificial and yet completely convincing. A persistent dream. Our minds would decide what is and is not possible, and from there we would construct worlds lush with imagination. Who would want to return to reality? Who would choose their current life? I wouldn't.
Lately I've been a little down, and have been having problems focusing on what I need to be focusing on. The onset of this spell was about a week ago when I was coming out of winter break. At some point I think I was mulling over the themes from Avatar, and I came to a realization that James Cameron has essentially created and immersed us in a world that was in so many ways superior to our own. Over and over I read and hear of how people go to see the movie and come out depressed when they remember that they have their own boring lives to return to. It made me realize that our own "happiness" is grossly limited by the shackles of our individual realities. Now, this is nothing new to me and admittedly I've spent many hours exploring the subject before. I guess the underlying difference was that it never really sank in when I debated it in my own head, as opposed to actually falling victim to the idea. Truly, I exited the theater with a cloud of depression over my head, realizing that instead of sleeping in trees I would be staying up at night studying for tests. I couldn't help but ask myself why this was the case and why we stand for it. I can't speak for everyone, but in my specific situation this idea is very disturbing. I began school at about age 5 I believe, and I will finish it when I hit 30. The next 7 years of my life will spent studying and living out of hospitals. I will never swing from the trees of Pandora, nor will I do anything of significance in my little reality. Yet I accept it and struggle through my difficulties, as do those around me. I find myself looking forward to the short hours of the night that I can sleep and, because they are the only way I ever enjoy this life. In a dream anything is possible, and we experience the outer edges of emotions far more often than in real life. This is what I find depressing. Reality. It is the sole limit on the happiness we can achieve in this life. In its absence our minds roam free to explore any corner of the realm of possibility. In its presence we grind through the day like machines. Some day I expect we will find an answer to this problem, as I expect that technology will eventually supersede the limits of what we perceive as real. The movie The Matrix comes to mind. Imagine a world that was completely artificial and yet completely convincing. A persistent dream. Our minds would decide what is and is not possible, and from there we would construct worlds lush with imagination. Who would want to return to reality? Who would choose their current life? I wouldn't.
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