We all play our part

Life is much like the WWF toy hockey game - you're controlled by forces far beyond your influence, assigned your set role and unable to move out of it, save the little wiggles in the tiny rut you call "your life". Mine too! In this parable you are the Hacksaw Jim Dugan character, and not the Hulk. Ain't that always the case?

But seriously, this artwork is magnificent. Note the detail in the customized hockey sticks, each suited to its owner. So you know, Hacksaw is the creepy looking guy in the top left of the ring, eating his 4x4 hockey stick. You ever feel like doing that? Me too!

Not Redshirts

One might say - might! - that by willingly going in to an obviously doomed situation it is your own fault for the doom that falls upon you, even if you really had nothing to do with it, even if your intents were as pure as a cat's purr...... Or, any situation that can reasonably be foreseen. Another example: In a "bad part of town", you leave your wallet on the car seat with the windows rolled down and hundred dollar bills hanging out. Do you deserve to get it stolen?

Thusly, falling in love with a Redshirt is just asking for heartbreak, since we all should know what happens to Redshirts. But! In the grand scheme of it, are we not all Redshirts? Mortal, fools, fated to be used, doomed to a certain end? So why bother falling in love if it will end - Darwin guarantees it! - in tragic loss?

You know the answer.

Now, onto the show. WARNING! ADULT CONTENT BELOW THE FOLD (speaking of guarantees)!

Scales of Perspective (Let's Go!)

Here we go - let's bring it home. Here we have the proton and neutron, the building blocks of the nucleus, which, combined with electrons, make up all atoms. Inside the proton and neutron are quarks, which come in colors. What makes up a quark, you might ask? So far, according to standard theory, nothing. According to String Theory, strings. Now, at this scale of perspective, quarks aren't really "things", but like electrons, they exist, believe it or not, more like "probability waves". Here's another picture that might illustrate that better:

 See? They're kinda there, kinda here, kinda moving all around all the time. Anyways, quarks make up protons and neutrons, protons and neutrons make up the core of an atom:

 Again, with the fuzziness - the gray clouds outside the nucleus are the "probability waves" of the electrons, which, like quarks, are kinda here, kinda there. But the nucleus is our first "real" thing that we can understand at our macro level. But consider! Every atom that makes up every bit of matter you see is 99% empty space. It is only the Electromagnetic field generated by the electrons that gives it the impression of solidity - fields, not "things". Atoms make up everything we know, so let's skip way up to the next level of this thesis (Form is Emptiness, Emptiness is Form), the stellar realm:

 Its our new friend, the Oort Cloud - but, like the atom itself, each star is just a tiny bit ensconced in a far larger cloud - a shell - of particles that are here and there. In this case, frozen ice and rock, but you see where I'm going with this, yes? Next up, a picture I just posted!

 So, again, like the stellar neighborhood, and like the atom itself, our galaxies exist as tiny specks amongst a far larger sphere of Dark Matter. And just as a reminder at the scale of perspective we are currently talking about, here's a yearbook photo:

Every little box here is a picture of a galaxy, and this is just a tiny sample. There are hundreds of billions of galaxies out there (maybe many, many more), each containing hundreds of billions of stars. Some perspective, eh? But we're not stopping there:

 The Multiverse - just a theory at this point, but everyone seems to be heading towards acceptance of it quite quickly. Note, that our entire Universe might just be a small part of a larger sphere which in turn is contained within a still larger sphere which itself is contained within an even bigger sphere of existence.... and where it ends, who knows? Maybe it goes on forever. 

Have I blown your mind yet? I just blew my own - in fact, I've been living in a constant state of awed wonder since coming to appreciate these levels of perspective. This is where we live! This is our existence - we are part and parcel of this grand construction.

And in this scheme, does the guy who cut you off at the light really matter? Does anything really matter? No - objectively, how could it? We're all just dust in the wind.


Or, different answer. Better answer: All that matters is what you want to matter. In fine Existential tradition, we - humans - bring meaning to these scales of perspective. We choose how we want to perceive it, how we interpret it, how it makes us feel. You may not be able to change the multiverse we all live in, but you can change how you think about it, how you feel about it.


And that's all the freedom we can ever have: How we choose to deal with these infinities.

Yeah?  So choose wisely. And this is the task I've chosen for myself, and am sharing with you if you're willing to follow: The exploration of perspective. Hope you enjoy the ride.

EXTREME

Premise: Everything IS more extreme than in the past (it's not your imagination). The reason for this is the self-sustaining dialectic created by the Internet/Cable referenced down below. To wit: You have more opportunity to know what's going on out there. This knowledge will inform your decisions, which you then feed-back into the dialectic, which in turn will supply someone else information, and so on. Given the very human need to take something - anything - to the next level, or personalize it, this dynamic will create a feedback loop of ever increasing extremism, however you'd like to define "extreme".

Examples:

 The Police have gotten more extreme.

 The Technology has gotten more extreme.

 The guns and gun owners have gotten more extreme.

 The dialog has gotten more extreme.

The Media has gotten more extreme.

 The infantile delusions have gotten more extreme (for an easy formula to understand a teabagger - they truly believe they are of the same clothe as the folks involved in the American Revolution. The truth is, if anything, they're more like the folks from South Carolina circa 1857, but they'll never understand that. It IS important for US to understand what they think of themselves, however deluded)

I could - and will, later - go on and on. This extremism seems to be in every corner of the world, leaving nothing untouched (sports, for example). It's a function of our times in most ways, specifically the truly revolutionary technological capabilities that are continually reinventing our world.

That is, we're living through a mighty transition, and transitions, while natural and good in of themselves, bring massive amounts of upheaval and suffering. 


The only way to end an "extremist feedback loop" is to deprive it of fuel (true of any feedback). There is only three ways to do that: 1. It dries up on its own because it's exhausted its fuel supply, or 2. People willingly deprive it of fuel (a new mindset takes hold), and/or 3. There is a substantial external event that resets the playing field.

Then, of course, there are the changes each of us can make within ourselves - the only true and lasting change. But that's up to you.

And to conclude, the instigating factor (the spark) to many of the extremities of the day is Barack Obama. Not for anything he's done or said, but simply who he is. Think of American race relations as a blister that Obama popped. It needed to be popped, and will turn out OK in the end. But till then, we've got to deal with a lot of pus - IE the Teabaggers et al.

If you don't believe me, consider a similar era - the Civil Rights era. I don't think anyone could argue that the efforts of those folks paid huge, positive dividends for everyone in the world. But there was a sure lot of pain and suffering to get through it (Birmingham, Selma, etc). 

So buck up!

I do (I guess)

It's a trap! For her, I suspect.
"Fairy marries Tinkerbell"
The dowry was a 30 pack of Bud Light.

All that's missing is a shotgun. Pretty damn sad, actually - can you feel the love?


And that, dear readers, is where babies come from.

Poor Mom

At least you're still holding hands and posing for cheesy photos. Just wait till the older one develops the inevitable meth addiction and begins robbing you blind.

Ahh, children. Our future!

Upon reflection

But where is the blame? Should the trooper blame himself? He was cloned to be weak minded and easily pliable - why shouldn't he fall prey to insidious Jedi Mind Tricks?

However, once you go down this logic path, you will quickly see that no one is to blame, ever, for anything - because there's always a precedent. 

That's not a viable way to move in this world, however, so the opposite has become true: You're responsible for everything, regardless of circumstance.

Hence, bad trooper!

Monkey Business

Instead of cowboys and astronauts, it's spreadsheets and staff meetings. As if it was going to turn out any other way, but still: I think we're always surprised to find ourselves fulfilling our destiny.

Redemption for the Devil

A

Another fantastic episode of Lost last night. That was my favorite "Alt" story yet - Dr. Linus and office politics.

The show has always focused heavily on the fate v. free will debate, with neither side favored so far, as I can tell. Sometimes we're given large doses of Fate; other times, Free Will seems to be the prime consideration.

But consider what we saw last night in the Alt reality: Ben gases his Father, again. This time its helpful oxygen. Ben uses the infidelity of a superior for blackmail, and to gain power. This is how Widmore got exiled - Ben found out he was going off island and had a daughter. This time, however, instead of sacrificing Alex for his own power, Ben defers, instead helping Alex. And so on.

Point being: Sure seems like a foundation of Fate with little dollops of Free Will.

This episode made it pretty clear that Ben will get redeemed, or will walk the path of redemption. Amazing storytelling in that very same character I have hated in the past (when he murdered Locke, for example), I can empathize with now, and even root for. He's not unsympathetic, even though he's kinda the Devil.

We actually learned a lot last night, for example: Seems safe to conclude that Candidates are now immortal, but not invincible. Alpert can't kill himself. This explains one of the bigger niggling mysteries to the show: When Michael was off-island, he tried to kill himself repeatedly, with Mr. Friendly daring him to try, telling him "The Island isn't done with you yet". And what we saw last seemed to confirm that Jack is immortal in this same way, and it seems reasonable to assume the same for Hurley, Sayid, Kate, etc. Anyone touched by Jacob.

The scene where Ben breaks down to Illana was very powerful, I thought. It was also the first time anyone other than Richard has refused an offer from Flocke.