life and death: a coming of age
galathaea
mike gordge's wife may be dying
torkel franzen is dead
william elliot is well on his way
and a group of LIEberals
have been plotting the assassination
of unabashed rePUGliTARD leftwinghank (nee rightwinghank)
for some time now on alt.politics
some of this is very present in
certain peoples lives right now
robert cohen regularly posts on
why darfur stories matter to him
that can sometimes make me cry
in darfur
estimates have put the death rate
at 12 per 100000 people
per day
from violent death
21 per 100000 people from malnutrition and disease
much caused by the diaspora
and the circumstances of the refugees
per day
death matters in a very tangible way
every day
in 2004
violent deaths in america
were at 5.1 per 100000
for the entire year
violent death rates differ
by a ratio of more than 750
between these populations
this slaughter is often of the unarmed
-+-+-+-
understanding death
requires an understanding of life
for it is formulated in its language
modern theories of life
are all "autologic"
by this i mean
they are all expressed in a self-referential language
autocatalytic networks or hypercycles
the ability to embed symbols in the dynamics
so that symbolic evolution can occur
jablonka and lamb have recently released
" evolution in four dimensions:
genetic
epigenetic
behavioral
and symbolic variation
in the history of life "
where they discuss the basic mechanisms by which
symbols embed themselves in the dynamics
as seen in modern experience
this is one of those points the neodarwinian synthesis
has been attacking for some time
because any such embedding
has its own natural selection
neodarwinians have often been very exclusive-minded
DNA-centered
and the neolamarckians have a lot of fun with their
evidence
-+-
a common thread among the emergence of evolutionary forms
is that they evolve through first order processes
to obey second order propositions
that natural selection selects these second-order laws
"foundations without foundationalism" by shapiro
describes this for models of mathematics
and could be considered
an appendix to the last dimension of jablonka and lamb
these four dimensions should not be taken as exhaustive either
like relf's dimensions
they are just really important ones
^^
..____/
the concept of an autologic description of life
is founded in the necessity to describe
how a process can take action
to help ensure its continued existence
an autocatalytic reaction network
is fit when it intersects a flow of fuel
natural degradation of the network
thermal decomposition
environmental reactivity
that removes it from the metabolism
replaced by the process
if it can order the flow
or manipulate its position
or the position of fuel
in the environment to bring their relation to intersection
it is fitter
natural selection is death
the process of the entity referring to the entity
the sentence referring to itself
this second order property selected by natural selection
lacks teleology
that is the great lesson of evolution
that scared nietzsche so
not even autoteleology
just evolution
and the selection of second order properties
these properties are the entity
********************
last summer
i spent much time outside at night
watching shooting stars
i would think how very few of them
could ever make it down
and i would imagine these fingers
of molten rock and superheated steam
pushing death into the atmosphere
we live in an invader culture
violence
mass murder
death the rising god
the negation of process
and all i wanted was health
the antigod
the antidote
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
death fucks people up
it is an obsession with the most vital purpose
to stay alive
you can't die
it is a primary motive of moralities
i do not like the iraq war
because it is unhealthy death and anger
but i also do not like the iraq war
because it is hundreds of thousands of soldiers
made to face death
death fucks people up
my stepfather went to vietnam
and learned avoidance through alcohol
he could not keep the anger down
and i do not like the war in iraq
because millions of iraqi families
are made to face death
unexplainable
meaningless
death
unrelated to anything they may have done in their life
except live and support their system
-+-+-+-+-+-
i learned death
from the unearthly blackness
of the barrel of thirty-ought-six
this negative blackness in things
wanted to end my life
yearned
sucked
my stepfather's finger on the trigger
seemed to naturally want to pull
and the alcoholic flutter of the muscles
were keeping it back
some last piece of recognition of the scene
i pitied myself
i hated myself
music was an ideal to hold on to
and i was drawn to the punk
and other outcast music scene
i learned that others have it worse
those who couldn't handle vietnam
weren't the only ones to fuck up their children
meth addicts usually did
schizophrenic parents
depressed parents
missing-forebrain parents
...
i realised i knew others had it worse
and i had been avoiding that acknowledgement for years
so i could continue pitying myself
and hating myself
and that i needed to grow up
-+-+-
i have always loved coming of age stories
lately
i have been obssessed with kodomo no omocha
which has an eye for the lessons
of the loss of innocence
the lead character sana
learns about death and self hatred
through events in her friends life
i have been watching the dvd's a lot lately
and marvelling at her optimism
are you optimistic?
i've been thinking about the great heat death
and wondering about teleology
or rather ateleology
the absence of purpose
am i optimistic?
the inevitability of death
teaches me many things
it teaches me that i am alone
despite loved ones i may get help from
i must burden my own
am i optimistic?
major genocides occurring regularly
over the past centuries
not even a decade apart anymore
overlapping even
am i optimistc?
death teaches health
and action
this is my only life
what do i want to learn?
what do i want to see?
what can i accomplish?
can i make things better
even just a little
before i go?
am i optimistic?
and it was summer with these molten fingers
tapping into the night with random death
and then i picked up this book
it was called "quantum limits to the second law"
and i saw the heat death challenged
i saw perpetuum mobile
and the possibility of refuting carnot
i thought of membrane intersections and dark energy
and how much was so uncertain
-+-+-
in emiliana torrini's "love in the time of science"
there is a song "telepathy" that goes:
" why is it so we never know
what we have until it's gone?
until we burn we never learn
what we have until it's gone... "
classic dk goes:
" kill kill kill kill kill the poor
kill kill kill kill kill the poor
kill kill kill kill kill the poor
tonighighighighiiiiighhhhttttt! "
are you optimistic?
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
galathaea: prankster, fablist, magician, liar
Publius
news:galathaea-150...@10.0.1.2...
> the inevitability of death
> teaches me many things
>
> it teaches me that i am alone
> despite loved ones i may get help from
> i must burden my own
>
> am i optimistic?
>
> major genocides occurring regularly
> over the past centuries
> not even a decade apart anymore
>
> overlapping even
>
> am i optimistc?
>
> death teaches health
> and action
>
> this is my only life
>
> what do i want to learn?
> what do i want to see?
> what can i accomplish?
> can i make things better
> even just a little
> before i go?
>
> am i optimistic?
Ever read Asimov's "The Last Question"?
I didn't know about Torkel.
Great post.