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| Supporting the warmachine |
| 06.23.04 (8:34 am) [edit] |
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Department of Defense. Air Force. Marines. These are all easily identifiable members of the war machine. They are easy for me to be vehemntly opposed to. How can I support organizations that collaborate to inflict death upon others? How can I be support anyone who willingly chooses to participate in these activities? Back when I had my protest, people asked that even if I didn't support the war, did I support the troops. I believe my answer back then was yes, but it was more that I was in support of them as people, not as troops. So I would like to restructure how I answer this question. I am not in support of war. I am not in support of the troops. I do care about the lives of all people affected by war, whether they be our military, our "enemy's" military, or people indirectly affected. I will not, however, support these people in their endeavor. I will not support their decision to actively participate in the military. I will not support their decision to consciously and actively aide the military. I will not support them promoting the military. Whether you are an engineer designing a new missile system, a programmer designing a new tracking system, or a grunt weilding an M-16, I will not support your actions and decisions.
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| surgery |
| 06.16.04 (4:14 pm) [edit] |
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of course I've been doing the dangerous thing and looking up information on knee surgery for tendons and such... so now I'm all convinced that 1) I'm going to have surgery and 2) that it's going to take me at least a month before I have full use of my leg again and 3) that it will probably take another 6 or 8 weeks after that for physical therapy to get my leg back into shape. Consider that I'd probably be lucky to get into the OR in a month, that'll make about 5 to 6 months of dealing with this problem including the time I've already spent dealing with it... joy :cry:
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| cogito ergo sum |
| 06.14.04 (3:50 pm) [edit] |
I think therefore I am.
I ask all of you, do you believe in free will? Do you believe that you are more than a response to external stimuli?
Many people believe that there is no such thing as God or gods and explain such through physics and other mathematically logical reasonings. How many of these same people believe they have free will?
Much of our biology is explained through the stimulus-response idea. Some amount of light of particular wave lengths enters your eye and you see a stop sign. Stimulus/response. A tiger jumps out of the woods while you're walking and growls at you with blood dripping from its jaw. You pee your pants and run away. Stimulus/response. Someone asks you a question. The sound waves enter your ears and vibrate tiny hairs causing them to send certain signals to your brain, which in turn processes the signals and you hear the question. You then, in turn, think about what the question asks and respond in some way. Stimulus/response? or free will?
Explained by stimulus/response, your answer is predetermined and calculable* by the makeup of your brain. The neurons fire in a particular pattern to form your answer. (*: assuming 0 randomness)
Explained by free will, there is something above and beyond the biochemical movements in your brain that comes up with the answer. Something that is not explained by physics or math.
If you believe in free will, can you use physics to prove the non-existence of God or gods? If you believe that there exists one thing that does not fall in the realm of current physics models, how can you say that because another thing also defies current physics models, it cannot exist?
just something to think about...
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| the cost of driving in barrels of oil |
| 06.11.04 (8:17 pm) [edit] |
The gas in your car is petroleum based.
The oil lubricating your engine is petroleum based.
Various other lubricants in your car are petroleum based.
All of those plastic parts--yup, petroleum based.
That asphalt you're driving on... you guessed it, petroleum based.
How about the machines that laid that asphalt--yeah, vehicles burning gasoline, using oil to lubricate, and probably a couple of pieces of plastic in there too--all petroleum based
The plant that built your car... the vehicles used to build the plant... the electricity used to power the plant... the vehicles used to lay the wires to the plant... all of this is recursive of course for the building of the vehicles...
Just think about all of the oil that gets used to get you from home to work...
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| drunfken revelry |
| 06.01.04 (7:17 pm) [edit] |
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I used to drink heavily and to excess on a regular basis until I started developing some very scary psychological issues relating to the drinking. Since then, I have abstained from alcohol or drank in moderation. Yesterday, I was reminded more of why I wish never to be driunk again. My friend, who is notorious for getting drunk and being stupid, did so again on Monday and seemingly upset his wife. He was an idiot. As were most of the other people who were drunk. The sad thing is, I know I've been just the same if not worse. I guess it's good to have stuff like that cemented into your head.
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| the rhetoric of leadership |
| 05.27.04 (7:30 am) [edit] |
I'm interested in getting people's ideas about the rhetoric of leadership... what things are good to say or bad to say in a leadership role... think negative vs. positive frameworks, personalization, empowerment, etc.
I'm thinking about writing something on this, but I haven't quite gotten all of my ideas fleshed out, and discussions on here often help me with that.
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| Capital letters |
| 05.24.04 (3:21 pm) [edit] |
We often use a capital letter to differentiate between two things of the same name. A god is different than God. A friend is different than a Friend. I'd like to propose another differentiation: leader vs. Leader.
What is a leader? The most obvious answer is that a leader is someone who leads. But what does it mean to lead someone? You can lead someone through the woods by having them follow your path. You can lead someone in the business world by using management skills to increase productivity. So where does the differentiation come? It's how you get someone to do something. A true leader, a Leader, inspires his (or her, but I'll stick with his for my own ease of writing) followers, and a leader only convinces his followers.
Another way of looking at it: Imagine a group of people walking through a field. When you imagine where the leader of the group is, chances are, you imagined him at the front of the group. When I think of a Leader, I think of a person in the middle of the group. He still has enough control over the flow and movements of the group that he can direct them in the right direction. But from the middle, he is able to pull the stragglers along and push the people in the front forward. Think about the person in the front again. Now imagine all of the people walking in a single file line. All the people behind the leader can see are his footprints. They can't see where they're going. They are so concerned with following his footprints that they can't see outside of his path. Now think about the Leader, in the middle of the pack. Those around him are more able to see different paths, different flowers, etc.
A leader gets people to follow his footsteps. A Leader inspires people to lay their own footsteps. You can teach a person to be a leader. You can teach him about group dynamics, psychology, sociology, etc. You can teach him management techniques. All of this will make him a good leader, but he will never be able to lead as well as a Leader. Ask the Leader how he does it and he might not even know. It might be instincts to him, a gut feeling.
(this all made a lot more sense to me when I was writing it in my head at 1:30 this morning while trying to battle the caffeine so that I could fall asleep....)
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| underlying racism |
| 05.23.04 (6:08 pm) [edit] |
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I was talking to one of my friends as we were driving along and listening to some OutKast. She was having trouble understanding what was being said and made some comment like, "I sure didn't get much out of going to a predominantly black high school." I kind of frowned and stated that I wasn't too fond of statements like that. She then asked me if I thought saying something like, "I miss hanging out with my black friends," was racist. I didn't really have an answer for her. The term "racist" carries a very negative stigma of considering one race to be superior to another. My question is, is differentiating between one race and another considered racist? I hang out with a lot of different people, and I have to sit and think about what ethnic background many of them have. I've never really thought to myself, "I want to hang out with some of my black friends today," or "I want to hang out with some of my asian friends today." But is it necessarily racist to think those things? Is it necessarily racist to acknowledge the ethnicity of a person in that way? Saying Eric is Asian, Jason is Black, Ahmed is Egyptian, etc. is recognizing that there are cultural differences. I embrace diversity. I enjoy learning about different cultures. I enjoy experiencing different cultures and I'd hate to see people to amalgamate into one culture. Is that any different? I'm not entirely sure. What is the difference between saying, "I miss hanging out with my black friends," and "I miss learning about Mohawk rituals?" Is it the ambiguity behind the first statement vs. the explicit nature of the second? There could be any number of reasons behind the first--she could want to learn, she could want to appear diverse, she could want to ... whatever. Behind the second, there's a pretty straightforward reason--obtaining knowledge. Of course, the intent of obtaining the knowledge is ambiguous and the respect of that knowledge is unknown. Perhaps it's the level of involvement that gets to me. With friends, what does it matter what race, sexuality, gender, sex, etc. they are? But with a culture, you are exploring on a ... broader scope, perhaps? I'm not sure. The idea of differentiating between friends based on race seems inappropriate to me. The idea of differentiating between cultures does not. What are your thoughts?
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