Rapidly divergent thoughts converge always at a point of least expectance; and in that way, when you’re not expecting to think at all, you might dredge up an axiom: that your thoughts are of the same stream, a single river, come from some cloud-hidden valley in that unknown cardinal direction which points to the heavens. Therein resides a lake whose pure water is analogous to the gods, by its depth you might measure their ambition. On its surface forms a fine mist and from that mist the fontanus, simulacra of divinity made to stimulate the Earth by rain of dithyrambs, paeans, and odes. Diluted by descent from so high, these sacrosanct globules of thought travel through the infinite tributaries of man, his capillary labyrinths of consciousness; and then, when discarded as silt, whether that of the theologian or philologist, they’ll share the same soggy delta—before being poured into the maw of that eternal glutton, the Thought-Æther Ocean, its true source.
It's been a few days since I started this blog and after making two extremely dissimilar posts to begin things, I began to feel guilty that I should have opened with some greeting and/or statement of intent. But now it's too late for that, so I hope any potential readers are capable of accepting that the content of this blog will be as it will be. You wouldn't challenge the Ocean to a duel would you? Muhfuckahs get drowned-dead.
Thinking about thought (as I'm prone to do when doing little else), I was reminded of a video my friend Wythe linked to over at the Culture Project. In it, Professor Dan Dennett does his damnedest to remind us that, much like ants, there's a whole fuckton of human beings out there, and as a consequence of that fact we can't all be special, especially not in the way our minds work. The video is perhaps too brief to wholeheartedly dig into that vulgar proposition, but the good Doktor is an engaging and amiable fellow (lowering our guard with his jolly beard and bald pate) who, through the use of optical illusions, proves that since we all get fooled we are all not special.
His thèse dramatique is not something that humanity can easily be convinced of, as Doc Dennett observes through many dinner conversations, but even if you find yourself scoffing at the information presented I recommend watching it through to the end just so that you can test yourself at the "What's Wrong with the Picture?" Game. The website that hosts this video also has some other talks of his, including one on the dangers of memes, and a bevy of other excellent scientific resources. Always good for a wandering through the mist.
The discussed speech can be found here: "Can we know our own minds?"
I also like this one: "Apes that write, start fires, and play Pac-Man"
I'd befriend a bonobo.
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