Remembrance in Spacetime: TheBigHenry Manifesto (rev.2)

Sunday, November 8, 2009

TheBigHenry Manifesto (rev.2)

Posted by TheBigHenry at 2:12 PM Labels: Remembrance

Related Link » TheBigHenry Manifesto (rev.1)

TheBigHenry Manifesto (rev.2)
In which I address the question, "Why do you blog?"

"Cogito, ergo sum [I think, therefore I am]." — René Descartes

"I am, therefore I may [timshel]." — TheBigHenry

"When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle." — Edmund Burke

I ascribe significant value to structure in my life. Perhaps that is a manifestation of my OCD "persuasion". Be that as it may, I think of my life having consisted of several stages so far:

Preschool (ages 0—3)
Schooling (ages 3—28)
Research (ages 28—60)
Retirement (ages 60—present)

It is obvious that my principal tool from birth to retirement had been my mind, which by most accounts served me well. Although some of my colleagues suggested I had lost it by retiring, I am inclined to believe that my mind is still intact. I plan to keep it that way.

In planning for my retirement, I understood that to optimize that stage of my life would require care and feeding of heart and mind — physical as well as mental exercise, in addition to a healthy diet. All three are important, of course, but for me the most interesting to contemplate has always been the mental exercise.

During my research stage, my mental exercise derived primarily from my work-related activities, and even from my favorite pastime, duplicate bridge. In my retirement, I needed to find a suitable alternative for my professional research. The operative word was "suitable".

Several aspects of intellectual activity are important components for my personal notion of a suitable mental exercise: reading; comprehending; analysis; writing; joking; musing; and documenting. All these and more are available through the publishing of a blog. I also derive satisfaction from the creative process of maintaining such a living and evolving document.

Having maintained my blog for more than two and a half years now, I have come to realize another important motivation for what has become part of my daily ritual. I have reached the stage of life when thoughts of posterity "trespass onto the radar", to coin a phrase. And with such a mixed-emotion realization, I have also recalled a quote that is often mis-attributed to Edmund Burke:

"All that is needed for the forces of evil to succeed is for enough good men to remain silent." — (William Safire?)

I refuse to be shoved into tomorrow's gas chambers without speaking out while I still can.

This is why I blog at Remembrance in Spacetime.

Post #993 TheBigHenry Manifesto (rev.2)

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To Life!

“Much writing and research has been devoted to the relationship between the thermodynamic quantity entropy [specifically its negative, negentropy] and the evolution of life.” — Wikipedia, Entropy and life

“But the Hebrew word, the word timshel — ‘Thou mayest’ — that gives a choice. It might be the most important word in the world. That says the way is open. That throws it right back on a man. For if ‘Thou mayest’ — it is also true that ‘Thou mayest not.’” — John Steinbeck, East of Eden

“Life is timshel negentropy.” — TheBigHenry, Timshel Negentropy Redux²

My-ass Coverage: Satisfaction is posited but not guaranteed

The opinions and views expressed herein are those of the person posting them, at the instant of posting, and are subject to change without notice, reason, logic, malice aforethought, due process, or any other process you can think of. Furthermore, they (i.e., the opinions and/or views) do not necessarily reflect the view of this web site's ownership, administrators, moderators, or anyone else for that matter, living, dead, or any other state of existence. Any reasonable or unreasonable potential liability that may not have been expressly disclaimed herein, should, nay must, be assumed to be implicitly claimed, disclaimed, or even declaimed, whichever is deemed most appropriate. Additionally, more authoritative discussion may be found at Wikipedia: Freedom of speech in the United States, though such specific reference is not to be construed as exclusive, inclusive, or even preferable to any other more, or less, authoritative reference that can be found online, offline, inline, outline, underline, borderline, or paradigm, etc., etc., etc., ...

Knowledge of Truth

“Nothing exists except atoms and empty space; everything else is opinion.”
— Democritus of Abdera

“Nature abhors a vacuum.”
— Baruch Spinoza

“Nature abhors everything, with the single exception of perfect symmetry.”
— TheBigHenry's Law of Nature

“Anything is possible, except certainty.”
— TheBigHenry's Law of Possibility

“You are entitled to your own opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts.”
— Senator Patrick Moynihan

“I can please only one person per day. Today is not your day. Thursday's not good for me either. How about never? Does never work for you?”
— TheBigHenry

“Moral relativism is all the rage; anti-Semitism is a statistic.”
— TheBigHenry

“Waterboarding a couple of terrorists is a travesty; murdering thousands of civilians is a statistic.”
— TheBigHenry

“I'm suggesting that your outrage is unbalanced; as is your psyche.”
— TheBigHenry

“Free lunch is a fig leaf of the unimaginative.”
— TheBigHenry

“There are no shortcuts to expertise. The only known exceptions were Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Rain Man, and Barry Bonds.”
— TheBigHenry

“You're never ‘completely lost’; you're always ‘here’.”
— TheBigHenry's Law of Special Relativity

“You can't choose not to worry, but you can choose what you worry about. Choose wisely.”
— TheBigHenry's Law of Restricted Choice

“If we cannot put solar power plants in the Mojave desert, I don't know where the hell we can put [them],” said Schwarzenegger at Yale. “Put them where the sun don't shine,” cracked TheBigHenry at Remembrance in Spacetime.