To Be or Not to Be - #Occupy Style

To be or not to be,

that is the question.

1
To go up against almost insurmountable odds,

Or back down and submit.

2
To be a virtuous being in pursuit of happiness,

Or a coward driven by fear.

3
To wield the sword of truth,

and cut down all unreason,

(Or to throw it into lake,

and hope someone finds it later.)

4
To stand for non-initiation of force,

Or to condone it with silent consent.

5
To live a life without real human connection and empathy,

Or to live in small, silent, subconscious fear of others.

6
To hold reason, evidence and truth above people,

Or to give up reason to be with the unreasonable.

7
To live up to one's ideals,

Or to back down and fall short of one's potential.

8
To realize that your time is limited,

Or to live a life of delusion.

9
There is no question really,

Just words and excuses to let you not see reality.

10
That your life is yours to live;
It can be awesome and all you want it to be;
But time is slipping away...
Rise up and live it!

This is an infinitely extendable poem. Feel free to add!!


Here's a talk (TED) by a Poet!

"We're all going to die — and poems can help us live with that."

Lucy: A Movie Review

A way overdue movie review for a movie most people probably aren't going to watch/rewatch now.

Lucy... the New Woman.

Directed by Luc Besson, this movie is reminiscent of the Fifth Element, the Professional and other action movies. There is more than enough action to go around, but there is more than meets the eye...

Plot Summary

Credits. A cell becomes 2 cells, then 4 cells, then 8 cells, doubling.

We open with an ape/chimp/monkey drinking from a river. A montage ensues taking us through the passage of time, of human progress from prehistoric to civilization to horse-drawn to modern Taipei.

A young woman, Lucy, is persuaded to be a drug mule. She gets the drugs inserted into her abdomen before being sent to another country. Unfortunately, she is intercepted by a rival gang, where she gets beaten up. The package in her abdomen rips open, and she begins to become superhuman. Overcoming her captors with extreme ease, she proceeds to take revenge on the drug gangs, informing the authorities of the situation.

While things cool down, she goes to contact a certain top expert (Morgan Freeman) in this field. She tells him she has "read all his research" and wants to know what is going to happen to her. He does not know. She tells him she knows that the drug CPH4 is slowly killing her.

So, she goes back to exacting revenge on the gangs, but this time, with the goal of retrieving all the other drugs. She finds that she needs it to survive.

Eventually, she meets the Expert, who has brought his fellow top-expert friends along (they look like bewildered dorks). They analyze the drug, while a firefight ensues outside, between the authorities and the gang who want their drugs back.

Eventually, the gang breaks through, after employing an anti-tank missile. The gang boss hangs there, his pistol aimed at Lucy. I can't think why he would do such a thing, but it seems to be important to the plot.

A time travel sequence brings Lucy backwards and forwards in space and time, as she appears to gain the ability to effortlessly manipulate space and time. Eventually, she returns to the room only to become this black goo that eats all the equipment in the room

The movie ends with the villains dead and a shiny, space-black flashdrive being created.

Analysis

Here are some truly significant excerpts I thought everyone who did/didn't watch the movie should know.

When cells grow in a hostile environment, they will choose immortality.
When cells grow in a friendly environment, they reproduce.

The Myth of 10% Brain usage

Are we really using 10% of the brain's neurons? No, that's just an urban myth. I'm thinking 10% potential sounds about right - my brain could be doing wildly awesome things, but only after the training and learning required to even comprehend such knowledge bases.

"One factor to rule them all" CPH4. For some, a growth hormone. For others, certain death from overdose.

The Role of Force

While most of the action (shooting and car-chases) are pretty much for entertainment, much of the brutality is there to shock. By that, I mean the hiding of drugs in the abdomen via surgery.

The Obsolete of the State

Before being tipped off by Lucy, drug enforcement officials are sitting around and basically ineffective. Their security measures are pretty useless too.

If you think about it, the only reason why drugs must be smuggled via such extreme means is because the drugs are illegal. Understanding this, Lucy was as much a victim of the State, as she was of the mafia-like drug gang.

Men are Useless

Yes, that's right. Feminism is everywhere. Every man are absolutely and totally useless. The cops, all men, are only good for killing the criminals, who are also, all men. The "top scientists" of all fields are men, but all are incompetent jaw-droppers in the face of almighty Lucy. Lucy's sidekicks all want her sexually, but Lucy is like this asexual organism.

If women were given the treatment the men are given, the movie would never be made. When men are treated this way, most men have no problems with it.

2001:A Space Odyssey

Honestly, I can never cease to be amazed at how many tributes to 2001:A Space Odyssey are in remotely sci-fi, philosophical movies. Lucy is uncannily similar to 2001 in plot and visual metaphor.

The Matrix

Anonymous agents perfectly dressed in black suits? Uploading yourself into any screen or electronic device? Downloading skills and information at will? The bending of reality?

The violent, deceptive Win-Lose world. The Win-Win world evolves out of the Win-Lose cut-throat world. Technology grows out of it. That's the story of the human race, for now. What is done with the technology determines whether we boom or bust.

Integration. 

The Singularity, achievable by recognizing fully human potential. It is not machines who will cause the Singularity, but human beings aided by machines.

The meaning of life

In a voice over at the beginning of the film we hear "Life was given to us a billion years ago. What have we done with it?" At the film's conclusion another voice over tells us "Life was given to us a billion years ago. Now you know what you can do with it." 

At the end of her lifespan, she turns all her knowledge into a USB flashdrive and hands it to the scientists to help the world. The movie argues that the meaning of life is to realize you are part of a bigger whole, and so serving the world is the meaning of your life, and everybody's.

Internet of EVERYTHING

Download any skill, all of every kind of science. Hardwork all nonsense now. Beat the experts of different fields within a few seconds, by somehow reading everything they ever published. Isn't that a modern, info-age notion of Enlightenment, as being able to process data and make decisions quickly.

Cell Mitosis, Cell Integration. Monoliths.

Cells separate, and specialize as a human being grows. Eventually though, the film makes the argument that self-actualization is achieved by becoming whole again.

Deux Ex Machina. You know exactly what's going to happen the moment she starts evolving...10%...20%...30%...40%... so on ... 100%. You know no bullet can touch her.

Digital Immortality, if you so choose to accept it.

In the end, Lucy becomes this organic supercomputer that proceeds to consume all the other computers in the room, before creating a USB flashdrive to store all that she had learnt. She then ceases to be a physical form, turning the screens to "I am everywhere". 

Which reminds me of... the starchild at the end of 2001.

Transcending physical existence is one of those things that only movies and art can do. The movie makers have full control of the "reality" on screen, its space and time... and even your mind. You may not be conscious of all the details, but your unconscious is affected... all the time. As the name "unconscious" goes, you are

Think it Through Critically, or Be Subconsciously Programmed...

How I Solved a 10-year old Insecurity in Less Than 5 Minutes

Dear Reader(s), 

This article may change the way you see me, past, present and future. I hope you get something out of it.

Cheers,

Eugene.

Problem

I have an insecurity.

I have always had a fear of being alone.

- Darkness

- Friends leaving.

- Being picked up late back in school.

- Socializing.

- Friends not texting back.

It's a terrible burden that has sapped energy.

Change

OK, it took 5-7 years to build up to this. But 5 minutes max was all it took to understand and uproot this. Some remnants could still exist, but as of today, none have been discovered or attributed to this.

Trigger

Long story short, I am sitting at the office OTing one night, feeling very productive but kinda lonely. So I talked about Kumon with a friend. He talks about flushing Kumon papers and coming up with all kinds of excuses not to do them (eg. down the toilet, throwing them in the trash). I realized I was always the good student and did all the Kumon, even if it meant overtime. (Overtime at age 7 lol.)

And then out of nowhere, I made a connection. The loneliness of OT was the same as the loneliness experienced by the younger me, all those times when I was picked up late, in detention, etc.

Change

• Realizing the emotionally significant experiences, going as far back as possible: 
• Childhood: Since kindergarten, my caregivers kept being late coming over. I waited for hours. It was bad enough to see everyone else gone home, or out to play and not being able to join. I felt abandoned. On top of this, I had separate issues about social anxiety, which only multiplied its effects. 
• Early Childhood: Left in daycare center. For whatever reason, I can only recall short segments.
• "It's not my fault." (or "It's not your fault"):
• The realization that there is no inherent defect in me, that my issue is caused by certain external factors outside my control. 
• The realization that I am paying for the bad decisions of some people. 
• Because it is caused by external factors in the past, I see my freedom, power to choose.
• HOWEVER, stopping here would create another problem called "Victim Mentality". So...
• Self-reaffirmation
• I have done very well given this. 
• Purpose: Inoculates against self-criticism.
• "I am actually very different.": 
• Links my best work, experiences, happiness. 
• Gather up all my finest moments.
• The things I can have and do without this issue.
• What will I do differently from now on?
• Solving a major hurdle is kinda useless, if I didn't then move forwards.
• What is my new vision? 
• Redefine all relationships as mutually-supportive and never due to loneliness.
• What is the underlying "human nature"? To what extent are humans "social animals"?
• Curiosity, Rational research needed.

Aftermath

Before this, I had an immense issues dealing with loneliness. 

Now, I have less than 10% of the original. I used to wait for people to respond on whatsapp, watch their last seen time/date. It also made it very difficult to actually sit down and do individual work, because I feared being alone. Now I don't care anymore, except for matters of business urgency. 

I used to feel isolated, lonely and homesick. Now, I can feel almost none of it, simply because I expect to feel isolated, lonely and homesick and don't have any of it anymore. It's a strange feeling, like opening my eyes after a good night's sleep. As my mind synchronizes, the remaining anxiety are disappearing.

Considering myself as an introvert, I did well independently, but as I grew up and went through the "socialization phases", the issue began to affect me. I had to be out and always doing something with others. Sometime, it became hard to stay put and focused on hard stuff. This affected my university grades. 

I can only wonder where I would be now, if I didn't have this issue, or had it resolved early on.

I have come home, wherever I am. 

And ahead of time. I'd hate to be going through this during a mid-life crisis in my 40s. For that I'll be ever grateful.

Impact

As far as I can tell, I have met many with similar anxieties (who have no idea). Logically, these issues will persist forever or are patched, until one fixes them. Over the course of a lifetime, they can be a massive drain on happiness, satisfaction and productivity. 

Most people need to be seriously affected to seek help with their bugs. Ironically, this means that people who have milder forms, or are adept at coping with or avoid the bug, may have less incentive to figure it out and tolerate these bugs for longer. 

Why should people fix their bugs completely, no matter what? 

• Murphy's Law. Because bugs always come back to haunt them. At the worst times possible.
• All bugs persist until the day they are fixed, or the host dies. All bugs are lifetime max-security prison sentences. 
• You will live better. Most bugs sap mental energy.
• Able to discover your intrinsic motivation. Issues prevent motivation, cause procrastination. "What do you want?". 
• For other people. So that the world has less assholes, less violence. So that you can bring the best to the world. Many issues cause negative feelings towards others. No, that's an understatement. Why are people supporting violence against others, which is completely morally insane?
• So that the world can change.

Work. Could this prevent one from moving forwards? Do unresolved issues prevent an increase in performance? 

Relationships? What can an attachment disorder do to a relationship? How many relationships have not worked because of insecurities? Could this lead one to stay in a bad relationship? Ever heard of the slang "Clingy Girlfriend"? 

Old age? What happens when one's kids are gone and one is in a nursing home or hospital? Could this be a cause of senior depression?

Denialism is common, possibly due to ignorance,defense mechanisms. "I am no problems!" is the most frequently heard words spoken in group counselling sessions. Such people almost always have the most unresolved issues.

TakeAway

Resolving issues can be incredibly fast with the knowhow.

Self-therapy is easy.

Personal development can be completely free and open-source.

We are a few steps away from resolving issues. The problem is not "HOW?", but "WHY?".

A world with no government, no violence is 100% technically (psychologically, sociologically) feasible.