psyche

I went to a talk by Thomas Vander Wal at school today (it was organised, I believe, by Mr Smith. It was very interesting. Social software, to use the phrase of the day, is continuously evolving and binding us to the network, wherein we are all connected. As Mr Vander Wal noted, communication is the key to our success - even as a species. Collaboration and massive data retention ability are what defines us as a civilisation. We are continuously getting better at it.

I dream of this. Then, this.

Pax

In previous posts I have alluded to things from my past reappearing in such ways that I understand them better this time around (e.g. the Game of Life and SEL). Something else is happening too. Usually, I phase through interests. That is to say, when I am interested in one thing - be it fencing, physics, computing or music - I neglect the others, both in terms of wanting to do them and actually doing them. However, now I feel like I want to engage in all my interests. I’ve never experienced this before - it’s some kind of consolidation of who I am. I may still lack an identity but now I am ready to forge one. I am no longer a computer enthusiast OR a bad musician OR a wannabe fencer etc. - I am in a state of superposition of all of them.

Observe me and my wavefunction collapses and I appear to be only one, but observe me again and I may differ… or not.

My analogy is approximately 1*10^-999999*awesomeness_of_Feynman.

That makes it the single greatest analogy ever.

Pax

Just saw it; it was okay, actually!

Getting an A in music will haunt me for the rest of my life, won’t it?

Won’t it?

Pax

 Of course, getting straight A*s would have been nice but I made the decision to get this exact set of grades two years ago when I chose to do Music (Mr Parry said that you should be “a bit better” than Grade 5 on your instrument; I didn’t have any grade at that point) instead of Technology. You know what? I’m glad I chose Music.

Pax

Saw Evan Almighty today; was okay but unfunny. Got Core 1 result, was good. Expecting V for Vendetta graphic novel tomorrow, will be awesome. Will start writing song about Harry Potter innuendo tomorrow.

Pax

I just logged in to the Edexcel results thingy and it caused me extreme distress - I initially thought I had got an A in Maths and the same in Biology but luckily it was just a sample page. That freaked me out. Oh dear.

Pax

GCSEs finished; they were good overall. I can only hope I did well. Seriously. I’m down to hope as a strategy. Down to hope. Also, there was a guitar concert and our illustrious teacher, Prof. Michael Lewin, entertained parents with a humorous side I can’t say I’ve seen before! It went quite well despite several unfortunate incidents (Faraz had a few mishaps with wrong music and such but still managed to improvise something to fill in for a page or so of Bach he’d misplaced without the audience realising).Awesome, you know?Pax

There is an old computer in a basement; it is not particularly dusty but it still exudes a sort of smell (which isn’t really a smell, but smell will do) which heavily implies that it is old. By old I do not really mean aged (although it has indeed aged), but more specifically I refer to that vaguely-defined state of oldness that exists in computer culture and probably in most other subcultures: the computer is a generic old thing and no-one knows precisely what it is but they know that it is from another era.

It had previously belonged to a man who liked it quite a lot and did some useful things and also, like any man, wasted a fairly large section of his life using to pursue things which ultimately meant nothing. Of course, he found out interesting things and his life was better but he also engaged in other things; he dialled into boxes ever so far away and played tricks on the telephone men and women and was occasionally proud of himself. The computer didn’t really remember him as such; certainly were there things on backup tapes still bound to it that had never been overwritten but, in a way that makes me sad, would probably never be looked at - in fact, I can confirm that they never were but, as you now know, they could have been. It now sat humming below the electronics shop. Its hum was permanent because it ran some antiquated but venerated software that required several hours which, according to its system clock, should not have harboured much human activity, for “housekeeping” tasks and so was left on by its more recent owner (a shop employee). It had been superseded by much, much faster machines.

Left behind by someone who found things out. I cannot really convey the strange tightness that I feel in my torso when I think about it; it’s like an edgy nostalgia: it had been left. Dark people in dark rooms had done dark things but found the way. Most left in a bad, lonely way. Others left in a way that was still lonely but they experienced a profound connection to something incredible. They broke many rules and, you know, I wish they would come back and help me but they won’t. I still sort of wait, you know. I sit here in my room at my computer staring at it and hoping something will come, although I know that I really have to make it come. I have to pull things to me.

Now, the light from the character bled into the darkness which might as well be considered part of the bigger darkness of the room. People had sat and done things but now no-one sat; I would’ve taken a melancholy photograph had I been there. No-one remembers the computer! It doesn’t even exist!I made it up! It died alone! I MADE IT UP.

Physics and guitar concert on Monday. Someone knows that I try!

Pax

I’m in the middle of these exams. The screech of pencilcase zips and the clatter of rulers and calculators are beginning to erode my very soul.

However, I was never really on my own. Never all alone.

On a more sociological theme, what about the following?

I wouldn’t really say I’m into any specific type, but I like guys who enjoy sports and I love it when they speak several foreign languages…

(quotation doctored)

Surely engaging personality or just being ripped help?

Pax

I need to redo some of Pysche as this article has won me over. I’m also very interested in XML now; as my previous thoughts have indicated, I believe that the possibility of extreme data-mining from the web is one worth pursuing and the powerful markup of XML could facilitate an AI’s ability to comprehend human- (or program-) created data. I might just try something out. I have loads of exams next week.

Loads.

Pax