Shows galore!

So on the 17th I went to a free concert show with Bend Sinister and Hot Hot Heat at Holland Park. I’ve never heard of HHH before, but I’ve seen Bend Sinister along with other local artists when I went to the Rio Theatre to watch another live performance the previous week. Anyway, the crowd in the front-middle was insane. Being there was like being in a game of tug o’ war, but with pushing instead of pulling. Losers fall over, but in that case everyone’s a loser because the fall causes a domino effect. I got pushed into it. And I lost my shoe. Twice. Hah! But it’s all good. We got out of there eventually.

Meet Bend Sinister. They’re pretty good.

The next day there was another movie we caught. The Couples Retreat. After dinner with some old friends from high school who I barely see, we decided to rent a movie. Couldn’t decide on which movie so the worker made a not-so-great suggestion where we not-so-smartly agreed to seeing. It was a bad chick flick, I fought to pay attention.

Then yesterday we decided to watch Shutter Island.
Leonardo DiCaprio’s an excellent actor. It was a psychological thriller.

And today I’ll be watching How I Met Your Mother.

I said what?!

So I asked my sister, who’s 9, to use the lint roller to help me get some lint off my pants yesterday. When she got near the bottom it became harder to get off. I told her what to do for that part and she started laughing.

I asked her why she was laughing and she said, “you just told me that I couldn’t take the lint off, so take the lint off. That doesn’t make sense!”
Me: I said that? Really?
Shayla: Yeah! Don’t worry, I know what you meant (couldn’t get lint off using roller, so take them off with hands). But you always say weird things that don’t make sense!
Me: What? No wayy, since when? Like what?
Shayla: Remember when you said not to hang upside down because all the blood would rush to the bed? You said bed when you meant head!
Me: Oh.. HAH. I can’t believe you still remember (lol). Pshh that was it!
Shayla: No, AND the time when I asked you where to put the food. You said to put it in the sink, then later on you asked me why there was food in the sink and I said you told me to do it!
Me: HAHA OH, right, then I told you put it in the fridge instead.
Shayla: SEE? You say weird things!

I had to give to her. She got me. I cracked up pretty badly as she was telling me this. It’s one of those things when my thoughts jump from one subject to another before my words can get the point across. So before my sentence is finished, it skips over to what I’m currently thinking about.

Happy Chinese/Vietnamese New Year!

Oh, and Valentines too.

I have exactly 4 minutes to post this before the day is over.
So here it is:
Xin Nian Kuai Le， 新年快乐!
Chuc Mung Nam Moi!

So what did I do today? Worked at the salon and spent the rest of the day at an old family friend’s place.

That’s it for today!

Brain in a what?

Brain in a vat.
I was on the skytrain when I overheard a couple students talking about philosophy. They were right behind me. Student 1 was learning in class about the possibility that we could be living in a Matrix-like world and that this is all a dream. Student 1 was really intrigued about that theory, saying we could never know if that was the case. Student 2 was totally into the idea, saying it’s like when we have lucid dreams.

It reminded me of the “brain in a vat” thought experiment.

It basically claims that there is a brain with wires hooked up that is connected to a machine to stimulate a virtual reality. All thoughts, sensations are merely the product of a machine feeding in signals to the brain.

The problem I see with that idea is its solipsistic nature. If there was a “real me” (the dreamer) outside of this dream world, then you and everything else within that dream would just be an illusion. All that would really exist is the real me. But considering there are so many of us, there can’t be only one “real” me. If that’s the case then our minds must be all connected somehow in one large network, much like in The Matrix.

The thing about all this is that there is no proof. You can’t reject or confirm what you can never experience. Even if indeed the idea of a brain in vat or Matrix is true then everything you believe would only be what the machine persuades you to believe. You are not coming to some realization that there is a “more real” world out there. You are only being fed electronic impulses, telling you what to believe. There is no original thought whatsoever. You wouldn’t be able to go beyond the nerve stimuli you receive, which cancels out the whole idea to begin with.

In response to Student 2’s comparison to lucid dreams: It is possible to realize we’re dreaming because we have reality to refer to. In our everyday experiences, we know what reality permits and what it doesn’t permit. If in the dream you have superpowers, then this could be indicative that this is not a reality, thus trigger the awareness that you are in fact dreaming.
However, when it comes to this world, since we have no way of experiencing the “world beyond this world,” we can’t make the connections that would verily affirm that we’re in a dream world.

I was tempted to join the conversation, heh.

News of Newsworthiness

The good news is: Mutual respect regarding people’s ideals has flourished within the past few years!

The bad news is: …I made that up.

I encountered a handful of people (again) who kept showing an unwillingness to learn even the fundamentals of the theory they’ve decided they didn’t believe in, and kept using arguments that were either straw men, red herrings, or ad hominems to attack the opposition and preserve their position. This applies to both sides on any topic where conflicting beliefs and narrow-mindedness would occur. Either way, I think people should think with their heads and feel with their hearts, and that a lot of people forget that.

Rather than trying to understand and/or respect each other’s opinions, they were merely rehearsing their own prejudices thus creating a bigger gap between them.

The real news is: Narrow-mindedness is like a sugar-coated toxin that plagues those who’ve fallen victim of delusion thinking they’d feel good, warm, and fuzzy inside only to get high off blind ignorance, bigotry, and self-proclaimed superiority once they’re intoxicated.

…but that’s old news.

So tell me, what’s new?

Going with the Flow

This is something I tend to do. I think my problem is that I’m too easy-going sometimes. I just go with the flow and accept whatever life has to offer, then make the best of it and move on. That’s why I very seldom get angry.

Whatever happens, happens.

So how is this a bad thing?
What if going with the flow doesn’t take you where you want to go? Then what’s the point? I’ve always thought that you can’t control the situation, but you can control how you react to them. This is true, especially if the event already happened. But if we’re talking about the future, then it’s a different case. While you can’t always control how the situation will be exactly, you can definitely still try to make it happen. That’s where my problem is. I’m taking the attitude I have after an event happened, and applying it to the time before the desired event happens. In the end, I just end up working around what would otherwise be the desired outcome.

Point is: know what you want and strive for it. Don’t settle for less.
Time to fight the flow!