Mid-morning. Rain showers cloudy this morning, boy, and you are ready to
go back to bed in a funk. The leaf screens apparent to the north and west sides
of the house are dulled by lack of sun and rain at least so far today. Spooky
is asleep by the front window and Jadah is nowhere to be seen. Carol is in the
dining working on her newspaper word puzzles to keep her mind in good form
along with her good body. From your perspective she is in her late forties or
early fifties but you both know better. – Amorella
0904 hours. When I woke up I vowed not to work on the post until I
completed work on chapter twelve. Par for the course obviously. If we go to the
park I’m planning on walking further than I did yesterday. The soreness in my
palms has not gone away and I have an appointment on Friday. We have talked a
bit about taking a trip to Glacier National Park this summer. If we do I’d
rather take the Honda than put miles on the Toyota. It is almost 2000 miles and
30 hours away, and that is the short route. We would easily put 5000 miles on
the car if we stopped in Wyoming. I will be surprised if Carol really wants to
do this. On another note, I think you are the anachronism Amorella and thus, so
am I. Dad always said he was in that he would have been a better fit in the
1880’s. I don’t know when I would be in a better fit. Oddly, nowhere comes to
mind.
Mid-afternoon. You had a late lunch at Marx
Bagels and though it is nice out you are waiting until tomorrow to mow so the
grass still looks decent on the weekend. Carol has an appointment tomorrow at
eleven-thirty and you are calling about the car open for painting touch-ups
tomorrow. You both have another appointment on Thursday at one uptown, and your
doctor appointment is on Friday. You found a recent article on Feedback which
reinforces your feeling on human social sense, and while you may be open-minded
and reserved you too would be uncomfortable with real aliens, particularly if
they were more humane, respectful, kind, trusting and sharing than Homo
sapiens.
1515 hours. In real life it would be a great and humbling shock, mostly
an embarrassment for our species, but I don’t know what could be done about it.
I would imagine they would just leave us alone. Maybe a sign on the other side
of the moon – “Children at Play. Do Not Disturb” – that’s how I see it.
Exactly, this is how you see it. So, what
are you going to do to better address this in book two? – Amorella
1520 hours. Begin to address this in these chapters. Surely Pyl, Justin
and Blake are in for a shock unbefitting their station/status in life, being
scholars and fully educated and open minded, at least to a point. In some ways
the dark humor that rolls in says, “Divine Justice, boy, don’t you think?” but
these are my words not yours.
How do you know these are your words and not
mine? – Amorella
1524 hours. My right arm begins to ache, just enough to be a reminder. I
do not know. I don’t. I just said it not in jest but I was being clever I
suppose, thinking, ‘well, it would be a kind of divine like poetic justice at
least in my mind; not in yours Amorella. It is pretty harsh though. I know I
have thought this before when I first wrote the Merlyn series, but somehow it
was a dark joke, but if it were real life, it would not be a joke at all.
Mostly it would embarrassingly sad, I would feel terribly bad for our species
because I am one of them. A fiction is one thing, real life is another.
But you insist that you are mostly fiction.
– Amorella
1530 hours. My thoughts are slowing down. I don’t want to continue
thinking on this as a real probability. Just the idea is disheartening in this
context.
Here’s a selection of that article. You need
to tackle this subject with heartansoulanmind boy. Imagine it real for the
benefit of the books. You want the authenticity to flow throughout write what
comes to mind if it were true, that one day you wake up like everyone else
alive and discover that kind visitors have come to say hello and would like to
share the bounty of their social graces and technologies with Earthlings with
no strings attached – just fellow brothers and sisters of the spirit helping
those less fortunate than themselves. Post. - Amorella
** **
Motivated Memory
Published
by Steven Novella under Neuroscience
I have had
the following experience many times, and so I suspect that it is a
near-universal experience. You are in a heated conversation with one or more
other people who have differing opinions on the topic of discussion. Perhaps
it’s just a fight over personal matters. After the heat has died down and calmer
emotions prevail, you try to come to some sort of resolution about the prior
conversation. Such efforts, however, are complicated by the fact that everyone
has a very different memory of the conversation you just shared.
A related
experience that is also common occurs when discussing a topic about which there
is disagreement (such as politics), and then revisiting the topic weeks or
months later. Again, everyone has a different memory of the prior discussion,
including which facts were established. It’s almost as if the previous
conversation had not taken place.
It’s as if
everyone edits their memories to fit their existing narrative. In this way,
memory can be a very dangerous thing – it gives us a false confidence in our
current beliefs and attitudes. We believe the facts support our position.
However, we often choose our facts based on our narrative, rather than craft a
narrative based upon facts.
We tend to
easily see this process in others, but of course often fail to see it in
ourselves.
As an aside,
this is perhaps one of my favorite aspects of the Internet, combined with smart
phones. Now, during a conversation and in real time, I can look up a reference
to establish a fact, rather than just relying on everyone’s edited memories.
A newly published study sheds further
light on this common experience of dueling memories. The researchers wanted to
explore the effect of in-group vs out-group status on memories of wartime
atrocities. Specifically, they looked at memories of stories of atrocities
committed by either American or Afghan soldiers.
Subjects
were given written stories about atrocities committed by either side, including
a justification for their actions. After a distraction period they then watched
a video in which some of the stories were repeated, but without the
justification. Following another distraction period they were then asked
questions about the stories.
As
predicted by the researchers, Americans were more likely to remember the
justifications for the actions of American soldiers than they were for Afghan
soldiers.
Previous research
has clearly established that humans are tribal – we think in terms of in-group
and out-group We can show tremendous altruism and compassion towards members of
our in-group, while simultaneously displaying callous cruelty toward members of
an out-group. History provide many examples – in extreme cases out-groups can
be entirely dehumanized, allowing for unlimited cruelty. . . .
Selected from Feedback.dot.com
** **
2002
hours. Tomorrow the Honda gets a touch-up, then, I get pipe tips and have the
car super cleaned by Mr. Clean. We drove over to Chris’ house to make sure we
knew where to take it tomorrow morning. After Carol’s appointment with our tax
lady about advanced quarterly tax payments we have lunch at Potbelly’s. It has
been awhile. We filled the car today and it got 27.2 mpg not too bad; 11.0
gallons to run 299 miles.
You love your cars, boy, whatever you have
at the moment. – Amorella
I figure that if we do buy another car it won’t be for a year or two. We
might as well enjoy the ones we have. – I wonder what Pyl, Justin and Blake are
thinking, about how it is going to be traveling with aliens to alien territory
on the other side of the galaxy. I think of the American natives in the sixteen
hundreds being sent off to England, Pocahontas and the like. I remember a
fellow from the Interior standing in front of a modern grocery store like
Kroger’s in Sao Paulo. All he wanted was money to take the bus home. We gave
him enough for the ticket and his eyes watered, he was so grateful. He thanked
us and blessed us then he saw my white gold college ring on my right hand and
bent down and kissed it like I was a Catholic Bishop or someone of that sort.
I’ll never forget those eyes and the tone of his Portuguese. He was out of
place and just wanted to go home – whatever he had heard about the big city
(the size of Chicago at the time) it was not for him. We never saw him again. I
assume he caught the next bus traveling his way. People may have a lot of
anticipation for big changes in their lives, weddings for example, or going off
to college or the military, but life is hardly ever what you dream it is going
to be. And, deep down, I think we know it, but we head out anyway. We head out
to wherever our inner spirit takes us. We allow this, we allow ourselves an
adventure at least once in life most people do if they are given the
circumstances that allow them to make a choice at the time. I think this is
where Pyl, Justin and Blake are. They trust their newfound benefactors. Why
not? I am learning to better trust Amorella. (2039)
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