If Everyone Could Do Everything...

Whether you misunderstand or take "Do What Thou Wilt" out of context or if you just would love to do everything and anything, wouldn't that be awesome? Let's think it through and see under which definition something would be allowed.

Thinking It Through

We start off thinking through some cases and create some rules or laws according to those cases. We'll also try to stay as general as possible. Then we check later on if our deductions match with existing rules or if not. If they don't or if we find mistakes or other issues we can further think through it and try to find solutions for them to fix them and get a better ruleset.

Rule I: Self-Affecting, Same Task

If we do something that has no effect on another person like, doing playing video games we run into no issues. Another person like a neighbor, for example, can play the copies of the same video games as we do on their own console.

So, "if we do A, another person can do A" if both actions are not related.

Rule II: Self-Affecting, Different Task

Let's say we keep on playing video games and our neighbor goes to buy groceries. Again both tasks are not related but different. This is again no issue since us playing video games only affects us and the neighbor buying groceries only affects the neighbor.

Thusly, "If we do A, another person can do B" if both actions are not related.

Rule III: Alia-Affecting, Same Task

(Alia meaning second or third person)^[1]

If we lock our neighbor into his house with no escape possibilities - for whatever reason you would do such a weird thing. We affect the neighbor in the things he can do. Unfortunately, by doing this, your neighbor can't get out of the house, so he can't lock you into your house without any escape possibilities anymore. Even if you don't care about this, if you turn the situation around and he would lock you into your house without any escape, you can't lock him in anymore, since you're stuck in your own house.

We reached a problem there. This means for us to be able to do something we wanted we need to find a solution that allows both of us and the neighbor to do the same thing before, meanwhile and after. The only solution here is a compromise. A compromise also means we can't do everything we want anymore. We can still do everything without those exceptions though.

Which means "If we do A to someone, they can still do A to us". Keep in mind we're talking about being able to do before, meanwhile or after.

Rule IV: Alia-Affecting, Different Task

Alright, getting a little brutal now. If you would kill your neighbor, your neighbor can't longer go buy groceries. Because dead people don't buy groceries - prove me wrong! Same thing the other way around, if your neighbor kills you, you can no longer play video games - you've met a terrible fate, haven't you?

So there's another problem here. Pretty similar to the previous one though.

Basically "If we do A to someone, they can still do B".

Summarizing The Rules

Okay, so under our... let's call it law.. we are allowed to do everything that fulfills the following sentences or rules:

1. "If we do A, another person can do A." ("If another person does A, we can do A")
2. "If we do A, another person can do B." ("If another person does A, we can do B")
3. "If we do A to someone, they can still do A to us" ("If someone else does A to us, we can do A to them")
4. "If we do A to someone, they can still do B" ("If someone else does A, we can do B")

Matching With The 10 Christian Commandments^[2]

1. “You shall have no other gods before me."
2. "You shall not make for yourself an idol and worship it."
3. “You shall not make wrongful use of the name of your God."
4. “Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy."
5. “Honor your Father and Mother."
6. “You shall not murder."
7. “You shall not commit adultery."
8. “You shall not steal."
9. “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor."
10. "You shall not covet your neighbor's house or wife."

1. “You shall have no other gods before me."

In our case, this one is uninteresting. Having another god before does not affect other people and if we don't have one anyone else can have one or can't have one. Thus regardless of if you do or don't, it's not a rule we must abide by our law. It doesn't mean you don't have to it's your choice in this case.

2. "You shall not make for yourself an idol and worship it."

This is the same as the first one. It does not affect another person in the sense of limiting them in what they can do. At the same time whether you do or don't is your own choice and is not forbidden by the law we just created.

3. “You shall not make wrongful use of the name of your God."

I could say the same for this one like for #2 and #1, however, if we assume God to be another being that counts into our law, using his name wrongfully can result in his reputation being ruined and as such affects the possibilities god has. As such this could - depending on interpretation and believes - count as forbidden by our law.

  4. “Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy."

This one is the same as #3. If we assume we have a person who keeps the Sabbath holy and another person who prevents them from holding the Sabbath holy by for example letting them work they are limited in what they're able to do. As such this commandment matches our law in certain circumstances. However, this is only the case if there's no alternative for Sabbath to still be held holy before or after. (assuming the whole day is meant here and not holding the day holy at some point some time.)

5. “Honor your Father and Mother."

According to our rules, this is not a must. We should think about expanding our rules to include this one. Though it also depends on how we interpret this. If your mother or father wants to do something and you do not support them, you basically prevent them from being able to do what they want to do. An argument against that is that you need to do something you don't want to do. It looks like we found a grey zone, worth discussing further.

6. “You shall not murder."

Well... I already used this in the example above, so you can probably guess the result. This is enforced by our law, since killing someone prevents them from being able to do what they wanna do and vice versa.

7. “You shall not commit adultery."

According to our current rules, this is fine two. It feels wrong though since there's probably a better solution to avoid this issue to prevent hard feelings. Let's keep this in mind as well.

8. “You shall not steal."

Stealing something from another person prevents them from using that object, hence limiting them in what they can do, thus it is not allowed by our law.

9. “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor."

Bearing false witness, or generally lying results in restrictions of what another person can do if we take the result of the false witness or lie into consideration. Generally lying to another person that does not affect their limitations in any kind of way is not disallowed and if it allows new options or swaps old option for new ones it's another grey zone.

10. "You shall not covet your neighbor's house or wife."

The yearning itself is not disallowed according to our rules. So no problem here if no further steps are taken.

In The End

Our rules are definitely not perfect. There are a lot of grey zones and things we haven't considered yet, but we've got the basics down and talked through examples that our rules apply or may not apply to yet.

Next time we should expand more on those. Finding a solution for every person on the world is something many people broke their heads over.

I tried to explain it for people who care more about themselves but also for people that - like me - prefer the rule of "don't do something to someone else that you don't want them to do to you" (oh, and "if someone does something to you, they don't mind you to do the same thing to them." ;P). In any case, making everyone requires a compromise. You can't do everything and expect everyone else to be able to do everything, it just doesn't work logically.

^[1]https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/alia

^[2]https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Commandments

Everything in Balance - The Concept of Ying and Yang

A few weeks or months ago I was talking to amount about this and it's a really interesting topic. You might have heard of Ying and Yang or the idea of balancing your life or you might have seen the thought experiment that went into a slightly different direction.

The Concept of Ying and Yang

The idea of there being a perfect balance that needs to be kept is something that appears in a lot of works from the eastern world. The idea of there being as much evil as there should be good and the idea of living a balanced life. It may seem far fetched or just some weird way of thinking but actually it's obvious if you think about it.

You know what. I'll tell you a few examples and if I can't convince you with these then you do you. :P

Balancing Your Body

Did you ever go to the doctor and let them check your blood? Our blood contains so many different things and it gets checked only for certain elements. For example, Vitamin D is not checked as it required a different procedure they can't do when doing the normal check. You probably know what I mean if not here are a few out of the top of my head: sugar, fat, (cholesterol, potassium, sodium).

So something you might have noticed is that on the paper you almost always have a top and bottom value. If you're below the minimum, it's bad, if you're above maximum, it's bad.

Additionally you probably also know that if your heart rate is too high, it's unhealthy since your heart could skip beats resulting in an irregular rhythm which means an inefficient amount of blood is pumped which most likely leads to death.

Another Story: Sunlight

Ah, the sun, isn't it awesome? It keeps our planet warm and people enjoy being tan. Well turns out the sun doesn't have sunlight only but UV rays as well. And these UV rays cause skin damage and skin cancer since they also decrease the skin's capability to regenerate. But you need UVB rays for vitamin D. An important vitamin for the bones especially.

Consumption of Alcohol and Drugs

In Vino Veritas. Wine or alcohol for that matter is believed to be healthy. We all know that people that drink a lot of wine, beer or any alcohol for that matter are intoxicated and with enough consumption die.

The Theme

You should be able to see it already. If not there's an awesome video from CollegeHumor that plays a good example.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPz9Fcvb1II

Versus Vegans and Vs Meat-Only

I'm sorry, I can't leave this out. There's this discussion on whether eating meat all the time or not eating meat at all is healthier. Well reading this blog post and pondering over it you should see, guys, like our ancestors it's important to eat meat. We've been eating meat for years. No plant includes the whole composition meat has, maybe we can synthesize it, though I don't know if that will do us any good. So eating meat in small amounts is okay. A bit of meat every two weeks or having just a bit of chicken in your salad every 3rd day or so should probably be fine.

However, if you're vegan because you can't eat an animal thinking about them or if you avoid eating meat to reduce the demand of meat resulting in a decrease of production of meat thus meaningless animals are killed then don't let me stop you! You're doing a great job even if it's just this small thing. 

Conclusion

"Everything will kill you eventually."

 However, having a too high or too low consumption of things you will die faster. Thus the best idea would be to find the perfect balance of everything. Unfortunately, it's not as easy since in comparison to games we don't have a bar that tells us whether or not we're above or below a certain vitamin.

Thought Experiement: In Balance With All

Through my journey through learning about magick in an unbiased way, I came across this weird concept. This concept of being in balance with all and even weirder being all.

What is a Thought Experiment?

You might have heard of common thought experiments like Schrödingers Cat or the Trolly Problem. Thought experiments allow us to think about psychological or philosophical problems, questions or concepts. They also allow us to follow an idea, concept or thesis. In the case of both examples, I named actually performing the experiments would be animal cruelty or would mean humans are being sacrificed. Of course, you could argue that this is for the greater good but I think we all agree that this just can't be done. In both examples either humans or a cat is killed directly or indirectly. Thought experiments allow us to think these experiments through and sorta simulate them with the way we know the world works. As such these are very useful to think through unusual, absurd, impossible or inhuman experiments and their outcomes without hurting anyone.

The Idea

The idea behind this thought experiment is to follow this idea of being all and in balance with all. It's a concept I talked about people that assumes that we repeat our life over and over intending to be one with everything. I have no idea how this affects different people or what kind of feelings come up going through this.

Please read the disclaimer before participating. For all I know this may help people who have depression, it could make it worse, it could open people's eyes or change their way of thinking or maybe it doesn't have any effect. Our mind is something very special and very strong as the placebo effect has shown us over and over. So participate if you want but be aware...

*** DISCLAIMER: Actually performing this thought experiment is done by your free will as such I do not take any responsibility on how this affects the reader or the performer.

Preparation

It's not as easy when reading instead of listening as you can't close your eyes and let it affect you. Something you can do however and something I'd advise you to do is take the following statements for granted. You don't need to believe them after the thought experiment, you don't need to fully believe them but give them a benefit of a doubt. If you disclaim any of the following statements you might ruin the thought experiment and the idea behind it. I also don't mind reading through it first, do as you wish. Another good idea is to write your experience down afterward somewhere and try to share it with me via my E-mail, twitter or any other way. As the experience of other people plays a big role in research and in thought experiments.

Thought Experiment

We'll start easy with something I hope many people can relate with. First, let's think about any bad thing you've ever done. Anything that can be considered bad or evil can be mentioned here and from any time in your life. Stealing something, hitting someone, cursing, destroying something, being mean, trolling, even the thought of raping, killing or in some other way wishing someone hell.

You are a bad person, you are evil.

Now think about all the good things you have done in your life, helping people, supporting someone, doing anything another person liked, making someone smile or making someone's life easier, again anything goes.

You are a good person, you are good.

Yet you are evil. You are good and evil at the same time.

Let's think about what you've learned through your world. All the information you soaked up like a sponge, school, work-life, everything you can do, all the skills you have, all the languages you speak. You are intelligent, you are wisdom.

Look at the animals they can't speak their people who are not as intelligent as you. Yet, you make mistakes, you do stupid things. Some people are more intelligent than you. There's so much you don't know so much you should know. So much you can't know.

You are stupid, you are stupidity.

Yet you are intelligent. You are wisdom and stupidity at the same time.

You do sport, don't you? You move around every day, even if it's a bit, you move more than nothing. You do more sport than other creatures, there's always some creature that does less, that is lazier.

You are an active person, you are a sport.

Do you run a mile every day? Do you do 50 push-ups every day? Do you go by bike for hours on hours? You never move as much as the next person, there are people more active than you and even if you were the most active person ever you could still be less lazy and move more.

You are lazy, you are inactivity.

Yet you are sporty. You are active and inactive at the same time.

You can feel your body, you can touch your arms and legs and you can feel it. This is your body, this is you. From head to feet this is you, this is what you are.

You are your body, this is you.

Where do your thoughts come from, is this really your body? Or are you imprisoned in the head of this body? Track your thoughts back and where they come from, are you sure this is your body? Is this really you? This isn't you, this isn't your body, you're something else.

You are something else, you are different.

Yet this is you. You are this body and you're not at the same time.

Do you remember how old you are? Of course, you do, no one forgets their age. You celebrate your day of birth every year, you're reminded of how old you are every time. This is your age, this is the number of years you have spent in this world, this is your time. You've been on this old for so long already, so much time has passed already. Thus...

You are old, you are an older generation.

You can feel it, you are still young, sometimes you don't feel how old you are, you might call it your inner child and avoid calling what is part of you, you. There's still so much you can do and no reason not to do it. Because...

You are young, you are the inner child you feel.

Yet you are old. You are old and young at the same time.

You are living in this life, maybe you're enjoying yourself and every second, maybe you're trying to achieve something unique no one else has or you try to compete with someone, whatever the reason or goal you have is you are alive, still alive.

You are alive, you are life.

Every day, every second a part of you dies, you slowly rot away. Your regeneration worsens day for day, year for a year until it can't keep up anymore.

You are dead, you are death.

Yet you are alive. You are dead and alive at the same time.

Whether or not you believe in life after death or death afterlife. Whether or not you believe in god or not. You are just a human, after all, a fragile, finite creature that in some way could be considered an animal, you are not as wise, you are not as omnipotent, you can't compare with a god-like figure.

You are normal, you are a mortal being.

Yet God has created you like a copy of him, you have the power to change things, you can learn your whole life your whole time, you can even be reborn according to believes. God isn't only in your heart.

You are god, you are immortal.

Yet you are normal, you are a mortal being.

You are construction. Yet you bring destruction.

You enjoy violence. Yet you want peace.

You love things. Yet you hate things. 

You are a demon. Yet you are an angel.

You are awake. Yet you are asleep.

You don't believe what you can't see. Yet you are a believer.

You are everything. Yet you are nothing.

You can't do anything. Yet you can do everything.

The Different Layers of Sex

A few posts ago I mentioned that sex is a topic in on itself and now I'm gonna throw myself into the hassle to shine a light on the different layers of sex. Maybe we can figure out why it is considered to be handled so immaturely in video games. This post may not be suited for children below sex education age, then again I don't think any of my posts are suited for that age of an audience.

Different Layers?

Now, some people may wonder what I mean by different layers. This has nothing to do with the act of sex. Instead, it is more about the intent or reason to have it. I don't know how many people are part of which category and this may be arbitrary. Sometimes multiple layers may be intended or maybe none of the ones listed in this post. I can say one thing at least: Sex is not all about pleasure and with that said, let's tackle the respective layer.

Pleasure

The first layer is something that might be very common especially in the younger generation. Of course, it exists. If it feels good then why wouldn't people do it? There are some consequences with this though. Sexual diseases, a chance for impregnation, especially if something goes wrong and something can always go wrong (Murphy's Law). This layer probably applies to everyone to a certain degree, however, I think it differs in strength from person to person, so that other layers are stronger shown. It's kinda like a policy or rules that are checked one after another if you see it more technical.

A person who has their focus on this layer probably doesn't care too much about who they're doing it with. This means that there's a high chance for these people to be pansexual or omnisexual. Whether they are or not also depends on social influences, at least as long homosexual is seen as a weird thing.

Love

Some people may see this as the opposite of the previous layer, there's no doubt that one of the reasons for sex is because you love someone. Whether or not love is some biological thing that drives us crazy for a person or makes us wanna sleep with them is something I'm not gonna debate here. The fact is that people who love each other have an interest in an intimate, romantic or affectionate sexual time. I would assume people in which this layer is strong have a great interest in doing it with their special one only. (heh, obviously) Also, this usually has not so much to do with having the looks. It's not about bodily features but more about the relationship. The only downside of this layer is, that the feeling of love may change over time. From experience, I would say love does not go away or decrease of disappearing, it instead kind of calms down so to say. Most couples are probably together as long the love is strong and once it starts to calm down they break up as they don't feel like they "love" each other anymore. Worst case scenario they break up after having a child already. The saying that people are together "because they're used to being together" may not necessarily be true. I think it is possible to still feel attracted or love a person without those tingly feelings in the tummy or being all into them. As I already mentioned, it's a different kind of love; More calm, less wild.

Reproduction

If you're talking about sex, you just can't leave out the biological reason behind it. Reproduction or giving birth to new life is a part of sex just like pleasure and love or intimacy. Additionally, I think there's no doubt that reproduction is a goal for some people in the world. Just imagine being able to teach and show your child the world. I can imagine that being a unique and awesome experience. Though I have heard of people not having any interest in having children, birthing them into the terrible world as is, people hating children and some being afraid of the pain or exhaustion from the first few years, the crying and aggressiveness or jerkiness of children and on, and on, and on. Some may even say no, due to the costs that are created. Whether or not this can be linked to an unconscious attempt of regulating overpopulation is another topic on its own.

Rituals

I already mentioned that I journey through the world of magick, it's interesting, gives a different perspective of the world and how things work and it's really interesting philosophically. Also, it tries to answer questions we can't answer yet. Anyways, from magick, I know that sexual intercourse can be used for rituals. Sexual magick is actually a thing that is used to channel the energies that exist during intercourse and use those to fulfill your goal or wish. This is done by two people of any sex who agree to pleasure each other while having the intent, goal or wish kept in mind. The climax is then used to release the intent, goal or wish into the unconscious. This is then followed by total silence and forgetting the act in an attempt to allow the energies to do their job in fulfilling the intent, goal or wish. At least that's how it can be described. What exactly happens is hard to tell, as there's not enough information on that. At least I don't know the details I never participated in or read into details on this topic.

That's It

As I already mentioned, these are the layers I know of, as humans can be infinitely complex there can be infinitely many layers and all of them can have different weights. Additionally, you can also see sex as a ritual to become more intimate with the person you love mixing the ritual and love layer with each other. Also, don't forget that these aren't all layers, these are the ones I would say I have noticed or that I can imagine existing. Nonetheless, it is important to analyze sex and sexuality scientifically and to ponder over it to address it in video games or other media. The more you know about it and which type of sexual behavior matches which person and vice versa the easier it is to create a befitting character or to fit the right sexual behavior to the right character. It's also an element that further completes the style of characters and type that you want to create for your game and it's also important especially in sex games that currently only focus on the pleasure layer. Even if those games try to make a romantic character I've seen it fail too often. 

Cursing and Free Speech

Alright, this is something completely different than all the other posts. This time I'm actually gonna write down my own opinion about something and that thing is free speech and cursing.

Youtube Demonetization

I don't get any of my videos monetized but that's not my fault. It's someone's fault thanks to who the monetization requirements were made more strictly. Though I can definitely say if my videos would get monetized I know exactly which ones wouldn't. Which ones it would be? Some of my streams and there's a simple reason behind it. I don't know about other people but I'm all Christian channel as PewDiePie would say it but - huge but - I may not be the calmest player. If some difficult part in a game gets me stuck or I'm close to losing something (Loss Aversion) or under stress due to the level design preventing you to find a safe place to calm down at some point with varying amounts of replays and tries I might start to get bumped and later quite angry. Up to the point that I start cursing.

Cursing Through Anger

There are many people worldwide who curse when angry. At the same time, you actually should differ between cursing meaning it as an insult and cursing to just let your anger out not addressing something or someone. An example for the first one would most often be at the game, the situation, yourself or even a character you identify yourself with. The second one would be the random unaddressed F-Word or some kind of trial to make it light weighted like seen on the GTLive streams on Youtube.

"Poop on a bisuit" 

~ Matthew Patrick

Can It Be Avoided?

Though can you avoid cursing even if you lose control of your body due to rage? I actually think it is possible. I'm also planning on experimenting with this too. My goal is to make my brain to jump to a random word instead of a curse or insult. However, I think it's rather hard. Basically, we're talking about breaking your habit. This is on the level of stopping something you unconsciously do.

"I'm breaking the habit, I'm breaking the habit tonight!" 

~ Linkin Park

Unconsciously is the right word here. Unfortunately, people are judged for being a bad influence because of their habits. Imagine someone getting no money for a whole day working because they picked their nose. I know this example is ridiculous but it perfectly displays the issue here.

Are Curses Really That Bad?

Maybe we should just accept that people curse and curses exist. At the end protecting our children from not learning these is very unlikely. I mean. Curses aren't that bad, are they? Well, aside from it being proven that letting your anger out is actually healthy we need to take a good look at curses.

So the interesting part here is.. what are curses? Basically, they are words that are frowned upon and sometimes used to insult someone. At the lowest level they're just words though. Imagine the word "Unicorn" was a curse. People would be like

• "What the unicorn"
• "Your moms a unicorn"
• "For unicorn's sake"

Words Are Meaningless And Forgettable

Words themselves are meaningless. It's the meaning we give them and apply to them. Though doesn't this mean if you use words without a meaning behind them whatever you're saying is meaningless? It seems logical at least. Well if I curse due to being mad I didn't mean it or intend to use them in a bad way, it means these have no meaning - aside from the context which would result in the meaning "I'm angry and letting my anger out". In the end context matters.

"Words are trivial
Pleasures remain
So does the pain
Words are meaningless
And forgettable" 

~ Depeche Mode

Moving On

So what happens if we prevent people from experiencing these words and such versus what happens if we remove censorship for free speech. I'm not a psychologist and yet I would assume that in either case, nothing much is going to change. Children will learn to cuss either way.

But hey, we're living in 2018 after all. Shouldn't we stop caring about curse words and actually try to further our science and technology? Why spend all our time and power on such an actually irrelevant topic?

Then again.. same applies to people still trying to compete with their land against other lands keeping prejudice high instead of actually working together to solve world problems and issues - eh whatever.

Update Note

This has nothing to do with this topic but yesterday I was celebrating my start at my new company so I had no time to write a post yesterday. What does that mean for the posts? Nothing. Today's post was yesterday's post. Tomorrow's post is today's post etc.

"Save TonightFight the break of dawnCome TomorrowTomorrow I'll be gone" 

~ Eagle-Eye Cherry

Why I May Share Myself

Welcome to 2018. Another year for technology to grow further. Another year for more and more people being introduced to the internet. More and more generations grow up with technology and the internet.

Question of Confidentiality

Everyone has to ask themselves this question when going online. The question of whether or not they should share information about them or not. Once something is on the internet you won't get rid of it. So the question of what you write online, what you tell others about you, what you write on your profile is really important. How much do you want to share of yourself? How much of you do you want public? These questions become even more interesting in the future.

The Generations

Different generations had different experiences with the internet and modern technologies. I had access to the internet in the 3rd or 4th grade of primary school and as long I had at least average grades I could go on the web as long as I want. Of course, except logging off for bedtime. I used that time when not playing with my friends and I spent hours and hours on the web. At some point, I spent more time on the internet than a part-time job would take. When there were holidays I've spent more time on the web than a full-time job. Older generations hadn't the ability to do that and newer generations may or may not grow up differently with more or less access to these technologies. Though it also depends on the parents, friends, and situations in one's life.

My Answer

As I already mentioned everyone has to decide for themselves and it's not an easy question. Your answer to this question can always be no but if it's a yes there's no turning back. Honestly, when I think about how my life has been up to this point this was a dilemma, I don't want everyone to know everything about me and yet every piece of information I share about me every now and then will probably be sold from person A to person B to earn money. The information age, isn't beautiful? The other thing is nationality. You were born in a country, this country knows probably a lot about you, of course, it must be able to administrate their citizens and that stuff. Though I never really felt myself being German that much - that's another topic in detail later someday. So if I feel more home on the internet than Germany, I can just share the data Germany has with the internet? I don't think the internet or Internetian goes through as nationality as of yet, lol. Anyways without further talking around it. I don't mind not "hiding in the dark" anymore. If the situation brings it I won't doubt myself for sharing. You live only once they say so let's make the best out of it as I can.

"You know you gotta, you know you gotta eventually make up your mind.
'Cause no one's gonna find you when you're hiding in the dark.
No one's gonna find you when you're hiding in the dark.
No one's gonna find you when you're hiding in the dark. No one's gonna find you."

~ "End Love" by OK Go 

Yesterday The World Came To Be

Imagine the world came to exist yesterday and all memories you or your friends or anyone else has just come to exist on the same day too. Alright. Now try to find arguments that disprove this theory and that can't be disproven themselves.

Any?

No Proof - No Disproof

You won't be able to argue against this idea. That's like arguing about aliens or god. You could say that it seems unbelievable, after all, you got all your memories, right? And they feel real, everything you remember seems real. The better you remember something the more real it seems, in the end, it's just memories. The thought that these might have come into existence the same time the world came into existence seems absurd and yet it could very much be possible. You have no proof to confirm this. Just like there is no hard evidence on the existence of god or aliens. At the same time, you can't rebut it either. There is no evidence to approve these from not existing. We have the same case without an example.

The Phenomenon's Name

This may be called Last Thursdayism, Omphalos Hypothesis or Five-minute hypothesis. In all of these the basic concept is the same:

• happened some or a specific time ago
• the world came into existence just like it is right now
•  we came into existence with all the memories we have

The only thing that differs is the time-span or the story behind. 

Omphalos Hypothesis This hypothesis says god created the world several years ago the way it was back then for it to be able to function. If everything is supposed to stay in balance you have to create everything at the same time, right? That's the idea behind it.

Last Thursdayism According to it the world was created last Thursday the way we remember it to be on that day with all the memories of what happened before.

Five-minute hypothesis, in this case, we, the world and everything came to be just five minutes ago with all the memories of what happened before.

Regardless of what the parameters are it's always the same problem. If everything came into existence as it is and you have all these memories it's hard to disprove it.

Trying to Disprove

One attempt that was made, was of someone who had a note from before last Thursday. They said it can't be that they have a note with a date written on it from before last Thursday and remember what they wrote on it.

However, if the note came into existence on Thursday and you were given the memory of it being written by you before Thursday, the attempt already failed.

Conclusion

So what does this all tell us? Like the example of ghosts, god, aliens, demons or this hypothesis, some things can't be proven nor disproven. In these cases, we should stay skeptical. Though in my opinion, it's never a bad idea to give anything a benefit of a doubt. You'll never know and being open to changing your way of thinking is better than being wrong and trying to hide that fact.

By the way, it would be cool to hear your attempts on trying to prove this hypothesis wrong, such a great topic for discussion.

~GreenyNeko, out!

Is Living Forever That Great?

Something I really hate about real life is the correlation between time and money. Either you have time or you have money. Having both is hard especially finding the balance. However, time wouldn't be such a big problem is we could

Live Forever.

A dream many people have - I could imagine - and many people had. Frankenstein and Linus Pauling for example. But what would living forever mean? What would it be like? There are many interpretations of how it would work but most boil down to you no longer aging. To know how this would work we need to know what happens when we're

Getting Older.

To simplify what's happening. Our cells reproduce over and over every second. The old cells that died get replaced that way. We lose these cells all the time if they're stuck on our body and cling to each other we know this most commonly as dandruff. Anyways this reproduction or copying of our cells transfers the data in the DNA of the cell onto an mRNA (messenger Ribonucleic acid). Basically a string of information on how the DNA is built. This mRNA is then translated into the new cell to recreate the DNA of the old cell. If the new cell is a copy of the old one, where's the problem?  The problem is that this procedure isn't perfect. There's a mistake every now and then and these cells with mistakes in the DNA are copied too and at some point, we have completely broken cells. A common example is the loss of information in the DNA, as the hair color. We have a mechanism that tries to correct these errors that occur but it can't fix everything and trying to fix these mutations isn't always successful. So if it weren't for those errors, we would probably be immortal.

Great! Get this fixed! Get me signed up! I'm ready!

Hold On

This may sound great and all, unfortunately, there are a few problems that arise when we live forever. I know the idea of immortality is great but we need to think it through what it would mean. We can't just say we're immortal and do what we like. We might lose our immortality that way. At least if we're talking about living forever. 

Well first things first, perfect copying of our DNA means there will not be any mutations anymore. You could say, that's great! No more cancer! However, at the same time, this means no evolution anymore. We would be stuck with the body of ours at its current state. No improvements. No evolution. I guess you could replace parts of your body with technology, that might still work.

Second of all, environmental awareness has already been spread but we're just starting. If you want to be able to keep your infinite life, you need to learn to live in balance with nature.

This may sound like something an esoteric may tell you but it makes sense here. The environment and world try to stay in balance. Simply put: if we destroy this balance the world may be destroyed meaning your life ends.

Going hand in hand with the previous statement. If multiple people life forever we need to find a solution to overpopulation.

Overpopulation is already a problem. The planet we live on has only a limited amount of space. Without utterly destroying the planet how are we supposed to all life? The last overpopulation was solved by the black death. One way would be to deny oneself to have children the other way would be to bring back sacrifices. I'm not saying this is a good or fair option but it would be an option. Whatever the case is this problem needs a solution and reducing offspring would be one way to do it.

On the Other Hand

If waiving on those things I mentioned is no problem for you then be happy to enjoy your infinite life. I wouldn't mind trading those aspects for adding an in- to my finite life. No more fearing to not have enough time. You can learn everything and all you want because you have infinite time to do so. You can enjoy what you're doing and work on things in your spare time the next day after work because it doesn't matter how long it takes as time is no longer the problem. Work 5 years earn money and then lie back a few years and start working again once the money goes out. No problem.

Conclusion

I've mentioned the 3 biggest disadvantages or problems. How heavy or strong these are for you, I don't know. It differs from person to person. As I already mentioned it wouldn't be a problem for me and the advantages are much greater in my own opinion. Ain't no rest for the wicked [...] ain't nothing in this world for free. Now, of course, technically there are other times of living forever like true immortality (not being to able to die at all), near-immortality (extreme self healing properties), rebirth (being reborn afterlife) but I wanted to go into one that is comprehensible in the sense of "that would scientifically work".

Whats There If No One Looks?

We know if we look at something it's there. It is hard to argue that there's not a computer screen, mobile phone or different device to read this page in front of you right now. If you look at football, it's there! Definitely! If you look away and someone looks at it, they can tell you it's there.

If No One Looks At It

Is it there? You're not looking at it. Now you could say, I've seen it there it must be there. Alternatively, you could ask someone else if they see it, but if they don't look at it they can only do the same you did: Say they've seen it there so it must be there. Is that enough? Can we say just because we've seen something at a certain place it's definitely exactly at that position?

Empirical Research

This is how our brain works most of the time. Knowledge by experience. We see the football, look away, check it at some point again, it's still there. Thus we conclude it must've always been there like it has been the first time we saw it. At some point when we see the ball is no longer at the same spot, something must have changed. We figure out someone moved it. We see how it was moved. Now we think if it's not at the same spot it has been moved. So if we look at the football and check on it later and nothing has changed we assume the scene hasn't been tampered with. We would never expect that when we do not look at the ball something might be going on with the ball and the surrounding area. If we're away from our home we would never imagine that something happens to our room at home when we're not there. Especially if we come home and it hasn't changed at all.

Observing Changes Variables

Through our years in quantum physics, we figured out that every particle has a probability to be at a position. When we observe the particle it is always at a certain position respective to that probability. If we don't observe it we can't say for sure where it's at. If this counts for every particle of a ball. Additionally, these particles interact with each other they collide and all. So due to the interactions of each of those particles, we can say for sure that they're forming a ball. Now the ball can be at any position that matches the formula of all the probabilities of the particles. Since the ball also interacts with the air surrounding it and the ground it may lie on we can continue to eradicate all possibilities that won't match this position. In the end, we can say that as long we observe anything we can conclude that the world around us is as we experience it.

Does A Blind Man Observe?

Observing something isn't the only limiting factor here. Just standing around makes your feet interact with the ground.

Okay, let's go with a thought experience I've created once to give an example of the division through zero. If you have a cake and you divide it through 2 people, you get 2 pieces - a half each - for each person. If you have a cake and you divide it through 1 person you get the whole cake for that person. If we have a cake and divide it through no one, there's no one there, there's no one who can divide the cake. You don't even have someone who knows the cake is there. Does the cake even exist? No one can tell you.

If We Don't Observe

Going with this, if we're not observing anything and not looking at something we're disconnected from the world. We're now independent of what happens around us, the probabilities can do their thing freely and the position of everything around us is uncertain until we observe it again. You could call this a state of mind of uncertainty.

Magic Plays a Role Too

Now at this point, if we say magic exists and what magic does is change the probabilities of reality. This means if we think about the ball being where we saw it. This thought should change the probabilities for the ball to be where we saw it. That also means if we convince our unconsciousness to believe that we remember the ball to be somewhere else it should be somewhere else if it's a possibility given by the probability function of the particles of the ball.

Okay, but.. if one person thinks the ball is on the desk and another thinks it's on the ground where is it then?

Interference of Several Thoughts

Well, what happens if two people think of a different position of the ball? I wouldn't know the details but I would assume the more people, the more whose unconsciousness is convinced the most the higher the chance for the ball to be at the position these people believe it is.

And that's all there is. At least as long you or someone else looks at it. :P

Magic Is Science

Magic is something that seems to have existed for centuries. From the miracles we're told Jesus did, up to the medieval times in which wizards are told to have lived and witches have been hunted. Nowadays we know it as some sort of esoteric stuff. Even ending up with a bad connotation. From fake mediums to cash grab fortune-telling.
Scientific sworn people even explain magic to be unexplained scientific phenomena.

Like the God Argument

Magic has the same problem, ghosts and god have. There's no proof of its existence, there's no proof of its absence either. So does it exist? Or does it not exist? Or is it not worth thinking about it? What if it exists? So the position of magic is bad. Especially since the explanation of modern magic says, it depends on your unconsciousness. If you can't convince your unconsciousness, then magic will be even harder to prove. But there must've been people who are dedicated to proofing it?

The Scientists of Magic

You would think, even if most people don't believe in magic there must still be some scientists who are interested in understanding it and figuring out whether or not it exists and you're partially right. Most people that write the greater literature aren't scientists but psychologists, philosophers and such. Some of the greater literature on the topic of magic takes a skeptical and scientific approach to the topic of magic, trying to be as unbiased as possible and there's a good reason to do so.

Age of Quantum Physics

We figured out there are layers below our previous understanding of physics and the world. Quantum physics revamp what we have known so far. We're reaching an understanding of a lower level of our world. From everything consisting of particles that act as wave and particle at the same time to particles having a probability function telling where the particle is. On a micro level the quantum physics act and on a macro level, we see the results of all those phenomena working together.

We Still Do Not Know All

After all these years quantum physics is still a new topic. There are still a lot of things that need to be figured out and the potential of it tiptoes in the dark. Additionally, for all we know, there might even be another level below quantum physics. We don't know what it might be it could be ethereal for all we know.

Wait a minute. Ethereal? That's something esoteric talks about! Indeed it does.

Science Ignores - Magic Cooperates

Compared to science that has been ignoring magic so far, magic, on the other hand, tries to find it's placed in the universe next to psychology and physics. Even if Einstein is unhappy with the probability of being part of quantum physics, it does not only play a huge role in quantum physics because it just happens to play a huge role in magic too.

We now know that everything may consist of particles that act like waves, waves vibrate. It just happens to be that magic says everything is vibrating. This is just the beginning. Psychology can explain how placebo works. Magic agrees. Additionally a few years ago there were experiments on a monk and the scientists figured out that during his meditation a substance or vitamin was especially high. Unfortunately, I can't find this source and I don't know how believable it is. Stay skeptical, but welcome magic.

The Conservative of Wizardry and Witchery

However conservative thoughts exist in the realm of magic as well. I bet there are tons of people that would never agree for magic to be science. They believe it to be a tradition. It needs to be taught the way it is and has been without being open to reality or new things.

Magic the Science of What?

But isn't magic like the thing where you offer sacrifices, draw pentagrams or hexagrams, talk to ghosts, angels, demons, and gods? You're not wrong with saying this. It is to a certain degree. However, this is just a part of magic, not the whole thing. Magic consists of more than that. It also has a lot to do with psychology. You know how words can have a connotation to them? Or like certain symbols invoke certain feelings? That's why. Many people believe in angels, demons, gods, and ghosts. The more they do the stronger it sits in our unconsciousness and that's what we "abuse" when doing magic. Wizards, Witches, Shamans, Monks, etc. they all work with our unconsciousness to send energies to do their bidding. If it's about staying healthy, making you rich or changing the probability of something else happening instead of what would have, it all boils down to the same. So what science is magic? It's kinda a huge topic but simply put it's the science of psychological impact and manipulation of energies on a lower level to change the probability of a certain event to occur.

But It Seems So Old Fashioned

It has existed for tons of years and gathered all those traditions. It's weird. It is and it does seem ancient. However, just like math and physics have been refined over all those centuries at some point the same may happen to magic. Esoteric is a rising topic nowadays and who knows maybe at some point it changes from what it has been up to now to something completely new and reworked. A new era of modern magic.

Waiting for the Time to Come

So I'm gonna sit here waiting for the time to come. I don't wanna initiate it, I bet a lot of modern wizards and witches still might not like the idea of everything that has been handled as secret so far to be released onto each and every one of the public. Even though the current direction is more than obvious. However, if the surge of wave starts I'm ready.

By the way

I figured I had to mix in some more topics on magic in case people are interested in it and to keep it fresh. Besides theorycrafting consumes a lot more time than this. :P

Psycho-Pass Dilemma

So a few weeks ago or so I've binge-watched the whole Psycho-Pass anime both season one and season two and I really enjoyed. Though one part of an episode from season one stuck with me. One I found particularly interesting.

But first.

What's Psycho-Pass?

Psycho-Pass is an anime that ran 2012 to 2013 its genre is Dystopia, Crime Thriller, and Cyberpunk and it plays in a futuristic society where it's actually possible to read the Psycho-Pass of people. This Psycho-Pass contains information about your psyche using stress levels and emotions. It is represented in a number as well as a color or hue going from "crystal clear" to blue down the rainbow to red followed by brown and black. The worse your psyche is the more likely you're to become a criminal. So with a Psycho-Pass of 100 you're considered a latent criminal and with a Psycho-Pass of over 300 you're considered a serious threat to society.
Anyways the story follows a young graduate that got perfect scores in all areas but decided through gut feels to become a detective at the Public Safety Bureau's Criminal Investigation Division, whose job it is to kinda hunt down latent criminals as well as to protect society from threats. To do this they use investigators or detectives to solve the situation and command the squad to solve the situation as optimal as possible. There are also people called enforcers, these are latent criminals or previous detectives, whose Psycho-Pass went over 100.

These enforcers are treated like hunting dogs, hunting the suspects or criminals down under the command of the detectives.

And If They Catch Those?

The same system that detects the Psycho-Pass of people is also used on a type of gun called Sybil's gun. The divisions of the Bureau use it to take down the suspects or criminals. The gun reads the suspects Psycho-Pass to decide on which action to take:

• Below 100: No action is required, the gun will be locked.
• Above 100 and below 300: Safety is unlocked, the gun will paralyze the target
• Above 300: Safety is unlocked, the gun will shoot a projectile that eliminates the target

Alright. I think this is all you need to know about the anime for now. So before I move on to the actual part in the episode I have to go deeper into it. This means SPOILER ALARM!

Okay, I think this is not visible enough yet.

SPOILER ALARM FROM HERE ON OUT!

Don't tell me you haven't been warned.

Problem In The System

So in episode eleven of season one, we come to an interesting point. After the young inspector, Akane Tsunemori chases after Shogo Makishima and her friend and approaches them she tries to use the Sybil gun to read his Psycho-Pass for the gun to take the respective action. However, she quickly notices that something is off. Shogo Makishima's Psycho-Pass is below 100. Mixed in the confusion of how the Psycho-Pass is mismatched with the actions Makishima has taken and is still taking she tries to figure out a way to solve the issue. Retrying over and over again to use Sybil's gun.

Coming To The Dilemma

So after some small talk (yes, I call it small talk here, sue me xD) Makishima gives Tsunemori a test. He throws down the shotgun he was carrying and tells her that he's going to kill her friend giving her two options. Either pick up the shotgun and shoot him or stand there do nothing.

That Ain't A Dilemma The Choice Is Obvious!

You might think. But if you think the choice is obvious you're not invested into the anime or situation up to this point. The problem is. If we're living in a society that has used systems to check whether or not a person is a latent criminal or a criminal for several years we get used to it. Especially if we're born in such a world. With this system in place, anyone who actually uses guns to shoot people (with the exception of using Sybil's guns) is probably going to be considered a criminal. Oh, and don't take that lightly. In the real world, you're getting into jail for a few years and then out if they think you're safe to be around. In Psycho-Pass it's different. Once you become a latent criminal or a criminal you're marked for life. You lose your job and you're brought into a facility where you're supposed to recover. However later in the anime, we're told that it's not so easy to get cured. You're most likely going to be locked up in there spiraling down to a point where you can't recover if you haven't already reached that point.

Aha! Now We're Getting At It!

So the choice is simple. Try to use the Sybil gun. At some point his Psycho-Pass must go over 100, right? Right!?
Or use the shotgun to shoot him, saving your friend but ruining your complete life and additionally knowing you have murdered someone.

Wait, Shooting Someone With a Sybil Gun Also Kills

Yes, but there's a small difference. The gun decides how to treat the target. Not you. So you just pull the trigger. If they are dangerous it will kill them. If they are latent criminals the gun will paralyze them. I already marked the interesting parts bold: you're not directly killing or paralyzing them technically. This system also helps the carriers of the guns to keep their Psycho-Pass clean.

Familiar Dilemma

Wait a minute. Being the active killer? Being the passive killer? I know this from somewhere.

If you know this, you know it right. The Trolley Dilemma or Trolley Problem.

The Trolley Dilemma has five people stand on a railway for some reason and another person stands on the other railway. You have a switch in front of you. If you do not flip the switch the trolley will go the railway the five people stand on, killing them. If you flip the switch the trolley will kill the single person on the other railway path.

The answer is easy. Flip the switch since one person dying isn't as bad as five.

Lucky us, this isn't the end of the Trolley Problem. It goes one step further.

Second example: 

You've got a trolley again and it goes just one way: straight.

There are five people on the railway for some reason that surely die if nothing is done. However, you can move a person with more curves (trying to make it sound as politically correct as possible) onto the tracks stopping the trolley saving those five people.

The Dilemma

In both cases, you kill a person. However, by flipping the switch you kill inactively.
By pushing the person you actively kill a person.
Would you do it?

In the Psycho-Pass Dilemma, we do not compare one person to five people. Here we compare the life of a precious friend to your own life. Would you save your friend but live an empty life in pain being locked up? Or would you let your friend die and save yourself? Can't decide? Then your friend dies as well. Oh, it's timed too. You have only so much time to do it. Additionally, you have to kinda calmly goal and shoot him. So you need to be sure about your actions.

To top things.. I've already mentioned being born into this system. Now imagine you're born into this system and used to it for all the years you've lived and everyone is too. By using a normal gun instead of the Sybil gun you're basically destroying the foundation of your beliefs.

The Decision

So in the anime, Tsunemori tries her best fighting herself over what to do end up missing her target with the shotgun broken down under the dilemma of fighting a system she believes in that does not seem to be perfect.

The more interesting part is... how would you decide?

I have to say that I don't know how I would handle the situation it's hard for me to imagine my reaction to it and I sure hope this will not be the case for me.

Purpose of Life Defined by Genre

The philosophical question of "What's the purpose?" has been asked for thousands of years. But maybe we can answer this question by looking at genres of media created by us which matches real life the best. Any media that is created by us is categorized by genre. From books to videos, to games.

So What Genres Are There?

For books there is:

Satire, Drama, Action And Adventure, Romance, Mystery, Horror, Self help, Health, Guide, Travel, Children's, Religion, Spirituality, New Age, Science, History, Math, Anthology, Poetry, Encyclopedias, Dictionaries, Comics, Art, Cookbooks, Diaries, Journals, Prayer books, Series, Trilogy, Biographies, Autobiographies, Fantasy...

For movies there is:

 Film, Horror, Action, Drama, Thriller, Adventure, Romantic comedy, Animation, Western, Fiction, War film, Film noir, Science fiction, Family, Romance, Documentary, Music, Historical period drama, Biographical, Disaster, Crime, Slasher, Melodrama, Fantasy, Art, Chick flick, Black comedy, Heist, Mockumentary, Anime, Superhero, Spy, Comedy horror, B movie, Coming-of-Age Fiction, Screwball comedy, Peplum, Silent, Parody, Mystery, Spaghetti Western, Neo-noir, Experimental, Indie, Comedy, Musical, Action/Adventure, Bollywood, Satire...

And for games it is:

Action: Platform, Shooter, Fighting, Beat-'Em-Ups, Stealth, Survival, Rythm; Action-Adventure: Survival Horror, Metroidvania; Adventure: Text adventure, Graphic adventure, Visual novels, Interactive movie, Real-time 3D adventure; Role-playing: Action RPG, MMORPG, Roguelikes, Tactical RPG, Sandbox RPG, First-person party-based RPG, JRPG, Choice oriented, Fantasy; Simulation; Strategy, Sports; Idle Games...

 And that's just a bunch, there are probably more.

Which One Matches Life?

So, which of all these matches life? Coming to think about it. Doesn't life include all or like a lot of those? We all have been scared by our child's fantasy back when we were young. We all enjoyed laughing together about a joke. We all have seen or learned about the history and much more. So we're not making progress here. Let's take a different approach to this.

What's the purpose?

Each genre follows a certain purpose. They might want to tell a story in a certain staging, criticize humanity and morality, get your adrenaline rolling or getting you to think about things. One genre that's particularly interesting here is a sandbox. Why? Sandbox games have no purpose! Wait. A game with no goal? How does that even work? Oh, it works, and it works well. If you have ever heard about Minecraft it's a sandbox game aside from having achievements and bosses that guide you. Additionally, if you've played it, you probably already know that at some point the only way to go on is to create your own goals and additional rules, creating challenges, getting creative and life is similar to this. Of course, you're guided by the school system, application system followed by working at a company. However, you're not forced to go this way or do this, you can do what you want. But it may not go the way you want and you might have a bad time. In the end, you can create your own goals and challenges in real life and Minecraft alike and you might have consequences respective to your behavior in both as well.

So Life Is a Sandbox Game?

Alright, life's a sandbox game, guys! Hold it! Not too fast! You can't say for sure it is. Philosophy lets us think about how or why things in life are as they are as well as allowing you to live by it. (like "Hakuna Matata" for example)

From the definition of the word philosophy:

"the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence, especially when considered as an academic discipline."

"a theory or attitude that acts as a guiding principle for behavior."

So What Can I Take From This?

If you're seeking the purpose of life. Instead of falling into despair seeking to make your purpose, make your own goals. In the end, it's your life and you should be able to do whatever you want. However, keep in mind the rules still apply just like in sandbox video games and you're not the only player. The result is to play with everyone together supporting each other's goals and finding compromises when not getting along too well.

Or maybe this all doesn't matter because we all unconsciously fabricate life together as we experience it. But that's a different topic entirely. :P