Causality Loopy

"Many years from now, a transgalactic civilization has discovered time travel. A deep-thinking temporal engineer wonders what would happen if a time machine were sent back to the singularity from which the big bang emerged. His calculations yield an interesting result: the singularity would be destabilized, producing an explosion resembling the big bang. Needless to say, a time machine was quickly sent on its way."

--Barry Dainton, Time and Space, 1958

a millisecond prior to impact

"From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"The nictitating membrane (from Latin nictare, to blink) is a transparent or translucent third eyelid present in some animals that can be drawn across the eye for protection and to moisten the eye while also keeping visibility....

"Woodpeckers tighten their nictitating membrane a millisecond prior to their beak impacting the trunk of a tree in order to prevent their eyes from leaving their sockets."

Freedom Parade 2009

"I wanna invite you to FREEDOM PARADE 2009 on 12th September on Freedom Square.

"I'm working for MONFEMNET as information manager. We have a youth campaign for Human Rights. The campaign name is "Hands Up 4 Your Rights" (http://www.monfemnet.org/en_hands_up.php) Our campaign has a lot activities. One of them is FREEDOM PARADE. If u wanna to see last year's parade pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/handsup4yourrights/FREEDOMPARADE2008?feat=directlink#

"I hope that you'll participate in our FREEDOM PARADE, and support activity that promotes Human Rights, Freedom, Gender Equality, and Democracy in Mongolia.

"Sincerely, Zola"

Dharma Bums VII

"We gotta go to Berkeley after this and attend a lecture and discussion at the Buddhist Center."

"Aw I don't wanta go to no such thing, I just wanta drink in alleys."

He was really sad about it, and worried about me, but I just went on drinking.

When we got to Alvah's cottage and it was time to leave for the Buddhist Center lecture I said "I'll just sit here and get drunk and wait for you."

"Okay," said Japhy, looking at me darkly. "It's your life."

He was gone for two hours. I felt sad and drank too much and was dizzy. But I was determined not to pass out and stick it out and prove something to Japhy. Suddenly, at dusk, he came running back into the cottage drunk as a hoot owl yelling "You know what happened Smith? I went to the Buddhist lecture and they were all drinking white raw saki out of teacups and everybody got drunk. All those crazy Japanese saints! You were right! It doesn't make any difference! We all got drunk and discussed prajna! It was great!" And after that Japhy and I never had an argument again.


--Jack Kerouac, The Dharma Bums, 1958

Dharma Bums VI

"I saw there was nothing to do because nothing ever happened, nothing ever would happen, all things were empty light."

--Jack Kerouac, The Dharma Bums, 1958

to treat mental diseases

"While investigating Tibetan books in the library of a former lamaistic university of Gandan, I found a book, by Lovsan-Yondon and Tsend-Otcher, entitled in free translation Anatomical Dictionary for Recognizing Various Diseases. It was a typical Tibetan book, printed from woodcuts on long, narrow strips of paper. Each leaf was printed on both sides and each page was from a separately cut wooden plate. In the systematic discussion of the fauna of Tibet and adjacent regions I found on p. 24, in a group of monkeys, an illustration of a wild man. This illustration shows a biped primate standing erect on a rock, with one arm stretched upwards....

"While studying the literature in the central library of the Scientific Committee in Mongolia I found, in the Tibetan department, another, more recent, edition of the above book, printed a century later in Urga (now Ulanbator). The author of this edition was Jambaldorje. An illustration of the above biped primate, along with monkeys, appears in this book also as part of a systematic discussion of Tibetan natural history on p. 119....

"Left of the picture there is a Tibetan text which in free translation runs: 'The wild man lives in the mountains, his origin is close to that of the bear, his body resembles that of man and he has enormous strength. His meat may be eaten to treat mental diseases and his gall cures jaundice.'"


--Emanuel Vlcek, "Old Literary Evidence for the Existence of the 'Snow Man' in Tibet and Mongolia," Man, volume 59, 1959 August, pages 133-134

Greenland shark (Somniosus microcephalus)

"ARCTIC KILLER

"In Lapland, herds of reindeer on migration swim between the islands, and some never reach the shore. Largest of the species of dogfish that live in the cold oceans near the poles, the giant Greenland shark often exceeds 20 feet in length and frequently weighs over a ton. Fishermen seek it out for the valuable oil found in its liver -- over 30 gallons in a really big one. Though this ferocious predator can swallow a seal or reindeer whole, when caught by man it gives itself up with the meekness of a lamb."

--Animal World in Color, Volume 8 - Hunters: Birds, Fish, and Amphibians, edited by Maurice Burton, Childrens Press: Chicago, 1969

finally, an epiphany

I have identified what it is that bothers me about the portrayal of gay people in contemporary American comedic movies and television programs. It is straight people pretending to be gay people for a straight audience; it is the emphasizing and exaggerating of stereotyped traits of gay people for the amusement of straight people. It is equivalent to the American minstrel shows of not very long ago, in which white people pretended to be outlandish caricatures of black people for the amusement of white audiences.

It will not be very long before these comedies are looked back upon with the same distaste and shame with which the old minstrel shows are currently looked back upon.

perception of the universe

"Much of both modern fantasy and modern horror, it seems to me, still deals with the relationship of the ordinary human world with Faerie, the Land Beyond the Hill, the World Beyond the Wood, that land of ghosts and shadows and unearthly Powers that still flickers just beyond the periphery of our bright, tidy, rational modern world... The major difference between the two, I think, is not so much subject matter as Attitude, the prevalent emotional weather or coloring of each....

"Much of modern horror has succumbed to--in fact, wholeheartedly embraced--a numbing sort of nihilism and fashionable designer despair, the message of which seems to be: you can't win, nothing matters, neither ethics nor morals nor religion are an effective guide to behavior, and none of them will save you; you can survive for a while by turning yourself into a savage predator, devoid of remorse or compassion or pity, but there's always a bigger predator in wait somewhere; in the end, the grave will get you, and sometimes you will continue to be flayed and tormented even beyond death. The house always wins, you always lose, and nothing you can do has any significance at all.

"This perception of the universe may be closer to 'reality' than that of fantasy..."


--Gardner Dozois, Modern Classics of Fantasy, 1997

to be an American

“Sarah!” she called. “Sarah, do come and meet young Mr. Mathews, who wants to be called Warren.”

A tall, pretty girl turned from a group of other drinkers to smile at him, extending her hand, but when Marjorie Blaine said “He’s an American,” the girl’s smile froze and her hand fell.

“Oh,” she said. “How nice.” And she turned away again.

It wasn’t a good time to be an American in London. Eisenhower had been elected and the Rosenbergs killed; Joseph McCarthy was on the rise, and the war in Korea, with its reluctant contingent of British troops, had come to seem as if it might last forever.


--Richard Yates, “Liars in Love,” 1981

Ethics with Calvin and Hobbes

excerpted from Open Questions: Readings for Critical Thinking and Writing edited by Chris Anderson and Lex Runciman, copyright 2005, pages 413-414:

“BILL WATTERSON
‘Today at school, I tried to decide whether to cheat on my test or not.’

“The creator of the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip, Bill Watterson (b. 1958) refused to merchandise his characters. Calvin and Hobbes appeared in more than 2,300 newspapers around the world, and ran from November 1985 through December 1995.


“Calvin: Today at school, I tried to decide whether to cheat on my test or not.
Calvin: I wondered, is it better to do the right thing and fail...or is it better to do the wrong thing and succeed?
Calvin: On the one hand, undeserved success gives no satisfaction. … But on the other hand, well-deserved failure gives no satisfaction either.
Calvin: Of course, most everybody cheats some time or other. People always bend the rules if they think they can get away with it. … Then again, that doesn't justify my cheating.
Calvin: Then I thought, look, cheating on one little test isn't such a big deal. It doesn't hurt anyone. … But then I wondered if I was just rationalizing my unwillingness to accept the consequence of not studying.
Calvin: Still, in the real world, people care about success, not principles. … Then again, maybe that's why the world is in such a mess. What a dilemma!
Hobbes: So what did you decide?
Calvin: Nothing. I ran out of time and I had to turn in a blank paper.
Hobbes: Anymore, simply acknowledging the issue is a moral victory.
Calvin: Well, it just seemed wrong to cheat on an ethics test.

“What does it say?
1. There are two figures in this comic strip, Calvin and his tiger, Hobbes. Track what each one says. Calvin obviously does most of the talking. What does Hobbes say and when does he say it? What is your reaction to Hobbes's final statement? How does Hobbes's body language—his facial expressions, his gestures—contribute to your understanding of what he says?
2. It doesn't take long to read a comic strip like this, and first reactions are usually quick, too. Describe yours. As soon as you stop reading, jot down a quick four sentence response. Did you laugh? Why? What made this funny? If you didn't laugh, what was your reaction and why?

“What do you think?
3. Bill Watterson, the cartoonist, doesn't come out and say what he wants this comic to mean. He is neither Calvin nor Hobbes. What do you think Watterson is getting at? Write a brief essay that presents your understanding of the thesis statement of this cartoon, and explain the evidence that supports your analysis.
4. Though Watterson is neither Calvin nor Hobbes, one of these characters may serve as his spokesperson. Which do you think does? Which of these characters comes closest to representing Watterson's own views, and how do you know? What details in the comic lead to this conclusion? Or do you think that neither character represents Watterson?
5. People often send their friends and families copies of cartoons they like. Who would you send this cartoon to, and why?
6. Hobbes says that ‘Anymore, simply acknowledging the issue is a moral victory.’ Write an essay agreeing or disagreeing with that statement, explaining your position.

“What would they say?
7. Read Lawrence Hinman's ‘Virtual Virtues: Reflections on Academic Integrity in the Age of the Internet.’ How would Watterson have to adapt this particular cartoon to reflect Hinman's analysis of ethical behavior and the Internet? Would the cartoon have to be any different? Is there something about cyberspace that changes the ethical dilemma that Calvin is describing?
8. Based on your reading of Hinman's ‘Virtual Virtues: Reflections on Academic Integrity in the Age of the Internet,’ do you think he would put a copy of this cartoon on his office door or on his syllabus for one of his courses? (Hinman is an ethicist who teaches courses in ethics and ethical reasoning.) Explain why or why not.
9. Write an essay explaining how you think Stephen L. Carter, in ‘The Best Student Ever,’ and Donald McCabe and Linda Klebe Trevino, in ‘Honesty and Honor Codes,’ would respond to this cartoon. What would they say? Would they agree with its premise? Why or why not?
10. Out of all the essays you've read in this book, which writer comes closest to embodying Calvin's position in this comic? Which writer comes closest to embodying Hobbes's position? Explain.”

*John Dies at the End* by David Wong

"It’s a drug that promises an out-of-body experience with each hit. On the street they call it Soy Sauce, and users can drift across time and dimensions. But some who come back are no longer human.

"Suddenly a silent, otherworldly invasion is underway, and mankind needs a hero. What it gets instead is John and David, a pair of college dropouts who can barely hold down jobs.

"Can these two stop the oncoming horror in time to save humanity?

"No. No, they can’t.

"John Dies at the End is coming to book stores and everywhere else September 29th, 2009 from St. Martin’s Press."

http://www.johndiesattheend.com/updates/?page_id=10

The website includes a characteristically entertaining and lucid explanation by Wong of pareidolia:

http://www.johndiesattheend.com/updates/?p=22

"Everything you need to know about the universe, you can learn from this picture of Captain Kirk holding a rock shaped like a boner."

Delaying not, hurrying not, low and delicious

O give me the clew! (it lurks in the night here somewhere);
Oh, if I am to have so much, let me have more!

A word then (for I will conquer it),
The word final, superior to all,
Subtle, sent up--what is it?--I listen;
Are you whispering it, and have been all the time, you sea-waves?
Is that it from your liquid rims and wet sands?

Whereto answering, the sea,
Delaying not, hurrying not,
Whispered me through the night, and very plainly before daybreak,
Lisped to me the low and delicious word death,
And again death, death, death, death,
Hissing melodious, neither like the bird nor like my aroused child's heart,
But edging near as privately for me rustling at my feet,
Creeping thence steadily up to my ears and laving me softly all over,
Death, death, death, death, death.

--Walt Whitman, "Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking," Leaves of Grass

"Mongolia: Surviving the Winter" by Richard Wainwright

"Under the streets of Ulaan Baatar, the coldest capital city in the world, many children struggle to survive the bitter winter.... Munkhbat (15) & Altangeret (15) have lived down this manhole in Unur district of Ulaan Baatar for over 3 years."

http://www.gaia-photos.com/mongolia-surviving-the-winter/

Buddha.mn

www.Buddha.mn
Mongolian Buddhist Information and Education Network

Dharma Bums V

"Sociability is just a big smile and a big smile is nothing but teeth."

--Jack Kerouac, The Dharma Bums, 1958

are ambiguous

"Real moral dilemmas are ambiguous, and many of us hike right through them, unaware that they exist. When, usually after the fact, someone makes an issue of them, we tend to resent his or her bringing it up."

--Bowen H. McCoy, "The Parable of the Sadhu," Harvard Business Review, 1983 September/October

Happy Independence Day

propaganda poster
Harald Damsleth
1906-1971 Norwegian

a better world flag

The Flag of Earth
James W. Codle

Cat in the Rain

"Hemingway has succeeded in rendering an immensely poignant human experience with all the poetry that pure prose can achieve. The simple language and brittle style simultaneously conceal and reveal a powerful emotional situation without the least trace of sentimentality. The delicacy and accuracy of the achievement are magnificent."

--John V. Hagopian, "Symmetry in 'Cat in the Rain,'" College English, 1962 December

Bonne Fête du Canada.

Happy Canada Day.

protracted conflict

"Since the early nineteenth century, borderlanders have witnessed protracted conflict rooted in the vastly unequal power relationship between Mexico and the United States."

--Oscar Martinez, U.S.-Mexican Borderlands: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives, 1996

a World Flag

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Flag

Dharma Bums IIII

"Across the evening valley the old mule went with his heartbroken 'Hee haw' broken like a yodel in the wind: like a horn blown by some terribly sad angel: like a reminder to people digesting dinners at home that all was not as well as they thought. Yet it was just a love cry for another mule."

--Jack Kerouac, The Dharma Bums, 1958

Films

Slumdog Millionaire
The first 3/4 is basically Oliver Twist and makes for excellent viewing, but the dramatic climax of the film appropriates the inauthentic, manufactured drama of awful reality television (the film's climax cleaves exactly to the fulsomely protracted climax of any episode of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?), and the ending is happy-happy dreadful.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine
Australian Hughie, our pretending-to-be-Canadian Wolvie, pivots his motorcycle by slashing asphalt with his claws and then takes out a Humvee with his claws and then flies up in the air and stabs a helicopter and rides on top of the helicopter. And Liev Schreiber is Sabretooth.

the entire Eastern seaboard might join the European Union

"The front page of the December 29 issue of the Wall Street Journal carried a story about a Russian professor, who predicts the disintegration of the United States by 2010....

"Igor Panarin, a former KGB analyst, forecasts economic, financial and demographic turmoil in the U.S. leading to a political and social crisis that will result in social unrest and a civil war before the country breaks up along ethnic lines....

"Panarin, the dean of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s academy for future diplomats, first predicted a U.S. collapse in 1998 at a conference in Linz, Austria... [Attendees] lined up afterward and asked him to autograph copies of the map showing how America would break into different regions that would align with foreign lands.


"He essentially predicted nearly a decade ago that California and many western states will become part of China (or fall under Chinese influence), Alaska will go back to Russia, Hawaii will go to either China or Japan, Texas and several southern states will become part of Mexico, northern states will become part of Canada and the entire Eastern seaboard might join the European Union.

"Panarin spends plenty of time at receptions in the Kremlin, lecturing to students, publishing books and appearing in various media outlets as an expert on U.S.-Russian relations, which are pretty dismal right now....

"His projections of a U.S. breakup have made him a darling of the Russian media and power circles.

"White House reaction at a December news conference drew laughter from the press corps. But Panarin warns a similar 1976 prediction by a French political scientist, Emmanuel Todd, correctly predicted the collapse of the Soviet Union 15 years before it happened."

--Rick Killion, Prairie Business Magazine, 2009 March

Painting the Space Needle, 1962

"Giving an upper leg its coat of 'astronaut white,' painter pauses in high cage to view awesome sight. Copyright 1962, The Craftsman Press, Inc."

U.S.A., Washington, Seattle
Space Needle
from VintageSeattle.org

Gegeen.com

www.Gegeen.com

"Supporting Health, Wealth and Education of Mongolian Youth"

Happy Bloomsday

yes I said yes I will Yes

Lyrical III

Seven Nations
I'm waiting for midnight
I'm waiting for silence

John Cougar Mellencamp
She calls me "Baby"
She calls everybody "Baby"

Marilyn Manson
Kill your god
Kill your god
Kill your TV

Merle Haggard
If someone ever said I gave a damn
They damn sure told you wrong

LFO
Deep down I know she loves me
But she's got a funny way of showing me how she cares
Last night she did a donut on my lawn
Then drove off with one finger in the air

Nirvana
I found it hard
It's hard to find
Oh well, whatever, nevermind

Motion City Soundtrack
I'll be back tomorrow
I'll be back in the ballroom, swinging
I'll be back with a capital "H"
It stands for "Hero" and the Hero is me

I'll be back tomorrow
I'll be back at a quarter to eleven
I'm half drunk, I can't see straight
And I'm off to save the world

New Found Glory
I finally have an audience to ignore me

Quarashi
There's a party at your house
'Cause your mama is a stripper

No Address
She don't like me singing songs
She don't wanna sing along
It's still the same
She only likes me when I'm gone

Counting Crows
Well, I woke up in mid-afternoon
'Cause that's when it all hurts the most

Steve Earle
I got an empty feeling deep inside
I'm going over to the other side

All Lyrical

Arbuckle

In the Garfield universe, Arbuckle can't hear Garfield's thoughts. Remove Garfield's thought balloons, and the strips become poignant: a very lonely man, talking to his cat.





--http://www.truthandbeautybombs.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=4997&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

65th

F-5 Lightning with D-Day Invasion stripes

European Bee-eater

Merops apiaster

Picking up hookers instead of my pen

Cowboys are special with their own brand of misery
from being alone too long.
You could die from the cold in the arms of a nightmare,
knowing well that your best days are gone.
Picking up hookers instead of my pen,
I let the words of my youth fade away.
Old worn-out saddles and old worn-out memories,
with no one and no place to stay.

My heroes have always been cowboys.
And they still are, it seems.
Sadly in search of, and one step in back of,
themselves and their slow-moving dreams.

--Sharon Rice, "My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys"

old movie

poster by Eric Tan

Lake Nicaragua shark (Carcharinus nicaraguensis)

"HIDDEN DEMON OF THE PEACEFUL LAKE

"High in the jungles of Central America, Lake Nicaragua lies shimmering amid green hills in a setting of breath-taking beauty, inviting the passer-by to escape the oppressive heat in the coolness of its waters. But this can be an invitation to death, for under its calm surface lurks one of the world's few fresh water maneaters, the Lake Nicaragua shark. Averaging 8 to 10 feet in length and closely related to the Atlantic ground shark which rarely attacks men, this predator was originally a sea-dweller who migrated up the San Carlos River from the Caribbean. When prehistoric earthquakes cut off its return route to the sea with waterfalls and rapids, this shark settled down in its present home and somehow acquired a taste for people. The Lake Nicaragua shark is a deadly menace to swimmers in the lakeshore shallows because it hugs the bottom, so that no racing fin breaks the surface to warn of its approach. Local people and visitors alike have succumbed to its stealth, their first hint of danger being the mortal crush of the murderer's powerful jaws."

--Animal World in Color, Volume 8 - Hunters: Birds, Fish, and Amphibians, edited by Maurice Burton, Childrens Press: Chicago, 1969

You don't seem to

"Why make a fuss when you're so comfortable? Don't make a fuss, make a baby. Go out and get something to eat, build something. Make another baby. Babies are cute. Babies show you have faith in the future. Although faith is perhaps too strong a word. They're everywhere these days, in all the crowds and traffic jams, there are the babies too. You don't seem to associate them with the problems of population increase. They're just babies!"

--Joy Williams, "Save the Whales, Screw the Shrimp," Ill Nature: Rants and Reflections on Humanity and Other Animals, 2001

Mother's Day cards

The blackness of the eternal void from which we come and to which we return.

The briefness of our sojourn among the conscious.

Knowledge of the Human Experience in Diverse Cultures Enlightens One to Moral Relativism

"In any comprehensive study of psychology, the selection that different cultures have made in the course of history within the great circumference of potential behavior is of great significance.

"Every society, beginning with some slight inclination in one direction or another, carries its preference farther and farther, integrating itself more and more completely upon its chosen basis, and discarding those types of behavior that are uncongenial. Most of those organizations of personality that seem to us most uncontrovertibly abnormal have been used by different civilizations in the very foundations of their institutional life. Conversely the most valued traits of our normal individuals have been looked on in differently organized cultures as aberrant. Normality, in short, within a very wide range, is culturally defined. It is primarily a term for the socially elaborated segment of human behavior in any culture; and abnormality, a term for the segment that that particular civilization does not use. The very eyes with which we see the problem are conditioned by the long traditional habits of our own society.

"It is a point that has been made more often in relation to ethics than in relation to psychiatry. We do not any longer make the mistake of deriving the morality of our locality and decade directly from the inevitable constitution of human nature. We do not elevate it to the dignity of a first principle. We recognize that morality differs in every society, and is a convenient term for socially approved habits. Mankind has always preferred to say, 'It is morally good,' rather than 'It is habitual'...

"There is an ascertainable range of human behavior that is found wherever a sufficiently large series of individuals is observed. But the proportion in which behavior types stand to one another in different societies is not universal. The vast majority of individuals in any group are shaped to the fashion of that culture. In other words, most individuals are plastic to the molding force of the society into which they are born. In a society that values trance, as in India, they will have supernormal experience. In a society that institutionalizes homosexuality, they will be homosexual. In a society that sets the gathering of possessions as the chief human objective, they will amass property. The deviants, whatever the type of behavior the culture has institutionalized, will remain few in number, and there seems no more difficulty in molding the vast malleable majority to the 'normality' of what we consider an aberrant trait, such as delusions of reference, than to the normality of such accepted behavior patterns as acquisitiveness. The small proportion of the number of the deviants in any culture is not a function of the sure instinct with which that society has built itself upon the fundamental sanities, but of the universal fact that, happily, the majority of mankind quite readily take any shape that is presented to them...."

--Ruth Benedict, "Anthropology and the Abnormal," Journal of General Psychology, 1934

all both alike and different

"War stories, like Holocaust stories, are all both alike and different, and all improbable; each turns on moments of hor­ror, serendipity, and unimaginable bravery. Sitting next to me at Fran O'Brien's was Steve Reighard, of Bloomington, Indiana, who was hacking one-handed with a combination knife-fork at a steak the size of a dictionary. 'They am­bushed us,' he said. 'I'm standing there trying to realize what happened and my arm is laying there. I picked it up and fell in the dirt.' Across the table, Robert Acosta, of Santa Ana, California, manipulated a steak knife with his stainless-steel hook. 'They threw a hand grenade in my truck,' he said. 'I picked it up and, damn, dropped it down between my legs. When I grabbed it again, it blew up in my hand.' At Walter Reed, Phil Bauer, a strapping cavalry scout from upstate New York, had described being on a Chinook heli­copter that was shot down on November 2nd, killing fifteen soldiers on their way to a short leave. When he came to, he said, he was pinned atop the open-eyed corpse of a woman soldier to whom he'd just given a piece of gum. His leg was jammed beneath the burning roof of the Chinook, and he had to lie there, without morphine, for two hours while a 'jaws of life' appa­ratus was flown in from Tikrit. 'It was like cooking a steak with the cover down,' he said. He lost his right leg below the knee. At the dinner, a soldier named Ed Platt, from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, told me that the signature moment of his calamity was when the medics used the ribbons of his leg--­shattered by a rocket-propelled grenade--as its own tourniquet. 'They just folded it up,' he said. 'I looked down and I'm looking at the sole of my boot.' He shuddered. 'OK, cool, whatever, dude,' he muttered to himself as he finished his story. Doctors amputated just below Platt's right hip."

--Dan Baum, "The Casualty," The New Yorker, 2004 March 8