The Veldt
A Short story by Ray Bradbury.
A musical interest I have composed a piece of music inspired by this short story, it's an interesting story and if you've never heard of it you should google it and do some more reading. To me music is about creating an emotion, a feeling that the audience might get while listening, or it can be about conveying an idea or thought
Happy life, full of machines all around the room.
look what they made, they made it for me, happy technology.
So in love with the way we are, here.
Monday, March 19, 2012
Thursday, March 8, 2012
Climbing indoors and building some holds of my own.
I've been doing some indoor rock climbing lately and really enjoying the challenges both physically and mentally that present themselves while pursing this new(ish) hobby. One of the things that has intrigued me lately is the quality and types of holds that I haven encountered while climbing indoors.
Based on my limited experience I plan on making some climbing holds of my own first with some Resin based holds and foam shaped originals to give to my local gym. Its kind of an experiment to see if I can create something that route setters will find fun to use and possibly give them some options they might not have had while route setting previously.
If I'm not too lazy i'll try to take some pictures of different stages of the process to post here at a later date, for now I'm working in my mind and on paper conceptualizing some thoughts and ideas to start to shape this weekend hopefully.
later.
Based on my limited experience I plan on making some climbing holds of my own first with some Resin based holds and foam shaped originals to give to my local gym. Its kind of an experiment to see if I can create something that route setters will find fun to use and possibly give them some options they might not have had while route setting previously.
If I'm not too lazy i'll try to take some pictures of different stages of the process to post here at a later date, for now I'm working in my mind and on paper conceptualizing some thoughts and ideas to start to shape this weekend hopefully.
later.
Monday, December 5, 2011
Keeping life interesting
What is it that we strive for as human beings? People enjoy accomplishing things and being able to say, yeah I did that... but what lies behind that basic human instinct to push ourselves? Is it our competitive nature, the yearning for new adventures, or is it something more deeper then that?
recently I've picked up rock climbing at an indoor gym with my son, we go, do some climbs and I often think i'm pushing my son too much to climb harder grades then he believes he is capable of accomplishing. sometimes it's a struggle to get him to try a harder climb, i think his lack of interest in trying it is the sense of failure. we sometimes don't do things because we don't want to fail at it. Much like when you are young you don't ask out that girl because you don't think you have a chance, or that you don't want to get rejected. I believe the same thing happens in every other aspect of life, people don't try new or harder things because of the fear of failure.
the funny thing is even when we expect the worse and do fail there is always a sense of success when we try at those things, for example while climbing on Sunday we've climbed a bunch of 5.9 routes successfully and failed at some 5.10 routes that are just out of our technical know how and ability right now. But there is a 5.8 climb at the gym we go to that appears daunting, two good overhanging ledges. This route isn't technically difficult, however it is mentally and physically demanding to be able to get over these two overhangs. I gave it a go myself and almost got above the second overhang but yet failed. After my go at it, I convinced my son to give it a go and he did better then he expected and even had a look of satisfaction on his face that he accomplished something. That feeling of accomplishment is great, it will lead him to believe that he CAN do it and give it another try the next time that we go.
recently I've picked up rock climbing at an indoor gym with my son, we go, do some climbs and I often think i'm pushing my son too much to climb harder grades then he believes he is capable of accomplishing. sometimes it's a struggle to get him to try a harder climb, i think his lack of interest in trying it is the sense of failure. we sometimes don't do things because we don't want to fail at it. Much like when you are young you don't ask out that girl because you don't think you have a chance, or that you don't want to get rejected. I believe the same thing happens in every other aspect of life, people don't try new or harder things because of the fear of failure.
the funny thing is even when we expect the worse and do fail there is always a sense of success when we try at those things, for example while climbing on Sunday we've climbed a bunch of 5.9 routes successfully and failed at some 5.10 routes that are just out of our technical know how and ability right now. But there is a 5.8 climb at the gym we go to that appears daunting, two good overhanging ledges. This route isn't technically difficult, however it is mentally and physically demanding to be able to get over these two overhangs. I gave it a go myself and almost got above the second overhang but yet failed. After my go at it, I convinced my son to give it a go and he did better then he expected and even had a look of satisfaction on his face that he accomplished something. That feeling of accomplishment is great, it will lead him to believe that he CAN do it and give it another try the next time that we go.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
procrastination
sometimes I disgust myself with my own laziness. I hate procrastinating.
If only we could wage a war against poverty, then there would be LOTS of money thrown to it's cause.
according to http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/02/osama-bin-laden-dead-war-on-terror-costs_n_856390.html the US has spent 1.28 trillion dollars on the war on terror from 9/11/2001 till the death of Osama Bin Laden.
the current US population is around 307 million.
based on these numbers alone we have spent 4,169 dollars per person in the US on the war on Terror. what would happen if we gave the 1.27 trillion dollars spent on the war to people living in poverty.
according to wikipedia the current percentage of the US population living in poverty is 15% that is a bit more then 46,000,000 million people living under the poverty level in the US alone!
those numbers are STAGGERING! so if we hadn't spent the 1.28 trillion dollars on the war on terror we could have instead given that money to people living in poverty almost 28,000 dollars per person. What would that amount mean to an individual living in poverty? what would it mean to you?
So where did that money come from in the first place? The answer to that question is not clear cut, but some research will show that it came from taxes being paid, existing federal programs being cut of funds it used to get, and the list goes on.
What other money is the federal government spending on "wars"? we also have the war on drugs that is an active, ongoing, on NON-winnable war. according to http://www.drugsense.org/cms/wodclock we spent over 15 billion dollars on this war in the year 2010 alone! if we look at money spent on it from when this war was started we have spent untold amounts. These efforts began over 3 decades ago!
here is a basic timeline on the war on Drugs http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/
Just thoughts i've had this morning.
If only we could wage a war against poverty, then there would be LOTS of money thrown to it's cause.
according to http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/02/osama-bin-laden-dead-war-on-terror-costs_n_856390.html the US has spent 1.28 trillion dollars on the war on terror from 9/11/2001 till the death of Osama Bin Laden.
the current US population is around 307 million.
based on these numbers alone we have spent 4,169 dollars per person in the US on the war on Terror. what would happen if we gave the 1.27 trillion dollars spent on the war to people living in poverty.
according to wikipedia the current percentage of the US population living in poverty is 15% that is a bit more then 46,000,000 million people living under the poverty level in the US alone!
those numbers are STAGGERING! so if we hadn't spent the 1.28 trillion dollars on the war on terror we could have instead given that money to people living in poverty almost 28,000 dollars per person. What would that amount mean to an individual living in poverty? what would it mean to you?
So where did that money come from in the first place? The answer to that question is not clear cut, but some research will show that it came from taxes being paid, existing federal programs being cut of funds it used to get, and the list goes on.
What other money is the federal government spending on "wars"? we also have the war on drugs that is an active, ongoing, on NON-winnable war. according to http://www.drugsense.org/cms/wodclock we spent over 15 billion dollars on this war in the year 2010 alone! if we look at money spent on it from when this war was started we have spent untold amounts. These efforts began over 3 decades ago!
here is a basic timeline on the war on Drugs http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/cron/
Just thoughts i've had this morning.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Life begins again.
If The world were to face a cataclysmic event that caused the vast majority of humans to die and you were a survivor what would you do? Who would you be?
if you knew or believed that the end was coming how would you prepare in the event that you lived through it?
would you buy guns and ammo?
would you invest time in learning how to grow crops / plants to eat?
In most things you learn at the beginning, whether you are learning about math, horticulture, or martial arts, the basis for your learning is the roots or basics of the topic.
What are our roots the will help us grow? love, patience, tolerance, peace?
would you look to the heavens and ask why and do nothing?
if you knew or believed that the end was coming how would you prepare in the event that you lived through it?
would you buy guns and ammo?
would you invest time in learning how to grow crops / plants to eat?
In most things you learn at the beginning, whether you are learning about math, horticulture, or martial arts, the basis for your learning is the roots or basics of the topic.
What are our roots the will help us grow? love, patience, tolerance, peace?
would you look to the heavens and ask why and do nothing?
physics, black holes and the like.
God is everything or nothing, some what say that God is both everything and nothing at the same time. In mathematical representation then we would say on or both of these can be true based on your experience.
God = 0
God = ∞
So in terms of Einsteins theories we would say that we know the following about gravity.
Gravity is what holds us to the earth, what holds the planets in orbit, what causes galaxy's to move around super black holes, along with stellar black holes to orbit around them. simply put Gravity states that an object with larger mass attracts objects of smaller mass
Singularity = The quality or condition of being singular.
the point at which a black hole attracts all matter is referred to as a singularity.
Big bang theory says that everything was created out of nothing, or rather that a singularity "exploaded" causing the universe and eveything in, and around it to expand, going faster the farther away from the origin it gets.
multiple singularities? if a singularity is the quality of being singular why do we think that there can by multiple copies of this? are we unable to adiquately define what's at the center of a black hole?
so we think that everything started with a bang, flinging crap outward from the center speeding up as it gets farther away. Then we have black holes which are so massive that they attract everything, stars, planets, all matter towards it's center, and at the heart of the black hole is nothing. Oh yeah, also we can't see them...
if at the center of the milky way galaxy there is a super massive black hole keeping all the stars dancing about the center of the black hole that *should* be attracting everything in the universe torwards it's center if it's the most massive thing according to einstiens theories.
but that isn't happening either.
could it be that the way we are observing these stellar phenomena just cannot accurately describe what is going on?
So, how does God fit into all this? Some believe that we are able to make contact with God and have a relationship with him. If God is everything and nothing then how we perceive the stellar activities or cellular level of activities is of no consequence.
What does the man that spends his entire life focused on such things percieve himself at the end of his life? Does his scientific success fulfill him? if the God particle or Higgs Boson is found what will it tell us about ourselves? I don't think there is any scientific breakthrough that will change the relationships I have with those around me. Whether you view the earth as flat or spherical does not matter in my opinion.
Like the business man that is only focused on bringing home wealth and fortune for himself and his family that he wastes his life trying to acquire it all forgetting that his family just wants a hug today.
God = 0
God = ∞
So in terms of Einsteins theories we would say that we know the following about gravity.
Gravity is what holds us to the earth, what holds the planets in orbit, what causes galaxy's to move around super black holes, along with stellar black holes to orbit around them. simply put Gravity states that an object with larger mass attracts objects of smaller mass
Singularity = The quality or condition of being singular.
the point at which a black hole attracts all matter is referred to as a singularity.
Big bang theory says that everything was created out of nothing, or rather that a singularity "exploaded" causing the universe and eveything in, and around it to expand, going faster the farther away from the origin it gets.
multiple singularities? if a singularity is the quality of being singular why do we think that there can by multiple copies of this? are we unable to adiquately define what's at the center of a black hole?
so we think that everything started with a bang, flinging crap outward from the center speeding up as it gets farther away. Then we have black holes which are so massive that they attract everything, stars, planets, all matter towards it's center, and at the heart of the black hole is nothing. Oh yeah, also we can't see them...
if at the center of the milky way galaxy there is a super massive black hole keeping all the stars dancing about the center of the black hole that *should* be attracting everything in the universe torwards it's center if it's the most massive thing according to einstiens theories.
but that isn't happening either.
could it be that the way we are observing these stellar phenomena just cannot accurately describe what is going on?
So, how does God fit into all this? Some believe that we are able to make contact with God and have a relationship with him. If God is everything and nothing then how we perceive the stellar activities or cellular level of activities is of no consequence.
What does the man that spends his entire life focused on such things percieve himself at the end of his life? Does his scientific success fulfill him? if the God particle or Higgs Boson is found what will it tell us about ourselves? I don't think there is any scientific breakthrough that will change the relationships I have with those around me. Whether you view the earth as flat or spherical does not matter in my opinion.
Like the business man that is only focused on bringing home wealth and fortune for himself and his family that he wastes his life trying to acquire it all forgetting that his family just wants a hug today.
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