So I have started reading

Richard Dawkins. The Greatest Show on Earth. At 'work'.

And the first chapter covers definition and pretty much bitching a bit.

According to Mr.Dawkins, 40% of Americans do not believe in Evolution. They believe in what is known as Creationism, that is everybody just sprang into existence, each discrete and unique i.e. designed entirely by God to be different.

Now, 40% is huge. That's 2 out of 5. And the other 3 are not necessarily evolution fans I guess.

And what do I think of it? I don't know. Pretty much Evolution is the only thing I was thought, and I have not given much thought to this. I follow the philosophical trend of 'nothing is absolute. Science is entirely fallible'. But even then, I feel empathy when Mr. Dawkins mentioned that scientists are not given the due credibility. In some sense that is agreeable I guess.

But to say all life sprang into existence within a week =/ even if we were to go all philosophical about this, while it does not violate any of my philosophical thoughts, it does sound counter intuitive and reeks of religious ideas. Not my idea of common sense nor process anyway.

Regards

____________________________________

Edit 29/12/10
I find Mr Dawkins to be a funny man. His usage of words is excellent in that it politely yells at you 'YOU'RE A FUCKING IDIOT IF YOU BELIEVE OTHERWISE'

Edit 29/12/10 (2)
Ain't no drama like ToraDora

Drying your hands can be a Dilemma too!

Today after washing my hands, I proceeded to dry them. But it struck me.

If I use paper, I have to consider the trees that are felled. Deforestation, animal habitats destroyed, greenhouse effect etc comes to mind.

So I went to the dryer. But hey,

If I use the dryer, I have to consider the environmental damage caused by electricity generation. All the mining, combustion that releases gases, death of miners, flooding from dams, etc.

So I stood there for a good two minutes considering my alternatives.


... and I wiped my half dry hands on my shirt and walked out the toilet.

in case you didn't know

but you guys are so outnumbered...

time to change profile pic no?

Katanagatari

That's 5 a's out of 6 vowels. Spoiler alert if you do watch the series and haven't completed it.

It ended, with the lead's dying wish to spread the way of greeting people with 'Cheerio!' throughout ancient Japan. Cute. It is used with the wrong meaning in this sense. Cuter.

Final episode questioned heaps, though not exactly too directly relevant to our interests. But I liked it nonetheless, since the core can be added with the details to make them relevant.

I loved this series, and liked the author's style with stories. Looking forward to more quality work from NisioisiN (which if you read backwards and forwards, is the same. Cool pen name eh?)

Boredom

So what do you do when you are bored?

I was bored out of my wits these past few days. My internship doesn't start until Monday, and I have no commitments. At all.

To be honest though, I seriously appreciate the boredom. Being bored is a luxury; finding things to occupy our time and satiate the otherwise empty feeling is a natural thing to do I guess.

But time is as transient as it gets to me (unless I am in great pain. Relativity!). When I get bored, my body shuts down slowly. I get lethargic. I get sleepy. I get listless. I get disinterested. And the weather here in Malaysia doesn't help. At all. I wonder how I grew up until 19 in this climate?

The odd thing being, while my body functions in the most unhealthy manner after a few days of bumming around being bored, my mind for one did not stop spinning new tales, new worlds, new ideas. While I sat there being bored and watching the wall, I was simultaneously in another world. Slaying monsters, debating, researching in a thought lab, pondering on science and philosophy. If I could find the time and effort to pen them down, no matter how gibberish.

All these thinking done without moving. Oh heck I haven't cut my fingernails. That's been 3 days since I thought of it, and its really long.

When my internship starts, I wonder when can I afford such luxury again? Being bored that is.

Truly, life is not defined as crying the first five years, studying the next 20, working the next 30 and crying till you reach the grave. Might as well be an android. Android 2.1 maybe?

All these, while pondering the fact that matter blinks in and out of existence. That is experimentally observed in two pieces of electrically charged plates with supposed vacuum between them and well sealed. And naturally, people begin to think that our universe is perhaps something that blinks in and out of existence, just as the 'blinking matter' that exists for nanoseconds. Relativity I guess.

On another note, books really are cheaper here huh? Anybody know the price for 'History of Western Philosophy' by Bertrand Russell and where?

So

Um, yeah...

I am back in the sweltering hot hellish food heaven tropics, and the first thing I do after a snack, a shower and some family chat is to update my blog. How dedicated am I?

Enjoyed Melbourne heaps. I saw

Penguins
Penguins
More Penguins

That made a fortnight. Seriously.

Funny that

When we are so immersed in something, we forget the question of why we exist.

When people are bitching about so and so, they forget the question of why.

We never seem to be able to see things from other sides. That is the greatest failure of our kind.

With that said, I will be enjoying myself in Melbourne the next two weeks. Doubt there will be updates, so chill :D

Cheerio! (In case you are wondering, it is a catchphrase from the anime Katanagatari, or Sword Story. A catchphrase that the character misunderstood the meaning and used it repeatedly oblivious to the actual meaning. Its infectious to me.)

Power Rangers and Ultramen

When I was young, my heroes were inevitably the Power Rangers, Ultraman, Masked Riders and of course, Son Goku from Dragon Ball. Coupled with Disney, they make up an interesting part of philosophy and morality combo for when I was young, and naturally it went unnoticed.

If I think about them from my perspective now, the first few introduces the idea of good and bad. Monsters are bad, because they eat people. The heroes/heroines are good, because they protect us. Simple as that. And violence against such creatures are justified, because well, they are evil.

Disney introduces the idea that each and everyone of us are unique. It feeds our imagination, and plants the ideas that the world can be a better place if we would just love everyone more, and express it properly. In fact, if we take one step further, it subtly hints that each of us are princes and princesses in our own rights, and that we will find 'the one for us', enjoy love and bask in its sweetness and live happily forever after. Such ideals are wonderful, and I still do think so now.

But reality is strange. Everybody loves Disney stories, everybody agrees with it. But you don't see happy people dancing in the street. Reason is? I don't know but I guess people are weary and think reality is a bitch. There's work.. there's relationship problems. Love is not what was portrayed in Disney. Something I personally feel, well, nothing is complicated. We are the complicated ones, and we complicate everything. The same argument holds for physics and mathematics. Although I doubt there is an absolute truth in these, the beauty of these two subject lies in its simplicity.

Now, at the age of 21 (approaching 22), I introduce to you the 'Philosopher Rangers'. Warriors who fight against the crushing depression of human stupidity, and seek to make sense of the reality and people. My heroes, are all dead unfortunately.

Before that, I must confess I do not understand them completely yet, though I doubt there is a single soul on Earth even now who understands them 100%. You can't even understand your wife, how could you understand deep thinkers?

First up, we have Kirky (an affectionate nickname I gave him, not Kirby though).
I was listening to the radio on BBC website this morning on Kirky, and well, much of what I said about my philosophy in the previous post had actually been covered by Kirky. So much for my own originality, but I find comfort not in recognition of originality, rather I am happy that I have made the same realization as someone who heavily influenced the world of thinking with (not exactly) same ideas that I had. In fact, it was pretty much summarized in the first 20 minutes of the talkshow. Kierkegaard holds that we cannot know anything absolute, i.e. we are not entitled to God's view as mentioned in the talkshow. Reason and rationalization are not absolute, but acceptance is what constitutes faith. he rejects all manner of institutionalization of religion (namely Christianity).

However, I do not agree entirely with Kierkegaard's ideas. Not all. Definitely.

Second Hero, we have Heidi.
Heidegger was one who studied profusely into the subject of 'existence' or as he termed it, 'Being'. I admire him strongly for that, for he spent a great deal of time making sense of why we exist, why we are 'be-ing'. The field in question is none other than 'Ontology', the question of Being. Unfortunately, Heidi got entangled in the Nazi craze. Of course, why he did it is very possibly because the Nazis were partly influenced by his thoughts. And naturally they incorporated his ideas into their doctrines of German supremacy.

Heidi was deeply into language. A romantic perhaps? He believed in primordial languages, namely Greek, and that these oldest languages held 'True meanings' to words, unlike his 'present' language where words are said without meaning what they meant. Think of slangs even now, that is perhaps what he felt was the corruption of language.

And no, I do not agree entirely with Heidi either. Whatever I understand anyway.

And third, we have Can't.
Kant is the one I understand the least. The few books I read about him, explaining his ideas, employs super heavy words and super heavy languages. But nevertheless, the essence of his ideas are what attracts me. We strongly cannot know anything absolute, according to Kant. He divides the human mind into four primary faculties, namely Pure Reason, Practical Reason, Judgement and one more I forgot what. And he studies (armchair speculation, I believe) deeply into the relation between these. I don't understand much, but from what little I gleaned, Kant holds a treasure of ideas on, well, Ideas.

Because I don't understand much, I can't say I disagree with him. Partly because whatever I understood (I hope not wrongly), I agreed.

Fourth, we have Bertie.
Bertie is known for his quick wit. His major(? there are others but major to me) study is in philosphical history, epistemology, logic, and of course the main interest of him I think is NUMBERS. Numbers are so embedded into our lives we don't even realize they are there. And incidentally, numbers are logical axioms. You cannot prove them logically, and Bertie tried using mathematical sets. Can't remember if he succeeded (I think he did, I didn't bother understanding the logics, its taxing on the brain). While Newton wrote Philosophie Naturalis Principia Mathematica, Bertie wrote 'Principia Mathematica'. And one book I am keen on reading by Bertie is 'The History of Western Philosophy bla bla bla politics'.

One famous (I think it was improptu) answer Bertie gave, when during a lecture (I think), some guy questioned him as 'If what you are saying is true, then 1+1=3 and you are the Pope should be equivalent!'. The answer came:

"If 1+1 = 3, then we have 2=3. Subtract 1 from each side, we now have 1=2. The Pope and I are two people, therefore we are 1."

And a lovely quote by Bertie goes "The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the smart are always full of doubts".

Moving on, we have Leibby. The antihero of Isaac Newton.

Leibniz invented calculus independently of Isaac Newton. And the two are bitter rivals, so I understand. Newton was famous for being a taciturn character, some described as 'arrogant' etc. and I read somewhere that some professor thinks he has some form of autism. But the subject is on Leibniz. Leibniz, unlike Newton, sought to socialize a lot. With powerful figures, namely princesses and the like.

The work by Leibniz that I find intriguing is his work on 'monads'. In it, he tries to form a model to explain reality, and matter. The general idea is that the universe is made up of infinite 'monads', little round stuff that floats around throughtout the entire universe. And these monads are infinitesimally small, and he described them as 'beings in harmony with each and all others. All information of every single monad is known by every other single monad, and any change in one is immediately conveyed to every other one of them' is what I remember.

And currently, Physicists are spooked by electron entanglement, where information is transferred faster than the speed of light. Quantum mechancis comes in, but I shall not delve into a subject I am not too confident of yet. Suffice to say, electronic entanglement is currently being researched as a means of teleporting information, according to Michio Kaku.


That's 5 philosophers that I strongly admire. Nonetheless, Socrates deserves an honorary mention, for he was the Father of Philosophy. The very first human being who sought to employ reasoning and rationality to tell people they are stupid. And we know that Socrates didn't like writing, and frequently sought conversations with people and asking simple questions that make people admit they are stupid and didn't know (but thought they did).

Plato too, is a hero by his own rights. His world of Ideas, now coupled with Kant can make your supposed knowledge or wisdom turn to dust if you concede to their arguments.

Edit : How could I forget George Carlin? Goodness me.

Oh and in case you're wondering, no I do not get all (or for now, any) sources from wikipedia. I am reading real life physical books.

Fun Fact : In case you didn't know it, 'Science' and 'Scientists' didn't come about until people like Galileo, Hegel and Descartes (Pronounced as Dey-kah I think) established it. Hegel (Kirky does not like Hegel) believed in totality, an organized rationality that explains stuff in all subjects. Formally though, Descartes is the "Father of Modern Philosophy", and Galileo the "Father of Science". The basis of science is one of 'Cause-and-Effect', but that is steadily being dismantled currently (by quantum physics, and some logics).

Opinion : Of course, science works so well its uncanny. Applying the principles of similitude (studying something specifically in labs by simulations/experiments and then applying the results in real projects) currently is what drives our world of economy and science now. But, the wry side of it is that scientists are observers, and currently it is realized that the observers unknowingly change what is being observed. Quantum mechanics again. But, on a more common-sensical well, sense, below is a pretty cute logical flaw in experiments that captures the idea of 'you measure only what you want to measure'. I forgot the author, but the book was titled 'I think, therefore I laugh' (Wittgenstein said if you understood philosophy completely, you can write a book on it that is made up entirely of jokes).

"Professor A has a jar full of fleas (Jar A), and another same-sized jar that is empty (Jar B). Professor A took out one flea from the jar A, and put it before Jar B. He yelled 'JUMP!', to which the flea responded by jumping into Jar B. He then meticulously repeated the activity with every single flea until Jar A is empty.

Now, he reversed the experiment. He took out a flea from the now full jar B, plucked out its legs and put it before Jar A. He yelled 'JUMP!', but the flea did not jump. He then, very meticulously repeated the experiment with every flea, plucking the legs out everytime and yelling 'JUMP!'. All the fleas did not jump, of course. Faced with a monumental 100% success rate in this part of the experiment, he happily noted in his lab journal that:

Fleas without legs cannot hear".

Because I have time

So I will update.

Exams are over, and the sudden liberation left me senseless for the past two days. Yes, I have achieved absolutely nothing in the past two days, with minimal reading/thinking. Time passes when you are dazed.

A state of mindlessness is how I would describe it. It is a feeling of liberation from all woes, all cares, and funny that it all arose from the examination period, when you are tremendously occupied with scoring in a paper, and then............

It is also during this period that, I get the feeling that is constantly lost and regained all the time; nothing matters. Reality is, in a sense what we perceive. That is directly against solipsism (which is a philosophy that can be simplified into a sentence : "I am the only one that exists. The environment and people in it are products of my imagination". ) And naturally, while I doubt solipsism is 'correct' (mountains of logical thoughts against it), you cannot disprove such a notion, simply because we lack the tools to transcend reality. The same argument holds for God.

And from here, allow me to introduce to the world the embryo of my philosophy of reality. It is yet undeveloped, problems are everywhere yet to be solved, but nevertheless it is a project/a viewpoint/statement of problem, call it whatever you want.

The human reality is an egocentric one. Ego here, meaning how we perceive ourselves, and centrism meaning putting it in the centre. Naturally, since we feel inclined to think that we are the most (and not the only) intelligent being on Earth. Haven't came across a dog that blogged, but there certainly are interesting blogs out there (a pair of tooth comes to mind, some cats also).

Well the point is, if we stop in our tracks, stop in our habit of living, and just think about how would an alien perceive us, what can we imagine the alien will think?

We can't.

Why? Think of a room, a square, whatever. You are not in it. Colour every side a different colour. There should be six colours, the colours irrelevant.

Now fix a window on the square, a small one, a peephole, doesn't matter. The only rule being, you can only fix it on one side. And the circumstances are, when you view from the window into the room, you can see only one colour (the room being infinitely larger than the window, theoretically of course).

And that summarizes the argument. If you are born into a world seeing only red colour, then the word 'blue' or 'green' does not mean anything to you. Your viewpoint, in fact your habit of seeing things is accustomed to only from one side. 'Thinking outside the box' is rubbish because while you can tap into dormant ideas in your brain, you cannot escape from your 'red-only' world.

Hence, I define 'logic' and 'reason' something applied purely only to human beings, and maybe the animals/plants that inhabit the same world. This 'world' can extend to the universe, no problem there. But not to unimaginable worlds though.

If you had actually thought of what the alien would think, then you are imposing your view upon the fictional (maybe) alien. Since you don't even know what the alien looks like, much less how it thinks, you cannot for sure imagine anything remotely probably to the alien's way of thought.

If that confuses you, think of a colour outside of the three primary ones (all the colours as we know are mix and matches). Asking you to invent a new basic colour is an impossible task (I wonder if anybody can do that?)

Here I admit, though I stress that this is a thought entirely of my own but not without influences, that there are connections/similarities (some) to Plato's World of Ideas and Kant's idea of Faculties (which I still find it difficult to understand, mostly because its so wordy and heavy that I lose my concentration half a page down).

The central idea of egocentrism is that, because we have no other yardstick, we put ourselves at the centre and measure everything from there. (Copernicus anyone?)

The reason why I have not followed any mainstream religious faith up until now, is purely because I reject the notion of 'God who created Humans'. I do not reject the idea of God though. Blurry, I know.

Simply put, we are not special. And therefore it is presumptous of us to think that God is capable of emotions. Counter-intuitive and antilogic, but that's the gist of it. God cannot be logical because logic as we know it is a human thing. Thus the idea that God loves us, is one that I sense the idea of human arrogance. We seek to describe the undescribable.

Mathematics as we know it can prove many things. Physics thus far is uncovering heaps of facts about our reality.

But we cannot escape from logic, nor reason nor emotions. Those are what defines a human, and interestingly (though not meant to be contradicting) this same rule applies to intelligent animals as well. But that is no justification for such a rule to be imposed on a being not of this reality e.g. God and our alien friend.

Consider this an introduction. Now I have to resolve some conflicts in this theory, namely this theory is subject to the laws it introduces, since the only tools I have in developing this idea is logic and reason.

If you question what the significance is, well, nothing life-changing for you I guess. But it is a way I am trying to understand our existence. An ontological or epistemological quest if you like.

_________________________________________________________

Now, on to my little degenerating activities. I have been watching some animes, new and old. And I shall 'type' of some ideas I gleaned from them.

The first anime is currently an ongoing one, titled 'Shiki'. Literally in Chinese it is written using the words 'Corpse' and 'Ghost' (Shi Gui), but in comprehending it it means a 'Corpse Demon' of sorts. The Japanese words employed the same writings, and the same meaning.

The story is set in a remote village, and a strange family (with a family name Kirishiki, though not written with the Corpse Demon words) moved in. Before long, people began to die, and the local doctor notices the recurring symptoms in people dying (with the assumption that it was an unknown epidemic). Namely anaemia.

Oh yes, this is about vampires by the way, and no they do not glow. Nor are they sex-bombs. The vampires featured in this show are zombie like. They feed on human blood, cannot stand sun and go comatose during daytime. And they were friends of the victims, who still retain all their original thoughts but with an added insatiable hunger.

In my opinion, this is easily better than all your Hollywood shows about vampires (that I have seen, come across or heard thus far). The author discusses the course of actions of the characters very well. I should mention there are two main characters, a teenager and a doctor.

The teenager found out about the secretive, growing group of zombie-vampires and he was determined not to die. Yet when his friend became one, he wanted to save him. It cost him his life, because he persisted and gave blood to the vampire. As of now it is unknown but highly probably that he became one as well.

The doctor is the character that strikes me more. He found out about the zombies, but he is more prudent. In fact, the chief vampire family knew that he knew of them, but they sought no action against him other than a threat (reasons yet unknown though). The doctor, knowing that he would not be believed by the villagers anyway, sought other ways to fight other than screaming about the vampires to everyone.

He wanted a specimen to experiment on, but he cannot catch one. If he catches one (if he could anyway), they will retaliate in full force. Thus he could only watch silently as people fell prey.

Until his wife became a victim. He slowly nursed her in isolation, and waited for her to die. Then, after a few days, just as she was about to turn, he bound her up and began experiments on her, while she cried and screamed unable to understand that she herself had became a vampire. Oh, he cut her up, injected all sorts of stuff from drugs to pesiticides, and when he was finally satisfied he drove the stake through her heart. Gory.

Heartless? Perhaps. But faced with such a situation and knowing no cure nor way to save his wife, it seems the doctor was logical/reasonable enough to take such a course of action. Since the vampires have no access to knowing whether his wife would rise (she was not buried, they only know she died. And not all rise by the way).

I feel the author has sufficient 'darkness' in her work, and it justifies the story thus far. There is no catering to what people would expect (yet), and I have high hopes for the ending. It being original enough I mean.

Personal opinion? One of the best thus far, no doubt.

I have another one to discuss, 'Welcome to the NHK'. But the post is lengthy, and I doubt it will do any good to make it longer.

So I shall update tomorrow. Cheerio!

Books

I think I am most creative when I procrastinate.

I had tons of stuff to write about, everything from intelligent discussions about reality to the downright depressing feelings related to exams. And this was yesterday, before the last exam paper today.

And today, after the exams, I forgot every single thing I intended to write on this blog. (I didn't do it yesterday because I was convincing myself I was not procrastinating. But well, haha...)

Anyway, I dropped by my fav. place in the world after the toilet. The library and the book shop.

And, I found out that Robert Jordan had drafts for three books before he died. THREE. Oh in case you're not familiar with him, he's the guy who wrote the Wheel of Time. Yeah, that book, I read 11. There's 13 now. And the thinnest is 750 pages long. With a font size about this small, in every page. And there's three more, written by some other people based on his draft. Not sure if I'll read it, because the last book I read was pre-SPM if I remember correctly. That's 4 years at least.

And, as I was leaving Borders, I saw Justin Bieber's face. No, not the real guy. The real face slapped on a hardback book. The pretty face took about 75% of the front cover, and the other 25% filled with the words '100% official' and something else.

So yeah, it pisses me off because I hold a sacred view of books. Books are tomes of knowledge. They share imagination, ideas, facts etc. But writing a book of 'How I became famous, how I got inspiration for my mushy songs and how I dealt with the emotional problems when everyone hates me' stuff is not exactly something that turns me on. I detest it, in fact. 

I wrote all these without having listened to a single song by him (an achievement I maintained till now). But the general idea I have of people like Bieber is that, well, shallow. Perhaps it is unfair, perhaps it is unjustified bias. But I just cannot stand the idea of a pre-pub guy singing about love (remember my statistics about 90% of the songs out there being about love). It is a poisoned view, seasoned with media inputs and baked with the camera lights. The idea of everlasting love, with unimaginable freedom and as simple as 'be with me forever', without a shred of responsibility other than the impetus of the rush of emotion.

No, in the long run, this will not contribute anything to humanity. It will serve to entertain and whittle away the time of a disillusioned faceless society. As bad as reading some sappy love story perhaps.

And I am not saying all readings I approve of are of science or philosophical themes. I read fantasy all the way up until last year, before I switched genres (to science and philosophy). I still enjoy other books, comic books and fantasy books in fact. Leisure reading is leisure reading that exercises the mind and stretches the imagination. Reading about how wretched and blessed an idol's life is is not leisure reading.

And I almost began ranting on the state of movies on screen, but I'll consciously avoid that.

My current reading list includes Dawkins, Atkins, Kaku, Kant and Nietzche. Heavy. Throw in Robert Jordan maybe? Oh and Bryson. Bought a whole lot of his books for a bargain and didn't get around to reading them.

Till then, I shall indulge in some nerdy bookworm activities after a depressing period facing coursebooks and textbooks. 

On a side note, I found a really awesome wallpaper of Fate/Unlimited Blade Works that utilizes fully the great laptop I have. That made my day :D 

Study

I really need to do some serious revision, but oh well.

The torrential emotions, namely the dread, the melancholy, the existential angst, the boredom, the lethargy, the distractions, the hopelessness, the pointlessness, and of course not forgetting the brain resistance to input.

With all those massless weightless yet heavy stuff on me, uhhh yeah I am procrastinating.

I shall do my best to cast aside all that is life, the mantle of emotions and focus as a zombie, as a robot would and figure out how to solve engineering problems!

I just wasted perhaps 20 seconds of your life. Cheerio

Edit 6/11/2010
P/S : Came across this passage by Bertrand Russel. In case you don't know who he is, he is a logician/mathematician/philosopher, an interesting one at that because he spent his whole life trying to prove numbers are logical. Numbers are axioms by the way, and axioms are stuff that are correct as we know but cannot be proved. One example is numbers, another example are the laws of thermodynamics. And perhaps one that everyone can relate to is the 2nd law of thermodynamics - Heat always flow from hot to cold (the premise being natural processes of course).

Anyway, the passage goes

"no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought or feeling can preserve a life beyond the grave; that all labors of the ages, all the devotions, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of the human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system; and the whole temple of Man's achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins".

It does poetic justice to the existential angst  (the more proper word should be ontological?) angst in me :D

Somebody grab that running fellah! He's my sanity!!

So yeah, I'm losing it. Let me recount the stupid things these past few weeks :D

1) Being an idiot while doing a group project. Totally embarassed myself.

2) Being smart and asking lecturers questions via email. Totally embarassed myself with the stupid questions.

3) EPIC : Crossing the road when the traffic lights turned green. The car-traffic lights, not the pedestrian lights.

4) Forgetting to bring my cash card. Realized it after I ordered the food and the food is brought before my eyes. No cash at hand, only my debit card. EPIC : Forgot my debit card password. Went to the bank and remembered it AFTER I asked. Cute.

And almost gave wrong directions to a poor lost soul.

I think I'm studying too much = =" I need a rest.

P/S : I think number 3 is uber cool. I almost got ran over xD (its funny! Really! Because when I realized it I realized why people in the car were staring at me)

PP/S : I broke my speakers. 

Haha

I've pretty much just reminded myself that I haven't lived this past few weeks, and was about to before I realized I have to kill myself again for the next three weeks.

Maybe I'll live for 2 hours a day, and be a zombie robot as I study for my exams.

Or maybe I'll update this blog more often.

Problem Prabelem Prabulum

The problem with people is, there is always a problem.

Adults can be childish, children can be matured, but you bet your unwashed underwear, there is DEFINITELY a problem.

And I have written in this before, God (I remain agnostic, but swearing using God sounds cool) definitely screwed up when he made humans.

"To err is human", how apt. But to an engineer, you really don't want to have problems with your designs.

I find human problems trivial, and am sad that George Carlin became a problem when he died.

Life might be easier if you would just sit back and laugh at everyone running around in clothes, while you eat something nice. (Kumara perhaps? I grew to love them. Tasty shit)

But who am I but just another human with problems? And there is the problem, EVERYONE have problems. It would be a problem if you didn't have any problem, because people would probably be jealous of you and that becomes a problem.

I think I just confused myself, but never mind! Our race is a confused one, as I have noticed.

The monkey has two goals in life. Be the alpha, and feed and breed.

The man has but one goal in life. Find out what the heck he is doing here alive in the first place.

Blue

Today was a day like any other day, nothing special happened. But then again, nothing happened.

I scheduled my time for this weekend to be one that is filled with myself accomplishing coursework, as any supposedly sensible university student should (and every week at that).

Instead, I was moping around in my room the whole day, lacking the drive to do any work and indeed, found myself questioning and lacking the drive for life either.

Interestingly, I am not suicidal. I do not have suicide tendencies despite the occasional bouts of morbidity. I suppose that is good, but then again, I am such a cynic I do not attest to there being good or bad. I even doubt my own conscience sometimes (the presence of it).

I paced around in my room the whole time, thinking and searching for something worthwhile to do. I probably have been doing this my whole life, but it struck me particularly today that I have nothing worthwhile to do, and did nothing worthwhile in my 21+ years of life. It is at this time I realized that, 'Man.. I really do have lots of time don't I?'

I would prefer it to say I am not being emo, but rather that in my course of studying past philosophers and philosophizing on my own, I am increasingly certain that we do not know what we are doing.

In science, this is what is happening as I observed. Physicians are constantly unearthing new discoveries, and it is the mathematics that make it so damned hard to understand anything at all. And also, by deriving mathematical relationships logically, we find that we are using expressions without really understanding the physical meanings behind it.

I guess it is time in the race for progress (to where I wonder) that we take the periodic dose of stepping back and evaluating what we have done, why have we done that, and what next should we do. Or else we might face the consequences of losing ourselves in the process of finding ourselves. The irony.

I hope there's a great weather when I wake up. I should take another walk in the park.

Just to show that I am not modern-kids-emo, here's a lovely side shot of me and KS by UMSA's photographer :D

Fate

In case you're turned off, I'm not going to discuss from a philosophical context what I think fate is.

But, really.

I'm a person who loves to commune with nature. Auckland provides much opportunities for that. The animals here seem like a bunch who are used to human presence, and in their heads the only mathematical equation that exists has to be HUMANS = BREAD.

Auckland has lovely parks. And well maintained at that, with the flowers in full bloom and their scent is in the air. And speaking about birds, has anyone tried feeding birds? Its fun, in a sense. The pigeons here actually are willing to jump and perch on your hand as you feed it. The little robins are shy and more cautious, but the sight of bread makes them abandon all else and jump into the fray. The ducks and geese sometimes come in, with the occasional gulls. Its fun.. until you have 12836124128936 x 2 eyes staring at you.

But at least they are harmless. I think.

The main point of today is, as I said, I am a person who loves to commune with Nature. I think there is a connection between us and the Earth and other living beings, something inexplicable. I do not think we can save the world though, its stupid really the environmental campaign thing. In a way its smart cause most people are stupider.

Anyway, I deviated again. As I 'typed', I am a person who loves to commune with Nature. One day, after feeding the birds and enjoyed a moment of silent communion with Nature, I decided to go shopping.

The sky was a beautiful azure, with an occasional cloud. I couldn't help but stare at it as it awoke a slumbering poet in me. I felt as though a beautiful poem was waiting to be composed, eventhough I don't compose poems.

Then, guess what? A really beautiful ass came in front of me. No, not a donkey. Okay, I meant a woman who had a really nice ass. I don't know how she looks like though, the way she was walking was really distracting. And her back was facing me all the time.

There I was, torn into two. The slumbering poet was pissed off, and the man is awakenening.

Fate, has bestowed upon me two wonderful things to look at. Both at the same time.

What should I do, I have but a pair of eyes. Shall I gaze upon the lovely blue sky, or shall I gaze upon the peach discreetly? I can't control my eyes to look at both!

As I walked, I pondered. Contemplated. Debated. Raging emotions, akin to a stormy sea.

When I decided, the ass had turned away into another street.

I felt cheated. Fate had played a joke on me.

Sometimes I think I think too much. Really.

PS : This is a true story. I posted this because I wanted to lighten the mood in this blog ever so slightly :D I am not a gloomy person! I just think a lot

Love!

Looking back at the few posts, I have been so overly serious that its so gloomy. Its late at night, and I feel very tired. That's when all the brain juice comes out.

I return as Professor Leslie and today I shall analyze teenage love! (for some reason its the first thing that comes to mind when I was thinking of something to ramble on).

Disclaimer : I am not psychologist, no expert, nobody! This post is largely intended to poke fun and take jabs at everyone and mean no offense to anyone is particular. In short, its nothing personal. And if I ever write stuff that pisses you off, too bad. If I am legally in the wrong, FORGIVE ME~~~~~~

Continue on.

After not-so-much thought, I have decided that the media largely is to blame for the sorry state the emotion is today. Love is worshipped as the ultimate emotion, transcending every single shit in existence.

Yeah right.

So let's think about it. Hmm..

When we're kids, Disney tells us stuff (here's to you, Aimee). What stuff? Happily ever after. True Love ALWAYS wins, no matter how evil how fugly how smart the villian is, they will always LOSE because they have no love. And the princess always live happily ever after.

Ok, now grow up slightly. Songs come to mind. Wohoo, lots of songs. AND GUESS WHAT? 99% of the songs are about love (in the past). How innocent your love is, they sung it. How beautiful your love is, they sung it. How heartbroken you are because of love, sang it. How lonely you feel because you don't have a love, sang it. How much you want to make love to that random person (James Blunt, anyone?), sang it. Perhaps even how much you want to be a paedophile has been sang. By your neighbour's dog maybe.

Now we advance a bit, and get slightly older. Songs still in our head, Disney still haunting some people(Aimee). Oh, guess what? Here comes along Korean soaps. And glorified Hollywood at its best. Korean soaps with all its sappiness, and Hollywood with all their sex bombs. Oh and Bollywood too. What do you get? Illusioned.

Allow me to explain. From watching Korean soaps (or wherever they come from. As long as its sappy), it reinforces the brainwashing you had when you were younger. You need love, someone who will be happily ever after with you. From watching Hollywood, that someone must be a fucking sex bomb. Erm, from Bollywood.. I'm not sure. Have lots of friends perhaps?

So, ever wondered why people always complain about their spouses but worships these idols?

So I have come to the conclusion, perhaps we are all mistaken about the simple emotion that appears apparently to be inherent in most creatures capable of sentient thoughts (woah, long and heavy there). Put it simply, some animals know love too (since the definition is so vague, anything goes I suppose).

The problem here being that, we have been brainwashed by the media since young. No, there is no immediate harm to it, in fact its probably physically harmless.

Problems come when you begin to EXPECT love. Heh, even from a dog. And surprise, dogs can love you better.

See, its not wrong to expect love. I'm being confusing here, but never mind. I should define the problem by stating it, as what an engineer should do.

"PROBLEM comes when you expect the one who loves you do everything you expect him/her to do".

Was that simple enough? In short, expecting people to cater to your fantasies (or desires. Fetish if you like.) So, during courtship tolerance is high. Love is in the air anyway, its like alcohol. After you have settled down a bit, its like you begin to see the other person clearly. That's when a new love emerges. Love to complainnnnnnnnnnnnnn.

So, it makes people miserable because as they complain, they convince themselves that there is something seriously wrong with their partner.

So really, just a community message from your friendly Professor. Love is a good thing. Just don't OD on it like weed. Get the right ideas of love and what to expect. And lay off the novels a little once in a while. Real vampires sparkle anyway, I heard. Oh and I have not heard a single song of Justin Bieber's (what an achievement), but I can pretty much guess what sort of songs he wrote (note: 99% songs are about love. I have a 99% chance of getting it right. The statistics was made up, but could very well be accurate). While I'm at it, what's the craze about Lady Gaga until NOW?

PS : Being one who has never been in a relationship with girls, I am perhaps the least qualified to speak of such relationships. But I assert that I am an asshole :D! and that I have plenty of experiences as an observer.

Now I think I should sleep, my brain went off just moments ago with my hand still typing on the keyboard until now.

Curse!

While I do make a direct attempt to avoid contemplating on issues regarding ethics, sometimes its hard. Really.

Been watching too much anime, but you'd be surprised at the depth of stuff discussed in these Japanese animations (provided you watch the right ones. Some of them are really subtle).

Now the question is, would you kill someone at the cost of your soul, and nothing else? What it means is you go to hell when you die, there is no other way around it. In exchange the person you wish to kill will be sent to Hell immediately.

The premise here being Hell Girl. Interesting story, nonetheless.

Hmm

As the title suggests, I suck at titles.

But well, been meaning to do this post for some time (my housemates and the constant call for blood on the computer does NOT help).

Onward to the topic of discussion this time : Racism.

First and foremost, a vaguely related note. Personally, I find the idea of patriotism and nationality a somewhat "bad" idea. I would envision humanity without borders, just one species plaguing the world without distinction from each other. But well, there's still time for our species to grow eh?

And regarding the issue of racism in my homeland, it strikes me that we are still in a paradoxical situation. Strange that, when asked, most people would say they have good friends from other races. They agree on unity and harmony. But really, if everyone says that, who the heck is fanning the fire then?

Politicians, no doubt.

Despite the obvious blame that people are pointing at the politicians, I would like to in turn point back at everyone. Let's face it. We are an immature bunch.

Why do I type so? In my honest opinion, we have yet to achieve a decent state of racial harmony. There are no sensitive issues, only sensitive people. At the mention of anythiing remotely racist, you can bet your money people will begin condemning them. The racist people I mean. They get angry, they flame, they curse and they call for blood of the racist people.

Interestingly, when you detach yourself from being 'one of them' to being an 'observer', you find that pretty much we're doing the same thing as politicians. Calling for blood. Asking for justice.

I am not saying that we should not allow people to be trampled on by policies that are discriminating. I am also not asking that people condone the acts of those in the obvious wrong.

Merely stating that, when can we, as a society, tear down the barrier that is known as 'race', not only in my country, but in the whole wide planet? When can we, as a society safely ignore people who utter extreme remarks and regard them as deranged and that's it? When can we have no need to call for justice or blood of those who would threaten others?

Such barbaric creatures we are, always calling for blood of our kin.

I don't know about you, but certainly I would not seek blood (unless I have godlike powers and cease to be human, but that's another issue) of others.

Ultimately, that is what we are I guess, humans. We revel in conflict, we worship gods of war.

And I do hope someday, my homeland will be a place of peace, where religion and racial issues are spoken of openly and respectfully. Differences are celebrated, not tolerated.

PS : We do not need tolerance. We need acceptance more, don't you agree?

Busy!

I have tons of assignments, tests, duties, commitments and all coming up, but really...

fuck them all and lets update the dying blog.

First of all let me lament for the breaking of my beloved phone. She died suddenly, and would not wake up. I feel like I lost a lover.

... *sighs*

Anyway, on to today's update!

I shall talk about a random topic, and the first thing that came to mind is education!

Mind you, I pursue knowledge and wisdom earnestly. Its just that sometimes I dabble in epistemology, and suddenly all knowledge I have is reduced to utter bullshit.

But anyway, I always did have the feel that I am a failed product of a miserable attempt at education. Not a problem of mine. And certainly those in my generation are, whether they realize it or not.

An education based on the importance of knowledge, i.e educating people by telling them stuff, in my opinion, is the simplest but rather a stupid thing to do. The reason we are applying this is simple, really. We can't teach wisdom. (Reason 2 being that people are naturally stupid)

Now, the situation has balanced itself out (I would use equilibrium, but I would be called a fucking nerd). Everybody, around the world (yes, apparently my current uni does this as well. To some extent though, not 100%. But that's really my own personal opinion, and not meant to insult or flame or anything negative) is enrolled in an education that, well, 'teaches' you new stuff by telling you all about it.

Sure, they tell you about it, you remember it, you go for exams and they ask you about it, you answer it and you pass it. Then you forget it. Just bits and pieces remain. Something lingers in your brain, but when really put to the test, bet you can't do shit. Try taking a history exam in SPM again now, huh? Or even Geography (or Maths. I suck at maths). Bet I will fail it.

As such, I have began educating myself. I swear, Auckland's changing me a lot. I feel grown up sometimes.

How do I educate myself? I accumulate wisdom (or at least, I think I am).

I first study the history of philosophy, and how science came about (school of thought in empiricism. Thanks to empiricists like Berkeley).

Then I study philosophy itself, what all the crazy nutcases in the past with nothing better to do thought up of, and those changed the world.

Then, now's the tricky part. I formulate my own thoughts on EVERYTHING. (Note : I might still have zero wisdom, but my arrogance refuses to admit that). That's when I realized, everything I did up to the age of 21 was meaningless and full of shit! A terribly exciting revelation, really (and I consider that an accomplishment). Nono, this is not depression. In fact I am extremely jovial about it.

Imagine achieving nothing and yet appearing to be doing something, and all these helps secure my livelihood (I hope). Bet you didn't think of looking at it this way eh?

But no, while that is what 'normal' (I would say unenlightened, but I would be a bigot and an arrogant bastard if I wrote that) people usually do, I do not agree with that life. Why live, then? (apart from feeding and breeding, which is what nature dictates us to do).

Really, the reason education fails is because first, our forefathers who have insight, do not know how to teach that insight. How do you teach someone how to think anyway? Nobody knew.

(But really, if you need someone to teach you how to think, you FAIL big time)

But you can't get someone to seriously think without something to spur them on. And that something happens to be knowledge, or some people are born naturally curious. Naturally born philosophers I call them.

So yeah, you need to know stuff (or just be curious) to know how to solve problems or answer questions. So they began telling us stuff, and we began telling stuff to our kids. No sweat there.

When and where did the problem began, then? No idea. Somewhere along the passing of knowledge, someone forgot the original purpose. And we just kept passing on the knowledge and swallowing it whole, nobody even knew how to question.

So yeah, we know heaps lot (I hope), but we don't know shit.

PS : I am so amazed as to how fucking amazingly lazy people can get. Imagine, some of us have invented a toilet THAT WIPES YOUR ASS!!!!!!!!!

Leslie

is uber busy

(Just thought highlighting my name as the title seems cool)

And...

Philosophy's such a cheap word now isn't it?

So is intelligence.

Oh while we're at it, common sense has become not so common anymore.

Sigh.

Conceit

Carlin said, we humans are arrogant in thinking that we need to save the planet. I agree with him, I did notice that if you just sit down and think for 5 minutes, arrange the facts together and just ask yourself a simple question, 'What exactly is the planet being threatened by?', you soon arrive at the answer that (ignoring those astronomic cannons and blasts and whatnots that can vaporise the planet)

...... well.. nothing. Humans are the ones in danger, but we like to glorify ourselves and say that we must save the planet and everyone else; and be a hero in the process. Everyone's a hero now.

There is nothing wrong with the planet. Mother Earth does not regard Global Warming, pollution and whatnots as a threat, she just spins around as usual while we little pricks worry about how she will die.

Personally? I have no intention of preserving the environment for the sake of humanity. Never did. I just enjoy the company of trees and birds and great weather from time to time, and I wish to preserve that. Not avoid some catastrophic calamity in the weather that will wipe us out. If it will, it will.

I wonder am I contradicting myself there.

Michio Kaku said that we humans are supremely arrogant to expect aliens to visit us. It is conceit at the maximum level to expect that xenos thousands or maybe millions of years more advanced than us will come to us one day and impart knowledge to us.

He said that, well, a far advanced race (Stage 3s he called them, but i'll avoid terms here) than us will be humans to us as if we were ants. And what do you do if you come across an ant colony? Step on a few of the ants.

So he aptly came to a conclusion that, well if they visited us, they'll probably kick our ass.

I did wonder about that as well. Aliens being aliens, I'll be grateful if they don't eat my cereal in the morning, much less expect technology from them. Should they come anyway.

Bill Bryson wrote in his book 'A short history of nearly everything', i forgot which page, hell i am not going to cite here. Citation is tough work. Not an engineer's interest, definitely.

Anyway, Bryson said something that clicked with me. 'We all want to be good looking, have multiple sexual partners (all incidentally damn good looking at that), we want to talk to animals, we want to know lots of stuff and control pretty much everything from the weather to what we want for breakfast'. Ok not the exact words, but you get the idea.

So, what more can I say? We people as a species is different from others probably not in terms of our intelligence, but probably our ego.

I do not recall a chimp or a dolphin telling me that it wants to dominate the world (Powerpuff girls is not a factual thing. I mentioned that because there's a archvillian monkey. I think its not factual, it does not belong to our reality, I think... I'm not sure)

But then again, I don't speak Chimps.

A brief interlude

A brief interlude within the transient everflowing time,

for exams.

Fuck

Update

At Aimee's insistence, I shall update this dying blog.

Really, I have enough stuff in my head to write 500 blog posts, so much so that nobody can actually understand anything from reading it all in one go.

I am indulging myself in heavy volumes of philosophy-ing, and naturally i find myself increasingly detached from reality.

Well, we do take things for granted. Go along the streets and ask someone what they think time is.

Well what do you think time is anyway. Common answers should give you 'the dimension that is measured from point A to point B'. Interesting. More common answers should give you 'Look at your clock', but really those are exactly the people who takes things for granted.

If you're not confused yet and willing to soldier on in this post, good for you.

Perhaps what is most taken for granted is existence itself. Nobody questions why they are here, and the ancient idea of God and his creative week is still the.. I don't know if its widely or not but its the accepted solution I guess.

Interesting. God decided to be creative and created humans. And we are to be punished/to make paradise/ whatever whatever.

Really, there's no answer. Science tells us pretty much we're an accidental product from a string of 0.1% probability events. There's so probable many ways to make our race extinct you could list them down and laugh at it, only its not funny. But life goes on strangely. Many people don't realize that.

I do realize there are people who take philosophy in healthier doses. That's why I don't generalize everyone anymore, I use the term 'many people' now, to denote 99% of the population.

Thinking is a luxury, in case you don't realize it. From reading, hearing and meeting a few people, I generally got the idea that when livelihood is threatened, you don't think so much. Survival is top-most.

And when your livelihood is not threatened, you're in a safe zone and filled with comfort, you forget about thinking.

Or you could be like me, who realized that we don't even know why we're fighting to survive.

Ah in case you're wondering, I am not being emo or depressed, I am healthy mentally and physically(I hope) and happy. I just don't understand what am I doing here being healthy and all. I guess I tend more towards slightly angsty, and am more inclined towards existentialism philosophy now. But I might go slightly further with philosophy, so far without much reading on the topic.

Really, you don't need knowledge to start philosophy. Just your mind. And occasionally get some input using your senses. And occasionally you might find that the conclusions you arrive at for some topics actually were thought of by others. That's when you realize there's still hope for humans. There are some people who still thinks, thank god.

And really, at that point there is some satisfaction eventhough you can't claim credit for originality. It is a sort of assurance that you are thinking along a somewhat 'right' way. But that is disputable, but I did feel some sort of relief at times when I discover that my conclusions actually matched a well known scholar from elsewhere and at a different age without prior knowledge.

For starters, if you want to start philosophy, just go out and take a stroll. Randomly set your eyes on anything and ask why is it like that. There you begin your journey of random thoughts.

One question still puzzles me though. Why is the grass green? Chlorophyll is all and well, reflecting green waves is all and well, but why that particular colour arises is interesting. I can't get a conclusion yet. I'll probably spend a few hundred more hours on this.

Lonely Planet

Sometimes I get the strange feeling that, despite all the lifeforms on the planet, our planet is still feeling lonely.

Weird ain't it?

Just to say I am alive.. I think

Its been a whole three months and three weeks and three days.

Since my last update.

Of course, I can offer you a lot of reasons why I am not updating this blog. But the prime reason above all is... I am so lazy.

I have many things to share, to type, but somehow putting them on public doesn't sound that great to me. Because some of it are so offensive people will mail me bombs from Malaysia to New Zealand.

So I keep a private journal. I'll leave that journal to Aimee when I die, I'll mention it in my will.

So, haha.

__________________________________________________________

One of the most important thing I notice is, woah why are road works following me everywhere? Last year when I was in Grafton, they started this mega bridge makeover.

This year, I am in Mount Street. And right after I moved in.. Mount Street is being street make-overed.

Interestingly, I have come to the realization that some humans are still pretty much barbarians. Regularities in life somehow breeds a wild side in us. Regardless of race.

Why do I say that? No, not the drug addicts or the Mat Rempits back home. Its some group of white kids who come by every night (like.. 1am?) to the Uni Residential Hall opposite my place.

Just to yell 'O'rorke SUCKS!'. For half an hour. And then they realize they are ignored. And they leave and come again next day.

Wtf? Whatever makes them happy.

__________________________________________________________

Life in Uni is good so far. Still haven't got a chance to see a girl undress in the opposite unit, but we can keep hoping right? They don't bloody draw the curtains to do whatever stuff. Friend said he saw some people making love. Interesting.

On a side note, whats with society and resumes? Everyone's obsessed with resumes and CVs. Takes the fun out of everything, and everything done is just for the sake of the bloody CV. This defeats the purpose of the CV in the first place.

I believe the CV/resume is just a summary of your life that lets the employer or whoever pretty much get an idea of how you lead life. A well filled CV is definitely a good one, but joining shit JUST for the sake of filling up the CV is only going to make you an asshole. Take that.

On another side note, I am probably going to suicide during the winter break (break, i typed as berak. I corrected it). I am going to bungee jump in south! Unless I go for plan B which is Melbourne (after Aimee leaves that goddamned place)