random babble
technology makes us dumber. that statement, grammatically incorrect as it is fits. A few classmates and I had this conversation with my philosophy teacher last week and it made perfect sense. For every one thing new that technology creates, it destorys something old, once useful and thus everything with it goes down away and is forgotten. Telephone numbers are a prime example. some people have what, 250 speed dials on their phone? 112 is blah 7 is blahblah and 9 is mesohorny. voice dials, shortcuts, all of it. I don't even know my own sisters cell phone number or many friends numbers...hell even my brothers numbers. I think all i really know in my phone book is my house, my moms cell, my dads work and lauren (cell and home). thats it. pathetic. i remember the days of etching down numbers and repeating them till they were as deep in my memory and i could recite them like the punch out code in mike tyson's punch out and the konmai code from contra. but no, useful information gone with a touch of a button or simple voice command. adding laziness.
i think computers are a prime example of this blessing/burden scenario we have with technology. sure some advances are leisurely and beneficial, but then some are outright lazy. Kids playing everquest two have to type in a simple command and pizza hut deliverys a pizza to their house...no phone, no looking for the number, no making an effort. click click boom. laziness increased to level 10. Long, long ago the neumatic system was used for memorization and from what my professor touched up on, it sounded pretty ingenious. say you are going shopping for 10 items. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10. bread, milk, eggs, orange juice, a magazine, an apple, soda, shoes, paper and a pen. now, for each number think of a word that rhymes with the corresponding number. one, done. two, shoe. etc. now, think of the item on the list in its corresponding number (the first listed as bread) and add it with the rhymed word. done, the bread is done. shoe, the milk is in the shoe. three, eggs in a tree. you get the picture. so we did this at the beginning of class and periodically he asked us to list them off and believe it or not, it works. concentration is the key but it works. and people didn't use to just do this with lists but poetry, stories, anything needing to be remembered before the invention and importation of the printing press.
i watched the movie "Stay" tonight...not sure if i like it or love it or not yet. one i am really torn with on. it was cinematically really nice looking and really cool, the acting was good, direction good, music good but the story was lacking. stop reading if you want to see it. basically ewan McG-kenobi plays a shrink who takes over a patitent from a collegue who is sick. weird shit happens, the story and people get twisted all around, so do events and time. sweet, a mind fuck movie right? sweet indeed but alas the ending ruins it. the movie starts with a massive car crash that you see from the hood of the car. so you don't see anything but flipping around, loud scratches, noises and sparks all along a bridge. then ryan gosling sitting on the bridge, in front of the car. he gets up and walks away. insert: wtf?. as the story progresses he predicts some little odd things happening and they do, and all the characters have some sort of key phrase they say and keep saying. in the end the kid shoots himself (said he was going to, so its no shocker, the movie is the last three days he is "alive") and it goes right to the car crash scene we see at the beginning of the movie. his parents dead in the car, girlfriend/fiancee dead, thrtown from the car. all the characters in the movie who knew the kid, or other characters and played a role now are pedestrains and by standers looking on to see if he is going to live. Ewan and his girlfriend in the story are helping ryan as he is laying there bleeding, talking to him trying to get him to live. he dies, it ends. SO, the last two hours of the movie you watched never existed. none of it. it was all an illusion. Ryan's character put 3 days into the last 3 minutes of his life and all the people present at the accident he created into an elaborate little story that ends with him dying..which is what he is doing. strong imagination indeed. read that again if it didn't make sense, cause it takes a moment to grasp that. everything after the crash never happened, it was all made up in his head....you sit there for two hours constantly wondering wtf? wtf? wtf? then it adds up and its the big, WTF? Two very cool things about this movie that make me like it....1) all the key phrases i mentioned the characters say throughout the movie are everything they say at the end. The guy who is Ewan's friend is just an on looker but a key line he said in the movie, he says at the end at the crash scene. some are little things that don't really matter but it all adds up. one silly line here makes no context, but at the crash scene it does. cool trick showing how elaborate this kid made up the story. 2) during the movie if you watch the "extras" i guess, the people just walking by, driving by etc. alot of them are in pairs or groups of three and they are all wearing the same clothes. the same jacket, sweater, sweatshirt, and its the same color. three blonde girls walk by wearing the same blude sweater, a dark haired man and woman walk by wearing the same black jacket, same colored jeans, same colored boots and walking in unison. people driving the same car same color same direction etc. etc. i noticed this at least 10 times or so before i caught on. the subtle little things you notice about the "fake" world this is all taking place in.
i think computers are a prime example of this blessing/burden scenario we have with technology. sure some advances are leisurely and beneficial, but then some are outright lazy. Kids playing everquest two have to type in a simple command and pizza hut deliverys a pizza to their house...no phone, no looking for the number, no making an effort. click click boom. laziness increased to level 10. Long, long ago the neumatic system was used for memorization and from what my professor touched up on, it sounded pretty ingenious. say you are going shopping for 10 items. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10. bread, milk, eggs, orange juice, a magazine, an apple, soda, shoes, paper and a pen. now, for each number think of a word that rhymes with the corresponding number. one, done. two, shoe. etc. now, think of the item on the list in its corresponding number (the first listed as bread) and add it with the rhymed word. done, the bread is done. shoe, the milk is in the shoe. three, eggs in a tree. you get the picture. so we did this at the beginning of class and periodically he asked us to list them off and believe it or not, it works. concentration is the key but it works. and people didn't use to just do this with lists but poetry, stories, anything needing to be remembered before the invention and importation of the printing press.
i watched the movie "Stay" tonight...not sure if i like it or love it or not yet. one i am really torn with on. it was cinematically really nice looking and really cool, the acting was good, direction good, music good but the story was lacking. stop reading if you want to see it. basically ewan McG-kenobi plays a shrink who takes over a patitent from a collegue who is sick. weird shit happens, the story and people get twisted all around, so do events and time. sweet, a mind fuck movie right? sweet indeed but alas the ending ruins it. the movie starts with a massive car crash that you see from the hood of the car. so you don't see anything but flipping around, loud scratches, noises and sparks all along a bridge. then ryan gosling sitting on the bridge, in front of the car. he gets up and walks away. insert: wtf?. as the story progresses he predicts some little odd things happening and they do, and all the characters have some sort of key phrase they say and keep saying. in the end the kid shoots himself (said he was going to, so its no shocker, the movie is the last three days he is "alive") and it goes right to the car crash scene we see at the beginning of the movie. his parents dead in the car, girlfriend/fiancee dead, thrtown from the car. all the characters in the movie who knew the kid, or other characters and played a role now are pedestrains and by standers looking on to see if he is going to live. Ewan and his girlfriend in the story are helping ryan as he is laying there bleeding, talking to him trying to get him to live. he dies, it ends. SO, the last two hours of the movie you watched never existed. none of it. it was all an illusion. Ryan's character put 3 days into the last 3 minutes of his life and all the people present at the accident he created into an elaborate little story that ends with him dying..which is what he is doing. strong imagination indeed. read that again if it didn't make sense, cause it takes a moment to grasp that. everything after the crash never happened, it was all made up in his head....you sit there for two hours constantly wondering wtf? wtf? wtf? then it adds up and its the big, WTF? Two very cool things about this movie that make me like it....1) all the key phrases i mentioned the characters say throughout the movie are everything they say at the end. The guy who is Ewan's friend is just an on looker but a key line he said in the movie, he says at the end at the crash scene. some are little things that don't really matter but it all adds up. one silly line here makes no context, but at the crash scene it does. cool trick showing how elaborate this kid made up the story. 2) during the movie if you watch the "extras" i guess, the people just walking by, driving by etc. alot of them are in pairs or groups of three and they are all wearing the same clothes. the same jacket, sweater, sweatshirt, and its the same color. three blonde girls walk by wearing the same blude sweater, a dark haired man and woman walk by wearing the same black jacket, same colored jeans, same colored boots and walking in unison. people driving the same car same color same direction etc. etc. i noticed this at least 10 times or so before i caught on. the subtle little things you notice about the "fake" world this is all taking place in.