Check Out My New (Improved) Blog

Hey everyone. I'm moving my blog over to Wordpress. Why? Because they're just so much more Web 2.0! Like, totally.

And because I need to shake things up if I hope to continue providing you with interesting and thoughtful commentary.

So head over to nomrad.wordpress.com. Yeah, nomrad is Darmon backwards. Aren't I so witty? :)

I'll see you over there.

Namaste.

Sweet Charity

If anyone's looking for something to do with their evening today, Friday, and Saturday at 8 PM, I highly advise going to see Sweet Charity at the Neumann Life Center. The show's definitely a laugh (though probably only for one time... some of the jokes get old fast) and the acting/singing is excellent.

Though, checking the prices, it's $12 for general admission and $8 for admission with college ID. Yikes. Though I imagine they'll let you in for the eight bucks if you just say student. Still rather pricey.

And thus I complete my obligation to advertise for Center Stage Productions. What can I say, they pay well.

Namaste.

Kissing Hank's Ass

This is funny. Very funny. A look at organized religion from a slightly different perspective than it normally affords. Think of this as shifting your point of view a degree or two and seeing a completely different thing. As if your head has been in a vice up until now.

Then again, I don't think any of the people who read this are fundies, but it's still fun to laugh at others' misfortunes. Muahahaha.

PS - That last part was a joke.

Dear God by XTC

Dear god,
Hope you got the letter,
And I pray you can make it better down here.
I don't mean a big reduction in the price of beer,
But all the people that you made in your image,
See them starving on their feet,
cause they don't get enough to eat

From god,
I can't believe in you.

Dear god,
Sorry to disturb you,
But I feel that I should be heard loud and clear.
We all need a big reduction in amount of tears,
And all the people that you made in your image,
See them fighting in the street,
cause they cant make opinions meet,
About god,
I cant believe in you.

Did you make disease, and the diamond blue?
Did you make mankind after we made you?
And the devil too!

Dear god,
Dont know if you noticed,
But your name is on a lot of quotes in this book.
Us crazy humans wrote it, you should take a look,
And all the people that you made in your image,
Still believing that junk is true.
Well I know it ain't and so do you,
Dear god,
I cant believe in,
I don't believe in,

I wont believe in heaven and hell.
No saints, no sinners,
No devil as well.
No pearly gates, no thorny crown.
You're always letting us humans down.
The wars you bring, the babes you drown.
Those lost at sea and never found,
And its the same the whole world round.
The hurt I see helps to compound,
That the father, son and holy ghost,
Is just somebody's unholy hoax,
And if you're up there you'll perceive,
That my hearts here upon my sleeve.
If there's one thing I don't believe in...

It's you,
Dear god.

Just because I figure you could use one more quotation / song lyric. :)

Free Scientific American Magazines

Hey everyone. If any readers would like my Sci Am magazines from about September of 2004 to January 2005, just send me an e-mail or leave me a comment.

I'm trying to clear out my room some, and I don't think I'll ever read these magazines again. And to be honest, I find them a bit dry for my taste. Too science-y, if there can be such a thing.

If no one's interested, it's all good. I'll make sure to recycle them so they can return from whence they came.

Thanks.

Namaste.

Quotation

Look up at the surroundings around you. Look at your furniture, computer monitor, room coloring and even the clothes you are wearing. Now answer this simple question. Is this the surroundings of the person who has already achieved my goal.
- Scott Young

Quotation

You'll find that by continually placing your focus on the breath and the sensations of the body, the mind will go about the business of downloading everything it is not immediately concerned with, so don't try to stop the mind from thinking. The mind thinks, that's what a mind does, so don't ever expect to be totally without thoughts. As long as you avoid involvement in what your thoughts are saying, they will become less intense, and eventually change into meaningless static at the back of your mind.

- From Happiness to Burn by Roger Wells

A great free book about meditation with an EXTREMELY Western slant. I love all the scientific explanation of why meditation really works. Check it out. What do you have to lose other than your Self? :)

I Still Live

I haven't blogged in a while. I don't know why. I guess I just haven't been up to it. I've been busy movie making (either SO or real movie), contemplating how much I like to bitch about life (if I only had my room back... blah blah blah), and just generally putzing around, realizing I have less than three weeks until college starts.

Man, what a sorry excuse for a human being. I don't mean that in an emo way either. I mean, honestly, I need to get up off my ass and get cracking. On what, though? That question haunts me.

I hope that everything falls into place when college starts. I hope that somehow I'll find a purpose worth putting the whole of my being behind (whether that purpose involve science or just getting a girlfriend [and I think we all know which one would pose the greater challenge to me :) ]. Then again, I have to realize that "wherever I go, there I am." If I don't change, I shouldn't hope for my situation to change.

Enough of this, though. I hope everyone loves their life right now. I really do, underneath all this "turmoil" and "tribulation." God, I act so emo. Yuck.

Namaste.

Cool Puzzle

My mom brought me home this really cool optical puzzle pamphlet with the cow and two-faced woman puzzles. Serendipitously, today I found another interesting puzzle on an interesting site.



Try to see how many faces you can find. I found seven, but apparently you should find ten.

I love these sorts of puzzles because they analogically match with enlightenment so well. Enlightenment resembles seeing the faces in a picture where you before saw nothing. Beautiful. And everpresent.

Enjoy.

Oh, and if you liked this one, you can check out Mycoted, the site I got this from. It bills itself as a creativity site. Sounds good to me!

Ooh, and I found a whole bunch more here. Cool beans!

Ænema by Tool

Some say the end is near.
Some say we'll see armageddon soon.
I certainly hope we will.
I sure could use a vacation from this
bull-shit three ring cirrrrcus siiiideshow of
Freaks here in this, hopeless fucking, hole we call LA.
The only way to fix it is to flush it all away.
Any fucking time.
Any fucking day.
Learn to swim, I'll see you down in Arizona bay.

Fret for your figure and
Fret for your latte and
Fret for your lawsuit and
Fret for your hairpiece and
Fret for your prozac and
Fret for your pilot and
Fret for your contract and
Fret for your car.
It's a bull-shit three ring cirrrrrcuus siiideshow of
freaks here in this hopeless fucking hole we call LA.
The only way to fix it is to flush it all away.
Any fucking time.
Any fucking day.
Learn to swim, I'll see you down in Arizona bay.

Some say a comet will fall from the sky.
Followed by meteor showers and tidal waves.
Followed by faultlines that cannot sit still.
Followed by millions of dumbfounded dipshits.
Some say the end is near.
Some say we'll see armageddon soon.
I certainly hope we will
I sure could use a vacation from this
stupid shit, silly shit, stupid shit...
One great big festering neon distraction,
I've a suggestion to keep you all occupied.
Learn to swim.
Mom's gonna fix it all soon.
Mom's comin' round to put it back the way it ought to beeeeeeeee.

Learn to swim.
Fuck L Ron Hubbard and Fuck all his clones.
Fuck all these gun-toting Hip gangster wannabes.
Learn to swim.
Fuck retro anything. Fuck your tattoos.
Fuck all you junkies and Fuck your short memory.
Learn to swim.
Fuck smiley glad-hands with hidden agendas.
Fuck these dysfunctional, insecure actresses.
Learn to swim.
Cuz I'm praying for rain
and I'm praying for tidal waves
I wanna see the ground give way.
I wanna watch it all go down.
Mom please flush it all away.
I wanna see it go right in and down.
I wanna watch it go right in.
Watch you flush it all awaaaaaaaaay.

Time to bring it down again.
Don't just call me pessimist.
Try and read between the lines.
I can't imagine why you wouldn't
Welcome any change, my friend.
I wanna see it come down.
Suck it down.
Flush it down.

I just realized how much I like this song. I mean, I knew I liked it, but not until now did I see its true "beauty." You know, in the tragic sort of way.

Though, unfortunately, I can't say I quite fit the bill for the authentic person Tool associates itself with.

Maybe someday.

Quotation

The difference between Chinese medicine and Western medicine is the dissection versus the observation of the thing in motion. The difference between reading a story and studying a story is the difference between living the story and killing the story and looking at its guts.

School! We sat in English class and we dissected the stories that I'd escaped into, laid open their abdomens and tagged their organs, covered their genitals with polite sterile drapes, recorded dutiful notes en masse that told us what the story was about, but never what the story was. Stories are propaganda, virii that slide past your critical immune system and insert themselves directly into your emotions. Kill them and cut them open and they're as naked as a nightclub in daylight.

- Cory Doctorow, from Eastern Standard Tribe

Hilarious!!!

the show with zefrank



Seriously, if you haven't started checking out the Show with Zefrank, you're missing out. In this one alone, Ze talks about the barbie that claims "Math is hard," discusses the finer points of how to skillfully learn, and eviscerates a cocky bastard. And you can get it all for free!

Come on, what are you waiting for?!

Cool Article On Sleep

Go ahead and read this fascinating article on sleep. I though I knew everything about sleep. Shows how little I know...

I especially enjoyed the part about owls and larks. I definitely fall under the owl generalization. And the concept that this may have occurred for evolutionary benefit just makes sense. Evolutionary psychology / sociology really rock.

On a similar note, I think I'll try to get to sleep at a time a little earlier than 0300. Maybe after I get my room back. Yeah, then!

Namaste.

PS Don't get electrocuted!

Thought

rationalize - v. intr. - To devise self-satisfying but incorrect reasons for one's behavior.

Funny, I always thought of rationalizing as having only positive traits. It contains the word "rational" for God's sake. Now I realize that when I catch myself rationalizing something, the logic lies to me. Even when the logic has no flaws.

Tricky mind.

Testing Time

Found a new little application for posting (which you can see below has the title of Qumana). I don't know if I like it yet, but we shall see.

Hm, I wonder how well it actually seperates paragraphs (in the viewer, they don't look so seperated).

Hope you all continue to enjoy a magnificent summer.

Namaste.

Powered by Qumana

Big Bang, Little Thought

Cosmologists think the universe came into existence anywhere between 12 and 15 billion years ago.

That makes a difference of 3 billion years. That's a lot of time. 3 billion years. That's over 30 million human life spans (assuming a 100 year old life).

Damn. Thinking about big numbers can really stretch the brain. Especially at 4 in the morning.

Shit! The Apocalypse!

I guess it figures that fundies would find the slow destruction of any semblance of peace in the Middle East as a sign for the End of Days. I just forgot about them (I often forget that I live in a Christian (Fundamentalist) Nation...)

Then I consider the make-up of our nation. Here's a passage from Sam Harris' book The End of Faith. He explains the situation better than I could hope to.

According to Gallup, 35 percent of American's believe that the Bible is the literal and inerrant word of the Creator of the Universe. Another 48 percent believe that it is the "inspired" word of the same - still inerrant, though certain of its passages must be interpreted symbolically before their truth can be brought to light. Only 17 percent of us remain to doubt that a personal God, in his infinite wisdom, is likely to have authored this text - or, for that matter, to believe that God has guided creation over the course of millions of years). This means that 120 million of us place the big bang 2500 years after the Babylonians and Sumerians learned to brew beer. If our polls are to be trusted, nearly 230 million Americans believe that a book showing neither unity of style nor internal consistency was authored by an omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent deity.

Shit. If that doen't scare you, I don't now what will. Oh, wait, maybe the fact that one of those 35% currently heads one of our branches of government. Fuck.

One last fun factoid: did you know the bible claims that Pi equals 3 (check out 1 Kings 7: 23-26 or 2 Chronicles 4: 2-5)? Yep. Man, if only. Math would take so much less effort... [Well, you do have to do some math first, then you quickly find that Pi =/= 30/10]

I do all of this in fun, of course. Yes. Don't damn me! :)

But if the end does come in the next few years, you can send me straight to Hell. I don't want to hang with the fundies. Or their vindictive god. No fun, that bunch of characters.

Namaste.

Quotation

Even the libertarians among us aren't opposed to stop lights.


And, as my friend Zig Ziglar points out, they really should be called 'go' lights, because if you take them away, the traffic stops.


Self-organizing systems are terrific, but more often than not, systems don't self-organize. Try to get nine kids to agree on a batting order in Little League and it'll take a week. You could do it in ten seconds and they'll whine and then thank you for it.


Stop lights are essential in almost all marketplaces.


While individuals might moan about how they were treated, we all realize that without some sort of central allocation of scarce resources (like a piece of tarmac or a booth at a trade show), chaos ensues. And the chaos hurts everyone.


- Seth Godin

He He He (I Suffer from Dork-dom)

Doobie Doobie Doo

I promised a post on linguistics and how our use of language affects our view of reality. Just not yet.

I presently feel a little down. Nothing to worry about. I know exactly WHY I feel down. Silly, really: I just want to get everything and its sister done (no, no, no, that doesn't mean I want to "do" your sister, you sicko!). And I don't have the will or the way to pick somewhere and just start.

Hm, nothing new. A common problem. I miss the days of video games and TV sometimes. So much simpler back then. Just plop yourself down in front of the TV and either play the latest video game or turn on the best channel.

Damn, that life rocked! Yet accomplished so little. I doubt I would ever convince myself to go back to that way of life. Though it's siren song attracts me sometimes.

And now that I've bored you with my life story, I proudly announce I have finished the DVD for the Science Olympiad Video. All I need to do now involves adding all the raw footage into the DVD-ROM partition. Then completion. And burning.

Finally.

I hope everyone feels wonderful! I do now!

Hip, hip, hurray!!!

The Science Olympiad Movie is DONE

Woot. The SO movie, for all intents and purposes, is done and ready for the viewing public.

Yeah, I finally got off my procrastinating ass and finished it. And it's beautiful. If I may say so myself. Which I will.

I'll have the DVDs ready by the end of the week for everyone. That's a whole post-production process that shouldn't take anywhere near as long as making the movie itself.

I was thinking of having a premiere get together sometime the week of the 31st. If anyone thinks that's a good idea / would be available for it, give me a holla in the comment section. I'd like to get as much of the SO team involved as possible (realizing that a majority of the SO team does not read this... though they do have relatives / friends that read this!)

Thanks for your patience. I hope you find the movie worth the wait.

Namaste.

More Cool Stuff from Mind Performance Hacks (Learning Styles and Why School Fits Me)

Remember learning styles? Those things we learned about back four years ago in Speech and Study Skills. Yeah, I haven't given much thought to them since then (or even then, for that matter), but reading through one of the free preview chapters of Mind Performance Hacks (MPH) got me thinking. What style fits me best, really?

First, some background. The makers of VARK (the learning style model I present here) propose four types of learners (well, really five, but the fifth mixes the other four to make a super type): visual, aural, read/write, and kinesthetic. In a nutshell, visuals learn by seeing charts, diagrams and pictures; aurals learn by hearing and saying; read/writes learn by reading notes, books, etc. and then writing their own ideas out; and kinesthetic learn by doing. Pretty self explanatory, but I thought I should just make sure we all share the same definitions.

After taking this questionnaire from the VARK website, I learned that I most match with the read/write learning type. Now, this should not come as a suprise to anyone, especially to myself. However, I always described myself as a "visual" learner, not really considering what that means. The distinction between visual and read/write learners lies mainly in the organization of the information: both systems operate through seeing something, however the visual through seeing holistic systems and diagrams, whereas the read/write operates through big clumps of data (think books).

I hadn't realized it, but I definitely do more closely resemble the read/write than the visual. That comes in handy when I consider how I study (I tend to just read the textbook and notes) and realize that, for me, this really offers the best way for me to assimilate the information.

And with that realization, I also realized something else: modern public schooling contains an incredible bias when it comes to learning styles. I happened to naturally have the tempermant of learning that schools look for: reading and writing (you know, readin', writin', and arithmetic). I can pick up a textbook and absorb the information with little difficulty just by reading it. I can easily regurgitate information in essay form, and even occasionally come up with my own original ideas. However, this presents a major problem for all of the other students out there that do not share this learning type. Admittedly, aural learners, with a little bit of effort, can at least survive (and often thrive) by listening to oral presentations of the curriculum (though even then some teachers do not always lecture and just present worksheet after worksheet). Visual learners probably have an even easier time, since they can easily convert written text and written notes into a more visual, flow-chart-esque format. That leaves the kinesthetics, those who society labels as having "ADHD." Bull. Unfortunately, their active method of learning all but prevents them from reaching their full potential in the classroom.

The even greater travesty rests in society's attempts to pick one learning style and force it upon everyone. The latest fad attempts to make up for the neglect towards visual learners by proposing that all students use flow charts and diagrams to learn. At the other end of the spectrum, some educators propose teaching science type activities by demonstration and "real world" (read watered down) situations. In both of these situations, I much prefer my method of reading information straight from a book, though I realize that others must also be taken into account.

I suppose then the challenge rests with future educators and administrators to find a way to first realize and then implement the idea of different learning styles. Add to that the concept of multiple intelligences, and educational models quickly gains many levels of complexity. However, as with most concepts, the more complex the model, the simpler the solution.

I hope some found this vignette interesting and thought provoking. If you did, you most likely utilize mostly the read/write learning style. :)

On the more personal side, now I realize why I much prefer reading and writing to just about anything else. It takes all kinds. And I feel relieved knowing what "kind" I take.

PS - Wow, writing without "to be" makes me sound all academic like. I don't know if I really like that too much... Or maybe the academic voice just kind of surfaced on this topic. Who knows.

And on another note, I need to remember that "the map is not the territory." These styles are great tools for thinking about how we think, but they are not in fact how we think. :)

Telekinesis / Telepathy, Anyone?

Apparently the dreams paranormal connoisseurs interest members of the scientific community. This article discusses technology a person plugs into his brain that allows a him to control electronic devices (ie computers, tv's, etc.).

The "next step" for this technology, other than just improving it (but technological capacity doubles every year or so!), involves creating devices that can control cars, airplanes, etc. And then, telepathy!!!

Man, this era rocks! We keep seeing more and more advances that at one time resembled "magic." And we get it thanks to science. Just think what nanotechnology will do with this. [Goosebumps]

Namaste.

Wanna Learn Morse Code (And Other Cool Things)

I found a rather amazing book titled Mind Performance Hacks while perusing through the good 'ol RSS Reader (well, I consider it an amazing book [for reasons I will elucidate later]).

Critics hail this book as "a toolbox that you can use to improve your performance and understand things that often are unconsciousy occurring to us on a regular basis." Topics include memory, information processing, creativity, math, decision making, communication, clarity, and mental fitness. Keep in mind all of this stems from the concept of the mind as software. An apt metaphor, considering the brain as the hardware. I like it.

Anyway, this book reminds me of my freshman days of high school. At that time, I spent a great deal of my leisure hours learning memory techniques and other "brain enhancing activities" (yeah, I definitely acted like quite the dork, trying to learn as much as possible... quite the Renaissance Man). If I had found this then (admittedly, it didn't exist then), I might have peed myself (wait, that happened Sophomore year...).

Anyway, if you would like to learn how to use Morse Code in a day (I have the whole system more or less memorized, and I started at around 1300 today and only spent 1 hour max on it spread throughout the day) as alluded to in the title of this post, check out this link to a PDF file. In fact, check out all of the free PDF's here. Every last one of these hacks opens your mind to wider and greater possibilities. At least, they did for me.

Once you've exhausted the hacks, head on over to Ludism.org to read up on more mind performance hacks (the author of this site authored Mind Performance Hacks). Lots more thought provoking material here, for free.

One of the more interesting concepts shared on this wiki, known as E-Prime, proposes removing the verb "to be" and all its conjugations from the English Language. I hope to discuss the implications of this idea at in a future post. This idea opens many doors into linguistic theory. (If you haven't noticed, I haven't used the verb "to be" yet, and it's [there it is!] been a bitch. Just trying to eliminate the verb itself offers an eye-opening experience. And makes me sound like a major douche).

I hope you find all of this as interesting as I do. If not, I will feel very dorky. :( And you wouldn't want that! :)

Namaste.

I always k/new (I hate homonyms) learning felt good...

A new study shows that understanding something new releases in-body opiates.

Yeah, I knew I loved learning for a reason. My elders have always lauded me for "learning for learning's sake."

If only they all knew I I learned to get that fix. Though I imagine they already knew that. Everyone knows the high resulting from learning something new and interesting.

I suppose a learning addiction trumps a drug addiction. Maybe...

Raising the ever ubiquitous question: does learning constitute a drug?

Why The Future Doesn't Suck as Much as You Think

I had a minor epiphany yesterday as I lay down to go to bed. I was thinking about the past a lot (I did that again today... for future reference, not such a great idea!), and thinking about the future. Unfortunately, the only thing I didn't think about was the present.

But in all that thinking, something good grew. I realized an interesting fact about how we humans (or at least I) think about the future. Often, when we think about the future, we assume it will be just like the present, but at a later date. We don't believe that anything could possibly change, especially not ourselves. The future seems like a fixed point, instead of a ever changing mirage on the horizon.

So, take for example a common anxiety of a first year college: the loss of your current (high school) friends and the fear that you won't make any friends at college. It seems as this by itself should call for a reason to never go to college. "What, I'm going to be away from all my current friends! But, I've spent my entire life with these people! How could I live without them? They're irreplaceable!"

Yeah, that's true. They are irreplaceable. But the error in this way of thinking is that you'll never meet any more people that you connect with. That the moment you leave your hometown and go to college, from that moment on, you'll never make any new friends.

It's just so irrational a thought. But it's one I've had. I still have it. I wonder what the first few months of college will be like. What the first few days will be like, when I must take into my own hands whether I meet new people or just make a tragic rerun of Governor's School. It's scary, God yes. But only when I imagine, despite al of the evidence to the contrary, that I can't do it.

The future isn't the present. In fact, the future doesn't exist. But when the future does become the present, the present will be completely different from how it is now. It always will be. Because change is, ironically, the only constant in this universe.

In short, don't worry about making friends in college. Don't worry about losing your current friends. You won't make friends only if you make no effort to make friends. You'll lose friends only if you make no effort to keep them.

It's that simple.

Namaste

A Month from Yesterday

Huh, I go to Ursinus a month (well, a 31 day month) from yesterday. How about that. How the freak about that.

College. Interesting.

Oh, and I found out that the XC run is a 8k. Hm, I might be able to do that. :)

Namaste.

Nocturnal Energies

I find that the night has so much more energy than the daytime. Strange, one would think it's the other way around. But at night, the silence is such a blessing. And the solitude.

It might also be that the infernal television downstairs is off. I hate TV. I really do. I know that a good part of my hatred is irrational and unnecessary, but that doesn't change it.

Anyway, I'm considering switching my biological clock over to nightime waking, daytime sleeping (for the rest of the summer). I think I'll get much more done this way and enjoy my waking hours much more. And I can enjoy the silence and energy of nightime.

I look forward to having my own home (probably an apartment) someday, just because I'll be able to have this nightime feeling (namel solitude and quiet) 24/7. I think. Though I will miss the family.

Just thought I'd share. I mean, I guess this isn't anything special. Just typical teenage circadian rhythms. I'm just going to stop fighting mine.

Namaste. 

Holy Shit, This is Funny

Here's a exemplary Zefrank video. Man, this one's just freakin' hilarious. I especially like the part how kids wait forever until summer and then realize that it's in fact boring. I used to have that problem. Then I made friends. :)

Plus, the scathing review of modern youth culture and Walmart is, shall we say, perfect?



the show with zefrank

 

A Critique of Atheists and Secularists

sums up my hopes for a more authentic atheist.

I especially resonate with the following part:

Like atheism (with which it is more or less interchangeable), secularism is a negative dispensation. Being secular is not a positive virtue like being reasonable, wise, or loving. To be secular, one need do nothing more than live in perpetual opposition to the unsubstantiated claims of religious dogmatists. Consequently, secularism has negligible appeal to the culture at large (a practical concern) and negligible content (an intellectual concern). There is, in fact, not much to secularism that should be of interest to anyone, apart from the fact that it is all that stands between sensible people like ourselves and the mad hordes of religious imbeciles who have balkanized our world, impeded the progress of science, and now place civilization itself in jeopardy.

And now I'm going to drop the atheism thread. I'm sure it's getting boring for everyone (it is for me). In it's place, I'm going to pick up on the meditative technologies thread. Because, honestly, that's the next logical step.

Namaste

Subject Lines in E-Mails

Does anyone else feel that subject lines in personal e-mails are largely unnecessary?

I think they're really an unnecessary cross over from business e-mails. I mean, when you right a personal letter (a snail mail one) to someone, do you think of a subject line to go with it? No, you just write a message to them and allow them to figure out the "subject" for themselves.

That said, from now on, with personal e-mails, I'm not going to use a subject anymore. But the dreaded "[No Subject]" just looks so spamish. I guess from now on I'll subject my e-mails "Hello and Have a Great Day" or something like that.

Namaste

Should Atheism Matter?

Since I seem to be beating a dead horse into a fine little pulp (and because I have this suweet widget that lets me post to blogger straight from Dashboard), I want to pose a question. This question can be either rhetorical or non-rhetorical, it's largely up to you.

I was wondering if atheism should even matter in the arena of public (or private) discourse. It's interesting that I'm now thinking that, because I used to think upon atheists with a bit of confusion. I couldn't get how atheists could possibly believe what they believe. But after reading Sam Harris' book, I realized that my problem wasn't with atheism, but with my definition of atheism. I found, via Harris, that an atheist isn't necesarily a reductionist. You can be an atheist and still believe in higher levels of reality. You just can't be an atheist and believe in those realities without proof.

In that sense, Buddhsim (something I've claimed as my religion) is an atheistic tradition. There is no God in it. There is no god in it. There is no Thor, or Zeus, or Yahweh, or Allah. There is only your direct experience of reality.

Wow.

Anywho, I'm beginning to think that this whole issue of atheism is a non-point. It doesn't matter to be an atheist. In fact, atheism has little to no affect on just about anything. As Sam Harris stated, being an atheist is more or less not actually something you could be.

The things I fear are reductionism and positivism. No need to fear atheism. Phew.

Namaste. :)

Atheism: A Primer

As I continue to try on the atheist cap for size (though I have a feeling this may cause some people to give me strange looks and curiouser thoughts), I offer you the most lucid (free) summary of Sam Harris' work The End of Faith I have yet to find. Read it hear at truthdig.

That's about the jist of the book. Other than that, the book goes into far more detail with the atrocities caused by Christianity (Inquisition, anyone?). It also goes on to describe belief in very solid philosophical and neurological detail. More importantly, in the last quarter of the book, Harris goes on to present a secular vision of ethics and spirituality and explain why these in fact would be more (not less) humane than the religion (read myth) based standards we have today.

If you're interested in the additions, please do read the book. If not, this primer should be enough to get your wheels turning.

Mütter Museum Success

Just wanted to thank everyone for making the Mütter Museum such a success today. Couldn't have done it without you (quite literally).

This may have been our last get together as the Science Olympiad team (insane!), though I'm still up for a whole team get together where I show off the movie I (still haven't) made. I suppose I could plan that one too and see who's available.

Why? Because planning is fun. Though hard. But isn't that just life!

Huzzah!

Namaste.

Imagine the Tenth Dimension? (A Thought Experiment)

Came accross this really interesting flash presentation (click on the "Imagining the Tenth Dimension" link on the side) that takes you on a step by step tour through imagining the numerous dimensions (some say up to 11) of the world offered by String Theory.

This is one of the best presentations of ways to visualize 4, 5, and 6 dimensional space. Of course, it goes all the way up to 10th dimensional, but at that point my brain goes "plop."

I especially liked the part that draws a parallel between how we perciever time (as if it flows from a time a to a time b) to how a "flatlander" would perciever a three dimensional object (as if it moves from one cross section to the next). The implication from this is that if we could exist in 5th dimensional space, we could see the 4 dimensional object and therefore see all of time. Psychic implications, anyone? If not, still very cool.

Check out the presentation. This is why I love physics. I'd forgotten why at one point I wanted to go into string theory. Cool shit like this. Yeah!

Namaste.

What do ya want to talk about?

I had an interesting epiphany. Everyone wants to talk about themselves. Yet everyone wants to have people listen to them talk about themselves. Therefore, there's this constant give and take between people talking about themselves and people listening (about themselves?).

I think that's one of the main differences between introverts and extroverts: though both may wish to talk about themselves, an introvert is less willing to actually do it. If you ever observe a conversation (as I've been prone to do over the past year), you'll notice that about 70% (yes, that's an arbitrary number) of it involves someone telling a story, relating an event from their day, or voicing an opinion. That never fails. And that's why extroverts can continue on with the conversation, making it all seem to flow from one concept to the other (because they keep talking about something [invariably something interesting] that happened to them) while an introvert will stumble to continue a conversation because they don't see how anyone could possibly be as interested in the introvert's internal / external world as that person is in his own.

Wow, random tangent, but I'd meant to get that thought out there for a while.

Now to the real point of this post. I was wondering if anyone would like to give me some topics to talk about. Maybe your'e interested in the inner machinations of my mind, or would just like a different spin on something you've been thinking about. No topic is off limits. I'm open to "ruminating" (haven't heard that word in a while) on anything.

This is what I had in mind with Think Bowl. I find the perspectives and colorings of our thoughts fascinating. And I figured we would want to share these thoughts with other people in an open forum. I thought of it as win-win. The site fizzled (though I see Lenny offered a thoughtful post just yesterday!), but the thought's still a good one.

I just thought I'd share that with you all. Thank you for your readership thus far. I've especially appreciated any and all comments, positive or negative. They all show me that you're genuinely interested and help to keep me on my toes, intellectually and as a person.

Namaste.

Quotation

If you are willing to discipline yourself, the physical universe won’t need to discipline you.

-Leonardo da Vinci

Right in Two by Tool

Angels on the sideline,
Puzzled and amused.
Why did Father give these humans free will?
Now they're all confused.

Don't these talking monkeys know that
Eden has enough to go around?
Plenty in this holy garden, silly old monkeys,
Wonders when you're bound to divide it

Right in two

Angels on the sideline,
Baffled and confused.
Father blessed them all with reason.
And this is what they choose.
(and this is what they choose)
Monkey killing monkey killing monkey
Over pieces of the ground.

Silly monkeys give them thumbs,
They forge a blade,
And where there's one they're
bound to divide it,

Right in two.
Right in two.

Monkey killing monkey killing monkey
Over pieces of the ground.
Silly monkeys give them thumbs,
They make a club
And beat their brother..down.

How they survive so misguided is a mystery..here
Repugnant is a creature who would squander the ability,
to lift an eye to heaven conscious of his fleeting time here..

Cut it right all, right in two


They fight, till they die
Over earth, over sky
They fight
Over lies, over blood, over air
And fight, over love, over sun
Over blood
They fight, till they die, over what? for our lies!

Angels on the sideline again
Been so long with patience and reason
Angels on the sideline again
Wondering when this tug of war will end


Cut it right all, right in two
Right in two

Right in two...

Seems only appropriate considering the current world situation.

Quotation

It may sound paradoxical but it's not. I'm advocating a kind of conversational intolerance. It's really the same intolerance we express everywhere in our society when someone claims that Elvis is still alive, or that aliens are abducting ranchers and molesting them. These are beliefs that many people have. But these beliefs systematically exclude them from holding positions of responsibility. The person who's sure that Elvis is still alive and expresses this belief candidly does not wind up in the Oval Office or in our nation's boardrooms. And that's a very good thing. But when the conversation changes to Jesus being born of a virgin or Mohammed flying to heaven on a winged horse, then these beliefs not only do not exclude you from holding power in society; you could not possibly hold power, in a political sense, without endorsing this kind of thinking.

It should be terrifying to us because many of these beliefs are not just quaint and curious, like beliefs in Elvis. These are beliefs about the end of history, about the utility of trying to create a sustainable civilization for ourselves -- specifically, beliefs in eschatology. These are maladaptive. For instance, if a mushroom cloud replaced the city of New York tomorrow morning, something like half the American people would see a silver lining in that cloud because it would presage to them that the end of days are upon us.

- Sam Harris from a Salon.com Interview

A great display of what is post-Political Correctness.

Quotation

Life shrinks and expands in proportion to one's courage.

- Anais Nin

Sam Harris = Brilliant

Wow, I just finished (well, in truth, I finished it a little over two hours ago, but I've been going strong [even going to keep up with that Goldeneye promise. :)]) The End of Faith by Sam Harris. One, well, maybe two words! Frickin' brilliant. He pulls the sheet out from under religion in one of the most provocative, scientific (and not materialist!), and articulate ways I've ever experienced. At the same time, he offers the place for a rational, secular approach to understanding reality at it's most basic (read spiritual) level. Beware of many head-aches as your dualistic mind tries to wrap itself around it's final demise. :)

I highly recommend this brilliant book. I'll talk more about some of it's high points in later (though not later [time of day]) posts. If you're interested and don't yet want to buy the book (or get it from the library, for that matter), check out some of Harris' writings and television appearances. They're good stuff.

Yeah, it's nice to watch Sam talk to the "moderate" religionists. The ones that somehow claim stem cell research causes cancer?! Wow. That's right up there with the "scientific studies" that prove that abortions cause breast cancer.

PS - And now I may broach an interesting area I haven't considered: am I an atheist? Maybe. But not in the way most people consider this idea.

Peace.

Quotation

Christopher Luxenberg (this is a pseudonym), a scholar of ancient Semitic languages, has recently argued that a mistranslation is responsible for furnishing the Muslim paradise with "virgins" (Arabic hur, transliterated as "houris" -literally "white ones"). It seems that the passages describing paradise in the Koran were drawn from earlier Christian texts that make frequent ues of the Aramaic word hur, meaning "white raisins." White reasins, it seems, were a great delicacy in the ancient world. Imagine the look on a young martyr's face when, finding himself in a paradise teeming with his fellow thugs, his seventy houris arrive as fistfuls of raisins.

- From The End of Faith by Sam Harris

Wow, that's awesome. Right up there with the mistranslation of "almah" (Hebrew for "young woman") from Isaiah in the Gospel of Matthew to mean "virgin." I guess "young woman birth" doesn't have quite the same ring as "virgin birth," and it's definitely nowhere near as miraculous.

Just goes to show, always check your work! It may define history for the next 2000+ years.

Quote

What am I? What is a person? I'm a pattern of matter and energy. I'm not this stuff that I'm looking at, because these particular particles were all different six months ago. We know that our cells turn over pretty quickly, and although our neurons persist longer, their constituent parts, the tubules and filaments, actually get turned over in days or weeks. Within a matter of months, all of the cells, or at least all of the systems within the cells, are changed. What persists is a pattern. I'd like to compare it to the pattern that water makes in a stream. When it's cascading around a rock, you can see a certain pattern, and that pattern can stay the same for hours or even months or years. But the water molecules that make up the pattern are changing within milliseconds. The pattern itself gradually changes as well—both the pattern of water in a stream and the pattern in our own bodies and brains—but there's a continuity even in this gradual change.

- Ray Kurzweil

HILL-arious!

Found an interesting site called Fundies Say the Darndest Things! Turns out that I didn't come up with the word Fundie... But on a brighter note, I have all these funny comments to read!

Here's a highlight to wet your appetite!

Let me give you something real simple so that a child can understand it. DNA code is made up of ACGT. The A here is the first letter in the alphabet. It is the beginning and DNA is also the beginning of everthing that is living. C stands for Christians. It is the Christians that are here to deliver God's message to the world. G of course stands for God. It is God who is expressing Himself in the DNA and thus God is expressing Himself in Creation. The T of course expresses God and the head or in His leadership over man. There is a lot that can be said about this, but now is not the place. If you have a small t then of course you have the cross that Jesus gave Himself for us. If you have a small g you will see that God has expressed Himself in us. The small c of course represents our humility before God. If we have pride or ego or are puffed up before God, then it is not going to work according to God's plan and purpose. The small a of course shows how things start off small in the beginning and over time they become greater. A journey of 1000 steps begins with one step. A study of the Bible begins with one word and one passage at a time.

JohnR7, Christian Forums [Comments (51)] [2006-Jul-01]

Brilliant. Really.

Sorry if anyone's a fundamentalist and reading this, but I'm not one to be PC. That's just not what I do. I'd respect your beliefs - if you were a six year old. But you're not. So, um, it's not cool to believe in the easter bunny (read your anthropomorphic god) anymore.

Not to pick on just the Christians. It's equally not cool for Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, Sheiks, Pagans, Communists (Mao is NOT God), and Scientismists. It just so happens that Christians are in the majority here.

:0

Namaste.

Hm

Well, I had written a whole big long awesome post. And then blogger killed it. Though, to be honest, my silly absent-mindedness killed it. So, no harm done, blogger?

Because of that, I'll just be leaving you with the links to everything, and trust that you can fill in the blanks that would have been an awesome post. Think of it as Mad Libs. Trust me, every click is worth is. I'll even give you an interesting, descriptive link title for each site.

The Funniest Show You Can Watch with Your Pants on (With Some Sarcasm, Current Events, and Plain Old Common Sense)

The Best Online Radio that Doesn't Rhyme with Baboo

An Interesting Exercise In Seeing If Music Can Be Broken Down Into Genetic Bits And Still Be Found Enjoyable (IE This Will Find Lots of Songs You Didn't Know You Liked)

I Now Know How to Tie My Shoe in not one, not two, but THREE ways!!!

And to think, I could have just rewritten the post. Psha.

PS - If you haven't checked out the Chi Movie blog recently, there's some commotion over there. And by commotion, I mean I think we'll get together tomorrow between 1600 and 1800 at an undetermined location (probably my house).

Everything is OK by Halou

Break it all down into simplest terms.
There, was that so bad?
Now, is that so bad?
You doubt yourself so much you don't even
Know what you really want, or how you really feel.

And I'm so tired
Of you constantly over-thinking.
I know why, because everything's going OK.
Just your style, to break it all into pieces,
I know why, because everything's going OK.

Disregard your inner monologue
Don't try to drown it out, 'cause it'll only wear you out.
Sometimes things are just beyond control
That has to be OK, you don't have a choice

And I'm so tired
Of you constantly over-thinking.
I know why, because everything's going OK.
Just your style, to break it all into pieces,
Just one time, I've had just about all I can take

Everything is unacceptable
If you overanalyze,
And that is just your style.

Donnie Darko: Amazing

I saw the movie Donnie Darko today and I have one word for it: amazing. I've now discovered my favorite genre of movie for certain: the pyschological thriller. That list includes works like Donnie, as well as a movie I hold in equally high esteem, The Butterfly Effect.

I don't know what it was about this movie that just gelled with me. I suppose part of it had to do with the theme of the movie: how life really has no meaning at all, yet humans are meaning finding machines that must search and eventually come upon their own meaning.

At the same time, the movie parodies the self-help gurus that I all to often listen to and believe with a tad too much conviction. These men and women that offer perpetual happiness and joy, with no sorrow mixed into the lot. That promise a better tomorrow, if you'll just employ technique x, y, or z.

Maybe that's why at this moment in my life, I felt so attracted to this movie. I've been living in a "happy-go-lucky" world a lot as of late, and I haven't gotten a lot of the tragic into the mix. I find myself attracted to the tragic. Strangely attracted. Like to this movie, or to Butterfly, or to this poem from The Perks of Being a Wallflower. There's just something more beautiful about the uglier parts of life. At times I feel like those things are the more real. The only reality.

Very existentialist.

However, the important thing is to realize that neither the happy-go-lucky nor the tragic are what reality really is. Reality can't be put into words. It can be whatever you want it to be. But even that won't be reality.

I like this quote from UC, Irvine Cognitive Scientist Donald Hoffman: "There are no public brains, only my brain experiences and your brain experiences. These brain experiences are just the simplified visual experiences of homo sapiens, shaped for survival in certain niches. The chances that our brain experiences resemble some mind-independent truth are remote at best, and those who would claim otherwise must surely explain the miracle." In other words, the chances that we, or our instruments, or anything we use actually register actual reality is very small.

So no matter what you decide to believe, chances are, it's partial.

That being said, the partiality of the moment for me is the tragic side of life.

Mad World by Tears for Fears

All around me are familiar faces
Worn out places
Worn out faces
Bright and early for the daily races
Going no where
Going no where
Their tears are filling up their glasses
No expression
No expression
Hide my head I wanna drown my sorrow
No tomorrow
No tomorrow
And I find it kind of funny
I find it kind of sad
The dreams in which I'm dying are the best I've ever had
I find it hard to tell you
I find it hard to take
When people run in circles it's a very very
Mad world
Mad world
Children waiting for the day they feel good
Happy birthday
Happy birthday
Made to feel the way that every child should
Sit and listen
Sit and listen
Went to school and I was very nervous
No one knew me
No one knew me
Hello teacher tell me what's my lesson
Look right through me
Look right through me
And I find it kind of funny
I find it kind of sad
The dreams in which I'm dying are the best I've ever had
I find it hard to tell you
I find it hard to take
When people run in circles it's a very very
Mad world
Mad world
Enlarging your world
Mad world

Poem from Perks of Being a Wallflower

Once on a yellow piece of paper with green lines
he wrote a poem
And he called it "Chops"
because that was the name of his dog
And that's what it was all about
And his teacher gave him an A
and a gold star
And his mother hung it on the kitchen door
and read it to his aunts
That was the year Father Tracy
took all the kids to the zoo
And he let them sing on the bus
And his little sister was born
with tiny toenails and no hair
And his mother and father kissed a lot
And the girl around the corner sent him a
Valentine signed with a row of X's
and he had to ask his father what the X's meant
And his father always tucked him in bed at night
And was always there to do it.

Once on a piece of white paper with blue lines
he wrote a poem
And he called it "Autumn"
because that was the name of the season
And that's what it was all about
And his teacher gave him an A
and asked him to write more clearly
And his mother never hung it on the kitchen door
because of its new paint
And the kids told him
that Father Tracy smoked cigars
And left butts on the pews
And sometimes they would burn holes
That was the year his sister got glasses
with thick lenses and black frames
And the girl around the corner laughed
when he asked her to go see Santa Claus
And the kids told him why
his mother and father kissed a lot
And his father never tucked him in bed at night
And his father got mad
when he cried for him to do it.

Once on a paper torn from his notebook
he wrote a poem
And he called it "Innocence: A Question"
because that was the question about his girl
And that's what it was all about
And his professor gave him an A
and a strange steady look
And his mother never hung it on the kitchen door
because he never showed her
That was the year that Father Tracy died
And he forgot how the end
of the Apostle's Creed went
And he caught his sister
making out on the back porch
And his mother and father never kissed
or even talked
And the girl around the corner
wore too much makeup
That made him cough when he kissed her
but he kissed her anyway
because that was the thing to do
And at three A.M. he tucked himself into bed
his father snoring soundly

That's why on the back of a brown paper bag
he tried another poem
And he called it "Absolutely Nothing"
Because that's what it was really all about
And he gave himself an A
and a slash on each damned wrist
And he hung it on the bathroom door
because this time he didn't think
he could reach the kitchen.

Mmm, Lateral Growth (and "The Movie")

I've been experiencing a lot of "lateral growth" (a concept I picked up via Scott Young's blog via this article). Just been doing random things. Branching out. Though, a lot of these random things have been rather introverted, so you probably haven't seen me doing them. That's all good though.

Anygay, I don't know if I've "earned" this lateral growth phase, but I'm really enjoying it, so who cares!?

Speaking of gay (no, not really), we need our oh so great omnipotent movie organizer (you know I love you Dave!) to plan out our next get together for the "movie." Preferably soon. And we should probably start filming. Just so we have something. We can just run with it.

Keep on rockin' everyone. I hope you're enjoying life. It's freakin' awesome, isn't it!

Namaste.

Free What Is Enlightenment? Subscription

Hey everyone. I just got an e-mail from the good people at What is Enlightenment offering me the chance to give a free one year subscription of their magazine to one of my friends. I was just wondering if anyone's interested?

I figure you might want to know a little about What Is Enlightenment? (WIE) before making any choices regarding it. WIE is a magazine about spirituality on the cutting edge. It covers everything from reincarnation (yes, it may be possible!) to the permanent elongation of the human life span (apparently that too may be possible). This last issue was about how spirituality may look in the coming century. No, this isn't all new agey crap. It's real, hardcore spirituality. And yes, there is such a thing.

I greatly enjoy this magazine, and I had to pay for it! So, if anyone's interested, just send me an e-mail or leave me a comment and I'll fill in all your vitals so that you can get a years subscription (4 magazines [it's a quarterly service]) free. No strings attached. As far as I can tell. I'll read deeply into all the fine print for you.

Just wanted to give you all a heads up. Hope you're enjoying your summer. It's almost been a month since we graduated. Hm, seems like so much longer.

Namaste.

Mmmmm

It's nice to be back. At the same time, I miss some parts of the solitude. And by solitude, I mean having a solo bedroom and not having the TV on 24/7. Ah, that's my heaven.

Anywho, I'm back and ready for action. I don't know what I mean by action, but I know that I'm ready for it!

I just finished reading a book about FLOW, so look forward to me posting more on that in the near future. After I've recuperated a bit. Cuz I'm tired. Hells yeah.

Keep on rockin', everyone.

:)

I'm Back

Woot!

Life is Wonderful by Jason Mraz

It takes a crane to build a crane
It takes two floors to make a story
It takes an egg to make a hen
It takes a hen to make an egg
There is no end to what I'm saying

It takes a thought to make a word
And it takes some words to make an action
And it takes some work to make it work
It takes some good to make it hurt
It takes some bad for satisfaction

Ah la la la la la la life is wonderful
Ah la la la la la la life goes full circle
Ah la la la la life is wonderful
Ah la la la la

It takes a night to make it dawn
And it takes a day to make you yawn brother
And it takes some old to make you young
It takes some cold to know the sun
It takes the one to have the other

And it takes no time to fall in love
But it takes you years to know what love is
And it takes some fears to make you trust
It takes those tears to make it rust
It takes the dust to have it polished

Ah la la la la la la life is wonderful
Ah la la la la la la life goes full circle
Ah la la la la la la life is wonderful
Ah la la la la

It is so...

It takes some silence to make sound
And it takes a loss before you found it
And it takes a road to go nowhere
It takes a toll to make you care
It takes a hole to make a mountain

Ah la la la la la life is wonderful
Ah la la la la la life goes full circle
Ah la la la la la life is wonderful
Ah la la la la la life is meaningful
Ah la la la la la life is wonderful
Ah la la la la la

It is so...wonderful...
It is so meaningful...

Quiet Desperation, Indiana, and The Fourth

Let me start with the most important of the things in my title: the fourth!!! Happy fourth of July. This marks the middle of our summer, more or less. More importantly, it marks the symbol of the birth of our nation (because everyone knows that nothing all that important happened on the 4th in 1776, but we can pretend for the sake of all those that don't!). A nation that for better or for worse has been at the head of this ship called Earth. May we take this day to reconsider what it means to be an American, but more importantly, to be human.

Next most important (look at me using my communication skills, Dave! :) ), Indiana. I'm going away to Indiana for the next four days with my mom to visit my grandmother. I might not have much of a stable internet connection, so if I don't, I look forward to seeing everyone when I come back. I know Chi will keep on running without me. Will I keep on running without Chi? Most probably.

Now, the least important topic. I've been suffering from a major case of "quiet desperation," to quote my good buddy Henry David. It started right with summer. Well, almost. It started more after the first week had passed and I thought, 'Hm, what have I accomplished?' That single, simple question has haunted me for the past two weeks (wow, it's only been two weeks? It seems so much longer?!) Hm, more importantly, I still have 7 weeks left of summer. I think, unless I'm making some gross miscalculation of my day counting.

Well, that by itself lifts the quiet desperation a bit. I thought I'd blown my entire summer! It still doesn't fix the fact that I need to find something to do with this summer that makes me feel like I didn't fiddle it away. A job's off the table: I've more or less given up searching. I'm sure I could get a job if I really tried (I'll flatter myself that), but I don't really think it's worth it anymore. I'll just wait until Spring Break of Freshman year.

The solution I've come up with to deal with my "quiet desperation" is to realize that I don't have to do anything. This isn't a new idea. I've had it many times before. I'm sure I'll forget it and realize it many more times. The point is, everything I do is by choice. And in the summer, I just have a lot more choices. I've been turning that into "I have a lot I have to do!" instead of realizing it means I don't have to do anything. In fact, I could just spend this entire summer playing video games or reading beach books. That's how I spent most of my summers before 10th grade. That doesn't fill me up anymore. But that doesn't mean I have to do everything! I can choose. One or two things. Do them well. And then move on.

I don't think I can express how much freedom this gives me. I honestly feel like a 10 ton weight has been lifted off my chest.

Well, once again, enjoy the fourth. Watch some fireworks! Enjoy the next week without me! Peace and quiet! :)

Namaste.

Progress. It's for the Strong.

Hm, after watching October Sky, I suddenly feel like I've only been running around in circles my entire life. True, I have accomplished a few things, but all of those things have just been by coasting. Very few things in my life have been accomplished by sheer force of will, determination, and passion.

I wonder sometimes how it is fair that someone that's spoiled like me gets everything, while someone from the very bottom of society gets NOTHING. Yet that person from the very bottom can manage to far surpass me by their drive alone, while I continue to sit here and spin my wheels.

I'd like to say that "things will be different" in college. That I'll actually take a path other than the one of least resistance. That I'll actually push myself for once in my life. To do something great. To be something great.

I just don't know.

In October Sky, Homer manages to beat the odds. Not because he waited for things to get better before he followed his dream. Not because he asked for the approval of the townspeople. No, he did it because he knew he had to.

Tony Robbins has a saying that the great men and women in the world got to where they are not because of resources, but because of resourcefulness. With enough creativity, drive, and passion, a person starting from the bottom can work their way up to anything they can dream of.

I need to remember that. I won't get anywhere if I only travel on sunny days. Resourcefulness, not resources.

Namaste.

Marching Band ?!?!?!

My power went out today around 21:00 (yeah, I've gotten to using military time because I tend to screw up the AM/PM), so I decided to go for a little walk just for fun. Interestingly enough, while I was walking, my mind switched to thoughts of marching band. I just thought to myself "four-e-and-uh-one" while my left foot came down. Not far behind came the thought of "eight-e-and-uh-one-cross-two."

What the heck is going on here, I thought. Then memories of band camp and seasonal practice flooded into my mind. I quickly thought of all the basics I've ever done, and all the fun "box" exercises.

Then, somehow, a feeling of dread washed over me. I so wanted to be able to go back and do marching band, but I knew my time had come and gone. Ursinus doesn't have a marching band and I'd never make it in drum corps. That's when it hit me: marching band is over for me.

I know what you're thinking: wow, this kid is a giant hypocrite. He claimed he hates marching band, and now he's singing its praises. Yeah, you're right. 100%. But I just happen to be at that phase of the summer where marching band looks like a really fun idea. When band camp is something to look forward to not just for the challenge of marching, but for the companionship of other members.

The mind weaves very interesting webs. I'm suprised I fell into this one. Nostalgia is king. Or queen.

PS - Speaking of nostalgia, I came across an interesting feature in iTunes that has a compilation of some of the most popular songs in any year from 1960 to 2005. It's really weird to look back on the individual years. I didn't become much of a mainstream music listener until freshman year of highschool, but even just looking at the popular songs from those years opens up a door to nostalgia and memories. Go ahead and try it. Even if you just listen to the 30 second samples per song (or sign up for Napster and listen to all of them for just $9.95 a month! if you're a iTunes hater :) ). See what pops up.

Namaste.

Yay, Interweb!!!

We bought a new router so I'm no longer pirating interweb. Sigh. But it's much nicer having a reliable, fast connection. Even if it costs money.

Woohoo!

Funny Quote

Whether your path to enlightenment is eightfold or twelvefold, or six-point-oh-two-times-ten-to-the-twenty-third-fold, a little music can well assist you in your journey. Gathered from the four corners of our round Earth (meditate on that for a while), this music captures the moment.

- From iTunes Essentials: Meditation Music

Voltage and Free Music

I found this really cool music store, eMusic. It's a subscription based store that works by giving you 20 downloads per month for a fee of $9.99. You can work that out in your head. That's right, 50 cents per song. 50 Cent would be pleased!

The only minor catch is that the site offers mainly indie songs. Now, it carries indie rock, new age, electronic, country, and rap. Not too shabby.

The even better part is that it offers you 20 free songs just for trying the service for free for two weeks. Uh, suweet. I got me some new age music (an album called Buddha Nature) and plan on downloading the new album by Dashboard Confessional and some Moby. I mean, it's free music. Take it!!! And if you like the service, keep on. If not, dump it.

That's my act of kindness for today. I hope you take advantage and enjoy your free music.

Now to the voltage part of my story. You see, our cable modem and wireless router have been acting up as of late, so I tried to fix them by unplugging. That's supposed to reset them. Long story short, I switched the plugs when plugging them back in (they're damn near identical) and they have different voltages. You know what that means? It means I fried the one that had the lower voltage (that being the router). So, no wireless for me until I buy a new router. How am I posting this now, you ask? I'm pirating wireless off of someone in the neighborhood right now. I'm a rebel!

And it turns out that both the modem and the router have nifty little "reset" buttons on the back that you activate via a paper clip. Go figure.

So, the lesson here is don't unplug more than one electronic device with a similar cord at a time. Or pay careful attention if you do. Unless you want to shell out 40 bucks for a new router.

A Review of Way of the Peaceful Warrior

I've been meaning to write a review on Way of the Peaceful Warrior. I finished reading it Monday into Tuesday (that should tell you something about the book: I rarely read them in almost one sitting) and intended to write a review then, but life had other plans for me. So now, here it is.

Some of you may have heard of the upcoming (well, it's actually out already, but not anywhere on the East Coast) movie Peaceful Warrior. If you haven't seen the preview for it, you can check that out here. That movie is based on the semi-autobiographical book Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman.

Way of the Peaceful Warrior (or WPW for short) is about the journey of a young man by the name of Dan Millman from a typical 'life of quiet desperation' to something akin to the Eastern concept of enlightenment. However, most people reading or seeing this journey, if not exposed to Eastern-esque schools of thought, might view this as a typical "coming of age story" because it's quite different from all the bildüngsromans (I've always wanted to use that word!!!) typical to Western culture.

Anyway, you can read all of this somewhere else. The thing that really interests me about WPW is the set-up. This book is coined as a "personal growth" book, but it's quite clearly fictional. But that's the greatest part. The way the books set up, you can see the passage of Dan through time, see him grow. And in a way, you can grow along with him.

That's where the tricky part comes in, though. Although you can experience Dan's highs and lows, you can't tap into them in the same way that Dan can. You can't do that until you put in the effort. There are no free lunches. You must follow the path.

But the path is well trodden by many people, and this book simply offers the Way to a modern audience. Whether the path of the Samurai, the Buddhist monk, the Christian Saint, or the humanistic philosopher, all roads lead to Rome.

All in all, I highly recommend Way of the Peaceful Warrior. It's a good, entertaining read in and of itself, with an excellent plot and compelling characters. Add to that the philosophical and spiritual areas covered, and you have a summer beach read that might just WAKE YOU UP. (It did me, but I went right back to sleep).

GodAIM, Part 3

SexyDaveDarmon: Hey, god, um, you there?

Godizzle: Does the little icon say "available?"

SexyDaveDarmon: Point taken.

Godizzle: Good, now, what's up?

SexyDaveDarmon: I have something to ask you about. Something that's been bothering me.

Godizzle: Is this "thing" more of a heaven or earth question?

SexyDaveDarmon: I guess more of an earth one. Though, what's the difference?

Godizzle: Nevermind that. Okay, so, it's a question of the earth. We need to get some more Heaven in this jaun thing. Word!!!

SexyDaveDarmon: Yes, well, maybe later. For now, I really have this problem.

Godizzle: Really, you have a problem? Let me play Ramana Maharshi on your ass and ask, "Who are you?"

SexyDaveDarmon: Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's real great. We could get far into that rabbit hole and never come out. But for now, can I just get on with my question?

Godizzle: "Your" question? Now, who is this "you."

SexyDaveDarmon: Dude.

Godizzle: Okay, okay, okay. What's this problem?

SexyDaveDarmon: I can't quite figure something out. It's really something quite simple, but it's blowing my mind, so to speak.

Godizzle: And...

SexyDaveDarmon: My question is this: where does one draw the line between introspection and narcissism?

Godizzle: Fuck lines.

SexyDaveDarmon: Huh?

Godizzle: I said "fuck lines."

SexyDaveDarmon: How can I "fuck" lines?

Godizzle: Simple. Stop drawing them. Or I should say, stop letting your mind draw them.

SexyDaveDarmon: What do you mean?

Godizzle: Look at the real world. Are there any lines? Any lines that haven't been drawn by you?

SexyDaveDarmon: Well, yeah, of course. There's hot and cold. And, uh, acid / base. And of course, you and me.

Godizzle: Bull. You know that's all bull. None of those dichomotomies exist unless you make them so. And you know that's true.

SexyDaveDarmon: So, you're saying that I make all the divisions out there. None of them are really there? Everything is "one," right?

Godizzle: Yep.

SexyDaveDarmon: I don't know, that just seems a little too simple to me.

Godizzle: Yep.

SexyDaveDarmon: You seem pretty sure of all this.

Godizzle: Hey, I'm god.

SexyDaveDarmon: But can we get back to my question. Disregarding the fact that the narcissism/introspection dichotomy doesn't actually exist, in my world it does, and it's bugging me.

Godizzle: When do you feel most full? Most complete?

SexyDaveDarmon: When I'm learning and growing.

Godizzle: Have you ever encountered a time when this learning and growing didn't help those around you?

SexyDaveDarmon: Most of the time. I mean, I don't do charity or donate much money to poor people or anything like that. I'm pretty lousy at helping the world.

Godizzle: What do you do with your time?

SexyDaveDarmon: Nothing of much importance. That's why I feel like shit at the end of the week.

Godizzle: So, the problem isn't whether or not your being narcissistic or introspective, it's whether or not you're actually living a conscious, growth-filled life, right?

SexyDaveDarmon: Hm, I guess it is! I wouldn't have thought of that!

Godizzle: And that's why you're not god!

SexyDaveDarmon: Touché!

Godizzle: Well, I'm off to enjoy my summer. You might try doing that instead of worrying so much about accomplishing things. This is your last summer before college, you know? And it'll be over in a flash.

SexyDaveDarmon: Yeah, thanks God. You're always a great help.

Godizzle: No problem. Peace.

SexyDaveDarmon: Namaste.

Godizzle signed off at 10:58