"Real loss is only possible when you love something more than you love yourself."

- Sean, Good Will Hunting

Live Fast

I wanna be a Kennedy
I wanna be a big heartbreaker
Live fast and for real
And you can follow it in the papers

I wanna be a Kennedy
I wanna shake hands with heroes
And kiss the girls of centerfolds on the tongue
And die young

I'll be brave tonight
Either live or die
I'll be brave tonight
Standing tall and bright
Such romantic eyes
Got me hypnotized
And if I had my chance I'd never let you go
And if I had my chance I'd never let you go

I wanna be a Kennedy
I wanna be tall and handsome
I'd conquer the world
And you'd see it on television

If I could be a Kennedy
If I could be a real heartbreaker
I'd watch you crash into my arms
We're the stars under the barrel of a gun
We'd die young

I'll be brave tonight
Standing tall and bright
Such romantic eyes
Got me hypnotized
And if I had my chance I'd never let you go
And if I had my chance I'd never let you go



"One of my teenage heroes was Harry Crosby. He was a poet from the 1920s, and, frankly, his poetry sucked. But his lifestyle was legendary. The nephew and godson of J. P. Morgan, he hobnobbed with Ernest Hemingway and D. H. Lawrence, was the first person to publish parts of Joyce's Ulysses, and became a decadent symbol of the lost generation. He lived a fast, opium-enhanced life, and swore he would be dead by the age of thirty. When he was twenty-two, he married Polly Peabody, the inventor of the strapless bra, and persuaded her to change her name to Caresse. For their honeymoon, they locked themselves in a bedroom in Paris with stacks of books and just read. At the age of thirty-one, when he realized that his lifestyle hadn't killed him yet, Crosby shot himself."

- Neil Strauss, The Game

Thank You For Joining; Your Participation Is Important To Us

Whenever we seek protection from a system, or allow a system to help us, we are validating and strengthening that system and legitimizing it. For instance, living in a exponentially-growing technological world, it is a necessity to stay tech-savvy and keep up with products and software for the average person. This keeps us afloat, if not ahead of the game, and helps us deal with new challenges and problems that arise from pushing the boundaries of technological possibility.

See also: gang protection fees
See also: insurance
See also: China government
See also: banking
See also: US aid
See also: social pandering

Survival

Perhaps it can be said that nobody is really ever resigned. Everybody fights regardless of the situation or predicament. It's just how it's done, and how the rest of us judge it.

Give a real life loser access to the internet, and he can create a king in cyberspace. That's survival. When we deterioriate in reality, our virtual lives flourish. Identity is still identity regardless of the dimension.

Only that some dimensions are more 'real' than others. 'Better' than others. More 'respectable' than others.

Create more artificial and synthetic channels, worlds and realities as we progress technologically, and prepare to see a decline in the effort to uphold a respectable real life identity. Give people more places to hide away legitimately from our primary reality, and soon there'll be more soulless bodies than we might be comfortable with.

Even the heavily depressed are seeking survival by leaving this world.

Smart Bug

Holy hell. Those MSN viruses are getting smarter. One of them had a conversation with me today.

Sabrina:
Hey are you there?

jose:
yeah, wassup?

Sabrina:
i just took an IQ quiz

jose:
haha uh huh?
and?

Sabrina:
I was better than I am! I scored 108

jose:
haha ehh
meaning your IQ dropped

Sabrina:
u need to see if u can do better than me, http://iqscoretest4.com/?test=1mmb44503 [do not click this]

jose:
is this like a high level virus haha

Sabrina:
lol no its me [no fackin' shit! on 2 levels - a bot that tells you its not a bot in response to your query, and that i must be dumb to even ask this]

jose:
hahaha ok

Sabrina:
I bet you cant haha

jose:
you realize this sounds somewhat dodgy coz we havent talked for like 3 years or something and you're asking me to do an IQ test right
i'll be at it in abit
what've you been up to? [just to put it off and see if there's anything fishy going on]

Sabrina:
take it now while Im in the shower and tell me your score later

jose:
haha nope


Is this freaky or what.

"Just 'cause you feel it doesn't mean it's there."

- Radiohead, There There

But perhaps it is also true that because you can think, feel or perceive something, it exists as a construct in and of itself.

And as we might be aware, ideas or perceptions, although non-existent physically, have the potential to influence more than anything real.

φιλοσοφία philo-sophia: the love of wisdom or knowledge

I'm hearing very loud cricket rhythms outside my window as I devour some books. Along with the cool of the post-summer night air, it strangely makes me feel very very serene, as if it can be more vividly felt that there's nothing but dense foliage outside my house instead of roads and concrete, if I just closed my eyes.

I feel like meditating.

Forbidden

In her appointment book, next to his name it said Marilyn Monroe, the same as most guys here for their first time. She could live on just doing Marilyn. She could live on just doing Princess Diana.

To Mr. Jones, she said, imagine you’re looking up at a blue sky, and imagine a tiny airplane skywriting the letter Z. Then let the wind erase the letter. Then imagine the plane writing the letter Y. Let the wind erase it. Then the letter X. Erase it. Then the letter W.

Let the wind erase it.

All she really did was set the stage. She just introduced men to their ideal. She set them up on a date with their subconscious because nothing is as good as you can imagine it. No one is as beautiful as she is in your head. Nothing is as exciting as your fantasy.

Here you’d have the sex you’d only dreamt about. She’d set the stage and make the introductions. The rest of the session, she’d watch the clock and maybe read a book or do a crossword puzzle.

Here you’d never be disappointed.

- Choke


Things are sweeter when we can't have them. Little else is as beautiful or worthy as our ideals.

Assumptions

I'd always found the idea that the brain forms assumptions about the world in order to facilitate our lives very fascinating.

Assumptions, or cognitive inferences, are what separates humans from robots. One very salient instance of this is our ability to see a man and his shadow against a wall, and not perceive that there is actually another physical object next to the man. Robots need to be programmed an infinite number of rules to overcome just this problem which our brain easily solves by utilizing assumptions that have been formed based on our experiences and through learning

One very interesting way of teasing out these assumptions is by means of optical illusions. Optical illusions fool us because they violate our assumptions about what we see. A really good one I'd recommend is this illusion by Edward H. Adelson.

What is special about this, you might ask? Well, Tile A and Tile B are objectively the same colour.

Look again. It might be hard to believe at first, but it really is!

And to prove it (I couldn't believe it myself initially), I did the following. I created a brownish-green oval, copied it so that there are exactly two same coloured ovals, and shifted them into the tiles.

Amazingly, the two ovals appear different accordingly.

To shortcut the process above, here's probably what's going on.


The bar in the middle is really a uniformly grey bar.

What's happening is that our mind cannot divorce the effect of shadows from our perception. As long as the picture shows the green cylinder casting a shadow, the 'shadow assumption' module of our brains gets activated and the things in relation to it will be affected. A robot should typically see Tiles A and B to be the same.

Our assumptions fill in the gaps so that our perception of the world becomes seamless and efficient (and it doesn't feel like we're constantly bombarded with stimuli).

Time Immemorial

come ride with me
through the veins of history
i'll show you a god
who falls asleep on the job
how can we win
when fools can be kings?

no one's gonna take me alive
the time has come to make things right
you and i must fight for our rights
you and i must fight to survive


Same story, different people.


"We live, we die, and the wheels of the bus go round and round."

In a modern world marked by subtlety and the aversion towards taking anything too seriously, defensiveness, pretentiousness and overcompensatory behaviour are the new stick-out nails to be hammered.

On 'Truths' And Openness

The first step to knowing more about something is to be open to it.

It is virtually impossible to tell something to someone if he or she isn't prepared or willing to listen.

It's kind of like how the general rule applies when a guy tries to hit on a girl. How the guy looks and how the guy approaches accounts for 90% of the girl's response, while a mere 10% is accounted for by what is actually said during the pick-up.

A truth, concept, philosophy, idea or way of life is useful to a person only if he or she can (and is open to) accept it, handle it or incorporate it into his or her way of life or worldview.

There are so many truths out there. Some are in complete conflict with each other, but each still bestows upon their bearers much wisdom in dealing with reality. There are ideologies and worldviews such as Christianity, evolution, economics, science, just to name a few. Books have been written convincingly on all of these subject matters to espouse them, and perhaps as many have been written to expose their flaws and undermine them.

But the apparent fact of the matter is that, whether or not someone comes off feeling like he/she has learned something after reading a book, a lot of it has to do with how open or skeptical he/she already is prior to reading the book.

This is why, even if I have very strong views on many things, I've come to realize that there isn't really a point to pushing these thoughts on others when I'm with them. I will blog about my ideas and thoughts to a general and anonymous audience who may or may not accept my views or I may share them if I think people are interested to know, but in the presence of another who isn't asking me for my opinions or is skeptical of what I do, there's no bridge between us.

Between two or more people who aren't willing or prepared to connect on a level of understanding, nothing can ever be conveyed constructively. All sorts of useless outcomes will result, such as one person patronizing the other, tolerating each other in a politically correct manner, or emotional arguing, amongst other things.

When it comes to the crux of the matter, people seek knowledge because it helps them understand the world (as they perceive it given their own personal experiences) better. Everyone has cherished beliefs, some with more beliefs than others, but which are all important nonetheless in contributing towards firmly getting a grip on reality so that they may better navigate it. A truth or axiom is useless if it is incompatible with a person's system that already allows him or her to comfortably tide through life.

Of course, many people lead lives that appear less desirable to ourselves. This is what motivates some of us to try and influence and change others, because we think we know better. Maybe we do, if we lead secure and satisfied lives and believe we've got it made. But maybe we don't, because we lead different lives. Perhaps, to each his or her own.

Which is why if you so wish to influence somebody, do it by inspiring others. That is probably the best way (and the only way) to fully create openness in others towards what you do or believe. Be a living example of what you believe in and hope... no, - believe - that by standing up for the things and truths you believe in, others will be open to knowing more.


(However, the condition is as such: If a person appears not to know his/her way around because he/she simply is unthinking and uncritical, perhaps those who try to impose views on them can't be faulted for doing so. This, I suppose, is at the core of my issue with 'unthinkingness', because an unthinking population is fertile ground for anyone who has the desire to manipulate the masses. Evil people cannot do great evil without an easily manipulable army of blind followers.

This post addresses only people who do already hold cherished values and beliefs and with good reason for doing so.)

Barney Stinson Solves The World's Problems One Punchline At A Time

"When I get sad, I stop being sad and be awesome instead. True story."

Gosh. The torment of losing a painfully thought-out post is always almost unbearable at the point of realization. Lasts for a good 30 seconds more or so, then life goes on.

Baby says that maybe it's a sign that I shouldn't post it. Will listen to the voices for now!

“Pathos is what men have in common, however variable it may be in its aspects and intensities. Pathos designates a passive experience, not an action; it is what happens to man, what he suffers, what befalls him fatefully and what touches him in his existential core – as for instance the experiences of Eros. In their exposure to pathos all men are equal, though they may differ widely in the manner in which they come to grips with it and build the experience into their lives. The community of pathos is the basis of communication. Behind the hardened, intellectually supported attitudes which separate men, lie the pathemata which bind them together. However false and grotesque the intellectual position may be, the pathos at the core has the truth of an immediate experience. If one can penetrate to this core and reawaken in a man the awareness of his conditio humana, communication in the existential sense becomes possible.” (Voegelin E., 1957, 29-30)

More Inception

Never Wake Up: The Secret and Meaning of Inception by Devin Faraci is possibly one of the most alternative and yet most coherent explanations/interpretations of Inception by far.

His write-up is corroborated with the first interpretation in Peter Hall's Dissecting Inception: Six Interpretations and Five Plot Holes.

It seems like I'll be going with the idea that the entire movie is a dream. Devin Faraci takes it even further by bringing out the analogy that the audience is the dreamer, and Peter Hall brilliantly indicates what the audience's totem should've been, but wasn't available, thus confirming it.

Must reads for all Inception junkies IMHO!

Incredible

I'd just chanced upon a movie reviewer's page that appears to suggest that Inception might get stick for its lack of emotional development of its characters as it is too 'cerebral'.

The article says, "Although [Christopher Nolan's] films provoke deep thought and weighty themes, they are never said to touch the heart. Nolan is regarded as a cold, clinical director, whose movies care more about ideas and mind tricks than making us feel for characters. ... Although the Inception review responses hail Nolan for his mind trips and con games, they are more mixed when he goes to the emotional. Even some of the positive reviews nitpick Nolan for doing better with the workings of the head than the heart. ... will emotional flaws prevent the film from being Nolan's masterpiece after all?"

The article ends off on a neutral and questioning note, but the nuance is unmistakable, and it also indicates that there are more professional criticisms of this sort elsewhere.

All I can say is go watch something else if the cerebral stuff isn't your thing. It's like criticizing a perfectly sweet apple for not being sour enough.

Thoughts and comments on Inception to come once more people have watched it so that I don't contribute to the spoilers! Lastly, if you love good mindfuck movies, please watch Inception. It's the next level from the likes of The Matrix and Minority Report.

Blind Men Also Love Barbies

Abstract of a study, titled "Blind men prefer a low waist-to-hip ratio", done by Karremans, J., Frankenhuis, W., & Arons, S. (2010), says:

"Previous studies suggest that men in Western societies are attracted to low female waist-to-hip ratios (WHR). Several explanations of this preference rely on the importance of visual input for the development of the preference, including explanations stressing the role of visual media. We report evidence showing that congenitally blind men, without previous visual experience, exhibit a preference for low female WHRs when assessing female body shapes through touch, as do their sighted counterparts. This finding shows that a preference for low WHR can develop in the complete absence of visual input and, hence, that such input is not necessary for the preference to develop. However, the strength of the preference was greater for the sighted than the blind men, suggesting that visual input might play a role in reinforcing the preference. These results have implications for debates concerning the evolutionary and developmental origins of human mate preferences, in particular, regarding the role of visual media in shaping such preferences."


Excellent. More evidence in favour of the basal instincts undergirding our mate choices that truly drive the media, rather than the often asserted opposite that socialization shapes everything. Of course, socialization has a huge part to play in skewing us towards the trends of the culture we live in. But the origins of media content don't just sprout out randomly.

There's always a rhyme and reason. Everything is traceable back.

The World Is Your Oyster

Here are two videos that have totally revved up my desire for traveling. I'm pretty aware that their feats are possible because going hungry and being homeless for not holding down a job isn't a concern, but it is still goddamn inspiring all the same.

And if I'm wrong and they have traveled in the face of potential poverty, then all the more I salute them for providing validation to the idea that little should stand in the way of our dreams.

Enjoy.