Flowering

Yesterday was an eye-opener. A bunch of rather peculiar coincidences led to much thinking. Little action, save to enhance the thinking. My day started late, no surprise. At some point, I got around to looking up Wikipedia entries on a bunch of luminaries - initially Nietzsche, Kant and Hegel, then followed links around to such diverse personages as Sartre, Tom Stoppard, Neil Gaiman, Lord Vetinari and Samuel Vimes. Some bits of philosophy I'd only really known by name started to fall together. Still fractional, but we proceed by steps, eh? Was preparing for an early-ish night, but was prevented by a summons to Doughty for more baking. Coffee cake from scratch. By some random decisions, Maya, Deividas and I ended up watching "Waking Life" - a 2001 movie animated from actual camera footage. It brings up questions about consciousness, existence and awareness via the medium of a dream. Much of the movie is talk - the somewhat surreal images heighten the sense of the abstract. Far from an adequate description. As one reviewer put it, audience reaction would be either "rapt attention" or "utter boredom". Look for it, people. We later watched "The Human Stain", a movie shot at 'Athena College'. The bell that rings in the first campus shot rings every fifteen minutes, very much audible from my Morgan room. It only rang once in the movie. Central story is about living a lie, slowly exposed throughout the film. Much like all our lives?

Had an early wander behind Dean Carole's house. I probably covered a total of about 100m? Just walked as silently and as carefully as I could to a clearing behind the house, stood and watched a few birds, chipmunks and caught a glimpse of a rabbit (hare?) before I turned around and walked back. Solitude is, in many ways, good for me.

Following are a number of thoughts, none in chronological, or any sort of order, besides a weak attempt at categorizing them. My inspiration, in part, is Jostein Gaarder's 'memo' in 'Maya'. Maybe a tiny bit of influence (or just similarity to) the Analects and Tao Te Ching. But first, a question from 'Waking Life' - "Are we sleepwalking through life, or wake-walking through our dreams?"

Creation
There is no monopoly of any kind on creation. We all leave a mark, indelibly, on the large canvas that is the Universe. Intentionally or accidentally, we cover the trails of others with our own masterworks - innate genius, a sage in all of us, incomprehensible, non-deliberate - like graffiti artists on the walls of eternity's tenement blocks.

We advertise the superiority of 'organic', 'all-natural', 'no artificial ingredients', yet we still declaim the need for a designer for the essence of nature. Why imbue the world with a derogaratory stamp of 'MANUFACTURED'? The most ingenious solutions to problems of the world have sprung up of their own volition. Treasure that fact, that by the most random of fluctuations, we have eyes, noses, brains, legs. Consider priceless, for that matter, such things as fingernails, nose hairs, eyelids, the appendix. Few are likely to intentionally create these little details again. They're here by chance. You have any idea what it's like winning the lottery? That's life everyday.

Nature
Where do we stand? On the side of the natural, or the artificial? Why are there any shades to begin with? Where did we come from? If we were created with the rest of existence, is there not nothing natural? If we are the product of natural development, are our products not the same?

Walking through the crisp snow, I take deliberate steps, sink in less than an inch in the firm but yielding white. The squirrel and deer tracks are deeper than mine. Mine are much larger though. How deep and broad are your footprints on the snow of the material world? And how hard do you try to stay on top, leaving no indentation? And why would you want to? Why not?

The Mind
I have not remembered a significant dream in many years. Someone thought that dreams let our minds integrate memories of our experiences. I no longer seem to form vivid memories - I live more in the present now. I have goals, hopes, aspirations. No dreams. What happens to the past? Somewhere inside me I've been changed. How is my mind aware of the changes. Have I lost the power of the memories, or the keys to them?

We have no physical possibilities where it comes to free will. The classical, deterministic view says eternity is known from the start. When OS Universe booted up, everything was installed, automated, it mindlessly ran itself, and goes on mindlessly doing so and will go on mindlessly doing so till the battery runs dead. The quantum picture had OS Universe run a random number generator. Not stochastic. Albert's old man is rolling the dice every moment, and never tires of the game. The problem is, the game of chance has no element of skill. Or thought. Or will. "Heads or tails" is as mindless as "Clock". Yet both still entertain us. How? And are we either of these? Or is life a chessboard? I'm a terrible chess-player.

God
"Gott ist tot." Also Sprach Zarathustra. Will you be a nihilist, deriving your life, your actions and deeds from corpses, letting the words and thoughts of the buried guide you? Or can you be an Übermensch, self-sufficient in morality? I wish to be the latter. I can accept that ethics is contained within religion, but how necessary is the latter?

Do you want to be on reality TV, with an audience of at least 1 watching your every move, blunder, embarassing moments? Of course, you can't do anything about it. How would you behave, though. Can you be yourself uninhibitedly? Given the choice, would you participate? Not having been given the choice, and without being able to know for sure if you're on candid camera, how do you feel?

The game of life
All of history has been spent shuffling an infinity of decks, and each of us has been dealt one to play solitaire. We can comment on each others' moves, but must touch none but our own cards. We have no idea of the stakes, though we can speculate. The big question is, who deals the cards? Do the cards deal themselves? Have we each individual dealers? Do we share a few? Just one? And most importantly, if there are dealers, are they honest, or cardsharks?

Holy Moment
Can we share a holy moment? Now? Ever? Later? Soon? Forever? Just you and me? Everyone? How long is a moment? Do we need to share them, or can we have them alone?

Repetition
Given the choice, would you relive your entire life, exactly as it has happened up to this point? If not, what are you going to do about it, if anything at all?

Silence
The chances are, you can hear. Assuming you can, can you contemplate absolute silence? When there are no extraneous sounds, your ears ring. What must the lack of even that be like? Do you want to know?

Butterflies
Am I a butterfly or a monk? Do either of them even exist? Convince me that you exist! Can figments of the imagination be convinced of their reality? Would they be conscious? Are you?

THE FINAL QUESTION

Ask and answer your own.

For further reading (and thinking!!):
Wikiquote: Ros & Guil
Wikiquote: Discworld
Wikiquote: Discworld Novels
I'd also recommend looking up distinguished thinkers on Wikipedia.org. Note that all this extra reading will take a LONG time, but if you're up for it and bored out of your mind, and were determined enough to get this far through the post, hey I'm all for your reading them!