Sorting Out What's Wrong

I'm a little concerned that this post could go on an awful long time. There are a great many things that I feel are wrong with the state of the world as we find it today. Broadly we can define it as 'The System'. However, further analysis is going to be needed if we are to actually get anywhere! Subsquent p[osts are going to go into this in detail I hope, but I've just realised that this is going to need a little plaaning before I just write stuff into my blog! So will hopefully begin this task pro[perly tomorrow when hopefully, it wont quite have reached this time of morning.
rik

A Little Less Serious

So am very tired as have partyed hard this weekend and as a consequence have not slept all that much. Will start planning the revolution tomorrow I think. Just letting you know I'm alive and so are the plans ;)
rik

Demanding the Impossible

So tonight, despite the tiredness, I want to try and talk, just a little bit, about the stuff this blog should really be concerning itself with, utopia. We were talking on the way home from our friends just now about bringing about widespread political change, and how, more often than not, that change has come about through violence. I know I am not alone in expressing a view of pacifism, especially under contrived circumstances, such as causing a revolution! So the topic for tonights, increasingly un-brief, post, is change. Of course the dilema is not just change, however much some marxists declare, but what we are going to change, and how are we going to change it? These are big, fundamental questions to the nature of human society. Of course these decisions are made everyday by the myriad of people with power, in any form, in world society. However, the stance that is going to be taking by this blog over the following posts is going to be one of staunch opposition to the way the modern world conducts itself. First we need to establish what is currently wrong and why change is needed. The next question to address is therefore how is the change to be brought about. And by refering to the first part of our arguemnt, and subsquent ideas, we need to formulate some idea, of what we might want the change to bring about out in the real world. Ok, that's fat too much for tonight already.
rik

Continuing conversation . . . .

So (continuing as if nothing had happened from yesterday) . . . we appear, more so every day, to be in an age of increasing technology but decreasing communications. Perhaps the point I'm making to my friend's dilema is that everything is certainly not lost! But the point of this particular post is that, because emailing and txt are now so widespread and easily accessible, it is really making a dent in our ability, as a species, to communicate f-t-f. All the hard things that we have to try and and manage in conversation, for example, getting together with someone, or indeed, breaking up with them, can now be done with the convenience of a text message. Now this is not only a demeaning and detrimental thing for the person on the wrong end of any such conversation, but importantly for this article, we can, very conveniently avoid having an ACTUAL CONVERSATION. I think there really is something to be said for facing your fears head on, and part of that includes facing up to people, literally, when there is trouble or tension between you. I'm sad to say that I can only see this aspect of humanity disappearing as time goes by; more and more people will just take the easiest route possible and just end up dumping some poor person over a txt. What this adds up to, in my book at least, is a sorry state of affairs for the human race. If we can not conduct the hard stuff between us any more f-t-f, how long before the easy stuff goes as well? We can already do all our shopping online, thereby reducing our social skills to dealing with the occasional postman, but what next?
Much is made of our increasing ability to communicate. I, for one, am sad to see that this is only going to lead to a decline in communication.
rik

More Conversation?!?

Well after yesterdays thought provoking entry "ahem" I thought I'd better get back to something a little more insightful this evening. Nothing else his piqued my interest just yet, although I'm sure I had some stuff I said I'd talk about a while back . . . I thought I'd write tonights musing as a continuation of my friend's conversational dilema. My main thought over the last few days is that, in general, people today find conversation difficult to do. Things is, we live in a time when technology is increasing communications potential exponentially; through mobile phones and the web chiefly, the develpoed world at least, is clearly communicating far more than ever before. Yet, it we look closely at these means of communication, they are far removed from, what I think really is, an essential part of communicating successfully: face-to-face interaction. Psychologists tell us that MOST of our communicating when we engage with each other face-to-face (from now on f-t-f) is NON VERBAL. Blimey, if this is the case, and I do see where they are coming from at least, this leaves the modern generation at a considerable disadvantage. For you can not get through life without any f-t-f just yet, it still has to be among the skills one needs in life, and I shudder to think of the day when it really is no longer needed. And so, with all the increase in communications, are we actually increasing our interaction? Not one jot. For within the email or the text message, there is no instantly recognisable feel or emphasis to the words in front of you; you can not know half as well, what the persons intentions, or indeed, intonations were from the printed word. Yes we devices such as 'smileys' but this still gets us preciously little closer to the information one can pick up in a f-t-f conversation.
Ok I've already written masses, so I'll leave it here for tonight, and (hopefully!?) finish off with this tomorrow.
rik

Me!! 

Conversation

Talking with Rach on the old email the other day about conversation. We were chatting a while back in Sheffield and I was just conveying the basics of how we perform conversation and she was saying even at that point that she knew what I was saying (smart girl that one;-) ) but she emailed the other day about agreement in conversation and how she was having difficult with the difference between agreement and disagreement in the context of both argument and debate. It is a difficult one to explore, particularly when you don't have a transcript of anyone one conversation, so I was just thinking about making an answer to the question that she had raised in the course of her email.
I can imagine people having difficultty with debate, particularly if the personal relationship is not particularly evloved or strong. The point my friend raised is that if conversation works on agreement, yet when we debate we always disagree, how can we still have a conversation? My response was to make clear that boundary between mundance conversatio nin everyday life, and specific, debate orientated discussion. The trick, simply, is to not let the two inter-twine. Just because, say, two people share radically different politics, does not mean to say they can't be friends outside in the ordinary world. The phrase 'agree to disagree' would be a particualrly salient one here, I think. Just think how hard daily life would be if we couldn't speak to the people we disagreed with on some level, your choice of conversation would be dramatically lowered! It's an extreme example, but does, I hope, illustrate well the point I am trying to make.
There are, don't get me wrong, certain things upon which, if two people do not agree, can break a friendship before its begun; or worse, if it has. But for the great majority of life, it is nice to know that humanity can put aside its differences for the most part, and live with some degree of harmony (I just can't bring myself to say peace given the current state of the world).
rik

Musical Thoughts (Damn internet)

This post was supposed to go up yesterday evening, and then my connection crashed as I clicked the 'publish' buttom. Damn. Oh well, I just resolved to muse about it tonight instead. My subject for this post, as you may have guessed, is music. It all started last night when I was working in the pub and we had an open mic night on. After all the regulars had done their bit they invited me up for a while so got up and did a couple of songs, to a good reception (I think!). Anyway, on the way home I was thinking of how I could encorporate music into my blog. It is, after all, a huge part of my life. And the question posed itself before I had chance to think of it. I was wondering about my ability to like almost anything with a tune, and why for some people this just isn't the case. What is it inside us that tells us we do or dont like a specific piece of music?
Who knows though? Once again my thoughts finshed with more questions a and fewer answers than I started out with, but hopefully a little more savvy to the world around me. All I hope is that everyone has the means, musically, to express themselves.
rik

poetry

doing too much tonight (read watching movies and playing along to Dylan) so I thought I'd just put up some of my more politically tinged poetry in the meantime.

Ranting Politicians

A ranting politician may be easily pleased
By telling him you see the world exactly how he sees
It may not get you very far to tell him its not right
He'll just start shouting more and more and maybe start a fight
We cannot stop these silly people thinking the way they do
But only hope they stopping seeing everything as quite so blue


Ebay.com

Global market
Up for sale
High street chique meets
Mass produced tack
Mass produced
People all over the world
Shanghai trader meets
Parisian business woman.
Common interest:
Mutual survival.
The World chasing the
American dream
New and exciting ventures from the
Comfort of your own sofa this time
Capitalism democratised for the
E-generation
Everyone crazy for the
Last minute bargain
Rare collectable anythings
Exchange hands for millions while
Millions starve and all you worry about is where the next bargain?
Saw the World the other day
Someone wanted some compensation
Maybe you could auction it off
Ladies and gentlemen of the World
What am I bid?


rik

Descartes and other amusing things

just explaining to Dan that he can read Descartes on holiday, as long as he knows he was wrong. How do you argue subjective consciousness? I'll probably pick up on this one soon (not least because I want to!). And language as well, well, that one might take a little longer. I cant take much more of Heidegger or German idealism for the moment. I'll return to it some day though. I'll talk about deconstructionism before that. In the mean time, I'm still stuck on the happiness issue. However despite nine hours of work, I'm in quite a good mood, so perhaps I've progressed further than I think. An issue for the subconscious maybe? Maybe I'll think about this tonight. Regardless, I'll babble again tomorrow.
rik