Last Mango Tequila with diet redbull like drink and four frozen cherries.

Er, sorry for not posting for a couple of weeks. Anyways I was jotting this idea in a notepad earlier today and thought I'd share with the blog-o-sphere.

We must reuse old books and objects like maps and movies and content. There will always be copies, but we need to reuse the actual objects. Old books, reels and records are just wasting away because they’ve been antiqued and archived. They fall into disuse and disrepair increasing the rate of aging. The use of copies of these works promotes simulation which accelerates not only the physical but conceptual death of the work. It sits as a referent that serves in theory to verify a copy as valid. The copy is never really checked. And in fact the work is “improved” over time to follow the political and moral fashions of the day as well as contemporary visual and aural aesthetics. The physical object then becomes a distortion to itself. It becomes a shadow that no longer contains or reflects the transient and contemporary meaning that are the work “today.” Its original meanings get lost and new ones are created. Since no one uses the original context of the work, that context gets lost, and so does its connection to history. A piece then becomes a “timeless” work. This is actually preferred by the longwinded thinkers (Am I one of these? Hmm probably, but just b/c I am in academia doesn't mean I won't deconstruct it. Oh yes, I will rip you a new one!), because the work can then be continuously re-evaluated through a huge variety of new contexts (Marxist, feminist, socio-economic, gay, psycho-analytical, Freudian, Jungian, post-colonial, etc, etc…). Each study verifying the “timeless”-ness of the “work” by creating a new meaning and destroying or devaluing the original in the process. Our notions of the permanency of meaning are illusory. We need to face this. In doing this we could drop a lot of needless struggle over intangibles like validation and authority (Which post-modernism was supposed to get rid of by denying grand-narrative, but in my opinion, it just created new alternate ones to replace the old. So much for PoMo)

And yes. That is picture of a flattened frog. I'm not anti-french or anything, I just collect images of squashed animals. Cheers!

Mac vs. PC ads... spoofed!

I found these spoofs on YouTube.com and afew are absolutely hilarious! Check em out...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLhKkvyXw-Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QG2uz2apprw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZSr89b4EoA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PDKWg9FclU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nUeZycfCG0

Enjoy and Cheers!

Coffee with Baileys and the bad Apple vs. PC ads...

These ads make the Apple/Macintosh company and Mac users seem annoyingly smug about themselves. Which I know quite a few Mac users and they’re not all that smug, a few are. Having a Mac does not make you cool.

These ads are comparing apples and oranges in they're comparing a computer brand (Mac) against a computer architecture (PC) instead of Mac vs. Dell or something much more comparable.

To add to the nonsense Macs are mostly the same architecture as PCs are now. You can now use Power Macs as PCs if you want, because there is essentially very little difference in the hardware components. They both now are using the same processors, same memory, same drives (DVD, HDD), and same buses (IEEE-1394, USB, etc). So these whole Macs vs. PC arguments are totally fatuous and actually incorrect. Because…

Macs are now PCs. Yes I know there are historical differences between those to, but they no longer exist. All the new Macs are just a brand of PCs. Sorry Mac users (the smug ones only), in the end you lost your little “Macs are so much better” battle, because your company went to the other side. Oh yes! Only they don’t want you to think them as PCs… I wonder why?

Actually, You could buy a cheaper and likely more powerful desktop or laptop (it won’t be as pretty I agree), install a free (a four letter word to Apple and MS) Linux based version of Mac’s OSX or Tiger or whatever, and run all your Mac software or PC or Linux software on it, because they are all the same hardware.

Don’t confuse “Windows” with “PC”. There are two different things. Actually the whole, “I come ready to make movies and web pages” statement is so much bullshit. Windows actually came up with that idea with the dreaded Windows Millennium Edition. Macs used to come with NOTHING but Quicktime and a text editor and calculator. So the whole “I come with software” BS is something they wised up to, not something they started. And let’s be real. They don’t come with Professional i.e. quality software like, Photoshop or Aperture or Premiere or Avid or Final Cut, Macromedia studio, etc, etc. No computer does. They come with “iDink” and “iCrap” and “iReally am never going to use this much without Apple taking even more of my money”

As per the whole viruses and malicious software, well that’s really a matter of what you call malicious. Like, spyware that tracks all your moves and purchases vs. your service provider tracking your moves and purchase (anonymously of course) and forcing you to use DRM software. If you don’t know, DRM stands for evil media corporation greed. And since Macs are now PCs viruses are a matter of a code rather than hardware, and the more Mac users... well Mac, you keep telling yourself your "safer". Sure you are.

Lastly they use up bandwidth, and make pages load slower, although all web ad movies are guilty of that. And I could go on and on but I'm stopping now to make breakfast. Cheers!

The story of the beached beer

So the other day wife and I went swimming at Kailua Beach Park. After we swam for about five 45 minutes I wanted to go get the fins and mask to go and just look at the bottom and see if there were any fish or fifty dollar bills swimming around the sandy bottom. After going out a ways and seeing not much really, I was swimming back along the bottom and swaying back and forth was an unopened bottle. Beer? Yes I rescued an unopened bottle of Heineken from the sea. I brought it back to wife (still in the water) and our conversation went something like this.
“Look what I found.”
“Is it unopened? It looks like some leaked out.”
“No, Yeah. I think. I mean it seems to missing some liquid but I think it’s just the carbonation separated from the rest of the beer.”
“You’re not keeping it are you?”
“I can’t just throw it back out into the ocean? I’ll have to throw it away or something.”
“I think there a trash can up there.”
“I don’t see one.”
“It’s behind the lady in red. "
“What lady in red?”
“That one over there.”
“I think I’m going to keep it. It’ll make a good blog.” Wife rolls her eyes (assumed) after I turn away and take the beer up to the beach, wrap it in a towel, place it under our stuff and head back into the water to rejoin wife. We swim some more, go home, refrigerate beer. A few days pass.

So today I have documented beer, with pictures and am going to taste it.

Initial observations: 12 oz. bottle of Heineken brand beer found submerged and unopened in Kailua beach park about 20 yards offshore. Front label is still intact, back label is completely missing. The cap appears to be intact although looks faded and showing signs of corrosion on edges. Contents appear to be missing about 1.0 to 1.5 oz from bottle, even though bottle and cap appears intact.

Theories: As to the discrepancy in front and back labels this could be do to the lack of adhesive applied to one side of bottle. Also back label might have already been peeling or peeled by human interaction before being lost. Pertaining to the apparent loss of contents, it is likely the bottle has been shaken in mild (Kailua beach not known for waves) but non-stop manner by the waves. This has led to the separation of the carbon dioxide gas initially dissolved into the liquid through the process of fermentation. How did the beer get to this location? After some thought I think it might be one of two scenarios. Some person kayaking or canoeing on their way out to the ocean caught some waves or winds and had a rough time of getting away from the shore. Maybe they went for a roll, and a bottle or two fell out of the bag or vessel it was in, the bottle than slowly sank to the bottom and than slowly worked it’s way northwest up the beach. Or someone at the public beach park in a hurry to get rid of their alcohol (a minor perhaps) quickly dispensed of it in the ocean, and alas never recovered it. As to age of the beer, I don’t it it’s over a year, probably a few weeks to a few months, although I have no evidence of a stamp or lot number to check it by.

Observations: After photographing the beer, I opened it. There was a good bit of bright orange rust deposited on the edges of the bottle where the cap had been. I cleaned this rust off with a dishtowel. I then proceeded to sanitize the inner and outer rim of the bottle open in with 80 proof vodka. It has little taste is relatively non-toxic and is an effective antiseptic. I than poured the beer into glass to inspect it. It appeared just like beer in color although there was no head of foam from the pour, some effervescence however is present. It smelled like beer I did not smell any briny smell of the ocean which very detectable on the bottle cap and label of the bottle. Lastly the beer tasted just like a flat beer. It had the signature taste of the Heineken brand, although this beer has not been kept in optimal conditions, and the taste has been altered by the process. I drank about five more sips as the beer warmed from fridge to about 10 degrees below room temperature. As the beer warmed a metallic tinge started to become very apparent. The corrosion of the bottle cap while intact did seep into the product. The inner cap was plastic lined and I saw no sediment in the beer I think the rust must have just seeped enough to be detectable. This also might have been magnified by the addition to a piece of lime to the beer (since I am not a fan of Heineken or flat beer). The citric acid probably reacted with the few iron or tin atoms and resulted in a metallic taste becoming every more present.

Conclusions: The carbonation had dissolved out of the beer. I was right. I drank about 2 oz. all together and poured the rest out as this beer was science not pleasure (I assure you). As for wife, she thinks I’m stupid for drinking the beer at all. I could do some experiments to try and date the bottle. I could tie some beers to a buoy’s anchor chain and see how long it rusts or lasts in the ocean, but that would be tricky but possibly worthwhile. Let me know if I should investigate further. If anyone has some further experiments or theories or similar stories please comment or email me. Cheers!

Rampant courtesy and politeness with splash of fresh fruit, tequila and coconut rum

Do you know any one stupid enough to thank people for things they haven’t done yet? I hate this public signage today that thanks you, for you support, or not smoking, or for flushing. Flushing for Pete’s Sake! Hey! I’m an adult, and I know to flush after I take a piss! I don’t need a sign to remind me. Even so, it’s just a urinal. I’m busy paying attention to what’s going on. If I forgot to flush it makes little impact on the next person using the urinal. Also, I can think of more important things you should thank me for, like not leaving a puddle of piss all over the floor, or the wall, or the commode. Who are these guys who never learned to aim? Also, in the fashion of pre-thanking, I would like to thank maintenance for fixing the broken toilets and urinals and faucets and paper towel dispensers. Also I want to pre-thank you for finally fixing that leak in the roof that you so cleverly remedied by MacGyver-ing one of the urinals into a drain for by the clever use of plastic sheeting, garden hose, and duct tape (been there a year and it’s still a marvel to behold every time I visit the 3^rd floor gents). In fact, reading your sign makes me not want to flush, so wow, reverse psychology finally worked on someone. The next one I loathe is the “Thank you for not smoking” signs posted all over campus. These just make me want to light up and then put out my cigarette on the sign itself. Not only are they ugly, and self-righteous, but they’re purposefully put in out if the way areas where smokers would normally (out of courtesy for non-smokers) go to have a cigarette. I should explain. The campus is very beautiful, and so people must smoke their cigarettes at least 20 ft away from any building or window. Never mind the fact that the A/C systems are so infected with mold and whatever else is living in there, from non-stop year-round usage (tropical island) that they smell rotten. It’s like a dirty dish sponge you just used to clean up a 2-day old cat pee! That’s ok, probably healthy even, just what your lungs were wanting. But should they ever smell smoke (I don’t know how anyone works in a rotten damp a/c office has a sense of smell left. I think they must smell it for just a moment every morning when first arrive. Honestly, it seems you’d have to be delusional after smelling that all week), well they might get the lung cancer. That right that’s the smell of CANCER! BOO! CANCER!

Knock! Knock!
Who’s there?
The CANCER!
Arrrgggghhhhhhhhh! Not the CANCER!
The one and the same!

Any ways. This politeness has one really ugly mark on it as well. In Hawai`i thank-you is mahalo. And signs rarely ever say thank-you, they say, “mahalo! for…“ This rampant use of the Hawai`ian language for meaningfulness of inflection is so fake and dishonest and racist and no one addresses it because it’s being used for “politeness.” For example, for donating, or not using the other door, or just flushing, a sign will say” Aloha! Blah Blibity Blah! Blah blahbity and mahalo for your kokua! And when it’s on television, it makes you want throw up. (Kind of like when Country and Christian singers bend there knees and reach up to the sky while singing some very very powerful and meaningful line. I mean are they supposed to be “weak in the knees” for Jesus Christ or something, because I thought that was a sin. You know they do never pick a 30s-ish, ugly, middle-eastern actor to play the big JC in movies, just the “young and virile cute-anglos” thank you very much. I mean mahalo nui loa.) Maybe it’s just me. But I feel this bizarre usage of indigenous language to signify emotional sincerity by people who aren’t Hawai`ian (I’m haole.) or speak Hawai`ian. It’s not only stupid, but a little insulting. Imagine if someone, who normally spoke any other language, spoke yours just to evoke glib uses of sincerity. It would be weird. It is weird. So everyone just stop it. I’m NOT calling for an end to common courtesy, and manners, for I have very little respect for those who have none. Only, let’s get “sorry” and “thank you” back to being a meaningful exchange rather than a mechanical absurdity. We have to write letters today, because it’s not enough just to say “thank you” in person anymore. Maybe it’s a conspiracy of postal service… maybe not. Cheers!

-Shakabusatsu

Tequila and Redbull Continued...

Baudrillard’s, theories of orders of simulacra, and simulacrum, are very important in that they logically point out how reality becomes separated from the past by rendering the meanings responsible and necessary for contextually connecting a phenomena with its history, entirely pointless. It doesn’t really matter if it takes 2 or 32 orders of simulation to sever the bonds between reason and observable effects, we’ve been there, and we need to be careful in how we treat reality, in all out philosophizing. Our evolution of thinking has come very far, very fast; let’s make sure we’re not lost, before we go to much further…

Also, I have something else I was just thinking while staring at the horizon. I think it has been shown it’s a finite world we live in. So, we are eventually going to run out of space and resources. So let’s start acting and talking like its really going to happen. Cheers!

-Shakabusatsu

Tequila and Redbull.

Structuralism is historically and logically connected to Christian theology. In this statement I'm using a broad brush to cover all formalist arguments that ignore important contextual factors that contribute to the analysis of the logic to be used. These spheres of effect of these factors often range from the personal to the planetary. The main example of why context is not universal, cannot be overlooked is because we do not have a logic, a system of rules, ways of thinking, that don't breakdown when talking about a phenomena greater than this planetary life. We are never going to be able to imagine the ways in which how we (as we seems to ourselves) are never going to join with this immense imaginary thing. We are not autonomous to all this everything around us. If structuralism could show some evidence of it always being there for everyone all the time, I could understand and allow its notions that it can speak about people as classes. But it doesn't work, doesn't even make sense to use it all the time. This "everybody and everything" usage is about just abstractly applying a system of mathematics between a semiotic system and a distorted, veiled reality. It seems like it should work logically, but it isn't consistant, which undermines the basis of its structural forms. That's why all atheists should realize that they can't go throwing around structuralist arguments, and formalist ethics, to accurately describe and judge the complex relations across boundaries of imaginary ownership, genetic distinction, political and physical natures into what ends up being post-colonialism. Especially involving the "West," when "West" is suffice to say "Christian" (just as a very appropriate example). So atheists, even the ones who still feel some sort of mysterious greater(?) power, should just keep that in mind. I don't care what religion / spiritualism you call yourself, if you're an atheist there you go. If your not, your probably saying "My religion is benevolent to manking oops… mankind and society, not a pox of ignorance and lack of mental grace, as you seem to imply?"

To you I honestly say, in all the ways you can interpret this next quote,

“I welcome you to think again.”

-Shakabusatsu

A few little changes.

Those of you who check up on this blog, (are there any left?) might have noticed I changed the background and the description. I got rid of the killing the vampiric culture beast shit because I just am too tired to write that stuff all the time. Or I was too busy last semester to bother posting at all it seems. Any how I'm going to start writing on here again. And yeah I know I reference drinking, but hey if your're an alcoholic, you probably are too drunk to be offended, and if your on the wagon or you relative died becuase of alcoholism and you can no longer tolerate drinking...BOO FUCKING HOO! Haha I love taunting people using the written word cause they had to make the effort and interest to read this. Any ways blah blibity blah, and the background image is of Sturken's and White's The Elements of Style burning in a fireplace. I don't usally attend book burnings, this one was at a house warming party. Cheers!

It's a winning combination.

Today I went swimming, after aweek of putting it off. It's suprising how while living on a tropical isle with a beach right over that way... you'd think you go swimming all the time. That is what most of think while on vacation, Comedian Bill Hicks put it in perspective, "Oh if we could just live at the beach... Could you imagine that? Livin' at the Beach ! What's the freakin' deal? It's where dirt where meets water." Still, I feel like an idiot for only going to the beach like 4 times in the last 9 months. One thing I think we are all aware of is the post swimming lazyness that hits you after you come home and take a long shower, and lat naked on the sheets and let the fan's breeze caress you dry... as you drift off into a TV wonderland where every thing is clean and bright, smells are just a concept, you are thin and have two adorable children, and every knows how happy you are by the insipid plastic grin you parade about to friends and strangers alike. Then you wake up and realize oh shit I'm hungry let find soome pizza, and put some sundried tommatoes and faux hamburger, and red pepper flakes, and don't you forget those mushrooms! But something is missing. Ah yes a cool refreshing drink of ice, orange juice, tangerine tequila, blackberry schnaaps, and splash of cranberry and lime for me, and frozen stawberry banana coconut daquiri for the misses. Eat our pizza watch some stand up and seconds on drinks. yeah I love summer. It reminds me of my second favorite Simpsons quote, "Alcohol and night swimming, it's a winning combination!" spoken not by Homer but Lenny.

Legacy

How are we, as a society of intellectuals, going to insure, to protect, to preserve our legacy. I don't know if we can even decide what exactly that legacy is or should contain. We cannot predict the next dark age. It may be only months away, possibly millenia. When is not important. But how are we going to do this ... would it just be for ourselves? Even if it was, it would be a intellectually heroic move. We don't know the extent of what was lost in the Library of Alexandria.
Are we content to let all the achievements and failures, all the great leaps of mind of even faith, just wash away. Will we be content to take every lesson we painfully learned through warfare, through catastrophe to be wiped clean? It is not hope to think we will persevere forever. It is foolishness. We need to have the forethought to realize the future, thinking may be out. We may be reduced to animals, or we may be gone and some other animals are left to evolve in our place. There won't be time to ponder, or wonder or dream. Your days may be filled with the struggle to survive and your night spent in a sleep that borders between rest and paranoia. Now look around at the world today. What do we want to leave to the next sentients, whoever or whatever they call themselves. What is around today that's worth saving? Maybe we should move towards only those things that are essential and enriching. Fire, the wheel, poetry, math, religion, politics, fashion... etc? We have to stop this sillyness, because we are weakening, and don't realize it. The greatness of the humananity has come from compassion, communion, examining the physical world, and pondering great mystery of why it's all here. Let's move toward a society based on that. Not on pyramids of succession, not on attachments or apperances, or jugdements of each other.

-Shakabusatsu

The Three Modes Cont'd

Now I would call [1] discovery. Many associate [1] with birth and childhood/youth because life then is full of [1]. Much of everything is new, you have no choice. [1] is your main part of life and you can't avoid it. ( that said I heard of three year old who if an old Sesame St is on, cries bereft of Elmo, that is truly a sad sad something)

[2] is repetition. It's rhythm, and it's addiction. I think everything in the realm of [2] has diminishing returns. I know addiction is a strong term for this, but it's [2] in it's most extreme (compulsory / obsessive) form. It's a natural mode of operation but it's distracting and gets out of control, mentally (OCD), physically (addiction), and spiritually (radical fundalmentalism).

[3] naturally is fear. Sometimes this is very mild and an activity that everyone engages in, simple avoidance. For example, potato salad tastes horrible to me. I don't know what it is, it's not texture, there a chemical or protein formed in the potato salad process that makes me wince. So I naturally avoid it. Wife is afraid of break-ins to our home, because her home was burgled 7 times as a child. I was viscously attacked by a dog as a child. He bit through my face I had stitches and drank /ate through a straw for weeks. And while I was afraid of a few loud barking snarling dogs... I had a dog and loved him, I'm not afraid of dogs at all. Strangely enough I don't really see the attack as traumatic. I don't remember any pain, I remember being in shock not really understanding what had happened.

Also I am very allergic to Poison Ivy/oak etc. (This will clarify the picture in the earlier post) And while I'm educated and avoid it, I sometimes wish my skin was so sensitive as then. When I have poison ivy the constant fluctuation between sensory overload, and itch and relief can be addictive. Also things like warm rushing water, does feel anything like it does normally. For Poison Ivy I normally engage in [3]. I've had some very curios [1]'s while inflicted with it so there's some [2] tangled up in with it as well. And this leads me to a curious point. Sometimes the very "Full" experiences of life involve all three modes. Love definite has all three mode in spades and so we say... "Better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all." All activities probably have some small bit of all three in them. It' s hard to say what life is from this side of the death divide. But it's a stream of 1,2,3's
1,2,,,1,2,,,1,2,3
1,2,1,2,,3,1,2,1,2,3
1,2,2,1,2,2,3,2,2,2,,,,,,,,,,1

There's a rhythm to it all

The Three Modes

We as inhabitants of this world, are so fixated on owning life or experience. There are basically three modes of existence that as far as I can see make up most of "life". These are not to be confused with the birth/life/death trio.

[1] Trying to own/have new experiences.
[2] Trying to repeat (very often "good") experiences.
[3] Trying to avoid (very often "bad") experiences.
There might be a fourth class in trying to understand experience. I mean by this reflection or seeing past experience in a new way or light in order to get some clarity or invent new meaning for memories. But I think just a combo of [1] and [2].

Now, some people view death as just another [1] and these people seem to have no hard feelings. They do it's because they can no longer [1] or maybe they wanted to share their [1]'s. Or maybe they are so busy finding [1]'s they often find death "the great [1]" on their heels before they have time to prepare.

Most people find some [1]'s they like and then struggle to [2] the rest of their life, or until they are bored of the same old [2] and go looking for a [1] to own and [2] over and over again. This is stability, addiction, materialism, a lot of things. It's the mode of life we most often operate in. This is what many people would call life and it is for many. Death puts a big kink in [2], in that most see death as no longer being able to enjoy the people/stuff/sensations we like so much. No longer taking satisfaction in making for yourself the things and activities you enjoy. People being something we become very attached to, and death takes them away. I ask you, at a funeral, do we weep for the dead or for ourselves?

Thirdly ,people [3] what they determine or are taught are "bad" experiences. Ones they did not enjoy or do not wish to repeat. They are vigilant to [3], not to repeat them or even have them at all. Even without their own judgment. They are told or taught they are "bad" and thus will not engage certain experience. Obviously death is the ultimate "bad" experience, to many people, especially those consumed with [2]. Also death gets a "bad" rap; people are taught death is horrible, tragic, etc, etc..., and so they are afraid of death. And since they [3] death at all cost eventhough it's inevitable, they [3] all sorts of other things, to fool themselves they can [3] death. Laughable. ( As a side note, I'm not taking in to account the "survival instinct". That is very biological in nature and I'm talking about mental constructs, although it only takes a slightly altered view of consciosness and spirit to see that all life is really engaged in [2] )
Some people, depressed or suicidal, euthanasia, mercy killers, etc... engage death as a very effective act of [3]. And it's true to avoid bad experiences...just die. It's pretty simple.

The Two Universes

This is a series (in a series...) of writings I will be doing... As far as I know, no one else has come up with this theory or talked about this in this way. If it is original, well it first appeared here. (Photo: The poisionous itch of skin)

Why are we here? I know people usually attach this question with the notion of destiny. Destiny is not a path and not an explanation, it's not a reason. Everything we do. Everything that life does. Is to try to create stasis and order. It has many forms: reproduction, obsession, manipulation, accumulation, etc. We're trying to control the universe through puppet strings. Why?
There are two universes. One immaterial, transient, omniscient, potential, non-local. The other is very similar to what we think of as reality, only blank, darkness, and void... but stable. What was the universe before the big-bang? Very hot and very small? It wasn't. But something happened. Was it a question? A collision? I'm not sure. But here we are conscious protrusions of one reality into another.
Only we never entered. It's like a puppet show. I think "TYPE IN ALL CAPITALS" and it happens. The actor pushes a series of buttons and keys, he does what I tell him (most of the time) like a good little puppet. And I play with the puppet, and we play all my favorite games. I love the puppet. Not only can I move him about but with practice I can see through his eyes, hear the sounds he hears. I can even make him talk. It's like it's me on stage, saving the day and getting the girl.
We think we are that thing in the mirror, on the tiny stage. We are not. Although we are so entertained by the multitude of new tricks and old tricks it can do. It keeps it's shape. It has stasis. It has memory. Even a glass of water has memory. Through all this manipulation we think we own this reality. We made that thing. We stare at the puppet and scream "I made you!" We gave the dark chaotic void order and reason.
What does it want?
What does master want?
What do you want?
I dunno, what do you want?
How foolish we must seem to the rest of existence talking to ourselves like this? How narcissistic. We are addicts. We are all on drugs, addicted to material life, and it's bullshit. Ask any ghost you know or might happen to meet.
My real worry is not "What does it want?" I think I know. But I'm not sure if we can severe the bond and split ourselves into a autonomous and yet incomplete soul to inhabit this "material reality." I don't want to. Then again if your like me, and you've read the Precession of Simulacra by Baudrillard, then you worry that there might a lot of reasons to worry.

An Argument for Numbers

Mathematical analysis of the universe is simply the acknowledgement that Quantity is an essential property of nature or reality. This is important because while many scientists are studying the breakdown of the universe into tiny bits of probability or quanta, or math, most of them are at a loss to explain or ask why. When scientists say "this is what we find", they do not say "why". Science and religion are not mutually exclusive. Science explains that according to the evidence nature seems to be locked into a patterns of behaving certain ways, so much so, that we can even predict with some accuracy the behavior of the properties, given a limited set of unknowns and data on initial states. Never does any of this reporting from science ever say why. It never says God does not exist, it never says he does exist, because it never asks why things are. Conversely, The Bible does not explain how things work. It doesn't explain how wheels are round, how one side of a mountain range gets rain and the other doesn't, or how when one plugs in a lamp and turns the switch, a light comes on. Other than a few short passages in Genesis "God created..." which is all on one page, versus the other 1300 or so (depending on your version) it never once explains anything quantitatively or concretely. And creationists or intelligent design (that God sure is a prankster!) seem to swear up and down that the bible is God's word and it's all true. There are no concrete statements that relate directly to the contemporary world to invalidate! Conversely there is little to none science (including evolution which is a PROVEN theory, and is NOT the theory of common ancestry, is NOT the theory of primordial earth!) that disqualifies anything in The Bible. Which is a book. That can serve as a record. And is a collection of stories. But ,as a book, is inwards. It's in the mind, and must be tempered with reason. Also science mostly is outwards and tempered with reason. It's a bunch of theories and equations and yes, numbers. And that's the true physical reality. We want to make more powerful microscopes to see smaller and smaller. It doesn't work that way. Light doesn't operate on those molecular levels. Because an image of something doesn't make it real. Science in this last century has gone deeper and deeper into what everything is made up of. And it's made up of numbers and thoughts. Why numbers and thoughts? Scientists aren't used to playing that game and the religions of world aren't capable of answering, they've become irrelevant. And that's why science, even though it has been wrong a few times and is still wrong on a lot of stuff, works. Mathematical analysis of the universe is simply the acknowledgement that Quantity is an essential property of nature or reality.

The secret value of censorship.

When writers, singers and artists cannot directly address a subject like sex, even loving marital relations, they must find metaphors or even a sub-language to address any forbidden subjects. For example in the King James Bible, Genesis, male/female intercourse is written "he went into her". Now it seems today in poetry, song, or fiction people can write anything without it being censored or banned by society because we have this thingy called free speech. Unfortunately free speech has a desensitizing effect of dumbing-down popular culture. in the Victorian - era or earlier you could reference sex or other taboos but you had to insinuate it, be oblique, use metaphor. Since writers and talkers might be using a metaphor, pun, or subversion to reveal their true meaning, or a hidden meaning behind their remarks, readers and listeners had to be alert. All this sub-text creates fantastic amounts of sophistication, which we have a total lack of today. I am not for bringing censorship back or against free speech, but it is naive to say that this change in our culture has no effect, or is all good. Also, since sub-text and metaphor have lost a daily- regular or practical function, its function now is just aesthetic. And this aestheticism is a label that says, I wrote this, this way to sound pretty. Which is weak. So this enforced a way of writing that makes metaphors and sub-text seem functional, for example Period writing.

-shakabusatsu

The Power of Simulacra.

The most volatile part of Baudrillard's idea(s) about simulacra, is that we live in a simulacrum. Not actually fourth-order "pure simulacra" but on the third-order. This is where our consciousness resides. Let me explain. Let's assume there is a basic wide spread reality. When we look at it with our eyes, we sense an image. Now this image is a projection on our retinas, upside down and backwards. This masks or replaces the reality, which are actual physical objects. This image is transmitted via electrical nerve impulses to our brains. At our brain the signals are then compared, and information about depth is constructed along with the two images being almost seamlessly patched together. It's then sent, or fed into, or compared with our memory, and our consciousness.

Our consciousness resides here on this third level/order of simulation. Where an absence of a basic reality is masked. Therefore we can't tell, our sense of reality, through our normal senses. It may prove interesting to consider if the mind malfunctions, and creates images from memory or other senses. When memory is fresh, this now fourth order simulation (pure simulacra), with no connection to reality, maybe hard to detect. As it becomes apparent a persons conciousness is now relying on fourth-order simulation, we recognize this as madness or insanity. Also consider, when we dream. Usually, to my experience, it is only through examination of the circumstances, that I recognize a dream. Only then, when I compare it to a normal third order experience, through examination of circumstances, that I recognize a dream. Only when I compare fourth order to third order (PINCH ME!) am I convinced that this dream does not exist, or is not connected to reality.

Guerilla Girls Part II

The other day a girl in a workshop heard me talking about the Guerilla Girls post and thought I was against equal pay between gender and racial lines; which I am for equal pay across all lines. So I explained it all and she asked, "So the manager or CEO would make as much as a janitor?"
"Yes"
"But that doesn't make any sense"
"No, it makes perfect sense, everybody works all week, everybody gets paid."
"But there would be no motivation, to do more work, to be better"
"So you think the artists who make a lot of money, more than you or I ; have more motivation and passion?
"Oh, so this is just in an Artist context, from your view?"
"No, I want that for everybody."
"Who did you vote for?"
"Actually, I really regret who I voted for, I should have voted for... see I voted for Nader and the Green Party the last two elections.
"You didn't vote for Bush did y..."
"No. I voted for the other guy, Kerry. But I should voted for Nader, I mean he wasn't on the ballot, I should have written him in. Because the Democrats, and their sect of pundity movie/rock/television star voices were saying some really awful things. Saying he's old, he's crazy, lost all respect for not standing down. That is not how you treat someone who fought the system in court and won consumer rights for all of us. And the Democrats should be ashamed, ashamed (it's cheesy I know to repeat it like that but, It's like a little speech I've repeated more than once), especially the people who spouted that disrespect" (some heads nod)

That there was proof the Democrat party had become exactly what Greens, Libertarians, and Independents hate about the two party system. They together have become the party of Big Business only they don't really want you to know that. The both just want to win, they both lack vision. And therefore lack any real solutions to the problems barreling down on this country. So we talked further about our dissatisfaction at the current administration, and one person offers up that he wishes all the old people would die, and this world would change tomorrow. And it's a little true. Wife thinks that the longer lifespans of politicians, means that while society and the world is changing faster and faster, our government is changing slower and slower, and while I don't want to disrespect the wisdom of our elders, I don't want up to hold up the folly of our elders either. Anyways I say, "I want the whole eutopic Star Trek vision of a unified earth. I don't know if that's possible in my lifetime, but I think there are three things we have to change. We have to 1. Control population growth. And we have to RID ourselves of 2. Religion, and 3. Nationalism."

Now I just met these other classmates a few weeks ago. I don't even know one dude's name. I'm 29 and these people are early twenties. Here are their responses in order:

1. nods all around
2. unanimously "yeah"
3. hmmm, Nationalism I don't know if we can get rid of that, you think? I don't know.

I don't know how to explain what joy it gave me to hear those answers. Answer #2 ,as an atheist, is especially reassuring. And #3, They think (rightly) that government is too powerful to easily rid ourselves of. All I could say in response was "It's one planet, we have to start thinking that way."

My own parents would likely laugh at me for such notions, (which is funny because I have no problem seeing their point of view) although they would have no answer as to a unified vision for planet earth (probably everybody should serve in the military).

Later,

shakabusatsu

Mass is not the stuff of the universe.

(This is an old journal entry, but so nessecary, to understand alot of arguments I will be making in the future. So enjoy!)

The conventional model of the universe is that all bodies are made up of stuff. That stuff is matter and all this stuff (matter) is floating about in a shitload of space. It's important that there be plenty of space for matter to float about in, so the universe is presently expanding. Let me start by saying that the conventions about the universe (if you can call it that) are at best incomplete, but probably total guesswork. From my observations I can make totally differrent conclusions about physical reality (because that's what it really is, not a silly word like universe with all its erroneous conotations). To begin.

The conventional idea of space, is just that. It's a bunch of nothing for something to float about in. I would conclude from the scientific endevors and evidence published around the world that it is precisely the opposite. It is the stuff of the "universe", and that matter is just abubble, a pocket of nothing. Blackholes are not singularities, or anomalies. You get enough matter together it will start to condense, just like a gas suspended in a liquid, in a foam. Foam is the equilivelent to what we commonly think of as matter. Some bubbles when squeezed together will condense and form a larger bubble of pure gas. Think of blackholes. Theoretically and semi~observationally they are big holes, in the universe created by a super ( but not infinite) concentration of matter. Scientists call them singularities, because they don't exist, or don't conform to the regular laws of the universe. But this hole of nothing is caused by stuff inside of it. In side where? The black hole literally doesn't exist within the laws of this reality. But as more mass falls into the hole and the event-horizon gets larger. The black hole, and ultimately the question or problem of gravity is this. How does mass or matter bend space? This is the craziest of proposals since space does not in present scienticfic measure ment exist. Its the vacuum. The idea of space bending in its mathematical accuracy or its abity to explain observations, shows the weakness of our present assumptions on the nature of physicall reality.

A response to "Guerilla Girls on Tour"

I've been going to lectures on Tuesday nights while my wife is in class. The weird thing is that the older I get, the more I disagree with everything, even stuff I would normally agree with. ( Once I was told that my "liberal notions" were just part of being "young", and that I will become more "conservative" as I get older... Well maybe that line works on babyboomers who just get stupider and more selfish year after year, while I have just watched everything get shitty-er and shitty-er. Sorry, that I just get more angry as I get older and realize this whole Cold War was a gigantic bullshit story for the benefit US and Russian arms suppliers and the respective politicians who played along. )

For instance two weeks ago I went and saw "Guerilla Girls on Tour." Let start by saying these are not the original Guerilla Girls. This is a separate group of theatre professionals who go on tour "changing the world, one sexist city at a time." This was a show by two "Guerilla Girls" who instead of wearing the trademark anonymous gorilla mask, substituted blond wigs and ape-ish face-pieces that covered the eyes and nose. Plus they wore white T-shirts and boardshorts to dress "Hawaiian", the effect was of a beach blanket troglodytes movie. They acknowledged how Honolulu, happened to disprove there statistical arguments. The one calling herself Julia Child did the WORST impression, making Ms. Child sound like a drunken Foghorn Leghorn. But also, the writing was sooo bad, that they themselves exemplify the false argument/notion that women aren't good playwrights. The audience was funnier than the performers! The flier for this had a headline, "Feminism Is Funny." No. It wasn't. Lastly, during the highlight of the audience participation portion of the show, they ask, "Who here believes in equal pay for equal work?" And everyone raises their hands. "You are all feminists!" Well... I disagree.

No one in that room believes in equal pay for equal work. I doubt most reading this would either. Why else do you go to college (except for lofty notions of education and knowledge) but so that your 40 hours a week gets you 40k + salary instead of the 18k you might make at minimum wage? Huh? Maybe we like to humor the illusion that our desk job is actually more work than following behind a garbage truck, selling fast food, or cold calling customer after customer, but it's not true. Most people don't want those jobs because it is a great deal more work for little pay. So Feminists and ACLU members what are you fighting for? For your own piece of an inherently flawed system. It's a system based on discrimination. Everyone of us get discriminated everyday. By our appearance, our language, our economic status. Whose outlawing that? No one is trying to get rid of the "buddy" system, or tipping. I don't see anyone saying fashion is immoral. In most states you can't hire or fire people based on gender, race or religion, but you can on almost any other reason you can think of. So what's the point? If we the discriminated, discriminate the discriminations we are subjected to, we'll fix the system? It may just be me, but I don't think it's going work. It takes something more revolutionary. And Guerilla Girls, you aren't it.

TTFN,

-shakabusatsu

Welcome to my spanking new blog.

I will be posting images, and journal entries (new and old) on this, my first blog. Once upon a time, I was posting my writing and pictures on my own website, but this whole auto-magic blog service stuff seems too convenient. I write short critical essay-ish rants about science, society, and religion with the occasional daydream thrown in. I am little busy tonight, so instead of some thing new I'll give those who might stumble across here an old journal entry. (from a couple years ago)

Sometimes this whole notion of "why I write" is to do something with all the thoughts I have. I have career choices to make. What to do with one's life is such a troubling notion. My whole life has been a double-life; one in thought and one in practice. I've desperately wanted something in which the twain shall meet. But some of me thinks this is a vain search. Further more, despite myself, my experience with parents, friends, and others, I'm not sure anyone wants to hear my thoughts. I am intelligent, but otherwise unremarkable. My thoughts are remarkable, but maybe only to me. That truly is a disparaging feeling. And yet it's the kind of loneliness I've known my whole life.