We live in the spaces defined by our cultures.
Some of us expand inherited houses to palaces,
some – narrow them to defensive forts,
which then have to be lit by funeral pyres.
Tag: culture
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Living space
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Ideas
Ideas permeate cultures like rings on the water;
the stone someone threw is gone, submerged,
but the ripples go on and on,
slowing down where the water is thick and marshy,
amplified by resonance and creating new patterns where they meet waves from other stones…
There is almost nothing more powerful;
while there is water the ripples will go on,
where there is water – the ripples will get there,
sooner or later… -
Level of abstraction
Nothing generates as much philosophical drivel as incorrectly chosen level of abstraction.
“What are the origins of evil?” –
ask a stupid question – get a religion. -
THE ULTIMATE SECRET OF LEADING A LESS STRESSFUL AND MORE PRODUCTIVE LIFE!!!
Don’t make unnecessary choices,
it really doesn’t matter what colour shoes you are wearing today! -
Me and Mark Twain are like that!
Our planet seems to be becoming smaller by the year,
as technology and communications develop, and yet …
When I encounter popular media
with our mediaeval debates about local religions or news
with our primitive tribal politics,
I keep thinking:
“Things are getting better…
most people are still poorly educated…
it is just a matter of time…”
and then I read Mark Twain
and realise that this is how he consoled himself
more than a hundred years ago… -
Been there, done that…
The “seen it” phenomenon almost completely passed me by.
I cannot understand how it is possible to be bored by too much experience.
The more things we see – the more patterns we notice.
The more patterns we notice – the more things we find interesting.
When we pay attention, experience is the act of creation:
of an image out of patterns of light and dark,
of a thought out of words and images,
of a world out of perceptions and thoughts…
One notable exception is the entertainment industry,
where the “seen it” phenomenon happens to me all the time. -
Patriotism
Patriotism is a bizarre belief
that we are better than everyone else
because we happened to be born in a particular place or into a particular group.
Sociologically it is maintained by politicians
as one of the cheapest and most efficient methods of control.
Individually, it is maintained by our refusal to examine a premise
that gives us a warm and glowy feeling of being special. -
A monument to Yuri Gagarin in London – verse 1
The city is made of shadows of history,
from the heavy metal shadows of ideas,
through the solid, slightly organic, old-stone shadows of creation,
to the barely noticeable, evanescent shadows of lives unexamined and barely lived,
momentarily dispersed by prevalent winds,
lives of which the city itself is composed,
its life blood,
without which it is just a heap of stuff,
a stone doll-house decorated by metal figurines…
