Lucky Day

I said the other day I would add the concept of having different selves each day to writing as self-reflection, but what I wrote yesterday instead was a digression to Naruto, Dragon Ball, and Bill Gates.

What I mean to say I guess is that if we are to consider a No answer to the ship of Theseus question, then we could say two things. The obvious one would be that the intended audience for those who write as self-reflection would be the future versions of the self, for whom the artifact would be of little use, except as markers against which to measure differences with respect to the evaluation of it by the future self, which would be, for example, good if met with disgust and bad if met with admiration.

However, what I really want to do is to put forward the idea of somehow having this concept in reverse, by introducing something like writing as a self-projection, that is, considering the written material not as a reflection of the current self but as something a future self would write as a self-reflection, but described by the current self as though acquired through divination, treating the written artifact as if sent from the future, by virtue of the current self holding all the future selves accountable to make the writing actually such.

It’s definitely a stupid idea. In fact I am already looking at it with disgust I have barely even finished writing it, but this entry is already getting too long, so maybe I’d reserve my violent reactions for tomorrow, unless something else comes up.

Enough for today.

Some things I noticed 01/08/2020:
  1. on wanting to be rich, since I can already delude myself into thinking I already am, I always find it too hard to admit that that’s what I want, even though society seems to impose this as a goal every chance it gets
  2. Filipinos ascribe number eight’s luck to its upwards stroke when written using Arabic numerals, while the Chinese think the number lucky because of how their character for it sounds like in their language; both fascinating displays of motivated reasoning and people’s unquenchable thirst for certainty
  3. doubly challenging to descend Child’s Hill in a culture where “trying hard” is a pejorative and insecurity a taboo word
  4. that guy Ned Hall on the Mindscape podcast used the word ecumenical twice on non-religious contexts
  5. enjoyed how this interview started really slow but picked up steadily until it climaxed at the end
  6. writing one’s thoughts is like exfoliating the mind

Strange Parts

Alright, picking up from yesterday, while dying seems like too strong a word to describe what happens to the previous day’s self at sleep, I think if we are to be clear that dying is mere non-existence then in some ways it’s just appropriate; even though because death is such a loaded concept I would say to my yesterday’s cramming self that the word should have been avoided.

There are many other analogies we could use, Theseus’s famous ship first and foremost comes to mind, but that’s a very old tale and nobody rebuilds anything anymore, because capitalism rewards the production of disposable goods. So maybe sleeping is a git merge and waking up is a pull request? But then what is a fork?

Fork is what Kage-bunshin no Jutsu does and that is why Naruto is such imba. Every time he merges his branches it’s like he has lived so much longer in a condensed time period. This way, using this ability is basically the same as entering the Hyperbolic Time Chamber in Dragon Ball; such a convenient narrative tool to explain away characters getting really good at what they do real fast.

Back to reality, in the documentary Inside Bill’s Brain I remember his secretary making a remark about how sensitive Bill is regarding the allocation of his time and about being punctual, because of all the resources available to him the one thing he cannot have more of is an extra hour a day. Such a downer.

This line of thought was hitting some sweet nostalgic heartstrings so I better stop now, before it continues regressing to below the mean and because it is getting too long, so maybe I’d continue thinking about this tomorrow, unless something else more exciting comes up.

Enough for today.

Some things I noticed 01/07/2020:
  1. battery factory in China. If we are to extrapolate the trend of automation, we’re heading towards a future where most economic value is socially constructed, if it isn’t already, and the production of tangible stuff will be so common physical things will be taken for granted; this assumes, of course, that there is a future to speak of, considering climate change and the threat of nuclear annihilation
  2. attempting to play Robin Thicke’s Lost Without You at the guitar is a reminder why music is not for me, getting lost in the moment to follow the beat is such a skill unattainable to those whose minds wander all the time