Setting: Underwater Base
Plot: Yet Another Christmas Carol
Narrative Device: Promoted To Scapegoat
Hero: First Person Smartass
Villain: Villain With Good Publicity
Character As Device: Iron Buttmonkey
Characterization Device: Compliment Fishing
My friend looked straight at the person who was quite possibly the best-known figure. I knew where this was going, so looked out the window to watch the fish. Boring conversations I can fake interest in, but I could mouth along with this one if I wanted to.
"You know, your colleague there would make a splendid commander." I heard and didn't react. The man wasn't addressing me, I'd always survived before, and the school looked like a white fish had swum through a prism.
"I'm sure you'd know better than I." I suppressed a smile that the best-known might see reflected in the glass. Three...two...one...
"But you have the most insightful opinions. I really would like to hear." The first time I'd heard the man speak like this, I'd been confused. His persona was so carefully crafted. It honestly hadn't occurred to me that he was charading. I suppose I wanted the world to be as it seemed.
"Very well." My lips did twitch then, as I turned to look at the two who were moving past the traditional back-and-forth. My friend sat cross-legged and we followed suit, though I was still clearly outside the conversation. Not that they'd notice if I did mind, wrapped up as they are in each other. Honestly, I should just bring candles and lobster one of these times.
"Let me tell you three stories. They're about you."
Setting: Premiseville
Plot: Legion Of Doom
Narrative Device: Hostile Weather
Hero: Technical Pacifist
Villain: Non Action Big Bad
Character As Device: Fantasy Character Classes
Characterization Device: Kick Them While They Are Down
I sighed at the dim light of false dawn as rain poured down. There wasn't time to run back and grab my jacket unless I wanted to miss the sunrise.
The only particular reason one would run across this particular place was because of its name. First, because out here, far from Earth, the names were traditionally quite long and two words at a minimum. Second, because out here, people had come to find fresh and new; very few used any piece of the old Earth languages or names. No Plymouth, no New London, always something different. And then here we were, old enough to be part of a dead language, but in the fresh land, barely a generation and a half settled.
Tomorrow, I would be fighting. I'd been in something like this before, and figured this would be worse. Some would be with me, but I'd be darting to reach where I needed to be, and I'd be alone. It'd feel like me against the world. And, of course, the world as a whole would have no trouble killing me, even if I were lucky enough to find some with a code like mine.
Avoiding killing them wouldn't be a problem once I reached the heart. The leader wasn't much for physical fighting, really. Guile, yes, of course. I'd have to be on my toes, when I'd probably be bruised and suffering from minor-to-severe blood loss. I briefly entertained the thought that the injuries might make someone go easy on my before my suspension of disbelief shattered.
But still. I was fighter enough from my mother, and had smarts enough from my father. Even if this didn't work, I'd probably survive. Bruises, blood, broken bones and all.
I watched the green and gold of a drenched Pax sunrise.
Setting: Big Fancy House
Plot: Forgotten Birthday
Narrative Device: Explosive Leash
Hero: Hurting Hero
Villain: What Measure Is A Mook
Character As Device: Reformed Criminal
Characterization Device: Ridiculously Successful Future Self
The ballroom was the definition of opulence. If you stuck the picture in the dictionary and left no other definition, people would get the basic idea. A more thorough idea would probably also require the living rooms, the bedrooms, and the fireplace. Oh, and the guest kitchen.
It was a terrible place to dust.
The place would have been awfully time-consuming even if I wore comfortable clothing. As it was, the jumpsuit itched, and the collar chafed. Of course, the collar was not quite as uncomfortable as it would be, should I move three steps outside this room.
Everyone forgets us. It's not that I really expect them to care most of the time, but I feel like they should care when I do something wrong, at least. Some iota of concern. But nope. Uncomfortable outfit, choke collar, and beyond that we're just forced labor that did something wrong. Something, somehow, somewhere, somewhen, but not quite someone. I rubbed at my eyes with the heel of my hand. It was the dust in my eye.
It was my birthday, the day before the one I'm writing of. As I write this, three years have past, and I celebrated my birthday for the first time in a decade. Chelsea's is in a month, and I'm already planning the party.
The old house is still a terrible place to dust, but I make sure none of us work on our own. After all, I can afford it.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Saturday, May 21, 2011
Speaker and Author, Author and Speaker
Sometimes the same and sometimes one's meeker.
Matter-of-factly.
I scare you, you know. When you let yourself think of me. When you let me be here, in front of you, not behind, not out in the corner of your eye, not flickering or glimmering through a cloud or a crowd. When you genuinely, honestly, accept that I am.
I am what I am, and I translate poorly.
You know, I don't have to be scary. I didn't scare you when you were littler. You made a game of me, actually; do you remember? Figuring out what sort of person you were. Most of your firsts. First book read all through, first time you listened to a piece of music because you liked it, not because your parents were playing it. I was there with your first lie, the first thing you took without asking. The first time manipulation failed, too.
With a note of annoyance.
I can help you. But only if I'm standing in front. Not all the time; I'd block your view of everything else. But every once and a while, let me hold up the mirror. Remember where you're worse than you dare admit and that you are better than you recall. Look. Look! You're getting comfortable as yourself; that's what growing up is. But not if you're so dead set against looking at me that you only bother to see your sunburns and scars. Not if you're so determined to never let me in front that you never see your face, until you almost doubt you have one.
Calmer, and tired.
I know. You can see your hands; you can see what you're doing; you can look into still lakes on clear days and see your face. And maybe if you've forgotten me, forgotten even my glimmers, even how I look in the clouds, only notice me when I flicker through crowds of half-remembered faces and spotted mirrors, you might forget that I don't only show you.
Not an order, but still firm enough to be heard.
Call me. Look at the edges. I remind you of yourself, yes, but around the corners where I keep myself clean but that the lakes cut off with blurs and shores and odd angles, where that old mirrors cut off with dots of tarnish, look. You can see the crowd around you. What they say when they think you're not listening. They're not all insults; there's admiration. It's getting better. I swear it's getting better. I swear it will get better.
As one asking for an old friend back.
Come on. Call me. You know the name. You can't have forgotten that much. Even if you only remember the mirror, only the wisp of a dream, you can't have.
A pause. Then, perhaps, a note of desperation.
You can't.
Matter-of-factly.
I scare you, you know. When you let yourself think of me. When you let me be here, in front of you, not behind, not out in the corner of your eye, not flickering or glimmering through a cloud or a crowd. When you genuinely, honestly, accept that I am.
I am what I am, and I translate poorly.
You know, I don't have to be scary. I didn't scare you when you were littler. You made a game of me, actually; do you remember? Figuring out what sort of person you were. Most of your firsts. First book read all through, first time you listened to a piece of music because you liked it, not because your parents were playing it. I was there with your first lie, the first thing you took without asking. The first time manipulation failed, too.
With a note of annoyance.
I can help you. But only if I'm standing in front. Not all the time; I'd block your view of everything else. But every once and a while, let me hold up the mirror. Remember where you're worse than you dare admit and that you are better than you recall. Look. Look! You're getting comfortable as yourself; that's what growing up is. But not if you're so dead set against looking at me that you only bother to see your sunburns and scars. Not if you're so determined to never let me in front that you never see your face, until you almost doubt you have one.
Calmer, and tired.
I know. You can see your hands; you can see what you're doing; you can look into still lakes on clear days and see your face. And maybe if you've forgotten me, forgotten even my glimmers, even how I look in the clouds, only notice me when I flicker through crowds of half-remembered faces and spotted mirrors, you might forget that I don't only show you.
Not an order, but still firm enough to be heard.
Call me. Look at the edges. I remind you of yourself, yes, but around the corners where I keep myself clean but that the lakes cut off with blurs and shores and odd angles, where that old mirrors cut off with dots of tarnish, look. You can see the crowd around you. What they say when they think you're not listening. They're not all insults; there's admiration. It's getting better. I swear it's getting better. I swear it will get better.
As one asking for an old friend back.
Come on. Call me. You know the name. You can't have forgotten that much. Even if you only remember the mirror, only the wisp of a dream, you can't have.
A pause. Then, perhaps, a note of desperation.
You can't.
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Moments
The odd feeling of falling, tumbling up as two quick eighth notes precede a held belt.
Pain rumbling through your stomach as the junk food catches up with you.
Discovering that the reason your favorite snack is out is because the fresh batch finished as you walked in.
Skimming along different sources to procrastinate and finding a quotation that explains, exactly and succinctly, that odd thought that had been running through your head all week.
Sprinting for the sheer joy of feeling bare feet pound dew-damp grass.
Staring at someone who called you out. Watching calmly as the light flickers on behind those arrogant eyes that start to recognize a fighter.
Watching the sunset in midsummer, harvesting done and safe for the moment, babe in arms. Your lover puts a warm hand on your shoulder and shares the moment.
Yelling, "Echo!" in an empty cavern.
Glancing at the clock and realizing with a jolt that it's two hours later than you thought it was.
Finding that piece of candy that you'd come to think was something you'd dreamt, rather than something you'd truly eaten.
Stabbing yourself with the pig-dissecting scalpel without piercing your glove.
The moment after a terrible day where you fall into someone's arms and cry so hard you shake without any control.
Realizing that what you just did was the last item on your to-do list.
Finding an author with a writing style you love, then finding nineteen other books by the same one at the library.
Shyly holding hands on the first date.
Feeling your breath stop as your eyes meet with the person you've never quite gotten the courage to ask out...and realizing the other person stopped breathing, too.
Finding that someone else feels the same way you do.
Figuring out what on Earth made that piece. Why this chord sounds happy, what this archaic language means, why the cadence works as it does.
Standing confidently to a challenge and exceeding even your own expectations.
Extending a hand to that person you've never been close to without thinking about it, then seeing the spark of friendship start in those eyes. A smile echoes in yours.
Seeing everyone you care about safe. Laying down to rest.
Pain rumbling through your stomach as the junk food catches up with you.
Discovering that the reason your favorite snack is out is because the fresh batch finished as you walked in.
Skimming along different sources to procrastinate and finding a quotation that explains, exactly and succinctly, that odd thought that had been running through your head all week.
Sprinting for the sheer joy of feeling bare feet pound dew-damp grass.
Staring at someone who called you out. Watching calmly as the light flickers on behind those arrogant eyes that start to recognize a fighter.
Watching the sunset in midsummer, harvesting done and safe for the moment, babe in arms. Your lover puts a warm hand on your shoulder and shares the moment.
Yelling, "Echo!" in an empty cavern.
Glancing at the clock and realizing with a jolt that it's two hours later than you thought it was.
Finding that piece of candy that you'd come to think was something you'd dreamt, rather than something you'd truly eaten.
Stabbing yourself with the pig-dissecting scalpel without piercing your glove.
The moment after a terrible day where you fall into someone's arms and cry so hard you shake without any control.
Realizing that what you just did was the last item on your to-do list.
Finding an author with a writing style you love, then finding nineteen other books by the same one at the library.
Shyly holding hands on the first date.
Feeling your breath stop as your eyes meet with the person you've never quite gotten the courage to ask out...and realizing the other person stopped breathing, too.
Finding that someone else feels the same way you do.
Figuring out what on Earth made that piece. Why this chord sounds happy, what this archaic language means, why the cadence works as it does.
Standing confidently to a challenge and exceeding even your own expectations.
Extending a hand to that person you've never been close to without thinking about it, then seeing the spark of friendship start in those eyes. A smile echoes in yours.
Seeing everyone you care about safe. Laying down to rest.
Friday, May 13, 2011
After Rose's Tale: Part 1
Merry Friday the 13th
Story Generator
Setting: Bazaar Of The Bizarre
Plot: The Siege
Narrative Device: Mind Rape
Hero: The Drifter
Villain: The Evil Genius
Character As Device: Walking Disaster Area
Characterization Device: Squee
Rosetail got its name a while ago. No one's entirely sure where, anymore, though my favorite one tells that some determined young thing named Rose got the people here, then no one bothered to write it down.
Whatever the story, the place is absolute heaven for someone looking for weird stuff. You know that thing you had when you were seven, and you've never been able to find it since? You can find it here. Eventually.
The man's mouth twitched as he walked.
If you've got money to spare for a guide, then you can even find the thing efficiently. The vaguer the description, the better the guide, the more the money.
That was what Daniel Riverside was here for, at the moment. He traveled all over, but always ended up back at Rosetail, one way or another. For a few supplies he couldn't find elsewhere, to be a guide for a little extra cash, just to breath air that had touched coral-kissed sand and dry desert nights. Never had a place to call home, but Rosetail came pretty close. When the rain soaked through his coat, or someone got a little too close to...
That night, the one he didn't talk about, the one he wasn't going to think about here, the one he would not tie to Rosetail if it would save his life because Rosetail was still home, still here, still the same, even if he wasn't...
Riverside gestured to the shop with a polite smile. "I believe you were looking for the tintinnabulator, miss." The name didn't really matter. It was a pretty little machine that made lovely, lightly jingly and twinkly. The thing wasn't particularly rare, but the young woman had an odd cadence that made her a little more difficult to understand, so she had gone to Riverside anyway. The uselessness of the object didn't bother him. He got his rate.
Riverside wandered back to where the guide-seekers lingered, though he took a scenic route. For business, it was good to check for anything new, and for pleasure...
"Fresh apples even in the driest regions!"
"Here, rub a little honey into the back of your hand, and it'll make your soft skin even softer--"
"Oh, my, these are beautiful..."
The guide smiled at the thrumming market. It remained enough to bring back old memories, and changed enough that the old drifter might not much mind calling it home, if he ever tired of drifting.
The not-that-tired drifter glanced over the walls absentmindedly, not really expecting to see what he'd become accustomed to looking for...
Riverside sighed and swung up and through the hole in the wall nearest the new cracks.
"River!" Happy, but still jittery little Jen.
"Jennifer," he drawled, as she expected and he was used to. "Fancy finding you here."
Story Generator
Setting: Bazaar Of The Bizarre
Plot: The Siege
Narrative Device: Mind Rape
Hero: The Drifter
Villain: The Evil Genius
Character As Device: Walking Disaster Area
Characterization Device: Squee
Rosetail got its name a while ago. No one's entirely sure where, anymore, though my favorite one tells that some determined young thing named Rose got the people here, then no one bothered to write it down.
Whatever the story, the place is absolute heaven for someone looking for weird stuff. You know that thing you had when you were seven, and you've never been able to find it since? You can find it here. Eventually.
The man's mouth twitched as he walked.
If you've got money to spare for a guide, then you can even find the thing efficiently. The vaguer the description, the better the guide, the more the money.
That was what Daniel Riverside was here for, at the moment. He traveled all over, but always ended up back at Rosetail, one way or another. For a few supplies he couldn't find elsewhere, to be a guide for a little extra cash, just to breath air that had touched coral-kissed sand and dry desert nights. Never had a place to call home, but Rosetail came pretty close. When the rain soaked through his coat, or someone got a little too close to...
That night, the one he didn't talk about, the one he wasn't going to think about here, the one he would not tie to Rosetail if it would save his life because Rosetail was still home, still here, still the same, even if he wasn't...
Riverside gestured to the shop with a polite smile. "I believe you were looking for the tintinnabulator, miss." The name didn't really matter. It was a pretty little machine that made lovely, lightly jingly and twinkly. The thing wasn't particularly rare, but the young woman had an odd cadence that made her a little more difficult to understand, so she had gone to Riverside anyway. The uselessness of the object didn't bother him. He got his rate.
Riverside wandered back to where the guide-seekers lingered, though he took a scenic route. For business, it was good to check for anything new, and for pleasure...
"Fresh apples even in the driest regions!"
"Here, rub a little honey into the back of your hand, and it'll make your soft skin even softer--"
"Oh, my, these are beautiful..."
The guide smiled at the thrumming market. It remained enough to bring back old memories, and changed enough that the old drifter might not much mind calling it home, if he ever tired of drifting.
The not-that-tired drifter glanced over the walls absentmindedly, not really expecting to see what he'd become accustomed to looking for...
Riverside sighed and swung up and through the hole in the wall nearest the new cracks.
"River!" Happy, but still jittery little Jen.
"Jennifer," he drawled, as she expected and he was used to. "Fancy finding you here."
Saturday, May 7, 2011
One Day
Her voice kept the cadence, and she didn't look at him.
"One day...when the Earth burns cold and fire is a distant dream, when warmth is rarer than diamonds and burning is indescribable, perhaps I will lie down to rest. Perhaps I will have that respite, will have gone long enough and have no more promises to keep. Nothing to keep me clawing back up."
Her eyes closed.
"My little ones will be grown--unless they don't, and I end up spending my life hunting who hurt them. But, should life work out as I would have it, they will grow. They will live. They won't need me anymore. I'll be here and find that no one calls for me to save them from dark creatures they barely understand"--without opening her eyes, she nodded towards the two, though one had moved--"and I'll be done."
A dark, genuine smile touched her lips.
"Perhaps it will be death. Given how I live, I would guess that I'll see it coming, if only by a few seconds. Have a moment to myself when I simply know there's nothing left to do, no one left to save, nothing to do to extend a life or a helping hand. Just feel it...end."
A few people shivered. She opened her eyes, glittering with a sun-bright smile.
The hearth crackled, and the usual hum of background conversation gradually started back up. Everyone could figure out how much she dedicated. Very few liked to think of it.
"But not today, I think."
"One day...when the Earth burns cold and fire is a distant dream, when warmth is rarer than diamonds and burning is indescribable, perhaps I will lie down to rest. Perhaps I will have that respite, will have gone long enough and have no more promises to keep. Nothing to keep me clawing back up."
Her eyes closed.
"My little ones will be grown--unless they don't, and I end up spending my life hunting who hurt them. But, should life work out as I would have it, they will grow. They will live. They won't need me anymore. I'll be here and find that no one calls for me to save them from dark creatures they barely understand"--without opening her eyes, she nodded towards the two, though one had moved--"and I'll be done."
A dark, genuine smile touched her lips.
"Perhaps it will be death. Given how I live, I would guess that I'll see it coming, if only by a few seconds. Have a moment to myself when I simply know there's nothing left to do, no one left to save, nothing to do to extend a life or a helping hand. Just feel it...end."
A few people shivered. She opened her eyes, glittering with a sun-bright smile.
The hearth crackled, and the usual hum of background conversation gradually started back up. Everyone could figure out how much she dedicated. Very few liked to think of it.
"But not today, I think."
Understanding
A/N: Mm...yep. One of these again.
I am of the opinion that any hate I feel is a failure in my own understanding. I might hate a person, but the fact that I am feeling hate is an expression of my own ignorance: I do not hate the person, I hate the incomplete collection of facts and theories I have cloaked the person in.
Therefore, the idea of an omniscient being hating anyone feels too simply wrong to express. This is a being that understands every moment, every thought, every justification and doubt and fear and hope and whisper of change, and that being can hate?
I have spoken of my obsession with communication. If I had to pick something I believe in, I would say connections. If one tries to communicate and one tries to listen, we can connect.
This feeling is not just an expression of poor communication, a thinned connection. It perpetuates it. Hate, prejudice, old feuds. They're not just things that split communications, that isolate, though that would be enough. They connect to shadows, shadows that layer until it's so dark you can't see what you're doing, much less the person across from you.
And that is simply too much. That is not violence, though violence may come. That is not suppression, though that may come. But it's before that, when maybe no one even realizes what is going wrong. For as you see my shadow, I see yours. When you react to my shadow, when you react poorly, I add that to my information of you. I create a you that does these things in reaction to me as I am. And as I react to that, my shadow becomes richer, I become the person who does that.
Ticking and tocking through darkness, slowly we look to see shadows and epiphanies.
I am of the opinion that any hate I feel is a failure in my own understanding. I might hate a person, but the fact that I am feeling hate is an expression of my own ignorance: I do not hate the person, I hate the incomplete collection of facts and theories I have cloaked the person in.
Therefore, the idea of an omniscient being hating anyone feels too simply wrong to express. This is a being that understands every moment, every thought, every justification and doubt and fear and hope and whisper of change, and that being can hate?
I have spoken of my obsession with communication. If I had to pick something I believe in, I would say connections. If one tries to communicate and one tries to listen, we can connect.
This feeling is not just an expression of poor communication, a thinned connection. It perpetuates it. Hate, prejudice, old feuds. They're not just things that split communications, that isolate, though that would be enough. They connect to shadows, shadows that layer until it's so dark you can't see what you're doing, much less the person across from you.
And that is simply too much. That is not violence, though violence may come. That is not suppression, though that may come. But it's before that, when maybe no one even realizes what is going wrong. For as you see my shadow, I see yours. When you react to my shadow, when you react poorly, I add that to my information of you. I create a you that does these things in reaction to me as I am. And as I react to that, my shadow becomes richer, I become the person who does that.
Ticking and tocking through darkness, slowly we look to see shadows and epiphanies.
Statistics at time of posting:(I updated this list just before posting. The former had gone down, the latter up. Cheers.)
God hates:
Bing: 8,180,000 results
Google: About 1,540,000 results
God loves:
Bing: 198,000,000 results
Google: About 4,560,000 results
Friday, April 29, 2011
Messy Moral Mathematics
Inspiration for this post comes from the oft-spoken argument that Gotham would be better off with The Joker simply dead, not in the Cardboard Prison of Arkham Asylum, so Batman should just shoot him already.
The authors'/Batman's argument against this is that it would make him "just as bad" as The Joker. The common response of the fan in question is that it totally wouldn't. The Joker is literally irrecoverable, and even if he can, eventually, be reformed, the number of people he will kill/maim/drive insane before he would change clearly outweighs the loss of one person.
In a sense, I agree with both parties. It's not that Batman would be as bad as The Joker because this one act would be so horrible on an objective scale. Batman would become just as bad.
My reasoning for this can be divided in two parts. The first is the Mirror side, which works in a vacuum, and the second is the eponymous Messy Mathematics, which remembers all of Gotham.
Mirror: The Joker is essentially a mirror image of Batman. Batman went through a wrenching experience, went insane, and went dark and good. The Joker went through a disfiguring experience and saw life as a joke--he went light and harmfully insane. Both are hurt, costumed, insane, spreading their world view, and terrifying--even to their allies.
They're so similar. If one is beyond salvation...
Mathematics: I'm going to draw on another example for this one. Let's say you have two people in a fire, and a hero willing to save them. The math at first appears fairly simple: 2 > 1. The hero should risk life and limb to save the two who need saving.
But it's not, really. Let t=time left alive. Let n=average number of people saved. Let the end goal=maximum number of people alive. The hero isn't 1, the hero is 1nt, and so are the two people. If the two civilians are frail, or dying soon, or cowardly, or any number of other things, then their variable-adjusted 2nt < 1nt. The math gets messy. But the problem isn't even that simple. If the hero is the sort of person who allows two people to die in a fire because the hero can save someone else tomorrow, chances are good that the same excuse is going to come up tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow...and that changes the value of n.
And that's not even taking into account inspiration. Let i=inspiration. The act of saving the two people adds an i to other's equations, rippling out, and it's impossible to calculate the exact effect that has.
It isn't that killing The Joker is an act of such outright, objective evil that it could not be construed as a good act. But the equation changes. If Batman is the sort of person who can kill The Joker, that taints him. The man, who has broken his one rule, the one thing that stops him from becoming Templar. The idea, that was the one beacon of hope, clothed in shadows and terrifying, but there to make the monsters scared.
The man becomes a killer. Someone who takes the law into his own hands, until it isn't even the law anymore, just the code of an insane man--and the image is as cracked as the dead reflection.
The idea is a monster. The shadow will find you. You won't see it coming. You'll have time to draw breath but not scream, time to be terrified, an unbearable eternity, but barely a moment. No trial. No justice. Just the swish that you hear when the wind blows the curtains, when cardboard runs against cardboard, when you're about to die.
The authors'/Batman's argument against this is that it would make him "just as bad" as The Joker. The common response of the fan in question is that it totally wouldn't. The Joker is literally irrecoverable, and even if he can, eventually, be reformed, the number of people he will kill/maim/drive insane before he would change clearly outweighs the loss of one person.
In a sense, I agree with both parties. It's not that Batman would be as bad as The Joker because this one act would be so horrible on an objective scale. Batman would become just as bad.
My reasoning for this can be divided in two parts. The first is the Mirror side, which works in a vacuum, and the second is the eponymous Messy Mathematics, which remembers all of Gotham.
Mirror: The Joker is essentially a mirror image of Batman. Batman went through a wrenching experience, went insane, and went dark and good. The Joker went through a disfiguring experience and saw life as a joke--he went light and harmfully insane. Both are hurt, costumed, insane, spreading their world view, and terrifying--even to their allies.
They're so similar. If one is beyond salvation...
Mathematics: I'm going to draw on another example for this one. Let's say you have two people in a fire, and a hero willing to save them. The math at first appears fairly simple: 2 > 1. The hero should risk life and limb to save the two who need saving.
But it's not, really. Let t=time left alive. Let n=average number of people saved. Let the end goal=maximum number of people alive. The hero isn't 1, the hero is 1nt, and so are the two people. If the two civilians are frail, or dying soon, or cowardly, or any number of other things, then their variable-adjusted 2nt < 1nt. The math gets messy. But the problem isn't even that simple. If the hero is the sort of person who allows two people to die in a fire because the hero can save someone else tomorrow, chances are good that the same excuse is going to come up tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow...and that changes the value of n.
And that's not even taking into account inspiration. Let i=inspiration. The act of saving the two people adds an i to other's equations, rippling out, and it's impossible to calculate the exact effect that has.
It isn't that killing The Joker is an act of such outright, objective evil that it could not be construed as a good act. But the equation changes. If Batman is the sort of person who can kill The Joker, that taints him. The man, who has broken his one rule, the one thing that stops him from becoming Templar. The idea, that was the one beacon of hope, clothed in shadows and terrifying, but there to make the monsters scared.
The man becomes a killer. Someone who takes the law into his own hands, until it isn't even the law anymore, just the code of an insane man--and the image is as cracked as the dead reflection.
The idea is a monster. The shadow will find you. You won't see it coming. You'll have time to draw breath but not scream, time to be terrified, an unbearable eternity, but barely a moment. No trial. No justice. Just the swish that you hear when the wind blows the curtains, when cardboard runs against cardboard, when you're about to die.
Friday, April 22, 2011
Titleless
Little lost. Little fool. Little ignorant little thing, trying stupidly, never finding anything but a place to run from run from, to never run to. No desire, no ecstasy, no fire or fate. Just a vague delusion that she's too little, too late.
Patterns? Oh, once they were hers. She was the smartest. She could reach things others couldn't, even when she was shorter. She was impressive. It wouldn't matter if they all deserted her. She stood, she walked, she ran, she rose, from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes.
Ah, but she grew. It's quite impressive to read when you're two. It's a stunning adventure to reach that view, to stretch up eight feet when you're five foot two. Amazing, astounding, and then...not so new.
She grew up and stretched to her very best, but the drive went away with no rewards nor a rest. They would grant, surely would, those who would smile were plenty--but no one cheered when she soared. She felt empty.
The logical part of her mind will say no, of course they're still cheering, still watching that show. But all she can see, beating heart in her chest, is they're not surprised--how can she let herself rest? She fed on perfection, or so close flaws unseen; she flew on being blue in center of green.
She popped, no comparison, no one that would thwart; what else can be when there's but one in that sport?
And still she is good, she knows herself great: she's pretty, she's smart, her friends love when she bakes. But she can't help but feel, in the back of her head, this odd little feeling of unending dread.
Here comes the last of the structure and schooling. Soon she'll be all alone, and it, life, will be grueling. She holds herself up and sees herself short--she cooks just desserts, what's that say of her worth? She could not support herself, not if she tried, she doesn't have the skills--she knows that she lies.
She could, if she tried. She knows she could. And that's the greatest terror, the one even she can't face, the one that makes her flee from her place. Not that she falls short, not that she lacks the reason, but that she simply, normally, pays that, come her season.
To be incapable--that she would hate. To be a dependent--what worse fate? But she knows one, though she bare' dare admit:
To be fully capable, and still to quit.
Patterns? Oh, once they were hers. She was the smartest. She could reach things others couldn't, even when she was shorter. She was impressive. It wouldn't matter if they all deserted her. She stood, she walked, she ran, she rose, from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes.
Ah, but she grew. It's quite impressive to read when you're two. It's a stunning adventure to reach that view, to stretch up eight feet when you're five foot two. Amazing, astounding, and then...not so new.
She grew up and stretched to her very best, but the drive went away with no rewards nor a rest. They would grant, surely would, those who would smile were plenty--but no one cheered when she soared. She felt empty.
The logical part of her mind will say no, of course they're still cheering, still watching that show. But all she can see, beating heart in her chest, is they're not surprised--how can she let herself rest? She fed on perfection, or so close flaws unseen; she flew on being blue in center of green.
She popped, no comparison, no one that would thwart; what else can be when there's but one in that sport?
And still she is good, she knows herself great: she's pretty, she's smart, her friends love when she bakes. But she can't help but feel, in the back of her head, this odd little feeling of unending dread.
Here comes the last of the structure and schooling. Soon she'll be all alone, and it, life, will be grueling. She holds herself up and sees herself short--she cooks just desserts, what's that say of her worth? She could not support herself, not if she tried, she doesn't have the skills--she knows that she lies.
She could, if she tried. She knows she could. And that's the greatest terror, the one even she can't face, the one that makes her flee from her place. Not that she falls short, not that she lacks the reason, but that she simply, normally, pays that, come her season.
To be incapable--that she would hate. To be a dependent--what worse fate? But she knows one, though she bare' dare admit:
To be fully capable, and still to quit.
Saturday, April 16, 2011
My Line on Secrets
60 summarized posts+13 musings+26 somethings+this post=100 Posts
To start with the simplest way I can think of to say it: Any person should be able to keep secrets that do no harm. No person should be forced to keep a secret.
What I mean to say by the first is that I am not writing this as a part of a crusade to completely do away with secrets. I recognize that saying something like, "Ugh, you are [insult]" is something you might want to keep to yourself. Particularly if there's nothing constructive about the insult--"Your clothes are messed up" is worse than, "You're tag's sticking out," for instance. I also recognize that some secrets are simply difficult to communicate. I...obviously can't give an example of that one.
And, simply, I believe people deserve a certain level of privacy. Unless I am interested in a relationship/one-night stand with you, I don't need to know your orientation. I would say I don't even need to know that, only if you're interested, but there's an entire part of the courtship ritual devoted to winning over a potential mate so...gray area.
Simply put: maybe it's none of my business. I'm fine with that. As one of my goals is to know everything, I want to know, and as a friend I hope that if my friends wants to tell someone they can tell me, but I would not intentionally force an invasion of privacy.
And here comes the flip.
All that stuff I just said about being forced to tell a secret? Combine that with a need to communicate and understand, and a reflexive feeling of wrong about anyone being forced to keep a secret, and you begin to have how I feel about a person made to keep one.
Then there's the more conventional way to force: make it unsafe. If I have no particular thing standing in my way, I personally am open about my bisexuality. If I would become a target...well, I personally would probably be fiercely open out of spite, though that's not exactly the healthiest way to be open, but someone else might hide, and it certainly makes things more difficult. If I would be putting my family (or friends, or partner) in danger...that would stop me. At least for a while. And that lack of choice is not healthy.
There are multiple methods of force, of course. The simplest is one I've alluded to in talking about the right of secrecy: intentionally creating a situation where people are incapable of saying it. Back to sexual orientation--if a person does not know the word bisexual, nor that such an orientation exists, it suddenly becomes a lot harder to recognize that orientation in one's self, never mind explaining it to someone else. It's not as flagrantly dangerous, and yet...
If I'm under threat, I'm under threat, but if I lack the ideas, then I have no idea what is happening. I cannot speak for more than myself, but I would rather understand.
To start with the simplest way I can think of to say it: Any person should be able to keep secrets that do no harm. No person should be forced to keep a secret.
What I mean to say by the first is that I am not writing this as a part of a crusade to completely do away with secrets. I recognize that saying something like, "Ugh, you are [insult]" is something you might want to keep to yourself. Particularly if there's nothing constructive about the insult--"Your clothes are messed up" is worse than, "You're tag's sticking out," for instance. I also recognize that some secrets are simply difficult to communicate. I...obviously can't give an example of that one.
And, simply, I believe people deserve a certain level of privacy. Unless I am interested in a relationship/one-night stand with you, I don't need to know your orientation. I would say I don't even need to know that, only if you're interested, but there's an entire part of the courtship ritual devoted to winning over a potential mate so...gray area.
Simply put: maybe it's none of my business. I'm fine with that. As one of my goals is to know everything, I want to know, and as a friend I hope that if my friends wants to tell someone they can tell me, but I would not intentionally force an invasion of privacy.
And here comes the flip.
All that stuff I just said about being forced to tell a secret? Combine that with a need to communicate and understand, and a reflexive feeling of wrong about anyone being forced to keep a secret, and you begin to have how I feel about a person made to keep one.
Then there's the more conventional way to force: make it unsafe. If I have no particular thing standing in my way, I personally am open about my bisexuality. If I would become a target...well, I personally would probably be fiercely open out of spite, though that's not exactly the healthiest way to be open, but someone else might hide, and it certainly makes things more difficult. If I would be putting my family (or friends, or partner) in danger...that would stop me. At least for a while. And that lack of choice is not healthy.
There are multiple methods of force, of course. The simplest is one I've alluded to in talking about the right of secrecy: intentionally creating a situation where people are incapable of saying it. Back to sexual orientation--if a person does not know the word bisexual, nor that such an orientation exists, it suddenly becomes a lot harder to recognize that orientation in one's self, never mind explaining it to someone else. It's not as flagrantly dangerous, and yet...
If I'm under threat, I'm under threat, but if I lack the ideas, then I have no idea what is happening. I cannot speak for more than myself, but I would rather understand.
Saturday, April 9, 2011
Another Origin
A/N: Just hit 1500 hits, and coming up on 100 posts. Wow.
It amazes me, as I edit old things I wrote, how redundant I was. Wonder what I'll notice in another few years.
“In the beginning, there was nothing.”
That’s how I’m supposed to start, right? But that can't be right. Because when someone says in the beginning, it means that there was the beginning. There is something present. The beginning is there. Were there truly nothing, it would not be a story.
If you merely wish to hear what happened, here it is: There was nothing, or so little that none would notice it. And then it became everything.
But the story is a story:
In the beginning, there was everything.
All wrapped up together, there was everything, tight as a bond between lovers, between mother and child, between trust and belief. And it was still.
There is no word left or yet for how absolutely motionless it was. A still pond has thousands of things moving in it, even in the tiniest drop. Motionless implies that motion is the basic state. But here, things were simply still because they were. None of the little particles in the universe had gotten the idea that one might turn yet.
So they were, and they were still—though ‘still’ is a shadow cast from that first stillness. And perhaps this is what some mean when they say, “In the beginning, there was nothing.”
And then, one tiny, miniscule little particle got the idea to move.
This was not easy. This was not moving against a strong wind, or moving against an ocean current pushing you the wrong way. This was not even moving against surrounding granite. A strong wind is still a force, and can be worked against; an ocean current can only push so hard; granite can be worn down. This was not merely moving against something tough. This was moving when ‘moving,’ ‘against,’ and, ‘force’ were not even ideas. They weren’t.
Yet this little, tiniest piece off a whole that had never been apart from anything managed to figure out that it could be done.
This was the first thought.
Then there was a slight movement, and the little piece—and ‘piece’ was as new as ‘slight,’ as ‘thought’—found itself doing something that was impossible.
This was the first action.
Then the first piece that had had the first thought and made the first action passed the idea to another.
It was possible for the piece to leave movement to itself. To be able to see all. To leave the universe an eternity before anything began to turn. But the piece simply shared the idea: the thought of being known or keeping this to itself as foreign as ‘moving’ had been a moment before. More, the idea of moving eventually came to this little one’s mind.
When I have been saying ‘little’, the only comparison I have had has been the universe. Our little one may have been larger than anything we could imagine. Or it might have been smaller than the smallest thing any will ever experience. The size does not matter, for, at this time, it was the smallest thing in the universe.
The idea being passed on was the first gift.
And something else picked up on the idea. There was a moment, an impossible moment. How do you introduce the idea of movement to one who has never felt it, never experienced anything like it? When it is not merely that you do not share a language, but there is no language, where do you begin?
This was the first story.
And the other piece, somehow, miraculously, understood. And they realized, together, that this was amazing. That this should have been impossible. That the little one should have sought for weary eternities, looking for one who could understand.
And then awareness sparked and they realized that this was simple. It was not luck. Once the first barrier had been broken, it was simple. For it is impossible to describe movement without movement, but descriptions are movement. They moved together, in the indescribable joy of two who have realized not just that they might be happy, but that everyone might be, and truly understanding.
This was the first emotion.
This was the first moment. The rest was background, now.
This was quickly followed by the first silence. Not because it had not been quiet before, but because there had never before been sound for silence to dance with.
And suddenly, one wondered about the other’s motives. Perhaps both. But then, one, the other, both, reached out for the other.
For each other.
This was the first trust.
This was the first truth.
This was the first time two souls, two pieces of collective divine, met.
They might have been together before, but they had not known each other, not even known of each other. They had simply had the universe, and were the universe. And that had been something.
But being able to be together, stand together, mind to mind, heart to heart, soul to soul, love to love, was something else.
This is why some people will insist that lust in any form is evil. Because that profound connection echoes through us still, and each any every one of us can feel that, in some way. And there is a fury in some spirits for doing something so similar, but so much less.
And, for the first time, they looked at each other. Then they realized that everything was moving. Had this been a sudden shift? Had it always been? How could everything have happened so quickly? They couldn’t’ve missed it, but they must have, hadn’t they?
And maybe they had. And maybe it hadn’t. It didn’t matter then, and it does not matter now. The two oldest souls are a part of each other.
They are just as old as everything else, but they came apart first.
They met first.
Monday, April 4, 2011
Why I'm Writing
This is not quite "Why I'm Blogging", though blogging does reside under the umbrella of the written word.
For the basis of this article, "communication" will refer only to an honest attempt to deliver information. For instance, bullshitting or lying would not be communication.
Context: I'm attracted on a basis distinct from the male-female spectrum, which is usually called bisexual. (Given that there are more than two sexes, I dislike the term, but there you go.) I'm open about this, so people tend to know.
I'm walking down a street with two girls from school, because it's a school trip and we need to go in buddy groups of three to go shopping. Girl A asks if I'm religious (I'm not, but I never answer), and how that fits together with being bisexual, since the Bible forbids it. I point out that the Biblical book she was referring to also forbids things like wearing cotton and wool together. Or wearing linen. She says that clothing requirements "are obviously different from sex stuff." I ask why. She's turned away and moved on.
There. That is why I am writing. If I am in the middle of a conversation, the other person gets to interrupt, to turn away and stop. And I can't do anything short of grabbing them bodily and yelling, which isn't particularly helpful at communication anyway.
When I write, I put up a roadblock to that. If I had written a page and she read half of it, something is missing. If she responds to the first half, essentially interrupting me in text, then I can just go "...You didn't finish it, did you?" It goes from turning away and ignoring what I say to end the conversation to sticking fingers in one's ears and singing. It isn't an end to a conversation; it is immature and absurd.
I want to explain exactly how important this is to me. I am absolutely obsessed with communication. I love learning new words and concepts, because each new thing is not only something new to know, but another chance to explain something to someone, anyone. Understand me. This is the closest I will ever come to touching you, to knowing you are there; see me; try to understand; please listen.
I need to communicate.
That is not a poetic way of saying that I like having people around, or that I find people who don't understand what I'm saying annoying. I need someone to understand, and every time someone turns away without even explaining why they're so annoyed as to fully shut me out, it hurts. I don't know what I did, so I can't fix it, so I am going to fail at communication again. In the same way.
That is why I'm writing. Each step that makes it likelier that someone will see my full point is a step that makes communication likelier. I want to learn; I want to teach; I want to talk.
I want to communicate.
For the basis of this article, "communication" will refer only to an honest attempt to deliver information. For instance, bullshitting or lying would not be communication.
Context: I'm attracted on a basis distinct from the male-female spectrum, which is usually called bisexual. (Given that there are more than two sexes, I dislike the term, but there you go.) I'm open about this, so people tend to know.
I'm walking down a street with two girls from school, because it's a school trip and we need to go in buddy groups of three to go shopping. Girl A asks if I'm religious (I'm not, but I never answer), and how that fits together with being bisexual, since the Bible forbids it. I point out that the Biblical book she was referring to also forbids things like wearing cotton and wool together. Or wearing linen. She says that clothing requirements "are obviously different from sex stuff." I ask why. She's turned away and moved on.
There. That is why I am writing. If I am in the middle of a conversation, the other person gets to interrupt, to turn away and stop. And I can't do anything short of grabbing them bodily and yelling, which isn't particularly helpful at communication anyway.
When I write, I put up a roadblock to that. If I had written a page and she read half of it, something is missing. If she responds to the first half, essentially interrupting me in text, then I can just go "...You didn't finish it, did you?" It goes from turning away and ignoring what I say to end the conversation to sticking fingers in one's ears and singing. It isn't an end to a conversation; it is immature and absurd.
I want to explain exactly how important this is to me. I am absolutely obsessed with communication. I love learning new words and concepts, because each new thing is not only something new to know, but another chance to explain something to someone, anyone. Understand me. This is the closest I will ever come to touching you, to knowing you are there; see me; try to understand; please listen.
I need to communicate.
That is not a poetic way of saying that I like having people around, or that I find people who don't understand what I'm saying annoying. I need someone to understand, and every time someone turns away without even explaining why they're so annoyed as to fully shut me out, it hurts. I don't know what I did, so I can't fix it, so I am going to fail at communication again. In the same way.
That is why I'm writing. Each step that makes it likelier that someone will see my full point is a step that makes communication likelier. I want to learn; I want to teach; I want to talk.
I want to communicate.
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Incompletes
Wrote these a while back.
The guy took off and I jumped, hitting the ground with a bang that echoed through my knees. I would run.
It’s funny.
My feet hit the ground one after the other, faster than anything and soundless, because that slap, slap we’re so used to isn’t nearly as loud when you run right, and I was just moving to move.
Vampires, elves, Vulcans, we’re so obsessed with things that go for longer than we can.
I couldn’t tell you how long I went, just keeping my sight on him, one foot after the other, hitting the ground in a rhythm that soon matched my heart and breath, cut time to common but still there, still a rhythm within me that faded as it synchronized. Everything was instinct.
And yet, and especially, when we look for what makes humans better in the animal kingdom, what do we find?
The one in front of me started slowing. He was bright; he’d avoided anywhere I could trap him. But he wasn’t agile. It was all wide open space; I could see him from a mile away. He couldn’t hide, he couldn’t dart under something, and by this point he didn’t even have time and energy to spare if he found a place, not enough to hide his tracks.
He slowed. Collapsed. I sped.
Humans endure.
The mirror was in an undesirable state of being.
Once, lifetimes ago, he had been alive. And possibly female. That would be closer in line with how the woman who had trapped him worked, but he couldn’t remember anything of his past life. His voice was masculine, so, at the present time, he was a he.
“Mirror, Mirror on the wall,
“Who’s the fairest of them all?”
He is bound to answer truth, but is adept enough at sticking only to the letter. That, the spell allows for. The mirror opens his mouth to give back her expected, “You are,” as always, and hears himself say, “Um.”
The witch glares at him.
He tries to think of a way out. Snow White is lovelier, but factor her hair in, and she was by no means fair. Her hair was black as snow-soaked stone, even as her skin was as white as her name would suggest.
The mirror panicked. Had she updated the spell? He searched for anything that was different.
Oh.
Who’s the fairest of them all?
The mirror, miserable but bound to answer, lacking any outward expression so reflecting her calm annoyance, echoed out the answer. “Snow White.”
The queen was livid. She sent out a huntsman to kill the young girl. The mirror was neutral, with no one to reflect, and was left alone for so long he began to fade. There was nothing he could do, for he could not reflect a lie, anymore than he could clarify of his own will.
The fair queen hadn’t included herself.
I sucked in a breath and pinched the bridge of my nose.
“Victoria—”
“Wait.”
“We really don’t have time to—”
“My top five priorities just died, I think you can wait two silent seconds while I rearrange my damn goals.”
Vampires can enter uninvited.
The operative word here is can. A young vampire is still learning how to regulate basic functions, and the additional focus required to suddenly need to regulate not actively rotting when you’re still learning to remember to breathe and keep your heart beating are notable. If you’re outside, or invited, then forgetting those is mildly uncomfortable, and you may gray out. No big deal, usually it’s just a few moments of diminished senses, and at the most a few minutes—given the healing factor we have, there are very few things that can hurt us permanently even given all those minutes. And very few realize they need to. Would you proceed to burn the corpse if you’d already slit the throat?*
But the young ones usually haven’t figured out that they can pass through thresholds, the older ones know they shouldn’t, and the oldest ones can fake it well enough. I’ve been told that the truly old ones can trick even other vampires into believing that they’ve been invited in, though the fact that I’ve never even heard firsthand knowledge at two hundred and thirty-eight should tell you how rare or deadly quiet they are. Regardless, I’d say your chances are better of being killed in an earthquake/tornado/insert local disaster here.
Oh, also. I don’t know about you, but I’m the sort to pick up new accents after a few weeks around new people. Sometimes I’ve even been talking to someone for a few moments and started using their accent without noticing. So this will all be fairly modern, because I have yet to give up human interaction entirely.
And if my register flips between how old I am and far too young for any adult…well, I doubt it will, because I usually have trouble passing for “gifted,” much less my age. But if it does, do keep in mind that humans do still talk to me like I’m twelve. I have to move too often for anyone to acclimate to treating me my age.
The guy took off and I jumped, hitting the ground with a bang that echoed through my knees. I would run.
It’s funny.
My feet hit the ground one after the other, faster than anything and soundless, because that slap, slap we’re so used to isn’t nearly as loud when you run right, and I was just moving to move.
Vampires, elves, Vulcans, we’re so obsessed with things that go for longer than we can.
I couldn’t tell you how long I went, just keeping my sight on him, one foot after the other, hitting the ground in a rhythm that soon matched my heart and breath, cut time to common but still there, still a rhythm within me that faded as it synchronized. Everything was instinct.
And yet, and especially, when we look for what makes humans better in the animal kingdom, what do we find?
The one in front of me started slowing. He was bright; he’d avoided anywhere I could trap him. But he wasn’t agile. It was all wide open space; I could see him from a mile away. He couldn’t hide, he couldn’t dart under something, and by this point he didn’t even have time and energy to spare if he found a place, not enough to hide his tracks.
He slowed. Collapsed. I sped.
Humans endure.
The mirror was in an undesirable state of being.
Once, lifetimes ago, he had been alive. And possibly female. That would be closer in line with how the woman who had trapped him worked, but he couldn’t remember anything of his past life. His voice was masculine, so, at the present time, he was a he.
“Mirror, Mirror on the wall,
“Who’s the fairest of them all?”
He is bound to answer truth, but is adept enough at sticking only to the letter. That, the spell allows for. The mirror opens his mouth to give back her expected, “You are,” as always, and hears himself say, “Um.”
The witch glares at him.
He tries to think of a way out. Snow White is lovelier, but factor her hair in, and she was by no means fair. Her hair was black as snow-soaked stone, even as her skin was as white as her name would suggest.
The mirror panicked. Had she updated the spell? He searched for anything that was different.
Oh.
Who’s the fairest of them all?
The mirror, miserable but bound to answer, lacking any outward expression so reflecting her calm annoyance, echoed out the answer. “Snow White.”
The queen was livid. She sent out a huntsman to kill the young girl. The mirror was neutral, with no one to reflect, and was left alone for so long he began to fade. There was nothing he could do, for he could not reflect a lie, anymore than he could clarify of his own will.
The fair queen hadn’t included herself.
I sucked in a breath and pinched the bridge of my nose.
“Victoria—”
“Wait.”
“We really don’t have time to—”
“My top five priorities just died, I think you can wait two silent seconds while I rearrange my damn goals.”
Vampires can enter uninvited.
The operative word here is can. A young vampire is still learning how to regulate basic functions, and the additional focus required to suddenly need to regulate not actively rotting when you’re still learning to remember to breathe and keep your heart beating are notable. If you’re outside, or invited, then forgetting those is mildly uncomfortable, and you may gray out. No big deal, usually it’s just a few moments of diminished senses, and at the most a few minutes—given the healing factor we have, there are very few things that can hurt us permanently even given all those minutes. And very few realize they need to. Would you proceed to burn the corpse if you’d already slit the throat?*
But the young ones usually haven’t figured out that they can pass through thresholds, the older ones know they shouldn’t, and the oldest ones can fake it well enough. I’ve been told that the truly old ones can trick even other vampires into believing that they’ve been invited in, though the fact that I’ve never even heard firsthand knowledge at two hundred and thirty-eight should tell you how rare or deadly quiet they are. Regardless, I’d say your chances are better of being killed in an earthquake/tornado/insert local disaster here.
Oh, also. I don’t know about you, but I’m the sort to pick up new accents after a few weeks around new people. Sometimes I’ve even been talking to someone for a few moments and started using their accent without noticing. So this will all be fairly modern, because I have yet to give up human interaction entirely.
And if my register flips between how old I am and far too young for any adult…well, I doubt it will, because I usually have trouble passing for “gifted,” much less my age. But if it does, do keep in mind that humans do still talk to me like I’m twelve. I have to move too often for anyone to acclimate to treating me my age.
* Incidentally, the vampire population decreases significantly during plagues, because the answer to that question is suddenly and definitively, “Yes.”
Saturday, March 19, 2011
How I Read Reviews
In the world of the rhetorical triangle, my audience is an ill-thought-out metaphor.
So, I'm perusing Amazon. There are two items I come across, and one's ratings are significantly higher than the other. I have no other prior information on either book, and something in Amazon's algorithms directed me towards both, so I'm not even entirely sure what they're about. I read the descriptions, and they strike me as fairly similar. Both descriptions could be of a bad, textbook romance, or of a well-written tale of what "romance and intrigue" would bring to mind if it weren't so thoroughly associated with textbook romances #8-47, 89, 307-415, and 112. I pick the one with the lower rating.
Book set #2 looks almost exactly the same. If there are any differences in rating, they are in the hundredths. I was directed in the same way, and one looks textbook romance, one looks different in an interesting way. I pick the one with the higher rating.
The point of those paragraphs was to say that the average star rating doesn't factor in. Honestly, the stuff I like is probably going to do terribly in my age bracket, and the ratings say more about the advertising than the actual books--if you get a ton of adolescent males suddenly getting given Twilight books, guess whose rating drops? If the book is for an incredibly narrow audience, and no one else will understand it, but it also happens that only three people--myself included--outside that group will ever find it, then its rating will probably be pretty decent. And polarizing books have 2.5, because half the people give 5 and the others 1 (or 0). It just doesn't work for me.
So:
I start out looking at low-rating comments, seeing if I care about them. Then I look at high-rated, same metric. Basically:
1. Spelling. Not just proper spelling--it's the internet, people make mistakes and don't edit them. Big whoop. But if I come across a review that's written in 1337 or with a bunch of random symbols in the middle...I'm not part of that demographic. It's probably not going to say anything I care about.
2. Grammar. Once again, grammatical errors happen. The ones I'm looking for here are the ones where they wear their poor grammar as a badge of pride--"I know my grammars gonna be bad, but u can just deal."--and false intelligence. The most common are putting "I" where "me" belongs, or "whom" for "who". "He got the book for me."-->"He got the book for John and me." And if the who is performing an action in active voice, that's a who. "He is there."-->"Who is there?" "Whom is there?" just tells me you're trying to sound smart and failing.
3. What are you saying? All of these have been subjective, but this is probably the most so. Say the person says that the author went too far into the background and mythology of the piece, to the point of most of the story taking place in the past. I find that fascinating. If it goes dry, "Oh, by the way, vampires can move at exactly thirty two feet per second per second horizontally, and werewolves can move a 8.6753 meters per minute while in shifted form, but..." then I'm probably not interested. But if someone is complaining about background as a bad thing in and of itself, we have different tastes. That review doesn't help me, so I move one. Positive reviews have the same thing. If the person talks about how the graphics in X game are so amazing and immersive and...sorry. Graphics, not really my bit in videogames. I want to see everything clearly, so crisp graphics are good, but I only really fall into the sun-dappled autumn leaves fluttering if I'm not worrying about winning/losing/playing.
So, I'm perusing Amazon. There are two items I come across, and one's ratings are significantly higher than the other. I have no other prior information on either book, and something in Amazon's algorithms directed me towards both, so I'm not even entirely sure what they're about. I read the descriptions, and they strike me as fairly similar. Both descriptions could be of a bad, textbook romance, or of a well-written tale of what "romance and intrigue" would bring to mind if it weren't so thoroughly associated with textbook romances #8-47, 89, 307-415, and 112. I pick the one with the lower rating.
Book set #2 looks almost exactly the same. If there are any differences in rating, they are in the hundredths. I was directed in the same way, and one looks textbook romance, one looks different in an interesting way. I pick the one with the higher rating.
The point of those paragraphs was to say that the average star rating doesn't factor in. Honestly, the stuff I like is probably going to do terribly in my age bracket, and the ratings say more about the advertising than the actual books--if you get a ton of adolescent males suddenly getting given Twilight books, guess whose rating drops? If the book is for an incredibly narrow audience, and no one else will understand it, but it also happens that only three people--myself included--outside that group will ever find it, then its rating will probably be pretty decent. And polarizing books have 2.5, because half the people give 5 and the others 1 (or 0). It just doesn't work for me.
So:
I start out looking at low-rating comments, seeing if I care about them. Then I look at high-rated, same metric. Basically:
1. Spelling. Not just proper spelling--it's the internet, people make mistakes and don't edit them. Big whoop. But if I come across a review that's written in 1337 or with a bunch of random symbols in the middle...I'm not part of that demographic. It's probably not going to say anything I care about.
2. Grammar. Once again, grammatical errors happen. The ones I'm looking for here are the ones where they wear their poor grammar as a badge of pride--"I know my grammars gonna be bad, but u can just deal."--and false intelligence. The most common are putting "I" where "me" belongs, or "whom" for "who". "He got the book for me."-->"He got the book for John and me." And if the who is performing an action in active voice, that's a who. "He is there."-->"Who is there?" "Whom is there?" just tells me you're trying to sound smart and failing.
3. What are you saying? All of these have been subjective, but this is probably the most so. Say the person says that the author went too far into the background and mythology of the piece, to the point of most of the story taking place in the past. I find that fascinating. If it goes dry, "Oh, by the way, vampires can move at exactly thirty two feet per second per second horizontally, and werewolves can move a 8.6753 meters per minute while in shifted form, but..." then I'm probably not interested. But if someone is complaining about background as a bad thing in and of itself, we have different tastes. That review doesn't help me, so I move one. Positive reviews have the same thing. If the person talks about how the graphics in X game are so amazing and immersive and...sorry. Graphics, not really my bit in videogames. I want to see everything clearly, so crisp graphics are good, but I only really fall into the sun-dappled autumn leaves fluttering if I'm not worrying about winning/losing/playing.
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Vivid Memories
To the muse whose face is in the shadow of memory, whose throat brought us here.
I keep a diary, and one of the entries I try to keep up on are vivid memories that pop up during the day. These aren't just me remembering, "Oh, yeah, that happened." The memory has to have some sensory element that comes back into my head perfectly. For instance, my dad bought me a pink balloon. I remember the exact shade of the balloon before and after being blown up, so the balloon is a vivid memory.
The interesting thing, that the above illustrates quite well, is that these are entirely random. I remember the shape of quite a few traumatic memories well, of course, and the shape of exciting ones, amazing moments, moments I try to remember. But the memories where I can quote and mimic inflection, or repeat the movement, or remember how the hug felt, are entirely random. From observation, I have gathered that this is true of other people, although I'm not entirely certain.
What I find interesting about this is that it means a sufficiently large audience focusing on a sufficiently small performance will have every bit of the performance. Everyone will remember the shape of the spectacle you wanted to draw attention to, a good chunk will remember this or that part that made them come to a sudden realization, but these random, vivid-as-life memories can come from any part of the performance.
"Performance" has an association with the stage, and this is not the definition I am using. Any action with a sufficiently large group of people looking at it finds its way into someone's memory.
The statistics aren't perfectly even, of course. Things people are more likely to remember the shape of that are new are tipped a little towards vividness.* Because newness makes it more likely to be remembered, younger people and people in a completely new situation are more likely to remember. We recognize that much, intuitively. "Oh, I remember because it was my daughter's birthday." "I know because I forgot my hat that day, and when I went back I looked out the window and there it was." 'Something thrust me out of my routine, so I remember everything a little better.' But true vivid memories still have a touch of random to them. If something sticks out enough to make me remember, I may remember the shape better. If something is traumatic enough to give me flashbacks, then of course those are more vivid than almost everything else.
But I also remember the shade of that balloon. That freezer of ice by the grocery door. Staring at the mirror with the big crack down the middle. Bending to the audience in 'Defying Gravity' in eighth grade. The moment I realized I liked him, followed by the whiplash realization and throwing myself out of that. The lunar rainbow.
And so any word I say can be the most important thing I've ever done, because this person remembered it, and it inspired this.
*The shaped ones that you see regularly get back into shapes, like trying to hold a camera still and taking a picture of the same landscape on the same part of the film--the superimpositions that are slightly off blur the image.
I keep a diary, and one of the entries I try to keep up on are vivid memories that pop up during the day. These aren't just me remembering, "Oh, yeah, that happened." The memory has to have some sensory element that comes back into my head perfectly. For instance, my dad bought me a pink balloon. I remember the exact shade of the balloon before and after being blown up, so the balloon is a vivid memory.
The interesting thing, that the above illustrates quite well, is that these are entirely random. I remember the shape of quite a few traumatic memories well, of course, and the shape of exciting ones, amazing moments, moments I try to remember. But the memories where I can quote and mimic inflection, or repeat the movement, or remember how the hug felt, are entirely random. From observation, I have gathered that this is true of other people, although I'm not entirely certain.
What I find interesting about this is that it means a sufficiently large audience focusing on a sufficiently small performance will have every bit of the performance. Everyone will remember the shape of the spectacle you wanted to draw attention to, a good chunk will remember this or that part that made them come to a sudden realization, but these random, vivid-as-life memories can come from any part of the performance.
"Performance" has an association with the stage, and this is not the definition I am using. Any action with a sufficiently large group of people looking at it finds its way into someone's memory.
The statistics aren't perfectly even, of course. Things people are more likely to remember the shape of that are new are tipped a little towards vividness.* Because newness makes it more likely to be remembered, younger people and people in a completely new situation are more likely to remember. We recognize that much, intuitively. "Oh, I remember because it was my daughter's birthday." "I know because I forgot my hat that day, and when I went back I looked out the window and there it was." 'Something thrust me out of my routine, so I remember everything a little better.' But true vivid memories still have a touch of random to them. If something sticks out enough to make me remember, I may remember the shape better. If something is traumatic enough to give me flashbacks, then of course those are more vivid than almost everything else.
But I also remember the shade of that balloon. That freezer of ice by the grocery door. Staring at the mirror with the big crack down the middle. Bending to the audience in 'Defying Gravity' in eighth grade. The moment I realized I liked him, followed by the whiplash realization and throwing myself out of that. The lunar rainbow.
And so any word I say can be the most important thing I've ever done, because this person remembered it, and it inspired this.
*The shaped ones that you see regularly get back into shapes, like trying to hold a camera still and taking a picture of the same landscape on the same part of the film--the superimpositions that are slightly off blur the image.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
In Order
My overarching goals are as follows: To learn everything, to teach it to everyone, and to be an inspiration throughout.
This is the first time I have expressed this in print. Just thought I'd mark that milestone.
Common issues presented:
"...Isn't that impossible?" These are overarching goals that I constantly reach toward. I do not have to be able to see their fruition clearly, in fact, if I could, I would say I had poor overarching goals. My overarching goals contain supergoals contain goals contain tasks. Tasks are the first point where I assign a specific timetable, though goals have a vague one, and supergoals usually are possible within a lifetime not extended by a leap in the science of keeping humans alive.
"What if you discover that the human brain has limited capacity?" Then I will keep notes.
"But sometimes it's impossible to teach people things. You can't teach derivatives to someone who doesn't know algebra!" Yes. So I will teach them algebra first.
"How are you going to know how to teach everyone?" First: See first goal. Second: My supergoal here is to become a polymath teacher, with my current goal being becoming a mathematics instructor. Why math first? Because the worst teachers I have ever had/seen/heard of have all been mathematics instructors. Good ones exist, but math is more dependent on past knowledge than any other subject I've seen. A bad mathematics instructor can destroy a student's chances for years, if not more.
Another one that I can't summarize in a sentence but is expressed fairly well here is that I don't want to teach evil people. In reaction, I would give rational reasons for being good. If people like you, this is good. If people hate you, this is bad. Therefore, spreading happiness helps achieve later goals. We're pack animals; we like nice Alphas. Benevolent dictators have an easier time staying in power.
These three all have one answer, in a way: rational ignorance.* It is rational to memorize my notes' placements rather than all the information contained within if my brain truly has a limited capacity. It is rational to leave someone ignorant of how to work derivatives--briefly--if they do not yet understand algebra, because most people cannot learn both from scratch in a day. It is rational to help evil people become good before teaching them biases or how to achieve goals. The existence of a helpful being who will not help evil is a push toward good, which means I would be a motivator for anyone seeking to learn from me in the first place.
"How will you distinguish between good people and evil people?" I could say see overarching goal one again, but I have already stated that I will begin teaching before I learn everything. The simple answer is that I have no way to distinguish for sure. However, as a human, I do have feelings on the matter. Aaaaand someone in the audience points out that feelings aren't always correct; I can be biased, etc. So I'll say: "My goal is to spread knowledge, inspiration, and happiness. As these are my goals, I will place people who aid those goals as good, those who harm as evil, and those who do neither as in need of inspiration." It is not perfect in defining 'good' and 'evil', but it meshes with my goals and so works. I'd call it a pragmatism expression of idealism.
I can still be incorrect. That makes the instance a learning experience, bringing me full circle to overarching goal one.
* Ignorance when the knowledge would give less than the energy you would expend gaining it.
This is the first time I have expressed this in print. Just thought I'd mark that milestone.
Common issues presented:
"...Isn't that impossible?" These are overarching goals that I constantly reach toward. I do not have to be able to see their fruition clearly, in fact, if I could, I would say I had poor overarching goals. My overarching goals contain supergoals contain goals contain tasks. Tasks are the first point where I assign a specific timetable, though goals have a vague one, and supergoals usually are possible within a lifetime not extended by a leap in the science of keeping humans alive.
"What if you discover that the human brain has limited capacity?" Then I will keep notes.
"But sometimes it's impossible to teach people things. You can't teach derivatives to someone who doesn't know algebra!" Yes. So I will teach them algebra first.
"How are you going to know how to teach everyone?" First: See first goal. Second: My supergoal here is to become a polymath teacher, with my current goal being becoming a mathematics instructor. Why math first? Because the worst teachers I have ever had/seen/heard of have all been mathematics instructors. Good ones exist, but math is more dependent on past knowledge than any other subject I've seen. A bad mathematics instructor can destroy a student's chances for years, if not more.
Another one that I can't summarize in a sentence but is expressed fairly well here is that I don't want to teach evil people. In reaction, I would give rational reasons for being good. If people like you, this is good. If people hate you, this is bad. Therefore, spreading happiness helps achieve later goals. We're pack animals; we like nice Alphas. Benevolent dictators have an easier time staying in power.
These three all have one answer, in a way: rational ignorance.* It is rational to memorize my notes' placements rather than all the information contained within if my brain truly has a limited capacity. It is rational to leave someone ignorant of how to work derivatives--briefly--if they do not yet understand algebra, because most people cannot learn both from scratch in a day. It is rational to help evil people become good before teaching them biases or how to achieve goals. The existence of a helpful being who will not help evil is a push toward good, which means I would be a motivator for anyone seeking to learn from me in the first place.
"How will you distinguish between good people and evil people?" I could say see overarching goal one again, but I have already stated that I will begin teaching before I learn everything. The simple answer is that I have no way to distinguish for sure. However, as a human, I do have feelings on the matter. Aaaaand someone in the audience points out that feelings aren't always correct; I can be biased, etc. So I'll say: "My goal is to spread knowledge, inspiration, and happiness. As these are my goals, I will place people who aid those goals as good, those who harm as evil, and those who do neither as in need of inspiration." It is not perfect in defining 'good' and 'evil', but it meshes with my goals and so works. I'd call it a pragmatism expression of idealism.
I can still be incorrect. That makes the instance a learning experience, bringing me full circle to overarching goal one.
* Ignorance when the knowledge would give less than the energy you would expend gaining it.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Hiatus
Yo. Remember that thing about massive workloads? (To the tune of that add-a-verse Christmas song:) 5 college courses, 4 musical things, 3 chorally related, 2 music'lly intensive, and 1 done currently.
I will definitely be back by the second week of April, and I may post some stuff in the meantime, but I make no promises. For those of you skeptical of hiatuses ending, I would like to point out that I did just give a date and I have come back before.
I will definitely be back by the second week of April, and I may post some stuff in the meantime, but I make no promises. For those of you skeptical of hiatuses ending, I would like to point out that I did just give a date and I have come back before.
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Ghastly/Yesteryear
This was for a writing challenge where authors start off with one word, then pick another word that begins with the letter the last one ended with.
"Don't worry?" she squeaked, "You just told me that there are monsters, and demons, and bad things, and it's dark and I can't see, and we're out in the woods, and they're out in the woods--" I held a hand up to stop her.
"Were." I rubbed my hands in front of the flames as they ate at the logs. "They used to live around here. You didn't let me finish the story."
Elsie curled deeper into her blanket. "Well...finish it, then."
"Eat your breakfast."
Elsie scowled and bit into her sandwich, swallowing it with an exaggerated motion. I stifled a chuckle and fell into the pace of the story.
"Once, when the world was young and dim, many came before humans. Some were calm, or peaceful, or frightened. Deer and young foxes are the remnants of the fearful. You see the peaceful in the dogs you kept around your house, that quiet intelligence. The calm were free as the foxes and the deer, but would look you straight in the eye.
"Then there were the predators. They were not the oldest--could not be. To be a predator, one must hunt; the hunted must predate the predators." Elsie ate her sandwich without thinking, falling into the rhythm of the story as easily as I was. "And they were terrible. Vampires who would eat only humans, werewolves who went insane in full moon's light. Young girls, no older than yourself, would go missing, and none would know if it were vampire, werewolf, eloping, or kidnapping.
"But, brave as the flame and bright as the sun, there came a paladin. One who would stand, not because it was the proper thing to do, but simply because such a warrior could not do otherwise."
"And the warrior struck the creatures down!" Elsie cried, beaming.
I smiled. "No, Elsie."
"What?"
"The paladin was a healer," I said. "Have I taught you to hate vampires?"
"No," she recited, eyes moving up and to the right, "The conscious ones can be good or bad as humans, and the unconscious ones are forces, and I should not hate them anymore than I should hate a stormcloud."
"The paladin had...blest hands," I murmured, remembering, looking at my own. "Many of the dark creatures were drawn to beauty, and the paladin was that. But more, a beautiful soul. People around her...wanted to be good. And the predators came out of the dark, at first to take a bite, then to feel the warmth. To bask. She healed, and before long, the healed were healing others. The warmth echoed." I closed my eyes, feeling the fire warm to my bones what had been ice for so long. So far fallen into the warmth, I started when Elsie complained.
"How come the girls are always the healers, and the boys get to fight? It's so stupid."
A smile that was neither good nor nice crossed my face. "Do you think every creature liked being warmed? The forces didn't. Some conscious ones didn't. The paladin was a warrior. The only difference between a warrior and a paladin is that a paladin is a warrior too."
A few silent minutes passed as the sun's light crept over the horizon and through the leaves. Elsie chewed silently. "You should be getting home," I said, pushing her pack over to her.
With the quiet scrutiny of a focused child, "Did you heal with her, or hunt?"
I smiled, and threw some ash on the fire and swung my pack over my back.
"Or?"
"Don't worry?" she squeaked, "You just told me that there are monsters, and demons, and bad things, and it's dark and I can't see, and we're out in the woods, and they're out in the woods--" I held a hand up to stop her.
"Were." I rubbed my hands in front of the flames as they ate at the logs. "They used to live around here. You didn't let me finish the story."
Elsie curled deeper into her blanket. "Well...finish it, then."
"Eat your breakfast."
Elsie scowled and bit into her sandwich, swallowing it with an exaggerated motion. I stifled a chuckle and fell into the pace of the story.
"Once, when the world was young and dim, many came before humans. Some were calm, or peaceful, or frightened. Deer and young foxes are the remnants of the fearful. You see the peaceful in the dogs you kept around your house, that quiet intelligence. The calm were free as the foxes and the deer, but would look you straight in the eye.
"Then there were the predators. They were not the oldest--could not be. To be a predator, one must hunt; the hunted must predate the predators." Elsie ate her sandwich without thinking, falling into the rhythm of the story as easily as I was. "And they were terrible. Vampires who would eat only humans, werewolves who went insane in full moon's light. Young girls, no older than yourself, would go missing, and none would know if it were vampire, werewolf, eloping, or kidnapping.
"But, brave as the flame and bright as the sun, there came a paladin. One who would stand, not because it was the proper thing to do, but simply because such a warrior could not do otherwise."
"And the warrior struck the creatures down!" Elsie cried, beaming.
I smiled. "No, Elsie."
"What?"
"The paladin was a healer," I said. "Have I taught you to hate vampires?"
"No," she recited, eyes moving up and to the right, "The conscious ones can be good or bad as humans, and the unconscious ones are forces, and I should not hate them anymore than I should hate a stormcloud."
"The paladin had...blest hands," I murmured, remembering, looking at my own. "Many of the dark creatures were drawn to beauty, and the paladin was that. But more, a beautiful soul. People around her...wanted to be good. And the predators came out of the dark, at first to take a bite, then to feel the warmth. To bask. She healed, and before long, the healed were healing others. The warmth echoed." I closed my eyes, feeling the fire warm to my bones what had been ice for so long. So far fallen into the warmth, I started when Elsie complained.
"How come the girls are always the healers, and the boys get to fight? It's so stupid."
A smile that was neither good nor nice crossed my face. "Do you think every creature liked being warmed? The forces didn't. Some conscious ones didn't. The paladin was a warrior. The only difference between a warrior and a paladin is that a paladin is a warrior too."
A few silent minutes passed as the sun's light crept over the horizon and through the leaves. Elsie chewed silently. "You should be getting home," I said, pushing her pack over to her.
With the quiet scrutiny of a focused child, "Did you heal with her, or hunt?"
I smiled, and threw some ash on the fire and swung my pack over my back.
"Or?"
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Doublethink and Acting
I've been reading Less Wrong. Several posts--mostly the comments section--inspired this post, but the Franz Ferdinand style sparks were the comments section on this one, and a practice SAT essay prompt asking whether we, the people, need to question authority.
Starting with the easy bit. Yes, we need to question authority. I believe the state of an ideal mind is perpetually and always questioning authority.
There is an important line to be drawn here: Thoughts and Actions.
I don't see the line in that statement. It isn't an insult to the person, because the difference, I believe, is merely one in communication. We would do the same thing.
Believing that the sky is blue allows me to behave as if the sky is green. The fact that in my head, I think, The sky is blue, the sun is yellow, and clouds are either white or gray, occasionally becoming dark enough to look black, does not stop the words, "The sky is green and there is never anything but green in the sky," from leaving my mouth. Believing that I should always question authority does not mean I believe I should always defy authority. It means that, if the authority is unjust, I have a system in place to recognize that fact. My system is probably not perfect. However, if everyone is questioning authority, and believes that this state of being is acceptable, then chances are good that someone will notice, and enough people will listen to make it possible to change the injustice.
In the absence of a telepath, what I think does not matter in terms of what other people think of me. If I need to appear to give into peer pressure to avoid being fed to wolves, then the answer is not to give into peer pressure; the answer is to give that appearance. There are places where this thinking reaches a stumbling block--"But I'm not a good enough actor. I have to believe what I'm saying or I can't say it convincingly!"
This state of mind is dangerous.
This mind says, "I can lie to myself easier than I can lie to others." Lying to one's self is also lying to others. And this lie is much more difficult to fix. A lie to yourself needs to be protected to remain, and so questions to it make more lies, before you think about it. You can't admit the truth to yourself; how could you admit it to someone else?
Parable Time
Continuing with peer pressure: Underage drinking. If you don't drink, the people you're with are going to leave you--and you'd rather not be alone in this neighborhood. So you figure one drink can't hurt...and then you're buzzed enough to figure that one more's okay...and then you get home, and your Mom asks you if you're drunk, and, well, you can't exactly lie about that one because you're walking funny and you smell something awful. You get in trouble, but tell yourself that it was your only choice to stay safe, and your Mom's being totally unreasonable, and...
Rewind.
If you don't drink, they're going to leave you, and you'd rather not be in this neighborhood alone. You look around and confirm, yeah, there's really no one who'd stay with you, except that one girl who's smaller than you are and shrinks in enough to basically be shouting, "Hey! Muggers! Easy target!" So you take a beer and sip at it, moving around enough that no one notices that you're not actually drinking more than a sip of the cheap, weak, beer. You also start walking a little funny, which is easy enough because there are some blasted people around to mimic and no one has ever seen you drunk, so any mild mistakes are dismissed as quirks specific to your drunkenness. You get home and decide that the people you were hanging out were all being unreasonable. Honestly, who would leave a friend like that? And the girl who always draws in on herself probably needs some help, she drank from peer pressure and you know her Mom's going to ground her for that, so maybe you should bring her a cupcake at school tomorrow to cheer her up, and find some new friends who won't ditch you for following the law...
You told yourself the truth, and so reacted to the truth, rather than a comfortable, confining lie.
If anyone has a counterexample short of telepathy, I would love to expand my knowledge.
Starting with the easy bit. Yes, we need to question authority. I believe the state of an ideal mind is perpetually and always questioning authority.
There is an important line to be drawn here: Thoughts and Actions.
> And of course, no matter how much you profess your love of mere usefulness, you should never actually end up deliberately believing a useful false statement.
I haven't yet needed to "deliberately believe a useful false statement" (to my knowledge), but I wouldn't be particularly disturbed if I tried to, and found it repeatedly successful. Another tool for my tool belt.
--manuelg 30 January 2008 08:04:00PM
I don't see the line in that statement. It isn't an insult to the person, because the difference, I believe, is merely one in communication. We would do the same thing.
Believing that the sky is blue allows me to behave as if the sky is green. The fact that in my head, I think, The sky is blue, the sun is yellow, and clouds are either white or gray, occasionally becoming dark enough to look black, does not stop the words, "The sky is green and there is never anything but green in the sky," from leaving my mouth. Believing that I should always question authority does not mean I believe I should always defy authority. It means that, if the authority is unjust, I have a system in place to recognize that fact. My system is probably not perfect. However, if everyone is questioning authority, and believes that this state of being is acceptable, then chances are good that someone will notice, and enough people will listen to make it possible to change the injustice.
In the absence of a telepath, what I think does not matter in terms of what other people think of me. If I need to appear to give into peer pressure to avoid being fed to wolves, then the answer is not to give into peer pressure; the answer is to give that appearance. There are places where this thinking reaches a stumbling block--"But I'm not a good enough actor. I have to believe what I'm saying or I can't say it convincingly!"
This state of mind is dangerous.
This mind says, "I can lie to myself easier than I can lie to others." Lying to one's self is also lying to others. And this lie is much more difficult to fix. A lie to yourself needs to be protected to remain, and so questions to it make more lies, before you think about it. You can't admit the truth to yourself; how could you admit it to someone else?
Parable Time
Continuing with peer pressure: Underage drinking. If you don't drink, the people you're with are going to leave you--and you'd rather not be alone in this neighborhood. So you figure one drink can't hurt...and then you're buzzed enough to figure that one more's okay...and then you get home, and your Mom asks you if you're drunk, and, well, you can't exactly lie about that one because you're walking funny and you smell something awful. You get in trouble, but tell yourself that it was your only choice to stay safe, and your Mom's being totally unreasonable, and...
Rewind.
If you don't drink, they're going to leave you, and you'd rather not be in this neighborhood alone. You look around and confirm, yeah, there's really no one who'd stay with you, except that one girl who's smaller than you are and shrinks in enough to basically be shouting, "Hey! Muggers! Easy target!" So you take a beer and sip at it, moving around enough that no one notices that you're not actually drinking more than a sip of the cheap, weak, beer. You also start walking a little funny, which is easy enough because there are some blasted people around to mimic and no one has ever seen you drunk, so any mild mistakes are dismissed as quirks specific to your drunkenness. You get home and decide that the people you were hanging out were all being unreasonable. Honestly, who would leave a friend like that? And the girl who always draws in on herself probably needs some help, she drank from peer pressure and you know her Mom's going to ground her for that, so maybe you should bring her a cupcake at school tomorrow to cheer her up, and find some new friends who won't ditch you for following the law...
You told yourself the truth, and so reacted to the truth, rather than a comfortable, confining lie.
If anyone has a counterexample short of telepathy, I would love to expand my knowledge.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Lack
It was not dark. If you envision shadow, the vast and endless black of the space between stars where some things can exist, in stasis, you miss the point. If you see utter, swallowing, dismal blackness that seeks to destroy, you miss the point.
The place was lack.
We are naturally predisposed to feel odd around lack. Not because of any shared experience, merely because of the lack of experience. If you are there, there is a being there. Vacuum should be true lack, yet we assign it a value in our heads. Even if we could only explain that value on that level between heart and head that gives the best and worst of poetry, or the true meaning of "space".
We cannot experience it in reality. We are. Nothing including us can ever have lack. Even removing ourselves from the equation, nothing can include a live us for long.
Nothing is terrifying.
We get hints of it. Loneliness. Darkness. Silence. Your heartbeat speeds. Your breathing grows heavy. Nothing there, but we're so used to it, there must be something, we can't handle there being nothing, but where, where, where...
The unthinkable. Nothing is there.
Alone in the dark.
What is so interesting is how easily we accept when this lack isn't our focus. It's our default, in the back of our heads. Think about a memory, or a vision, or a thought. Walk through memory, creating nothing new. Start at the center, your focus. Take one step out. Two. Three. Still within consciousness' soft glow. Eight. Ten. Twelve. Twenty-seven. Stepped past the light, past the black, to the default, to the lack.
And yet you've carried your focus with you. Named this realm. Lack. If you feel nothing, that still lacked. If not, if the sweet tang of blood, fear, sweat, the sweet touch of wonder, curiosity, love, the shimmers of novelty follow you, you move further from the realm of lack.
Here you stand. Not one foot in each world. Both feet along the blurred line. Go back two minutes, this realm was lack. Go forward some moments, the realm has no difference from any other reverie. Slowly, slipping, the focus blurs the lack to the have.
Welcome back.
You're home by now. Even if you stay. Especially if you stay. Home is where the heart is. This place glows now only with you. You made this space. The thoughts are yours.
The place was lack.
We are naturally predisposed to feel odd around lack. Not because of any shared experience, merely because of the lack of experience. If you are there, there is a being there. Vacuum should be true lack, yet we assign it a value in our heads. Even if we could only explain that value on that level between heart and head that gives the best and worst of poetry, or the true meaning of "space".
We cannot experience it in reality. We are. Nothing including us can ever have lack. Even removing ourselves from the equation, nothing can include a live us for long.
Nothing is terrifying.
We get hints of it. Loneliness. Darkness. Silence. Your heartbeat speeds. Your breathing grows heavy. Nothing there, but we're so used to it, there must be something, we can't handle there being nothing, but where, where, where...
The unthinkable. Nothing is there.
Alone in the dark.
What is so interesting is how easily we accept when this lack isn't our focus. It's our default, in the back of our heads. Think about a memory, or a vision, or a thought. Walk through memory, creating nothing new. Start at the center, your focus. Take one step out. Two. Three. Still within consciousness' soft glow. Eight. Ten. Twelve. Twenty-seven. Stepped past the light, past the black, to the default, to the lack.
And yet you've carried your focus with you. Named this realm. Lack. If you feel nothing, that still lacked. If not, if the sweet tang of blood, fear, sweat, the sweet touch of wonder, curiosity, love, the shimmers of novelty follow you, you move further from the realm of lack.
Here you stand. Not one foot in each world. Both feet along the blurred line. Go back two minutes, this realm was lack. Go forward some moments, the realm has no difference from any other reverie. Slowly, slipping, the focus blurs the lack to the have.
Welcome back.
You're home by now. Even if you stay. Especially if you stay. Home is where the heart is. This place glows now only with you. You made this space. The thoughts are yours.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Echoes
Two days. That was all it had taken, poring over the rulebook and knowing his pride, to get a private audience. There were guards outside, and I was unarmed. I spoke.
"How many traitors do you have who claim to be with you, do you think? Half?"
"You've been in prison the past five years. Do you really think I'll fall for that?" Inside, I snarled at him for that. Just as I'd taken every loophole to get here, he'd taken every loophole to keep me there. I hadn't done anything but think.
I radiated calm. "You mean I've had five years in the heart of your base." Jack twitched.
"Five years, where all I had to do was talk, and all I had to talk to were your own. And you, you were so kind, you rotated them." There's a sheen to a man's cold sweat that I've never found anywhere else. He had it. "Now, in five years, I couldn't turn everyone, you're thinking. But there were such lovely people there; they spread the message for me." I smiled fondly in a reverie. "By the end of the first month, I remember they were coming in already knowing. Already having the first seeds of ideas planted, saplings, even. And the loveliest thing was that I was a conversation starter."
Jack shook.
"Because I had my ideas, and they had theirs, and they were compatible." I cocked my head to one side and smiled wide as a cat. "The reason rebellions take so long to get off the ground is that it takes people so long to talk to each other. And I"--tapping my chest--"am communicative."
He stared at me, hands shaking, forehead shining, breathing uneven.
And then...he lied. He straightened his back, raised his chin, steadied himself on some inner pillar, and lied from his crown to his toes. "You're bluffing."
If I am, then I am doing better than you. But I don't let all of that show, just enough for verisimilitude. "Really? You pride yourself on being strong-willed. Even if you have some doubt in the back of your head about how you compare to the general population,"--a wince--"you must see enough of yours. You think yourself stronger than they are. And yet...in minutes, I have given you pause. You doubt. What could I do with five years, when I can work my way up, when I can use the more open-minded and weaker to echo me? Could I convince you?"
The open-minded and weaker parts of his mind echoed and whispered, She could. She could.
We shared a long look, and I watched the inner pillar of his. Moving slowly, but at the speed of shared thought. Marble. Then diamond, harder, brittler, hiding nothing. Then glass. A wavering attempt to hide and it was chalk. A stumble and it would fall.
He stumbled.
Alone.
He gasped at my words, from my lips and echoed. I saw the thoughts. They were what I would think.
I'm alone. I've always been alone. No one cares. I'll die alone. I willed him to finish the thought, to think what I prayed I would think in his place.
Nothing. He fell.
I knelt and put a hand on his shoulder. I said what I prayed someone else would say, were I in his place.
"You're not alone."
He stared at me. It was an interesting experience, looking into someone's eyes as he put himself back together.
He thought it.
And I will help anyway.
"How many traitors do you have who claim to be with you, do you think? Half?"
"You've been in prison the past five years. Do you really think I'll fall for that?" Inside, I snarled at him for that. Just as I'd taken every loophole to get here, he'd taken every loophole to keep me there. I hadn't done anything but think.
I radiated calm. "You mean I've had five years in the heart of your base." Jack twitched.
"Five years, where all I had to do was talk, and all I had to talk to were your own. And you, you were so kind, you rotated them." There's a sheen to a man's cold sweat that I've never found anywhere else. He had it. "Now, in five years, I couldn't turn everyone, you're thinking. But there were such lovely people there; they spread the message for me." I smiled fondly in a reverie. "By the end of the first month, I remember they were coming in already knowing. Already having the first seeds of ideas planted, saplings, even. And the loveliest thing was that I was a conversation starter."
Jack shook.
"Because I had my ideas, and they had theirs, and they were compatible." I cocked my head to one side and smiled wide as a cat. "The reason rebellions take so long to get off the ground is that it takes people so long to talk to each other. And I"--tapping my chest--"am communicative."
He stared at me, hands shaking, forehead shining, breathing uneven.
And then...he lied. He straightened his back, raised his chin, steadied himself on some inner pillar, and lied from his crown to his toes. "You're bluffing."
If I am, then I am doing better than you. But I don't let all of that show, just enough for verisimilitude. "Really? You pride yourself on being strong-willed. Even if you have some doubt in the back of your head about how you compare to the general population,"--a wince--"you must see enough of yours. You think yourself stronger than they are. And yet...in minutes, I have given you pause. You doubt. What could I do with five years, when I can work my way up, when I can use the more open-minded and weaker to echo me? Could I convince you?"
The open-minded and weaker parts of his mind echoed and whispered, She could. She could.
We shared a long look, and I watched the inner pillar of his. Moving slowly, but at the speed of shared thought. Marble. Then diamond, harder, brittler, hiding nothing. Then glass. A wavering attempt to hide and it was chalk. A stumble and it would fall.
He stumbled.
Alone.
He gasped at my words, from my lips and echoed. I saw the thoughts. They were what I would think.
I'm alone. I've always been alone. No one cares. I'll die alone. I willed him to finish the thought, to think what I prayed I would think in his place.
Nothing. He fell.
I knelt and put a hand on his shoulder. I said what I prayed someone else would say, were I in his place.
"You're not alone."
He stared at me. It was an interesting experience, looking into someone's eyes as he put himself back together.
He thought it.
And I will help anyway.
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Music
All quotes picked for the passage, save the second last, which inspired the passage.
I recently asked for a suggestion for a blog post--real life, don't go looking for the post where I asked. Though do feel free to leave any requests in the comments section.
The response I got was a tentative, "...Mu...sic?" followed by another person saying it would be interesting to see where I would go off only that starting point. And here we are.
I do have...issues with people who intentionally destroy musical instruments. Yes, including the guitar smashes. In fact, because people tend think about those the least, especially the guitar smashes.
When they noted that it wasn't likely that any given person would make a lot of money at this, a bunch of people were disappointed. I almost felt elated. I think I figured out why: I don't have to land a music job to keep spreading my music. My choice is not A) get a well-paying music job, B) sing only to family and friends, or C) starve. I can do both. I still want a music job, but I have the choice.
I sang a bit, when I was very young. I thought it was fun. It was something to do, and I didn't have to rely on any other single person, because I could sing solo. Even when I got into choir, that stayed to a certain extent because our choir was gigantic, and people tended to either be committed or simply mouth without singing--mandatory class.
Then came third grade. I hadn't really thought about music during the summer, but when I came back to school the first time I sang I remember stopping in my tracks because I sounded so different. And then...compliments started.
"You have a lovely voice." "[genuine surprise] My goodness, I thought a high schooler was here."
As a young child who had found no talent of her own, suddenly being able to sing, to do something I'd always liked, something I loved, was amazing. I had not thought anything about me was special; I thought everyone had some special talent and I was the one exception, and then I was wrong. If you have ever truly believed something bad of yourself and then had something prove, without a shadow of a doubt, that it wasn't so, I think you understand.
I was good.
Nothing bad mattered as much, once I could believe, "I'm good."
I recently asked for a suggestion for a blog post--real life, don't go looking for the post where I asked. Though do feel free to leave any requests in the comments section.
The response I got was a tentative, "...Mu...sic?" followed by another person saying it would be interesting to see where I would go off only that starting point. And here we are.
“Music is my religion.”I have occasionally said, in response to a question about my religion, that I am a practicing musician. Some people I've said that to took it as a joke, either a clever evasion of the question or a way of declaring myself non-religious. No. In the idealistic sense that religion is a way to become closer to the divine spark, I am a musician. In the cynical sense that religion is a way to meet people, I am a musician. In the sense that I feel a calling to music to and from my soul, the essence of my being, I am a musician. I am not shy about it. I only want to make sure people either let the topic alone or understand. A concert hall is consecrated. Singing is sacred, and I use that word in the way I know it. Song is not to be set up on an altar and treated with reverence from a distance. Song has the aura about it that a counselor who has been working in street grime, and beaming because he is helping people who need it. Singing in any style, playing any instrument. It is not the style, it is the feeling.
--Jimi Hendrix
I do have...issues with people who intentionally destroy musical instruments. Yes, including the guitar smashes. In fact, because people tend think about those the least, especially the guitar smashes.
“Music, the greatest good that mortals know and all of heaven we have hear below.”There's a band called Nine Days. You probably think you've never heard one of their songs, and also have probably heard exactly one, titled "Absolutely": "This is the story of a girl, who cried a river and drowned the whole world, but though she looks so sad in photographs, I absolutely love her--when she smiles." I bring this up both because I think they have some other music which is genuinely worth listening to, and because there are way too many people who seem to think that the band who sings that song is Blink182 or 3 Doors Down. Because...they all have numbers in their names. I guess. It isn't the people's fault, from what I can see, some of the music systems genuinely have their algorithms messed up. Which is worse, really.
--Joseph Addison
“Find people who think like you and stick with them. Make only music you are passionate about. Work only with people you like and trust. Don't sign anything.”I went to a music-focused day in the city recently, held at SF State. The specific workshop I went to was a DIY workshop, with DIT (do it together) focus. They noted that we probably won't get a steady cash flow, and we might not even want one. Art suffers if you have to get something out by X date, because then inspiration can't strike whenever and then polish until it's done. They focused very much on spreading art, on keeping your day job, and on making friends. They also taught us how to make origami CD cases, because screen printing and folding is much cheaper than a CD case.
--Steve Albini
When they noted that it wasn't likely that any given person would make a lot of money at this, a bunch of people were disappointed. I almost felt elated. I think I figured out why: I don't have to land a music job to keep spreading my music. My choice is not A) get a well-paying music job, B) sing only to family and friends, or C) starve. I can do both. I still want a music job, but I have the choice.
“As a musician usually music is your way out.”When I was younger, I didn't feel I had very many close friends. I realize this was mostly because I had unrealistic expectations: I wanted one person who completely understood me and almost always understood everything I said. My communication simply isn't that good. What I would give, to have it so...
--Damon Albarn
I sang a bit, when I was very young. I thought it was fun. It was something to do, and I didn't have to rely on any other single person, because I could sing solo. Even when I got into choir, that stayed to a certain extent because our choir was gigantic, and people tended to either be committed or simply mouth without singing--mandatory class.
Then came third grade. I hadn't really thought about music during the summer, but when I came back to school the first time I sang I remember stopping in my tracks because I sounded so different. And then...compliments started.
"You have a lovely voice." "[genuine surprise] My goodness, I thought a high schooler was here."
As a young child who had found no talent of her own, suddenly being able to sing, to do something I'd always liked, something I loved, was amazing. I had not thought anything about me was special; I thought everyone had some special talent and I was the one exception, and then I was wrong. If you have ever truly believed something bad of yourself and then had something prove, without a shadow of a doubt, that it wasn't so, I think you understand.
I was good.
Nothing bad mattered as much, once I could believe, "I'm good."
“There's so much excellent new music around that I can't afford to buy it all and I haven't the time to review as much as I'd like. I can't remember a better time to be a musician or to listen to music!”
--Malcolm Wilson
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Origin
A story is a story is a story.
It is rather difficult to describe the events that took place, because they took place outside time, and so not in anything we would call space. It's also difficult to explain the idea of coming up with an idea in terms outside of time, or creating something for that matter. Translated into our language--which is based around time, like it or not--here is how the conversation went.
There were problems. Beings wanted to be different, or should be something they weren't. In this place outside time, without time, "change" was not an idea yet. But, because they had infinite minds, which is almost the same as having infinite time, one came up with an idea.
"What about a place that allows change? A place with time." You would think this would be nigh impossible to communicate. In a world that lacked those terms and had time, that might have been true.
And so it was. And so the first were put through what might be a test, and left. It was an odd feeling. They genuinely left. And more were placed, at different places and times, which were close enough to be indistinguishable to any who had no memories from the place. Even those, when they came back, felt the lack of barrier was more correct. They simply remembered making the difference.
And so we sit and swim, moving on a line with branches and seen as goldfish in a sphere.
It is rather difficult to describe the events that took place, because they took place outside time, and so not in anything we would call space. It's also difficult to explain the idea of coming up with an idea in terms outside of time, or creating something for that matter. Translated into our language--which is based around time, like it or not--here is how the conversation went.
There were problems. Beings wanted to be different, or should be something they weren't. In this place outside time, without time, "change" was not an idea yet. But, because they had infinite minds, which is almost the same as having infinite time, one came up with an idea.
"What about a place that allows change? A place with time." You would think this would be nigh impossible to communicate. In a world that lacked those terms and had time, that might have been true.
And so it was. And so the first were put through what might be a test, and left. It was an odd feeling. They genuinely left. And more were placed, at different places and times, which were close enough to be indistinguishable to any who had no memories from the place. Even those, when they came back, felt the lack of barrier was more correct. They simply remembered making the difference.
And so we sit and swim, moving on a line with branches and seen as goldfish in a sphere.
Internal Evil Mentor
Inspired by something I do, named by this trope.
In order to make the proper choice, all options must be conceivable. If something is impossible, that is one thing, but convincing oneself it is impossible because it is immoral despite being the best option is something else entirely.
Simply giving oneself permission to think these thoughts can seem too far to go. After all, if you can think these things, you might do them! Despite the fact that I disagree, I understand the sentiment. So here's a workaround: Set aside a part of your mental processing to argue the evil side. You can make that anything, e.g. just giving yourself permission to think the thoughts--probably one of the best options--or creating a character to argue the side. Remember those shoulder devils from cartoons? Those work. I personally prefer a femme fatale, her male counterpart, or someone else who's going to be wearing a lot of immaculate black and have that aura of deft intelligence.
Discussing this feels weird. What I am describing is sitting down, seeing the little devil complete with pitchfork and smile pop up on my left shoulder, and then listening. If seeking some solace, one may look for an angel and completely miss the point when finding none. If there are only two of you, and you can't see the angel from a first-person perspective, who do you think you are? The point of creating this mental construct and listening to him/her/it in the first place is to allow thoughts to go into places they wouldn't go before. And even with the adviser in place, that is not the part with the final say. The composite gets the final say. A common trope about evil's weakness is that it cannot comprehend good. The strongest good mind is that because of an ability to entertain evil or "evil" thoughts, and then choose good anyway.
I'm not claiming to be the strongest good mind; I've never been in that extreme a situation. But I do not believe truly good people have been good out of ignorance.
In order to make the proper choice, all options must be conceivable. If something is impossible, that is one thing, but convincing oneself it is impossible because it is immoral despite being the best option is something else entirely.
Simply giving oneself permission to think these thoughts can seem too far to go. After all, if you can think these things, you might do them! Despite the fact that I disagree, I understand the sentiment. So here's a workaround: Set aside a part of your mental processing to argue the evil side. You can make that anything, e.g. just giving yourself permission to think the thoughts--probably one of the best options--or creating a character to argue the side. Remember those shoulder devils from cartoons? Those work. I personally prefer a femme fatale, her male counterpart, or someone else who's going to be wearing a lot of immaculate black and have that aura of deft intelligence.
Discussing this feels weird. What I am describing is sitting down, seeing the little devil complete with pitchfork and smile pop up on my left shoulder, and then listening. If seeking some solace, one may look for an angel and completely miss the point when finding none. If there are only two of you, and you can't see the angel from a first-person perspective, who do you think you are? The point of creating this mental construct and listening to him/her/it in the first place is to allow thoughts to go into places they wouldn't go before. And even with the adviser in place, that is not the part with the final say. The composite gets the final say. A common trope about evil's weakness is that it cannot comprehend good. The strongest good mind is that because of an ability to entertain evil or "evil" thoughts, and then choose good anyway.
I'm not claiming to be the strongest good mind; I've never been in that extreme a situation. But I do not believe truly good people have been good out of ignorance.
"I'd do anything!"
Breaking it down literally.
First: "Anything" has no constraints. It is like infinity; it means everything from every place and then some. We live in a finite universe, at least for the moment. Even if the universe is infinite, in the absence of an ability to prove that, our universe as defined by "do" is finite. Minuscule, even. Put simply: This statement cannot possibly be true, unless you are omnipotent.
Second: From the first we have gotten, "I would do anything I am capable of." Would you? Would you really? Even setting aside the vagueness inherent in what you can and cannot do--at the present time or ever?--how many people are honestly promising to do anything they can, without heed to any other promise, any other moral or physical obligation?
Third: So you've decided you do mean you will do anything within your power, and that the person you're speaking to recognizes that stuff you literally cannot do is excluded. Having come to that conclusion, I must give you a warning: you only get to make this offer once. If you would do anything, the being may ask you something that will take the rest of your life, or will have ramifications you cannot foresee. And you will have promised. You must say yes. If you make this promise twice, it is a lie. If anything conflicts with fulfilling this promise, you must drop it, so making it twice means that if they ever come into conflict, you are screwed. And this is true for everything. For the rest of your existence. And choosing to end your existence is also a violation. You might be needed, and are avoiding your obligation.
Of course, that doesn't mean you can't make the offer. It just means that you don't want to have this on your list of things to blurt out, and that if you do blurt it out, you should be wary about taking it from offer to promise. In other words, backpedal fast and hope.
First: "Anything" has no constraints. It is like infinity; it means everything from every place and then some. We live in a finite universe, at least for the moment. Even if the universe is infinite, in the absence of an ability to prove that, our universe as defined by "do" is finite. Minuscule, even. Put simply: This statement cannot possibly be true, unless you are omnipotent.
Second: From the first we have gotten, "I would do anything I am capable of." Would you? Would you really? Even setting aside the vagueness inherent in what you can and cannot do--at the present time or ever?--how many people are honestly promising to do anything they can, without heed to any other promise, any other moral or physical obligation?
Third: So you've decided you do mean you will do anything within your power, and that the person you're speaking to recognizes that stuff you literally cannot do is excluded. Having come to that conclusion, I must give you a warning: you only get to make this offer once. If you would do anything, the being may ask you something that will take the rest of your life, or will have ramifications you cannot foresee. And you will have promised. You must say yes. If you make this promise twice, it is a lie. If anything conflicts with fulfilling this promise, you must drop it, so making it twice means that if they ever come into conflict, you are screwed. And this is true for everything. For the rest of your existence. And choosing to end your existence is also a violation. You might be needed, and are avoiding your obligation.
Of course, that doesn't mean you can't make the offer. It just means that you don't want to have this on your list of things to blurt out, and that if you do blurt it out, you should be wary about taking it from offer to promise. In other words, backpedal fast and hope.
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Serial: Identity
So scary I will never see
As the little piece of me
That to all challenge did freeze and pale
Because I saw chance to fail
Once upon a time there was a young man--call him George, if only because I know no Georges. He was gifted. He knew he was smart, and would be perfectly aware of that fact regardless of if anyone told him. It wasn't just getting good grades--he's paid enough attention to the right things to notice that average children who work hard also get exceptional grades. But stuff comes easily for him. He picked up reading in a day. Prime factors make perfect sense to him, and fractions were easy.
George, one day, runs into a new subject, and the few students in the class who read ahead were quite confused, and asked him for help. George had shaken his head, because class was about to start and he didn't feel like being caught talking in class. Again.
The teacher starts into the topic at hand. It happens to be some quadratics, and he sees some students starting to get it, most of the others not. He turns back to the teacher and forgets about that.
George shifts uncomfortably.
He's looking at this, and there are too many things he doesn't understand. He couldn't even put his finger on what, so he couldn't ask, and it wasn't clicking.
George stayed in a few moments past the bell, trying to get it, trying to figure it out, but it just wouldn't stick. There was some number...and...and...
Some students who'd gotten in the habit of talking to each other for help started walking over, because none of them had understood. George got great grades, so they asked him.
The world slowed as they walked to him. Were he a different child, he might plan to say, 'Can't you figure it out on your own?' or, 'I don't know how to explain it,' or simply, 'I don't understand either.' But the problem was that George had set himself up around being The Smart Kid. So George knows exactly what they're coming over for--for that matter, he would know even if they were walking over for the dictionaries a few feet from his desk.
He bolts.
He knows what the adults think of him. He's stuck up; he doesn't get along with the other children; he's insufferable. And the kids think he's lording it over them, he knows the study group are the only ones who even talk to him anymore without insulting him, and no one, no one will help him.
George tends to think in words only when something really important comes up, but he's doing it now, because he is so entirely focused on the idea.
I can't fail.
It isn't a statement of physical impossibility. It isn't supposed to be railing against the universe, saying it's wrong.
I don't fail.
He's a teenager now. At some point this question flashes through a lot of teenage heads, though not always with the statement in front of it.
I can't fail. So who am I?
Suggested Reading:
How Not to Talk to Your Kids
As the little piece of me
That to all challenge did freeze and pale
Because I saw chance to fail
Once upon a time there was a young man--call him George, if only because I know no Georges. He was gifted. He knew he was smart, and would be perfectly aware of that fact regardless of if anyone told him. It wasn't just getting good grades--he's paid enough attention to the right things to notice that average children who work hard also get exceptional grades. But stuff comes easily for him. He picked up reading in a day. Prime factors make perfect sense to him, and fractions were easy.
George, one day, runs into a new subject, and the few students in the class who read ahead were quite confused, and asked him for help. George had shaken his head, because class was about to start and he didn't feel like being caught talking in class. Again.
The teacher starts into the topic at hand. It happens to be some quadratics, and he sees some students starting to get it, most of the others not. He turns back to the teacher and forgets about that.
George shifts uncomfortably.
He's looking at this, and there are too many things he doesn't understand. He couldn't even put his finger on what, so he couldn't ask, and it wasn't clicking.
George stayed in a few moments past the bell, trying to get it, trying to figure it out, but it just wouldn't stick. There was some number...and...and...
Some students who'd gotten in the habit of talking to each other for help started walking over, because none of them had understood. George got great grades, so they asked him.
The world slowed as they walked to him. Were he a different child, he might plan to say, 'Can't you figure it out on your own?' or, 'I don't know how to explain it,' or simply, 'I don't understand either.' But the problem was that George had set himself up around being The Smart Kid. So George knows exactly what they're coming over for--for that matter, he would know even if they were walking over for the dictionaries a few feet from his desk.
He bolts.
He knows what the adults think of him. He's stuck up; he doesn't get along with the other children; he's insufferable. And the kids think he's lording it over them, he knows the study group are the only ones who even talk to him anymore without insulting him, and no one, no one will help him.
George tends to think in words only when something really important comes up, but he's doing it now, because he is so entirely focused on the idea.
I can't fail.
It isn't a statement of physical impossibility. It isn't supposed to be railing against the universe, saying it's wrong.
I don't fail.
He's a teenager now. At some point this question flashes through a lot of teenage heads, though not always with the statement in front of it.
I can't fail. So who am I?
Suggested Reading:
How Not to Talk to Your Kids
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Honesty Is the Best Policy
I sat down to think about the title aphorism when I was younger.
I came to the conclusion that I agreed with the statement as written, and disliked how it seemed some teachers were using it. "Honesty is the best policy," does not mean "Always tell the truth."
There are two values of always that I heard used for this interpretation. One: whenever you think of something that is true, you should communicate it to the best of your ability. This may include insults that are untrue, as it is true you have thought them. This is rude. Two: Everything you say should be true. This is unhelpful.*
So I chose to follow what I believe the statement means, rather than how I have heard it used by people trying to get me to be a good girl, because that way is useful and the other is not. I had trouble communicating this for a while because it seemed so obvious to me that that is what a policy is: Something you need a good reason to move away from.
"Red or blue!" a voice barks over crackly transmitter.
It's hitting me. Everything. I'm certain, for once I can't hide behind error, because I know what button he wants to hit. He wants blue. But is it right? Is that what I should do?
"Kat!"
I don't know I don't know I don't know. There's no help I can see from picking one or the other, It's a coin flip, no matter what I do, no matter whether I choose red or blue.
So I assume the worst. I assume that I'm going to choose wrongly, I'm destined.
Do I want look back, years from now, and realize that I destroyed my life because I chose to lie?
I hit the orange button on the side of the communicator and shout, "Blue!"
Or, if you prefer to see how my mind worked through it:
Situation: Someone asks you, "T or F?" This is all the information you have. You know that T is the true answer, and F is false, but you have no idea which will benefit you, anyone you care about, etc., etc. But you do know that one of them will cause a clearly positive outcome. So you make your choice.
The chart that appears in my head:
Going by the T or F choices gives you coin flips, so your choice doesn't matter. So let's look at the +/- rows. The universe is secretly trying to screw you over, and you will lose no matter what. This isn't necessarily true; it's just how you're putting your mind together to limit yourself to that row. All things considered, I'll look back mournfully on the truth easier than a lie.
* e.g. "Do you think I can do well enough to get the part?" asked right before an audition. The true answer is 'I'm not sure,' and silence will communicate 'No.' So you lie, at the very least in the moment, because it is what a good friend does.
I came to the conclusion that I agreed with the statement as written, and disliked how it seemed some teachers were using it. "Honesty is the best policy," does not mean "Always tell the truth."
There are two values of always that I heard used for this interpretation. One: whenever you think of something that is true, you should communicate it to the best of your ability. This may include insults that are untrue, as it is true you have thought them. This is rude. Two: Everything you say should be true. This is unhelpful.*
So I chose to follow what I believe the statement means, rather than how I have heard it used by people trying to get me to be a good girl, because that way is useful and the other is not. I had trouble communicating this for a while because it seemed so obvious to me that that is what a policy is: Something you need a good reason to move away from.
"When in doubt, tell the truth."I hesitate. Nothing has given me any useful information about this, but everyone is so scared; it must be important. I may not pull the trigger, but I'm directing. Whatever happens, I'm responsible.
--Mark Twain
"Red or blue!" a voice barks over crackly transmitter.
It's hitting me. Everything. I'm certain, for once I can't hide behind error, because I know what button he wants to hit. He wants blue. But is it right? Is that what I should do?
"Kat!"
I don't know I don't know I don't know. There's no help I can see from picking one or the other, It's a coin flip, no matter what I do, no matter whether I choose red or blue.
So I assume the worst. I assume that I'm going to choose wrongly, I'm destined.
Do I want look back, years from now, and realize that I destroyed my life because I chose to lie?
I hit the orange button on the side of the communicator and shout, "Blue!"
Or, if you prefer to see how my mind worked through it:
Situation: Someone asks you, "T or F?" This is all the information you have. You know that T is the true answer, and F is false, but you have no idea which will benefit you, anyone you care about, etc., etc. But you do know that one of them will cause a clearly positive outcome. So you make your choice.
The chart that appears in my head:
* e.g. "Do you think I can do well enough to get the part?" asked right before an audition. The true answer is 'I'm not sure,' and silence will communicate 'No.' So you lie, at the very least in the moment, because it is what a good friend does.
Inspiration
These are the posts that make me wish for a larger reader base. In light of that--and I promise I will ask this very rarely, if ever again--if you could link this post, if it interests you, or you know some person/group it might interest.
Inspiration is a slippery thing. It appears to occur entirely within the mind, and at the same time comes from outside ideas bouncing onto and into us.
What I call the inspiration stage of art is where everything comes easily. I may not be able to write a passage perfectly the first time, but I write something, and what happens is what I want to happen. I have rarely had this continue for more than a few scenes. The time that works best for me is, annoyingly enough, also when people become the most concerned. Sometimes people stay still when they meditate, sometimes spar, and sometimes write. So that distant, "I am not connected to the world" look means I am where I want to be.
I, apparently, look depressed. Someone who doesn't know me well enough--or maybe doesn't know this sort of artist well enough--will peer and hover and ask, "Are you alright?" Others will pick up on what's happening and ask to see the work. I'm still meditating and the idea of saying "no" doesn't enter my thoughts. I want to say yes to my inspiration, and everything inspires. By the time I realize what I've done, something that can recognize it is there enough for me to feel more like I'm trying to meditate than meditating. For instance, right now, I'm trying to keep up the flow I had in the beginning of my post, but some distractions are settling in. There's a skype conversation with a friend, which can be helpful; I dive into this but I need air. It's more than an hour past normal dinner time. I'm not quite hungry, but my body is a focus; the first notes of wanting something in my stomach are there. There's homework I should be working on. There's always something.
There's a chart I saw a while back that put words to various actions along two axes. High skill had and high skill needed was flow. The moment when I need all I have, when my entire being is my work.
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Here, now. Don't go thinking it's all dandelion fluff and sunset roses. After the flow comes, I don't have the whole story. How'd I get here? Where was I going? Where am I going? How do I get there? Even the finished story isn't all. I'll go back and edit this post. There will be a certain amount of calculation there that the absolute golden flow of inspiration didn't have, just as the editing is not the story. And everything, every creation on this world as I know it, needs both.
I am a being of curves and artistry, and I love math. Those go together better than any who deny themselves the pleasure of both shall ever know. Look at yourself. You are made for distance running, but also swimming, also throwing, also thinking, also figuring out what you can do. We are tool-users, and everything can be a tool. Music inspires, a joke, an odd conversation. And odd state of mind. The Less Wrong blog got me thinking about this, but not because I read a post obviously similar to it. Because it wakes my brain up, in a way I still don't understand.
I'd like to emphasize that this is not a rhetorical question: What's in your toolbox? What inspires you? I've never found anything more interesting, yet all I can write on is what I found in myself.
Inspiration is a slippery thing. It appears to occur entirely within the mind, and at the same time comes from outside ideas bouncing onto and into us.
What I call the inspiration stage of art is where everything comes easily. I may not be able to write a passage perfectly the first time, but I write something, and what happens is what I want to happen. I have rarely had this continue for more than a few scenes. The time that works best for me is, annoyingly enough, also when people become the most concerned. Sometimes people stay still when they meditate, sometimes spar, and sometimes write. So that distant, "I am not connected to the world" look means I am where I want to be.
I, apparently, look depressed. Someone who doesn't know me well enough--or maybe doesn't know this sort of artist well enough--will peer and hover and ask, "Are you alright?" Others will pick up on what's happening and ask to see the work. I'm still meditating and the idea of saying "no" doesn't enter my thoughts. I want to say yes to my inspiration, and everything inspires. By the time I realize what I've done, something that can recognize it is there enough for me to feel more like I'm trying to meditate than meditating. For instance, right now, I'm trying to keep up the flow I had in the beginning of my post, but some distractions are settling in. There's a skype conversation with a friend, which can be helpful; I dive into this but I need air. It's more than an hour past normal dinner time. I'm not quite hungry, but my body is a focus; the first notes of wanting something in my stomach are there. There's homework I should be working on. There's always something.
There's a chart I saw a while back that put words to various actions along two axes. High skill had and high skill needed was flow. The moment when I need all I have, when my entire being is my work.
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Here, now. Don't go thinking it's all dandelion fluff and sunset roses. After the flow comes, I don't have the whole story. How'd I get here? Where was I going? Where am I going? How do I get there? Even the finished story isn't all. I'll go back and edit this post. There will be a certain amount of calculation there that the absolute golden flow of inspiration didn't have, just as the editing is not the story. And everything, every creation on this world as I know it, needs both.
I am a being of curves and artistry, and I love math. Those go together better than any who deny themselves the pleasure of both shall ever know. Look at yourself. You are made for distance running, but also swimming, also throwing, also thinking, also figuring out what you can do. We are tool-users, and everything can be a tool. Music inspires, a joke, an odd conversation. And odd state of mind. The Less Wrong blog got me thinking about this, but not because I read a post obviously similar to it. Because it wakes my brain up, in a way I still don't understand.
I'd like to emphasize that this is not a rhetorical question: What's in your toolbox? What inspires you? I've never found anything more interesting, yet all I can write on is what I found in myself.
Thursday, January 6, 2011
Thoughts
I wonder, if I could go back with today's knowledge...
What if I had a little more?
I wish there were a word for this.
One of the most fascinating moments I've ever seen in my life is mild surprise. When there's shock, or terror, that overrides the person--and anyway, if the other person is that far for long enough to see well, there's probably reason for me to be focusing on something else.
But that moment where you see them go, "Oh. The world is not as I thought it was." Not getting the rug pulled out from under them. Just watching it move a little.
And one of the ways I see that, in myself, is finding that someone has had the same thought I have. In the abstract, I recognize that this is probably happening--there are probably some thoughts that many people have. Yet, somehow, it's odd to fall into the statistics.
One of the times I remember that clearly happening has to do with the first line. The idea of going back to the beginning of my life, with the understanding I have gained. Sarcasm isn't something the average six- or seven-year-old understands; adults treat children as less and this is incredibly useful for eavesdropping and getting honest answers about some topics. I remember watching two adults gossip about me when I was very little, and being fascinated with how completely honest they were being. I mistook thoughtlessness for bravery in honesty, but it was still helpful.
And then there's, I wish there were a word for this, which is not only something that I see or hear other people thinking, but realize people must have thought for the longest time. This is how languages form. This started with a Socrates quote, which, translated, reads: "I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world." I remember reading it in my history book with a partial translation, the ancestor word of "cosmopolitan" was still in place. And it occurred to me that, yes, there's probably a word for what I want, however, creating words for an unfulfilled need is an art.
And yet. Even with these thoughts that almost everyone has thought, we still have such wide gulfs. Not even between cultures, just between two kids who grew up in the same town and went to the same school can simply not understand what the other is thinking. Even if I try my best to explain, and the other tries to understand, there are simply places it won't make sense. Even if someone knows me better than anyone does, better than I know myself.
Halfway across the world, someone else already understands, but here and next to my heart, this person doesn't.
Walks off, singing, "You say po-tay-to, and I say po-tah-to...
What if I had a little more?
I wish there were a word for this.
One of the most fascinating moments I've ever seen in my life is mild surprise. When there's shock, or terror, that overrides the person--and anyway, if the other person is that far for long enough to see well, there's probably reason for me to be focusing on something else.
But that moment where you see them go, "Oh. The world is not as I thought it was." Not getting the rug pulled out from under them. Just watching it move a little.
And one of the ways I see that, in myself, is finding that someone has had the same thought I have. In the abstract, I recognize that this is probably happening--there are probably some thoughts that many people have. Yet, somehow, it's odd to fall into the statistics.
One of the times I remember that clearly happening has to do with the first line. The idea of going back to the beginning of my life, with the understanding I have gained. Sarcasm isn't something the average six- or seven-year-old understands; adults treat children as less and this is incredibly useful for eavesdropping and getting honest answers about some topics. I remember watching two adults gossip about me when I was very little, and being fascinated with how completely honest they were being. I mistook thoughtlessness for bravery in honesty, but it was still helpful.
And then there's, I wish there were a word for this, which is not only something that I see or hear other people thinking, but realize people must have thought for the longest time. This is how languages form. This started with a Socrates quote, which, translated, reads: "I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world." I remember reading it in my history book with a partial translation, the ancestor word of "cosmopolitan" was still in place. And it occurred to me that, yes, there's probably a word for what I want, however, creating words for an unfulfilled need is an art.
And yet. Even with these thoughts that almost everyone has thought, we still have such wide gulfs. Not even between cultures, just between two kids who grew up in the same town and went to the same school can simply not understand what the other is thinking. Even if I try my best to explain, and the other tries to understand, there are simply places it won't make sense. Even if someone knows me better than anyone does, better than I know myself.
Halfway across the world, someone else already understands, but here and next to my heart, this person doesn't.
Walks off, singing, "You say po-tay-to, and I say po-tah-to...
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Norms
A/N: Between the last post and this one, I hit 1,000 page views. Yay!
EDIT: Because I can say this better than I can write this, I edited this to try and make it closer to how I say it. Then it didn't work. I revamped, and here you go. Still not as good as I can say it. *mutters*
Brief & even more confusing than normal: People normalize to people like them, so average people end up normalizing and other people end up with more time before they find anyone with the same amount and type of pull.
I think about this occasionally. If someone is a genius, that person is going to be weird. Really, being notably smart is probably going to make one weird.
The obvious way to explain that is that "weird" just means "not in the middle of the bell curve", so smart people are weird by the definition of the adjectives. That's probably true sometimes.
I have another idea: People at varying points on a given bell curve gravitate toward each other. Someone exactly at the peak will like people who are somewhere around the peak. People at one edge or the other will be incomprehensible to and will not comprehend those in the middle, or those on the opposite side. If people devote the energy to it, they can skip around--especially if the person isn't in the middle of some other bell curve--but the point remains that that takes energy. The default is among one's similars.
This means that, in elementary school, when social groups are forming, one of a few things happens to people far East or West of the peak: 1)the edgers do not interact with the middlers much because they stick to their own groups, creating parallel but slightly separate cultures, 2)the middlers do not interact with the edgers because they are weird--same basic thing as one, but with a little more ostracizing because individual middlers can genuinely decide to avoid the edgers most of the time, while the opposite is difficult to impossible, or 3)the edgers do not normalize to anything, because 2 is present but other edgers (on the viable side) are not.
Even in option 3, edgers will still develop patterns of behavior and ways of seeing the world; the patterns will just end up alien. They started out significantly more/less X than everyone else, and then were pushed even farther. I'd like to point out what that means to me in light of previous posts: patterns, the basis of any action a human makes, end up being alien and/or incomprehensible.
So smart people are visibly weird because they don't start out at the same baseline, and then that fact pushes them farther unless they decide to expend energy in avoiding that, and even then. People who are willing to expend that energy probably want to be able to talk to everyone. Someone who flows everywhere doesn't completely belong anywhere. The island is not the ocean, the continent not the sea.
EDIT: Because I can say this better than I can write this, I edited this to try and make it closer to how I say it. Then it didn't work. I revamped, and here you go. Still not as good as I can say it. *mutters*
Brief & even more confusing than normal: People normalize to people like them, so average people end up normalizing and other people end up with more time before they find anyone with the same amount and type of pull.
I think about this occasionally. If someone is a genius, that person is going to be weird. Really, being notably smart is probably going to make one weird.
The obvious way to explain that is that "weird" just means "not in the middle of the bell curve", so smart people are weird by the definition of the adjectives. That's probably true sometimes.
I have another idea: People at varying points on a given bell curve gravitate toward each other. Someone exactly at the peak will like people who are somewhere around the peak. People at one edge or the other will be incomprehensible to and will not comprehend those in the middle, or those on the opposite side. If people devote the energy to it, they can skip around--especially if the person isn't in the middle of some other bell curve--but the point remains that that takes energy. The default is among one's similars.
This means that, in elementary school, when social groups are forming, one of a few things happens to people far East or West of the peak: 1)the edgers do not interact with the middlers much because they stick to their own groups, creating parallel but slightly separate cultures, 2)the middlers do not interact with the edgers because they are weird--same basic thing as one, but with a little more ostracizing because individual middlers can genuinely decide to avoid the edgers most of the time, while the opposite is difficult to impossible, or 3)the edgers do not normalize to anything, because 2 is present but other edgers (on the viable side) are not.
Even in option 3, edgers will still develop patterns of behavior and ways of seeing the world; the patterns will just end up alien. They started out significantly more/less X than everyone else, and then were pushed even farther. I'd like to point out what that means to me in light of previous posts: patterns, the basis of any action a human makes, end up being alien and/or incomprehensible.
So smart people are visibly weird because they don't start out at the same baseline, and then that fact pushes them farther unless they decide to expend energy in avoiding that, and even then. People who are willing to expend that energy probably want to be able to talk to everyone. Someone who flows everywhere doesn't completely belong anywhere. The island is not the ocean, the continent not the sea.
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