Wednesday, September 07, 2005
i have been struggling with my writing. i feel like the idea i start with ends up as a sidelight to the act of writing itself. writing is a good outlet, but it should be an outlet for my head instead of for the grammar and vocabulary i learned in school. i don't want to be one of those people who can write something in a certain voice and convince himself that it is true. my writing and my eductation should be there to help me explain what i am thinking as accurately as possible. my mind is not just a vehicle for my writing style. no excess until the idea justifies it.
the real attraction for me is finding ideas i have never seen before. to be able to write, and end up with something i didn't know before i put it down in words. to feel the need for clarification because the topic is still so small in my mind.
i have been fixated on time manipulation lately. time only falls into seconds when you focus on seperating it. when you stop paying attention, it drifts completely out of thought back into an endless wave. i think about how the schedule i keep and the time table i adhere to shapes my world. i think about the people i meet on a regular basis who happen to be sharing my world because their schedules are the same, and how small a percentage of the population they make up. are there enough people that everyone could throw down regular scheduling and still function? would a timeless society work? if a second doesn't matter, does a minute, or fifteen minutes or two hours, and if two hours dosn't matter, why do we need alarm clocks or a 9-5 work day? i wonder about who i would meet if everyone functioned within their own time. who would be my regulars? who would be a part of my time, my world? would businesses profit by moving to a 24 hour schedule? would a 24 hour day be obsolete too, if businesses were always open? would crime go down if there were people around all the time?
everything is research, something new to incorporate into whatever book, business model, or philosophical theory happens to have number one priority.
but what really funds my mental interest on the effects of time are its effects on aging. if measurements of time are unimportant and we can lose seconds, hours, months at a time, can we slow down or speed up our aging process? is aging more a function of stresses on our body, or on our mind, and how can we use that knowledge to prolong (or shorten) or lives? just now, i've spent 45 minutes thinking about this. would the mental strain be the same if i had the same thoughts and came to the same conclusions in 10 minutes? did i just prolong my life by spreading that strain over a longer period of time?
who knows. we'll find out in 50 years i guess. or 100, or 500 if things go right.
the real attraction for me is finding ideas i have never seen before. to be able to write, and end up with something i didn't know before i put it down in words. to feel the need for clarification because the topic is still so small in my mind.
i have been fixated on time manipulation lately. time only falls into seconds when you focus on seperating it. when you stop paying attention, it drifts completely out of thought back into an endless wave. i think about how the schedule i keep and the time table i adhere to shapes my world. i think about the people i meet on a regular basis who happen to be sharing my world because their schedules are the same, and how small a percentage of the population they make up. are there enough people that everyone could throw down regular scheduling and still function? would a timeless society work? if a second doesn't matter, does a minute, or fifteen minutes or two hours, and if two hours dosn't matter, why do we need alarm clocks or a 9-5 work day? i wonder about who i would meet if everyone functioned within their own time. who would be my regulars? who would be a part of my time, my world? would businesses profit by moving to a 24 hour schedule? would a 24 hour day be obsolete too, if businesses were always open? would crime go down if there were people around all the time?
everything is research, something new to incorporate into whatever book, business model, or philosophical theory happens to have number one priority.
but what really funds my mental interest on the effects of time are its effects on aging. if measurements of time are unimportant and we can lose seconds, hours, months at a time, can we slow down or speed up our aging process? is aging more a function of stresses on our body, or on our mind, and how can we use that knowledge to prolong (or shorten) or lives? just now, i've spent 45 minutes thinking about this. would the mental strain be the same if i had the same thoughts and came to the same conclusions in 10 minutes? did i just prolong my life by spreading that strain over a longer period of time?
who knows. we'll find out in 50 years i guess. or 100, or 500 if things go right.
