Thoughts I have had...

Read my most recent essay.

These thoughts are in no particular order, except roughly choronlogical. Most of them have been coming to me since March, 2003. Their purpose is simply to encourage thinking in general and in no way are they to be considered dogmatic.

I can imagine a language in which "alone" and "dead" are a single word.
The more closely you hold an opinion, the more willing you must be to discard it.

Mixing patriotism with a cause is like riding a car without brakes.
A dream while sleeping is an untrained puppy playing in the yard of our consciousness.

Anyone who believes you can do anything you set your mind to has obviously never tried to change someone else's mind.
Life is the enigma of entropy.

I have a well-balanced set of neuroses.
One of the best ways to remember something is to try very hard to forget it (and visa versa).

We take in a breath of air, possibly holding within our bodies for one brief moment a molecule that spun out from the stars we see all around us. Endlessly repeated, in and out, now more, now less.
Failure is usually success picked before it's ripe.

The most tragic part of any good story is the end.
One word which could not ever be self-referential is "meaningless."

One of the most profound statements a person can make is: "I remember."
All statements claiming to be categorically correct are always false.

A dictionary is to a language as a photo album is to a family.
Life's too short to live a long time.

Being an American used to be more a matter of shared philosophy and geography. Now it seems to revolve around a shared politics and ideology.
What you believe is not nearly so important as how you believe it.

Better to be wrong for the right reasons than right for the wrong reasons.
If you are always right, you're not thinking boldly enough.

An enemy is a friend you've never met.
The next step in the evolution of intelligent life on this planet will have six legs.

The word "can't" is a linguistic form of suicide.
If Nature were intelligent, it would take a look at humans and say, "What the hell was I thinking."

The word "is" should always be put in quotes, in the manner of a word you use as the best of a set of rather poor choices.
"Dread" and "anticipation" and linguistic synonyms and emotional antonyms.

If it makes you happy or gives you pleasure, it's probably bad for you or illegal somewhere.
I force myself to socialize because it reminds me that I am alive.

Words, when at their best, are mental event triggers that invoke patterns of responses similar enough in different individuals that the communication actually occurs.
If it can be understood, it's not worth understanding.

An accident is a close shave with Occam's Razor.
Most people are too stupid to know how idiotic they are.

Pleasure is (usually) inversely proportional to longevity.
Some people need to sit in the sand before they make a good impression.

We don't program computers. Computers program us.
There seems to be no such thing as a group of individuals; a group transforms the individual into something else.

If Bush were to want to win a major victory against terrorism, he would commit suicide.
What is the largest terrorist organization on earth? Answer: the U.S.

Sometimes, the main reason to live is there is no legal way to commit suicide.
If one of your goals in life is to live a long time, prepare to be bored.

For me, the best way to understand loneliness is to sit in a crowded room.
Like all things beautiful, it must needs one day be restored.

Truth is to Reality as words are to intelligence.
What you believe is not nearly so important as how you believe it.

Don't simply play the piano; make love to it.
If you can't see the forest for the trees, the solution is not to cut down the trees.

Before you say you hate something, ask yourself how someone else could love it.
9-11 is just one more metasticized tumor in the cancer-ridden body called the United States.

Are you alive? Can you prove it?
The policies of this country make those of the Hitler regime look like a chat over tea.

In order to get an even grossly accurate picture of reality, it is necessary to entertain and maintain contradictory conceptions of it.
The most stupid question is the one left unasked.

America's so-called "democracy" is institutionalized stupidity.
We define ourselves by our hates and our loves.

The line between "meaningful" and "meaningless" is generally found between your ears.
To truly love someone, you must simultaneously give up and become more of yourself.

Language is so mercurial that it is possible for any given statement to be simultaneously true and false.
It is possible to interpret every motivation as a redirected sexual urge.

Certainty is topping off your tank so you don't run out or gas only to have your transmission fail.
You need to be crazy to stay sane in this society.

An American is the one who, having a huge room to enter, will stand squarely in the doorway.
I have confidence in the certainty of improbability.

It is neither desirable nor possible to see everything.
Seeing is an act of interpretation.

Our conception of the Universe is grounded in sensory integration. Imagine a sharp pillow, a fluffy knife, a linear spiral, a loud earthworm, a random thought.
"Agreement" is light-years away in meaning from "Conformity."

Just because you don't know your friend's favorite flavor doesn't mean you buy unflavored gelatin for dessert.
If you can formulate an opinion, you are a human being; if you can change one, you are wise.

One of the most abstract, ambiguous, possibly even meaningless attempts at communication in common usage is: "I love you."
Don't worry so much about your life ending as one more statistic. Worry about living your whole life as one.

To truly love someone, you must simultaneously give up and become more of yourself.
Even a seemingly objective notion as measurement is dependent on a frame of reference.

Reality is found not in the mid-point between irreconcilable points of view, but in their simultaneity and contradiction.
A purely Newtonian Universe could not evolve a species of live any more intelligent than a clock.

The human mind is evolved for rational intelligence...
...like a penny is evolved as a good fuse.
...like an old tire makes a good planter.
...like a feather is evolved as a pen.
...like a leaf works as a bookmark.
We see what we understand.

Language is a model of thought in much the same way that meteorology is a model of weather.
Sometimes living can be about as tedious as emptying the ocean with a teaspoon.

Not: "Seeing is believing." But: "Seeing is conceiving."
People retreat into absolutes when they cannot tolerate ambiguity.

Objects are best (only?) measured outside the dimension of time.
Am I indecisive? ...I don't know, maybe.

Myths are depictions of reality without the superficial baggage of fact.
Facts are like chess pieces: they only have meaning in their interrelation.

We look, without seeing. Hear, without listening. Touch, without feeling. Hmmm... taste and smell always seem to make an impression or impress us when they fail to.
Facts without correlative ideas are like books shredded into confetti.

Emotions are simultaneously universal and personal. We can share them with someone else even though they are not really understood.
Sometimes it is too much to say that we form a conception of the universe with our senses. More accurate is the meta-level statement: our conceptions determine what our senses can conceive of the universe.

The content of set labeled "existing" and "not-existing" are only partially knowable and, therefore, may also be partially overlapping.
Language is a structuring interface between our perception of reality and things in themselves.

It is at the moment when you think you understand something that you most need to worry that you've got it all wrong.
You can't separate perception from reality in the same way you can't eat only the egg part of your birthday cake.

To say that reality is a thing to be observed is similar to saying that lungs are Nature's way of doing air quality testing.
Probably the most important aspect of intelligence is knowing what to forget.

The small light of a candle is most clearly visible when surrounded in darkness.
Blinded by the intensity of new-found sight, we improvise the universe, externalizing our perceptions and forming creation with each breath and tear.

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