Postsingular has been a pretty fun read. I think it may be my favorite book of the quarter... I think it is interesting how everything seems to interconnect. The big pig, Chu's knot, Thuy's life and her metanovel are all dependent on each other. This is the conclusion that has been implied at the end of part three. I really wonder where the story will go for the rest of the book. There certainly still are a bunch of loose ends, for example, what will happen to Luty? Will they catch him and kill him, or will he dissapear forever? And Ond and Chu are still stuck in the Highbrane. For some reason I was feeling as if there wouldn't be much left of the story if it were to go on, but now I realize that there are a lot of unanswered questions.

In Rudy Rucker's Postsingular, nanotechnology has taken over the world. It seems interesting that in addition to the "real" world there is a "virtual" orphid net world, and a person can choose which one to be in at a given time. The dilema that seems to come up is whether people will still want to function in the "real" world at all, when they could be much smarter and connected through the orphid net. It's like cell phones. Most of us have them, and few of us that do choose to not use them. They are constantly on or near us. Additction? In postsingular people become addicted to the orphid net, or the big pig. Straight up addicted to technology. What is it with humans wanting to be smarter, greater, more powerful. I guess there is the condition that many of us think we are the shit. Humans are the top of the food chain, eh? The smartest, strongest. Right? Well, if we keep fucking with the natural world perhaps Mother Nature will show us whose really boss? I wonder if, in Postsingular, some such thing will happen. When, if even, will "Gaia" resist? I do like that some of the postsingular characters refer to Earth as the godess. i think she is.

techno-unsatisfied

so this whole technology thing... is it gonna help us, or swallow us whole? maybe it's already gotten us. I just wonder if we can keep creating "artificial" inteligence types of things and maintain our human state. I think were past the "raw" human state, and we have been for awhile, perhaps since we quit hunting, gathering and walking everywhere. A cell phone is merely and extension of one's being these days, atleast in the American culture I am familliar with. I can't remeber where I heard it, but I remember something about humans evolving even further now, into homo-evolutis I think. I believe it was Juan Enriquez on TED talks. We're creating, manufacturing, a reality for oursevles. It revolves around the technology we use everyday; cars, cell phones, computers, ipods. Where has the raw, primordial human gone? where is the essence? I struggle with the thought that everything comes from nature at one point... If something didn't come from nature how could it exist? Nature is the end-all-be-all. But, look at a cell phone, a camera, a computer; do those items remind you of nature? They certainly don't instill a natural feeling in me. Were so connected these days... connection is a precious thing, communication, but I'm not sure how I feel about this artificial umbilical cord...

pataphor (or pph)

January 8 post was a pataphor... this is a lipogram on it, using my plurk name, tyrannosaurusbex. This means that I had to get rid of all a,b,e,n,o,r,s,t,u,x and y's... doesn't make too much sense to me, but fun to read out loud. Makes for and interesting code. The only word that didn't change was "which". it is also now much shorter in length, but a bit harder to read, as I am not used to sounding out words that don't flow, or aren't a part of my usual vocabulary...

Pph
I d d m kf – cim ii glish mffi pp wih g cig f p. h di mffi w flig c, did i h mcifl lck hl f mh. kf n d iv d m f pin hgh i. h j i which h p cm fm i w lg l m, lgig pl hudd f ligh w. h p i, i fc, n h h h diliig m-g cqid f pvi c wih h mi d liv m. h picl i f m-g i l dmgig pc cf i, dig i qi gg. Cqill hi c h cd mlfci i h c mchic pi, whi h f i ccidl vigi i h lk hl.

The inevitable half-way-through-the-quarter drag of procrastination has a full grip on my ankles at this point. I'm goin down. Atleast i'm havin fun, but seriously, I should probably get some shit done.

The TED talks video of Juan Enriquez was quite fascinating... I feel that there is so much technology out there that I have no idea exists. It seems so surreal whenever I hear about stem-cells being created from skin, or whatever. Are we going to become competely engulfed in technology? I've never really thought about nanotechnology so much before.

I'm really enjoying the Cake-Wrecks blog. I have always been fasinated with cakes and their beautiful, or perhaps not so beautiful, deorations. I went through a phase in my life where I made a lot of cakes. I think i thought they looked better than they really did... I know I made atleast a few wrecks. I tried to make a light-ish purple icing once, and it turned into an unfortunate grey. I was so dissapointed, definately an ugly-ass thing.

I need to do work. Where do my days go? I know I do stuff... I ride my bike, go to classes, do a wee bit of homework... I eat a lot. Oh maybe i am to hard on myself. Its just hard to tell if i am getting enough done. Maybe I ought to just relish how easy my life is at this point. I really do like it. Feeling uninspired is tough. But when I think about it I'm not really that un-inspired, I just feel like I'm going through a funk.

I certainly need to make more time to read. Reading seems to put another world in the place of my reality, but also seems to intensify reality when it relates to real life.