Thursday, January 7, 2010
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Perfection
I'm sitting outside on my soft green, lawn in a comfortable chair slowing sipping a refreshing drink while a cool breeze offsets the warmth of sun on my skin.
Glimmering into existence are a family. Several children playing with glee and a wife sitting with me sharing a knowing look. I rub the soft fur of a content pooch with my toe as he pretends to sleep at my chair. I look back at our the home that has carried our memories.
And then it all vanishes. I sit alone without drink nor breeze nor sun nor child nor wife nor dog.
Yet the feeling of contentment has not left.
My dream is but an expression of myself and I am still me.
Glimmering into existence are a family. Several children playing with glee and a wife sitting with me sharing a knowing look. I rub the soft fur of a content pooch with my toe as he pretends to sleep at my chair. I look back at our the home that has carried our memories.
And then it all vanishes. I sit alone without drink nor breeze nor sun nor child nor wife nor dog.
Yet the feeling of contentment has not left.
My dream is but an expression of myself and I am still me.
Saturday, March 22, 2008
The Certain Uncertainty Principle
I think that the more we learn, the less confident we become.
I think that macroscopically this idea could be applied to humanity's transition from religion to science. When we knew less we thought things happened because there was a all-knowing God that controlled our fates. Now that we now about DNA, bacteria and other complexities of the world, we can't be as certain that we aren't all alone.
Microscopically the idea could apply to a single man's life. A naive young man is full of confidence and bravado, but a hardened older man is wise and tempered.
I heard Andrew Denton say that there should be a University where students graduate when they admit that they don't know anything. He knows what I'm talking about. It is to learn so much that there is always an alternative solution to suggest. A myriad of possibilities leading to intellectual confusion.
I call this phenomenon The Certain Uncertainty Principle. This principle could be a negative influence for us, but I think there is one thing that turns it into a positive.
Can it be denied that we all possess a degree of innate wisdom? Can children not smell a lie and find the truth in complex situations? I think this innate wisdom allows us to see through the fog of a thousand alternate solutions. An innate wisdom to find parsimony.I think that with learning it is easy to forget this innate wisdom that we all possess as children.
True geniuses are those of us who have learned enough to become experts and then reintroduced themselves to their innate wisdom. These true geniuses possess Informed Wisdom.
I remember reading a Pablo Picasso quote saying that as a child he could paint like Rembrant, but that it took him a lifetime to learn to paint like a child.
I know exactly what he meant.
I think that macroscopically this idea could be applied to humanity's transition from religion to science. When we knew less we thought things happened because there was a all-knowing God that controlled our fates. Now that we now about DNA, bacteria and other complexities of the world, we can't be as certain that we aren't all alone.
Microscopically the idea could apply to a single man's life. A naive young man is full of confidence and bravado, but a hardened older man is wise and tempered.
I heard Andrew Denton say that there should be a University where students graduate when they admit that they don't know anything. He knows what I'm talking about. It is to learn so much that there is always an alternative solution to suggest. A myriad of possibilities leading to intellectual confusion.
I call this phenomenon The Certain Uncertainty Principle. This principle could be a negative influence for us, but I think there is one thing that turns it into a positive.
Can it be denied that we all possess a degree of innate wisdom? Can children not smell a lie and find the truth in complex situations? I think this innate wisdom allows us to see through the fog of a thousand alternate solutions. An innate wisdom to find parsimony.I think that with learning it is easy to forget this innate wisdom that we all possess as children.
True geniuses are those of us who have learned enough to become experts and then reintroduced themselves to their innate wisdom. These true geniuses possess Informed Wisdom.
I remember reading a Pablo Picasso quote saying that as a child he could paint like Rembrant, but that it took him a lifetime to learn to paint like a child.
I know exactly what he meant.
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Existentialism, evolution and making it to tomorrow
I can distinctly remember thinking that existentialism was something that narcissistic people spouted about when they wanted to portray themselves as deep.
I never really knew why. But then I never really knew what existentialism was.
From Wikipedia: "Existentialism is a philosophical movement which posits that individual human beings create the meaning and essence of their lives"
Existentialism is actually something I have considered for a long time.
I grew up in a family that was pretty much agnostic, though my mother is Christian and took us to Church every now and then. I never really believed in Christ though, so I can't say I ever really was a Christian.
When I was doing my science degree I did a bunch of genetics courses and learned about evolution. I learned that humans are but biological entities that have come to fruition through natural selection, will to survive and random chance.
On the time line of biological life, humans are but a speck. On the time line of the universe, I don't think there is something small enough to describe us.
I also learned about how elaborate our bodies are. How there is an unfathomable complexity within each and every one of us. A million different biological mechanisms are at play even while we sleep.
Indeed, it is a miracle that we exist.
This made me question my lack of belief. Is it possible that such an elaborate system of cells could come together so successfully by shear chance as my studies had taught me?
After carefully consideration, I came to the conclusion that yes, the evolutionary drama of natural selection, biological will to survive and random chance played out over an incredible length of time could have created us and our environment.
It just seemed so incredibly unlikely. What are the chances? I wouldn't back that horse.
Still, I accepted that there did not need to be a creative force, one that oversees the world ensuring things go toward some divine plan. Things just happen.
To me this is existentialism. What we do does not matter. We are free to do whatever we please.
But is this knowledge a blessing or a curse?
This liberation could allow us to follow our own unique path, developing our own priorities, morals and doing what we feel is best.
But I can also see it being taken another way. We don't matter, so why bother doing anything at all? Also, when our lives take a turn for the worst, who do we turn to in times of need?
An aside: I think the latter point is why religion was created. Some person or group of people saw others in pain and created a means for them to believe that their lives were meaningful and that there was someone looking out for them. I also think religion was created as a mechanism to control the population beyond law-enforcement.
I have come to believe in somewhat of an intermediate between existentialism and traditional religion.
To me, the biological will to live is the common force that has united us to each other and our living environment since that day when primordial soup + lightning equaled life.
Life is what I believe in.
I find some similarities between my belief and a belief in Gaia, which to my understanding is a belief in mother Earth. The difference being that I don't really put much spiritual weight on a rock or a grain of dirt. Still when people ask me if I am religious I usually answer that I believe in something similar to Gaia.
It's a lot faster than going through all the above.
I never really knew why. But then I never really knew what existentialism was.
From Wikipedia: "Existentialism is a philosophical movement which posits that individual human beings create the meaning and essence of their lives"
Existentialism is actually something I have considered for a long time.
I grew up in a family that was pretty much agnostic, though my mother is Christian and took us to Church every now and then. I never really believed in Christ though, so I can't say I ever really was a Christian.
When I was doing my science degree I did a bunch of genetics courses and learned about evolution. I learned that humans are but biological entities that have come to fruition through natural selection, will to survive and random chance.
On the time line of biological life, humans are but a speck. On the time line of the universe, I don't think there is something small enough to describe us.
I also learned about how elaborate our bodies are. How there is an unfathomable complexity within each and every one of us. A million different biological mechanisms are at play even while we sleep.
Indeed, it is a miracle that we exist.
This made me question my lack of belief. Is it possible that such an elaborate system of cells could come together so successfully by shear chance as my studies had taught me?
After carefully consideration, I came to the conclusion that yes, the evolutionary drama of natural selection, biological will to survive and random chance played out over an incredible length of time could have created us and our environment.
It just seemed so incredibly unlikely. What are the chances? I wouldn't back that horse.
Still, I accepted that there did not need to be a creative force, one that oversees the world ensuring things go toward some divine plan. Things just happen.
To me this is existentialism. What we do does not matter. We are free to do whatever we please.
But is this knowledge a blessing or a curse?
This liberation could allow us to follow our own unique path, developing our own priorities, morals and doing what we feel is best.
But I can also see it being taken another way. We don't matter, so why bother doing anything at all? Also, when our lives take a turn for the worst, who do we turn to in times of need?
An aside: I think the latter point is why religion was created. Some person or group of people saw others in pain and created a means for them to believe that their lives were meaningful and that there was someone looking out for them. I also think religion was created as a mechanism to control the population beyond law-enforcement.
I have come to believe in somewhat of an intermediate between existentialism and traditional religion.
To me, the biological will to live is the common force that has united us to each other and our living environment since that day when primordial soup + lightning equaled life.
Life is what I believe in.
I find some similarities between my belief and a belief in Gaia, which to my understanding is a belief in mother Earth. The difference being that I don't really put much spiritual weight on a rock or a grain of dirt. Still when people ask me if I am religious I usually answer that I believe in something similar to Gaia.
It's a lot faster than going through all the above.
Sunday, October 28, 2007
A guitar is a beautifully romantic theoretical nerd.
Playing music on a guitar is a juxtaposition of nerdly intellect and romantic sensualism. I found out through experience. (boy was that guitar a mess afterwards ha!)
I first started playing guitar when I started my physiotherapy degree.
On first picking it up, I succeeded only in making the guitar sound like a box of disgruntled cats being shaken like a cassonette to the tune of Eye of the Tiger. It retrospect, why would it not? Poor tuning, block chords, heavy strums, poor rhythm and badly sung covers: I sucked hard.
(an aside, I find rhythm do be the hardest word to spell in the English language)
But, there were odd transient moments when I really enjoyed what came out of the guitar. In these moments, it seemed to sing to me. I tried to reproduce these moments.
I failed miserably.
So how could I discover the secret to making a guitar sing?
With that question, my fate was sealed: I started on a journey of musical discovery.
First, I needed to know how to find the good, non-disgruntled cat notes. So I studied music theory. This process was mechanical, unemotional, sexless and nerdily scientific. I had note pads filled with messes of numbers, cartoon fret-boards with circled chord shapes and scales, chord progressions with superimposed melody lines...in my head, my guitar began to look like a maze of numbers.
But, the results were starting to come: the singing moments were more frequent and the disgrunteld cat moments rarer. This success added to my need for discovery and I began to become a smidge obsessed.
I felt my nerdly musical obsession was crystalised with one moment: I was sitting in a physio lecture and furiously taking notes. A friend glanced over at my note pad with a look of confusion and asked incredulously 'what lecture and you listening to?' She had seen my outwardly insane-looking scrawlings. After pulling myself out of my concentration-enduced coma, I could only answer "I'm figuring out music."
So I was a little insane for a while.
But it really started to come together. Once I could autonomously avoid the disgruntled-cat notes on the fretboard, I was free to listen to my music. This was when learning guitar changed from being a mental exercise to being a romantic meeting of mind and melody.
The world of non-disgruntled cat notes was deeper than I first thought. I discovered that non-disgruntled cat melodies carry their own stories and these stories are set to context by the accompanying chord progressions expressed as other melodic stories of bass and harmony. The intimacies of each story could be expressed by the note's timbre, volume and rhythmic approach (being ahead of or behind the beat). I discovered that changes to any of these factors create musical drama.
This romantic beauty side of music is in contrast to the theoretical nerd side. It is expressive, sensual and requires more than an IQ.
But neither can exist with out the other.
Guitar: a beautiful nerd.
Thursday, September 6, 2007
Sleepy Sunday Truffle on a Dime
- Mix 1lb hyperactive-brother & pooch into early morning dozing till awake and bleerily looking at Fox 8 through rubbed eyes
- Stir in 4oz of contended-to-have-chickens-under-wings Susan to TV sofa and need with bare hands till soft and warmly cosy
- Abruptly add 1 dollop father till 3/4 mixture is ready to head on 100k bike
- Separate male ingredients and bake till exhaustion (skin will be lightly brown with a hint of scarlet)
- Recombine males with mixture and add 1 tablespoon of mum's cooking (fight the temptation to taste here!)
- Let rest for afternoon before reheating for evening's entertainment
- Ice carefully with some final calories on top
- Sprinkle Australian Idol and Rove to garnish
- Serves 4-5 routinely.
I'm finally patient enough to read novels
And I'm happy about it.
For most of my life, I've found reading a novel a challenge because
But that all changed when about a year ago I was reading a magazine and found a list of Stephen King's favourite books read in 2006. This was a revelation to me: why not let a fantastic author illuminate captivating titles rather than taking ill-judged stabs in the dark? I started reading my way through his list and began to discover that novels are the perfect way to transport you into the mind of an entirely different person. And unlike my prior attempts, which saw me reading a bunch of crime/detective thriller pap, I've been having no trouble reading in big old solid blocks of time - this is particularly easy when wrapped in 1 x cosy doona and when serenaded by pitter-pattering rain on window sill.
Now I can't get enough - especially when the novel gets me inside the mind of someone quite different to me or anyone I know well. For example, I particularly enjoyed Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, which gave me a insight into the mind of someone with autistic spectrum disorder.
Currently, I am reading The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne, which tells the story of the 9 year-old son of the Nazi Commandant running Auschwitz. Haven't come across anyone like that around Brisbane.
I've always been prone to a bit of arm-chair psychology and this sort of stuff is highly stimulating for the reclining leather chair-prescribing shrink that pontificates endlessly inside me.
I managed to read 6 novels last month, but am back at clinic this month. Heavens know that saps the aura right off your ectoplasm. After a day of constant learning and dealing with people, watching Australian Idol can be mentally challenging, let alone mustering the energy to imagine a world dictated by some words on a page...
Anyhoo, I have a new position statement to issue to the public: reading is cool.
For most of my life, I've found reading a novel a challenge because
- I never would read for longer than 1 hour continuously because I would become restless and
- I had no idea how to find novels that I might enjoy.
But that all changed when about a year ago I was reading a magazine and found a list of Stephen King's favourite books read in 2006. This was a revelation to me: why not let a fantastic author illuminate captivating titles rather than taking ill-judged stabs in the dark? I started reading my way through his list and began to discover that novels are the perfect way to transport you into the mind of an entirely different person. And unlike my prior attempts, which saw me reading a bunch of crime/detective thriller pap, I've been having no trouble reading in big old solid blocks of time - this is particularly easy when wrapped in 1 x cosy doona and when serenaded by pitter-pattering rain on window sill.
Now I can't get enough - especially when the novel gets me inside the mind of someone quite different to me or anyone I know well. For example, I particularly enjoyed Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, which gave me a insight into the mind of someone with autistic spectrum disorder.
Currently, I am reading The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne, which tells the story of the 9 year-old son of the Nazi Commandant running Auschwitz. Haven't come across anyone like that around Brisbane.
I've always been prone to a bit of arm-chair psychology and this sort of stuff is highly stimulating for the reclining leather chair-prescribing shrink that pontificates endlessly inside me.
I managed to read 6 novels last month, but am back at clinic this month. Heavens know that saps the aura right off your ectoplasm. After a day of constant learning and dealing with people, watching Australian Idol can be mentally challenging, let alone mustering the energy to imagine a world dictated by some words on a page...
Anyhoo, I have a new position statement to issue to the public: reading is cool.
Sunday, August 19, 2007
My Impending Baldness
I am losing my hair in the good old pattern way. Give me 5 years and I will be getting it cut close all over. 10 years and I will be stock-piling scalp wax to enhance my sexy Captain Picard-like shiny dome. An aside: how cool is Patrick Stewart?
I knew it was noticeable when a hairdresser took thinning scissors to the sides without asking - she had assumed I was cool with evening the sides out to be like that top! That was a very funny moment for me.
One Greek hairdresser noted "is shame: so thick on side, but not so much on top." She then shared with me her husband's story and how he has found great relief with a shampoo that has slowed his shedding dramatically.
But you know, I can't be stuffed. I'll be doing a civic duty as "short back and sides" will take on a new, far less-taxing meaning for my hairdressers!
And at least I know that women that show interest in my will be after me personality!
Monday, July 16, 2007
To Blog or not to Blog?
Today I was invited to Facebook by a friend and decided to sign up and enter the world of on-line exposure. So after patiently sifting through the entry forms and clicking multiple "I agree to Terms & Conditions" boxes without actually reading the Terms & Conditions, I now have a FB and also a Blog.
You can automatically search your e-mail address book to see whom of them have FaceBooks. It is a strange thing to go through your e-mail contacts (including friends, workmates, classmates and acquaintances) and see who of them a) you want to have on your FaceBook and b) would not think you a weirdo stalker by adding them ("Love me! Love me!!). Also, were some invitations obligatory?
After that, I was to create my FaceBook profile. It dawned on me that this little page was to act as a summary of me to date and perhaps this could be of certain importance. Not that I am religious, but if Judgement Day were tomorrow, whatever deity is actually raining Hell upon us might decide that reading millions of Blog and FaceBook profiles might be a good way to shortcut the red-tape at the Pearly Gates. But then I'm not religious, so that idea faded quickly.
So I added a photo, for which I chose a sexy pic of me at a triathlon, which in no way shows my impending baldness or pot-belly, and then set about trying to describe my interests and activities in a way that makes me appear appealing but trying not to embellish too much. (I have at some point read a book by Pulitzer Prize winner, but is it too much to say I am into French existential literature?)
I did notice I have a distinct attraction to 80's pop-culture. Power ballads, Sylvester Stallone, Transformers the Movie (cartoon) and Big Trouble in Little China all featured in my favourites.
Some of the contacts I selected to add as Friends agreed to my proposal and so my Facebook is now decorated with their pictures. I immediately noticed how many strikingly attractive girls I know! Why did I only notice this when seeing their pictures on the Internet?
But now what to do with my Facebook? I have some friends, some nice pictures and a few comments, but what do you do now? Am I cooler now that I have a Facebook?
Time will tell..
You can automatically search your e-mail address book to see whom of them have FaceBooks. It is a strange thing to go through your e-mail contacts (including friends, workmates, classmates and acquaintances) and see who of them a) you want to have on your FaceBook and b) would not think you a weirdo stalker by adding them ("Love me! Love me!!). Also, were some invitations obligatory?
After that, I was to create my FaceBook profile. It dawned on me that this little page was to act as a summary of me to date and perhaps this could be of certain importance. Not that I am religious, but if Judgement Day were tomorrow, whatever deity is actually raining Hell upon us might decide that reading millions of Blog and FaceBook profiles might be a good way to shortcut the red-tape at the Pearly Gates. But then I'm not religious, so that idea faded quickly.
So I added a photo, for which I chose a sexy pic of me at a triathlon, which in no way shows my impending baldness or pot-belly, and then set about trying to describe my interests and activities in a way that makes me appear appealing but trying not to embellish too much. (I have at some point read a book by Pulitzer Prize winner, but is it too much to say I am into French existential literature?)
I did notice I have a distinct attraction to 80's pop-culture. Power ballads, Sylvester Stallone, Transformers the Movie (cartoon) and Big Trouble in Little China all featured in my favourites.
Some of the contacts I selected to add as Friends agreed to my proposal and so my Facebook is now decorated with their pictures. I immediately noticed how many strikingly attractive girls I know! Why did I only notice this when seeing their pictures on the Internet?
But now what to do with my Facebook? I have some friends, some nice pictures and a few comments, but what do you do now? Am I cooler now that I have a Facebook?
Time will tell..
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
