Permanently Impermanent
Memento Mori- “Remember you must die."
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This Sam Harris podcast on the philosopher Derek Parfit is fantastic. Parfit had raised all these interesting questions. We want to save future generations from global warming, but the people we want to save don't exist yet. If we do something drastic to interrupt it... this is where it gets weird... if we do something drastic like eliminating airplanes, the future will be different than it would have been, and the people who would have existed with global warming, will no longer be the people living in the future.
So who would we be saving? We could only save the people who would have existed if we didn't do anything. Bizarre.
It's like if we went back and eliminated trains in the 1800's, enough things would have been different that perhaps nobody alive now would exist. Different people would be in our places.
Sam took it a step further. If Hitler never existed, would any of us be alive? My grandfather fought in World War II, and had he not, my father would have likely not existed. Maybe my grandparents would have had a different kid at a different time. Even if the same exact person was born, enough things would be different in the world that the rest of his life couldn't possibly follow through the way it did. So no Hitler, no me?
This is exactly the type of thing I think about all day!
https://www.samharris.org/podcasts/making-sense-episodes/321-reckoning-with-parfit
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All right, this Trump-boat-shark thing has unfortunately captured my imagination. It's like an adult version of Would You Rather.
Ben- Hey Trump, would you rather eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with slugs in it, or stick your hand in a hungry tarantula's cage for 10 minutes?
Trump- Slugs. Would you rather sink on an electric boat and get electrocuted, or potentially jump past the electric current, over near a shark 10 yards away? Nobody ever asks this question, and it must because of MIT, my relationship to MIT. Very smart.
Ben- I'll take my chances with the boat, plus you didn't say what kind of shark. Only three kinds of shark pose any real threat. And also, you could have put your hand in the tarantula cage but just kept it away from the tarantula. These are the kind of things I think about, but I don't think it proves I'm smart.
Trump- You're right. It proves you are a genius.
Did I say it's like an adult version of Would You Rather? Sorry. It's still like the kids version.
June 14, 2024
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Rodney Dangerfield- "I don't get no respect. I told my psychiatrist I got suicidal tendencies. He said from now on I have to pay in advance."
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News is the new comedy.
Reich- "Let me get this straight: It's patriotic to salute a North Korean general who's part of a brutal dictatorial regime that murders its people and aims nuclear missiles at America, but it's not patriotic to kneel during the national anthem to protest police brutality in America?"
June 14, 2018
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We found the graves of of Edwin and Mary Ann Fetter... or rather Gretel found them all by herself. (Maybe with some suggestive hints from me.) They are my great-grandma's great-grandparents. Edwin was a Civil War veteran... fighting for the correct side, which is always the hope! They are only 2 of only 3 of my 64 great-great-great-great grandparents buried outside of Lancaster County, and they are buried maybe 3 miles outside.
June 14, 2020
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Hey everyone, the president posted a happy birthday card for himself and wants you to sign it... you know, like everyone does on their birthday.
"I want to remember all of the great Americans who wished me a happy birthday! Help me celebrate by signing your name on my card!"
https://bit.ly/2l7pxZg
Hahaha, what a loser! Please, please sign my birthday card. A grown man! Correction, a physically grown man. Have some self-respect, dude.
June 14, 2018
Postscript- this scumbag was thrust upon us on this day in 1946, 145 years to the day after the death of Benedict Arnold.
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Boy George was born on Trump's 15th birthday.
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Today I saw a guy who was jogging while wearing a leather hat. What must have gone wrong in his past to bring him to that moment?
June 14, 2015
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I got home early from racquetball tonight and told Emma that I might have either torn an abdominal muscle or sprained my spine. She seemed amused and excitedly asked if I screamed when it happened.
June 14, 2014
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Emma made miso soup from scratch, and me so impressed.
June 14, 2014
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Great news: I tried to go out the in-door at Lowe's as it opened...it bashed me in the head and my neck is kinda sore! My well's come in, cha-ching! #americandream
June 14, 2014
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Got kicked in the face by a baby this morning... well, a fetus... a half-baby. Whatever you call it, it was great.
June 14, 2013
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When I decided to read Infinite Jest I didn't realize it was 1000 pages long. I'm daunted.
June 14, 2011
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Lolita was released on this day in 1962. It's tagline, "How will they make a movie out of Lolita???"
Good question. My favorite passage, not included.
"Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta. She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita. Did she have a precursor? She did, indeed she did. In point of fact, there might have been no Lolita at all had I not loved, one summer, an initial girl-child. In a princedom by the sea. Oh when? About as many years before Lolita was born as my age was that summer. You can always count on a murderer for a fancy prose style. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, exhibit number one is what the seraphs, the misinformed, simple, noble-winged seraphs, envied. Look at this tangle of thorns."
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The German occupation of Paris began on this day in 1940, starting a chain of events that caused millions of America, not yet born at the time, to feel personally responsible for it's liberation.
The first inmates of the Auschwitz concentration camp entered it's gates, also on this day in 1940.
One day someone would carve on one of the walls- "If there is a god, he'll have to beg for my forgiveness."
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Albert Einstein- "If my theory of relativity is proven successful, Germany will claim me as a German and France will declare me a citizen of the world. Should my theory prove untrue, France will say that I am a German, and Germany will declare that I am a Jew."
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On this day in 1954, Dwight Eisenhower signed a bill into law that places the words "under God" into the United States Pledge of Allegiance. For as far back as I can remember, anytime I said it I left it out.
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On this day in 2002, Near-Earth asteroid 2002 MN missed the Earth by 75,000 miles, about one-third of the distance between the Earth and the Moon.
If it had struck the Earth, the damage would have rivaled that of the Tunguska event of 1908, which leveled over 800 sq miles of trees in Siberia.
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Burl Ives between us on this day in 1909. This is not his song, but he made it his own.
Big Rock Candy Mountain
One evening as the sun went down
And the jungle fires were burning
Down the track came a hobo hiking
And he said, "Boys, I'm not turning
I'm headed for a land that's far away
Besides the crystal fountains
So come with me, we'll go and see
The Big Rock Candy Mountains
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
There's a land that's fair and bright
Where the handouts grow on bushes
And you sleep out every night
Where the boxcars all are empty
And the sun shines every day
And the birds and the bees
And the cigarette trees
The lemonade springs
Where the bluebird sings
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
All the cops have wooden legs
And the bulldogs all have rubber teeth
And the hens lay soft-boiled eggs
The farmers' trees are full of fruit
And the barns are full of hay
Oh I'm bound to go
Where there ain't no snow
Where the rain don't fall
The winds don't blow
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
You never change your socks
And the little streams of alcohol
Come trickling down the rocks
The brakemen have to tip their hats
And the railway bulls are blind
There's a lake of stew
And of whiskey too
You can paddle all around it
In a big canoe
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
The jails are made of tin
And you can walk right out again
As soon as you are in
There ain't no short-handled shovels
No axes, saws nor picks
I'm bound to stay
Where you sleep all day
Where they hung the jerk
That invented work
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
I'll see you all this coming fall
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
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Ernesto "Che" Guevara joined us on this day in 1928. From The Motorcycle Diaries:
“What do we leave behind when we cross each frontier? Each moment seems split in two; melancholy for what was left behind and the excitement of entering a new land.”
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Essayist G. K. Chesterton left us on this day in 1936. One could spend a day just reading his quotes. Here's a ridiculous one, and his second most popular on goodreads:
"Poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese."
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German tennis player, Steffi Graf, was born on this day in 1969. Were her grandparents Nazis? I can't help wondering!
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Other notable birthdays- Giglio Gregorio Giraldi (1479), Diablo Cody (1978), Alois Alzheimer (1864)
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Another notable deathday- Harriet Beecher Stowe (1911)
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A powerhouse quote from Conan O'Brien, "There are few things more liberating in this life than having your worst fear realized."
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Neil deGrasse Tyson said that if tiny aliens would visit Earth they might think it's the Planet of the Tardigrades.
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"When we make this illegal, we are just talking about making it unsafe. Because I would have done anything to get an abortion. I would have gone to a back alley if I had needed to. I believe it is my obligation as a mother to do whatever I can to make a terrible situation [for my children] better. I did that for my daughter. I resent it very much when politicians try to force me to carry a very sick baby to term and watch her die a slow and tortured death just because it fits their – and not my – religious sensibilities."
http://www.plannedparenthoodaction.org/issues/abortion-access/20-week-ban/20-week-abortion-ban-personal-stories/
June 14, 2015
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On this day in 1949, monkeys won the space race versus the humans.
June 14, 2015
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Room in Brooklyn by Edward Hopper
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Mother Jones, June 14, 2017- Trump Is Being Investigated For Obstruction of Justice, Says Washington Post
We know Trump, we know... the real crime is that someone leaked it. He'd say the same thing if the story broke that he just shot someone of 5th Avenue. The real crime would be all the witnesses reporting what they saw.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/06/the-washington-post-just-published-a-report-that-trump-is-being-investigated-for-obstruction-of-justice/
June 14, 2017
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The Hill, June 12, 2018- Trump: If I was wrong about Kim, ‘I’ll find some kind of an excuse’
He tells so many lies that when he tells the truth about his own deception it's almost refreshing.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/391774-trump-if-i-was-wrong-about-kim-ill-find-some-kind-of-an-excuse
Jun 14, 2018, 7:58 AM
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Huffington Post, June 14, 2018- Sarah Huckabee Sanders Cites Bible As Reason To Detain Immigrant Children
Oh for Christ's sake!
http://huffp.st/hlwYGZI
June 14, 2018
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Alternet, June 14, 2020- Should we be concerned that Trump needs 2 hands to drink a glass of water?
Imagine for a second that Biden went to drink from a glass of water, but then it appeared he could no longer lift it! And then he needed a second hand to guide it to his mouth! What would Trump have to say about that??? I don't think it's important, but it's weird!
https://www.alternet.org/2020/06/should-we-be-concerned-that-trump-needs-2-hands-to-drink-a-glass-of-water/
June 14, 2020
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Top 10 perfect movies, by Reddit
Back to the Future, No Country for Old Men, Star Wars: A New Hope, Princess Bride, Hot Fuzz, Memento, The Matrix, 12 angry Men, The Prestige, Texas Chainsaw Massacre
https://collider.com/perfect-movies-reddit/#39-the-prestige-39-2006
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Olaf- Do you ever worry about the notion that nothing is permanent?
Yes Olaf, I actually worry about that all the time. You might say I'm obsessed with that fact. Thanks for asking Olaf.
June 14, 2020
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Osamu Dazai- "People talk of “social outcasts.” The words apparently denote the miserable losers of the world, the vicious ones, but I feel as though I have been a “social outcast” from the moment I was born. If ever I meet someone society has designated as an outcast, I invariably feel affection for him, an emotion which carries me away in melting tenderness."
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Jung- "People don't have ideas. Ideas have people."
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Dylan:
"Democracy don’t rule the world,
You’d better get that in your head,
This world is ruled by violence,
But I guess that’s better left unsaid."
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