On Games and Axioms

So, it's Halloween, a time when children and college students alike dress up in costumes for reasons that nobody could really tell you. It is a night which is extremely frightening for some reason; perhaps the collective imagination of western culture owes someone money, and they collect at the end of the month? It could also be fear of those damn solicitors insisting that you take small morsels of candy. Yes, I see you have candy, yes, I understand that I may take some if I want, you don't have to bloody tell me all the time! (I may be annoyed by them a bit disproportionately, I just really don't like solicitors is all).

Anyway, in honor of this spooky day, (Christ, I hate that word, even ironically), I will be writing about the most HORRIBLE AND FRIGHTENING TERROR OF THEM ALL: EXISTENTIAL DREAD OOOOOOOH (wibbly-wobbly ghost sounds).

Interestingly, I don't have much problem with the "dread" part of existential dread. I mean, "life is devoid of any higher purpose." Okay. "Anything you do is ultimately futile." Well, sure, I could have told you that. "There is no afterlife, you and everyone you know and love are doomed to utter oblivion." Well, that kind of sucks, but I suppose it's just as well because you won't exist to experience your lack of existence. Nothing terribly horrifying here.

"Now spend 70+ years existing."

Oh, right, there's that.

I was reflecting on what I do with my time over the course of a week and the break down is something like this:

Week: 168 hours

• Sleep: (56)
• Classes: (14.5)
• Studying (7.5)
• Meals (21)
• Bugger-all (69)

That's 40% of my weekly life doing jack shit. I mean, I do other things too, hobbies, extracurricular and all that sort of stuff, but I count all of that in jack shit, because it's not necessary, strictly speaking.

Actually, come to think of it, neither are studying or classes, strictly speaking. Fuck.

Okay, so that's more like 52% of my life doing technically unnecessary things. This is getting really irritating.

So step one of getting over existential dread is your basic meaning axiom: the logical first step on which you base the value of literally everything you do. Choose wisely, kiddies. Now a lot of people behave based on what I like to call "the Games," which are terrible axioms. The top three seem to be the following: "Whoever Has the Most Money When They Die Wins!" Game, which is really stupid because of the whole cessation of existence post mortem thing. Likewise, the "Whoever Lives the Longest Wins!" Game and the "Whoever Had the Greatest Impact on History Wins!" Game are equally futile because at the end of the day, you'll still be fucking dead. And for those of you who think that technology will remove the death problem entirely, you're fooling yourselves, because the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics has already got everyone in checkmate. I swear to you that entropy is more patient than you. It's got till the end of bloody time, at which point the universe will stop existing and, by transitive property, so will you.

So, with the Games out of the way, we have pretty much eliminated the vast majority of motivation behind human endeavors. Really, there's not much left besides cultivating personal excellence and virtue and enjoying life as it comes to you. What a real stickler that is...

Of course, this ultimately leads back to a whole slew of questions: What is excellent? What is virtuous? How do I become those things?

Well, that is for you to figure out individually. How? Well, think of the people you admire. The ones who weren't playing the Games I mean. Look at people like Jesus, the Buddha, Socrates, Yakov Neyman the Hot Dog Guy, et al. and all the other people (with religious types like the first two, I tend to look at their more humanistic stuff. God does his thing and I do mine, which is fine, but even the most pious is still human, ultimately... I guess you could make the argument with Jesus- fuck, never mind). Find what qualities you admire in those sorts and strive to those qualities. Look everywhere. If there's some quality in Harry Potter or Tolkien or whatever then those work too (if it's from Twilight, strive for psychiatric assistance). Eventually, after years of thought and meditation, you'll have a clear picture of the sort of person you want to be. From there you strive to be that person as much as you can (while not beating yourself up when you falter, happens to everyone) and die content in the knowledge that through yourself you made the world a better place (I am guessing that your conclusion has something about making the world a better place. Have something about making the world a better place).

Now, with all that sorted out. Go out and enjoy your life!

Wait fuck I don't know how to do that, either.

This is where I'm really tripping up, which is weird, because you would think that I ought to know how to do that. But when I look at my life right now, between basic surviving, fulfilling my dues to society, cultivating excellence, and all that noise, I entirely forgot what I actually like to do. I sure as hell know that deciding that there's nothing to do on Reddit, YouTube, and Facebook, closing all those tabs and then immediately opening them up again out of sheer habit in an endless cycle until it's time for dinner is not only incredibly boring, it's downright stupid. It's like flipping through TV channels, playing the same chord on a piano, hitting my head on a wall, a pointless waste of time! There are so many things I could be doing! I could be learning to play an instrument! I could be writing the multitudes of stories I constantly plan! I could be serenading fair Spanish maidens beneath their chamber window- well maybe not that one. I must find some way to optimize active enjoyment and passive relaxation, because this is just fucking idiotic.

Don't look at me! I don't know how to do that; we're on the same page now.

If anyone knows how to do that, let me know. Seriously, it's getting annoying.

Sincere regards, Michael Coffey

On Rhinos and Grammar

Now, if you're reading this, I bet you're asking yourself  "why am I reading this?" If you weren't you are now. You're now thinking of a rhinoceros. The more you try to think of something else, there it is. It may be one you've seen at the zoo, or in a National Geographic, or somewhere on the internet. It could be a real one, a cartoon one, or even a fuzzy plush one.

God dammit, this is stupid. What was I even talking about?

Oh right, the purpose of the blog.

Well, I suppose I am writing this mostly to transcribe various miscellaneous thoughts that I have. I am sure that many of you know that instead of thinking about things that most people think about (Sports? Politics? Boobs? I am literally just drawing stuff out of my ass here), I tend to think about inane academic things that aren't even allowed in the Ivory Tower because they're so entirely pondiferous and stupid.

Apparently pondiferous isn't a word, by the way. I don't see why not; it's a conjoining of pondere and ferre: "to carry things of great weight, to be reflected upon." 

Yeah, see it's things like that. Why would I need to reflect upon the etymology of words that are so fake that they have tiny, squiggly red lines under them? Because that's just how I roll.

Speaking of which, the idea of words being "real" is stupid anyway. When I say "pondiferous" you know exactly what I mean. It has a sensible etymology in a suitably serious language. While it is not common in the English vernacular to be sure, it carries more meaning than other words, as the very fact that it's fake gives it the additional meaning of "seemingly intelligent but in fact meaningless." Its fakeness is so poignant that it is like a meaningfulness double reach around, as its fakeness contributes to the very meaning of the word. It is seemingly intelligent and literally means that something is really serious and weighty and requires a lot of thought, but its contextual meaning in the language which it simultaneously is and is not a part of gives it the additional meaning because of the irony of its false nature. I can understand why it isn't a word now, because it's not being a word somehow makes it more powerful in its meaning. What the fuck, English?

Still, it's better than the word "to be," (Yes, I know that "to be" is two words. That's because English can't do an infinitive without a preposition. The "to" doesn't actually exist despite it being RIGHT FUCKING THERE. Fucking analytic languages.) Anyway, putting aside the fact that "to be" is nearly always an irregular verb, at least in the Indo-European Language family, which is so fucking stupid because it's literally the most common verb ever, "to be" is a real word, but unlike the fake word "pondiferous," WE HAVE NO FUCKING CLUE WHAT THE SHIT IT EVEN MEANS. Go to the dictionary: "to be" is defined as "to exist" and "to exist" is defined as "to be." WELL GEE, THANKS A LOT, YOU WORTHLESS CLOD OF A BOOK, THAT'S REAL FUCKING HELPFUL. To be fair, "to exist" is also defined as "having objective reality." I guess that makes sense.

Wait, no it doesn't. What about the infinitive preposition "to?" I just said at the beginning at the last paragraph that it doesn't actually exist. But it obviously does, because without it, I have to say "be" and order the reader around like a fucking asshole, because in English, an unconjugated verb is an imperative! Who the fuck came up with this nonsense? It's like a bunch of people just made it up as they went along with absolutely no regard for sensible metaphysics, grammar and common courtesy.

Which is exactly what happened.

Fuck this shit.

Sincere Regards, Michael Coffey