Tuesday, April 1, 2008

I need to stop reading romance novels.

I'm almost starting to believe in happy endings.
So, I believe in fate.
But I also believe that due to our severly limited perception of space, and especially time, it is impossible for us mortals to know our fate before it happens, thereby creating the illusion, and for all reasonable intents and purposes (from our perspective) the reality, of free will.
...
Okay I was going to rant about how fate may or may not affect daily decisions and such, but I got bored and realized that all my arguments were pretty much pointless and circular and led to the conclusion that if one believes that the existence of fate makes action futile, the he/she was fated to be a n apathetic slob anyway, and if one decides to act anyway, then once again they were fated to do so.
Also: Perhaps fate is a wrong word, and free choice really does exist, only we have already made all of our choices, and fail to see that because our perspective is limited. Perhaps some omnipotent being who can see all that happens in all the time it takes for it to happen in, much in the way that we might see all of a two dimensional image of a certain size if given enough time to study it fully (therein revealing the flaw in using a spacial metaphor for a temporal phenomenon), can see and know what decisions we will make when we ourselves do not.
It's kind of difficult to describe that accurately with a limited perspective and vocabulary based on our own perception of time, so I'll have to trust in your imaginations and capability for abstract thought to figure it out.
Also I need to learn to make my run on sentences more readable.
This "Top1, top2 (top3 end3) end2, end1." or even worse: "Top1, top2 (top3 end3) middle2, top4 end4, end2; top5 (top6 end6) middle5, (top7 (top8, top9 end9; top10 end ten) middle8 (top11 end11) end8) end7) end5 (top12 end12), end1." (to cite an extreme case) has got to stop.
Even my example sentence was bad, it went: "top1 "Top2-end2" or "top3-end3" (top4 end4) end1.
Rignt then.
I can't help it.
I guess it just goes to show how my thought patterns work - circles within circles within circles connected to other circles. If some one were to draw my thoght patterns out it would probably look like the chainmail armor from hell....with horrid complicate spiderwebs connecting random distant links to each other.
Anyone capable of accurately representing such a thing on paper would have to be mad...or terribly terribly sane.....with a piece of paper that says they are.

Soooo....I digress.
Back to fate:
I bring this up because I have concluded that it is unwise to assume you know your fate, especially in connection to emotional matters, as you may well be dissapointed.
Same goes for hope, which is the same thing really.
...
Some people try to protect themselves from harm by not hoping, calling it being pragmatic, others manage to hope hard enough that even when they are dissapointed and manage to find solace in the next thing they hope for.
Buddhism teaches moderation in all things.
This post started cynical and now preaches moderation.
I may move on to endorsing wishful thinking by the end, but I doubt it.

Anyway

It's pointless to allow belief in fate to influence ones decisions since no matter what you do, you were going to do it anyway (or had alread chosen to, in the cosmic scheme of things).
Besides, you don't know, and speculation is always a poor basis for choice.

...I forgot anything else I was going to say, except for this:
I saw two robins on the way to the library today.
No doubt I would likely have seen one sooner had I not been driving the library for the past couple of weeks (cutting back on cigerettes (I always seem to smoke one each way when I walk) so I won't feel guilty about enjoying the pipe my brother gave me for my birthday) but regardless, it is now officially spring for me.
There's another one of those sentences...
Oh well.
Yay robins.
Yay spring.
And everyone is fated to comment: "TL;DR"
Oh well, I'm not gonna read it either. >_<

I'm cheering about spring...there's your endorsement of hope. o_o*

Aaaaaand it's April first...I should have said: "Hi, I died in a car accident about two hours ago, you'll hear about it soon, the afterlife is boring and really sucks."
Oh well.

2 comments:

Lauren Sparks said...

my brain hurts now! thanks a lot, you crazy-man. :) happy april fools day. unless of course it was fated (or free choice'd) that you should have a bad april fool's day, in which case you have all my sympathy (and also a hypothetical hug, and hypothetical therapy cookies too) and i hope that the days following were good ones, or at least better. hm, the jens sentence structure is a bit difficult to emulate...

Lauren Sparks said...

also, if you're looking for something good that isn't a romance novel, "Good Omens" by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett is really really funny and well-written. :)