Complete Faith In the Continued Absurdity, and Other Observations

No biggie today. Just Trump sharing a person's post suggesting a civil war. The Trump era is not over, and can not possibly end well.

Incidentally, exactly 150 years ago today, in 1872, 

Ulysses S. Grant signed the Amnesty Act into law which restored full civil and political rights to all but about 500 Confederate sympathizers.

Can't we just skip the Civil War II, and go straight into embracing reason?

May 22, 2022

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Birthday boy Ted Kaczynski with an unfortunately apt observation. "History is made by active, determined minorities, not by the majority, which seldom has a clear and consistent idea of what it really wants." 

Music to Trump's ears.

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But I'm choosing to remember Victor Hugo who left us on this day in 1885:

"Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise."

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Jon Stewart: "I have complete faith in the continued absurdity of whatever's going on."

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Patton Oswalt- "Dear people citing the Bible, it's a cool book with some wonderful passages, but it also has ghost sex & giants & super babies & demons. It's why we don't make laws based on Legend of Zelda, My Little Pony, and Game of Thrones."

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The Lancaster Library book sale starts tomorrow. Gretel and I volunteered to help set it up today so I got to pick out my books early. For $32, I made out great! What should I read first?

May 22, 2022

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Newspaper headline: Duck Eats Yeast, Quacks, Explodes, Man Loses Eye

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Mathematician Martin Gardner left us on this day in 2010. 

"The last level of metaphor in the Alice books is this: that life, viewed rationally and without illusion, appears to be a nonsense tale told by an idiot mathematician."

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Philip Roth, on the subject of death: "The contract is a bad contract and we all have to sign it."

He signed the contract on this day in 2018.

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16 Cognitive Distortions, from Positive Psychology, by Courtney Ackerman

1. All-or-Nothing Thinking / Polarized Thinking
Also known as “Black-and-White Thinking,” this distortion manifests as an inability or unwillingness to see shades of gray. In other words, you see things in terms of extremes – something is either fantastic or awful, you believe you are either perfect or a total failure.

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Bertrand Russell was asked in 1959 if he had a message to anybody who could be watching a thousand years in the future. He said he had an intellectual message and a moral message. This is the moral message:

"Love is wise; hatred is foolish. In this world, which is getting more and more closely interconnected, we have to learn to tolerate each other, we have to learn to put up with the fact that some people say things that we don’t like. We can only live together in that way. But if we are to live together, and not die together, we must learn a kind of charity and a kind of tolerance, which is absolutely vital to the continuation of human life on this planet."

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On this day in 2021:

Harvey Milk- "If a bullet should enter my brain, let that bullet destroy every closet door in the country."

He could have been 91 today, if he wasn't assassinated by Dan White.

Not-so-fun fact- In his college yearbook, Tucker Carlson listed being a member of the Dan White Society. Another Dan White? Sure, maybe. He was also a member of the Jesse Helms Foundation.

Garbage like this aging so poorly is a real testament to how far we've progressed.

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I finished watching The Last Dance, the documentary on Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls from the 90s. A smattering of thoughts:

-Michael Jordan... goodness, someone pointed out that his greatness goes far beyond basketball. Nobody in history has ever been better at their job. In terms of sports figures, there's Jordan, Muhammad Ali and Babe Ruth. Who else rises to that echelon???

-I think basketball is the worst sport, except maybe golf. I've never really understood it. The rules seem stupid and arbitrary. 95% of the scoring doesn't mean anything because both teams just score non-stop the whole way through, etc. Nevertheless, I could watch a 10-hour documentary of just basketball highlight reels. There just something about the balance between such high pressure and the only way of succeeding is to forget that there's any pressure at all.

-Jordan recounts Phil Jackson telling him that, there's no I in team, and he remembers coming back with, "But there IS an I in win." Perfect!

-I was not expecting the Zen Buddhist, and Native American sub-story in episode 4 about Phil Jackson... using those philosophies as a guide for practice and living. Funny thing is... Michael Jordan's always crossed my mind in reference to Zen Buddhism. I remember hearing stories about him making free throws by completely emptying his head, even shutting his eyes. When you can detach from your self, you are a master of 3-D space, because emptying your thoughts makes you one with that space. I think I wrote about this in a philosophy paper in college. Heidegger wrote that your identity is tied to your intention... you are what you focus on. When Michael Jordan focuses on the rim, the two become one and the ball goes in. There's no other option.

-When I used to kick extra points in rugby in college he was my inspiration. When I made them, it was because I was able to think of nothing. When I missed them, it was because I was thinking about thinking about nothing. (Now think about that.)

-Apparently I can name Take A Walk In the Wild Side in one note.

-Phil Jackson- "You're only a success the moment you perform the successful act. Then you have to do it again." I love that. It reminds me of the Bob Dylan line, "When you stop being born is when you start dying."

-The Hitler mustache... they didn't go into it, of course, but why the Hitler mustache??? I can't explain it, but it kind of makes sense now in some weird way. I'm going to stew on it.

-Somehow the guy started his minor league baseball career with a 13-game hitting streak. Then they started throwing him curve balls and that was the end of it.

-Jordan, on nerves- "Why would I think about missing a shot that I haven't even taken yet." That's a quote for all time. His gift, being totally present. Something to aspire toward. That is some advice that you can take and adapt to your own life. I won't be forgetting it anytime soon.

Your thoughts?

May 22, 2020

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I suppose two headgashes at work within a 5 year period isn't too bad.

May 22, 2015

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The buildings tumbling down at the end of Fight Club... it gets me every time.

May 22, 2012

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I had an ironic computer problem- cat hair in the mouse.

May 22, 2011

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Have you heard the theory that the rapture happened and that God only took "Macho Man" Randy Savage? The nation's Sunday schools have decided to teach the controversy.

May 22, 2011

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Time for a tea break.

May 22, 2011

Postscript- By my estimate that grass would be 206 feet high by now.

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Pac Man's birthday, born on this day in 1980.

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The Hill- Sinkhole develops on White House lawn
Someone commented: "I never rooted for a sinkhole before."

May 22, 2018

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https://youtu.be/DnI4Pro5OHg

Do you know what's missing from political attack ads? Humor! Bill Maher had it right months ago with this fake ad. If I have one piece of advice for the Biden campaign, it's to get the country laughing by completely defining this guy as the emperor with no clothes... the guy that the entire world laughs at, which happens to be Trump's worst nightmare. Let's face it, there's something we can learn from Trump... we want to be entertained!

Right? Well hopefully we want more than that. I don't think the average person does, but we SHOULD expect more. If you're that type of person... and I mean this literally... go to each of their campaign websites and compare their visions for the future. There's a pretty stark contrast

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Quite a cost to learning some lessons. If you want to kill your wife, and also want her to vote for Trump, you have to wait until AFTER the election.

May 22, 2021

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I thought I had read all of John Steinbeck's books... but I guess I missed the werewolf one! Excellent last paragraph from an article about it:

"But while we would love to finally dip into this slightly more lurid spin on My Travels With Charley, Steinbeck’s literary agents won’t budge, on the grounds that he almost certainly would not have wanted them to—since he wrote Full Moon under a pseudonym, and never tried to get it published again after he became world famous. Which is all well and good, but we would like to offer up the following counterpoint to this well-reasoned call for decorum: C’mon. Release the John Steinbeck werewolf book! The burgeoning field of werewolf literature needs this."

May 22, 2021

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Robert Byrne joined us on this day in 1930. 

"Stop crime at it's source! Support Planned Parenthood."

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Other notable birthdays- Arthur Conan Doyle (1859), Laurence Olivier (1907), Morrissey (1959), Novak Djokovic (1987)

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AJ Langer was born on this day in 1974, a few months behind me. She was the new girl in Kevin Arnold's class. What did she see in him???

https://youtu.be/S8VTf9E3E-s

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Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Infidel- "The only position that leaves me with no cognitive dissonance is atheism. It is not a creed. Death is certain, replacing both the siren-song of Paradise and the dread of Hell. Life on this earth, with all its mystery and beauty and pain, is then to be lived far more intensely: we stumble and get up, we are sad, confident, insecure, feel loneliness and joy and love. There is nothing more; but I want nothing more."

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Martin Amis- "What is the only provocation that could bring about the use of nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. What is the priority target for nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. What is the only established defense against nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. How do we prevent the use of nuclear weapons? By threatening to use nuclear weapons. And we can't get rid of nuclear weapons, because of nuclear weapons."

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Kit Carson left us on this day in 1868. His last words:

"I just wish I had time for one more bowl of chili."

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LGBTQ Nation- Transgender kids’ brains resemble their gender identity, not their biological sex

https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2018/05/transgender-kids-brains-resemble-gender-identity-not-biological-sex/

May 22, 2018

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IFLScience- This Is Probably Why You Believe In Conspiracy Theories

Do you misunderstand probabilities, hate uncertainty, and want to find an explanation for unlikely events?

http://www.iflscience.com/brain/this-is-probably-why-you-believe-in-conspiracy-theories/

May 22, 2018

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Dolly Parton- Dumb Blonde

https://youtu.be/D7sfxPyicDI

In Ken Burns' Country Music documentary, someone referred to her voice as spine-tingling.

May 22, 2020

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ABC News- Man Arrested in Wife’s Murder Now Accused of Voting for Trump in Her Name

Quite a cost to learning some lessons. If you want to kill your wife, and also want her to vote for Trump, you have to wait until AFTER the election.

https://www.newsandguts.com/link/abc-news-man-arrested-in-wifes-murder-now-accused-of-voting-for-trump-in-her-name/

May 22, 2021

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AV Club- John Steinbeck wrote a violent werewolf mystery novel and no one will let us read it

I thought I had read all of John Steinbeck's books... but I guess I missed the werewolf one! Excellent last paragraph of this article:

"But while we would love to finally dip into this slightly more lurid spin on My Travels With Charley, Steinbeck’s literary agents won’t budge, on the grounds that he almost certainly would not have wanted them to—since he wrote Full Moon under a pseudonym, and never tried to get it published again after he became world famous. Which is all well and good, but we would like to offer up the following counterpoint to this well-reasoned call for decorum: C’mon. Release the John Steinbeck werewolf book! The burgeoning field of werewolf literature needs this."

https://news.avclub.com/john-steinbeck-wrote-a-violent-werewolf-mystery-novel-a-1846948076

May 22, 2021

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Oscar Wilde- "Conformity is the last refuge of the unimaginative."

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Norman Mailer, Harlot's Ghost- "Sometimes I think our future existence will depend on whether we can keep false information from proliferating too rapidly. If our power to verify the facts does not keep pace, then distortions of information will eventually choke us."

I just found this book in a Little Library. The reviews were not good. Goodreads to not have many quotes from it, not a good sign. This one stood out though. It's reminiscent of the Trump era, obviously, but also of the recent supposed advances in AI. 

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Stephen Jay Gould- "We are here because one odd group of fishes had a peculiar fin anatomy that could transform into legs for terrestrial creatures; because the earth never froze entirely during an ice age; because a small and tenuous species, arising in Africa a quarter of a million years ago, has managed, so far, to survive by hook and by crook. We may yearn for a ‘higher answer’– but none exists."

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Agee- "As small, quick, foolproof cameras became generally available, moreover, the camera has been used so much and so flabbily by so many people that it has acted as a sort of contraceptive on the ability to see."

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Henry David Thoreau- "I heartily accept the motto, "That government is best which governs least"; and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe — "That government is best which governs not at all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have. Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient."

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David Hume- "All knowledge degenerates into probability."

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Ralph Waldo Emerson- "Fear always springs from ignorance.

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Albert Einstein- "Life is a preparation for the future; and the best preparation for the future is to live as if there were none."

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Balzac- "Every moment of happiness requires a great amount of ignorance."

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John Stuart Mill- "I have learned to seek my happiness by limiting my desires, rather than in attempting to satisfy them."

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I'll leave this post with the words of the poet Langston Hughes, who left a note unsaid on this day in 1967.

"Life is for the living.

Death is for the dead.

Let life be like music.

And death a note unsaid."

Addendum

Carl Sagan:

"My parents died years ago. I was very close to them. I still miss them terribly. I know I always will. I long to believe that their essence, their personalities, what I loved so much about them, are - really and truly - still in existence somewhere. I wouldn't ask very much, just five or ten minutes a year, say, to tell them about their grandchildren, to catch them up on the latest news, to remind them that I love them. There's a part of me - no matter how childish it sounds - that wonders how they are. "Is everything all right?" I want to ask. The last words I found myself saying to my father, at the moment of his death, were "Take care."

"Sometimes I dream that I'm talking to my parents, and suddenly - still immersed in the dreamwork - I'm seized by the overpowering realization that they didn't really die, that it's all been some kind of horrible mistake. Why, here they are, alive and well, my father making wry jokes, my mother earnestly advising me to wear a muffler because the weather is chilly. When I wake up I go through an abbreviated process of mourning all over again. Plainly, there's something within me that's ready to believe in life after death. And it's not the least bit interested in whether there's any sober evidence for it.

"So I don't guffaw at the woman who visits her husband's grave and chats him up every now and then, maybe on the anniversary of his death. It's not hard to understand. And if I have difficulties with the ontological status of who she's talking to, that's all right. That's not what this is about. This is about humans being human."