Is where I am right now.
I should be doing something for thesis, but my fingers feel frozen due to the cold. I'm typing this with my frigid fingers, warming them up for a day of typing ahead.
Yes, I did mean a day of typing. Looks like I'm going home at ten again.
Anyways, today had been a fun day thus far. I beat my old Plants vs. Zombies I, Zombie record of 7 with a whopping 9. Yay.
It's not without help though, I got some small tips from my thesis mates. And yes, right now I just confirmed all of my thesis mates play or had once played Plants vs. Zombies. Can't blame them, it's a really fun game. To quote a review site I visited which I already forgot, the game keeps on giving and giving. And yes, it does. I suppose a hardcore player can breeze through the game in perhaps 15 to 20 hours, but realistically, it takes a little longer. And with the Zen Garden game mode, Plants vs. Zombies can keep you entertained, well, indefinitely I suppose.
As my previous post mentioned (indirectly though), I've been watching this mindfucking anime entitled Serial Experiments Lain, or Lain for short. Lain is a really complex complex anime, interpretable in more than one layer. Incidentally the episodes are called Layers, but I think that's more of due to the fact that it discusses lots of computer network concepts, and computer networks topics really like to use the term layer. Back to Lain, Lain is a truly difficult anime to watch, each short moment might bear some significance that takes a while to process. It's really just that mindfucking.
It's very nice though, shows like those really stimulate the way I think and challenges my thought process and my concepts of what is standard or real. Suppose it's just fantasy, yes it is, but it still does not take away the fact that it has some more than real issues being tackled. And those issues are sometimes so compelling that no matter how fictional the work is, it still is worth some second thought.
There, my fingers feel quite nimble again. Guess it's time for more thesis, up in the fourth floor.
Saturday, July 18, 2009
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Duality
The Internet is beautiful isn't it?
You can be who you want to be in the Internet. You can be a girl if you're a boy, or a boy if you're a girl. You can be a legendary hero, or a devious villain. You can be a magician, a swordsman, a warrior, even a dark lord. You can be who you want to be.
You can be wild and outgoing. You can be meek as a sheep. You can be sassy, aloof, conceited.
You can be anonymous.
The Internet makes this duality very possible. In the Internet, you can be who you want to be, even be the complete opposite of who you truly are. If you're shy in the real world, in the Internet you can be wild and outgoing. If you're ugly in the real world, you can be as sexy and alluring in the Internet. If you're a loser in the real world, you can change that in the Internet.
The Internet is beautiful isn't it?
The anonymity associated with the Internet makes all these possible. In the real world, you can only be born once, and once you become a physical entity in the real world, you assume a set of traits, and other people begin associating those traits to you. You gain an identity, and that identity will stick with you. It's not to say you cannot begin anew; the physical world permits this. It's just that, you cannot really begin anew, the old you would continue to haunt you.
This is not true in the Internet.
In the Internet, you can create as many identities as you want. You can assume any characteristic, any trait, any personality. And you can do it as many times as you want. You can assume any number of virtual entities, any number of virtual identities.
In short, you can be anybody.
A friend of mine wrote about freedom and reality. For him, reality is a "concentric", with multiple "realities" existing inside each other. It need not be a complete reality, sometimes sub-realities exist. For instance, a slave lives in his or her own reality, in which he or she is limited by his or her master. Slavery then is a sub-reality of the "real" physical reality. The difference between full realities and sub-realities is also ill-defined, what could be held as a sub-reality can be a reality all on it's own. In this light, freedom then is defined as being in the most external of reality, and questing for freedom is defined as finding your way out of your inner reality and embracing an outer reality.
How do you find out if you are still in an inner reality?
For him, an indicator would be repressive force. If something represses you in your reality, then you are not truly free. There exists a more external reality than where you believe you are in, and it's up to you if you want to pursue this more external reality. A slave would feel repressed by the limits set upon him or her by his or her master. This would indicate that there is a more external reality to the reality the slave is accustomed to, since he is not totally free yet due to the repressive force.
What then is the most external reality?
Is it the physical world? Then why do people escape to the Internet? In the physical world, you cannot assume more than who you are. It's difficult to be more than who you are already; unlike in the virtual world.
Is this repressive force? Is this then enough to say that the physical world is not the most external reality, but is an inner reality to something else? Say, the virtual world?
So which is it? Which is more real? The seventeen year-old boy sitting in front of his computer, or KittyMaster<3<3 his laser saber of kitty-cuteness, cutting a swath across the magic flower field? Isn't he more free as KittyMaster<3<3 than as a boring seventeen year-old bound by the rules of society?
Who then is who?
You can be who you want to be in the Internet. You can be a girl if you're a boy, or a boy if you're a girl. You can be a legendary hero, or a devious villain. You can be a magician, a swordsman, a warrior, even a dark lord. You can be who you want to be.
You can be wild and outgoing. You can be meek as a sheep. You can be sassy, aloof, conceited.
You can be anonymous.
The Internet makes this duality very possible. In the Internet, you can be who you want to be, even be the complete opposite of who you truly are. If you're shy in the real world, in the Internet you can be wild and outgoing. If you're ugly in the real world, you can be as sexy and alluring in the Internet. If you're a loser in the real world, you can change that in the Internet.
The Internet is beautiful isn't it?
The anonymity associated with the Internet makes all these possible. In the real world, you can only be born once, and once you become a physical entity in the real world, you assume a set of traits, and other people begin associating those traits to you. You gain an identity, and that identity will stick with you. It's not to say you cannot begin anew; the physical world permits this. It's just that, you cannot really begin anew, the old you would continue to haunt you.
This is not true in the Internet.
In the Internet, you can create as many identities as you want. You can assume any characteristic, any trait, any personality. And you can do it as many times as you want. You can assume any number of virtual entities, any number of virtual identities.
In short, you can be anybody.
A friend of mine wrote about freedom and reality. For him, reality is a "concentric", with multiple "realities" existing inside each other. It need not be a complete reality, sometimes sub-realities exist. For instance, a slave lives in his or her own reality, in which he or she is limited by his or her master. Slavery then is a sub-reality of the "real" physical reality. The difference between full realities and sub-realities is also ill-defined, what could be held as a sub-reality can be a reality all on it's own. In this light, freedom then is defined as being in the most external of reality, and questing for freedom is defined as finding your way out of your inner reality and embracing an outer reality.
How do you find out if you are still in an inner reality?
For him, an indicator would be repressive force. If something represses you in your reality, then you are not truly free. There exists a more external reality than where you believe you are in, and it's up to you if you want to pursue this more external reality. A slave would feel repressed by the limits set upon him or her by his or her master. This would indicate that there is a more external reality to the reality the slave is accustomed to, since he is not totally free yet due to the repressive force.
What then is the most external reality?
Is it the physical world? Then why do people escape to the Internet? In the physical world, you cannot assume more than who you are. It's difficult to be more than who you are already; unlike in the virtual world.
Is this repressive force? Is this then enough to say that the physical world is not the most external reality, but is an inner reality to something else? Say, the virtual world?
So which is it? Which is more real? The seventeen year-old boy sitting in front of his computer, or KittyMaster<3<3 his laser saber of kitty-cuteness, cutting a swath across the magic flower field? Isn't he more free as KittyMaster<3<3 than as a boring seventeen year-old bound by the rules of society?
Who then is who?
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