Jul
3rd
Fri
3rd
For me, Michael Jackson represents a sort of pioneer of self-transformation. Aside from whatever questionable personal motives are impelling him, he is using cosmetic surgery to achieve a look that is definitely transhuman. He has taken us by proxy to the frontier of what is currently possible with cosmetic surgery and he has even escaped the constraints of race by lightening his skin color. This last aspect is perhaps the most controversial and disconcerting, but the freedom to choose all your “inherited” features, both familial and racial, will probably become an intrinsic part of the transhuman era. ... Yet when I asked a lot of “average” people — people who weren’t part of my circle — what they would do with the kind of self-transformative power that may perhaps be ours to wield, I was increasingly appalled. The jocks I talked to wanted to be bigger and stronger so they could beat the shit out of everybody else; the women wanted to morph into their ideal role models. I began to realize that what most people wanted was conformity; their “ideals” would turn us into a world of underachieving Nicole Kidmans and eight-foot Brad Pitts, identical cut-outs with no individualism. My previous rather naive notion that biotechnology would free us from the tyranny of “normalcy,” that we could become anything we wanted, morph ourselves into elongated, blue-skinned, orange-haired, sixteen-fingered geniuses or perhaps flying ribbons of sensual bliss that performed acrobatic choreographies above the sunset, was a very utopian and, as it turns out, unpopular dream. Individuality or creative improvisation is the last thing most people want. So Botox is really a dreadful symptom of a new, radical mundanity enabled by biotechnology. And that’s disillusioning.
(via Dedroidify)
Jun
29th
Mon
29th
June 25. Last week on the forums, freecookies posted this 1941 essay, Who goes Nazi? The author spent a lot of time in Europe watching nations and people turn Nazi, and here she goes through Americans (and one German) at a party, one by one, sketching their personalities. Even if it wasn’t about who goes Nazi, it would be worth reading just for the complexity of the characters and the glimpse of American culture 68 years ago. But the conclusion is also valuable:
Those who haven’t anything in them to tell them what they like and what they don’t — whether it is breeding, or happiness, or wisdom, or a code, however old-fashioned or however modern — go Nazi.
This reminds me of how fire spreads: in a forest where everything is alive, a fire can’t even get started. When the ratio of deadness to aliveness gets high enough, there’s a tipping point at which a spark will turn into a spreading fire. And if the ratio of deadness to aliveness is even higher, then there’s another tipping point at which the fire grows so hot that it consumes everything
— Ran Prieur
Jun
25th
Thu
25th
To search for solutions to hunger means to act within the principle that the status of a citizen surpasses that of a mere consumer.
—
CITY OF BELO HORIZONTE, BRAZIL
Citizen > Consumer. Why does this feel like a welcome surprise to me? It should be a given…
This is the unmistakable teaching of the Gita. He who gives up action falls. He who gives up only the reward rises.
Jun
24th
Wed
24th
Inquiry vs Design (just ignore the “science” and “engineering” bits…)
AKA: Thinking vs Doing
Jun
22nd
Mon
22nd
During the Renaissance the classic five simple machines (excluding the wedge) began to be studied as a group. The complete dynamic theory of simple machines was worked out by Italian scientist Galileo Galilei in 1600 in Le Meccaniche (“On Mechanics”). He was the first to understand that simple machines do not create energy, only transform it.
—
Simple machine - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (via stumblinghorse)
“simple machines do not create energy, only transform it.” see also: The I Ching
Craziness happening in Japan. Mumified snakes and tadpole rain…
Jun
18th
Thu
18th
There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is, nor how valuable it is, nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep open and aware directly to the urges that motivate YOU. Keep the channel open… No artist is pleased… There is no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a queer, divine dissatisfaction; a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others.
— Martha Graham to Agnes DeMille
Nowhere in this world is a refuge.
Now if thoughts should arise in your mind that this country or that country is peaceful or fortunate or that money is easy to get there, discard them, my friend, and do not dwell on them whatsoever. For you know that the whole world everywhere is plagued by one problem or another….Whether by cold, heat, disease, or danger, people are always being oppressed; nowhere in this world is a refuge. There is no country where fear does not exist, where people are not in terror of old age, sickness, and death.
Source: Translated from The Saundarananda of Asvaghosa, ed. E.H. Johnston (reprint edition, Delhi: Montilal Banarsidass, 1975), pp.111.
