Notes - Plowed&Reseeded / Human is a Metaphysical Conceit / Souls as Sarcophagi

         Mid-morning. You both decided to see Harry Potter next week. Beautiful day and the windows are opened for a change. No air conditioning desired. The cat is enjoying her newly re-discovered  scent-gathering freedoms (window screens intact) of the nearby woodsy outdoors.

         More spring-like this morning. Quietly polite outside of a momentary police or emergency siren in the distance a reminder of  the line “for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee” by the great seventeenth century English metaphysical poet, John Donne, father of the metaphysical conceit. Anger is an unloaded bullet has a familiar though understated sociopathic bang to it. How do the Dead in the book treat their mentally ill?

         Plowed over and reseeded, boy. That’s the best I can say at this time. We have no one for consideration in the books. The world of the Dead is as it is, just as the world of the Living is as it is. Rules is rules, son. Blessings of a sort are giving and scattered like seeds. Time for a break. Post. -  Amorella.

          Late afternoon. You hurt your back opening a window, rested, had lunch at Chipotle/Panera late.

         On the “plowed over and reseeded,” – I was rather shocked by your reply and it left me with a sadness in the gut. I’m glad you had a reply, even though, happily, the contingency is not in the book(s).

         “Plowed over and reseeded” is a metaphor for the ‘sense’ of the operation. It would be quite ironic in the books and blog if the characters within were not treated humanely.

         I’m sure a lot of people would not care if they were treated humanely or not – most would expect punishment whether they could help themselves or not (forget to take their meds).

         How do you administer ‘self-punishment’ (self imposed exile) until ready to meet and greet) for people who cannot reason through it? Some poor souls, from my perspective, don’t have hearts and minds intact enough to reason humanely. The soul is as a spiritual body and can be refurbished (metaphorically speaking). I have to fit my responses in context of books and blog. Thus, in keeping with the sense, think of human beings as three/four dimensional metaphysical conceits. Post. – Amorella.

         Time for bed. Tomorrow, up to Westerville for the day. You are dropping off Bob’s 8X10 photo of City Lights and having lunch with Carol’s Uncle John. Mary Lou will also be there.

         I am thinking more about “souls” in the book and how they relate to the Rebellion. For instance, those whose heartsanminds are enclosed within their souls – what happens to them as the rebellion commences?

         Those souls are as stones in a desert, boy. For an image think one foot or so stones scattered about as one might see in a photo shoot from one of the Mars Landers. They are of no consequence until they decide to be.

         So, those enclosed heartsanminds are aware of the ‘outside world of the Dead’?

         Reason would have it that way as they are encased within the soul-shell. They would have to listen to their souls, but some don’t even believe they are dead. What they believe is their choice. Hearts and minds have to talk it out and realize their souls are as small sarcophagi.

         Cool. Is this the reason when the Dead are in a deep sleep they are as stone?

         Yes. This is how it works. In a deep and pleasant sleep the Dead are protected by their souls – their minds and hearts are in a harmonious relationship when the ‘day’ is said and done.

         Most awesome. How things work! You have a consistency that fits throughout the books and blog. It is hard to be conscious of this.

         Nearly impossible, boy. Gives the diligent reader reason to think and pause on how you accomplished these books. No deception here. The notes show all.

         Sometimes I think it is impossible myself.

         You, the author, question the authorship of the books too. Very amusing. My kind of humor, boy. Post. – Amorella.

         Word play on the ‘muse’.

         Deeper thought for you to focus on. Muse One as well as Muse Two, as Muse One prophesized.

         Indeed, she did. She said there would be another, and there was. Perhaps it was me self-fulfilling her words unconsciously.

         You don’t believe that for a minute. – Amorella.

         It makes no difference what I believe.

         Really. Such a thought from a professed agnostic. Post, orndorff, and go to bed. – Amorella.  

Notes - lottery / CA photo / Infinity & we finite /

       Mid-morning. Odds and ends, breakfast and the paper. An article, “More people fight aging by going under the knife,” by Abby Ellin on page 3A of the Enquirer caught your eye, and a quote within from a professor at Harvard Medical School, Nancy Etcoff, caught your mind. “Part of our stereotype of old people is that they are social, warm and likeable, but powerless and sexless.”

         At first it made me angry, but with time and consideration, I would say it is pretty accurate, at least psychologically. I never thought about aging as being powerless and sexless. Old and retired are certainly more powerless unless they have money. Maybe that is what it is about, at least in terms of family. I never really thought about that before either because I never considered money important beyond making a living and surviving retirement. I remember that in old age my father bought lottery tickets, hoping to make it big, but I think he was looking out for his wife and kids too, hoping they would gain from his lottery winnings. He never won that I know, and certainly not much, if he did win.

         Do you ever play the lottery? – Amorella.

         Rarely. When it’s worth millions and millions of people are also playing. Why not?

         What would you do with it if you won? – Amorella.

         I don’t know beyond giving 99 percent or so to wife/partner, Carol, who would no doubt give some to daughter Kim (with my wholehearted approval already understood); then, knowing Carol, she would invest it very conservatively. I would look for a restored 1965 green Beetle with a sunroof and FM radio with a rear speaker, like my first car. That would be cool. But then I would have to find some place to store it. So, with that complication, it might not be worth it. If I wanted a sports car and it was going to be a nice day, I’d rent one once in a while. I can’t think of anything I really need and not much else I would want. I don’t really want the Beetle that badly, it is more fun to think about than to actually own, otherwise I suppose I would have one now. I’d give it to Carol and let her deal with it.

         I didn’t say if you won the big lottery, let’s say you won a thousand dollars, what would you do with it?

         Give it to Carol to put in her budget – well, after I took out a hundred for myself. Why not? She would use it prudently. Look, Amorella, money is as bad as politics and religion. I am uncomfortable with all three. All three make me uncomfortable in being here, that is, existing in this universe. I know this probably sounds silly, because, well, here I am, just like everyone else. I’ve dealt with it, just like everyone else. Poor brain cell connections, who knows. A statement not a complaint. I’m done.

         Post. – Amorella.

         Why do you dig this stuff out of me? What good does it do me to see this in print?

         Keeps you conscious of what is and what is not important in your life. – Amorella.

         You were on Facebook, and reminded again of what is important in your life. First, is your partner without whom you would not have a child, Kim, a son-in-law, Paul, and a grandson, Owen. The photo was taken by Craig or Alta while on your recent trip to California. You hiked a mile off Route 1 and discovered the bench, wherein you sat. It is one of your favorite photos of you and Carol. Why not?  Drop it in here and post. - Amorella.

        Note: I think I have already used this photo. It fits in context though, so I'll leave it. - rho


         After noon. Errands to run. – Amorella.         

         Do you ever run errands, Amorella? What do you do (even if you are imagination) when we are not on the blog?

         Are you out of your mind, boy? I don’t do anything. – Amorella.

         That’s funny. You sound just like me retired. Now, that is something I can reflect on.

         It is the only thing you can reflect on. You are no different than anyone else on that score. People who reflect on others reflect on themselves first. Dampens the process, even among friends. – Amorella.

         That’s not nice. I don’t agree.

         When have I ever cared whether you agree with me?

         I don’t know. I could check – if it is so it is no doubt in my notes.

         Twenty some years of this, only two on the Internet.

   

         Later, after a late not too well prepared lunch at the rocking chair place. Running more errands and picking up corn on the farm north of town you read the newest Edge and the focus on “infinity” caught your attention. This is a selection from “Next Step Infinity” by Anthony Aguirre, PhD.

** **

         . . . In this picture, dubbed the string theory “landscape,” inflation brings into being an infinite number of sub-universes with a diverse set of properties spanning the array of ways in which low-energy physics can emerge from high-energy unification. Inflation can spawn bubbles inside of which is inflation, which spawns bubbles, and so on. And the incredibly rich structure of this “multiverse” is that of infinitely many times, each forming infinitely many sub-universes, each of which is infinite.

4. This raises profound issues that we cannot ignore.

Infinity can violate our human intuition, which is based on finite systems, and create perplexing philosophical problems. A classic example was invented by the mathematician David Hilbert. Rather than imagining an infinite universe, imagine an infinite hotel, with all rooms completely filled. Though the hotel is full, you can accommodate infinitely many more guests by moving each guest into the room of twice its current number and adding guests in all of the odd rooms. Yet although you double the number of guests, the hotel looks exactly the same. Applying this notion to an eternally inflating universe, suppose the whole bubbling mess is infinite at some time. Although infinitely many bubbles have formed during some time interval, it is rather unclear that after this time the universe is actually any bigger!

The same example reveals problems for such naïve questions as “What is the chance that a randomly chosen guest is in an even-numbered room?” The seemingly obvious answer is 50 percent. Yet the number of even-numbered rooms is just as large as the total number of rooms in the hotel (since each guest found an even-numbered room to go to) and thus twice as large as the odd-numbered rooms (which make up just half of all rooms, remember?) This implies that a randomly chosen guest is twice as likely to be in an even-numbered room. Yet, by exactly the same reasoning, there are as many odd-numbered rooms as total rooms and twice as many as even-numbered rooms! Our intuition that the answer is “obviously” 50 percent arises from considering the first N rooms, then letting N approach infinity. But that’s only one way of comparing the number of even- and odd-numbered rooms, and different choices—that is, different ways of measuring—would give different results.

This “counting” or “measure” ambiguity afflicts infinite systems terribly and creates a nightmare in cosmology. If postinflationary regions can have different properties, and each possible set of properties is realized in an infinite number of such regions, there is a twofold problem. First, there is no unique prediction, from this fundamental theory, for what we can observe. This is a letdown but not fatal, since we would still hope to make probabilistic predictions. Yet the measure ambiguity suggests that the relative probabilities themselves depend on the particular measure we choose and there is no compelling reason to believe any one given measure. This measure problem has spawned a large amount of recent work in inflationary cosmology, and although there has been progress, it’s not clear that the progress is toward any particular resolution.

Another key aspect of infinity is that it is so much larger than anything finite. In particular, an infinite system including some randomness will tend to contain infinitely many realizations of any given finite subsystem compatible with the properties of the infinite one. This means that if we reside in an infinite bubble, then somewhere (incredibly far away) within it is another copy of the entire Earth, perfect in every detail. On a more personal level, there are infinitely many identical copies of you, as well as infinitely many of every possible small or large variation of you, some more common than others. What does this mean? If these other people are identical to you, are they you? What is your relation to them? If you were to suddenly cease to exist, should you take heart that “you” continue merrily along out there? Or would “you” simply find yourself to be one of them? (Beware: This possibility becomes more and more disturbing the more you think about it.)

Should we embrace the idea that our world is truly infinite, or should we look for some way to tame and regulate this infinity in our theories? It is difficult to say. What seems clear, however, is that infinity can no longer be safely ignored: beautifully constructed, empirically supported, self-consistent theories have brought infinity from idle curiosity to central player in contemporary cosmology. And if correct, the worldview these theories represent constitutes a perspective shift unlike any other: in comparison to the universe, we would be not just small but strictly zero. Yet here we are, contemplating—if not quite understanding—it all.

From: Edge. “Next Step Infinity” [Infinity can violate our human intuition, which is based on finite 

systems, and create perplexing philosophical problems.] by Anthony Aguirre (Tuesday, 9 August, 2011)  edge.org

Anthony Aguirre holds a BS (1995) in mathematics and physics from Brown University and a PhD (2000) in astronomy from Harvard University. He is an associate professor of physics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, where he studies a variety of topics in theoretical cosmology, including the early universe and inflation, gravity physics, first stars, the intergalactic medium, galaxy formation, and black holes.

** **

         I like this. The concept has potential to give us thought and pause. I like stuff like this.

         Post. – Amorella. 

Notes - context in reality / Hooper / too much P&R

         Chores, played with the cat, breakfast and the paper. Within half an hour you and Carol are heading to an appointment in Hyde Park.

         You are next to the Baird building in a parking lot off Smith Road and I-71. Adjacent to the same parking lot it the Charles Schwab building, in between is a building, smaller than the other two, connected with Christ Hospital. You think it is a symbol of the times, more floors and fancier architecture with the financials than the building to treat human patients who are not well.

         I don’t really have anything to say, Amorella.

         Last night you watched the last three episodes of “Falling Skies” on TNT. What are your thoughts?

         I enjoyed the series. I still don’t like the fact that I was seduced by the alluring methods of storytelling by Spielberg and company. Modern storytellers know what they are doing. I respect them for that. They get you hooked; it’s like the Saturday matinee sequels I grew up with in the fifties. Now I have to wait until next summer to see what happens next. It is entertainment. We want to go see the last Potter film before it leaves the big screen. More entertainment, on a higher level, as we are hooked into the growth of the real life actors who play the parts. More is invested emotionally in real life. Our neighbor’s kids grew up with Potter and his friends. I’m sure their investment is even greater. A couple of years ago one of them flew to London with her mother to see Daniel Radcliffe play live in Equus. There’s an investment in the broader world at large. Movies can do good things. She is a college junior now, no harm in all that Potter business as far as I can see.

         I am angry that politicians use religion to gather their votes. They probably say they have no choice but to appeal to some of the many factions of political and social thought out there. The other day a well-known national newspaper columnist used the word “tar baby” to show how some think of Obama. Some just don’t want to see a black man succeed. Too reasonable, people say. Lots of people have lots of opinions and many of them think they are correct in their assumptions.

         I wonder about that because even if I have an even flow of heartansoulanmind in the blog and books, if that is true, and I don’t know that it is because only Amorella can verify it, the evenness of the heartansoulanmind doesn’t make a person right. I makes the person know who sheorhe is perhaps if sheorhe stands before G---D or an Angel of G---D, but such reason and conviction and ‘truth of self’ still don’t make a person correct. Correct answers have to be verified by some sensible form of objectivity and accountability.

         You are an angry man, but you already knew that. Amorella.

         I am. Perhaps this blog is returning to the journal it once was, a place for me to express my thoughts – except too me that seems so much less than it could be. I think I need a break from this world, but it will come soon enough. The irony is that one person can make a difference but ego becomes involved, then arrogance, then followers, then a sense of power and reinforcement of what you become as a symbol, as an icon for a perspective and point of view. Some great people can handle these things fairly well publically – Churchill and FDR, but then look at their private lives. Then, on the other side of the coin you have Hitler and Stalin as examples of those times. Surely both were men just as Churchill and FDR. All four got up in the morning and did the same routines we all do. Toilet, shower and shave, put on clothes the same way everyone else still does. Breakfast, lunch, supper or dinner, relaxation, entertainment, companionship and bedtime or some similar order of the day. To deny this sense of how things were and still are is wrong in my mind. Human beings are what they are. Some are considered heroes and others monsters, but no matter, they are/were human beings first. They came into the world fully bodied and naked and left, possibly, with heartansoulanmind but no physical body. Where it goes from there is between the individual and G---D if SheanHe exists. If not, then I guess it is for nothing but living, conscious dust returning to dust.

         That’s where you are at present. Consciousness. Post when you return home. – Amorella.

          

         You played and game of computer chess and of slots while waiting. You stopped for lunch at Potbelly’s in Kenwood and are presently in the south lot of Macy’s waiting for Carol. Errands to run once home. 

         Again, I have nothing on my mind.

         Last night you had a strange dream, vivid and in color, of being wrapped in an image that you had always seen as flat but now it was round, a tube, and you were cocooned within it.

         True. I wish I could remember the image, it was as though I had been living in two dimensions and was upgrading to three, yet the upgrade was a prison while the two dimensions were freer. Now that I see it in writing it makes more sense. I am freer in the blog and books than I am in real life. Not much of a self-revelation in that. Why would I even dream such a simple thing?

         Because the image was a painting, a work of art. Now you can see the complication.

         The dream wrapped painting was the style of Edward Hooper.  The colors were similar. The Wikipedia photo “Nighthawks” fits the dream’s bill.

         Close enough for context. Post, dude. – Amorella. 

** **

Personality and vision  (from Wikipedia: Hooper)

Always reluctant to discuss himself and his art, Hopper simply summed up his art by stating, “The whole answer is there on the canvas.” Hopper was stoic and fatalistic—a quiet introverted man with a gentle sense of humor and a frank manner. Conservative in politics and social matters, he accepted things as they were and displayed a lack of idealism. Cultured and sophisticated, he was well-read, and many of his paintings show figures reading. He was generally good company and unperturbed by silences, though sometimes taciturn, grumpy or detached. He was always serious about his art and the art of others, and when asked would return frank opinions.

Hopper's most systematic declaration of his philosophy as an artist was given in a handwritten note, titled "Statement", submitted in 1953 to the journal, Reality:

*

“Great art is the outward expression of an inner life in the artist, and this inner life will result in his personal vision of the world. No amount of skillful invention can replace the essential element of imagination. One of the weaknesses of much abstract painting is the attempt to substitute the inventions of the human intellect for a private imaginative conception.

The inner life of a human being is a vast and varied realm and does not concern itself alone with stimulating arrangements of color, form and design.

The term life used in art is something not to be held in contempt, for it implies all of existence and the province of art is to react to it and not to shun it.

Painting will have to deal more fully and less obliquely with life and nature's phenomena before it can again become great.”

Edward Hopper, "Statement." Published as a part of "Statements by Four Artists" in Reality, vol. 1, no. 1 (spring 1953)

*

Though Hopper claimed that he didn’t consciously embed psychological meaning in his paintings, he was deeply interested in Freud and the power of the subconscious mind. He wrote in 1939, “So much of every art is an expression of the subconscious that it seems to me most of all the important qualities are put there unconsciously, and little of importance by the conscious intellect.”

From: wikipedia: Hooper

** **

         You stopped by home to pick up the mail. More errands, Kroger’s to pick up a prescription, then pick up corn at the Black Barn in Lebanon. After that, to Walmart to have photos made, two for Bob who wants to frame the photo you took of City Lights in San Francisco. It is one of your favorites too, so why not post it here as a sample of who you are.

Columbus Avenue, SF

         I just noticed, it has a semblance of the Hooper setting. A bit too bright perhaps, but a street scene with a solitary individual looking in the bookstore window. I wonder if I can tweak this. I did but it will not upload to the blog. I finally got the doctored photo to upload. 

Columbus Avenue: (Edward Hooper)

         Carol is in picking up the photos. We stopped and had a Graeter’s while waiting. One more quick trip to Kroger’s then home. Looking forward to seeing last night’s “Closer” tonight. I don’t think the effects are all that good. I like the color tone of the building though. I don’t have Photoshop loaded, I could probably do some more ‘creative’ tweaking. I guess people do photo tweaking for fun, but I don’t think it is my cup of tea.

         Strange that you would think the photos are wasting time. – Amorella.

         Pictures may be worth a thousand words, but words are sweeter.

         Sounds like the beginning of a religion with this piece of opinion, orndorff. Is that your intent? – Amorella.

         More gallows humor. I think what happened was a group of creative artistic folks diverged into two cults – the artists and the writers. More of a great philosophic schism than a religious one. No, it is not my intent to create a new religion, Amorella. We already have too many from my point of view. I’ve got to get out of this politics and religion.

         If you think that is going to happen in this world you are already three sheets to the wind, boy. – Amorella.

         That’s another of your out of the blue sobering comments.

         You are thinking, “hope is a thing with feather,” and assume it is from Emily Dickinson.

         I can be out of the blue too. Let’s post this, Amorella. I need a break.

         Post. – Amorella.

Notes - Aromas&Memory / Missing Letter / Mind@Zero

         Later mid-morning. You spent time on chores, playing with the cat, exercising with barbells, discussing the trip to Maine and periodically sitting in the chair since breakfast.

         Lower back and other arthritic pains. Such is life. Working on lower back exercises. Some days are better than others, actually mornings are usually the worst part of the physical day. Just a statement.

         Shortly after noon. When you walked downstairs this morning you were greeted with the aroma of a mostly done meatloaf, which was created following the secretly shared recipe of your Grandma Schick and Carol’s Grandma Cook (best of friends). Thinking on the aroma, the scent, and how it refreshes memories. Your mind most naturally moved to burnt human flesh.

         That brings up a question. In here, do the heartansoulanmind share all the earth-oriented memories?

         In the blog and books they do. – Amorella.

         Which one of the three strikes the memory?

         The one foremost affected/effected by it.

         In my mind the memory of the burnt human flesh was in a self-induced hypnotic trance. It was not therefore real. Many real memories of well-loved food aromas should have come to mind before burnt human flesh.

         Like what? What food memory comes to mind? – Amorella.

         I can’t think of any, which seems odd. You would think there was a food aroma that would come to mind because my lifelong focus on eating good food.

         That should tell you something.

         The implication is that I do not like food. How very disturbing.

         You enjoy eating food and the satisfaction of feeling full. – Amorella.

         This is a revelation, though I don’t quite believe it. It shows me to be a silly sort of person.

         You are what you are. – Amorella.

         I am wordless here.

         Post, as it is almost time for lunch. – Amorella.

         Early mid-afternoon. You have little to say. Nothing on your mind? – Amorella.

         Doug sent a note saying most of the Area 51 stories can now be explained. The names of exotic and not so exotic flying structures are accounted for, even an experimental lighter than air triangular ship. I was looking on Facebook and discovered one of my friends periodically watches “Ghosts” on the Travel Channel, evidently it is about the paranormal. I would not have thought she would be interested in such things. I have only caught a glimpse of the show or a similar one (most of the time) while passing through the channels. Never any proof. Just like aliens, no proof. I assume it is for the obvious reasons neither ghosts nor aliens actually exist, never an artifact of any kind, never footage that can scientifically show a ghost (or something similar exists in this world). Shows me how much I need imagination, and the concept of that is rather depressing. It is a sad world if neither exists or ever did exist.

         Why is that? – Amorella.

         Because I like to think our sense of ‘reality’ misses something.

         What, specifically?

         Another letter in the alphabets of the world, that’s what it comes down to.

         Post. – Amorella.

         You had a nap after cheese and crackers for lunch. Late afternoon you and Carol drove uptown for ice tea, you split a cookie and had a chat. Tomorrow Carol has an appointment in Hyde Park to see her other financial advisor. You are going with her to get out of the house, something you both like to do most every day. You took the 05 Honda so you could listen to Bloomberg radio on XM, alas things did not go well today.

         The economic instability bothers me, not just here, but the world-wide effect that each nation’s crisis causes. I am not going to get started.

         Supper, green beans, baked potato and meatloaf, one of your favorites. The news, and Carol is washing her hair. You are both hoping for rain within the hour as the storm is over Oxford, Ohio at present. You have nothing to say. – Amorella.

          Two hours later, and you still have nothing in mind.

         I don’t. Nothing.

         Post. – Amorella.