Sunday, January 31, 2010
Holga
I just ordered a Holga camera and 3 rolls of B&W 120 film. I am very much looking forward to seeing what this thing can do. The Holga is a medium format “toy” camera with a plastic lens. It is very limited mechanically speaking. In most ways it is only a bit more sophisticated than a disposable camera, but it has quite a cult following, because it can produce some rather interesting results. I was able to get it for only $20, which is the cheapest I have seen it. Now I need to figure out a way to get my scanner, which has the ability to scan 35mm and slide negatives to scan the medium format negatives. I would also like to pick up a TLR medium format camera for some more serious medium format work at some point in the future.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Get Ready
Still have yet to write a part two of my travel blog, but right now I am hard at work of my massive counter-strike against Rational Dawn. Stay tuned
Friday, January 22, 2010
Road Trip (Part 1)
Due to unforeseen circumstances, I left for Ashley’s (HealthyAddict’s) house 2 hours later then I had planned. The road were mostly clear of traffic, other than the inconvenience of having to pay the tolls (boy I wish I had the I-Pass for that trip) until I got onto 294. Traffic was fairly heavy from the time I got onto 294 pretty much until I was in Indiana and got on 65. Once on 65 there was little traffic I drove through the desolate, baron wasteland that is Indiana. The trip to Columbus took about 7 hours and was largely uneventful and rather dull, although I did see an anti-evolution and pro-life sign outside Indianapolis. Around 9, which is when I had originally planned to be in Columbus, I got a call from Ashley saying that she too was delayed due to a meeting at work. I joked that the bible tells us that all things work together for good for those who love god. a bit behind schedule, I arrived at Ashley’s house and after dropping my stuff off in the living room we decided to go out to have a drink and chat as to avoid waking up her boyfriend who had to work early the next morning. We went to a place called the surly girl in an area called the short north (you may have seen this in her ‘discover Columbus’ promotion video). We chit-chatted for about an hour or so, and I found it rather odd and amusing that they had a rather homo-erotic AIDS public service ad in the men’s room that showed the torso of a shirtless man and the slogan “stay negative”, placed right about the urinal and in the stall. After returning from the bar we chatted as quietly as we could for a bit longer before going to sleep. The next day we deliberated on what to do for awhile. Some consideration was given to the idea of visiting some sort of art display of a concert cornfield, but our enthusiasm waned once we found out that it was not stalks of corn, but giant cement ears of corn. Instead we opted (for whatever reason, given that it was only about 30 degrees) to go have ice cream at a specialty ice cream shop, which was also located in the Short North area. I have to say that I am quite the fan of ice cream and the flavors we tried were certainly different. We shared a cup that came with three scoops, one of which had balsam needle in it, another was made with goat cheese and the third was chocolate, cinnamon and Cayenne pepper (the last of which I didn’t care much for). After having ice cream we went back to Ashley’s place for a bit, where we recorded the videos most of you have probably already seen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2rU2M1Oqlw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJyzrRx5YgQ
After that was finish we snapped a couple of pictures, and Ashley then had to dash off to work and I headed to a place called Midwest photo exchange which was in Columbus because I was looking for a sync cord for my flash, as my wireless system did not come in before I left on the trip and I planned on using it more then I actually did. I should also say here that while I was showing Ashley my camera gear I was being immature and flashed my camera directly I her eyes at half power, which is temporary blindness mode (full power being permanent blindness mode) and so I apologize again for that. After wasting time at Midwest photo, I wasted nearly another half hour in my car trying to get the flash cable crap to work because I did not want to swallow my pride and admit I did not know what the fuck I was doing. I finally did simply go back into the store and it turns out that one of the transmitters was faulty and so they gave me a new one. This then put me a bit behind schedule again going to James’ (DasAmericanAtheist’s) house.
It was about a 3 hour drive to James’ house, but I got lost going through Pittsburgh so it took longer. Driving though that part of Pennsylvania and a little bit of West Virginia was extremely hill. I am used to driving on highways that maintain more or less a smooth and level grade, even when going through mountains, 87 going through the Adirondacks comes to mind. After some difficulty, I did finally arrive at James’ house, only to once again drop off my things, and be given a brief tour before heading out to the bar. This place, which I believe was called the Haufbr äuhous (the äu is pronounces Oi in German), and as you might imagine from the name it was a German style beer hall that had its own brewery. It was on the river across from downtown Pittsburgh, quite a nice place. There we met up with Nick (Ahughman08) and a couple of James’ college friend, who names I do not recall, but one looked like Egon from Ghostbusters and the other looked like Lex Luther from Smallville. The 5 of us had a debate about religion which was quite fun despite Lex Luther’s initial objections. James’ also bragged several times about finding and watching “two girls, one cup” in its entirety, as if that were something to brag about.
On the drive back from the bar, James and I discussed the now ongoing video series by Veritas et al on negative atheism and, once back at his apartment, James read me an argument he was working on which was an atheist version of a cosmological argument. His girlfriend, who had also go to sleep for need of being up early for work, had left me a note which she signed as miss DasAmericanAtheist. I thought that was pretty clever. But alas, not longer after our return from the bar I was pretty well exhausted and so I called it a day and went to sleep.
Too lazy to write more right now. stay tuned for part two coming soon.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2rU2M1Oqlw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJyzrRx5YgQ
After that was finish we snapped a couple of pictures, and Ashley then had to dash off to work and I headed to a place called Midwest photo exchange which was in Columbus because I was looking for a sync cord for my flash, as my wireless system did not come in before I left on the trip and I planned on using it more then I actually did. I should also say here that while I was showing Ashley my camera gear I was being immature and flashed my camera directly I her eyes at half power, which is temporary blindness mode (full power being permanent blindness mode) and so I apologize again for that. After wasting time at Midwest photo, I wasted nearly another half hour in my car trying to get the flash cable crap to work because I did not want to swallow my pride and admit I did not know what the fuck I was doing. I finally did simply go back into the store and it turns out that one of the transmitters was faulty and so they gave me a new one. This then put me a bit behind schedule again going to James’ (DasAmericanAtheist’s) house.
It was about a 3 hour drive to James’ house, but I got lost going through Pittsburgh so it took longer. Driving though that part of Pennsylvania and a little bit of West Virginia was extremely hill. I am used to driving on highways that maintain more or less a smooth and level grade, even when going through mountains, 87 going through the Adirondacks comes to mind. After some difficulty, I did finally arrive at James’ house, only to once again drop off my things, and be given a brief tour before heading out to the bar. This place, which I believe was called the Haufbr äuhous (the äu is pronounces Oi in German), and as you might imagine from the name it was a German style beer hall that had its own brewery. It was on the river across from downtown Pittsburgh, quite a nice place. There we met up with Nick (Ahughman08) and a couple of James’ college friend, who names I do not recall, but one looked like Egon from Ghostbusters and the other looked like Lex Luther from Smallville. The 5 of us had a debate about religion which was quite fun despite Lex Luther’s initial objections. James’ also bragged several times about finding and watching “two girls, one cup” in its entirety, as if that were something to brag about.
On the drive back from the bar, James and I discussed the now ongoing video series by Veritas et al on negative atheism and, once back at his apartment, James read me an argument he was working on which was an atheist version of a cosmological argument. His girlfriend, who had also go to sleep for need of being up early for work, had left me a note which she signed as miss DasAmericanAtheist. I thought that was pretty clever. But alas, not longer after our return from the bar I was pretty well exhausted and so I called it a day and went to sleep.
Too lazy to write more right now. stay tuned for part two coming soon.
Monday, January 4, 2010
40 is the new 70 (degrees)
Some how, 40 degrees does not feel nearly as cold when you are in Florida. Yesterday morning when I left Illinois, it could not have been more than 15 degrees out. It was the sort of cold so bitter that it stung my hands. Then I rolled down my window to pay the toll, the window got stuck and would only roll up a few centimeters at a time and so for a few agonizing moments I had to endure driving 70 mph down the highway with the window open. Not a pleasant experience. Safely in Florida now, I took a walk around the block with only my hoodie on, which is something I could not even dream of doing for the past couple moths now. It is certainly warmer here then in New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania or anywhere else I have been for that matter. It has been a long couple of weeks, and it is winding down now. Only a week till school starts back again. I am going to spend this afternoon getting caught up on YT videos to try to get back in the swing of things.
Friday, October 9, 2009
Atheism and Death (A Reply)
Since I spent the time to write a script for my latest video, i figure I might as well make the most of it and post it here as well.
In his latest video, Theatheistantidote, hence forth referred to as Brock, said that the problem with atheism is that it does not promise life after death. He then went on to state that there is no point in living if we are without purpose, individually or collectively. All of this is nothing new, and it is also all largely irrelevant to the truth of atheism. Atheism is not about coddling people with a raft of promises, that’s the job of religion. Really this amounts to nothing more than an appeal to consequences.
None the less, I see there are several issues with what he said that I was to address anyway.
1) No god is needed for the afterlife
Simply put, it possible to conceive of an afterlife that does not involve a THEOS, a personal god. Reality could be infinite, or there could be an infinite number of universes, in which case there would have to be one in which you “survived death” all be it in some bizarre fashion. It is also possible that there is a personal god, but one that is far more reasonable that the Christian god and judges you on how well you lived your life and not what you believed or if you knew the secret password (the secret password is: JESUS!). We could all be just thought in the mind of an impersonal super-consciousness. The list simply goes on and on, and that’s not to say that any of these things are true or even likely, but they are possible and as far as I can tell, at the least they are just as likely as any religious conception of the afterlife.
2) No one knows what happens after death
No one knows for sure what happens after death. More and more I see the need as person to stress my own believe in the virtue of Socratic ignorance, because all too often, because I am an atheist, I am mistaken by people like Broke as having a definitive answer on subjects such as death. NO ONE knows from whence the universe came and NO ONE knows what happens when we die. PERIOD! I will even admit that perhaps, as Hamlet says, there is enough suffering in this life to seriously contemplate ending it all if not for “that the dread of something after death, The undiscovered country from whose bourn No traveller returns”, but I will also say that part of what makes life worthwhile is the fact that I don’t know everything, that there is still a journey of discovery to be made. Religion would only serve to rob me of that.
3) Objective purpose is conceptually impossible
Sorry Brock, that’s just the way it is. Purpose implies intention, intention implies mind, and mind = subjectivity. Objective purpose is conceptually impossible. Now I know you may try to argue that god gives us something like “ultimate purpose” but really Brock, all that amounts to is say “atheists don’t have someone with enough authority to dictate to everyone what to do”. Also, I should add that having eternal life is not the same as purpose. You could live forever purposelessly. Likewise, and perhaps more importantly, having purpose is in no way a guarantee of satisfaction, contentment, happiness, or anything else for that matter, Nor is not have purpose necessarily an impediment to any of those things. Really, the reality of religious purpose, at least nearest I can tell of the Christian world view, is that you must fulfill what God wants you to do and you have to TEACH yourself to be happy submitting to HIS plan. Living your life for a purpose someone else dictates to you hardly seems like something the religious should go out of their way to brag about.
4) This is purely an ego problem
This whole issue constitutes a problem with the Ego. Unwilling to accept that we are finite being on a small rock circling (and yes I know it is actually an ellipse) an average star which is merely one of SEXTILLIONS of stars. Unable to bare the fact that we are yet another animal destined to parish like all others, the ego of man stands up and revolts. Screaming and shaking its fist at the uncaring sky saying “I cannot continue to live if the whole universe was not created for me! How can I be just another animal?!”. The response to this is GET THE FUCK OVER OURSELF! What have you done what’s so great? Why this sense of entitlement?
5) Christianity is nihilistic to the core
In reality, if you are to take the Christian worldview seriously, and what is yet to come in the hereafter will eclipse all that is in this world, then why should you not wish for death on a daily basis and actively place yourself in situations where you are likely to be martyred? Certainly Christianity contains more than enough scriptural basis for you to “take up your cross and follow Jesus” into life endangering peril. At the least you should actually take seriously Jesus’ commands to “behold the lilies of the field”. Really, according to Christianity and the words of Jesus, the shorter your life, the better; the deeper into poverty you are, the better, because greater will your place be in the kingdom of heaven. The message of Jesus was not “Carpe Diem” it was grit your teeth and bare this life in order to gain the hereafter. It is a denial of life, not an affirmation.
6) How we should face death and life without purpose? By living the best we can here and now.
What is comes down to is that all that any of us are really able to do is make the best of what little time we have in this life. If there is any meaning to life, it can only be found through actually living it. If you live your life to the fullest and are annihilated after death, then what have lost? Well you may have wasted a few decades, but there will be nothing there of you to care or regret this lost time. If there is more after death, whatever that may be, at least you can go out with the knowledge that you lived your life the best you could, and really that all any of us really can do in the end.
In his latest video, Theatheistantidote, hence forth referred to as Brock, said that the problem with atheism is that it does not promise life after death. He then went on to state that there is no point in living if we are without purpose, individually or collectively. All of this is nothing new, and it is also all largely irrelevant to the truth of atheism. Atheism is not about coddling people with a raft of promises, that’s the job of religion. Really this amounts to nothing more than an appeal to consequences.
None the less, I see there are several issues with what he said that I was to address anyway.
1) No god is needed for the afterlife
Simply put, it possible to conceive of an afterlife that does not involve a THEOS, a personal god. Reality could be infinite, or there could be an infinite number of universes, in which case there would have to be one in which you “survived death” all be it in some bizarre fashion. It is also possible that there is a personal god, but one that is far more reasonable that the Christian god and judges you on how well you lived your life and not what you believed or if you knew the secret password (the secret password is: JESUS!). We could all be just thought in the mind of an impersonal super-consciousness. The list simply goes on and on, and that’s not to say that any of these things are true or even likely, but they are possible and as far as I can tell, at the least they are just as likely as any religious conception of the afterlife.
2) No one knows what happens after death
No one knows for sure what happens after death. More and more I see the need as person to stress my own believe in the virtue of Socratic ignorance, because all too often, because I am an atheist, I am mistaken by people like Broke as having a definitive answer on subjects such as death. NO ONE knows from whence the universe came and NO ONE knows what happens when we die. PERIOD! I will even admit that perhaps, as Hamlet says, there is enough suffering in this life to seriously contemplate ending it all if not for “that the dread of something after death, The undiscovered country from whose bourn No traveller returns”, but I will also say that part of what makes life worthwhile is the fact that I don’t know everything, that there is still a journey of discovery to be made. Religion would only serve to rob me of that.
3) Objective purpose is conceptually impossible
Sorry Brock, that’s just the way it is. Purpose implies intention, intention implies mind, and mind = subjectivity. Objective purpose is conceptually impossible. Now I know you may try to argue that god gives us something like “ultimate purpose” but really Brock, all that amounts to is say “atheists don’t have someone with enough authority to dictate to everyone what to do”. Also, I should add that having eternal life is not the same as purpose. You could live forever purposelessly. Likewise, and perhaps more importantly, having purpose is in no way a guarantee of satisfaction, contentment, happiness, or anything else for that matter, Nor is not have purpose necessarily an impediment to any of those things. Really, the reality of religious purpose, at least nearest I can tell of the Christian world view, is that you must fulfill what God wants you to do and you have to TEACH yourself to be happy submitting to HIS plan. Living your life for a purpose someone else dictates to you hardly seems like something the religious should go out of their way to brag about.
4) This is purely an ego problem
This whole issue constitutes a problem with the Ego. Unwilling to accept that we are finite being on a small rock circling (and yes I know it is actually an ellipse) an average star which is merely one of SEXTILLIONS of stars. Unable to bare the fact that we are yet another animal destined to parish like all others, the ego of man stands up and revolts. Screaming and shaking its fist at the uncaring sky saying “I cannot continue to live if the whole universe was not created for me! How can I be just another animal?!”. The response to this is GET THE FUCK OVER OURSELF! What have you done what’s so great? Why this sense of entitlement?
5) Christianity is nihilistic to the core
In reality, if you are to take the Christian worldview seriously, and what is yet to come in the hereafter will eclipse all that is in this world, then why should you not wish for death on a daily basis and actively place yourself in situations where you are likely to be martyred? Certainly Christianity contains more than enough scriptural basis for you to “take up your cross and follow Jesus” into life endangering peril. At the least you should actually take seriously Jesus’ commands to “behold the lilies of the field”. Really, according to Christianity and the words of Jesus, the shorter your life, the better; the deeper into poverty you are, the better, because greater will your place be in the kingdom of heaven. The message of Jesus was not “Carpe Diem” it was grit your teeth and bare this life in order to gain the hereafter. It is a denial of life, not an affirmation.
6) How we should face death and life without purpose? By living the best we can here and now.
What is comes down to is that all that any of us are really able to do is make the best of what little time we have in this life. If there is any meaning to life, it can only be found through actually living it. If you live your life to the fullest and are annihilated after death, then what have lost? Well you may have wasted a few decades, but there will be nothing there of you to care or regret this lost time. If there is more after death, whatever that may be, at least you can go out with the knowledge that you lived your life the best you could, and really that all any of us really can do in the end.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Survey
035: Heavy Survey
Do humans carry souls?
Not likely
2. What about animals? .
Also not likely
3. Was September 11th a government conspiracy?
It was a conspiracy of 19 Muslim hijackers.
4. Do you believe a plane actually hit the pentagon?
all evidence points to YES
5. Are the methods the U.S. is using to handle illegal immigration satisfactory?
No
6. Do you think that John F. Kennedy's assasination was a government conspiracy?
No
7. Do you believe that the moon landing in 1969 actually happened?
Yes
8. Do you believe in ghosts?
No
9. Can subjection to violence in media lead to violence in the real world?
rarely
10. Did O.J. Simpson murder his wife?
All the evidence and statistics point to yes.
11. Do you believe going to war in Iraq was the right thing to do?
We went in on bad evidence, which due diligence would have expose as bad. however, once we were in, leaving would have done more harm than good.
12. Can we as people ever co-exist with each other peacefully?
On what scale? People do all the time, they just draw arbitrary distinction of “otherness”
13. Do you believe the course of our lives are pre-determined by unseen/unknown forces?
Yes, but not in any sort of supernatural way.
14. Has democracy made the world a better place?
Yes and no
15. Was the governments reaction to Hurricane Katrina acceptable?
No. they should have had plans to deal with a cat 5 DECADES in advance.
16. Are celebrities punished justly for crimes they commit?
rarely
17. Can we ever win the war on terror?
Wars on ideas tend to fail. The definition of terrorism is so vague WE are terrorists as well.
18. Are professional athletes over-compensated for their abilities?
Yes.
19. Did the fabled people of Atlantis ever exist?
No.
20. Are there other intelligent beings in the universe?
Seems fairly likely statistically speaking given that there are 72 sextillion stars in the visible universe and who knows how many planets.
21. Should the 1st Amendment protect all forms of expression, including those that may be offensive or harmful to others?
Yes on offensive, no on harmful.
22. Is it better for one innocent man to be sent to death or 5 murderers to be pardoned?
No.
23. In the case of homosexuality, do you believe it's sin?
Don’t believe in the concept of sin and cannot thing of any good reason to condemn it under any other moral model.
24. Can the human race ever help the planet Earth to recover from the ecological damage it has suffered?
Not totally
25. Will race/ethnicity always be an issue amongst differing peoples?
I think race is not actually the real problem. People are scared of difference and race just happens to be one of the more tangible differences between people.
26. Are you for or against abortion?
Pro-choice is not “for abortion” it is for choice.
27. Are you for or against capital punishment (i.e. the death penalty)?
I don’t think it works to deter crime and I don’t believe the state should be in the revenge business, but I am not crying for the people that get killed either.
28. Do you practice any form of religion? Why?
No. because all reason and evidence points to them being human fabrications.
29. Do you believe that the writings in the bible can still apply to today's world?
So of it can, but that’s not saying too much really. There is plenty of wisdom from all over the world and people really need to broaden their horizons beyond the bible.
30. Has religion made the world a better or worse place?
The effects of religion are manifold and likely incalculable.
Do humans carry souls?
Not likely
2. What about animals? .
Also not likely
3. Was September 11th a government conspiracy?
It was a conspiracy of 19 Muslim hijackers.
4. Do you believe a plane actually hit the pentagon?
all evidence points to YES
5. Are the methods the U.S. is using to handle illegal immigration satisfactory?
No
6. Do you think that John F. Kennedy's assasination was a government conspiracy?
No
7. Do you believe that the moon landing in 1969 actually happened?
Yes
8. Do you believe in ghosts?
No
9. Can subjection to violence in media lead to violence in the real world?
rarely
10. Did O.J. Simpson murder his wife?
All the evidence and statistics point to yes.
11. Do you believe going to war in Iraq was the right thing to do?
We went in on bad evidence, which due diligence would have expose as bad. however, once we were in, leaving would have done more harm than good.
12. Can we as people ever co-exist with each other peacefully?
On what scale? People do all the time, they just draw arbitrary distinction of “otherness”
13. Do you believe the course of our lives are pre-determined by unseen/unknown forces?
Yes, but not in any sort of supernatural way.
14. Has democracy made the world a better place?
Yes and no
15. Was the governments reaction to Hurricane Katrina acceptable?
No. they should have had plans to deal with a cat 5 DECADES in advance.
16. Are celebrities punished justly for crimes they commit?
rarely
17. Can we ever win the war on terror?
Wars on ideas tend to fail. The definition of terrorism is so vague WE are terrorists as well.
18. Are professional athletes over-compensated for their abilities?
Yes.
19. Did the fabled people of Atlantis ever exist?
No.
20. Are there other intelligent beings in the universe?
Seems fairly likely statistically speaking given that there are 72 sextillion stars in the visible universe and who knows how many planets.
21. Should the 1st Amendment protect all forms of expression, including those that may be offensive or harmful to others?
Yes on offensive, no on harmful.
22. Is it better for one innocent man to be sent to death or 5 murderers to be pardoned?
No.
23. In the case of homosexuality, do you believe it's sin?
Don’t believe in the concept of sin and cannot thing of any good reason to condemn it under any other moral model.
24. Can the human race ever help the planet Earth to recover from the ecological damage it has suffered?
Not totally
25. Will race/ethnicity always be an issue amongst differing peoples?
I think race is not actually the real problem. People are scared of difference and race just happens to be one of the more tangible differences between people.
26. Are you for or against abortion?
Pro-choice is not “for abortion” it is for choice.
27. Are you for or against capital punishment (i.e. the death penalty)?
I don’t think it works to deter crime and I don’t believe the state should be in the revenge business, but I am not crying for the people that get killed either.
28. Do you practice any form of religion? Why?
No. because all reason and evidence points to them being human fabrications.
29. Do you believe that the writings in the bible can still apply to today's world?
So of it can, but that’s not saying too much really. There is plenty of wisdom from all over the world and people really need to broaden their horizons beyond the bible.
30. Has religion made the world a better or worse place?
The effects of religion are manifold and likely incalculable.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
I will...
eventually get off my lazy ass and make a video and write new blogs and all that jazz soon. I swear!
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