3D-Printed Gödel Escher Bach QR-Code Cube
Ein 3D-gedruckter Würfel mit QR-Codes, die auf die Wikipedia-Artikel zu Kurt Gödel, M.C.Escher und Johann Sebastian Bach linken. (via Hackernews)
The shadow of this cube in different directions gives QR codes pointing to the Wikipedia articles for Kurt Godel, M.C. Escher, and J.S. Bach respectively. Also a pretty challenging print test.
„Gödel, Escher, Bach – Ein endlos geflochtenes Band“ ist Douglas Hostadters Jahrhundertbuch, das Mathematik, Kunst, Philosophie und Künstliche Intelligenz auf ‘ne einmalige Weise zusammenbringt. Unbedingt lesen und extrem weird, wie Mathe auf Acid.
Alles ist ein Symbol, und Symbole können kombiniert Muster ergeben. Muster sind schön und zeugen von einer größeren Wahrheit. Diese Ideen stehen im Zentrum der Gedanken von Kurt Gödel, M. C. Escher und Johann Sebastian Bach, den vielleicht größten Denkern der letzten Jahrhunderte. In einem beeindruckenden humanistischen Werk führt Hofstadter die Werke des Mathematikers Gödel, des Künstlers Escher und des Komponisten Bach zusammen.
Gödel, Escher, Bach, ein mit dem Pulitzerpreis ausgezeichnetes Buch über Genie, erforscht anhand von historischen Beispielen und Denkspielen die Gedanken brillanter Persönlichkeiten. Dieses Buch eignet sich nicht für den geistig Trägen und zeigt mehr als jedes andere, was es bedeutet, Symbole und Muster zu sehen, wo andere nur das Universum vor Augen haben. Gödel, Escher, Bach setzt sich mit Mathematik, Computern, Literatur, Musik und künstlicher Intelligenz auseinander und stellt nicht nur eine Herausforderung dar, sondern auch ein möglicherweise lebensveränderndes schriftstellerisches Werk.
Amazon-Partnerlink: Gödel, Escher, Bach: Ein Endloses Geflochtenes Band
The Improbable Normal
Schönes Posting von Kevin Kelly über das exponentielle Bombardement mit Außergewöhnlichem durch das Netz: The Improbable is the New Normal.
That light of super-ness changes us. We no longer want mere presentations, we want the best, greatest, the most extraordinary presenters alive, as in TED. We don’t want to watch people playing games, we want to watch the highlights of the highlights, the most amazing moves, catches, runs, shots, and kicks, each one more remarkable and improbable than the other.
We are also exposed to the greatest range of human experience, the heaviest person, shortest midgets, longest mustache — the entire universe of superlatives! Superlatives were once rare — by definition — but now we see multiple videos of superlatives all day long, and they seem normal. Humans have always treasured drawings and photos of the weird extremes of humanity (early National Geographics), but there is an intimacy about watching these extremities on video on our phones while we wait at the dentist. They are now much realer, and they fill our heads.
Ich hab’ da ‘ne Weile drüber nachgedacht und unter Kellys Posting folgenden Comment abgegeben, auch weil dieses Blog an diesem Bombardement nicht ganz unbeteiligt ist. Zu einem Schluss bin ich nicht gekommen, aber den Gedanken will ich trotzdem hier festhalten, vielleicht ergibt sich daraus nochmal etwas ganz anderes:
Great Post, but I’m not really sure if this is a Thing. You have the same effect since media exists, from the begin of the first Newspapers in the 19th Century, the yelling Paperboys screamed Things in the Streets that were „remarkable“ [and extraordinary]. Also: Freakshows and Circus.
Ofcourse, the Web turns up the Heat and bombards us (the more tech-savy, the über-informed) exponentially with stuff, but I’d not say that this Effect is really new. Like most of the stuff with the Web it’s a question of scale. That’s what transforms and challenges us. It’s the sheer Volume of the Effect, not the Effect itself, I think.
A Higher Theory of Assholes
Der Chronicle of Higher Education in einem superunterhaltsamen Text über den Philosophen Aaron James und seine Theorie über Arschlöcher. Der Mann hat eine ziemlich schlüssige These aufgestellt, warum das Arschloch an sich so gut in unsere Gesellschaft und in die heutige Zeit passt, im Gegensatz etwa zum Drecksack, Wichser, Scheißkerl oder dem Depp.
James argues for a three-part definition of assholes that boils down to this: Assholes act out of a deep-rooted sense of entitlement, a habitual and persistent belief that they deserve special treatment. (Nunberg points out that use of the phrase “sense of entitlement” tracks the spread of “asshole”—both have spiked since the 1970s.) How to distinguish an asshole from a scumbag, a jerk, a prick, or a schmuck? Assholes are systematic. We all do assholeish things, but only an asshole feels fully justified in always acting like an asshole. As James puts it, “If one is special on one’s birthday, the asshole’s birthday comes every day.”
To put meat on the bones of his theory, James names names. He was loath to do it. “I don’t see my job in life being the asshole police,” he says. But after a few pages of throat clearing—”We happily admit that any examples are properly controversial … we stand ready to update and revise”—he walks us through the “teeming asshole ecosystem.” There is the boorish asshole, who willfully flouts basic standards of decency (Rush Limbaugh and Michael Moore); the smug asshole, who is certain of his intellectual superiority (Richard Dawkins, Larry Summers, and Bernard-Henri Lévy, whom James describes as “a caricature of the intellectual asshole”); the asshole boss (think Michael Scott on television’s The Office); the royal asshole (Henry VIII); the corporate asshole (Steve Jobs); the reckless asshole (Dick Cheney); the self-aggrandizing asshole (Cheney again, also Ralph Nader).
There are many species in the asshole kingdom.
Chronicle of Higher Education: A Social Offender for Our Times (via 3QuarksDaily)
Aaron James Theorie der Arschlöcher gibt’s auch seit ein paar Wochen als Buch, hab’ ich mir grade bestellt und auf meinen Kindle schicken lassen. Weil ich ja sonst nix zu lesen hab’.
In the spirit of the mega-selling On Bullshit, philosopher Aaron James presents a theory of the asshole that is both intellectually provocative and existentially necessary.
What does it mean for someone to be an asshole? The answer is not obvious, despite the fact that we are often personally stuck dealing with people for whom there is no better name. Try as we might to avoid them, assholes are found everywhere—at work, at home, on the road, and in the public sphere. Encountering one causes great difficulty and personal strain, especially because we often cannot understand why exactly someone should be acting like that.
Asshole management begins with asshole understanding. Much as Machiavelli illuminated political strategy for princes, this book finally gives us the concepts to think or say why assholes disturb us so, and explains why such people seem part of the human social condition, especially in an age of raging narcissism and unbridled capitalism. These concepts are also practically useful, as understanding the asshole we are stuck with helps us think constructively about how to handle problems he (and they are mostly all men) presents. We get a better sense of when the asshole is best resisted, and when he is best ignored—a better sense of what is, and what is not, worth fighting for.
Amazon-Partnerlink: Assholes: A Theory (Kindle), Assholes: A Theory (Hardcover)
The Mostly German Philosophers Love Song:
The Mostly German Philosophers Love Song: I nietzsche so bad!
Ke$ha x Žižek
Ich weiß nicht, wer Ke$ha ist, aber ich liebe Slavoj Žižek und diese GIF-Mischung aus Trashpop und Philosophie erscheint mir irgendwie überaus passend, siehe auch Chomsky x Gangnam Style. (via AnimalNY)
Kim Kardashians Tweets mashed with Søren Kierkegaard
Kim Kierkegaardashian, ein Twitter-Account, der Kim Kardashians – ich weiß übrigens bis heute nicht, wer das is’ oder was die macht. Is’ aber auch nicht wichtig, glaube ich. Jedenfalls masht Kierkegaardashian Tweets von Kim mit der Philosophie von Kierkegaard. Gibts auch mit Justin Bieber und Martin Buber: Justin Buber. Grøßartig, man sollte für sämtliche Trash-Promis Philosophie-Mashup-Twitteraccounts anlegen. Für alle! Hier ein paar meiner Favs:
No filter. No photoshop. The highest and most beautiful things are not to read about or seen, but to be lived. Bikini summertime yoga!
Bootcamp & pilates by 9am! Beast mode day 2! I feel good! The defiant self is its own master, but he is a king without a country.
Baby I can take u places u aint never been before. Many ecstasies of love are just the lover’s delight in his own possibilities.
What do you like better steak or cake? Existence is a prodigious contradiction which it is impossible to ponder without becoming passionate.
So happy 4 Kanye! In despair he plunges into life & the distraction of great tasks, becoming a restless spirit. Won some BET Awards!
@KimKierkegaard: The philosophy of Søren Kierkegaard mashed with the tweets of Kim Kardashian. @Justin_Buber: Combining the pop stylings of Justin Bieber with the existential wisdom of philosopher Martin Buber. (via MeFi)
Bruce Sterling on the New Aesthetics
Superspannende Postings von Bruce Sterling über “New Aesthetics” im Digitalen Zeitalter, mehr oder weniger geht es um Digitalität selbst als neuen Rezeptor bzw. sowas wie ein digitales Sinnesorgan, dessen Eindrücke eine neue Ästhetik schaffen, die sich in Kunst- und anderen Werken wiederfindet.
Ich könnte dazu noch viel mehr erzählen, Sterling führt “New Aesthetics” zurück bis ins 19. Jahrhundert und den ersten Fotografien, aber tatsächlich sind “News Aesthetics” sehr viel älter. Man nehme nur die Bilder von Raphael aus dem Spät-Mittelalter, die der damaligen Kunst etwas bis dato völlig unbekanntes gaben: Perspektive. Bilder bis dahin waren praktisch zweidimensional, wie bei den Ägyptern. Raphael war praktisch “New Aesthetics” (hoffentlich kriege ich das richtig zusammen, ich sitze grade im Netzcafé und kann das nicht nachrecherchieren) und hat mit seinem neuen Spielzeug “Perspektivische Malerei” tatsächlich nicht wenig dabei mitgeholfen, ein ganzes Weltbild zu verändern. Sterlings Postings gehen mir da fast schon nicht weit genug und auch in andere Richtungen. Wie gesagt, ich könnte da noch viel mehr erzählen, aber ich ziehe grade um und hab’ eigentlich gar überhaupt keine Zeit.
One of the core themes of the New Aesthetic has been our collaboration with technology, whether that’s bots, digital cameras or satellites (and whether that collaboration is conscious or unconscious), and a useful visual shorthand for that collaboration has been glitchy and pixelated imagery, a way of seeing that seems to reveal a blurring between “the real” and “the digital”, the physical and the virtual, the human and the machine. It should also be clear that this ‘look’ is a metaphor for understanding and communicating the experience of a world in which the New Aesthetic is increasingly pervasive.
What has been brilliant about the New Aesthetic for me, personally, is that it has produced work, it has made me see and think about the world in a strange way, out of which thinking strange things have fallen, like Rorschmap and Robot Flaneur and Balloon Drones and Shadows, of which more anon.
But what has also been brilliant is that other people have pitched in. I first realised that NA was “a thing” not in that first blog post (I would have given it a better name) but when people started responding and writing about it. They started coming to me, bringing things, and saying “is this New Aesthetic?” or even “I think this is New Aesthetic” and I’d go yes, possibly, or better, why do you think that?
An Essay on the New Aesthetic, hier sein Posting zum Vortrag auf dem SXSW: #sxaesthetic (via Clockworker)
Animated Platos Cave Allegory narrated by Orson Welles
Youtube Direktplato, via Open Culture
Platos Höhlengleichnis in einer animierten Version und erzählt von Orson Welles.
Slavoj Žižek about Occupy Wallstreet, London Riots, Arab Spring and everything else…
(Aljazeera Direktzizek, via MeFi)
Hochspannendes Interview von Al Jazeera mit dem Philosophen Slavoj Žižek über die London Riots, die Wirtschaftskrise, Arab Spring, die Eurokrise und Occupy Wallstreet, die er sämtlich als Symptome einer ausgewachsenen Systemkrise ausmacht. Must Watch für jeden.
Slovenian-born philosopher Slavoj Zizek, whose critical examination of both capitalism and socialism has made him an internationally recognised intellectual, speaks to Al Jazeera’s Tom Ackerman about the momentous changes taking place in the global financial and political system.
In his distinct and colourful manner, he analyses the Arab Spring, the eurozone crisis, the “Occupy Wall Street” movement and the rise of China. Concerned about the future of the existing western democratic capitalism Zizek believes that the current “system has lost its self-evidence, its automatic legitimacy, and now the field is open.”
“I think today the world is asking for a real alternative. Would you like to live in a world where the only alternative is either anglo-saxon neoliberalism or Chinese-Singaporean capitalism with Asian values?
I claim if we do nothing we will gradually approach a kind of a new type of authoritarian society. Here I see the world historical importance of what is happening today in China. Until now there was one good argument for capitalism: sooner or later it brought a demand for democracy…
What I’m afraid of is with this capitalism with Asian values, we get a capitalism much more efficient and dynamic than our western capitalism. But I don’t share the hope of my liberal friends – give them ten years, [and there will be] another Tiananmen Square demonstration – no, the marriage between capitalism and democracy is over.” Slavoj Zizek
Interview mit Douglas Coupland: Media, Zeitgeist and the Web
Ich höre grade ein superinteressantes Interview mit Douglas Coupland auf SFs Sternstunden der Philosophie, hier das MP3 (55,4MB), in dem er über aktuellen Zeitgeist, Technologie und Medien spricht: „Juri Steiner spricht mit Douglas Coupland über McLuhan, den Medienguru und Wissenschafts-Popstar der Sechziger Jahre, mit dem ihn eine anatomische Besonderheit verbindet, und über die Einsamkeit im digitalen Zeitalter, die McLuhan mit seinen Thesen über die Einwirkung von Medien auf die sozialen Verhältnisse kaum überraschen würde.“
Wie würden Sie unsere aktuelle Zeit definieren?
Ich denke man kann sie unterschiedlich definieren, von innen oder von außen. Interessant an 2011 finde ich, dass unsere Zeit von keinem visuellen Stil geprägt ist. Wenn man in 20 Jahren, also 2031, ein Revival von 2011 lancieren wollte, gäbe es nichts, was man wiederbeleben könnte. Das ist seltsam. Es gibt keine typischen Frisuren, keine Kleidermode, nichts. Einzig vielleicht den iPod oder das iPhone und Interface, das scheinen die einzigen Charakteristika zu sein. Das Große, das unsere Zeit ausmacht, scheint in unseren Köpfen zu passieren. Vor allem in den letzten 5 Jahren kam es zu gewissen Traditionsbrüchen die neu sind für unsere Spezies. Unsere Wahrnehmung der Zeit, des Gemeinschaftssinns, der Politik, der Gesellschaft hat sich grundlegend verändert und zwar auf überraschende, unvorhersehbare Weise.
Bookmarks for Juli 4th: Downhill Skateboarding, Stickers, Portal 2 Cosplay
YouTube – Downhill Skateboarding: 2011 Santa Barbara Slide Jam
Terrific documentary on Rough Trade Records
Kutiman by Kutiman on SoundCloud: „my first album from 2007“
After Earth: Why, Where, How, and When We Might Leave Our Home Planet | Popular Science: Humanity may have millennia to find a new home in the universe–or just a few years
All kinds of stickers! – a set on Flickr: Bumper stickers, Hallmark stickers, promo stickers of all kinds. Mostly vintage stuff from the 70's and 80's, though I have a fair selection that's more recent.
Awesome Portal 2 Cosplay
3D display using a kinect – Hack a Day
How To Make a Tornado of Fire Out of Household Items
WARBIRDS OF MARS by Doc and Kane: A thrilling, neo-pulp/noir SciFi Webcomic
Hobo Lobo of Hamelin: A wonderfully crafted and designed illustrated book for the digital age.
TARDIS: Time and Relative Dimension in Soap
Springfield Punx: Doctor Who (Tennant) Wallpaper
atelier ted noten: lady killer vol. 1 for laikingland: poking a sturdy robotic finger in the face of conformity is 'lady killer vol.1', an unconventional jewelry box by atelier ted notenin collaboration with laikingland.
John Houck | iGNANT: Mittels selbst geschriebener Software generiert John Houck die höchst mögliche Anzahl an Kombinationen eines rasterförmigen Musters und druckt dies als Kontaktabzug auf Fotopapier. Dem Moment des mathematischen Konstruierens folgt der physische Eingriff. Immer und immer wieder werden dem Blatt Falten zugefügt, um es dann abzufotografieren, zu falten, abzufotografieren. Als Resultat offenbart sich der deutliche Verweis zu den Grundlagen der digitalen Fotografie: Eine von Fehlern durchsetzte Rastergrafik.
Norvig vs. Chomsky and the Fight for the Future of AI | Tor.com: Recently, Peter Norvig, Google’s Director of Research and co-author of the most popular artificial intelligence textbook in the world, wrote a webpage extensively criticizing Noam Chomsky. Their disagreement points to a revolution in artificial intelligence that, like many revolutions, threatens to destroy as much as it improves. Chomsky, one of the old guard, wishes for an elegant theory of intelligence and language that looks past human fallibility to try to see simple structure underneath. Norvig, meanwhile, represents the new philosophy: truth by statistics, and simplicity be damned. Disillusioned with simple models, or even Chomsky’s relatively complex models, Norvig has of late been arguing that with enough data, attempting to fit any simple model at all is pointless. The disagreement between the two men points to how the rise of the Internet poses the same challenge to artificial intelligence that it has to human intelligence: why learn anything when you can look it up?
Julian Assange and Slovenian Philosopher Slavoj Žižek
(Youtube Direktwikileaks, via MeFi)
Julian Assange und Philosoph Slavoj Žižek – der „Elvis of cultural Theory“ – in einem zweistündigen Gespräch live im The Troxy theater in London, moderiert von Amy Goodman (Democracy Now!). Ich habe die Runde noch nicht gehört/gesehen, dürfte aber hochinteressant sein. Aus der Ankündigung auf Frontline:
Last year, whistleblower website WikiLeaks released three of the biggest ever leaks of classified information in history: the Iraq War Logs, the Afghanistan War Logs and Cablegate.
Since then the world has undoubtedly changed. Ambassadors have resigned amid scandals exposed by leaked cables; the UK government has ordered a review of computer security; and, at the same time, a huge wave of protest has swept the Middle East and North Africa – in part fuelled, some believe, by WikiLeaks revelations.
Discussing the impact of WikiLeaks on the world and what it means for the future, for this very special event WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Julian Assange will be in conversation with renowned Slovenian philosopher, Slavoj Žižek.
Focusing on the ethics and philosophy behind WikiLeaks’ work, the talk will provide a rare opportunity to hear two of the world’s most prominent thinkers discuss some of the most pressing issues of our time.
Žižek kennt vielleicht der ein oder andere durch die ZDF-Dokureihe „Fantastic Voyages: Eine Kosmologie des Musikvideos“, die – wegen Copyright-Bullshits ohne die Musikvideos selbst – auf Youtube online zu sehen ist. Die gibt’s nach dem Klick.
Bookmarks for Juni 24th
- Vinyl Has Become Too Mainstream So Hipsters Now Making Records On Chocolate | Badass Digest:
- Plot Device on Vimeo: A young filmmaker obtains a mysterious device that unleashes the full force of cinema on his front lawn.
- The math of the Rubik’s cube – MIT News Office: New research establishes the relationship between the number of squares in a Rubik’s-cube-type puzzle and the maximum number of moves required to solve it.
- nathaniel mellors at venice art biennale 2011: british-born, amsterdam-based artist nathaniel mellors displays 'hippy dialectics (ourhouse)' in 'illuminations,' the international exhibition curated by bice curiger at the venice art biennale 2011. a double-headed animatronic sculpture, the work delivers a short schizophrenic dialogue which is both humorous and disturbing. the parenthetical 'ourhouse' in the title refers to a video work by mellors, a surrealist sitcom about an eccentric family featuring two central figures, ‘daddy’ and ‘the object.’ 'hippy dialectics' features two versions of the 'daddy' character – one blue, one yellow – connected by a ribbon of hair. cast from the face of the actor in the film, the latex heads are brought to life by means of electronics and software. they deliver a looped kind of pep talk, including a range of compliments ('god, you're looking buff. no seriously, you look great!' and 'cool, you are cool!') before reaching an absurdist conclusion of rebutting 'yes' with 'no'.
- 555 Chip Footstool:
- The Shocking True Tale Of The Mad Genius Who Invented Sea-Monkeys | The Awl: As anyone sold by the Sea-Monkey ads could tell you, it was hard to say exactly where von Braunhut was walking on the terrain between truth, embellishment and con. That was his gift. He convinced us to look at the jazz hands and lose sight of the footwork. Von Braunhut’s inventions were not quite what they seemed to be. Neither was he.
- Robots of Brixton on Vimeo: „The film follows the trials and tribulations of young robots surviving at the sharp end of inner city life, living the predictable existence of a populous hemmed in by poverty, disillusionment and mass unemployment. When the Police invade the one space which the robots can call their own, the fierce and strained relationship between the two sides explodes into an outbreak of violence echoing that of 1981.“
- 3-D ‘Motion Pictures’ From The Civil War : The Picture Show : NPR: „Here are some animated stereoviews from the Smithsonian's Photographic History Collection to show the images in 3-D by flickering the right and left sides of the views.“
- Minecraft Katamari Damacy-Mod: „“
- Poetry Shopdropping: „“
- LightScythe – The Mechatronics Guy: „The LightScythe is a device for writing text and images frozen in midair. The hardware information and software is open source and anyone can make it.“
- Bullet time Tesla Coil: „“
- Paramount Cease and Desist Targets 3D Printer ‘Pirate’ | TorrentFreak: „“
- 10 cameras + 1 Tesla coil = 70 megapixel bullet time lightning: „“
- A Journey Through The 1955 Disneyland Guidebook | Disney by Mark: „“
- In violent video games, teens face (and fight) their demons: „Sixteen-year-old Evan Jones played his first violent videogames when he was 3. He slew demons in Diablo II, blasted Lovecraftian horrors in Quake and shot terrorists in Counter-Strike. If you buy conventional wisdom, by now Jones should be a tightly wound coil of aggression, ready to attack someone at the slightest provocation. Instead, he’s a pretty laid-back kid.“
- Inside Google+ — How the Search Giant Plans to Go Social | Epicenter | Wired.com: „“
- Time-lapse Spider in space: „Esmeralda the spider isn't wasting away from homesickness in space, in fact she's doubled in size. She's one of two golden silk orb-weaver spiders (Nephila clavipes) that was recently sent to the International Space Station (ISS) on NASA's last shuttle mission to space, as part of a national education project in the US. One of the experiments, designed by Stefanie Countryman and her team at BioServe Space Technologies at the University of Colorado at Boulder, involves comparing spider behaviour in space and on Earth. Students in elementary and middle schools across the country are watching videos like this one of the spiders spinning webs in near-weighlessness and looking for differences from the same set-up in their classrooms.“
- Tiny Steve Jobs Still Makes More Money than You Do – Technabob: „1/6 scale Steve Jobs Limited Edition 12-inch Collectible Figurine which will include a 1/6 scale Steve Jobs head sculpt and 12-inch figure body plus 1/6 Scale items such as the iMac, Magic Mouse, keyboard, iPhone 4, iPad 2, Desk, Chair, Steve's outfit (New balance 992 sneakers, black T-shirt and jeans).“
- The Archiver on Vimeo: „“
- Splitscreen: A Love Story on Vimeo: „“
- Göbekli Tepe – The Birth of Religion: „We used to think agriculture gave rise to cities and later to writing, art, and religion. Now the world’s oldest temple suggests the urge to worship sparked civilization.“
- BBC’s The Romantics: The Birth of the Individual in Modern Society | Brain Pickings: „What The French Revolution has to do with the love of nature and the birth of the modern individual.“
- Inside Commodore DOS: „Inside Commodore DOS : the complete guide to the 1541 disk operating system.“
- YouTube – Solarnauts (Part 1 of 3): „An unsold pilot for a proposed 1967 sci-fi actioner out of the UK. Eye-popping costumes and sets belie an overall cheesy but charming tone. Cast of familiar but un-nameable Brit character actors, only Bond-Girl Martine Beswick stands out. Beware of LOGIK! You have been warned…“
- The Vintage Drink: „“
- History Cookbook – Cookit!: „Do you know what the Vikings ate for dinner? What a typical meal of a wealthy family in Roman Britain consisted of, or what food was like in a Victorian Workhouse? Why not drop into history cookbook and find out? This project looks at the food of the past and how this influenced the health of the people living in each time period.“
- Afghanistan’s Amazing DIY Internet | Fast Company: „FabFi is an ambitious project which is creating Internet networks for eastern Afghanistan whose main components can be built out of trash. It's low-tech, it's simple–and it works.“
- OpenWatch | Demand Marvelous Secrets: „OpenWatch, a global participatory counter-surveillance project which uses cellular phones as a way of monitoring authority figures.“
Philosophy Bro, what the fuck is Happiness?
Mein Lieblingsblog für die nächsten paar Minuten: Philosophy Bro (via MeFi): „Philosophy is hard – I read and summarize, so you don’t have to, man.“ Hier ein paar meiner Favorites:
Marcus Aurelius’ “Meditations”: A Summary: „Look, there’s a lot of unavoidable bullshit out there. Tons of it, in fact, and there is precisely nothing you can do about it. The sooner you accept that, the better your life will be; rather than bitching and complaining, learn to deal with it. Or, of course, you could keep whining like a little bitch; sure, maybe that’ll fix everything.“
G. W. F. Hegel’s “Lordship and Bondage”: A Summary: „Self-consciousness is a tricky motherfucker. Like every other idea, it has to encounter its opposite before it can be complete. Why? Because otherwise, it’s way too fucking abstract. Have you ever had a friend get really high and say, “Bro, I think I understand ultimate reality!” And then after you listen to his explanation about how we’re just a simulation or a computer game or some bullshit you say, “That’s fucking retarded.“
Jean-Paul Sartre’s “Being and Nothingness”: A Summary: „First of all, fuck Kant.“
Immanuel Kant’s “How is Metaphysics in General Possible?”: A Summary: „There is a ton of shit you can reason successfully about. Hell, math provides literally an infinite number of things you can reason about, including, conveniently enough, actual infinities. Still, some bros never have enough, and the stubborn fucks insist on trying to reason about experience. Of course, they all run into the same problem: it can’t. fucking. be done.“
Aristotle’s “Nicomachean Ethics, Book I”: A Summary: „Everyone pretty much agrees that that final good is happiness. Who doesn’t want to be happy? What asshole is moping around going, “Fuck happiness. I hate being happy.” No one, that’s who. The problem is, not everyone agrees on what happiness is or how to get it, which is what I’m here to clear up for you guys. Some people think that happiness is pleasure, which is just stupid. How could it be? Pleasures conflict all the time. When we’re presented with two competing pleasures, it’s a tough fucking choice, and we always agonize about it; when two options make us equally happy, though, we shrug and say, “I don’t give a flying fuck, bro. Honestly, I’m happy either way.”“
Adam Curtis’ All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace (3): The monkey in the machine and the machine in the monkey
Hier der dritte Teil von Adam Curtis‘ („The Power of Nightmares“) neuer Dokumentation „All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace“. Den ersten Teil hatte ich hier gebloggt, den zweiten hier (falls die Videos dort mittlerweile gelöscht wurden, werdet ihr da trotzdem glücklich) und falls die Doku verschwinden sollte: here’s the last Grace-Link to make you happy. Ich werde mir alle Teile auf jeden Fall nochmal am Stück ansehen, ganz großes Kino!
This program looked into the selfish gene theory which holds that humans are machines controlled by selfish genes, and covered the lives of William Hamilton, George R. Price, Dian Fossey. Richard Dawkins, who popularized selfish gene concept in his work by the same title (The Selfish Gene), was also briefly featured in this program. Adam Curtis also discussed the source of ethnic conflict that was created by Belgian colonialism’s artificial creation of a racial divide and the ensuing slaughter that occurred in the Congo, which is a source of raw material for computers and cell phones.
William Hamilton went to Kisangani in the Democratic Republic of the Congo where there was a war. He went there to collect Chimpanzee feces to test his theory that HIV was due to a medical mistake. Unfortunately he caught malaria, for which he took aspirin, which caused a hemorrhage and he died. However his selfish gene theory lived on.
In 1960 Congo had become independent from Belgian, but governance promptly collapsed, and towns became battle grounds as soldiers fought for control of the mines. America and the Belgians organised a coup and the elected leader was assassinated, creating chaos. The Western mining operations were largely unaffected however.
Bill Hamilton was a solitary man, and he saw everything through the lens of Darwin’s theory of evolution. When he wanted to know why some ants and humans gave up their life for others, he went to Waterloo station and stared at humans for hours, and looked for patterns. In 1963 he realised that most of the behaviours of humans was due to genes, and looking at the humans from the genes’ point of view, humans were machines that were only important for carrying genes. Wikipedia
