Tangents

[REDWAVE]

All that I know for sure is that my perceptions exist. It appears that I am an insignificant, fragile organism dwarfed by an enormous (perhaps even infinite), indifferent universe. Other people and things appear to me to exist, also.

I am worried about uncountable infinity, and it seems my heart has become tangled in a Klein bottle. The more I attempt to understand my own mind, the more it eludes me. It also seems like the more I reach out to other people, the farther I become from them.

Most of all I feel the heavy weight of my own mortality. How will the universe go on without me? But it seems to me the universe will probably go on very well without me, and after a while it will be as if I never was. I stare out the window, and think about the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

So how was your day?

 

[Angeline]

I was listening

Yep you're right the universe will go on without us and we are fragile and insignificant ultimately. But on the other hand, the universe also produced Picasso, William Butler Yeats, Lester Young, etc., etc.

Go listen to Billie Holiday sing Fine and Mellow or read some poetry. If all else fails, go to sleep. These feelings wax and wane, you know.

Hug and sweet dreams.





HEAR ME>> http://www.pagoo.com/signature/eosd22

 

[Senna Jawa]

non-existence

About the time I first went to a kindergarten I also had learned that everybody has to die. My parents had to die, myself, my only grandma. The knowledge about death was like an incurable toothache. Sometimes it would go away but it would not leave me alone for long. After a while the aches became less and less frequent. Then, when I was twelve the ache came back but in a different form. Bigger than a toothache. One sunny day, like every school day, after classes, I was going from the school to the bus stop, oblivious to the surrounding. For months and for weeks and during this walk I tried again and again to learn my own non-existence. Many times I was close. I was embedding myself in blackness and nothingness. I would nearly faint. Possibly I did faint on occasions. It was so horrible that each time at the last moment I would somehow come back. Then my heart would bang like a bell against the ribs, it hurt, untill my breathing would get restored slowly back to normal.

This time I got deeper than ever. The warm wall of the apartment building on my right, which I almost touched, didn't exist. The sidewalk, and the bush to the left of it, didn't exist... Only blackness and nothingness... Then a heavy explosion and the Hell broke out loud, Loud, LOUD ... I didn't exist, neither the bushes, the building, nor other people on the busy sidewalk... LOUD LOUD... no glimse of light, complete darkness, absolute.

I don't know how long this loud nothingness lasted. I did come back. I stood in an open first floor window, but outside of course. The windows in that building were opening out, not in. The explosion from an eternity ago had happened when I banged my head against the incoming, sticking out window frame. Somehow I got past it (without breaking any glass). And now a small, vicious dog, straining toward me from the window sill, was barking like possesed straight into my ear.

 

[smithpeter]

open another one of those bottles

I heard recently that the Victorian's covered piano legs because they were perceived as being naughty. Can this be true?
Oh well, stuff marches on.

and then there's http://www.secondlaw.com/

 

[WickedEve]

sp, I'm sure you'll be reincarnated and come back as a Jell-o mold, or a no U turn sign, or my next dildo.

Red, I think we're all victims of a enormous practical joke. Punchline: "You really thought you were going to get to hang around forever and be part of this swell thing called life? Get out of here! No, really. Get out of here now. Your time's up."

 

[lickmyboot]

and then there's http://www.secondlaw.com/

f'in brilliant!

 

[Rybka]

I am worried about uncountable infinity, and it seems my heart has become tangled in a Klein bottle. The more I attempt to understand my own mind, the more it eludes me. It also seems like the more I reach out to other people, the farther I become from them.

The Space Child's Mother Goose
Frederick Windsor - 1958

Three jolly sailors from Blaydon-on-Tyne
Went to sea in a bottle by Klein.
Since the sea was entirely inside the hull
The scenery seen was exceedingly dull.

*******

Flappity, Floppity, Flip!
The Mouse on the Mobius strip.
The Strip revolved,
The Mouse dissolved
in a chronodimensional skip.

*******

Embryonic, zoonic
Tectonic, cyclonic
We humans are never humane.
Explosion, erosion,
Corrosion, implosion -
And back into Chaos again!


Regards,                 Rybka

 

[Star At Sunrise]

If you can't laugh at death, what CAN you laugh at?

 

[Suzi]

All that I know for sure is that my perceptions exist. It appears that I am an insignificant, fragile organism dwarfed by an enormous (perhaps even infinite), indifferent universe. Other people and things appear to me to exist, also.

I am worried about uncountable infinity, and it seems my heart has become tangled in a Klein bottle. The more I attempt to understand my own mind, the more it eludes me. It also seems like the more I reach out to other people, the farther I become from them.

Most of all I feel the heavy weight of my own mortality. How will the universe go on without me? But it seems to me the universe will probably go on very well without me, and after a while it will be as if I never was. I stare out the window, and think about the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

So how was your day?

Wow! When you think, you really THINK! :O

 

[karmadog]

Hmmm, philosophical discussions about being and nothingness, huh?

Why do I have a craving for an orange?

 

[Suzi]

hehehehheheheheh

Hmmm, philosophical discussions about being and nothingness, huh?

Why do I have a craving for an orange?

well I hate to disappoint the philosophers..but I am not craving oranges, or logic.....

 

[REDWAVE]

Have an orange, K-dog!

I enjoyed reading everyone's responses. I'm gratified this thread generated so many replies: I wasn't sure anyone would answer!

If there is a God, I'm sure he/she/it is a "trickster god" like Coyote in the native American mythos. God is at the very least a practical joker, if not a mean, malevolent, cruel torturer of a god. . . Fortunately for me, I don't believe in God. I don't even think the word "God" has any meaning!

There's a great passage in Catch 22 by Joseph Heller where Yossarian and his girlfriend argue about God. Neither of them believes in God, but they almost come to blows over the nature of the God they don't believe in. His girlfriend doesn't believe in a kind, good, loving God. Yossarian doesn't believe in a mean, vicious, spiteful, hateful God.

I can relate to that.

 

[REDWAVE]

Suzi

I'm craving some smoked sausage right now myself.

 

[REDWAVE]

Mr. Death

Well, since this is a poetry board, I guess I should post one actual poem. This one is somewhat atypical for me in that it rhymes:


I like to flirt with Mr. Death
His bride someday I'll be
Or rather, he will rape and torture
And pillage and mutilate me

He'll tear the veil from my face
To let the maggots in
The nihilistic snort of glee
The skeletons will grin

And not just me, but all of us
Will be severed from our world
You can pile up honors, riches, power
None of it's worth a turd

I like to flirt, but not too close
I whirl him back against the wall
He will be no charming seducer
When finally he comes to call

--November 25, 1998

 

[HomerPindar]

It appears my perceptions percieved an obsession:
is the reality of reeling to this reel real?
or mearly a real perception of reality being percieved as reeling?
I really shouldn't obsess of the reality of this reeling reel -really,
the room only spins when I'm laying down

Hereby combining a request for live poetry and philosophy simulataniously.

HomerPindar

 

[REDWAVE]

More tangents

Very good, HP!

A left hand glove could be put on the right hand, if it were turned around in the fourth dimension. At least that's what Wittgenstein said. There are stones that have no name-- Richard Montague.

Some people think Godel's Theorem shows the human mind can never completely understand itself. The very attempt to do so throws it into endless, futile tail-chasing. Well, I don't know about that, but Godel's Theorem is a very important milestone in the history of thought, and it sure aggravated the hell out of David Hilbert. What do you think about it, karmadog?

I imagine you're an expert at tail-chasing!

 

[Rybka]

Don't Bring Ludwig Into Topology!

RW wrote:

A left hand glove could be put on the right hand, if it were turned around in the fourth dimension. At least that's what Wittgenstein said.

That statement has nothing to do with reality. Topology will show that other dimensions are not necessary to change a right to a left handed anything!

Where did L.W. say this? It sounds more like the repudiated Tractatus than the Philosophical Investigations, the brown or blue books, or the later notes. - "Philosophische Problemen philosophischen entstehen, wenn der Sprache Feiurt."

Regards,                 Rybka

 

[karmadog]

All I know is that if you store a wet glove in a dry room for six months, it won't fit OJ.

Philosophy is just an excellent way of not getting laid by the cute girls.

What Macchiavelli knew that the supposed smart kids didn't was this: If seeming smart is getting you nowhere, be smart and act less smart. (Translated from the Italian by babelfish, so it may not be 100% accurate)

I was a smart kid getting no play so I went to a party school and fucked my way through ten years of college. I learned a lot.

Now tell me, what is the use of worrying about death? Or the nature of God (I hope you won't be meeting him anytime soon)? Why do bad things happen to good people? Because bad things happen to everybody. The 'good' just whine about it more.

Which came first, the chicken or the egg? The egg. Chicken's evolved from dinosaurs that laid eggs. There is always a simpler answer than you think.

Remember that the dog worries about none of those questions, yet does everything purposefully.

 

[REDWAVE]

When the dog's away, the cats will play. O keep the dog far hence, that's friend to man-- or with his nails he'll dig it up again!

I've always been a working class dog.