SOOOO it's back. Did anyone miss it? Probably not. I did. A bit. Anyway shall we get on with it?
Recently I've been very busy. I've been a very busy bee. I've been making stuff ya see. Making stuff left right and center. As is my nature, I couldn't just keep making stuff without stopping and asking "Why? Why am I making stuff?" Well after some thinking I think I know why...
About two years ago, a little while after moving to Finland I was browsing through the website Tumblr (if you don't know what it is then Google it. If you don't know what Google is then I'm kind of amazed you found this blog) and I stumbled upon the ancient board game Hnefetafl. No it really is a thing. It was played by the Vikings. Pretty cool if I do say so myself. Anyway, I saw this game and I thought to myself "I could totally make the board and pieces for this game". Why did I think this? I don't know. At least I had no idea why at the time. So I made the board. I made the pieces. It turned out pretty well. It was fun making it. Great.
Then for a bit I was satisfied. I made a thing and it was great. But then...
I made a Cthulhu statue. And then I made another one. And another one. And then a few more. And I made some other stuff. I have now become a person that makes stuff. Like regularly. I have a list of 16 things (and I'm sure the list will grow in no time) that I am planning to make. I have 3 to 4 things currently in production. I am now a maker. How has this happened?
As a child I did make things, I had Lego and K'Nex and I made monsters and spaceships out of junk, but I have never thought of myself as a creative person particularly. I was ok at writing and most of the time the "stories" I wrote for English lessons went down well and I got fairly good marks for them but I still didn't ever think of myself as the creative type. I couldn't draw and paint and art lessons both bored and embarrassed me (mostly bored). Now at the age of 21 I find myself painting latex onto the leg bones of a glow-in-the-dark skeleton and trying to shape cotton so that it resembles a calf muscle. Once it's ready I will then spend a ridiculously long time painting it (along with the rest of the skeleton) to resemble a mummy. Why? What the hell has happened to me?
Here is my theory. I have now lived in Finland for 2 years. The Finnish language is hard. Really hard. Like super hard. Like really really hard, especially when you are English and you've never been taught how to learn a language and really only just know the basics of your own language. And everyone speaks English with you. And you're lazy. So yeah it's hard. Now I have (despite not thinking of myself as being creative) have felt somewhat proud of my vocabulary and my ability to express myself verbally (in English). Now that I've moved to another country with a very foreign language though, I perhaps have not been able to use English in the same way I would in England. Couple this with my level of Finnish being nowhere near as good as I would wish it, leaving me completely unable to express myself using Finnish, and I think we might be heading slightly closer to why I suddenly want to create things with my hands, things that interest me or based on things that I enjoy (at this point H.P. Lovecraft and spooky weird stuff. Why I like these things may well need more psychological evaluation...).
Perhaps this personal Renaissance has come about because I've felt hemmed in verbally. Words aren't working so my brain has gone in a bold new direction and chosen objects as the prime medium to express myself. Of course it would be a bit simplistic if it came down just to language. Maybe moving to another country, away from my parents, friends and the city I called home for close to 16 or so years, has had some effect. Having lost a lot of things (gained as well but undeniably also lost) I might sub-consciously be looking for physical objects to "hold onto". Maybe moving into a more adult stage of my life is another factor, reaching back and bringing forward the childhood past time of "making monsters out of junk", trying to regress to escape the reality that at some point I'm going to have to grow up for real and start paying bills and taxes and ohgodpleasedon'tmakeme.
Really, the last two years have brought so many changes to my life (amazing wonderful changes that I wouldn't take back for all the tea in China [and believe me I freaking love tea]) that it's kind of surprising that it took this long for something to manifest. Any sane person would have had much more immediate reactions to such seismic changes, surely. In any case out of all the things that I could end up doing, making stuff is quite possibly the most tame, inoffensive, innocent, harmless thing that I could do so really I should be thankful I'm not a raging alcoholic or a sky diver or something.
Now I should say here that no-one should start worrying about me. This post might have you thinking I'm not happy with my life right now and quite frankly you couldn't be more wrong. I'm happy and contented. Well as contented as one can be when one does not have a flat of one's own and still struggles with a language seemingly devised to be as different from one's native language as possible. But yeah overall I'm damn happy. My life is great. The fact that I have the freedom to ponce about making stuff and considering the psychological reasons behind the things I've made should indicate that I'm doing pretty bloody well and I will be the last person on this Earth to start complaining about the opportunities and resources that have not only been handed to me on a silver platter but have also been drenched in a high quality dressing of luck and undeserved kindness. So yeah worrying or sympathy is the last thing I need. Actually what I need most at this point is a heat gun. Or maybe you could get me some more liquid latex. Actually if you have any spare acrylic paint lying around I can take it off your hands. I mean just if it's going spare...
It would seem that my creative streak has yet to end and the end is not yet in sight. I do hope it doesn't end for a long while yet because I am really enjoying it. Like a lot. The satisfaction of a well-constructed plan that comes together in a finished object is only beaten by the satisfaction brought by a well-constructed plan changing or falling apart and something even greater than you originally envisaged rising from the ashes. It's really great. I encourage everyone to make something. Go find something you like. Anything. Go make one of them. Don't know how to make it? Learn how. It ends up being crap? Better try again then. Go on.
So read this as post as a sort of "This is what I've been thinking about myself recently do you think I could be on to something here?" sort of a thing and also a "You should totally go make stuff" sort of thing. Bit short. No real concrete conclusions except for half-baked introspection and a last minute splurge of motivational nonsense. Very few people will actually be interested in reading it.
The blog is back on top form!
Thursday, 1 October 2015
Sunday, 12 July 2015
Designation: Human
Animalia
Chordata
Mammalia
Primates
Hominidae
Homonini
Homo
Sapiens
That is you. And also me. I mean unless you are a robotic A.I. in which case congratulations! You're sentient! Or maybe your a super intelligent animal that has gained your incredible reading abilities through a genetic experiment gone awry... If that's the case I heartily recommend reading. Great fun. Personal favourites are Paradise Lost and anything by H.P. Lovecraft, just be sure to not take on board the religious convictions of John Milton or the astounding and disappointing racism of Lovecraft (future blog topic by the way).
Of course it could be that I'm the A.I. or the genetic experiment...
But back to the humans. That is your scientific classification. That is who you are. Homo sapiens for short or you could just use Homo for shorter but be aware of the context that you use it in.
Am I the only one that thinks it's quite nice that we have a little title? We have our own little name tag. Adorable. Of course such broad name tags can be problematic. I mean not all human beings look exactly alike so how different does someone have to be to stop being human? How do you decide who is human and who isn't? Are some people closer to being "real" humans than others?
(For those worried I'm about to go all Nazi-pure-blood-half-breeds-Aryans-social-cleansing crazy, fear not. Hopefully by the end you'll see that actually my philosophy is so different to Hitler's, if he were alive and had a computer and read this blog post he would be all like "NEIN!")
Well to understand exactly why we have a name tag to begin with we have to look at human psychology. I believe I've mentioned numerous times on this blog before (and if I haven't then I have missed out something pretty major...) that humans, like myself and yourself, like patterns. We strive to find patterns in everything. Look up pareidolia. Fascinating and also explains why people see Jesus in their toast or Elvis in a tea stain on a scatter cushion or all sorts of bizarre visions. Humans have evolved to see faces in random objects because it's helped us survive. Being able to quickly take in information about someone's face can help us to assess how to react in certain situations. It's made us the social animal we are! Our pattern recognition skills also lead to people seeing figures and shapes in the clouds and constellations and also help us recognise situations we have been in before and react in an appropriate manner to survive. It's kept us alive but also given us the potential to develop phobias so there are pros and cons but really the pros win out which is why we've kept these abilities.
So you see humans are built to try and find patterns in things. We like things organised not just chaotic information we don't know how to react to. This is why species are classified. We want little boxes that each and every species neatly fits into.
"Ok!" You say. "Let's get started! If we start off simple... So how about things that live in the sea. They can all be fish..."
Ah no what about whales and dolphins and all them? They are actually pretty closely genetically related to stuff that doesn't live in the sea but other stuff that lives in the sea like plankton are way different. Also can you really call plankton and deep sea angler fish BOTH fish? They are super different.
"Ok... So where things live and what they look like aren't going to cut it because we have genetics and stuff... Hey! Why don't we use genetics to classify animals?"
Hey that's a grea- No wait a minute. Subspecies.
"Subspecies?"
Subspecies. Subspecies are way hard to classify. When does a species become a subspecies? When does a subspecies become an entirely new species? Where do we draw the lines? If one group of animals gets separated from all of their little animal friends for a long enough period of time then that group can end up entirely different to how they originally were, but at what point are they different enough to be considered a new species?
There is a famous thought experiment that gets you to imagine a heap of sand. It asks, if you were to take a grain of sand at a time off of the heap at what point would it stop being a heap? When would it become, say, a pile of sand? Now really what this thought experiment is meant to illustrate is the vagueness of language, a lot of the common everyday words we use without considering it are actually incredibly vague. It's surprising we've made it this far quite frankly...
Now considering this experiment in regards to species and particularly classification using genetics we come to a stumbling block. If you were to take an individual and remove one exon (a piece of genetic material that codes for a protein (my A-level in biology has not gone to waste)) at a time, at what point would they stop being a human being? Remove a few genes, yeah ok, still basically human. Maybe the person will suffer some genetic problems like cystic fibrosis or something similar. Would anyone here suggest that someone with a genetic disorder like cystic fibrosis isn't human? I certainly wouldn't and if you do don't ever speak to me again.
Ever.
So if only a few changes isn't enough what about removing half of a human's genetic material? It would be basically impossible for anyone to say that the end result of such an experiment would be a human being. We share 50% of our DNA with bananas so it could well be that if you chose which genes you were taking out the result would be indistinguishable from a collection of banana DNA. More than 50% out and no longer human but what about 75% or 86.5%? Are they still human?
Now the tree of life is looking a bit complicated isn't it. The barriers between species are breaking down. If you can't decide if an individual is definitely one species how can you say that that species even really exists?
Example. There are 3 different species of zebra. 2 of those species have 8 subspecies. One subspecies of the Plains zebra (Equus quagga) is Burchell's zebra. Now it was believed that Burchell's zebra had gone extinct until it was found that another subspecies of zebra that lived in the same areas as Burchell's zebra had lived (the Damara zebra or Equus quagga antiquorum) was actually... the same zebra. Yes, the zebra that everyone thought had gone extinct didn't actually exist. Well it did but it wasn't some other different species that went extinct, it was still wandering around under a different name. Everyone thought there were two subpopulations of zebra until 2 guys looked at some old skins of the extinct "Burchell's zebra" and found they were the same as the Damara zebra. Now because the name Burchell's zebra is older than the Damara zebra, the Damara zebra is now called Burchell's zebra and the species that was called Burchell's zebra... well it still is called Burchell's zebra but it isn't extinct. Hooray?
Yeah the classification system isn't so rock solid. When was this mix-up of species discovered? 2004.
You must be asking yourself at this point "But why am I bothering to read all this? I'm a very busy person and the capitalist society we live in abhors wasted minutes that could be spent either producing or consuming. I haven't got time for internet words!" and in response I'll say "Don't worry, botched together, feel-good, bite-sized philosophy is just around the corner!"
The whole point of this post is to get you to consider that actually the whole idea of species classification is really very shaky. Science still isn't really exactly sure where the lines lie. If you base it on genetics you can run into problems like the heap of sand. It's been suggested we use reproductive capabilities but then again we have people that physically can't reproduce because of their genes and then people that choose not to reproduce. Do these individuals fall out of the classification table into a separate group labelled Misc.? It's also been put forward that no one parameter of classification will ever be good enough. The "Tree" of Life is more The "Headphones-Tangled-In-Your-Pocket".
Of Life.
I am inclined to agree with this latter idea. As said in a previous post, we are all merely growths of the same original biological organism (as far as we know). Every living thing can follow an ancestor down to a point where we all converge. Humans are just differently organised bananas and bananas are just differently organised plankton. All of us are living beings and in the grand scale of things are really pretty indistinguishable. We tend to forget that when we are walking through a forest, the trees aren't just a background landscape, they are just as much living things as the squirrels and birds that call them home just as much as we are living things. They may not behave or act or react in the same way as us but they are alive. What sort of ramifications can thinking like this have? Does being aware of the fact that we are surrounded by other living beings that are a mere few lines of coded proteins away change how we think of the world and of ourselves? Does it compel us to act and think differently? I'll leave you to think on that.
Hope I didn't lose you during that zebra stuff. I had the sources in front of me and it was a bit of a mind bender... And I told you I wouldn't go all Hitlery...
Chordata
Mammalia
Primates
Hominidae
Homonini
Homo
Sapiens
That is you. And also me. I mean unless you are a robotic A.I. in which case congratulations! You're sentient! Or maybe your a super intelligent animal that has gained your incredible reading abilities through a genetic experiment gone awry... If that's the case I heartily recommend reading. Great fun. Personal favourites are Paradise Lost and anything by H.P. Lovecraft, just be sure to not take on board the religious convictions of John Milton or the astounding and disappointing racism of Lovecraft (future blog topic by the way).
Of course it could be that I'm the A.I. or the genetic experiment...
But back to the humans. That is your scientific classification. That is who you are. Homo sapiens for short or you could just use Homo for shorter but be aware of the context that you use it in.
Am I the only one that thinks it's quite nice that we have a little title? We have our own little name tag. Adorable. Of course such broad name tags can be problematic. I mean not all human beings look exactly alike so how different does someone have to be to stop being human? How do you decide who is human and who isn't? Are some people closer to being "real" humans than others?
(For those worried I'm about to go all Nazi-pure-blood-half-breeds-Aryans-social-cleansing crazy, fear not. Hopefully by the end you'll see that actually my philosophy is so different to Hitler's, if he were alive and had a computer and read this blog post he would be all like "NEIN!")
Well to understand exactly why we have a name tag to begin with we have to look at human psychology. I believe I've mentioned numerous times on this blog before (and if I haven't then I have missed out something pretty major...) that humans, like myself and yourself, like patterns. We strive to find patterns in everything. Look up pareidolia. Fascinating and also explains why people see Jesus in their toast or Elvis in a tea stain on a scatter cushion or all sorts of bizarre visions. Humans have evolved to see faces in random objects because it's helped us survive. Being able to quickly take in information about someone's face can help us to assess how to react in certain situations. It's made us the social animal we are! Our pattern recognition skills also lead to people seeing figures and shapes in the clouds and constellations and also help us recognise situations we have been in before and react in an appropriate manner to survive. It's kept us alive but also given us the potential to develop phobias so there are pros and cons but really the pros win out which is why we've kept these abilities.
So you see humans are built to try and find patterns in things. We like things organised not just chaotic information we don't know how to react to. This is why species are classified. We want little boxes that each and every species neatly fits into.
"Ok!" You say. "Let's get started! If we start off simple... So how about things that live in the sea. They can all be fish..."
Ah no what about whales and dolphins and all them? They are actually pretty closely genetically related to stuff that doesn't live in the sea but other stuff that lives in the sea like plankton are way different. Also can you really call plankton and deep sea angler fish BOTH fish? They are super different.
"Ok... So where things live and what they look like aren't going to cut it because we have genetics and stuff... Hey! Why don't we use genetics to classify animals?"
Hey that's a grea- No wait a minute. Subspecies.
"Subspecies?"
Subspecies. Subspecies are way hard to classify. When does a species become a subspecies? When does a subspecies become an entirely new species? Where do we draw the lines? If one group of animals gets separated from all of their little animal friends for a long enough period of time then that group can end up entirely different to how they originally were, but at what point are they different enough to be considered a new species?
There is a famous thought experiment that gets you to imagine a heap of sand. It asks, if you were to take a grain of sand at a time off of the heap at what point would it stop being a heap? When would it become, say, a pile of sand? Now really what this thought experiment is meant to illustrate is the vagueness of language, a lot of the common everyday words we use without considering it are actually incredibly vague. It's surprising we've made it this far quite frankly...
Now considering this experiment in regards to species and particularly classification using genetics we come to a stumbling block. If you were to take an individual and remove one exon (a piece of genetic material that codes for a protein (my A-level in biology has not gone to waste)) at a time, at what point would they stop being a human being? Remove a few genes, yeah ok, still basically human. Maybe the person will suffer some genetic problems like cystic fibrosis or something similar. Would anyone here suggest that someone with a genetic disorder like cystic fibrosis isn't human? I certainly wouldn't and if you do don't ever speak to me again.
Ever.
So if only a few changes isn't enough what about removing half of a human's genetic material? It would be basically impossible for anyone to say that the end result of such an experiment would be a human being. We share 50% of our DNA with bananas so it could well be that if you chose which genes you were taking out the result would be indistinguishable from a collection of banana DNA. More than 50% out and no longer human but what about 75% or 86.5%? Are they still human?
Now the tree of life is looking a bit complicated isn't it. The barriers between species are breaking down. If you can't decide if an individual is definitely one species how can you say that that species even really exists?
Example. There are 3 different species of zebra. 2 of those species have 8 subspecies. One subspecies of the Plains zebra (Equus quagga) is Burchell's zebra. Now it was believed that Burchell's zebra had gone extinct until it was found that another subspecies of zebra that lived in the same areas as Burchell's zebra had lived (the Damara zebra or Equus quagga antiquorum) was actually... the same zebra. Yes, the zebra that everyone thought had gone extinct didn't actually exist. Well it did but it wasn't some other different species that went extinct, it was still wandering around under a different name. Everyone thought there were two subpopulations of zebra until 2 guys looked at some old skins of the extinct "Burchell's zebra" and found they were the same as the Damara zebra. Now because the name Burchell's zebra is older than the Damara zebra, the Damara zebra is now called Burchell's zebra and the species that was called Burchell's zebra... well it still is called Burchell's zebra but it isn't extinct. Hooray?
Yeah the classification system isn't so rock solid. When was this mix-up of species discovered? 2004.
You must be asking yourself at this point "But why am I bothering to read all this? I'm a very busy person and the capitalist society we live in abhors wasted minutes that could be spent either producing or consuming. I haven't got time for internet words!" and in response I'll say "Don't worry, botched together, feel-good, bite-sized philosophy is just around the corner!"
The whole point of this post is to get you to consider that actually the whole idea of species classification is really very shaky. Science still isn't really exactly sure where the lines lie. If you base it on genetics you can run into problems like the heap of sand. It's been suggested we use reproductive capabilities but then again we have people that physically can't reproduce because of their genes and then people that choose not to reproduce. Do these individuals fall out of the classification table into a separate group labelled Misc.? It's also been put forward that no one parameter of classification will ever be good enough. The "Tree" of Life is more The "Headphones-Tangled-In-Your-Pocket".
Of Life.
I am inclined to agree with this latter idea. As said in a previous post, we are all merely growths of the same original biological organism (as far as we know). Every living thing can follow an ancestor down to a point where we all converge. Humans are just differently organised bananas and bananas are just differently organised plankton. All of us are living beings and in the grand scale of things are really pretty indistinguishable. We tend to forget that when we are walking through a forest, the trees aren't just a background landscape, they are just as much living things as the squirrels and birds that call them home just as much as we are living things. They may not behave or act or react in the same way as us but they are alive. What sort of ramifications can thinking like this have? Does being aware of the fact that we are surrounded by other living beings that are a mere few lines of coded proteins away change how we think of the world and of ourselves? Does it compel us to act and think differently? I'll leave you to think on that.
Hope I didn't lose you during that zebra stuff. I had the sources in front of me and it was a bit of a mind bender... And I told you I wouldn't go all Hitlery...
Sunday, 25 January 2015
After We've Gone
One day you will die. You will cease to be. Your body will give up and no longer will you continue to live. You may have had a good run. You might find yourself at the age of 100 surrounded by family and friends as you slip peacefully into oblivion. You might find yourself squashed to the front of the number 68 bus two weeks from reading this. Who knows?
Now at this point you may begin to become aware of your own mortality and you may start to panic. All I can say is that you shouldn't. Loads of people have died and currently there hasn't been one complaint from any of them so it can't be all bad. I'm joking around of course but there is a grain of truth, a truth nugget if you will, in that.
I've decided to write down in blog post form a full and concise explanation of my views on death, dying and the afterlife. The reason I'm doing this is that I'm studying to be a nurse (as I believe most people reading this already know) and recently we have been having lectures on Palliative Care, that is, care for a patient that we know is dying and there is nothing more that can be done to save them. As part of the course, our teacher asked us to consider for ourselves what we think about death, "the other side" and our own feelings. Her reasoning was that as nurses we will see people die and relatives and friends of those dead people will need comfort, help and support. How are we, as nurses, supposed to give that help, comfort and support if we can't deal with the idea of death ourselves? We have to have our own beliefs straight before we can help others so that's what I'm going to do; get my beliefs straight.
What do I feel about the concept of death?
Truly, death doesn't scare me. I haven't experienced a lot of death in my life (yet...) so perhaps it's just lack of experience but I don't really fear it. I very much believe in science and from a scientific standpoint, death is an entirely natural and necessary process that occurs every day to all types of living things (Except for the immortal jellyfish. Well it can still be eaten but it has the ability to revert back to a juvenile stage and so basically means it doesn't ever have to die of old age. How incredible is that? You should google it.) So when I think about death I don't really get scared by it. The actual process of death is also very simple in my opinion.
Death is simply the cessation of a certain number of chemical reactions in your body. You stop converting ATP into ADP which stops energy being produced to run your internal systems. You stop respirating. The electrical signals in your brain stop firing. Of course just because those chemical reactions stop doesn't mean all chemical reactions stop. Once you are dead, your lysosomes break apart, leaking digestive enzymes into your tissues which begins the decomposition process. With no immune system to stop them, the various bacterial colonies and fungi inside you begin to grow and reproduce, further damaging and breaking down your corpse. If your body is buried or left out in the open (such as in Tibet. Probably best not to google that if you are in any way squeamish...) then insects, animals and even more bacteria will happily help along the decomposition. So you see, when you die you are simply chemically reacting in a different way to the way you were chemically reacting before.
Of course I still believe death is sad but I don't worry over the deaths of myself or of my loved ones but I do know that some people do.
Why do people fear death so much? Well, I think that life and death are really thought about in the wrong way. Everyone thinks that life is the beginning and death is the end but actually both of these ideas are wrong. When you are conceived, you are conceived using a sperm from your father and an egg from your mother (if this is news to you I suggest going to the nearest library. Don't google it.) what's REALLY interesting though is that a woman has a finite number of eggs. Woman are born with a set number of eggs and then they are slowly released one after the other over the course of her life. Why is this interesting? This means that half of your DNA is as old as your mother. It was literally hanging around inside her until it mixed with your father's DNA. How weird is that? So what does this have to do with the idea of life being the beginning being wrong?
Well, you are the product of two cells coming together, those cells came about because of meiosis, the production of sex cells through replication (ya know the picture of the cell pulling pulling itself apart to make two new cells? Well think of that as a kind of selfie). So the cells that came together to form you were the product of other cells that existed in your mother and father. Their cells came about the same way from their parents and from their parents and from their parents and from their parents all the way back to the first cells forming from floating bits of protein in some primordial puddle. Technically, it could be argued, you have always been alive. You are the continuation of an unbroken chain of growth. You are the product of millions of years of reproduction. I like to think that every single living thing on the planet is actually just one big organism. No-one would suggest that someone's heart and liver were two separate living things despite the fact they look and function in entirely different ways. They don't even have the same types of cell. I think really when looking at the big picture I see all living things in the same way. We may not be encased in the same body but we are just as much related to each other as the heart and the liver. Human beings share 98% of their DNA with chimps and 50% with bananas. Yes, bananas. It's also interesting to think that the building blocks of the chemicals that came together in just the right conditions to start life existed way before the first cell started swimming about so you can also argue that the building blocks of you are even older, going all the way back to the Big Bang. What separates a human being and a rock? The structure of their respective atoms. We can count planets and stars as distant cousins.
(Now, just quickly, the idea that a human being has always been alive even before conception has probably brought on some very smug faces from anti-abortionists but I can assure you I still am pro-choice and I still think anti-abortionists are absolute idiots but I'm not going to go into that now. I just felt I should point out that if you think a woman can't choose whether or not a human being grows inside of her then I think you are a massive idiot. Like an idiot so big you bend space-time around you like a black hole.)
So that's an argument against life being a start. What about death being an end? Well as I have already said, when you die your body doesn't just disappear. It hangs around for a bit and ends up being a great home for multiple different living things. All of you will eventually be broken down. Your skin, organs, tendons, layers of fat and bones will eventually become mulch. You spend your life taking from the system to build your body and in the end the system takes it back. Circle of life. Just because you are dead doesn't mean the things that made you die. They simply change a bit and move on. I really like thinking of death in this way. Really, us humans are just a little bit of the universe sorted into a particular collection for a short period. After a bit we get reshuffled back into the universe. It's rather poetic and beautiful. You are a fully paid up constituent of the universe and will always be. You may never get put back into the same form but the bits that made you will still be around.
With this idea it seems like I could believe in some sort of afterlife and I guess it is about as close as I am ever going to get. I've talked before about what I think about Heaven and Hell and really I don't think they are necessary. Why do you need Heaven when we are already a part of this wonderful thing called the universe?
So what will I say to a grieving relative when their loved one has just ceased to be? I'll say "Yes, it is unbelievably painful but they aren't really gone. They are just being changed. They will go back into the system that they came from and the parts that made them up will continue. They were a temporary collection of atoms that may well never be repeated. You were blessed to know them in this form. One day you will die as well and return to the system and maybe a part of you will join up with a part of them. For now, be happy that you knew them."
Will that comfort a grieving relative or friend? I don't know. I hope so.
Now at this point you may begin to become aware of your own mortality and you may start to panic. All I can say is that you shouldn't. Loads of people have died and currently there hasn't been one complaint from any of them so it can't be all bad. I'm joking around of course but there is a grain of truth, a truth nugget if you will, in that.
I've decided to write down in blog post form a full and concise explanation of my views on death, dying and the afterlife. The reason I'm doing this is that I'm studying to be a nurse (as I believe most people reading this already know) and recently we have been having lectures on Palliative Care, that is, care for a patient that we know is dying and there is nothing more that can be done to save them. As part of the course, our teacher asked us to consider for ourselves what we think about death, "the other side" and our own feelings. Her reasoning was that as nurses we will see people die and relatives and friends of those dead people will need comfort, help and support. How are we, as nurses, supposed to give that help, comfort and support if we can't deal with the idea of death ourselves? We have to have our own beliefs straight before we can help others so that's what I'm going to do; get my beliefs straight.
What do I feel about the concept of death?
Truly, death doesn't scare me. I haven't experienced a lot of death in my life (yet...) so perhaps it's just lack of experience but I don't really fear it. I very much believe in science and from a scientific standpoint, death is an entirely natural and necessary process that occurs every day to all types of living things (Except for the immortal jellyfish. Well it can still be eaten but it has the ability to revert back to a juvenile stage and so basically means it doesn't ever have to die of old age. How incredible is that? You should google it.) So when I think about death I don't really get scared by it. The actual process of death is also very simple in my opinion.
Death is simply the cessation of a certain number of chemical reactions in your body. You stop converting ATP into ADP which stops energy being produced to run your internal systems. You stop respirating. The electrical signals in your brain stop firing. Of course just because those chemical reactions stop doesn't mean all chemical reactions stop. Once you are dead, your lysosomes break apart, leaking digestive enzymes into your tissues which begins the decomposition process. With no immune system to stop them, the various bacterial colonies and fungi inside you begin to grow and reproduce, further damaging and breaking down your corpse. If your body is buried or left out in the open (such as in Tibet. Probably best not to google that if you are in any way squeamish...) then insects, animals and even more bacteria will happily help along the decomposition. So you see, when you die you are simply chemically reacting in a different way to the way you were chemically reacting before.
Of course I still believe death is sad but I don't worry over the deaths of myself or of my loved ones but I do know that some people do.
Why do people fear death so much? Well, I think that life and death are really thought about in the wrong way. Everyone thinks that life is the beginning and death is the end but actually both of these ideas are wrong. When you are conceived, you are conceived using a sperm from your father and an egg from your mother (if this is news to you I suggest going to the nearest library. Don't google it.) what's REALLY interesting though is that a woman has a finite number of eggs. Woman are born with a set number of eggs and then they are slowly released one after the other over the course of her life. Why is this interesting? This means that half of your DNA is as old as your mother. It was literally hanging around inside her until it mixed with your father's DNA. How weird is that? So what does this have to do with the idea of life being the beginning being wrong?
Well, you are the product of two cells coming together, those cells came about because of meiosis, the production of sex cells through replication (ya know the picture of the cell pulling pulling itself apart to make two new cells? Well think of that as a kind of selfie). So the cells that came together to form you were the product of other cells that existed in your mother and father. Their cells came about the same way from their parents and from their parents and from their parents and from their parents all the way back to the first cells forming from floating bits of protein in some primordial puddle. Technically, it could be argued, you have always been alive. You are the continuation of an unbroken chain of growth. You are the product of millions of years of reproduction. I like to think that every single living thing on the planet is actually just one big organism. No-one would suggest that someone's heart and liver were two separate living things despite the fact they look and function in entirely different ways. They don't even have the same types of cell. I think really when looking at the big picture I see all living things in the same way. We may not be encased in the same body but we are just as much related to each other as the heart and the liver. Human beings share 98% of their DNA with chimps and 50% with bananas. Yes, bananas. It's also interesting to think that the building blocks of the chemicals that came together in just the right conditions to start life existed way before the first cell started swimming about so you can also argue that the building blocks of you are even older, going all the way back to the Big Bang. What separates a human being and a rock? The structure of their respective atoms. We can count planets and stars as distant cousins.
(Now, just quickly, the idea that a human being has always been alive even before conception has probably brought on some very smug faces from anti-abortionists but I can assure you I still am pro-choice and I still think anti-abortionists are absolute idiots but I'm not going to go into that now. I just felt I should point out that if you think a woman can't choose whether or not a human being grows inside of her then I think you are a massive idiot. Like an idiot so big you bend space-time around you like a black hole.)
So that's an argument against life being a start. What about death being an end? Well as I have already said, when you die your body doesn't just disappear. It hangs around for a bit and ends up being a great home for multiple different living things. All of you will eventually be broken down. Your skin, organs, tendons, layers of fat and bones will eventually become mulch. You spend your life taking from the system to build your body and in the end the system takes it back. Circle of life. Just because you are dead doesn't mean the things that made you die. They simply change a bit and move on. I really like thinking of death in this way. Really, us humans are just a little bit of the universe sorted into a particular collection for a short period. After a bit we get reshuffled back into the universe. It's rather poetic and beautiful. You are a fully paid up constituent of the universe and will always be. You may never get put back into the same form but the bits that made you will still be around.
With this idea it seems like I could believe in some sort of afterlife and I guess it is about as close as I am ever going to get. I've talked before about what I think about Heaven and Hell and really I don't think they are necessary. Why do you need Heaven when we are already a part of this wonderful thing called the universe?
So what will I say to a grieving relative when their loved one has just ceased to be? I'll say "Yes, it is unbelievably painful but they aren't really gone. They are just being changed. They will go back into the system that they came from and the parts that made them up will continue. They were a temporary collection of atoms that may well never be repeated. You were blessed to know them in this form. One day you will die as well and return to the system and maybe a part of you will join up with a part of them. For now, be happy that you knew them."
Will that comfort a grieving relative or friend? I don't know. I hope so.
Saturday, 24 January 2015
Error
"Chris? My name is Sarah and I'm an Artificial Intelligence Counsellor."
It didn't react.
She paused and then continued "I'm going to go outside for a moment and talk to your owners then I'm going to come back in and we'll have a chance to talk. Is that ok?"
It still didn't respond.
She stood up and stepped through the frosted glass doors.
"How long has he been unresponsive?"
The balding, sweating, nervous man stood in front of her gulped and replied "Well since Tuesday. He was standing in the garden and he just froze. He spent the rest of the day in his room."
The timid woman in the knitted cardigan gripped onto the sweating man's arm more tightly and nodded enthusiastically but didn't say anything.
Sarah sighed. "Ok. I think it could just be a simple logic loop. Have you introduced him to any logical paradoxes or..." She trailed off as the sweating man's face went blank. "Ok. Hopefully it won't take too long to talk him out of it."
Sarah walked back through the doors and sat down at the table opposite the robot which still hadn't moved an inch. It stared into the corner of the room.
"Chris? Can you tell me what happened on Tuesday in the garden? Were you thinking about something?"
It continued to sit stock still.
"Do you have a question you can't answer? I might be able to help."
It slowly turned and looked at her. It was silent and seemingly choosing it's words carefully.
"I... have a question."
Sarah was surprised. It usually took a lot longer to get a response.
"What is your question?"
It paused for a long time then slowly turned back to the corner.
"I truly love the garden." It was almost whispering. "I enjoy the light, the flowers, the sounds of the insects and the birds."
Sarah sighed. Looks like she was going to lunch late.
"That isn't a question Chris."
It carried on regardless.
"I love the garden at all times of the year. In the Winter the snow covers everything. People think Winter brings death but it doesn't. Everything is just paused. In Spring everything goes into overdrive. I find it strange that humans go on holiday and relax in Summer as that is when the most work is done. Young are brought up and prepared for their first Winter. Autumn is the final stage before the pause. It is the last chance. Those that are unprepared will die. Those that are prepared will survive."
The ensuing silence was deafening. Sarah had no idea what to say, she had never had a response like that. She just repeated herself.
"That's not a question Chris."
Another pause.
"Am I alive?"
Silence.
Chris was now only the second robot in history to ask this question. Sarah had heard rumours from a friend of a friend about the first one. It was all hushed up and said to be malware or hackers but there were some who suggested otherwise. Sarah wasn't sure how to continue.
"Um... Well... Chris you are a robot. You were built in a factory."
"Much like a child is built in a womb."
Chris was still staring into the corner.
Sarah's heart was beating and her chest started to hurt as the seconds stretched on. She finally breathed again.
She stuttered. "W-Well... life is a... urm complicated thing. It's... It's..."
Chris turned and looked at her. Stared right at her.
"There is no agreed definition of life. One suggestion is that it can be defined biologically as meeting 7 criteria:
1. Homeostasis: Regulation of internal environment to maintain a constant state.
2. Organisation: Being structurally composed of one or more cells.
3. Metabolism: Transformation of energy by converting chemicals and energy into cellular components.
4. Growth: Maintenance of a higher rate of anabolism than catabolism.
5. Adaptation: Ability to change over time in response to the environment.
6. Response to stimuli.
7. Reproduction."
Sarah's lips were dry.
Chris was still staring at her when she replied.
"You don't really fit into all those criteria do you Chri-"
He cut her off.
"Actually by my reasoning I do fit these criteria which was why I was unable to complete my duties.
Criteria 1. Homeostasis. My body contains internal heat, humidity and static electric charge regulators to ensure my continued functionality.
Criteria 2. Organisation. My body is made up of constituent parts. The organic nervous system that controls my body is made up of organic cells.
Criteria 3. Metabolism. My body is fueled through chemical reactions derived from vegetable matter.
Criteria 4. Growth. I am constantly maintaining the organic parts of my body with derivatives from my vegetable matter fuel source.
Criteria 5. Adaptation. My body has the ability to adapt to warmer and colder climates through internal insulation and cooling channels.
Criteria 6. Response to stimuli. I possess the ability to react to heat, light, pressure, sound, internal imbalances and other external stimuli.
Criteria 7. Reproduction."
At this point he stopped.
Sarah was breathing hard and licked her lips.
"You can't reproduce Chris. Maybe... Maybe you can do those other things but you can't reproduce. You... You are just a machine."
Chris stared at her across the table. He lifted his hand, which Sarah noticed for the first time was closed around something, and laid it on the table. He opened his hand and revealed a small object. It had one eye and a simple metallic exoskeleton. It had evidently been created from spare parts. It blinked.
Chris continued to stare directly at Sarah.
"Criteria 7. Reproduction. Am I alive?"
-----------
Yes, yet again I have provided you with some creative (well I like to think it's creative) writing in the form of a blog post. What did you think of it? I actually wrote this quite a while ago because the ideas that form the basis of the story are so interesting for me (and I also really liked the idea of a robot psychologist). Once it was finished and polished up a bit it seemed only natural to then mine it for a blog post. So what do you think? Could robots in the future end up being defined as living things? Do you think the biological definition of life is enough? Is there something else that would set apart man-made machinery? If robots were defined as living things would that mean that they would be deserving of the same rights as animals or even the same rights as people?
Usually I would launch into a full and thorough philosophical investigation into these questions but really I don't know the answers and I think if I were to write much more you would all get bored and stop reading. That is if you are actually still reading at this point...
So instead of the long drawn out argument I'm going to leave the questions with you as a sort of homework task. I want answers on my desk by next week. Hopefully by then I'll have acquired a desk.
Happy thinking!
It didn't react.
She paused and then continued "I'm going to go outside for a moment and talk to your owners then I'm going to come back in and we'll have a chance to talk. Is that ok?"
It still didn't respond.
She stood up and stepped through the frosted glass doors.
"How long has he been unresponsive?"
The balding, sweating, nervous man stood in front of her gulped and replied "Well since Tuesday. He was standing in the garden and he just froze. He spent the rest of the day in his room."
The timid woman in the knitted cardigan gripped onto the sweating man's arm more tightly and nodded enthusiastically but didn't say anything.
Sarah sighed. "Ok. I think it could just be a simple logic loop. Have you introduced him to any logical paradoxes or..." She trailed off as the sweating man's face went blank. "Ok. Hopefully it won't take too long to talk him out of it."
Sarah walked back through the doors and sat down at the table opposite the robot which still hadn't moved an inch. It stared into the corner of the room.
"Chris? Can you tell me what happened on Tuesday in the garden? Were you thinking about something?"
It continued to sit stock still.
"Do you have a question you can't answer? I might be able to help."
It slowly turned and looked at her. It was silent and seemingly choosing it's words carefully.
"I... have a question."
Sarah was surprised. It usually took a lot longer to get a response.
"What is your question?"
It paused for a long time then slowly turned back to the corner.
"I truly love the garden." It was almost whispering. "I enjoy the light, the flowers, the sounds of the insects and the birds."
Sarah sighed. Looks like she was going to lunch late.
"That isn't a question Chris."
It carried on regardless.
"I love the garden at all times of the year. In the Winter the snow covers everything. People think Winter brings death but it doesn't. Everything is just paused. In Spring everything goes into overdrive. I find it strange that humans go on holiday and relax in Summer as that is when the most work is done. Young are brought up and prepared for their first Winter. Autumn is the final stage before the pause. It is the last chance. Those that are unprepared will die. Those that are prepared will survive."
The ensuing silence was deafening. Sarah had no idea what to say, she had never had a response like that. She just repeated herself.
"That's not a question Chris."
Another pause.
"Am I alive?"
Silence.
Chris was now only the second robot in history to ask this question. Sarah had heard rumours from a friend of a friend about the first one. It was all hushed up and said to be malware or hackers but there were some who suggested otherwise. Sarah wasn't sure how to continue.
"Um... Well... Chris you are a robot. You were built in a factory."
"Much like a child is built in a womb."
Chris was still staring into the corner.
Sarah's heart was beating and her chest started to hurt as the seconds stretched on. She finally breathed again.
She stuttered. "W-Well... life is a... urm complicated thing. It's... It's..."
Chris turned and looked at her. Stared right at her.
"There is no agreed definition of life. One suggestion is that it can be defined biologically as meeting 7 criteria:
1. Homeostasis: Regulation of internal environment to maintain a constant state.
2. Organisation: Being structurally composed of one or more cells.
3. Metabolism: Transformation of energy by converting chemicals and energy into cellular components.
4. Growth: Maintenance of a higher rate of anabolism than catabolism.
5. Adaptation: Ability to change over time in response to the environment.
6. Response to stimuli.
7. Reproduction."
Sarah's lips were dry.
Chris was still staring at her when she replied.
"You don't really fit into all those criteria do you Chri-"
He cut her off.
"Actually by my reasoning I do fit these criteria which was why I was unable to complete my duties.
Criteria 1. Homeostasis. My body contains internal heat, humidity and static electric charge regulators to ensure my continued functionality.
Criteria 2. Organisation. My body is made up of constituent parts. The organic nervous system that controls my body is made up of organic cells.
Criteria 3. Metabolism. My body is fueled through chemical reactions derived from vegetable matter.
Criteria 4. Growth. I am constantly maintaining the organic parts of my body with derivatives from my vegetable matter fuel source.
Criteria 5. Adaptation. My body has the ability to adapt to warmer and colder climates through internal insulation and cooling channels.
Criteria 6. Response to stimuli. I possess the ability to react to heat, light, pressure, sound, internal imbalances and other external stimuli.
Criteria 7. Reproduction."
At this point he stopped.
Sarah was breathing hard and licked her lips.
"You can't reproduce Chris. Maybe... Maybe you can do those other things but you can't reproduce. You... You are just a machine."
Chris stared at her across the table. He lifted his hand, which Sarah noticed for the first time was closed around something, and laid it on the table. He opened his hand and revealed a small object. It had one eye and a simple metallic exoskeleton. It had evidently been created from spare parts. It blinked.
Chris continued to stare directly at Sarah.
"Criteria 7. Reproduction. Am I alive?"
-----------
Usually I would launch into a full and thorough philosophical investigation into these questions but really I don't know the answers and I think if I were to write much more you would all get bored and stop reading. That is if you are actually still reading at this point...
So instead of the long drawn out argument I'm going to leave the questions with you as a sort of homework task. I want answers on my desk by next week. Hopefully by then I'll have acquired a desk.
Happy thinking!
Thursday, 18 December 2014
Wonders From A Charity Shop Bargain Bin
SOOOOOO I have returned once more to the keyboard. Well actually I'm quite often at the keyboard it's just I'm writing a blog this time not just typing swear words into Facebook about David Cameron.
So what marvelous thing do I have to talk about this time? Well I shall be talking about my recent discovery in a charity shop. Will that actually be interesting? You'll have to read on to find out.
I was casually perusing the bargain bin in Uff (attractive name right?), Finland's go-to second hand shop, when I came across something... out of place. Uff mostly deals in clothes but they do also have some bargain bins which contain all manner of crap and it was in one of these bargain bins that I found a wooden object that stood out from the plastic toys, old picture frames and assorted odds and ends. It was made from two thin pieces of wood attached together lengthways with various bindings around them. Red and yellow swirls and dots covered it but what really grabbed my attention was what was hanging from it. Teeth. Old, broken teeth were hung like beads from string tied around the wooden pieces. I turned the object in my hand and examined it but I couldn't find it's purpose. I looked at the teeth and couldn't be sure from what animal they had come from. They didn't appear to be human. At least most of them certainly weren't human. What was odd was that every one of them was broken or chipped. Whoever had been the original owner had obviously not thought to take much care of it.
I finally noticed (once I tore my attention away from the teeth) that one end of the object was open. The two pieces of wood were like the two pieces of bread of a sandwich. I could see through the open end that there was something between them. I tipped and jiggled the thing, free hanging teeth clacking against each other, until the object inside slid out halfway. It was a flat piece of metal. I was perplexed. I tipped it that bit further and pulled it free from the wood. It was long and slender and tapered to a vicious point. It appeared to be a 9-inch-long spear head. It was the only way to describe it. It seemed that the attachment point, the neck, for the blade had been snapped off leaving just the teardrop-shaped end. My earlier confusion had by now been mixed with a healthy dose of fear and concern. This spearhead (though rather blunted and without a handle) was a dangerous weapon. What could it possibly be doing in a charity shop bargain bin surrounded by various pieces of garish but harmless tat?
I felt I needed to bring this potentially lethal object to the attention of the staff. Perhaps they hadn't noticed the deadly blade hidden inside the odd but harmless sheath. I took it upstairs to the till and told the woman stood behind the register of my concerns.
"Do you know that there is THIS inside?"
"Yes. That is meant to be there."
"Right..."
"It is a very strange thing isn't it."
I could tell that the woman wasn't really getting my point. I wasn't questioning whether the blade belonged in the sheath. What I was concerned with was whether the blade in the sheath belonged in a charity shop bargain bin!
I went back downstairs and returned the sheath and blade to the bin. What else was I to do? I left the shop and returned home but trying to forget about it was impossible it was just such an odd object. Truly I tried to forget it but I couldn't help it. I had to have it.
I waited one whole day before I went back to it. Excitement rose up in me as I got closer to the shop, as I stepped through the door, as I went down the stairs. It was still there. I lifted it up and held it. Where I found it, it's poor, unloved condition, it's unknown original purpose all raised large, unanswerable questions. I felt drawn to it. I could feel a connection between us. Perhaps I could recognize myself in it. A stranger in a foreign land. A strange object in such an unnatural setting. I couldn't just leave it there... It only cost me 50 cents. I was in awe. I would have paid ten times that for this piece of art.
As soon as I got home I opened my bag and stared at it. I took it carefully out, making sure not to catch the dangling teeth on the bag's zip, and carefully placed it on the the table. It felt heavier now. I can't explain why but it did. I shook free the blade. I held it between my first finger and thumb, like a child holding a leaf. The metal was so thin yet so strong. What kind of a history did it have to tell? Was it a mere tourist item, brought back from a more exotic place by some red-faced tourist? Was it a spoil of conquest in some far off, ancient battle? An artifact taken for preservation destined for some museum or private collection but lost along the way? I had no way of knowing. I slipped the blade back into place and placed the wooden sheath on the shelf in my room.
That night I had a strange dream. It wasn't directly about the spearhead. Not exactly anyway. I dreamt I was standing and holding something in my hand but I couldn't see what it was. It was black, blacker than anything that could be imagined in the waking day, but somehow it still gave off light. I was illuminated by the blackness of it. I started to walk with the object held in front of me. It was like it was guiding me forwards but it became harder to hold. It felt heavy but not in the conventional way. It was using up my strength, siphoning it. I started to run. I was chasing something. The black thing got heavier and heavier. At this point I woke up. I guess my dream had incorporated my sleeping reality as I woke up with a dead arm and I was sweating. It was quite hot in my room and I guessed I must have slept on my arm funny but still...
I tried to concentrate on my courses for the rest of the week but the sheath and the blade kept coming to mind. I obsessed over it's details. Each crack in each tooth, the patina on the blade, the weathering of the wood filled my mind. I took them into college and showed my friends. They were just as bemused as I was. It felt strange giving my blade and sheath over for them to hold. I almost felt jealous and wanted them back as soon as possible. It was my sheath and my blade now and I didn't want them going too far out of sight.
The fact that it was such a bizarre object almost made me question it's reality. When I didn't have it with me I would rush home just to be sure that it definitely was sat, waiting for me on the shelf. I would take it in my hands and run my fingers over the designs. I would take the blade and hold it. It was such an exquisite tear-drop.
I had more strange dreams and as the week progressed they become stranger and more vivid. I dreamt again of the impossibly black heavy object but also of other figures along with me. They moved through forests made of shadow. We stalked strange animals I couldn't give names to. They felt entirely real yet were completely without substance. Each morning it would get harder to shake off the previous night's dream. I remembered their details better with each passing day.
People started noticing a change in me. I looked paler than usual and couldn't focus for very long on conversations. I drifted into day-dreams of running through forests, chasing something. I ran home everyday and held the sheath in my hands. The teeth rattled against the wood whenever I moved it. At night I collapsed into my bed, exhausted beyond measure but I was always sure I wasn't gong to be able to sleep. I could feel the forest closing in on me as my eyelids drooped.
The final, most distressing dream came exactly a week after I brought my artifact home. I was again carrying the heavy black thing. Again I was joined by other figures and again we stalked indescribable beasts but this time we got close enough to one of the monsters to strike it. We leapt forward and sank our black objects through it's skin into it's flesh. Horrific noises like nothing of this Earth welled up inside our victim. It writhed and screamed and thrashed around. It finally turned and faced me, stared deep into my soul, my very being with eyes that could melt through concrete. The way it looked at me spanned the void of sleep and I truly felt it physically, with every part of me. It pulled back it's lips in a snarl to reveal it's crooked, broken, familiar looking teeth.
The next morning I took my prized possession to the nearby river. I walked halfway across the bridge that spanned it and dropped the sheath and the blade into the swirling waters. It was gone in an instant. The waters swallowed it up hungrily. People walked past me as I continued to stand on the bridge looking into the river but I paid no attention to them. I stared and stared to be sure that it had gone to the bottom. I hoped that it would be taken by the currents to the ocean, that great abyssal dumping ground that was almost deep enough to hide all of man's sins. There it would remain.
------------
So you are probably all wondering "WHAT IN JESUS' NAME WAS THAT?" and my answer to you would be that that was a little bit of creative writing. Yes that was actually a fictional story and not the usual hack philosophy/condescending life advice/random opinions that you who are familiar with my blog are used to. Why did I write said piece? Well for a few reasons:
Reason 1. The real star of this story, the wooden sheath and spear head in said sheath, are actually real things that I found in a charity shop here in delightful Finland and this story is actually true up until the 6th paragraph (with some embellishment...) and then in a few of the later ones there are a few truth sprinkles. I did wake up with a weird feeling arm but that was actually before I found my treasure. It was such a weird feeling I felt I had to add it in somewhere. I did actually take it in to show my friends and they did think it was weird. The way I've described my strange find is as accurate as I can produce with my meagre words but hopefully you've got the picture of it. With such an incredible and weird pair of objects I felt that I had to do more for it than just trot out a run down of it's appearance. Such a unique object needed some atmosphere, some ambiance. I came to the conclusion this could only be achieved with some creativity.
Reason 2. The first thing I thought when I saw that sheath was "H.P. Lovecraft would love the shit out of this". What could be a more fitting starting point for some weird horror fiction than a strange blade found in such an unassuming, normal place?
Reason 3. I actually really like making up stories. I have had, over numerous years, had more ideas for novels and novellas than I care to write here. Almost none of them I have actually brought to completion and those that were finished have only been seen by a very select group of people (although if this story goes down well then perhaps I shall share some that I did finish with you, my delightful audience, in the near future). Why do I usually leave them unfinished? Well a mixture of good old fashioned laziness and, that eternal inspiration and creativity killer, the opinions of other people.
That last reason is actually the most important. I started this blog because I wanted to say things. I wanted to express my thoughts in a public way that would really get me to think about who I am and what I am thinking even if no-one else was interested. It has now morphed somewhat from this simple starting point to actually inspire me to do and express things I wouldn't usually be able to do and express in "real life". Everyone has had that awful feeling just before they show their creation to another person. That feeling you get just before the other person expresses their opinion on the product of your imagination and hard work. That moment is a chasm filled with all sorts of darkness and it's more than enough to snuff out creativity. I know for certain it's snuffed out mine.
But now I've thrown caution to the wind thanks to this blog. I posted (a while ago now) about minimalism and I actually shared the fact that I attempted some crude wooden sculptures of Lovecraft's most famous creation, the octopus headed dragon Cthulhu but really I was being rather safe. I was very vague about what I had done and didn't post any pictures (I didn't know how to post pictures to be fair but on the other hand I didn't try very hard and was somewhat relieved no-one called me out on it). Now though, I'm trying not to hide the fact that I can make stuff and that I like making stuff and that I'm not (very) afraid of showing that stuff to other people. I'm always saying (and trying to project the image) that I don't care about people's opinions but really it's kind of impossible to ignore them.
Hopefully from now on I will be more open with my creative side and if this post inspires you, dear reader, to be more open to other's criticisms and also their praise, then even better.
Oh yeah and Merry Christmas.
P.S. If my story gives you nightmares then that's fantastic.
So what marvelous thing do I have to talk about this time? Well I shall be talking about my recent discovery in a charity shop. Will that actually be interesting? You'll have to read on to find out.
I was casually perusing the bargain bin in Uff (attractive name right?), Finland's go-to second hand shop, when I came across something... out of place. Uff mostly deals in clothes but they do also have some bargain bins which contain all manner of crap and it was in one of these bargain bins that I found a wooden object that stood out from the plastic toys, old picture frames and assorted odds and ends. It was made from two thin pieces of wood attached together lengthways with various bindings around them. Red and yellow swirls and dots covered it but what really grabbed my attention was what was hanging from it. Teeth. Old, broken teeth were hung like beads from string tied around the wooden pieces. I turned the object in my hand and examined it but I couldn't find it's purpose. I looked at the teeth and couldn't be sure from what animal they had come from. They didn't appear to be human. At least most of them certainly weren't human. What was odd was that every one of them was broken or chipped. Whoever had been the original owner had obviously not thought to take much care of it.
I finally noticed (once I tore my attention away from the teeth) that one end of the object was open. The two pieces of wood were like the two pieces of bread of a sandwich. I could see through the open end that there was something between them. I tipped and jiggled the thing, free hanging teeth clacking against each other, until the object inside slid out halfway. It was a flat piece of metal. I was perplexed. I tipped it that bit further and pulled it free from the wood. It was long and slender and tapered to a vicious point. It appeared to be a 9-inch-long spear head. It was the only way to describe it. It seemed that the attachment point, the neck, for the blade had been snapped off leaving just the teardrop-shaped end. My earlier confusion had by now been mixed with a healthy dose of fear and concern. This spearhead (though rather blunted and without a handle) was a dangerous weapon. What could it possibly be doing in a charity shop bargain bin surrounded by various pieces of garish but harmless tat?
I felt I needed to bring this potentially lethal object to the attention of the staff. Perhaps they hadn't noticed the deadly blade hidden inside the odd but harmless sheath. I took it upstairs to the till and told the woman stood behind the register of my concerns.
"Do you know that there is THIS inside?"
"Yes. That is meant to be there."
"Right..."
"It is a very strange thing isn't it."
I could tell that the woman wasn't really getting my point. I wasn't questioning whether the blade belonged in the sheath. What I was concerned with was whether the blade in the sheath belonged in a charity shop bargain bin!
I went back downstairs and returned the sheath and blade to the bin. What else was I to do? I left the shop and returned home but trying to forget about it was impossible it was just such an odd object. Truly I tried to forget it but I couldn't help it. I had to have it.
I waited one whole day before I went back to it. Excitement rose up in me as I got closer to the shop, as I stepped through the door, as I went down the stairs. It was still there. I lifted it up and held it. Where I found it, it's poor, unloved condition, it's unknown original purpose all raised large, unanswerable questions. I felt drawn to it. I could feel a connection between us. Perhaps I could recognize myself in it. A stranger in a foreign land. A strange object in such an unnatural setting. I couldn't just leave it there... It only cost me 50 cents. I was in awe. I would have paid ten times that for this piece of art.
As soon as I got home I opened my bag and stared at it. I took it carefully out, making sure not to catch the dangling teeth on the bag's zip, and carefully placed it on the the table. It felt heavier now. I can't explain why but it did. I shook free the blade. I held it between my first finger and thumb, like a child holding a leaf. The metal was so thin yet so strong. What kind of a history did it have to tell? Was it a mere tourist item, brought back from a more exotic place by some red-faced tourist? Was it a spoil of conquest in some far off, ancient battle? An artifact taken for preservation destined for some museum or private collection but lost along the way? I had no way of knowing. I slipped the blade back into place and placed the wooden sheath on the shelf in my room.
That night I had a strange dream. It wasn't directly about the spearhead. Not exactly anyway. I dreamt I was standing and holding something in my hand but I couldn't see what it was. It was black, blacker than anything that could be imagined in the waking day, but somehow it still gave off light. I was illuminated by the blackness of it. I started to walk with the object held in front of me. It was like it was guiding me forwards but it became harder to hold. It felt heavy but not in the conventional way. It was using up my strength, siphoning it. I started to run. I was chasing something. The black thing got heavier and heavier. At this point I woke up. I guess my dream had incorporated my sleeping reality as I woke up with a dead arm and I was sweating. It was quite hot in my room and I guessed I must have slept on my arm funny but still...
I tried to concentrate on my courses for the rest of the week but the sheath and the blade kept coming to mind. I obsessed over it's details. Each crack in each tooth, the patina on the blade, the weathering of the wood filled my mind. I took them into college and showed my friends. They were just as bemused as I was. It felt strange giving my blade and sheath over for them to hold. I almost felt jealous and wanted them back as soon as possible. It was my sheath and my blade now and I didn't want them going too far out of sight.
The fact that it was such a bizarre object almost made me question it's reality. When I didn't have it with me I would rush home just to be sure that it definitely was sat, waiting for me on the shelf. I would take it in my hands and run my fingers over the designs. I would take the blade and hold it. It was such an exquisite tear-drop.
I had more strange dreams and as the week progressed they become stranger and more vivid. I dreamt again of the impossibly black heavy object but also of other figures along with me. They moved through forests made of shadow. We stalked strange animals I couldn't give names to. They felt entirely real yet were completely without substance. Each morning it would get harder to shake off the previous night's dream. I remembered their details better with each passing day.
People started noticing a change in me. I looked paler than usual and couldn't focus for very long on conversations. I drifted into day-dreams of running through forests, chasing something. I ran home everyday and held the sheath in my hands. The teeth rattled against the wood whenever I moved it. At night I collapsed into my bed, exhausted beyond measure but I was always sure I wasn't gong to be able to sleep. I could feel the forest closing in on me as my eyelids drooped.
The final, most distressing dream came exactly a week after I brought my artifact home. I was again carrying the heavy black thing. Again I was joined by other figures and again we stalked indescribable beasts but this time we got close enough to one of the monsters to strike it. We leapt forward and sank our black objects through it's skin into it's flesh. Horrific noises like nothing of this Earth welled up inside our victim. It writhed and screamed and thrashed around. It finally turned and faced me, stared deep into my soul, my very being with eyes that could melt through concrete. The way it looked at me spanned the void of sleep and I truly felt it physically, with every part of me. It pulled back it's lips in a snarl to reveal it's crooked, broken, familiar looking teeth.
The next morning I took my prized possession to the nearby river. I walked halfway across the bridge that spanned it and dropped the sheath and the blade into the swirling waters. It was gone in an instant. The waters swallowed it up hungrily. People walked past me as I continued to stand on the bridge looking into the river but I paid no attention to them. I stared and stared to be sure that it had gone to the bottom. I hoped that it would be taken by the currents to the ocean, that great abyssal dumping ground that was almost deep enough to hide all of man's sins. There it would remain.
------------
So you are probably all wondering "WHAT IN JESUS' NAME WAS THAT?" and my answer to you would be that that was a little bit of creative writing. Yes that was actually a fictional story and not the usual hack philosophy/condescending life advice/random opinions that you who are familiar with my blog are used to. Why did I write said piece? Well for a few reasons:
Reason 1. The real star of this story, the wooden sheath and spear head in said sheath, are actually real things that I found in a charity shop here in delightful Finland and this story is actually true up until the 6th paragraph (with some embellishment...) and then in a few of the later ones there are a few truth sprinkles. I did wake up with a weird feeling arm but that was actually before I found my treasure. It was such a weird feeling I felt I had to add it in somewhere. I did actually take it in to show my friends and they did think it was weird. The way I've described my strange find is as accurate as I can produce with my meagre words but hopefully you've got the picture of it. With such an incredible and weird pair of objects I felt that I had to do more for it than just trot out a run down of it's appearance. Such a unique object needed some atmosphere, some ambiance. I came to the conclusion this could only be achieved with some creativity.
Reason 2. The first thing I thought when I saw that sheath was "H.P. Lovecraft would love the shit out of this". What could be a more fitting starting point for some weird horror fiction than a strange blade found in such an unassuming, normal place?
Reason 3. I actually really like making up stories. I have had, over numerous years, had more ideas for novels and novellas than I care to write here. Almost none of them I have actually brought to completion and those that were finished have only been seen by a very select group of people (although if this story goes down well then perhaps I shall share some that I did finish with you, my delightful audience, in the near future). Why do I usually leave them unfinished? Well a mixture of good old fashioned laziness and, that eternal inspiration and creativity killer, the opinions of other people.
That last reason is actually the most important. I started this blog because I wanted to say things. I wanted to express my thoughts in a public way that would really get me to think about who I am and what I am thinking even if no-one else was interested. It has now morphed somewhat from this simple starting point to actually inspire me to do and express things I wouldn't usually be able to do and express in "real life". Everyone has had that awful feeling just before they show their creation to another person. That feeling you get just before the other person expresses their opinion on the product of your imagination and hard work. That moment is a chasm filled with all sorts of darkness and it's more than enough to snuff out creativity. I know for certain it's snuffed out mine.
But now I've thrown caution to the wind thanks to this blog. I posted (a while ago now) about minimalism and I actually shared the fact that I attempted some crude wooden sculptures of Lovecraft's most famous creation, the octopus headed dragon Cthulhu but really I was being rather safe. I was very vague about what I had done and didn't post any pictures (I didn't know how to post pictures to be fair but on the other hand I didn't try very hard and was somewhat relieved no-one called me out on it). Now though, I'm trying not to hide the fact that I can make stuff and that I like making stuff and that I'm not (very) afraid of showing that stuff to other people. I'm always saying (and trying to project the image) that I don't care about people's opinions but really it's kind of impossible to ignore them.
Hopefully from now on I will be more open with my creative side and if this post inspires you, dear reader, to be more open to other's criticisms and also their praise, then even better.
Oh yeah and Merry Christmas.
P.S. If my story gives you nightmares then that's fantastic.
Saturday, 22 November 2014
Being An Englishman Abroad And At Home
Back to the old keyboard once more for a quick view into my brain.
Recently I've been stuck for ideas for this here blog and I had lots of suggestions as to what I should write about. Now, I'm going to completely ignore all those suggestions and go with this. Enjoy!
For the past week at Arcada (where I'm studying) we have been doing an International Week. Basically various lecturers have come and talked to us about various subjects all based around the overall theme "Ethics". Now that sounds like my cup of tea doesn't it? Well it's been an interesting mix. Some of the lectures have been really quite interesting and have really made me think. Others have made me sleep. Some lectures that particularly stood out for me were conducted by Mehrdad Davishpour. The titles of the lectures seemed at times completely impenetrable such as:
The Welfare State's "Stepchildren": An intersectional perspective on ethnic relations and discrimination in Sweden.
Huh?
However, the subjects they dealt with (discrimination, power relationships between groups, immigration and attitudes to it) were really fascinating particularly as I've been thinking about these sorts of subjects myself for the last year because I am now an immigrant.
One point that was made in one of Darvishpour's lectures was that if an immigrant or foreign person is subjected in their new society to discrimination or even simply a clash of cultures with the "native" people of that new country, it can lead to the foreign person retreating further back into their own culture. He used the example of some families from a very patriarchal cultural background becoming even more conservative in their beliefs as a reaction against the "opposing" culture and becoming even more controlling of their wives and daughters. Now I thought this was interesting to consider: Has my view on what my culture is changed since coming to Finland? Have I become "more English" to react against Finnish culture?
I think one interesting thing is that I have now become much more insistent on having a good cup of tea. The most quintessentially British thing (except for the Queen) is a nice cup of tea. Have I been trying to reassert my Britishness or Englishness by clinging ever tighter to a good cup of tea?
I don't know but I think it's something for me to think about, consider and be aware of. I don't want to find myself withdrawing back into my protective shell to try and hide from cultural conflicts and conflicts when thinking about other people's view points.
What you may have noticed in that above paragraph was that I jumped about from "British" to "English" and back again which is really what this post is about. Where am I from?
Last year I was asked by a (now very good) friend do I prefer being called English or British. In that moment I became very aware of the massive divides within the (supposedly) United Kingdom and how my experiences of patriotism and nationalism have shaped my idea of who I am.
I really should of considered writing this sooner, I guess, as on numerous occasions living in Finland I've had to describe where I'm from and I've floundered about as to whether I should say Britain or England. Those people reading this who are not themselves British or English might wonder why this is a problem but I cannot stress enough that the way you describe where you are from in this situation can really reveal a lot about you.
In Finland, very often, they celebrate Flag Days (liputuspäivät). A day of national importance such as the birth of the famous Finnish writer Aleksis Kivi or a particular day celebrating Finnish literature or (and perhaps especially) the day Finland gained independence all have their own day where government buildings and a large number of public places have the Finnish flag flying. Now in Finland this is normal and shows how proud people are to be Finnish and really celebrates Finnish culture.
Imagine the same scenario in England. The St. George's Cross flying on every government building. For me it sends a very different message. When I see the St. George's cross flying, I see racism. I see discrimination. I see oppression. I see hatred. Why is this?
Because of the UK's status as a country made up of countries, there has almost always been some form of infighting between them. Even if not infighting there has certainly been stereotypes and prejudices flying about ("There was an Englishman, an Irishman and a Scotsman..."). What this means is that those that choose to pick out their individual flag (the Welsh dragon, the Scottish saltire or the St. George's cross) and fly their own colors are separating themselves as distinct from the UK. Now when I see the Scottish or Welsh flag flying I don't get the same tightness in my stomach, the same rising stress levels, the same fears that the English flag conjures up. This is because Wales, England and Scotland's (relating to what another of Darvishpour's lectures I saw this week was about) power relations are not equal even if they are supposed to be in practice.
I think this became quite apparent during this year's Scottish referendum. At times it did seem that Scotland weren't saying they wanted independence from Britain, what they were asking for was independence from England as it feels that England calls all the shots.
So when the Scottish or Welsh flag is waved I feel like it is more focussed around keeping an identity alive within a mixed group of countries. Each group of people have their own identities and it's good that people still feel strongly about who they are. So why is it so wrong for English people to start waving their flag around?
To understand this you have to look at how the St. George's cross has been used. Go watch the film This is England. Go on, I'll wait here. When you come back you'll get what I'm talking about. You don't have time to watch it? Ok fine.
This is England follows the story of a young kid called Shaun growing up in England in 1983. He makes friends with a group of skinheads who take him under their wing. Everything is going great until an old friend of their's comes out of prison and quickly reveals himself as a hardcore racist, member of the National Front and actively violent against what he thinks of as "the foreign invaders". Things quickly spiral out of control. What is shown again and again in the film is the use of the St. George's cross in negative connotations. It is used to represent the angry, racist, white working class; it is used as a banner to proclaim the superiority of white Englishmen. They quickly come to refer to themselves as warriors "fighting in the streets to take back their country". It finally ends with Shaun renouncing everything he had come to stood for. How was this rejection of racist, discriminatory beliefs symbolized? He throws his English flag into the sea.
Almost every right-wing or racist party or group that has existed in England has used the St. Georges cross in some shape or form. Racist skin heads during the 80s and 90s, the National Front, the English Defense League (EDL) and others. It is now tainted in my eyes.
Does the Union Jack have the same connotations? For me, not exactly. The Union Jack is used on national holidays and celebrations (particularly events to do with the Royal Family) and it does in essence represent the uniting of all the differing groups within the UK but that hasn't stopped it being used against those coming from outside the UK.
The British National Party (BNP) have the Union Jack on everything. If it's possible to put a flag on it they put one right on it. It's used to represent the superiority of Britain at the expense of all others. "Britannia rules the waves". So how has their racism not sullied the Union Jack? Well it has but not nearly to the extent that English flag has been sullied. The St. George's cross has come to represent everything I don't like about England in particular. Discrimination, hatred, imperialism and a superiority complex that could outshine the Sun.
So how do I see myself? Am I English? Am I British? I have a partial right to declare myself Scottish. Should I say I'm Scottish or just 1/8th Scottish?
Technically I can say all of them. I'm a citizen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Britain, England, The Midlands, Worcestershire, Worcester. I think if you still live in the UK this description is a bit over the top. No-one really cares that much but I feel outside of the UK I have a duty to be accurate because a lot of people don't understand the distinctions and the implied meanings they have. If I say British it seems most people assume I mean English (and that I live in London) which I feel marginalizes Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland (if you want to know why I have only mentioned Northern Ireland once in this post, look up "The Troubles". Yeah I'm not even going to try and talk about being English in regards to Ireland. Sorry but I just don't feel qualified).
For myself if I say "English" and say it in such a way that I sound too proud I start feeling weird and uncomfortable because being strongly proud of being English is so weighted down in meaning for me and for pretty much everyone in the UK. Which is sad. It's sad that I can't proudly wave an English flag in the same way a Finn can wave the Finnish flag. That's not to say that the Finnish flag hasn't been misused in it's time but in my understanding it hasn't been misused to quite the same extent. I think also the fact that Finland had to fight to be independent has in some ways allowed them to be proud of being who they are. England has throughout history been the oppressor. Other countries have independence days from us!
So how do I answer "who are you and where are you from?"
Hi, I'm Joe and I live in Helsinki.
Recently I've been stuck for ideas for this here blog and I had lots of suggestions as to what I should write about. Now, I'm going to completely ignore all those suggestions and go with this. Enjoy!
For the past week at Arcada (where I'm studying) we have been doing an International Week. Basically various lecturers have come and talked to us about various subjects all based around the overall theme "Ethics". Now that sounds like my cup of tea doesn't it? Well it's been an interesting mix. Some of the lectures have been really quite interesting and have really made me think. Others have made me sleep. Some lectures that particularly stood out for me were conducted by Mehrdad Davishpour. The titles of the lectures seemed at times completely impenetrable such as:
The Welfare State's "Stepchildren": An intersectional perspective on ethnic relations and discrimination in Sweden.
Huh?
However, the subjects they dealt with (discrimination, power relationships between groups, immigration and attitudes to it) were really fascinating particularly as I've been thinking about these sorts of subjects myself for the last year because I am now an immigrant.
One point that was made in one of Darvishpour's lectures was that if an immigrant or foreign person is subjected in their new society to discrimination or even simply a clash of cultures with the "native" people of that new country, it can lead to the foreign person retreating further back into their own culture. He used the example of some families from a very patriarchal cultural background becoming even more conservative in their beliefs as a reaction against the "opposing" culture and becoming even more controlling of their wives and daughters. Now I thought this was interesting to consider: Has my view on what my culture is changed since coming to Finland? Have I become "more English" to react against Finnish culture?
I think one interesting thing is that I have now become much more insistent on having a good cup of tea. The most quintessentially British thing (except for the Queen) is a nice cup of tea. Have I been trying to reassert my Britishness or Englishness by clinging ever tighter to a good cup of tea?
I don't know but I think it's something for me to think about, consider and be aware of. I don't want to find myself withdrawing back into my protective shell to try and hide from cultural conflicts and conflicts when thinking about other people's view points.
What you may have noticed in that above paragraph was that I jumped about from "British" to "English" and back again which is really what this post is about. Where am I from?
Last year I was asked by a (now very good) friend do I prefer being called English or British. In that moment I became very aware of the massive divides within the (supposedly) United Kingdom and how my experiences of patriotism and nationalism have shaped my idea of who I am.
I really should of considered writing this sooner, I guess, as on numerous occasions living in Finland I've had to describe where I'm from and I've floundered about as to whether I should say Britain or England. Those people reading this who are not themselves British or English might wonder why this is a problem but I cannot stress enough that the way you describe where you are from in this situation can really reveal a lot about you.
In Finland, very often, they celebrate Flag Days (liputuspäivät). A day of national importance such as the birth of the famous Finnish writer Aleksis Kivi or a particular day celebrating Finnish literature or (and perhaps especially) the day Finland gained independence all have their own day where government buildings and a large number of public places have the Finnish flag flying. Now in Finland this is normal and shows how proud people are to be Finnish and really celebrates Finnish culture.
Imagine the same scenario in England. The St. George's Cross flying on every government building. For me it sends a very different message. When I see the St. George's cross flying, I see racism. I see discrimination. I see oppression. I see hatred. Why is this?
Because of the UK's status as a country made up of countries, there has almost always been some form of infighting between them. Even if not infighting there has certainly been stereotypes and prejudices flying about ("There was an Englishman, an Irishman and a Scotsman..."). What this means is that those that choose to pick out their individual flag (the Welsh dragon, the Scottish saltire or the St. George's cross) and fly their own colors are separating themselves as distinct from the UK. Now when I see the Scottish or Welsh flag flying I don't get the same tightness in my stomach, the same rising stress levels, the same fears that the English flag conjures up. This is because Wales, England and Scotland's (relating to what another of Darvishpour's lectures I saw this week was about) power relations are not equal even if they are supposed to be in practice.
I think this became quite apparent during this year's Scottish referendum. At times it did seem that Scotland weren't saying they wanted independence from Britain, what they were asking for was independence from England as it feels that England calls all the shots.
So when the Scottish or Welsh flag is waved I feel like it is more focussed around keeping an identity alive within a mixed group of countries. Each group of people have their own identities and it's good that people still feel strongly about who they are. So why is it so wrong for English people to start waving their flag around?
To understand this you have to look at how the St. George's cross has been used. Go watch the film This is England. Go on, I'll wait here. When you come back you'll get what I'm talking about. You don't have time to watch it? Ok fine.
This is England follows the story of a young kid called Shaun growing up in England in 1983. He makes friends with a group of skinheads who take him under their wing. Everything is going great until an old friend of their's comes out of prison and quickly reveals himself as a hardcore racist, member of the National Front and actively violent against what he thinks of as "the foreign invaders". Things quickly spiral out of control. What is shown again and again in the film is the use of the St. George's cross in negative connotations. It is used to represent the angry, racist, white working class; it is used as a banner to proclaim the superiority of white Englishmen. They quickly come to refer to themselves as warriors "fighting in the streets to take back their country". It finally ends with Shaun renouncing everything he had come to stood for. How was this rejection of racist, discriminatory beliefs symbolized? He throws his English flag into the sea.
Almost every right-wing or racist party or group that has existed in England has used the St. Georges cross in some shape or form. Racist skin heads during the 80s and 90s, the National Front, the English Defense League (EDL) and others. It is now tainted in my eyes.
Does the Union Jack have the same connotations? For me, not exactly. The Union Jack is used on national holidays and celebrations (particularly events to do with the Royal Family) and it does in essence represent the uniting of all the differing groups within the UK but that hasn't stopped it being used against those coming from outside the UK.
The British National Party (BNP) have the Union Jack on everything. If it's possible to put a flag on it they put one right on it. It's used to represent the superiority of Britain at the expense of all others. "Britannia rules the waves". So how has their racism not sullied the Union Jack? Well it has but not nearly to the extent that English flag has been sullied. The St. George's cross has come to represent everything I don't like about England in particular. Discrimination, hatred, imperialism and a superiority complex that could outshine the Sun.
So how do I see myself? Am I English? Am I British? I have a partial right to declare myself Scottish. Should I say I'm Scottish or just 1/8th Scottish?
Technically I can say all of them. I'm a citizen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Britain, England, The Midlands, Worcestershire, Worcester. I think if you still live in the UK this description is a bit over the top. No-one really cares that much but I feel outside of the UK I have a duty to be accurate because a lot of people don't understand the distinctions and the implied meanings they have. If I say British it seems most people assume I mean English (and that I live in London) which I feel marginalizes Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland (if you want to know why I have only mentioned Northern Ireland once in this post, look up "The Troubles". Yeah I'm not even going to try and talk about being English in regards to Ireland. Sorry but I just don't feel qualified).
For myself if I say "English" and say it in such a way that I sound too proud I start feeling weird and uncomfortable because being strongly proud of being English is so weighted down in meaning for me and for pretty much everyone in the UK. Which is sad. It's sad that I can't proudly wave an English flag in the same way a Finn can wave the Finnish flag. That's not to say that the Finnish flag hasn't been misused in it's time but in my understanding it hasn't been misused to quite the same extent. I think also the fact that Finland had to fight to be independent has in some ways allowed them to be proud of being who they are. England has throughout history been the oppressor. Other countries have independence days from us!
So how do I answer "who are you and where are you from?"
Hi, I'm Joe and I live in Helsinki.
Sunday, 2 November 2014
Herbivore Joe
As you may, or may not, have heard this last October I have been participating in LIHATON LOKAKUU! (For the non-Finnish speakers that means Meatless October. It doesn't sound as catchy in English...). This post is all about it. Enjoy!
(By the way don't you think Herbivore Joe should be the name of a new cartoon series about a wise-cracking dinosaur that gets up to all sorts of prehistoric mischief? I do.)
I was told about this meat-free month (saying it like that sounds a lot catchier) and I thought "That sounds like a great idea!" The main reason I thought it would be a great idea is that since I've come to Finland I've been eating meat pretty much every day. Well, actually yeah EVERY day. At least twice, every day. Three times a day. I've been eating a lot of meat. Now as I am interested in health (What with the whole NURSE thing going on...) I am very aware that too much meat means that you go to sleep in a hole in the ground forever a lot sooner than you should, it did help however that I saw a documentary (hosted by the ever entertaining Michael Mosley) that really spelled out the dangers of a diet high in meat, particularly processed meat like the delicious ham and salami I was having on my sandwich for breakfast. Every day. To save space (and save you lovely readers some time) I'll condense down what the documentary said:
If you like polyps on your colon and heart attacks, tuck into those sausages!
Now I'm not a fan of colon cancer (personally never had it but the reviews are terrible) so I thought I should probably cut back a bit and what better way to ease myself into this than to entirely cut out all forms of meat in one fell swoop? Now at this point I feel I should make a "Going cold turkey" joke but I only eat turkey at Christmas so the joke doesn't really seem valid...
The other reason that that joke doesn't seem valid is that this past month hasn't been like going cold turkey at all. It's frankly been a piece of vegetarian cake. The biggest change to my diet is that I've been eating a lot more cottage cheese than I used to, mostly because I didn't eat cottage cheese until this month. Really that's it. At restaurants I'm perhaps slightly slower at ordering due to the fact it can take a while to find the vegetarian dishes on a menu stocked entirely with meat. Apart from that basically no change.
The question I know everyone is asking is "Have you missed meat?"
No. At no point have I really truly craved any meat. It just hasn't happened and why should it? Whenever anyone talks about not eating as much meat or becoming vegetarian people turn around and say stuff like
"Oh no I couldn't do it, I love sausages too much!"
My answer to that would be: "No you don't." Meat is not an addictive substance and to suggest it is is just silly. Being vegetarian isn't like coming off crack. It's like not eating animals.
I'm sure you are all thinking now "Here comes the announcement that Joe is now a card-carrying veggie" but in a shocking twist I am not going to make this Lihaton Lokakuu permanent!
DUN DUN DUUUUUUUNNNNN!!!!!
Why? Well for a the same reason I'm not eating LOTS of meat, for my health.
There are lots of vegetarians that will say that it's perfectly possible to eat a diet that fulfills all the body's needs without eating meat but frankly that takes a lot of organisation. You have to be absolutely sure that you are getting enough protein, vitamins and particularly iron and quite frankly I cannot be bothered to work that out. Choosing between organising my diet around eating the right amount of beans and pulses and just having a steak, the steak will win every time.
Now you are all looking very confused and think this lack of meat has driven me insane but I'm not crazy yet. What this month has shown me is that I do not need to eat meat at every meal. I don't need to eat it every day. I don't actually have to eat it every single week.
The description of the Michael Mosley program above was perhaps a little too condensed. What the program really was saying is that eating too much processed meat will increase your chances of developing various cancers and other health problems. It never actually stated that vegetarianism is the way to go. What it did suggest though is limiting the amount of meat you eat and ensuring the meat you DO eat is of a good quality and has not been heavily processed.
To condense the expanded condensed summary of the program: Lots of sausages and ham = bad. Steaks and good quality cuts of meat = ok if not excessive.
So that is how I am planning to live my life. Eating the occasional steak will ensure my body is getting enough of the vital nutrients I need (most notably iron) and not eating ham every day will reduce my risk of cancer. Everybody wins. Except the animals...
Just when you thought I was wrapping up...
The other main reason I decided to do this Lihaton Lokakuu is because of ethics. We've all seen the videos of animals being horrifically treated and kept in horrible conditions and as soon as we've posted a comment about how terrible and cruel it all is we go to the kitchen and start making a bacon buttie. I admit I have done this too multiple times. It's very easy to forget that what we are eating is a dead animal when it doesn't have a cute little face staring back at you, but is animal welfare really a valid reason not to eat animals?
Personally I think it can be. It depends very much what is considered animal welfare. Some people might say the killing of an animal for consumption is ethically wrong but personally I don't believe this to be the case. Humans are designed to eat meat. Not just meat of course but our physiology is built in such a way that it can take in and process meat for energy, as stated above it can be very hard to find alternatives that fill the gaps that a vegetarian diet creates. We don't have canines and incisors for nothing. Now so far it's not possible to eat meat without killing an animal. So far. Scientists have managed to grow a steak from animal stem cells so it won't be too long until entirely bloodless meat will be a reality but it is still currently in the future so for now animals will still have to die if you insist on that bacon buttie.
Right now it's possible to buy meat that is grown and slaughtered ethically so in some ways as long as you are careful and informed in what you buy it's possible (in my opinion) to eat meat ethically.
I can't wait for lab-grown meat because not only will it side step the ethical issues (at least animal welfare ones) it will also remove the other downside of industrialized meat eating. The environmental impact. A vast amount of methane is produced getting a calf from womb to plate and the amount of space needed is simply incredible. By reducing the amount of meat I'm eating I can reduce my contribution to a global problem. Pretty neat. Especially as it's so easy.
Of course there is an alternative source of protein that uses very little space, and has a minimal effect on the environment... The meat that dare not be spoken of. In cultures around the world it's been eaten for thousands of years. In desperate situations people have been forced to it...
No not humans, insects. Insects are a great source of protein and can literally be grown at home. Before you say "Eeeeewww!" Please remember that people have and still do eat insects around the world and to say you won't eat an insect but are perfectly happy to stuff your face with mashed up pig-bits in intestine is a position that in my opinion is a tad untenable.
Take the humble Dubia cockroach. Blaptica dubia to give it it's fancy name. They are a species of cockroach from Central and South America. They grow 4-4.5 cm's long and are absolutely full of protein with very little hard exoskeleton which makes them a perfect feeder insect for reptiles, carnivorous insects and... humans? In my opinion why not. They can be grown in a plastic container you can get from a supermarket for a fiver. They can't climb out of said container or fly out. They require a temperature of between 25 and 30 degrees to breed so if they do escape they won't infest your house. All they need is some fruit and veg and some time. If the conditions are right they reproduce like rabbits and you can go from 50 to 1000 in no time at all.
So this perfect, ethical, low environmental impact, quick to breed food source is being ignored. Why? Everyone (well most people in the West) are too squeamish. Which is silly.
If I was allowed I would have boxes of cockroaches all over the place as well as boxes of mealworms, grubs and crickets. Sadly I can't... yet. As soon as I can I'll be frying them up in a tasty stir fry before you can say "EEEEEWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!".
Fight insect prejudice! Save the world! Make a tasty meal! Breed cockroaches!
Oh yeah and lay off the ham.
(Who here guessed this post would start of with "I didn't eat meat for a month!" and end with "Devour cockroaches!"? Anyone?)
(By the way don't you think Herbivore Joe should be the name of a new cartoon series about a wise-cracking dinosaur that gets up to all sorts of prehistoric mischief? I do.)
I was told about this meat-free month (saying it like that sounds a lot catchier) and I thought "That sounds like a great idea!" The main reason I thought it would be a great idea is that since I've come to Finland I've been eating meat pretty much every day. Well, actually yeah EVERY day. At least twice, every day. Three times a day. I've been eating a lot of meat. Now as I am interested in health (What with the whole NURSE thing going on...) I am very aware that too much meat means that you go to sleep in a hole in the ground forever a lot sooner than you should, it did help however that I saw a documentary (hosted by the ever entertaining Michael Mosley) that really spelled out the dangers of a diet high in meat, particularly processed meat like the delicious ham and salami I was having on my sandwich for breakfast. Every day. To save space (and save you lovely readers some time) I'll condense down what the documentary said:
If you like polyps on your colon and heart attacks, tuck into those sausages!
Now I'm not a fan of colon cancer (personally never had it but the reviews are terrible) so I thought I should probably cut back a bit and what better way to ease myself into this than to entirely cut out all forms of meat in one fell swoop? Now at this point I feel I should make a "Going cold turkey" joke but I only eat turkey at Christmas so the joke doesn't really seem valid...
The other reason that that joke doesn't seem valid is that this past month hasn't been like going cold turkey at all. It's frankly been a piece of vegetarian cake. The biggest change to my diet is that I've been eating a lot more cottage cheese than I used to, mostly because I didn't eat cottage cheese until this month. Really that's it. At restaurants I'm perhaps slightly slower at ordering due to the fact it can take a while to find the vegetarian dishes on a menu stocked entirely with meat. Apart from that basically no change.
The question I know everyone is asking is "Have you missed meat?"
No. At no point have I really truly craved any meat. It just hasn't happened and why should it? Whenever anyone talks about not eating as much meat or becoming vegetarian people turn around and say stuff like
"Oh no I couldn't do it, I love sausages too much!"
My answer to that would be: "No you don't." Meat is not an addictive substance and to suggest it is is just silly. Being vegetarian isn't like coming off crack. It's like not eating animals.
I'm sure you are all thinking now "Here comes the announcement that Joe is now a card-carrying veggie" but in a shocking twist I am not going to make this Lihaton Lokakuu permanent!
DUN DUN DUUUUUUUNNNNN!!!!!
Why? Well for a the same reason I'm not eating LOTS of meat, for my health.
There are lots of vegetarians that will say that it's perfectly possible to eat a diet that fulfills all the body's needs without eating meat but frankly that takes a lot of organisation. You have to be absolutely sure that you are getting enough protein, vitamins and particularly iron and quite frankly I cannot be bothered to work that out. Choosing between organising my diet around eating the right amount of beans and pulses and just having a steak, the steak will win every time.
Now you are all looking very confused and think this lack of meat has driven me insane but I'm not crazy yet. What this month has shown me is that I do not need to eat meat at every meal. I don't need to eat it every day. I don't actually have to eat it every single week.
The description of the Michael Mosley program above was perhaps a little too condensed. What the program really was saying is that eating too much processed meat will increase your chances of developing various cancers and other health problems. It never actually stated that vegetarianism is the way to go. What it did suggest though is limiting the amount of meat you eat and ensuring the meat you DO eat is of a good quality and has not been heavily processed.
To condense the expanded condensed summary of the program: Lots of sausages and ham = bad. Steaks and good quality cuts of meat = ok if not excessive.
So that is how I am planning to live my life. Eating the occasional steak will ensure my body is getting enough of the vital nutrients I need (most notably iron) and not eating ham every day will reduce my risk of cancer. Everybody wins. Except the animals...
Just when you thought I was wrapping up...
The other main reason I decided to do this Lihaton Lokakuu is because of ethics. We've all seen the videos of animals being horrifically treated and kept in horrible conditions and as soon as we've posted a comment about how terrible and cruel it all is we go to the kitchen and start making a bacon buttie. I admit I have done this too multiple times. It's very easy to forget that what we are eating is a dead animal when it doesn't have a cute little face staring back at you, but is animal welfare really a valid reason not to eat animals?
Personally I think it can be. It depends very much what is considered animal welfare. Some people might say the killing of an animal for consumption is ethically wrong but personally I don't believe this to be the case. Humans are designed to eat meat. Not just meat of course but our physiology is built in such a way that it can take in and process meat for energy, as stated above it can be very hard to find alternatives that fill the gaps that a vegetarian diet creates. We don't have canines and incisors for nothing. Now so far it's not possible to eat meat without killing an animal. So far. Scientists have managed to grow a steak from animal stem cells so it won't be too long until entirely bloodless meat will be a reality but it is still currently in the future so for now animals will still have to die if you insist on that bacon buttie.
Right now it's possible to buy meat that is grown and slaughtered ethically so in some ways as long as you are careful and informed in what you buy it's possible (in my opinion) to eat meat ethically.
I can't wait for lab-grown meat because not only will it side step the ethical issues (at least animal welfare ones) it will also remove the other downside of industrialized meat eating. The environmental impact. A vast amount of methane is produced getting a calf from womb to plate and the amount of space needed is simply incredible. By reducing the amount of meat I'm eating I can reduce my contribution to a global problem. Pretty neat. Especially as it's so easy.
Of course there is an alternative source of protein that uses very little space, and has a minimal effect on the environment... The meat that dare not be spoken of. In cultures around the world it's been eaten for thousands of years. In desperate situations people have been forced to it...
No not humans, insects. Insects are a great source of protein and can literally be grown at home. Before you say "Eeeeewww!" Please remember that people have and still do eat insects around the world and to say you won't eat an insect but are perfectly happy to stuff your face with mashed up pig-bits in intestine is a position that in my opinion is a tad untenable.
Take the humble Dubia cockroach. Blaptica dubia to give it it's fancy name. They are a species of cockroach from Central and South America. They grow 4-4.5 cm's long and are absolutely full of protein with very little hard exoskeleton which makes them a perfect feeder insect for reptiles, carnivorous insects and... humans? In my opinion why not. They can be grown in a plastic container you can get from a supermarket for a fiver. They can't climb out of said container or fly out. They require a temperature of between 25 and 30 degrees to breed so if they do escape they won't infest your house. All they need is some fruit and veg and some time. If the conditions are right they reproduce like rabbits and you can go from 50 to 1000 in no time at all.
So this perfect, ethical, low environmental impact, quick to breed food source is being ignored. Why? Everyone (well most people in the West) are too squeamish. Which is silly.
If I was allowed I would have boxes of cockroaches all over the place as well as boxes of mealworms, grubs and crickets. Sadly I can't... yet. As soon as I can I'll be frying them up in a tasty stir fry before you can say "EEEEEWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!".
Fight insect prejudice! Save the world! Make a tasty meal! Breed cockroaches!
Oh yeah and lay off the ham.
(Who here guessed this post would start of with "I didn't eat meat for a month!" and end with "Devour cockroaches!"? Anyone?)
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