Caveat: 2

I bought 2 goldfish and named them 1 and 2.

… So if 1 dies I'll still have 2.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Бу айыллыбыт / Арылы халлаан алын өттүгэр

Бу айыллыбыт
Арылы халлаан алын өттүгэр
Куордаах эттээх,
Куодаһыннаах уҥуохтаах,
Оһол-охсуһуу доҕордоох,
Иирээн-илбис энээрдээх,
Ириҥэ мэйиилээх,
Иһэгэй куттаах,
Икки атахтаах үөскээн тэнийдин диэн,
Анысханнаах арҕаа халлааннаах,
Иэйиэхситтээх илин халлааннаах,
Соллоҥноох соҕуруу халлааннаах,
Холоруктаах хоту халлааннаах,
Үллэр муора үрүттээх,
Түллэр муора түгэхтээх,
Аллар муора арыннаах,
Эргичийэр муора иэрчэхтээх,
Дэбилийэр муора сиксиктээх,
Ахтар айыы араҥаччылаах,
Күн айыы күрүөһүлээх,
Араҥас илгэ быйаҥнаах,
Үрүҥ илгэ үктэллээх,
Элбэх сулус эркиннээх,
Үгүс сулус үрбэлээх,
Дьэллэҥэ сулус бэлиэлээх,
Туолбут ый доҕуһуоллаах,
Аламай күн аргыстаах,
Дорҕоон этиҥ арчылаах,
Тоһуттар чаҕылҕан кымньыылаах,
Ахсым ардах ыһыахтаах,
Сугул куйаас тыыннаах,
Уолан угуттуур уулаах,
Охтон үүнэр мастаах,
Уһун уйгу кэһиилээх,
Сытар хайа сындыыстаах,
Буор хайа модьоҕолоох,
Итии сайын эркиннээх,
Эргичийэр эрэһэ кииннээх,
Төгүрүйэр түөрт тулумнаах,
Үктүөлээтэр өҕүллүбэт
Үрдүк мындаалаах,
Кэбиэлээтэр кэйбэлдьийбэт
Кэтит киэлилээх,
Баттыалаатар маталдьыйбат
Баараҕай таһаалаах,
Аҕыс иилээх-саҕалаах
Алта киспэлээх,
Атааннаах-мөҥүөннээх,
Айгырастаах-силиктээх,
Алыгыр-налыгыр
Аан-ийэ дойду диэн
Муостаах-нуоҕайдаах бэртэһэ
Туоһахтатын курдук,

The above is a fragment of a poem in the Sakha (Yakut) language, and is part of the Yakuts national traditional epic poetic oeuvre, Olonkho.
Obviously, I don’t know the Sakha (Yakut) language. On a really good day I command a few hundred words of rusty college Russian, at best.
But I like unusual languages. And I like poetry. And, if you accept the controversial Altaic hypothesis, perhaps Sakha is a very distant relative of Ancient Korean. Anyway, they’re sort of in the same cultural neighborhood, albeit a bit farther north, in east-central Siberia: today it is -41 C in Yakutsk, while here in sunny 고양시 we have a balmy -8 C.
I came across a translation of the poem on the blog of the philosopher and polymathic philologist Justin Erik Halldór Smith. Smith is currently a professor at the University of Paris 7 but he is a native of Northern California – like myself and, furthermore, he is of my generation, more or less – and thus he is someone whose occasional reflections on his youth in the green-hilled, hippie-infested comarcas of The City [San Francisco] have always had exceptional resonances for me. Anyway, his translation is strikingly good poetry, in itself, and, I presume, faithful to the original, given his scholarly abilities.

Under that primordial
shining and lucid sky,
where the two-legged, having
a mortal body and hollow bones,
knowing war and battle,
acquainted with strife and discord,
having a vulnerable brain
and a trembling soul,
must be fruitful —
with the cool windy western sky,
with the good generous eastern sky,
with the insatiable thirsty southern sky,
with the impetuous whirling northern sky,
with the shivering breadth of the sea,
with the heaving depth of the sea,
with the swelling abyss of the sea,
with the twirling axis of the sea,
with the unbounded reach of the sea,
with the revered aiy [nature spirits] who lie beyond,
with the radiant aiy [nature spirits] who guard,
with abundant yellow nectar,
with generous white nectar,
encircling us in the manifold of stars,
in the herds of countless stars,
in the traces of rare stars,
with the full moon accompanying it,
with the bright sun leading it,
with purifying roars of thunder,
with the smite of bolts of lightning,
with moistening cloud-bursts of rain,
with sultry hot breath,
with the drying out and again the replenishing of waters,
with the falling down and again the growing up of woods,
with inexhaustible generous gifts,
with origins from gently sloping mountains,
with gardens from earthen mountains,
with a hot and giving summer,
with the turning axis of the center,
with four converging sides,
with such high firmament,
what you tread on, will not give way,

what you rattle, will not lurch,
with such an unfathomable breadth,
what you press, will not bend,
eight-chambered, eight-sided,
with six circles,
with disquiet and worry,
in luxurious attire and ornament,
serenely peaceful,
always-existing Mother Earth,
shining like a silver buckle
on a horned hat with a feather.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: the supremacy of the individual conscience

On Monday, the US commemorated Dr Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday. Dr King's memorial has become the somewhat anodyne fillip to an annual dialogue about race and civil rights, couched in terms guaranteed to offend no one. But he was pretty offensive to those aligned against him, in his era – and those people were offensive right back at him. Not least, consider this bit, written shortly after his assassination:

Those who mourn Dr. King because they were his closest followers should meditate the implications of the deed of the wildman who killed him. That deed should bring to mind not (for God's sake) the irrelevance of non-violence, but the sternest necessity of reaffirming non-violence. An aspect of non-violence is submission to the law.

The last public speech of Martin Luther King described his intention of violating the law in Memphis, where an injunction had been handed down against the resumption of a march which only a week ago had resulted in the death of one human being and the wounding of fifty others.

Dr. King's flouting of the law does not justify the the flouting by others of the law, but it is a terrifying thought that, most likely, the cretin who leveled his rifle at the head of Martin Luther King, may have absorbed the talk, so freely available, about the supremacy of the individual conscience, such talk as Martin Luther King, God rest his troubled soul, had so widely, and so indiscriminately, indulged in. – William F. Buckley, April 9, 1968.

Buckley, in essence, blames the actions of Dr King's murderer on the message he advocated and preached. It is deeply disturbing that in Buckley's view, "submission to the law" is a component of non-violence. This confuses the admonition to "render unto Caesar" for a quite different notion: "submit to Caesar." This is definitely not what any notable advocate of nonviolence has ever had in mind, including Jesus himself.

In light of this, please don't believe that dogwghistle racism and "blaming the victim" are in any way new to the right's discourses contra civil rights. I once thought rather highly of Buckley, but over the years I have seen more and more evidence to support the idea that he was, behind his high rhetoric, yet another defender of the Jim Crow status quo ante.

The only thing actually new in our current Emperor is a certain incisive vulgarity – the content of the message is little changed. Yet it is the content of the message we need to be concerned about, not the manner of presentation.

[daily log: walking, 7.5km]

Caveat: America Jumps the Shark

The phrase “jump the shark” is a contemporary idiom that means that moment when something that was for a long time a serious artistic undertaking is transformed into a kind of parody of itself, as the work’s creators pursue novelty. Originally it was applied to TV shows and other works of a serial or episodic nature – e.g. book series, etc. Nowadays, the idiom seems applicable to anything where an initially earnest project becomes self-parody. I believe the expression arose in a critical discussion of a certain episode of the TV series “Happy Days.”

So this happened to that project called “United States of America.” The USA has jumped the shark. I have evidence.

Exhibit A:

It doesn’t even matter if this is intentional satire or if it “real.” It is out there. 

Some points to consider:

  • History repeats itself, “the first as tragedy, then as farce.” – Karl Marx.
  • At what point does satire, parody, or fiction also become reality (e.g. we have a president who emerged from the realm of “reality TV” – which has always been a type of fiction)?
  • Finally – we must never, ever misinterpret stupidity or ignorance as evil.

Slightly related:

Perhaps Obama’s biggest mistake: the blogger “Atrios” at Eschaton blog speculates that Obama should bear some of the blame for the current mess in the White House: “Do not sanction powers you do not want your successor to have.”

[daily log: walking, 8km]

Caveat: The Karmic Black Hole

Last night, we had a 회식 [hwehsik – Korean "business dinner"] at a samgyeopsal joint we frequent (Korean grilled pork, mostly "bacon" cuts but prepared differently). This was to wish a farewell to two departing coworkers, and a welcome to a new one. 

I will particularly miss my coworker Kay. She has been probably the kindest "deskmate" I've had in my years teaching in Korea. She is good at conversation, and good at overcoming the inhibitions so many Koreans (even English teachers) have about communicating in English. She is happy to talk (or try to talk) about topics a lot of Koreans shy away from: politics, religion, the meaning of life.

She recently lost her sister, which I've blogged about, having gone to the funeral. 

So she decided a life change was in order – which I am utterly sympathetic to. Therefore I am actually pleased she's going – for her. 

But I will definitely miss her. And she is genuinely caring and interested in the kids – she has never been just a "time-keeping" teacher. She enjoys interacting with them. 

She said something funny, the other day. But first, some background.

There's a kind of revolving door, at Karma. People leave. Move on. But then they end up back, working at Karma again. Curt (the owner) clearly inspires a certain loyalty. 

I think, of my coworkers, every single one has left at some point, yet has come back to work again at Karma. Except Kay, of course. I would even count myself, in that – I worked for Curt back in the pre-Karma days, at LinguaForum. And I left, yet I returned. 

So I joked to Kay about her coming back, later, at some point.

She got a very annoyed, but amused look on her face. "That can't happen. That really can't happen. It won't happen."

"Are you sure?" I asked.

There was along pause.

"This place is like a black hole."

We laughed. 

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Ovid, you can go home now

I guess the ancient Roman poet, Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso, 43BC-17AD), was exiled from his hometown of Rome at some point. Apparently the city council in the city of Rome recently passed a motion revoking his exile. I'm sure his ghost is super happy to hear this.

Est deus in nobis; agitante calescimus illo:
impetus hic sacrae semina mentis habet.
from Fasti, VI.

There is a god within us.
It is when he stirs us that our bosom warms ; it is
his impulse that sows the seeds of inspiration.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: 담벽하고 말하는 셈이다


I saw this aphorism in my book of aphorisms.

담벽하고 말하는 셈이다
dam.byeok.ha.go mal.ha.neun sem.i.da
brick-wall-WITH talk-PPART guess-BE
[One could] guess it’s [like] talking to a brick wall.

This is exactly the same as the English expression, “like talking to a brick wall.” It’s not so often I find exactly matching aphorisms. Perhaps dealing with dense individuals is a human universal.
[daily log: walking, 1km]

Caveat: Aesthetica in vivo

What I’m listening to right now.

A Capella Science, “Evo-Devo (Despacito Biology Parody).” This song is truly awesome. It’s evolutionary biology. It’s poetry. It’s music. It’s all in a package, like the miracle of life, itself. For the prototype of which this song is a “parody,” see here.
Lyrics.

EVO-DEVO
Huxley
B. Mac.
Oh Carroll, Carroll
Gould, Stephen Jay yeah
D-D-D-D-Davidson and Peter

See
One cell divide and decide on a thousand fates
Did you ever figure how they know?
B. Mac.
We
Are built of modules combined in a planned out way
Each new piece must be told where to go
Oh

Now there’s a science helping us to understand
How our cells encode this architectural plan
Signalling each other with genetic tools oh
Oh yeah

Wow
Phenotype the interface for mouse and man
Genotype the files and the subprograms
What then are the switches, circuit boards and boot code?

Evo-Devo
Looking at the logic in the ways that we grow
Every gene directed by a signal key code
Proteins that can activate, enhance or veto
Evo-Devo
Signals are controlled by other genes that signal
Calculating in a network labyrinthal
Where the heart and liver and the hands and feet go

Signal mapping tells each region what it ought to be yo
With circuits so deeply built upon
They’re older than the Paleo
The Paleozoic Era baby
In a crucial pathway changes tend to get torpedoed
Where they go calamity goes
As this cyclopic sheep knows..

See down they cascade like a domino
Like you and I drosophila
The path that makes us optical
Was laid a long long time ago
Back before we blew up the cambrian like a bomb bomb
Now my eye protein can make you see out of your bom bom
And Hedgehog and its relatives like Indian and Sonic
Set up set up in a gradient on segments embryonic
Split forebrains and asymmetric parts depend upon it
Flipping on genetic switches and logic
From devo to evo
Adult and embryo
Mostly don’t evolve in the genes of the genome
Safer the mutation aimed at regulation
Keep the building blocks and swap their activation
From devo to evo
Parts have alter egos
Homologs evolved from repeats in the schema
Switch a couple bases in the proper places
You’ll be watching flies grow legs out of their faces oh yeah

Evo-Devo
Stick around for Modern Synthesis the sequel
Only by combining can a new theory grow
Evolution and development amigos
Evo-Devo
Signals trigger patterns of complexity so
Switching up the switches of a signalling node
Gives a modular and simple way to evolve

Look at how our spinal segments generate a neat row
Built on a molecular clock
One cycle, one vertebra
One vertebra one vertebra baby
Speeding up its rate is snakes’ developmental cheat code
That and where a lizard’s feet grow
They turn off distal aminos

Evo-Devo
This is how we go from single cells to people
Every generation and in life primeval
Life in variations endless and beautiful

Badaboom

From devo to evo
Larva to mosquito
Patterns are resolved as the signals proceed yo
Map out a gene with a glow tag
Kill it with a morpholino
Short oligo morpholino baby

From devo to evo
Voyage of the Beagle
Body plans evolve when proteins steer the genome
In this manner life’s beauty grows
Aesthetica in vivo

Evo-Devo

picture[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: his that enjoys it

"Wealth is not his that has it, but his that enjoys it." – Benjamin Franklin.

So there's that.


What I'm listening to right now.

Kelly Clarkson, "Stronger." This is one of the songs we've done for the "CC" class (lyrics listening / dictation). I like this song, because it's empowering for girls, in a fairly innocuous, pop-culture way. And girls need that kind of thing. Yesterday, I had a rather serious discussion about ambition and lowered self-expectation with one of the girls from my painfully unambitious but talented HS1-T cohort (because she was the only one that showed up for class). After explaining the idiom, I kept asking her, "Why do you sell yourself short?" Of course, these things don't have a clean resolution, in real life, but I hope what I said made sense.

Lyrics.

You know the bed feels warmer
Sleeping here alone
You know I dream in colour
And do the things I want

You think you got the best of me
Think you've had the last laugh
Bet you think that everything good is gone
Think you left me broken down
Think that I'd come running back
Baby you don't know me, cause you're dead wrong

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone
What doesn't kill you makes a fighter
Footsteps even lighter
Doesn't mean I'm over cause you're gone

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, stronger
Just me, myself and I
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone

You heard that I was starting over with someone new
They told you I was moving on over you

You didn't think that I'd come back
I'd come back swinging
You try to break me, but you see

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone
What doesn't kill you makes a fighter
Footsteps even lighter
Doesn't mean I'm over cause you're gone

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, stronger
Just me, myself and I
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone

Thanks to you I got a new thing started
Thanks to you I'm not the broken-hearted
Thanks to you I'm finally thinking about me
You know in the end the day you left was just my beginning
In the end…

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone
What doesn't kill you makes a fighter
Footsteps even lighter
Doesn't mean I'm over cause you're gone

[2x]
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, stronger
Just me, myself and I
What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone

(When I'm alone)

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Some People

"People on the side of The People always ended up disappointed, in any case. They found that The People tended not to be grateful or appreciative or forward-thinking or obedient. The People tended to be small-minded and conservative and not very clever and were even distrustful of cleverness. And so the children of the revolution were faced with the age-old problem: it wasn't that you had the wrong kind of government, which was obvious, but that you had the wrong kind of people." – Terry Pratchett

I guess this quote is from one of Pratchett's Discworld books – which, frankly, I never managed to read all the way through, and I enjoyed what I did read so little that I would be hard pressed to tell you what they are about. But he's nevertheless good at some great, quotable thoughts – he will live on through his many aphorisms, perhaps.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Confused Poemifying

There was a young man
From Cork who got limericks
And haikus confused

I don't know the origin of this… poem… but it's circulating on the internet. I found it quite funny.

Another unattributable internet-sourced quote, somewhat humorous:

"I have a computer in my pocket that lets me instantly access the entirety of human knowledge. I use it to look at pictures of cats."

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: and, but no

This made me laugh, quite a bit.

First they came for the verbs, and I said nothing, because verbing weirds language
Then they arrival for the nouns, and I speech nothing, because no verbs
Then they for the descriptive, and I silent because verbless and nounless
Then they for me, and, but no

This very humorous bit of linguistics-based humor has been circulating on the internets. Attribution is vague – the best I could find with google is an attribution of the first two lines to Peter Ellis (whoever that is). I first ran across it mentioned the All Things Linguistic blog, and that links to another tumblr page (tumblr is a kind of social media "lite" blogging host – in fact, the All Things Linguistic blog is in that medium, but I guess its settings are more blog-like and less social-media-like). Finding attribution on tumblr is like jumping down a rabbit hole, and without an active tumblr account mostly I get bombarded with requests to sign up, and I'm not interested in going there. So if whoever actually made this up finds this here without attribution, please don't get upset – I did my best.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: nervously loquacious at the edge of an abyss

"…there is no place for purely human boasts of grandeur, or for forgetting that men build their cultures by huddling together, nervously loquacious, at the edge of an abyss.‎" – Kenneth Burke.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Cause for Optimism

I ran across this quote. I suppose it summarizes my own reasoning as to why I am optimistic about the whole concept of development – in the sense that peoples and nations have no predestination in matters of whether their society develops or not, and to what degree, because policy decisions actually matter. You can't be pessimistic about improving the lives of people in the world, when there is proof that it is more than just random chance, and that decisions taken in a society, by individuals, can lead to substantial differences in outcomes.

"I’m not convinced with these arguments about some nations being predetermined in their development and alien to the concept of democracy and the rule of law.

"The reason I’m quite comfortable with this denial . . . We can move from theory to practice. While we can talk about history and certain influence of historical events to modernity, we can look at the places like Korean Peninsula. The same nation, not even cousins but brothers and sisters, divided in 1950, so that’s, by historical standards, yesterday." – Garry Kasparov, in interview with economist Tyler Cowen.

I guess Kasparov is responding to the idea that Russia is somehow predestined to be authoritarian. Clearly he is rejecting that notion. And I agree. I live within the most stunning example of this line of reasoning. Indeed, it is probably one of the reasons I choose to live here – it imbues me with optimism about human character and destiny. 

[daily log: walking, 6.5km]

Caveat: You are not Catullus

Be Angry At The Sun

That public men publish falsehoods
Is nothing new. That America must accept
Like the historical republics corruption and empire
Has been known for years.

Be angry at the sun for setting
If these things anger you. Watch the wheel slope and turn,
They are all bound on the wheel, these people, those warriors.
This republic, Europe, Asia.

Observe them gesticulating,
Observe them going down. The gang serves lies, the passionate
Man plays his part; the cold passion for truth
Hunts in no pack.

You are not Catullus, you know,
To lampoon these crude sketches of Caesar. You are far
From Dante's feet, but even farther from his dirty
Political hatreds.

Let boys want pleasure, and men
Struggle for power, and women perhaps for fame,
And the servile to serve a Leader and the dupes to be duped.
Yours is not theirs.

– Robinson Jeffers (American poet, 1887-1962)

This poem seems stunningly topical, given it was written 75 years ago.

[daily log: walking, 6.5km]

Caveat: a sufficiently obfuscated version of the UBI

I have long thought that the direction we should be going, in terms of social welfare policy, is what is called a "Universal Basic Income." Switzerland recently flirted with the idea, via its referendum process – my recollection is that it didn't pass (but I'm to lazy to find out if I'm wrong about this).

This strikes me as something we need to talk more about, in the context of cultural sustainability and US politics. I saw this on the marginalrevolution blog a while back (great blog, but for your sanity, don't read the comments). The quote that drew my attention:

[Patrick] COLLISON: Do we just need a sufficiently obfuscated version of the UBI [Universal Basic Income] and then we’re fine?

[Tyler] COWEN: We call it "disability insurance."

In fact, this thought had occurred to me, almost exactly as Cowen phrases it, many years ago when I was still living in the US. It is flattering to have a world-class economist validate my idea – not that I would try to take credit – I only have my own memory of thinking this.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: respect and brotherly love

I learned that the essential character of a nation is determined not by the upper classes, but by the common people, and that the common people of all nations are truly brothers in the great family of mankind. … And even as I grew to feel more Negro in spirit, or African as a I put it then, I also came to feel a sense of oneness with the white working people whom I came to know and love.

This belief in the oneness of humankind, about which I have often spoken in concerts and elsewhere, has existed within me side by side with my deep attachment to the cause of my own race. Some people have seen a contradiction in this duality. … I do not think however, that my sentiments are contradictory. … I learned that there truly is a kinship among us all, a basis for mutual respect and brotherly love.  - Paul Robeson

What I'm listening to right now.

Paul Robeson, "Joe Hill." Song by Phil Ochs.

Lyrics.

I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night,
Alive as you and me
Says I But Joe, you're ten years dead
I never died said he,
I never died said he.
The Copper Bosses killed you Joe,
They shot you Joe says I

Takes more than guns to kill a man
Says Joe I didn't die
Says Joe I didn't die
And standing there as big as life
And smiling with his eyes

Says Joe What they can never kill
Went on to organize,
Went on to organize
From San Diego up to Maine,
In every mine and mill,
Where working-men defend there rights,
It's there you find Joe Hill,
It's there you find Joe Hill
I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night,
Alive as you and me.

Says I But Joe, you're ten years dead
I never died said he,
I never died said he

I think the Joan Baez rendition of this song is the one I heard in childhood. 

[daily log: walking, 6.5km]

Caveat: Two quotes for Saint Zeno’s day

Two quotes. Their only relation is that of propinquity.

"The silent wilderness surrounding this cleared speck on the Earth struck me as something great and invincible, like evil or truth, waiting patiently for the passing away of this fantastic invasion." – Joseph Conrad

"I do not understand the squeamishness about the use of gas. I am strongly in favor of using poison gas against uncivilized tribes. It would spread a lively terror." – Winston Churchill

I guess I've posted the Churchill quote before – I only realized that after I prepared this blog entry, but I have decided not to let that prevent me from posting it again, as it seems, still, sadly relevant.

Saint Zeno is the patron saint of children learning to talk.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: On Expertise

"Certified skydiving instructors know way more about safely falling from planes than I do, and are way more likely to die that way." – Randall Munroe, author of the comic xkcd. This quote is the "hovertext" accompanying this cartoon.

picture

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: All your eyes sing the song to me

"Fascism is what capitalism does when it’s under threat." – Sam Kriss (Idiot Joy Showland blog).

What I'm listening to right now.

Heartless Bastards, "Only For You."

Lyrics.

Been a while since I felt this way about
Someone that really really like to know you
More I know you, more
All your eyes sing the song to me
And I really really like to move to it
Oh oh ? oh

And ? me oh
Open my ?
And now we I only for you

All your eyes spending on my head
And all, all this ? of sorrow uh yeah for ?
Yeah all your eyes spending on my head
And I ? spend of sorrow uh yeah for.

And now I'm ? open my heart
And I only oh only for you
And now I'm just gone don't know what to do
My head is such a cloud if you
And I'm just gone now what to do
My head is such a cloud if you so ?
I'm tryin uh uh uh
And now I'm just gone don't know what to do
My head is such a cloud if you

All your eyes spending on my head
And all, all this ? of sorrow uh yeah for ?
Yeah all your eyes spending on my head
And I ? spend of sorrow uh yeah for.

And now I'm ? open my heart
And I only oh only for you

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Social Observation

"Koreans are socially Confucian, philosophically Buddhist, and are spirit worshippers in times of trouble." – Homer Hulbert (1863~1949), missionary to Korea

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: If they can get here

The topic of immigration periodically looms in my political imagination. I have never done much about it, however. I once tried to build a website on the topic of “open borders,” but my own inertia doomed that effort (the site only lived about a year).
I’m pretty sure I wrote somewhere, but I can’t find where, that I have sometimes thought that the issue of immigration and open borders will be a new kind of abolition movement. I was gratified to read this post at a blog called spottedtoad, which appears to argue the same idea, more cogently than I ever could. It may fade, but at least at the moment, the issue is becoming more noticeable and more politically polarizing in the US. This is not dissimilar to the way abolitionism took hold of political discourses in the first half of the 19th century.
In the meantime, I leave with that same Herman Melville quote I’ve cited before:

“If they can get here, they have God’s right to come.”

picture[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: Great again? Great idea…

A nation which makes greatness its polestar can never be free; beneath national greatness sink individual greatness, honor, wealth and freedom. But though history, experience and reasoning confirm these ideas; yet all-powerful delusion has been able to make the people of every nation lend a helping hand in putting on their own fetters and rivetting their own chains, and in this service delusion always employs men too great to speak the truth, and yet too powerful to be doubted. Their statements are believed – their projects adopted – their ends answered and the deluded subjects of all this artifice are left to passive obedience through life, and to entail a condition of unqualified non-resistance to a ruined posterity. [emphasis added] – Abraham Bishop.

Bishop was an American Jeffersonian politician (called "Republican" in that Era), abolitionist and orator, who lived 1763-1844. He apparently advocated for gender equality, too. Oddly, the wikithing lacks an article about Bishop, but I found this with some biographical information.

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: The Semiotics of a Particularly Funny Joke about Dreams, Chickens, Roads, and Motives

 "I dream of a world where chickens can cross the road without having their motives questioned."

In a candy shop in Oldtown Pasadena about 9 days ago, where we had stepped in because my nephew Dylan had a sweet-tooth, I ran across the above joke, inscribed on a fridge magnet, for sale for the ghastlily exorbitant price of $6.50.

I laughed very hard. So did my dad. My sister just made a face – the kind that says, "I can see why you would find that funny but I don't plan to laugh."

I bought two of them, but the phrase was already inscribed on my brain. Curt, who'd witnessed all this, was unable to understand the humor. Of course, there are lot of cultural touchstones that make it inaccessible to those not grounded in US culture.

I have been trying to think about how best to explain to Curt why this joke made me laugh so hard. I think the first step is to begin to fill in some missing cultural components, with a disquisition on the ancient "Why did the chicken cross the road?" joke genre.

So, let's begin. There is a question-and-answer joke, that asks, "Why did the chicken cross the road?"

The oldest, most time-tested answer is, "To get to the other side."

There exists an infinite number of alternate versions, with questions and answers. Many of the versions rely on the "build up" of previous versions (e.g. #10, below). I researched a few that I found most humorous.

Why did the chicken cross the road? To get to the other side
Why did the chicken cross the basketball court? He heard the referee calling fowls
Why did the turkey cross the road? To prove he wasn't chicken
Why did the chicken cross the road, roll in the mud and cross the road again? Because he was a dirty double-crosser
Why didn't the chicken skeleton cross the road? Because he didn't have enough guts
Why did the chicken cross the playground? To get to the other slide
Why did the dinosaur cross the road? Because chickens hadn't evolved yet
Why did the turtle cross the road? To get to the shell station
Why did the horse cross the road? Because the chicken needed a day off

The next step is to recognize the new joke's nod to another genre altogether: the "I dream of a world where. . . "

Somehow, my feeling is that this is rooted in the Langston Hughes poem. Or, if not rooted there, then nevertheless Hughes' poem is an early peak of a meme.

I Dream a World

I dream a world where man
No other man will scorn,
Where love will bless the earth
And peace its paths adorn
I dream a world where all
Will know sweet freedom's way,
Where greed no longer saps the soul
Nor avarice blights our day.
A world I dream where black or white,
Whatever race you be,
Will share the bounties of the earth
And every man is free,
Where wretchedness will hang its head
And joy, like a pearl,
Attends the needs of all mankind-
Of such I dream, my world!

So another aspect of the joke's appeal, at least to me, is that it takes the silly chicken joke meme and combines it with the high-register "I dream" meme.

Finally, the last part of the joke, which renders it especially appropriate for me, is the bit of psychobable at the end:  ". . . without having their motives questioned."

This is a type of language popularized during my parents' generation, and echoes the whole "I'm OK, You're OK" meme of that era. 

There's a lot going on in that joke. I have placed it on the sidebar of my blog. 

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: I’m with Goethe on this one

I find most conspiracy theories – whether left, right, center, or way-out-there – implausible. My own response to most conspiracy theories can be summarized by the old quote from Goethe, "misunderstandings and neglect create more confusion in this world than trickery and malice. At any rate, the last two are certainly much less frequent." This idea has circulated more recently as "Hanlon's Razor": "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."

Mostly, I have given up trying to explain why conspiracy theories are implausible to those who espouse them, however. It seems a fruitless exercise, and anyway it's a lot of work.

I ran across an excellent debunking of the recently emergent conspiracy theory (being propagated by Trump et al.)  that Democrats are rigging the upcoming US election. Written by a commenter who goes by "CrunchyFrog" on the Clintonist left-of-center blog "Lawyers, Guns & Money," it is so well reasoned I felt like sharing it. Not that I have the mistaken belief that someone who believes Trump's voter-fraud theory would be persuaded by this to change their minds, but I cite it just because I admire this kind of reasoning. I think the author would not mind having most of it reproduced here (I clipped off the gratuitous insults and Trumpist-baiting at either end as detracting from the clarity of argument). 

Regarding the black voter busing scheme. Let’s think about this logically (not possible for the GOP, I know, but bear with me). If I were running such a scheme what would I have to do to make an effective dent in the results? As a starting point, a lot of Colorado wingnuts think that Obama won there in 2012 by cheating. He won by 138k votes, so let’s use 140k votes as a starting point. So let’s say I have a bus full of black voters – say 66 people (common capacity limit on school buses). So if every bus is filled to near capacity that’s about 2200 bus-visits to the polling stations. How many polling stations can a given bus hit in a day? Well, your typical precinct has 2-3 people checking voters in and each one processes about 2 per minute, so that’s over 30 minutes just to check in (of course there will be other voters, too), plus time to drive between precincts. Seriously, if you are counting on more than 10 precincts per bus per day you’re going to be disappointed. So that’s 220 buses chartered for the day, and a total of about 14k fraudulent voters.

Holy freaking crap. The logistical problems of arranging that many fraudulent voters, ALL of whom are risking felony sentences and NONE of whom have ever talked about it to anyone. Now plan to arrange for 140k fake registrations using the matching photos for each person and arrange it so that the manager of each bus makes sure that every voter gets the exact fake ID for each precinct. And NO MISTAKES – remember no one has ever been caught doing this because Democrats, who are inept in government, are utter geniuses when it comes to vote fraud. So that means there NEVER can be a situation where a fake voter encounters a registrar who says “Hey, I live on that street, I’ve never seen you” or similar.

By the way, the absolutely easiest logistical part of this scheme is arranging for photo ID. Assuming you have that many people willing to commit felonies for whatever you are paying them and have arranged everything else in detail, getting fake photo IDs for them is simple and routine. So photo ID laws do absolutely jack shit to stop massive vote fraud – but of course that wasn’t their real intention, was it?

[daily log: walking, 7km]

Caveat: fireflying around in unexpected and impossible trajectories

Is this quote interesting? You decide… 

That’s the extremely interesting thing: Everything is interesting. Potentially. Sometimes it may not seem so. You may think a certain thing is completely without interest. You may think, or I may think, eh, dull, boring, heck with it, let’s move on. But there is someone on this planet who can find something interesting in that particular thing. And it’s often good to try. You have to poke at a thing, sometimes, and find out where it squeaks. Any seemingly dull thing is made up of subsidiary things. It’s a composite — of smaller events or decisions. Or of atoms and molecules and prejudices and hunches that are fireflying around in unexpected and impossible trajectories. Everything is interesting because everything is not what it is, but is something on the way to being something else. Everything has a history and a secret stash of fascination. – Nicholson Baker (American novelist, b 1957)

[daily log: walking, 6.5km]

Caveat: 마음에 드는 방이 없었다

So, I was reading a random blog, and ran across this little meme, which is not that new:

“Pick up the nearest book to you, turn to page 45. The first sentence explains your love life.”

Curious to have my love life explained, I immediately did this.
The book nearest to me was TOPIK in 30 days – this is a book for self study of Korean vocabulary, intended for preparation for the TOPIK test (Test Of Proficiency In Korean – and as a side note, ¿why in the world does the main Korean language proficiency test have an English acronym?). Not that I’m preparing for the test, but I do try to compel myself to study Korean vocabulary sometimes.
On page 45, the sentence was an example of usage of the verb 구하다 [gu.ha.da = “get”]. The sentence read,

오후 내내 방을 구하러 다녔지만 마음에 드는 방이 없었다.
I’ve been looking all afternoon to get a new room, but there’s none that are appealing.

In fact, this is quite plausible, as a kind of metaphorical explanation of my love life.


A thought for the day, if that’s what it is:

“What if we’re not conscious, we just think we are?”

[daily log: walking, 7km]

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