Omission of mercy

My Mobile Phone

2005-09-22T00:09:00.000Z

Last Tuesday saw the very tragic, very violent demise of my mobile phone. On my way to visit Ali, it fell out of my pocket on the way to the tram stop. I didn't notice immediately, and didn't spot it when I retraced my steps. I cancelled the phone, and set off to Ali's again. In retrospect, it's not surprising that I didn't spot it the first time. After all, I was looking for a mobile phone.

Orange Juice And Chicken Soup

2005-09-06T07:51:00.000Z

I humbly request that you allow me to withdraw my recommendation of the stress + tea diet as a weight loss technique. Independant scientific analysis suggests that this diet also acts as an immunosuppressant. Now if you'll excuse me, I feel like crap and I'm going to bed.

Hamish Is So Metal That

2005-09-04T11:15:00.000Z

He has crocheted his very own metal style armband, as worn by his hero James Hetfield.

Have any of you done anything THIS metal recently? Post here if you have, but Hamish for one, doubts it very much.

Weight Loss

2005-09-03T14:10:00.000Z

Allow me to recommend the stress + tea diet.

It is very simple. All you have to do is be so busy that you replace almost all meals with a mug of tea. I have lost about 6kg in the last month and a half.

One side effect is mild insomnia due to the caffeine intake. Apart from that however, it's pretty economical.

Please do not ask me how I am, unless you want to know how I am.

2005-08-27T00:20:00.000Z

I am attempting to teach the world this important lesson, one embarrassed, tongue-tied Australian at a time.

Believe It Or Not...

2005-08-18T09:09:00.000Z

Now I'm going to be posting here less.
I've decided to split out the politics/philosophy ranting from the day to day news. I'll announce the new politics blog when I think up a suitably witty name for it.

Other than that, all is well.

Politics

2005-07-28T12:00:00.000Z

It is looking increasingly like politics is where I'll end up. I rather suspect however, that this might be a crowded field in which to look for work.

I have landed successfully. There was water in the pool, enough water for a soft landing. Unfortunately, that water was 8°C. Central heating and insulation appear to be alien concepts here, and I sometimes find it warmer to stand outside.

I have made some friends, with luck I'll make more. Student union life looks like it could be fun. Nottingham University was largely apolitical. The opposite appears to be true at Melbourne Uni. Politics is radicalised, and very leftwing. In addition to that, there is a lot of it, and a lot of interest in it. Student demonstrations are big. Even before the start of semester, I've seen at least three groups of people canvassing students on issues ranging from workplace reform, or war in Iraq, to voluntary student unionism.

I want to write for the student union paper, Farrago. I'm a new arrival, unfamiliar even with Australian politics let alone Melbourne University student politics. As such, I had mixed feelings when I found Farrago full of articles written by highly informed and motivated activists, each with their own particular axe to grind. At this stage, I doubt there is anything I could say that wouldn't tread on a few toes, and potentially lead to a vitriolic and devastating denouncement of my ignorance. In order not to risk my future journalistic career at the uni, I think it is probably for the best if I try and learn the lay of the land before getting involved.

Bright Lights, Big City.

2005-07-10T06:21:00.000Z

More soon.

Some Links For You.

2005-06-08T11:27:00.000Z

Apparently, salination in Australia is largely due to the release of salt trapped in the soil. As land is irrigated for agriculture, the salt is released. See here for more.

Sometimes I feel like I'm working with blunt tools. Maybe this is what I need.

Diving Board? Check. Blindfold? Check.

2005-06-08T09:05:00.000Z

Metaphorically, I am doing up buckles. I am polishing my compass and sharpening my penknife. Checking that I have the equivalent of £25 in all major world currencies, et cetera.

Actually, I am stuffing things into a variety of cardboard boxes, and hoping that some of the people that contacted me about accommodation haven't filled their rooms yet.

I think I'll dig out an E111.

In Parkour, it's called a "blind jump". You jump without being able to see your landing place. They can be some of the hardest moves to get right, or some of the easiest. You don't know 'till you've landed.

Finally.

2005-06-06T11:27:00.000Z

I've been waiting for this for ages. Was going to do it myself. Beaten to the punch. I'm not complaining.

"When we started jamming together back in late 2002, there were no real resources to tap into. There were only a few videos that were cool but had nothing to back them up in terms of definition or guidance. We got hold of Parkour, jammed heavily and through the nature of creation, came up with new moves that are now attached to what everyone is currently practising. We were driven by progression and most importantly, we used to have so much FUN while doing it. We've promoted ourselves and the art in exactly the same manner all along and have been told by Foucan, Vigroux and the Yamakasi, that we are promoting the 'way' in the right manner and that we have something very special."

- Ez, June 2005.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Freestyle Parkour: Moving Beyond Boundaries

‘Without freedom from the past, there is no freedom at all’
Jiddu Krishnamurti

Urban Freeflow has always been committed to absolute freedom of movement. Parkour, Freerunning, Freerun… the name has never been important; only that the medium by which we choose to express ourselves imposes no limits whatsoever upon that expression. The movement we are seeking is beyond limitations, beyond labels, even beyond simple definition. Only within such freedom is creativity unleashed, and so far that creativity has proven hard to restrain.

In the development of the art to date we have seen incredible achievements by freerunners or traceurs – call them what you will – the world over: mind-blowing movement capabilities that are helping to redefine and expand the limits of human potential. Creativity is everywhere within the community, and the urge to explore these talents is constantly driving new waves of people to push and stretch the boundaries of movement.

However, there is a risk of a tendency to restrain, to define, to possess. And it is this tendency in us as humans that must be watched, even guarded against.

It is an age-old truth that when a belief, a concept, or a label is hindering progress rather than assisting it, then it must be set aside. Change is the nature of all things, perhaps even – as is often said – the only constant in life. The ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus famously proclaimed ‘Everything flows; nothing remains’ [1], and both human history and modern science have proven him right in the two-and-a-half thousand years since his death. All is process, all is movement: all is flow. That is why this art we practise speaks so strongly to us, because it is our nature to be always in transition, changing, moving, not only on a physical level but on a mental one as well.

Parkour, like any other art, is not a static entity. However, there is a danger that it is becoming so. The growing concern is that the initial freedom that existed in people’s practice is now being restricted by an attempt to contain the art within definitions and terminology: this is parkour, this is not parkour, and so on. Endless debates as to whether such and such a movement is a valid part of the system or not is tantamount to creating a fixed curriculum of techniques, something so defined that it precludes any natural growth or creative progress. This is an approach that by nature excludes and that engenders both elitism and stagnation. It has created a situation whereby that which freed us to move in the first place is now threatening to restrict us.

The solution is simple. When such a danger arises, one avoids it by moving on, by letting go of one’s attachment to the old concept… by flowing past it. After all, while you are attached to something you are not truly free. Freedom is a matter of stripping limitations away, not of acquiring new ones. So it is with the art of movement. Mentally as well as physically, its practitioners must maintain an open, expansive mindset; an approach that never gets stuck on any one point. It is well to remember that anything unmoving in nature is already dead or dying. At its heart, parkour is about growth and about development, both on a personal level and as a community. In short, it is about movement. And how can movement be ‘right’ or ‘wrong’? There can be more efficient movements, there can be more graceful and aesthetic movements (though even this last is subjective), but ‘wrong’ movements? Surely not.

However, practicality demands the use of some label for ease of communication and conversation. Towards the goal of upholding a commitment to total freedom of movement, and to remain innovative and moving ever forward, Urban Freeflow is advocating the practise of Freestyle Parkour; a term that we feel is loose enough to be beyond any limiting definition whilst remaining descriptive enough to do justice to the art it promotes. It is inclusive rather than exclusive; expressive rather than repressive; open rather than closed.

Gandhi once stated ‘I want freedom for the full expression of my personality’ [2], and this effectively captures what drives most practitioners of our art. We want to encourage newcomers to find their own path in the art of movement, their own expression. No one can own movement: ask a hundred freerunners for their definition of their art and you will get a hundred different answers, and so you should. Why try to force these individuals to conform to any one single definition? Not only is it impossible, it is a highly restrictive process. And it is well within our ability to be free of such restrictions. So why not be free?

[1] Quoted by Plato in Cratylus, and by and by Diogenes Laertius in Lives of the Philosophers Book IX, section 8

[2] Mohandas K. Gandhi, 1946 p.246

Copyright © the urban freeflow network. All rights reserved. Reproduced with kind permission.

Warm Calling

2005-06-03T10:28:00.000Z

A few nights ago, I was called by a young woman from a company offering me a free mobile phone due to my (actually The Doctor's) loyalty to BT. She made the mistake of asking me how I was "this evening". A few minutes later, when I explained that I didn't need a mobile phone she said goodbye, and that she hoped things would look up for me soon.

This Week, I 'A' Mostly Been Listening To

2005-06-01T14:42:00.000Z

Fats Waller

Contrasting delightfully with my mood.

The Nuclear Option

2005-05-24T19:11:00.000Z

No, this is not going to be a 14-hour post. Blair eh? He attends the global sumit on nuclear non-proliferation, urging countries to avoid going nuclear, whilst refusing to rule out more nuclear power stations as a way to overcome the impending British energy crisis. It is all very well saying that nuclear energy is safe and non polluting, but we are not the only country that will need more energy over the next century, won't the Turkish/Brazillian/Polish economies need vastly more power as well? Are we advocating nuclear power as a global solution? If so, how can we be sure that the "exacting" waste disposal standards that we adhere to in the UK will be observed in the developing world? I'll answer that; we can't. Think of the other difficulties, all the fun we're having with Iran for example. So let's not start a ball rolling we won't be able to stop, eh?

Bookshops

2005-05-13T13:01:00.000Z

Within sight of the Blue Mosque is the tourist district. Outdoor cafes vie with one another for the custom of backpackers, and jokes are shouted down from rooftop bars to passing friends, while music blares out from any number of shop fronts. The door to the bookshop muffled all of this as it swung closed. I padded past a young man reading a paper by the till, and looked around. The shop was dark and narrow, lined all the way back with tall shelves filled with rows of newish paperbacks.

I browsed quietly, running my finger along spines without a particularly clear idea what I was looking for. Eventually I settled upon a copy of Don Quixote. I slid it out from the shelf, examined the cover and turned towards the desk. From Outside, the drone of the Muezzins poured from minarettes, and spread out through the cool evening air across Sultanhmet, the old heart of Constantinople. Radios were turned down in the crowded street bars.

In a fit of curiosity, I wandered back into the shop, looking for a little shelf, somewhere above the other bookshelves, perhaps with a single book upon it. Unable to find it, I took my purchase over the the man at the counter. "Excuse me," I asked, "Do you have a copy of the Qua'ran?". Without looking up, he raised a hand and gestured; "Over there, under 'K'."

This Is Like

2005-05-09T09:34:00.000Z

Delivering a lecture to a darkened auditorium. Are the crowd quiet because they are attentive, or are they quiet because they are not there? I suppose that's not really the point.

The Big Day

2005-05-06T14:08:00.000Z

It was a big day for everyone yesterday. Yesterday was the day the nation went to the ballot box to give its verdict on the performance of the government over the last four years, and decide who should govern for the next four.
For many people, this was a one issue campaign; despite the muted messages from the opinion polls, canvassers on the doorstep found a lingering and pervasive sense of betrayal and anger over Tony Blair's handling of the Iraq conflict. Little surprise then that in many safe Labour seats, their majority ebbed away as angry supporters abandoned the party in favour of the Liberal Democrats, who opposed the Iraq conflict from the onset.
Most of Labour's losses were in areas where they were in conflict with the Conservative party. In these areas in the previous two elections, Labour had been successful in persuading Liberal Democrat voters to vote Labour in order to keep the Conservatives out. In this election, Liberal Democrat voters decided that they no longer wished to give the Labour party, or more importantly, Tonly Blair the benefit of the doubt. Even if this meant letting back in a Conservative MP.
The Liberals were more successful in constituencies with large student populations; on the back of anti-war sentiment, bolstered no doubt by an opposition to top-up fees, students appear to have deserted the Labour party en masse.

All of this puts the Liberal Democrats in a rather interesting position; they are more powerful now than they have been since the days of Lloyd George, but they have a fine balancing act to perform when it comes to defining their policy over the next term. Almost all Liberal gains were in Labour seats, sometimes with enormous swings, and all of their losses were in Conservative seats. With this influx of ex-Labour voters, mostly from the left wing of the Labour party, the natural thing for the Liberals to do would seem to be to move a little further to the left, in the hopes of defining themselves as the leftwing party of British politics. This would almost certainly garner them support from the unions and take swathes of additional voters from the Labour party. However, many of their existing seats are contested with the Conservative party, and should the Liberals move further to the left, many voters from the center ground may find themselves drawn to the Conservatives. In addition to this, when Gordon Brown replaces Tony Blair as Prime Minister suitably close to the next election, he may reverse much of the leftwing swing away from Labour that we have seen in this election. It will be interesting to see what course the Liberal Democrat party steers over the next parliament.

In other news, yesterday was also the day that I handed in my notice at work. I'm finishing on June the 17th, and I have a one-way plane ticket to Australia for the 20th.

Who Will I Vote For?

2005-04-22T10:11:00.000Z

Your expected outcome:

Liberal Democrat

Your actual outcome:

Labour -6
Conservative -85
	Liberal Democrat 110
UK Independence Party -34
	Green 62

You should vote: Liberal Democrat

The LibDems take a strong stand against tax cuts and a strong one in favour of public services: they would make long-term residential care for the elderly free across the UK, and scrap university tuition fees. They are in favour of a ban on smoking in public places, but would relax laws on cannabis. They propose to change vehicle taxation to be based on usage rather than ownership.

Take the test at Who Should You Vote For

Temper Tantrum

2005-04-22T09:12:00.000Z

I wanted to fight the entire world the other night. Galloway was being intimidated on TV, and I heard bad news from a very ill friend.
Lying in bed, I was seething; the tendons in my fingers and wrists ached for violence and all the muscles in my chest, knees and throat were knotted with fury. It's hard to think when every thought becomes hate and destruction. It's hard to breathe when every exhalation is a suppressed bellow. It's hard to see when dark blood boils in the humour. In the end of course I found calm.

I'm shadowboxing with the umbra. I could swing but never connect. I'll shatter anyone's graven images; defy anyone to claim all this pain for their god.

Mmmm... Omlette...

2005-04-12T07:59:00.000Z

What if Iraq worked? The idea isn't too hard to comprehend, Iraq has just had its first free and (reasonably) fair elections ever, its Shia polititians are making strong conciliatory gestures towards both the Sunnis and the Kurds. So it doesn't take an enormous leap of imagination to picture a successful, stable and prosperous Iraq, only formed because of the illegal invasion of the country by US and UK forces.
If that were to happen, what could us naysayers think? It would make the war no less illegal and immoral in my mind (let us not forget that both the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Sudan could both have done with a big occupying force, potentially saving hundreds of thousands of lives in each case), but if an illegal invasion works, it works. Doesn't it?

Here's a crude analogy (pun intended);
If MI5 decided everyone in the UK should have an anal probe for security reasons, you'd object, right? So, they do it anyway and they find some guy with a nuclear bomb secreted in his colon, thus London is saved. The MI5 decide to do one of these sweeps every two weeks. Would that have made it wrong for you to object initially? Of course not; who wants an anal probe? Would it be wrong to object to subsequent anal probing (considering the success of previous rectal reconnaissance)? No, of course not; who wants regular anal probing? The security tactic is ridiculous, oppressive and cruel. Just because it happened to be successful once doesn't mean that it will be successful again, and it doesn't address a host of other security problems.

I am fairly sure that more people have died in Iraq because of the invasion than would have under the continued rule of Saddam, so I can sit comfortably knowing that I will be objecting to all subsequent anal probings with a clear conscience.

Living In The City

2005-04-11T10:36:00.000Z

Imagine leaning your head against the flank of a big horse. You could feel the warmth, its chest expanding as it drew in a huge lungful of air, and sinking back as it let the air out. Underneath that, and distantly you could hear the steady beat of a huge, powerful heart.

I think listening to police radio would help me sleep, that or taxi radio or air traffic control.

Picking At Injuries

2005-04-03T13:40:00.000Z

I have some bites on my knee. I think Metalboy's cats might have fleas, as I got three bites on friday night and haven't had anymore since. They've swollen up and turned slightly yellow. I was just thinking when I scratched them that the blood on my fingers had been in the various ventricles and atria of my heart just moments earlier. Once you get started down that line of thought, you don't want to lean your head against aeroplane windows, it's all terrifying.

The heart, it's such a fucking Heath Robinson contraption; blood goes through it two ways and it has to pressurise it's own blood supply. If you designed a submarine that way you'd get laughed out of the navy. We're pressurised blood filled balloons, wandering around avoiding sharp things.

Emo Kids

2005-03-31T09:27:00.000Z

What a bunch of winging pretentious tossers eh? I realise I should be pretty much last to jump on the "Slap the Emo Kids" bandwagon, after all I listen to (and enjoy) a fair bit of emo music, but they really have it coming. If I see another dyed black moptop, or any more pouty trembling lower lips (with obligatory piercing) I swear I'll knock some heads together. Allow me to quote a journal entry that I've discovered;

O3 Mar 2005

[ music she's my rushmore x every time i die ]

aaggghadfhadlfdjaf.

i want to be content.

just... content with life.

that would be good.

Oh wow. Now imagine that this stuff makes up approximately a quarter of all content held on the internet in total, and you'll see my concern. It seems that to ease childbirth modern mothers are bearing infants without spines. Apparently, rebellion is no longer cool. Nowadays it's much cooler just to sit at home and cry about your problems, preferably whilst listening to Jets to Brazil. I think this all stems from the fact that most kids nowadays find themselves unable to shock or worry their parents;

"Mum, my fifth facial piercing just got infected and I spent last night injecting heroin into my eyeballs with a dirty syringe I found on the floor of a squat."

"That's nice dear, remember to finish your homework."

Today's troubled teens have simply worn themselves out, like the fat lass crying in the corner of the party, who dries up eventually when she realises no-one is going to come over and comfort her. Why not take up boxing, or get in some fights in bars? Which reminds me, I know at least one emo kid built like a tank. It's hilarious how hard it is to pull off "my heart is breaking" when your huge meaty fists just scream "your nose is breaking". Don't get me started on new emo/hardcore "dance" styles.

Standard Deviation, P Math, And The Mule

2005-03-29T11:30:00.000Z

I think I'll continue to skirt my field of interest by looking at something that sits very uncomfortably with me; genius. I don't like Genius, it upsets the natural order of things, it is the unexpected spike in the standard distribution of intelligence. Although standard distribution predicts that incredibly intelligent people must exist, the bulk of humanity must have nigh on average intelligence; the force of humanity seems to be in the area of average intelligence, and thus one would imagine humanity's hope of progress lies in harnessing our gift for cooperation and pooling a million average minds to master phenomenal thoughts.

The Genius seems to break this pattern, not through intelligence alone, but through its application. To this end, the worrisome idea is not necessarily genius, but the capacity of someone exceptional to have an influence far beyond that which would be expected of an average person. To be an instigator, or a catalyst, or more worryingly, to drive events entirely by the force of their own will.

Individuals such as this make predictions about the ebb and flow of humanity nigh on impossible. Luckily individuals such as this are incredibly rare, So much so that I find it very hard to think of many concrete cases. Any good ideas, anyone?

A Change Of Heart Over Faith Schools

2005-03-29T10:31:00.000Z

In Bradford last Saturday, sat in a Pakistani restaurant, I had a change of heart over faith schools. I now think that they are a good idea.

Simply put; my original objection was that they would lead to social division. This is not necessarily untrue, but it misses a major point. Faith schools, faith schooling and religious education will lead to a strong sense of community WITHIN religious and ethnic groups. The issues that we face today are largely due to the disenfranchisement of vulnerable youths who find little within modern life in the UK that relates to who they are. By creating strong ethnic and faith communities, these concerns can be dealt with. No Islamic school will be teaching kids radical interpretations of the faith that promote violent struggle against the government and the west, but youths who leave secular school because they do not identify with the environment under which they are forced to learn, may well find themselves under the sway of radical and unregulated extremists who promote just such activity.

Cars, Java, And Parliamentary Select Committees

2005-03-23T09:31:00.000Z

When The Doctor was small, cars were much rarer than they are now. People who owned one knew how to perform basic maintenance on them, or retained someone who did. Nowadays such skills, whilst far from being unheard of are much rarer. Cars are just too complex for us to spend the required time learning how they work. We judge by results; does the engine start? Do we get where we're going? We leave what's under the hood under the hood. Maybe voter disinterest in Politics is a symptom of the fact that politics have reached a level of complexity that makes it time consuming to understand. People would rather base their preferences on results than learn the intricacies of how they are achieved. Perhaps all we need then is a fair and thorough way of testing the output.

A Moment In Time

2005-03-15T22:17:00.000Z

While I like the idea that one could value a single moment infinitely highly, I don't think one should value it more highly than a large number of moments. After all, can one learn to value a single moment highly without many other such moments in which to contemplate the idea of a singularly valued moment. Prince Myshkin's convict no doubt would have many days to contemplate his last moments; imbueing them then with a significance that they could not hold for him afterwards.

What strikes me is the paucity of experience in a moment; even the most fulfilled can do little more than touch upon a number of ideas and experiences, or perhaps reach a point of inspiration that can only be appreciated upon later analysis. It seems to me that the significance of a moment is related entirely to the circumstances in which the moment is viewed, thus to attach importance to a moment beyond its worth, simply because of its position on the order of things is to miss out on the much broader pattern of events.

Wherever I turn, I always end up with this idea: Patterns Emerging From the Chaos.

I'll talk more about this soon. I've been thinking about it a lot.

New Resolve

2005-03-14T09:35:00.000Z

The situation with H has resolved itsself to the extent that I am no longer losing sleep over it. My machine at home crashed. I lost a lot of stuff. Luckily, nothing vital apart perhaps from some rather nice photos of friends from Nottingham, and some holiday snaps. Work on The Project will not be halted by this. Arguably that's because work on The Project was already halted. There's something about rebuilding a machine that makes me feel optimistic; getting everything up and running again, clean and fresh, is a small pleasure. More thinking has been done about The Plan. It's going to be hard, but I think I can do it.

Parkour

2005-03-11T14:13:00.002Z

Whilst chatting to Kiell the other day in IRC about an article he was doing for a Toyota owners' magazine, I considered how I would rewrite one of his paragraphs. Having nowhere else to put it, and being loath to throw it away, I'm posting it here.

The most evident goal of parkour is smooth, flowing movement; tracing one’s own course though the environment whilst flowing gracefully from one obstacle to the next. This is as much an excercise in mental flexibility and ingenuity as in physical athleticism. The philosophy behind Parkour is contested in as much detail and with as much passion as the moves themselves; incorporating ideas from eastern mysticism, Post Modernism, and a myriad of viewpoints from Parkour’s diverse community.

Note that it is just as much an excercise in punctuation as it is in prose.

Do Not Spend 3 Hours In The Sauna

2005-03-08T11:04:00.000Z

Three hours is too long to be in the sauna. My skin felt great, and I had a sense of great physical wellbeing. However I spent the evening at the pub with Happy, sank into almost apocalyptic misery. You realise you're a loser when you spend the evening crying into your pint, being cheered up by someone with clinical depression.

Shabina Begum Is Beautiful

2005-03-03T09:32:00.000Z

That's what saddens me I suppose. Pretty selfish really. I'm sure she has lovely hair though. I should probably open this up a little; I think I'm happy with the court decision, if she wants to wear what she considers to be attire required by her faith, I think she should be allowed. I don't think the religious issue is what upsets me here. To me it seems like the Jilbab is more a form of national or ethnic dress. I think that's what I don't like.
Acknowledging one's heritage has merit; cultural diversity can be wonderful. Where would we be without Indian and Chinese food? I'm sad to say I can't think of many other examples right now, but I'm sure they exist. These are examples however of when groups of people who have moved to this country have opened up their culture and invited everyone to take part in it, to enjoy it and to celebrate it.
My worry is when people cling too hard to their culture and are prepared to exclude the world around them; it breeds division. The Irish question will only be solved ten years after Catholic children play with Protestant children in the playground in every school in Northern Ireland. There are parts of Bradford where you won't see a white face, and there are parts of Suffolk where you will only see white faces.
I don't really know what I'm suggesting, it sounds like I might be heading towards forced distribution of ethnic groups... Obviously I'm not suggesting that, that was tried in Australia with the Indigenous peoples, and has proved to be a disaster. I think a good first step would be to outlaw faith schools, whilst ensuring children of different religious backgrounds had the freedom and resources necessary to practice their religions within secular schooling outside of the curriculum.
We all have to work to make this succ... Insert unconvincing platitude here. Bleh, I give up, you get the idea.

Georgia, Ukraine, Lebanon... Iran?

2005-03-01T11:54:00.000Z

Peaceful democratic revolution seems to be the flavour of the week in global politics. It's all rather surprising, and one wonders what's brought it all on. I think the media may have something to do with it. The exposure of internal events to international scrutiny makes it rather more difficult to massacre vast numbers of peacefully demonstrating opposition supporters without running into difficulty. Having said this, it doesn't seem to have stopped the government of Sudan.

Sudan of course is a rather different case; the conflict there appears to be largely along the religious and ethnic divide as opposed to political difference. I've heard of Lebanese protestors citing Ukraine as an inspiration, so it may well be that these revolutions feed off one another. I think the first one was Georgia, maybe that bears further investigation.

Then Optimus Prime Jackknifed

2005-02-28T09:20:00.000Z

Well, it COULD happen. Tentative steps were made towards resolving The Situation this weekend, though it's too early to say anything yet.

Bear and Wiry came down for Saturday night and the idea was to have a party, but it all fell a bit flat and we ended up drinking quite a bit and going to the pub. CB proved exceptionally obnoxious to FlowerBoy, and I spent as much of the evening as I could near his F.I.U.U.C.S.P.B.
Hmm.. I think a better name is needed; how about H?

Actually got some work done on The Project on Sunday, mostly reading. Metalboy's lady managed to open her finger up on an unprotected razor, and gout blood all over the piano.

I'll think of something clever to say soon, watch this space.

Poor, Poor Gerry Adams

2005-02-23T13:57:00.000Z

I mean, you've got to laugh, haven't you?

Foxxx Club

2005-02-21T09:53:00.000Z

Bear sent me an email about fox hunting. Highly amusing;

given the (finally!) ban on hunting with dogs coming into effect I'm now
waiting for the 'underground'
fox hunting scene to emerge (foxx n houndz?)

The first rule of fox club......fuck the peasants

Heh, of course Bear meant proles, not peasants. It seems to me that this isn't about foxes at all; it's about classes. I've even heard this referred to as being revenge for the pit closures. A Tory government smashed the unions, now a Labour government appeases the unions by smashing an upper class institution. The foxes get shafted either way as I see it.

I find myself in the unusual position of supporting the animal rights campaigners; at least their motives for wanting an end to fox hunting are pure. The other sides of the debate seem to be merely engaged in a form of nasty and vindictive class warfare.

Support Red Ken!

2005-02-17T09:13:00.000Z

Good old Ken Livingstone. To be honest, I don't know much about his spat with the Evening Standard, but my initial position on any conflict involving him is to assume he is in the right. Boris Johnson suggested that Blair got involved to reassure the Jewish vote after being very careful bringing disillusioned muslims onside recently. I've heard a recording of the exchange, and it seemed clear to me that what Ken said was very offensive, as he was intending to be offensive, that was good. I suppose it is the equivalent of telling a black person that they are just like a member of the KKK before you knew that they were black, and then continuing once you realised. It's pretty nasty thing to say, but you could argue that if he'd stopped there, he would be displaying a form of racial bias as well. Tricky. Nonetheless if Ken apologises, his career will be over; people don't go "Oh, now you've apologised, let's all move on shall we?", once they've got an inch, they'll want to take a square mile. Nice to know that some of the people he was defending have come out in his support. Backstabbing bastards.

Stupid Robot

2005-02-14T14:12:00.000Z

Last friday lunchtime I started thinking about ideology, or at least my interpretation of the word. Ideology seems to imply striving towards an ideal. It allows no second place; "Death or Glory". If one has not attained one's ideal, one has failed, no matter how close one has come. There are certain places where ideology seems highly appropriate; parachute packing for example. In my opinion however, diplomacy is not one of those places. This brings me to the real word of the day; Compromise.

Compromise is everywhere, it is in everything. Ideals are the preserve of mathematics, whereas compromise is the science of life; the engine of creation. Without compromise, without "That'll do", everything we see every day would be impossible. Biology is compromise, the human mind is compromise; our ability to comprehend the abstract notion of ideal is entirely due to compromise. Properly managed, compromise can bring us closer to perfection than striving directly for a goal.

I remember being shown "Stupid robots" at the Magna centre in Rotherham (I think). These clever creations had no idea how to use their wheels or sensors in order to move about, and had to teach themselves from scratch. Given the simple goal of getting as close as possible to a particular point, they first had to teach themselves to use their wheels to move, and then their sensors to avoid obstacles in order to achieve their goal. How did they do this? They experimented. Of all the actions available to them, they would randomly pick one, and test the outcome. Should the outcome bring them closer to their objective, they would be more likely to do that in future, should the opposite be true, then they would be less likely to do so. It was amazing to see how quickly they developed complex behaviour patterns. By the end of the experiment, the little robots were enormously adept at attaining their objectives, their behaviour often resembling that of animals in a rather creepy way. These feedback loops of experimentation and learning allow complex behaviour patterns to evolve very quickly. With a more powerful computer, even more complex behaviour can be developed faster.

Perhaps parallels can be drawn from this? Can we achieve perfection by learning from a million tiny errors? Only If we forgive those errors I suppose. The difficulty comes in setting an initial goal. In the field of conflict resolution, it would have to be a goal upon which both sides could agree. For example, in the middle east, peace would seem to be an acceptable starting point. The remaining issues surrounding land and water rights, refugees and access to Jerusalem et cetera could be experimentally defined; in the same way that avoiding obstacles was not an original requirement of the robots, but they learned to do it in order to achieve their main objective. One can't help but begin to feel like Hari Seldon in contemplating ideas like this, but it could be just what we need.

A Weekend Spent Wasted..

2005-02-07T09:48:00.000Z

I can say with little reservation, or pause for reflection that this weekend was utterly, utterly wasted. Nothing of any practical merit was achieved, and I'm not an inch further forward than I was on friday.

Excellent.

A Missing Tactic

2005-02-03T09:15:00.000Z

Something has been troubling me for a while now. I think I have been trying to come up with some kind of plan, a tactic, or a philosophy. It seems to be on the tip of my tongue, or the edge of my thoughts. It seems to be the realisation I approach at the end of sleeping, a dim light glimpsed through foliage or a face part-recognised in a crowd.

It stems from the sense of powerlessness that I feel about events reported in the media. I have always been relatively slow to weigh in on arguments, and when I have done, I like to think that my reasoned opinion has carried extra weight because of it. In this vein I have been largely silent about politics, religion and the other issues that trouble humanity, barring the frequent discussions that I've had with a number of people that have helped form my opinions. When I choose to speak out, I want my voice to carry.

How will I give myself a platform from which to speak? Or how will I give my views a platform, as I'm not especially keen on the limelight myself. That is the question that has been troubling me. I believe the answer is close, and this is why I'm denying the idea that my silence is laziness.

In Summary

2005-01-25T11:48:00.000Z

I am concerned that unless Metalboy is constantly supervised, he may attempt to smash the state or abolish private property. His mum is back now, which eases the situation considerably. There was a party at the weekend, Blonde's house. It was good to see some of the old faces again. I didn't really talk to anyone new. Partly I think that was the weed, and partly it's because I don't live in Nottingham anymore, and getting to know people I won't see again more than once or twice seems like a bit of a waste to me. We failed to hit the sauna after driving back later, and I went for a pint with Happy instead. He showed me some of his round the world pictures and my feet itched.
After a fairly despondent few days, I'm starting to recover. Housework is always enormously therapeutic, which probably explains why I never seem keen to get started on it. I've moved loads of cushions and blankets into the front room, it looks warm and comfy now. A small but significant amount of work got done on The Project last night; significant in that it's been so long since I did any work on The Project. Not much great thinking has occurred recently, or at least none that I can remember.

Black Days

2005-01-23T18:37:00.000Z

I've not been running on a full tank of gasoline these last few days. I think it must be cyclical. Whatever it is, I am feeling acutely aware of The Situation right now, but there's more to it than that I think. I watched Hellboy on Saturday night, before heading to the pub for a pint and some pool in Bures. NinjaM stayed over, which I suppose didn't help, as he's in a similar boat to me. A few weeks ago, Metalboy's lady brought an attractive friend over, and we all had a pie off. It was supposed to be a pleasant evening for just the four of us. NinjaM invited himself over, which I didn't mind, but this friend of Metalboy's lady talked to him all night and barely looked at me. It's not that I was expecting anything, I was just hoping to have a pleasant evening in the company of a single girl. I don't think I have anything else to say about that.

Devious, Unscrupulous

2005-01-21T13:22:00.000Z

Mail order Scottish Aberdeen Angus steaks for dinner last night, courtesy of Metalboy’s gran. The evening was somewhat disrupted by the presence of CB, who turned up to collect his videos, but ended up having some dinner, smoking my weed, and drinking my beer. I am increasingly of the opinion that he is actually a fascist. Let me separate those points. I don’t believe his consumption of my comestibles makes him a fascist, I Believe his fascist tendencies make him a fascist. Either way, I’m not feeling so guilty about my less than subtle plan to drive a wedge between him and his F.I.U.U.C.S.P.B. The lady in question did not appear last night, but plans are in the offing.
It is quite disturbing to consider that someone with an upbringing very similar to my own has gone so badly wrong. He has, to neither I nor Metalboy’s surprise, put a lot of thought into the uniform he will wear upon becoming a fascist dictator. I find it ironic to think that someone with so little natural facility for leadership or social interaction should formulate such grandiose plans. When I’ve finished screwing him over completely, I hope he’ll understand that I was just being a good fascist/objectivist.

Politics

2005-01-19T09:35:00.000Z

I'm reading The Communist Manifesto at the moment. It lead to an extensive discussion about Marx's attitude to material acquisition with Metalboy. He seemed better today. I ended up being a little befuddled by what Marx meant when he said "Communism deprives no man of the power to appropriate the products of society; all that it does is to deprive him of the power to subjugate the labour of others by means of such appropriation". This suggests that under communism it is still possible to acquire the materials that allow one to live a wealthy existence. Metalboy pointed out that these materials are the product of labour, so he is effectively subjugating the labour of others by proxy.

In other news, the Fiesta keys have been discovered, which simplifies my life drastically. The folks are getting back in early March, and I'm contemplating a trip to Finland shortly afterwards.

The Court Marshall currently in progress in Germany reminds me of the short-sightedness of giving stupid people guns and sending them somewhere alien and hostile to represent our country. There was a debate on the Today Programme this morning between General Patrick Cordingley, commander of the Desert Rats in the first Gulf War, and Jihad Balut, a representative of Al Jazeera in which the General suggested that the Arabs were a pragmatic people and would understand that a small amount of prisoner abuse was the inevitable consequence of any invasion. Jihad Balut agreed that Arabs were a pragmatic people, but failed to make the point that they were no more pragmatic than Britons, and one can only imagine the reaction of the tabloids to pictures of an invading force abusing British prisoners.

Past Tense...

2005-01-17T10:47:00.000Z

As ever, future uncertain. The Doctor was not delighted when I told him what I wanted the kerosene for. Luckily he's 12,000 miles away. MetalBoy has clinical depression. At least I'm fairly sure he does. I'm going to get him to book a doctor's appointment over the next few days. Happy pills may not be a great longterm solution, but he doesn't need a longterm solution.

Made a curry for about ten people on saturday night. It was sunday morning before it got served. I had to flash fry the chicken in batches, though my decision to take longer cutting the chicken into thin strips was rewarded by lots of happy faces and full bellies. I like hosting.

Having the house to myself has been a blessing, but I'm missing company and motivation. Hopefully I'll have settled The Situation by the time the folks return, because right now they're 12,000 miles away, and I need a hug.