Why are flowers beautifully coloured when trees and plants have no eyes to detect their colour?
Sleepless last night. Trembling even now, as the endless night draws near, to find the courage to recollect and recount the dream in all its entirety.
It was a dream, or more accurately, as it seemed to me, a nightmare. Made so because of its resonance, because I've had my fair share of Deja Vu's in real life, but never a deja vu in a dream. And never a nightmare repeated.
Last night, I dreamt that I walked into this house, with people looking at me, and kids bursting from a bedroom happy, smiling at me, and I hugged some of them. They still look vivid now, like it happened only yesterday. *swallows*.
But what disturbed me, was the knowledge that I imagined the same dream, not too long ago, and the kids were the same. But younger perhaps. Have they grown? I wouldn't be disturbed by the same dream just appearing twice, but there came a duet, almost in concert, a dream matching a dream. The same circumstance that I've dreamed not too long ago, and the dream that quickly followed. Of me walking past these carts holding merchandise, of a place that vaguely resembled Bedok Interchange, resembling the metro or NTUC carts.
I quickly woke, but not before seeing this image of a lady in white, quite distressed, with hair cascading down to her shoulders. And I lay still in my bed, and the night was still, and the shadows creeped all over my skin. I closed my eyes, eager to fall into another dream, a dream that was no longer of familiar places I've no memory of ever being, or familiar faces I've no memory of ever seeing. But every time I closed my eyes, I recalled images I've seen in movies, and other images I couldn't quite place. And geometric patterns that appeared sinister by their very intricate simplicity.
I clasped my hands together, prayed to my gods for strength, tried to meditate and activate that ever present jewel above my brows. All I felt, was no returning call, no strength, and that jewel only thrummed gently, before the images returned, faster than ever, none repeated.
I forced my eyes awake. Opened the windows, switched off the air conditioner, and lay on my bed, unseeing. Twice I rose to look out of the window, twice I assured myself, the windows were still there. But the constant ticking of the clock sounded twice as loud as ever. And mysterious flashes of light illuminated my room harshly. I could see nothing, no one, only thinking, who called me. Shuddering at the feelings i had before, associated with the very same dream.
That dream I had before, while lying on my bed in mid-afternoon sometime in June, in a stupor borne by the liquor of excessive sleep. On that border between the asleep and the fully awake, I dreamt that very same dream. And as yesterday, fought my mind and kept my eyes open. However, my body refused to heed my commands, and all I could feel was my body sinking into the bed, now moist because of fear, and trepidation. The experience bore in me the resolution never to experience it again.
I walked into my ma's room and slumped into a chair, hugging my pillow, fighting the urge of my eyes to close. The uncomfortable posture of that chair made me glad, for it was not too comfortable, and there was reasonable assurance against sleep. But my lids grew heavier, heavier than the strength of my mind could keep open. And there I fell, spiraling, into a deep featureless slumber.
I'm convinced my room is haunted.
Yay!
Just collected my merit prize today, at the South East CDC photo competition. $150 dollars. But I'm happy not because of the prize money, but because this family whom I met at the bus stop actually remembered my name and photograph! I think recognition is the most important thing, and it makes you feel the warmest.
Just went back to sec4, when this audience member came up to us and told us she absolutely loved our choice piece. Even though we didn't get top 5 that year, only gold, the fact that we touched someone's heart, and someone actually remembered our piece, made us happiest.
Haha.. this MC person also congratulated me by name, I don't think I've met him before, but it was sweet too... Quite a handsome amusing guy.
But yeah... I've also learnt to give my best. I was so absolutely irritated with the quality of my winning photo cos I spent like 15 mins on it only to produce a nice print. And all the correctable flaws just kept staring back at me. I resolve to work harder for the next two competitions, firstly because they're open category, secondly because I don't want a repeat thingy to occur again! Best or nothing!
Anyway yeah... it feels sweet when people you don't know keep a copy of your picture in their short term memories. It was all worth the effort and money and rude stares.
Here I come into the fray...
Presumably the other entities competing for praise could be things like (in a way) money, power, fame or more concrete things like people and institutions. However, why is it that monotheistic gods usually long to be praised so much? Why do such perfect and virtuous beings possess one of the cardinal flaws of humans - the desire to garner accolades? Do we really need a god who is an egomaniac?
Those who believe in one supreme god usually believe in absolutes - things are right and you should do them because god 'says' so. Therefore, divine rules are unbendable.
I've been trimming the blogs I read recently, putting the less interesting ones or the ones of people I barely know into a "peruse when bored" folder. If I wanted to do everything worth doing in existence, I would need infinite lifetimes to do so. Incidentally, if you put too much of yourself into your blog, there won't be much left.
My computer is also capable of generating a graded response. Even though it thinks in binary, it produces an audio signal, which is decidedly graduated, all the time.
I don't believe in a God that requires our praise. After reading the Apocryphon of John, google, it has a very interesting argument. When a God requires us to praise him, he is indirectly saying that we praise him over something else. For if there is no other God, all praise of his creations, must of course directly be praise to him. There would be no question over what we are praising, because He would be the one and only Creator. So the question is, what are the other entities competing for praise? And if there are other entities, that means that God is aware of them. And that he cannot be the sole creator, because if he is, praising the other entities would be equivalent to praise for him. (I'd be equally happy if someone praises my works, or if someone praises me, because the praise and admiration will directly go to me.) If God isn't the sole Creator that he claims he is, then he isn't telling the truth, then he isn't the God we should be praising, because he is lying and he has therefore sinned. For example, the Christian example that praising Jesus, is the same as praising God, because they are of one body. (or something like that. please correct me.)
I'm not sure about the conceive/imagine thingy. Aren't they the same thing? If you can imagine something in your mind's eye, isn't it the same as conceiving it?
Yes... you're right on otherblogs.
It's actually called Threshold Potential. Haha... but I found the term rather cryptic for a discussion. I find sex inspiring. The creation of an entity that has never existed before, that is a combination of the lineage of two people, based on this emotion called Love, that no one over thousands of years, has actually managed to understand and elucidate. Love just happens. Just as two cells combined just creates a life.
have no time to read through all of that, so will only comment on the first line: the human body is capable of graded and/or multiple responses. so no, we are no truly binary creatures. at least, our mind is not. our body probably incorporates binary into much of its processes. its alot simpler.
we do too (think in binary). chemical/electrical signal on/off. neurons. K+ or Cl-? on. off. on. off.
quite lazy on the other points. too much to process. am bao en; ex-poured liquid.
i think there are no rules
because i believe there is an omnipotent God
barring the god-greater-than-God paradox, that belief does mean, for me at least, that all 'rules' are bendable.
visualize? in little circles, spheres and coloured bars?
that's a little sad.
and NO NO NO, the fourth dimension can be said to be time,
but thats theoretical
there is the 'nonexistent' mathematical fourth dimension too, and probably so on to infinity if mathematicians really can be bothered.
or are smart enough. (afterthought.)
i think all those imaginary experiences are in one way or another extrapolations of actual experience.
what would sex feel like. nice. what else. what you are told. how it is described. "nice" (so as not to be too graphic):
process: what have i experienced before that is 'nice'? have i experienced anything like it in a smaller scale? people are squishy, or at least look squishy.
so: squishy chocolate-y nice. just for an example. -like- this, -like- that.
perhaps paranoia, claustrophobia. imagine it.
its fear extrapolated, its the closed blinds of A Beautiful Mind, its the adrenaline of danger and/or competition, its darkness and a dank cupboard.
perhaps faith: belief in what we have never experienced, do not know.
i trust in my God like i trusted that my father would not drop me when he carried me, small.
the conception of a heaven and earth apart: they are like hazy circles of light in smoke, distinct and separate, with blackness (an inconceivable nothingness) in between-- yet it is so inadequate because i simply cannot conceive of two worlds coexisting without projecting them in the same mindspace.
again, we cannot conceive what we have not experienced, although we may imagine.
processing is not quite the issue here; its the wiring.
computers may outwit humans in chess, but they operate on what they were fed-- by humans.
in the same way humans can only operate on given data, although our wiring is infinitely more complex.
this is not to say that our minds are blank when we are born;
alright, perhaps 'experience' is not the right term. its more knowledge, whether innate (common consciousness?) or experienced.
but there is still that limit to how much we know.
"My thoughts are not your thoughts ... for as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts" (Isaiah 55:8-9)
otherblogs.
i think its a fascinating concept. my corner of the internet... is so inward in its facelessness.
its like an alternate universe, yesyes, not a new idea, but it still amazes me.
there are 16 blogs i frequent; 10 are from people i barely know-- the name, or the face, or a friend of a friend, or an exchanged word.
its so strange how you can communicate to so many nameless faceless people;
you know neither its extent nor its impact.
how you, as the audience, can identify so closely with such a disembodied character; its a blind communion of souls, throwing out a desperate line in the dark;
how you can look at a person-almost-a-stranger from a distance and think, i know what youre thinking.
almost frustrating in being one-directional, at the same time theres a perverse (voyeuristic?) pleasure in being silent and anonymous; a detached, all-seeing observer.
and sometimes, the profound difference between the online persona and the physical character. endlessly cryptic, mysterious.
ah yes, kenneth. nervous impulse voltage. do you learn that in JC?!!
its one of those (physical) things that constantly amaze me; i find it more inspiring than lofty mountains or what-have-you.
If we didn't exist, the things we call rules will be called something else by those who take our place. In some societies it is called fate. The whole idea of rules has been thrown into question with this quantum physics thing, because it gets harder and harder to modify these rules to fit the observations. In the end it all boils down to this... equilibria between order and chaos, and whatever is in-between. Some things can be predicted, and some can't.
A good example would be radioactivity. No rule tells us when a particular nuclide will decay - it is completely random (or so I am taught). But the half-life rule/observation enables to predict, rather accurately, what proportion of nuclides will still be radioactive after a certain period of time.
So, if we are not here, yes, rules will still exist. But not the way we conceive them to be.
Yes, the concept of - imagination. An integration of what we already know (what we have been told), into what we have not experienced yet. Our experience is the way our mind interprets the observations and feelings sent to us by our senses (not just those 5). Without this processing nothing is an experience.
I don't agree on the last point. We can take it all in with ease, because it is easy to just sit there and take it in. But when asked to visualise it ourselves we are unable to do so all at a go. Kim's game: We can see and perceive the objects in a room, but when asked to visualise the room, we can only do so one object at a time, and not all of it together at one go. And when it comes to really huge or complex objects, we have to visualise it one part at a time.
A correction on my part. If you were to liken the brain to a PC, what is lacking is not so much the GHz, but the RAM. The GHz is sufficient for our daily needs, but to really see the whole picture and its details we need to work on the RAM. I think we have it, but because we don't really need it or use it that much, most of it goes untapped.
The PC is beyond comparison to the mind in its entirety. The Pc is programmed in binary, we are - something else altogether. I don't think anyone here thinks in binary.
Friendships.
Sometimes I just feel like curling up into a little ball on my bed, with my phone in my hand, connected to all my friends over Singapore, chatting about the most irrelevant stuff. But people are always so busy, and phone calls are always so disruptive, all I can do to express my happiness is I suppose, to condense it in a small less intrusive SMS message.
As much as I'd love to call people, I really hate receiving phone calls. So that's part of my phone problem. My days are often so packed that I just can't spare time. And even if I could then, doesn't mean that I can everyday at that time. I'm behind enough as it is with my schoolwork.
If I could call, if I had the time to call, there'd be so many old friends and new friends past and present that I'd love to chat with, to find out how they're doing, to know how they're feeling. But I know I can never afford the time to. So tiny SMSes once in a while would have to suffice. And they'd be tiny at that. :(
Listening to Xin Bu Liao Qing. Very nice gentle song.
Someone asked if it was weird to look at other people's blogs, people who you don't even know. And this was my reply.
"Sometimes getting to know people is too much effort. Sometimes the effort isn't appreciated or reciprocated. Sometimes all you want is to know what someone else thinks and go "Hey, I also think like that too!" or "Hmmm... that's an interesting perspective." And when we're all too busy mugging for our A levels, maybe reading blogs would be the most efficient way of getting the social interaction that we all crave, without the time."
Isn't it true?
How many of us would find it disruptive if someone we barely knew called us everyday to find out how we've been doing? How many of us would actually make the effort to find out how your friends have been doing aside from the usual pleasantries when you see each other along the corridor? How many friends can you really care for anyway. My number's 2 or 3 thereabouts.
Beg to differ on the first. If we didn't exist, would the rules not exist?
We are on agreement with the second.
Comments later on the third.
We can't exactly see many things, but we do imagine them, and we do visualize them. Examples, DNA, Atoms, Molecules, etc... Just because we cannot directly use our senses, doesn't mean we are cut off from the experience. Experience brings with it understanding. And if we understand, we must have experienced it directly in some form or other (read: experiments). I'm pretty sure I can visualize the 4th dimension, and I believe it's time, or space-time.
I think the error is made when you mix seeing with experience. I assume seeing is a part of experiencing. I assume hearing is too, as is touch. Even though I've not had sex, I do have a concept of what it might feel like. An idea. Even if I have never bungeed, I do know what bungee jumping might feel like, when I stand on the edge of a tall height. The human brain can draw parallels based on incomplete information, to create concepts which are chimeras of all these experiences. Thus it is possible to conceive what once has not experience, and even more importantly, the conception of the idea only drives development of the experience.
The third point. I wasn't making a point on which is advantageous or anything, but more importantly is the idea that a higher order mechanism is something that works that the lower order mechanism can not hope to conceive. Our body can never begin to imagine how the conscious mind works, and our conscious mind cannot even begin to understand the motivations and the impulses of the unconscious mind.
Our processing capability is really up to par, or even greater than par. The world has an infinite number of polygons, and our eyes and our mind, computes the 3 Dimensional information of the world around us with ease. We know instinctively, at a single glance, which objects are nearer to us, which objects are further from us, where are the parts jutting out, where are the dents going in. And all that at an amazing speed of 20-30 milliseconds all the time. Even when we're asleep. And even more so, based on a 2D source (say a TV), by the movement of the camera, we can fully understand and calculate the 3D space of the 2D recording. No computer can do that.
The rules that govern the universe are conceived by ourselves. the mathematicians came up with the set of whole numbers - the universe didn't. of course, it exists before then, but no-one established it as a rule - but us.
and our limit lies not in the fact that our mind needs to be directed at something, but in the fact that our mind cannot be directed at everything at once. why else do we need to break concepts up into chunks before we can understand them?
because, like it or not, our mind is very much like a processing computer. To visualise a polygon we must first locate the coordinates of its vertices, then link them up. and our processing capabiity is simply not quite up to par when it comes to really complex polygons.
yes, the unconscious is the next step, but it is by no means advantageous all the time. to relegate something to the unconscious is to put it out of our control, so that we can focus our efforts elsewhere.
yes, i suppose to a large extent our mind is limited. and as mentioned before, it is because we simply have not experienced enough. we cannot visualise the fourth dimension - some of us think we can, but that is simply what wwe perceive it to be, for who in this world can truly claim that he/she has experienced or travelled in the fourth dimension? and having no prior contact with these thigns we can only leave them to imagination.
after watching a few episodes of
Broken Saints i think the only thing that has no true limitation is the truth.
Ahh aven. But the mind is only bounded by what you have seen, for how is it possible to conceive what one has not experienced? ;-) We are bound only by ourselves...
who are you anyway. just interested
The universe must be governed by rules. Why? Because rules are the foundations of complexity. Without rules, each and every instance must be uniquely defined. For example. The set of whole numbers as we know it is generated from a set of rules, that each consecutive whole number is one greater than the one before. That whole numbers do not posess decimal places, nor are imaginary. Of course, the rules can be changed. That in itself, is a rule, and the entity that makes that change, is similarly guided by a set of rules, things like motive, purpose etc.
I think you've a point. The limitation of the conscious mind (I have to be exceedingly careful here) is focus, or in other words, purpose. Our conscious mind sees only one thing at a time. It may be very quick in finding answers, or jumping from topic to topic, but the fact that we have a conscious directable mind, limits us, because we must direct it TO something.
The unconscious mind therefore, is the next step up. I doubt that the conscious mind can ever fully evaluate something higher up in order, just like the body can never evaluate the mind in body language. We can express the results of the higher order process, but we cannot understand the workings of that higher order process. The unconscious is the lack of choice. It has no overseer. It has no eventual purpose. It works, because it was made to do so. I breathe without thinking. I twitch my toes without thinking, shiver in cold without thinking, salivate without thinking.
I don't know. Now it seems like a trinity.
I was about to say that the unconscious is an embodiment of cause and effect. We respond to stimuli we may not even notice. But where does the stimuli come from? The body.
No. I'm leaving this here for discussion's sake. But I do not agree with the body part, nor the trinity part. I want to believe, that the unconscious mind, is the code that drives our consciousness. It is the humming bit of machinery just beyond our ken, that we can neither taste nor touch nor experience. It gives us the impulse to think about things, do certain things, the initial cause, which would result in a huge cascade of events. But why and where does this "cause" arise from, I cannot begin to fathom.
yes, actually, that was the general idea of my thesis. pretty interesting really, if i would only get down to doing it.
the universe must be governed by a certain set of laws- that in itself is a limitation of the mind.
also that is an assumption; i can similarly 'assume' that there is a God who can alter those laws at will;
or that just because we have never seen it happen doesnt mean that it can't happen.
but that was nitpicky, sorry.
true, our somewhat limited perception is sufficient for us
but that is because our scope of thought, feeling, expression, interest is similarly limited
we can't focus on more than that finger; that is usually adequate, yes,
but it is not always adequate, and seldom satisfactory
and even if we wanted to, we would not be able to focus on more than that finger.
which is just sad.
but there are also things that you cannot see even if you wanted to; like what was on the other side of the world, of so-and-so was alive or dead.
such sight may not be necessary for survival (which is a base instinct) but it is equally... desired, so to speak, because as 'higher' animals we are beyond mere survival.
similarly while the standard laws of the universe are more or less predictable, and all we need for immediate survival and comfort,
it it infinitely harder to understand the thoughts, emotions, perceptions of a person whose mind you are not connected to, but which are equally important.
that was what i meant by 'perceiving'... not so much knowledge but empathy, wisdom, etcetera.
also, while we may be able to see the finger, can we see ourselves from the finger's point of view?
another mental/ physical impossibility, limitation.
(cute analogy, by the way, i had fun with it.)
i thought you were the one who termed the mind a jail!
(but that was also nitpicky.)
point 2.
ahwell.
miscommunication there.
not sure about the sanity of an altered state, as never experienced (unfortunately)
possible that may believe self capable of what self is not capable of,
or that may accurately divine what self is actually capable of through expanded consciousness.
hmm... altered vs expanded. interesting distinction.
nevermind. that wasnt the point.
i quote the whole paragraph:
"...today one can't responsibly advocate the use of psychedelics. The risks are too high. "Bad trips" are an ever-present possibility. Informed consent is biologically impossible. For psychedelia is not just weirder than the drug-naive mind conceives, it's weirder than the drug-naive mind can conceive. One can't grasp, in advance, the nature of the sorts of experience to which one is nominally consenting. Yet in consequence of this taboo, unimaginably alien state spaces of consciousness remain off-limits to most of us. Trapped in the squalid psychochemical ghetto of Darwinian life, we lack the necessary wetware to conceptualise radically altered states of mind. We haven't even names for the strange new textures of selfhood and introspection that their metabolic pathways disclose; and alas pure reasoning is impotent to access their nature because it lacks the semantic primitives with which to do so. Yet when the vertebrate genome is rewritten, and genetically-preprogrammed bliss becomes the norm of mental health, our veil of ignorance can be safely ripped aside. Armed with exquisite designer-drugs, even the most outlandish realms of psychedelia can then be investigated in depth. The study of consciousness can become a true experimental discipline. And crucially, we can explore other-worldly forms of mental life in the confidence that they will all, without exception, radiate the sparkle of earthly paradise..."
tripping through paradise.
informed consent: if that is the definition, then a 'patient' can actually take that risk herself, without full knowledge, and the paragraph above is void.
but i feel that an important clause is that the person knows the full risks, benefits,
effects. which is the point of that passage: that since altered perception is beyond human conception, it is not possible for the person to understand fully what she is consenting to, and
informed consent is "biologically impossible".
cool stuff, eh. (and incidentally, why 'she'? how sexist. hah.)
Hmmm... perhaps drugs free the mind, by poisoning the body.
I disagree with two statements. One is that a finite mind can not perceive everything that is happening everywhere in the universe, and the second that one cannot have informed consent with regards to psychedelic drugs.
At a certain level, the universe must be governed by a certain set of laws. They may not be mathematical, but they must be logical and self consistent, for the world to exist. Thus, once man understands the laws, it may be possible to simplify these laws, and derive a method of finding the state of the world at any time. One may not be able to exactly "perceiving everything that is happening everywhere in the universe", but it'll be very very close. Let me draw an analogy to sight. We don't exactly see everything at the same time. There are parts of our vision that are blurred and parts that are focused all the time. But, to us, vision is adequately sharp, because we are able to adjust the limited scope of focus, to the parts that best interest us. If you hold a finger close to your eye, and focus on it, you'll realize that the background becomes very blurred. You really don't care, because you're interested in the finger.
second point:
The idea of
informed consent is "the legal and ethical right of a patient to direct what happens to her body." An altered state of body does not prevent people from being able to make informed consent.
Interesting reading of the day, The Apocryphon of John. Google for it.
well, so. where was i.
'These effects of mescalin are the sort of effects you could expect to follow the administration of a drug having the power to impair the efficiency of the cerebral reducing valve. When the brain runs out of sugar, the undernourished ego grows weak, can't be bothered to undertake the necessary chores, and loses all interest in those spatial and temporal relationships which mean so much to an organism bent on getting on in the world. As Mind at Large seeps past the no longer watertight valve, all kinds of biologically useless things start to happen. In some cases there may be extra-sensory perceptions. Other persons discover a world of visionary beauty. To others again is revealed the glory, the infinite value and meaningfulness of naked existence, of the given, unconceptualized event. In the final stage of egolessness there is an "obscure knowledge" that All is in all - that All is actually each. This is as near, I take it, as a finite mind can ever come to "perceiving everything that is happening everywhere in the universe." '
on psychedelic drugs: "informed consent is biologically impossible."
the mind is very limited:
- lack of knowledge
- finiteness
- temperament etcetera
- ability
- time; lifespan
- lack of neurotransmitters
- lack of communication. our left and right brain doesnt even connect properly. forget telepathy and empathy.
etcetera!
imagination may not seem finite, but there is a limit-- theres only these colours we know, there are only these emotions, so many dimensions, so much space, scale, time.
well, i could go on for very long in this vein.
doing a project on drugs. aldous huxley is a rabid fan of mescaline.
here's
the doors of perception.
the idea is that the mind is so limited; while it may not seem so, only awareness can actually convince us that there is a greater consciousness far removed from ordinary living.
read those essays on the matrix? how we would not be able to conceive ourselves as brains in vats because it would not be in our consciousness?
imagination itself is limited by experience, environment.
also read up on topology; dimensions and so on; klein bottle.
search google.
can't even begin to conceive the fourth dimension.
and its not ~time~ either; its much simpler, it just exists, is, all at once.
i think the mind is indeed a prison. its contained within the walls of the skull, and has five windows through which to perceive the world.
there are too many unfathomable things... imagination is mere flattery.
we can't even save ourselves.
title?
title!
is this new?!
(roof! roof! oh bliss, roof!!)
(says brave new world's liftman.)
[i felt like dropping by.]
soul-- collective consciousness?
little packages of human consciousness...
or, if there is no collective consciousness,
then the soul is the ultimate being...
to me its that 'wedge-shaped core of darkness'.
so it jails nothing, but contains everything.
but we exist in God, as God 'exists' in us...
then we are little packages of God, who is infinite.
while we are finite, jailed.
so. perhaps, yeah, although not necessarily.
turn on, tune in, and drop out.
Sleepless last night because of strange thoughts. I think I'm getting deeper into enlightenment and the nature of things, but I'm really wondering whether I can actually make money from it, or do it at the University.
Anyway on to the strange thoughts.
I felt jailed in myself. Had this image of a hexagonal 3D structure, this container for my soul. And that we would never experience without having to go through the barrier that is our body. Our body defines who we are, what senses and perceptions are available to us, our preferences with regards to which sense to use in any situation. Having a body simply means being constrained, to whatever the body has available to it in terms of inputs.
Our mind wishes to break free from the constraints of our body. We are all born to imagine, to create in our own little minds, worlds that simply do not exist and cannot be experienced by the body inputs. Art and Culture, although often expressed in a physical or visual form, are meant to convey ideas and meaning that cannot be transmitted well any other way.
I'm stuck! My mind is stuck, because of this symbiotic relationship with my body. Because I need the sensory inputs of the body to influence and spark fresh thoughts. But with a body, my mind is no longer free. The presence of a body means eventual death. And I can no longer have the infinite time and space to create my own world, and create my own fancies. And this body jails us, because bodies are not exchangable. Our minds cannot exist outside our body. We cannot literally be someone else, or experience what another person really thinks or feels.
We are prisoners in the jails of our mind. And that jail will only shackle us and lead us to eventual death.
And then it makes me wonder. If the body is the jail of the mind, what is the mind the jail of? Is the mind then the jail of the emotional soul? And what does the soul jail then? God?
-SSSTTTRRREEEESSSSSS-!!!
Anyway I wanted to say something about how beautiful East Coast Park is. I love the feeling of cycling along that path, watching all the hunky army boys work out, the girls and guys roller blading, the cute couples on tandem bicycles, the racers, the cyclists, the mums and pops, the smell of barbecues, and music, and the colourful clothing. Its just so relaxing. Saw a rainbow today over the sea, and got a few droplets of rain on my skin, but I managed to get home before the downpour. Not before taking a lot of beautiful pictures though. I think they'll turn out beautifully.
Just want to have a party with my friends too, just sit and chat, and look over the ocean. Eat good food etc...
Gah pissed. Lost my post.
Anyway nearly got killed twice today. First by two really unsteady people on a single bike, who didn't really quite get their act together before getting on the road, such that they were swerving hypnotically left and right. I decided to overtake them, and got so close to their swerving madness the girl riding pillion cried out "Oh My God!" There happened also to be 2 or 3 vehicles on that 2 lane road witnessing their suicidal madness. But that wouldn't have killed me.
The accident below almost did. Was on the left side of the 5 lane road outside my house, and realized to get home, I've got to make a right turn. Since the idea of cutting across 5 lanes didn't really appeal to me, I used the traffic light to get to the right side of the road. Then as the light turned green, I realized that the 3 lanes on the right were right turning lanes, and what I really wanted was to go straight and make a right turn at the next junction. So I kinda hotfoot across 3 lanes of accelerating cars, and made it, before this malay uncle and auntie on a motorcycle just accelerated past me as if I wasn't there, with handlebars inches from my face. Almost got killed cos I got two lanes of accelerating cars next to me on either sides. I kinda reflexively dropped my right shoulder and evaded a handlebar collision with that motorcycle uncle. Ugh.. sometimes the motorcycles are the killer ones. Anyway I'm never going to use that road again. Too busy and too wide!
Shit... I almost got killed twice cycling today. Once by this swerving 2 people on a bicycle nutcases that didn't master their cycling skills before going onto the road, resulting in me having to overtake them, and the car amusedly following them behind, on a 2 lane road, where the leftmost lane was taken up by a lousy parked car. Was so close the girl riding pillon said shit. But at least that one I wasn't in any mortal danger.
The second one was the real shit. Somehow going home on that road involves me having to cut 5 lanes of cars. Whooo hoo. So I decided to walk over to the other side, then when I started going forward, I realized it's 3 bloody right turn lanes. So I've got to cut three lanes of accelerating vehicles intent on having their nice family dinner at home. Some malay and auntie was so eager to get home, they nearly knocked into me on their motor cycle, until I realized that they were pretty near behind and whizzing by, and I sorta reflexively dropped my bike to the right, thus whizzing about an inch away their from their handlebars. And there were 2 lanes of cars beside me by the way, accelerating ones cos I happened to want the safe dotted lines in the middle of the road, which motorcycles love too. Sheesh. Lucky I didn't quite fall. I'm NOT EVER going to use that killer road again.
Anyway, really had fun cycling over at East Coast. I think I love the mood of the place.
I don't know why I write,
nor whom am I writing for.
Is it to preach? To other people who think like me?
The converted, who would not bother to dig down into the meaning of my words, but assume it to be their own?
And they ladle praise, heapings of it, presumably on my writing, but in actuality, on the similarity of our thinking.
Is it for pleasure? To read my words years later, and derive a masochistic pleasure, from reviewing mediocrity from years ago, and being cheered up at the thought of the improvements I've made. Is it an innate sense, to leave a mark where it may lie, in the hope that one might just stumble upon it, in an uncertain tomorrow? Man's desire to create fate?
Or is it just a natural human desire to share? That alien brain that exists in all of us, bursting to get out, to share it's thoughts with the millions of other brains out there, in an orgy of foreplay and sex, the constant reproduction of the thoughts that so gripped us and drove our behaviour. Do we write, to convince others of the validity of the path that we've taken, and encourage others to follow our footsteps, in the never ending, never ceasing loop of software running the hardware.
Perhaps writing is just the pursuit of longevity. Not the physical body, but the hope that the mental self would be passed on, like a person mummified in the pages of a book, influencing the future generations, who'd pick up the book, be converted, and decide to continue your work.
i find kenneth's vaguely depressing! but nevertheless good.
ode. (to my taste)
So give me words.
fragile
bitter black ink
on angelic paper pale.
the screaming scarlet words
drip drip dripping from the lips of a honey-tongued orator
resonate in my head, and exist nowhere else.
he's long gone.
and yet he still screams, and thumps his points,
like nails through the center of my heart,
a dull thumping.
In golden silence.
i could crumple you in one hand without even trying you know,
Silence you, keep you for my own.
i know better, of course.
This page just a carcass, its marrow already absorbed.
i swallow words, gulp them down like a cat drowning in cream.
words to break my heart to turn it to stone to shake the filing cabinets inside my head
to enrage the deep dark places to find the grail to paint my senses.
i would pretend to understand, but words catch me up
fling me away punching holes in the clouds through the stratosphere out past the moon and the stars into the expanding outer reaches and then
pull me in like a magnet
to the core of sensation and catch me,
rock me safe like a small child
bring me home,
dear words.
any tips? issues? with trite or confusing or rewordable bits?
love it, bun.
(but i said that already).
