Hiatus

I am just here to tell you all that I am taking a brief pause from my blog. The reason why I am taking a break from this is because I need some time to think a few things in my life over and catch up in some work I've forgotten to do. I will update this sometime in the next week.

We Are All Players

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side,
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
--William Shakespeare

Don't, Won't, Can't Stop The Beat

With all the new technology based around music, it's hard not to notice the impact it has made on our generation. Or to be more correct, it is hard not to notice the impact our generation has made on music.

One of the best ways of understanding a certain period of time in man is to analyze the music of the period. The music produced directly relates to the type of society at the time. A few examples are how the religious chants of Churches reflected the Dark Ages, how opera related to the Renaissance, and how rock and roll defined the 1950s. The types of music you are subjected to as a child influences the type of music you will prefer as you mature. This is a possible explanation of why most of our fathers prefer country or rock and roll over new age and contemporary music.

We encounter music every day in our lives. But rarely we stop to think about how it affects us. Music is one of the most powerful factors to our mood, it can make us emotional, angry, sad, sleepy, or make us want to dance. Music has also been proven to make us better at our job or crazier at the wheel depending on the type of music. But with current technology giving us 24 hour access to music, we grow accustomed to the constant input of music. In some cases we become addicted to it, needing it to pass the time. And with the ever evolving devices being created, it is not a challenge to meet that need.

We all have our taste in music, whether you are a country fan or an goth person, there are thousands of bands in the world to supply us with all the digitized music we need.

Memento Mori

Fear of death is the universal link that all organisms have in common. We all want to survive and live on.

Death has a way of turning brave men fearful, of turning lunatics sane, and of turning impious people religious. It is also because of death that we take precautions and avoid unnecessary risks, it is also why we become supersticious and why we would turn to Religion in times of trouble. The actual nature of death is inevitable, we all will die at some time or another. But we should not treat death as if it were a demon or a devil. Death closely follows life, like the sun follows the moon. You cannot have life without death. In order to truly embrace life and it's pleasures, you must first embrace death and it's reality. Once you come to terms with your own mortality, it will be as if you were liberated from an invisible captor. You will see the world in a whole new perspective, you will not be a slave to caution, you will be the surveyor of your soul. You will not be as frightened by the threat of your own death, you embrace and accept it as the nature of life.

Speaking from personal experiences, there have been 3 times in my life were I was absolutely certain I was about to die. The first time, when I thought I was going to die from an illness, after I recovered I started to plan the rest of my life as I needed, planning all the accomplishments I hoped to achieve. After the second time, I almost fell out of a train, I took it upon myself to come to terms with my mortality and embrace the fact of death. And the final time, too personal to share, I reconnected with a childhood friend.

People will have different and varied opinions about death, some will fight it to the end others will take it upon themselves. But no matter what your opinion may be, it is still a universal truth that we will all die sometime and someplace. Memento Mori.

Also, I appologize for the late entry. I've been having a busy week and it's hard to make time for this.

This Ain't A Scene

The first thing man did in it's history of organized society was to harness and create technology. The second thing man did after that was use that technology to destroy his fellow man.

The evolution of military technology can be described in a way very similar to a plague or epidemic. Say for example, Country A makes advancements in technology, that technology may also be applicable for military aspects. Because of this, if Country A uses that military advantage on, let's say, Country B, Country B is now in a state of impending destruction. If Country B does not adapt it's own technology to meet Country A's technology, then Country B can be assured that eventually it will be destroyed. Because of this fact, the development of better, faster, stronger, and more destructive weapons will continue among all organized societies of man. For those with some historical knowledge, the Cold War should be coming to mind.

The Cold War was the carbon copy example of the above, only on a globally destructive scale. As Russia developed new nuclear weapons, America had to quickly bridge the gap, and visa versa. Because of all this confusion, the entire globe was in a state of fear for a good portion of the century.

Now technology generally has two sides to it, a positive side and a negative. Let's take nuclear technology for example. Negative side-Most destructive weapon ever built in the history of Man. Positive side-Holds the secret to creating vasts amounts of cheap and feasible energy. So while most of us see the Bomb side of this, there is a good side to it. Because of this, technology will advance in war and peace times.

A famous actor in a bright red suit once said "With great power comes great responsibility". As corny as that sounds, that holds true with the example of Man and it's technology. If we, as a population, can learn to control our technology and utilize it for the good of all mankind we will advance as a world with no equal. All we need is some control.

Credit for picture goes to ~3-a-p-a-3-a at http://3-a-p-a-3-a.deviantart.com/

In The Eye Of The Beholder

They say that beauty is a ticket to an easier life, that if you are handsome or sexy people will treat you better than someone considered homely or ugly. Much to my disappointment, this is true in life, at least to some degree.

Aesthetics are said to be both subjective and hereditary. In other words, we are both born with a certain attraction to a certain type of person and we also have our own individual attraction that we create either through action in our childhood or random fetishes that spawn through our subconsciousness. Either way, there is a trend that can be seen in these attractions. This trend is not a random occurrence, it is directly linked to Darwinism. To name some examples, men prefer women with large breasts to women with smaller breasts because having large breasts is a sign of fertility. Another example is how women prefer tall men to shorter men because tall men are generally stronger than shorter men. But this is only half the story, the other half is a bit more....complicated.

Beyond this first explanation of attraction, there is another version in which attraction is formed through peer pressure, tradition, and ritual. In modern day society, you can easily see how a perception of beauty is thrown on to us from the media. You see it in magazines, television, Internet, basically anywhere advertisement permits. It is this constant input onto us that almost brainwashes us into thinking that this type of person is beautiful while this type isn't. To name other forms of this, Chinese foot binding was once an act that was considered extremely beautiful. The smaller the foot, the more attractive the women. While this idea is less accepted today in modern society, it was once very prominent. What makes this type of attraction more complicated than the former type is the fact that this type of attraction is not procreation oriented. The fact is, the attraction between the sexes was originally for the sole purpose of begetting offspring and reproducing, but as these examples have shown, this type of attraction is in some cases harmful to reproduction.

That's about all I have to say about the aesthetics between the genders, I will cover the philosophy of beauty another day. Sorry if that was a bit wordy.

A Rat Race

Ever turn on the news when an election was nearing? Ever notice how politicians just squirm and beg just for your vote? Some going so far as to make ludicrous promises, lie and deceive the voters, and bend or break the law.

I would just like to show you something I found quite humorous about politics:

Poli-tics (pol-ee-tics)

Poly, meaning many.
Ticks, meaning bloodsucking organism

It is just my opinion, but I believe that current politics and politicians have have declined so much so as to cause more harm to the world than good. A politician is supposed to be someone who's job it is to serve the public and have their best interest at heart. But now, politicians are more concerned with their popularity with voters than doing what is right. Politicians rarely do more than their quota, often just performing lip service to their jobs. It has gotten so that I have almost expelled politics from my interests. And while what I am saying may just be an over generalization of true politics, much of it still remains valid.

Modern politicians have become almost obsessed with just receiving public approval, so much so that they do long term damage to solve short term problems, just because they know they won't have to deal with it. I won't name modern or past examples, but you can probably guess what I am talking about. While a complete government change is obviously out of the question, I think politicians need to change their political convictions to the government's and peoples' sakes, even at the cost of their own political career.

But because people in general are selfish, they often sacrifice their values for the sake of their own personal gain. This is a reason why people need to vote. In order better the government that runs their country, people need to be politically active.

Some Quotes You May Like

Here are just some quotes you may or may not find interesting.
"Happiness is the interval between periods of unhappiness."
- Don Marquis

"The truth is incontrovertible. Panic may resent it, ignorance may deride it, malice may distort it, but there it is."

- Winston Churchill

"Do what you can, with what you have, where you are."

- Theodore Roosevelt

"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." - Henry David Thoreau
"The unexamined life is not worth living." - Socrates

"All humanity is sick. I come therefore to you as a physician who has diagnosed this universal disease and is prepared to cure it." - Buddha

Divide And Falter

They say that mankind is a species that lives to categorize itself and the things around us. We categorize nature, places, things, but more than anything else, we categorize ourselves. Weather it be in politics(Liberals and Democrats) or education(Freshmen and Seniors) or in our careers(Desk Jockey and Managers), ultimately we give a name or label to basically everything we encounter.

Now this categorization is essential to the organization of our lives, yes, but when these labels become so commonplace as to define the person, that is when individuality is compromised. We've all experienced some of this, whether it be a stereotype or a name we give ourselves. When it comes right down to it, many people give up their individuality and purposely live up to fulfill the labels given them. There are many examples of this: Immigrants traveling to America to live the "American Dream", Businessmen placing professionalism over moral instinct, children living up to the "punk" or "rebel" fan base. The list goes on and on.

The sad part about this is how many of us shape our future to fit one of these labels. Whether it be to grow up and be a successful and rich business man, or grow up and raise many children as a perfect mother, or even just grow up and become a rock star, these labels influence almost every action in our lives whether we are aware of it or not.

In order to make decisions from our own mind we must realize what has been influencing it. Try and think of what your life goal is, then ask yourself this: Is that your goal in life?

Buy One, Get One Free!

Ever feel like you're being suffocated? Like everywhere you go, you are surrounded to the neck? Like there is no escape?

Recently I have taken stock to what I encounter most in my daily life. And with people a far second, I realize that I have been inundated with advertisement. Everywhere I go I am subjected to message after message of advertisements I apparently cannot live without. Everything from the television to the sky is filled with brainwashing messages urging me to go out and spend some money on some mass produced trinket that will enlighten my life. It's gotten to me so bad that I am feeling an urge to leave it all behind and live a life of shamanism.

Now I probably sound like a crazed teen trying to "stick it to the man", and I probably am one of those(At least for some parts of me). But I realized that all this advertisement, all this spam, all this subliminal messaging, it is all necessary to the world's economy. It is a necessary evil we all must live with if we all wish to advance our culture. If we do nothing to help the economy wheels to turn, they will slow down and stop.

But I still felt like I was being surrounded. So to combat this, I have come up with a few simple ideas to help myself(and anyone reading) to get out of the sea of advertisement:
1-Try counting how many things for sale are absolutely necessary to your or your loved ones' lives.
2-Try and get rid of all the possessions surrounding you until you have the bare necessities. Or at least try and get some things out.
3-Rip up, burn, or otherwise destroy a dollar bill. You will be surprised at how it makes you feel.(Don't do this in front of any federal agents, it is a crime after all)
4-Take a retreat to the mountains, woods, beach, ocean or anywhere in nature that is free from man's "touch". (You may have a little problem locating such a place, but it does exist)
5-Laugh off the advertisements. Laughing is good for you anyways, and it will brighten your day.

Well that's about it for today, I hope next time you're drowning in an ocean of advertisements, you at least have a life jacket on. SEND A LINK TO THIS BLOG TO YOUR FRIENDS, FAMILY, AND GENERAL STRANGERS YOU MEET ON THE STREET!

-Derrick

Lucky Coin

I was fiddling with my lucky coin yesterday when a thought entered my head: What is luck?

Thinking more about this I concluded that luck is just another term for fate. Say for example, you break a mirror. According to luck and superstition, you are fated to have 7 years of bad luck. If you were to find a penny, you would be destined to have good luck for the rest of the day. I came to think that luck was just man's way of accepting fate without bringing up the concept of religion, a guiltless compromise. Then again I thought that, possibly, all luck was just derived from tradition and ritual, like something our parents fed on to us to help us understand the world when we were young, but then confuse us as we got older.

The more I thought about the existence of luck, the more I doubted it. "How could walking under a simple ladder bring about misfortune in the future?" I asked myself. "For what reason would any actions in the 'now' affect the 'latter' beyond the normal consequences?" "Is luck just a random coincidence?"

When I finally came to a conclusion, I felt that if there was such a thing as Fate, then there would have to be such a thing as luck, but only under the guise as what naturally occurs in our society with extremely good or bad actions being the exception. And if Fate is nonexistent, then so must be luck....and for most religions for that matter.

Then as I realized what I was doing with my lucky coin, I dropped it. I searched and searched, but I couldn't find it. "Maby if I'm lucky, it will turn up eventually."

-Derrick

First Post

Well, this is my first attempt at a blog. For those few who are seeing this, this blog is dedicated to anyone who values academics over athletics. I will talk and instruct you all from topics from philosophy to meditation to doorknobs. It's my blog isn't it?

So for now I will keep all this a little short and, until I get the kinks worked out, the update schedule will be whenever I feel like it.