So they got married and lived hapilly ever after

Back by popular demand here is the latest Thoughts editorial.

Today I'd like to stream a little about mating. No not sex in particular, but selecting and staying with "that special someone". Some of you already know my view about love (I might post my argument from Long Beach Philosophy about love as an illusion later for those who are unclear). But my first post about free will should explains it also. Essentially love is just what we call the biological drive to mate and procreate. The only reason we experience this sensation of love is to ensure that life goes on. Still with me? Good. Now, I like to imagine what life would be like if we were all robots. That is to say, not having an organic body that is hindered by the need for sleep, food, and sex. I think you can see where Im heading with this. If there's no need for sex, then does the whole monogamous (and even polygamous) mating thing fall apart? I'm probably making this more difficult than it needs to be, but my whole point is why do we mate? Why do we marry?

For as long as I can remember it seems that society has deemed marriage (or at least mating for life) as something everyone needs to forever be seeking. Teens are encouraged to date and beyond that you need to be always seeking your soul mate. That special someone that you have to spend the rest of your life with. That special person of the opposite gender (I would like clarify again that I am not sexually attracted to men, and if you recall I'm actually trying to kill my sex drive). Why does your one-and-only have to be of the other sex? If there is anything that I took away from my philosophy classes at Long Beach its that I need to think for myself and analyze why I believe the things I do. In this case, mating and marriage. Now you may say that marriage is a good thing to work towards because if it wasn't it would have been abandoned long ago. And rightly so. Studies have proven that time and time again married couples provide a batter environment for raising children. And thats great. I'm all for happiness and raising children in a good environment. However, my problem with marriage is that far too many people don't know why they strive to attain it. It seems like most people would say they do because its the normal thing to do.

I'm going to try to summarize and clarify a little now. But of course you probably won't agree if you don't follow the first premise.

Mind > Body (biology)
Sex depends on the body
Marriage (mating) is a direct product of sex
Therefore, mating is unnecessary.

Please note: This is just my own view and it is still in its infancy. I've only been toying with this for a few years now and I'm only twenty one. Things change, people change. This is where I'm at now.

Its just a matter of time

Sorry I didnt get around to writing a Thoughts monologue this week, but I've been busting my ass to finish my sculpture five days early because I'm leaving for Mexico in twenty minutes. So you probably wont hear too much from me til Monday night. What I am going to write about however is a major career concern of mine.

As you all should know by now, Im training to become a video game designer. Whats that? I'm on the top of the totem pole and tell the guys below me what to do. Its my job to plan out a game and see to it that all of my programmers and artists are working towards the same goal. I have a lot of good ideas that I want to implement and show the world but by biggest concern is that my unique and innovative ideas will have already been done by the time I have the resources to produce a big time game. Case in point recently: Mass Effect. This is a new game for the Xbox 360 coming out soon. Its a space shooter. Not really something I'm particularly interested in, but from cryptic statements from the producers, it seems that the game will offer a few distinct story arcs depending on a few key choices throughout the game. While this is nothing new, what they hinted at is that these decisions could carry over into the two planned sequels. I had been playing with this idea for a few years now and couldn't figure out why no one had done it yet. I guess it just takes time. Eventually everything will be done. I'm racing against the clock in an industry where I'm already behind.

However, I do have other (and better) ideas, but how long before someone beats me to them?

If it weren't for those meddling kids

I'm not a fan of Shrek. In my honest opinion its just not that great. The jokes are so-so, the animation looks like the Family Guy guys got a hold of it (actions are too fast), and the concept isn't as satirical as they want us to believe. Normally, I wouldn't have bothered to watch the third Shrek movie, but it happened to be playing on the way back from (or maybe it was to) China. I would just like to say that I've seen Scooby-Doo episodes with more original endings.

Free your mind...

This is another one of those topics that has a habit of branching rather quickly. Hopefully can stay focused without too many tangents.

How much control do we really have over ourselves? That isn't really a rhetorical question. You might expect that simply by asking that, I am implying that you think you have control but really you don't. But thats only half right. We actually don't have much control over ourselves, but some people are more aware of this than others. As you may recall from my first "Thoughts" post, our actions and thoughts are the result of trillions of calculable events that occur in our brains. Going a step up from atomic and subatomic interaction, we get to molecular and chemical interaction. In this case specifically, emotions. Emotions like love are not magic. If you are feeling depressed, its not because your dog just died, its because the chemicals in your body are interacting with your brain in such a way that makes you feel bad (see first Thoughts post for more info). Think about how you feel right now. You're probably calm and can think in a rational manner. This is your Default state. For the most part, the level of chemicals in your brain are overall average. However, get too much of any one chemical and suddenly rationality can go out the window. If some guy punches you in the nose and insults you, its very 'natural' to get angry and lash out in a way that you normally wouldn't. This is when your body takes over and pushes your Default state aside. The drive for sex is quite possibly the strongest emotion or state of mind that decimates normal behavior. As I've mentioned before, the basic meaning of life is to make more life. To reproduce. In order to ensure that life goes on, evolution has done a fantastic job of encoding everything living thing's DNA with the desire to make more of itself. This goes back to how the brain rewards us when we do things that keep us alive or spread our genes. Sex only feels good because if it didn't, life might not have gotten this far. And now here's my two cents about the whole thing. I hate my body. My body is just a car that my brain drives except that quite often my 'car' drives itself and my brain is almost powerless to stop it. I can't stand the fact that I don't have complete control over myself. To me, the mind is infinitely more important than the body. So maybe being a head in jar wouldn't be so bad. This is where the topic has a tendency to branch out. Consider this: what if everyone was just a brain in a jar with a mechanical body? Suddenly reproduction is irrelevant. Suddenly gender is irrelevant. Suddenly everyone is just a mind that is free to experience the world without evolution instilled dependencies like sex, eating, and sleep to hold us back.

I doubt in our lifetime (or probably anyone's lifetime) people will be able to transcend their physical bodies and escape these chains. However, I think I am getting a little closer to winning the battle over my body. I think that just being aware of how and why my body and emotions work, gives me power so that I can force control over myself. You may recall my recent abstinence vow. Its getting easier to stop myself from checking out every girl I see. Its a daily war but I think its starting to affect my subconscious and soon I won't even have to tell myself not to stare at the hot girl at the counter.

I feel kind of like I'm in the Matrix, but instead of being a slave to it I'm a slave to my emotions.

"I know what you're thinking... Why, oh why didn't I take the blue pill?"
~Cypther

Walking the line between genius and insanity

Sorry I havent updated in a while, I've been crazy busy lately. I've had barely any time to myself in the last two weeks or so. Who'd have thought that six classes would be so time consuming?

This Sunday I'm going to write my next "contemplations" piece but for right now I thought I would share my next big project with everyone and hopefully get some feedback. Remember back in elementary school when you would smear Elmer's Glue on your hand and then let it dry so you could peel it off like a layer of dead skin? Well I recently decided that I am going to cover the majority of my entire body in several layers of glue! You might be saying to yourself, "Thats just....insane". Precisely! My creativity teacher just gave us our next project in which we have to do something that an insane person would do. Something that in the service to a higher power, in this case art. However, this is just one of my ideas. The project isn't due for about five weeks so rather than do one project like most people, I'm planning on doing one per week as well as one on going project that I do everyday. Thus far I have the glue idea for sure (I'll go to class on the day everything is due covered in dry glue). I also want to do something with my video camera and projector. For example, setting up the camera in the hallway and feeding video to my projector which is outside and displaying the image on the wall so it looks like you can see through it. For the long term, I first considered saving five weeks worth of urine, but Howard Hughes already did it.

I think, therefor I am....kinda

This is one of the hardest topics for me to continually think about because its so easy to start thinking about all the related questions that it inevitably raises. Hopefully I can get through this without too many tangents. Its also really hard to convey the ideas.

Our memory, I've come to consciously believe, is one of the most important things in the history of things, second only to life. Whether you're aware of it or not, your memory is the biggest part of what makes you you. The other part being your genes. Those two things together make you what you are today. To get an idea of just how important memory is, consider two analogies. For Jimmy, image you've been using the same memory card for your all the video games you've ever played in your life. Then one day without warning, the memory card spontaneously combusts. Years of work. Gone. For the rest of you, imagine you have a the biggest paper of your life to write. Your entire future hinges on this one LONG essay/script. Now imagine that you can't save it. You have to write it continuously until its done. Then, just before you click Print, the power goes out and everything is lost. In the real world we call this amnesia. Its not the same as death since the body remains, but if you consider memory being such a big part of identity, its not going too far to say that its not much unlike death. It may seem callous to say that someone suffering something as terrible as amnesia is 'dead', but in the case of total amnesia you can't ignore that he or she is not the same person they were before. This is where it gets easy to branch off. Defining "death" becomes complicated. If dieing is the failing of the physical body, then what do we call it when someone's memory and identity (essentially what that person is) dies from amnesia? And then what of the person that remains? Its a strange thing to think about. A fully formed and 'used' body with a new memory. A new person.

Ok now for something a little more relevant to our daily lives. This little scenario always makes me a little uneasy and it has to do with split realities. Say to yourself, "I know I have memory and I exist because I can remember starting this sentence." It should feel pretty reassuring to say, it does to me anyway. I can tell I have memory and exist because I look around and I'm still here. Now, consider that someone video taped you doing this and you have been drinking heavily all day. So heavily in fact that you can't even remember reading this or talking to yourself. Then your friend shows you the tape. At that time you knew you existed. But to the version of you watching the tape, its as if at some point the night before everything blinks and you woke up this morning without any recollection of the previous night. Of being so sure you existed. The point I want to focus on is the 'jump' from before you were drinking til the time you woke up. To you now its like nothing happened. But to your self the night before, its as if hours went by. This all has to do with perception of time and reality. My question here is which one is the real you? And how can I really tell that I won't forget this moment like in the video?

Next topic: Mind vs Brain

Can you sit on your butt for a week straight?

There is simply not enough time. Not enough to do what, you say? Everything. No matter how hard to you try you just can't do everything. But dag-nabbit I'm gonna try. And as a first step I plan to spend a week (or however long it takes) and watch all the greatest movies and those that you just "need to see". I've starting compiling a list of movies that I will begin to collect or will "netflix" or "blockbuster-netflix-knockoff" when the time comes. If you have any movies that you think I should add, please throw them up. And of course anyone is welcome to join since it'll probably be over winter or summer.

BIG MOVIE LIST

Rennaisance Man
Citizen Kane
A Few Good Men
The Godfather
Schindler's List
Casablanca
Fargo
Goodfellas
The Usual Suspects
Dr. Strangelove or: How I learned to Stop Worrying...
North by Northwest
Apocalypse Now
Se7ev
Its a Wonderful Life
Clockwork Orange
Amadeus
Full Metal Jacket
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Blade Runner
Ben-Hur
Platoon
Easy Rider
Patton
The Day the Earth Stood Still
Bonnie and Clyde
The Exorcist
Lawrence of Arabia
Gone With the Wind
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Invasion of the Body Snatchers