To a modern day poet.

Getting me through work today. No skippin', just repeatin'.

RIP

Preach, Harvey Specter

I've recently finished rewatching the first season of Suits and thus was again exposed to the gem GIF'd above.

When anyone ever screws you over, have your little whinge about it, but then deal with it. Change, fight back, do whatever you have to do, but don't waste your time on lamentations and excuses. That's what petulant little kids do, not adults.

[Delayed Post] Defying the 'inevitable' - Post-holiday Euphoria

I've said it a thousand times and will say it again and again in future - I love the guys from The Buried Life.

As is evident from my earlier magnetic post (ha), I recently returned home from an incredible trip to Europe and have now been back for just over 2 weeks. What I've found in that time, and had slowly been coming to realise in the later days of my trip, was that I've somewhat successfully been able to build that life.

When we first joined our tour group in London, it did hit me and my friends that the group with which we were travelling were a good deal younger than us, two of us being over 30 and the other just under two years shy of it. We had some moments of wariness at first but they faded fairly quickly. As our Trip Leader pointed out when we sheepishly brought up our ages, it comes down to your attitude in the end, and she was right. It was entirely up to us whether we enjoyed our trip.

I've now been working at a university for almost a decade so to be honest, I've become quite accustomed to the atmosphere of young students (which made up a large proportion, if not the majority, of our fellow tour mates), breezily talking about nothing, airing their fears about the world or cockily shouting on about all the things they think they know and the change they will bring about. A lot of the time spent with our new mates felt just like that but it was one of our roommates who articulated the fact that from what she could tell, almost everyone on the tour, including the more cocksure and loud (and I would personally imagine them even more so), was a little lost, trying to figure out their lives, trying to decide who they were going to be, what they were going to do next and this made sense, particularly for the age group.

Being over 30 certainly doesn't mean you're not doing the exact same thing. I've many unanswered questions about where I'll end up and what decisions I need to make in order to get to wherever on Earth that will be, but I do think that the difference comes in your approach. Life is flux and after years of study, then work, then more attempted study alongside trying to hone whatever talents I think I may have, you realise you already have a life and every decision you make isn't the be all/end all of your existence. You learn to take things as they come and make the best decisions you can and just continue to do so.

Of course, the usual soaring highs and the dramatic lows don't necessarily go away, but the sense of having no direction fades considerably once you realise that at the end of the day, no matter what, you're ultimately heading somewhere. Whether you're following a step by step, year by year plan or simply just trying to make the best decisions you can as the need enters your life, you're still definitely headed somewhere and you're doing your best getting there. So long as you're trying to live your life the best you can every single day, you're headed somewhere and it's most likely wherever you're meant to be.

And when I got home, this was only confirmed. I know to a lot of the people on the trip, the escape from their lives was not only welcome, but one with which they desperately did not want to part. I initially thought I would feel the same, but then as the trip wore on, while I was still undoubtedly enjoying the hell out of all the places we saw, it was hitting me more and more that I only really wanted to put my life on hold for so long. I had things to go back to, people to come back to, a home to return to... I had a life and I realised how much I loved that life when I began to genuinely miss it at a time when I thought I would be reluctant to even come back. Then when I did come back? I was thrilled to be home. I was happy to see everyone - my family especially, but also my friends and my workmates. Hell, I was even happy to be back at work - something I most definitely did not expect when I first embarked on my holiday. My first week back was awesome and it felt so good to be home. It felt good to return to MY life.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The quote above was the source of my new year's post and the rest, a mere mindpath of how I got there in the first place (and once again delayed by a likely bout of self-doubt. Or laziness).

To the guys in The Buried Life - I think I can cross this off my list.

Build a life I won't need a vacation from. 

Check.

"Settling is the ultimate lonely."

- superbly true words spoken by my friend, Rosie.  

In Lieu of Photos - a snapshot of my trip to Europe last year

These boots walked Auschwitz and Birkenau. They also made it out. I am therefore officially luckier than 43,525 people, many of whom’s shoes or boots remain there till this day. #inlieuofphotos #europe2014

The Common Sense Atheist on the Logical Christian Philosopher

'In this post I want to celebrate what Craig and I (currently) agree about. I do this for two reasons:

1. So you can correct me if you think I’m wrong.

2. So atheists can stop wasting time by disagreeing with Craig even when he’s right, and focus on where he’s wrong.'

Luke Muehlhauser on William Lane Craig

It's a bare snippet of what Muehlhauser has to say so I do suggest clicking and giving it a read, however alongside the points made, it's the spirit in which the post was written than I am so happy to share. Modern debate of any kind has only become more and more exhausting because people seem to have no interest whatsoever in actually listening to what the other sides have to say.

Sure, when you go into any debate or any argument, you enter into it carrying your own personal beliefs and convictions which will inevitably colour your response to whatever you're presented with, but too often debates descend into agenda bashing, name calling and outright childish denial of any possibility that those with whom you disagree may actually have, if not a point, but backing for what they're trying to say.

Hence it is more than refreshing when someone, as Muehlhauser has done above, is so willing to focus on where he and Craig stand on common ground so that they can finally stop wasting time on mindless disagreement and actually try to genuinely hash out the roots of their differences. It's not just better debate, it's an actual exercise in real respect, something sorely lacking in so many argument these days.

I've said it before and I'll say it again - I respect the respectful, wherever they may lie on the spectrum of belief and opinion. Cheers, Muehlhauser, from a Christian who respects you and our differences.

Bookfest 2015 - The Chapters So Far

So since my last book infused entry, I have strayed from my original list in a somewhat haphazard game of literary hopscotch. As it turns out, tackling three books at once is really not my forte (Rory Gilmore, I am not), particularly considering the trio I decided to take on included Hawking, Steinbeck and C. S. Lewis - yeah, so I decided to not just jump into the deep end but straight up nosedive into it. Admittedly, Steinbeck and Hawking had a strong start, but once I got into Lewis, the other two were left behind entirely. I finished The Screwtape Letters in a few days and only recently finished Grapes of Wrath after a massive Palahniuk interlude.

Hawking is sadly now sitting on my shelf. Clearly my affinity for physics, the notion of time and perception doesn't translate into as fluid an understanding as I would have liked. Yep, a nice little beating to my intellectual ego there, but I do intend to finish it this year if anything. Hopefully this comes with a finer dose of understanding in an area that only continues to floor my limited grasp of abstract and physical thought. This year, there are a good few more non-fiction titles on my list, books on philosophical history, logic and moral relativism, though I do know historically I slog that bit slower though these despite the fact that I find them fascinating. Sans story (or at least fictional story, I mean, they're all telling a story of some kind), my scholastically challenged brain immediately kicks into 'oh great, learning...' mode, similar to that which plagued me as a student where my appreciation of new information was shamefully nonexistent and left me as an adult in perpetual desire of further study but without the patience or attention span to follow through. Thanks fast food style information age!

Meanwhile, events-wise, A Night with Neil Gaiman was incredible. Up close, the man has a quietly dramatic presence that is so easy to get comfortable with. His languid tones and Fourplay's dark, off kilter melodies married together exquisitely and it made for a brilliant night in. The event having been sponsored by the Sydney Writers' Festival, I am seriously looking forward to May and the Sydney Writers' Festival rolling around again. I've begun sifting through the events and am again faced with the dilemma of having to pick and choose, although that's hardly a complaint. Either way, it's a definite one or two days I plan to take off work in May so here's to the literary cherry-picking.

Anyway, on to the titles!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This book absolutely slayed me. Seriously, what a satirical masterpiece. The interesting thing about it is that despite the fact that the narrative revolves around a character that some will believe in and others wouldn't, it still succeeds as a great critique on human nature because the evils to which it refers are hardly mystical or mythical; things like greed, selfishness, violence and envy are very real aspects of our everyday lives and he drops so much indelible insight into their insidious nature while being humorous and entertaining as hell (pun embarrassingly unintended). I do highly recommend. 

In a complete 180 turn, could I recommend a book any less than Flowers In The Attic? What a horrendous read in every possible way. The story actually could have been quite compelling, but the writing style was vomit-inducing and soapy. I actually can't help calling it a Fifty Shades for the 70s and 80s - sensationalised, highly controversial yet so, so poorly executed you can't help wondering how publishers weren't embarrassed to be employed in its endorsement. The voice Andrews decides to use is clearly meant to be characteristic of a young girl telling a story, but it only comes across as infantile and though I enjoy my emphatic characters (and am admittedly guilty of peppering my more enthusiastic texts with these), the use of exclamations in almost! Every! Sentence! is just tiring. 

[That being said, if I choose to compare it to the bare 40-50 pages through which I was able to slog in Fifty Shades, at the very, very least, Flowers didn't read like a 12 year-old's sad fanfic although this may have had more to do with the fact that fanfiction and its more poorly skilled authors weren't so widely accessible without the internet back then.] 

I have a sneaking suspicion there was a book between Fight Club and Survivor - unless I'm thinking of Guts (read it, I dare you), which I do not count, but purely because it is a short, not because it isn't horrifically brilliant - nevertheless, my attempts at threes seems to shine nicely in my immersion into Palahniuk this year. It doesn't do each book justice that I'm deciding to review them all in one go but for the sake of space and time, I can still try to comment on Palahniuk's uniquely brash and violently graphic style which is well encompassed in all three books. Personally, I found all three quite the experience. Contextually, the least interesting of the three to me was Choke, about a sex-addicted con artist who 'chokes' people out of their money. However as my introduction to Palahniuk, it served well to familiarise me with his quite sharp ability to tear apart the fabric of modern society, something he does disturbingly well in all three books. In Fight Club, I was unsurprised by my perverse enjoyment of the concept of violent self-life-control. We all have a dark side and Fight Club sunk itself cozily into that part of me that could only begin to dream of fighting pain with the furthest reaches of pain itself. I do believe the book earns its notoriety and popularity well as it was a hell of a read from start to finish. I was however surprised to find that I enjoyed Survivor the most and this likely has a lot to do with my own personal religious leanings as the story follows the last ditch attempt for the final survivor of a religious cult to tell his own tale in the most audience grabbing way possible. The book's commentary on religion, modern attention and the constant need for an audience is on point and brutal as is Palahniuk's way and made for a thought provoking read. One thing I did find of interest which may sound like a criticism but is in fact sheer observation, nothing more, is that his main characters are decidedly passive. They do little to nothing to execute change and seem to just let things happen to them, despite their own ruminations about a need to change, escape or fight. That being said, I think this aspect only serves to heighten the air of helplessness that tinges each book - the notion of being trapped, whether it be within society's strangling norms or one's upbringing or one's own rampant inability. I personally found that this only enhanced the literary atmosphere of each story and I genuinely can't imagine the characters being any different and it all having the same effect which I think acts as a further testament to Palahniuk's extraordinary ability to capture and critique.

Despite having another Palahniuk book at the ready, I voluntarily took a break from the hypnotic gloom and decided to dive back into another area of struggle with Steinbeck. Candidly, this book is fucking beautiful. Its ability to draw me so deeply and poetically into the struggle of not just the one family, but an entire era of change and uncertainty and anger left me in awe. As I mentioned in the last reading entry, the first chapter alone sculpted an emotional landscape that would only continue to stun me as I kept reading. The Grapes of Wrath actually now stands as one my favourite titles for a book because it is perfect. Tempting though it is to quote Nelson Muntz ('here's the grapes... and here's the wrath!), Steinbeck's portrayal of a simmering societal rage that only feeds and mutates itself into a frenzy of paranoia and fear still manages to be almost hauntingly beautiful. I am aware that stream of consciousness is not everyone's cup of tea, but that said, I find few other narrative styles have the same power to captivate by sheer immersion. A lack of physical directive helps sweep you along in the emotion which, though abstract, is still paradoxically very, very real and I love that. Next move - look up more Steinbeck.
[Yep, another American author.  Quite honestly, the last decade has almost been like a revolt from my teen years of almost exclusively British literature. Thankfully, I happily enjoy both.]

This story was not what I expected at all. I frankly knew nothing whatsoever about Margaret Atwood and thus had no clue she wrote dystopian tales or science fiction. Quite unjustly, I was expecting a romantic drama and while there were of course aspects of that in this book, it was nothing to the frighteningly painted world of Gilead where the Handmaid resides as a sheer governmental breeding tool. It is the ultimate nightmare for a woman of any kind of conviction where each woman has been assigned a life sentence of inescapable monotony underlain with the danger of the Eyes and told through the eyes of the Handmaid. Despite a personally acquired distaste for the use of flashback, I thought Atwood used it effectively in the story allowing the ability to slowly piece the dark history together while walking through the Handmaid's rigid daily life. It was through study of this book that I came across the term, 'speculative fiction' which serves as a contrast to 'science fiction' and I think the former a decent descriptor of The Handmaid's Tale. There is nothing particularly scientifically fantastic in the story, it simply takes us through a genuinely scary 'what if' and this hit me because something that has always struck me about societies in collapse is how quickly it can happen. One year, people in places like Ukraine, Syria, Iran - hell, countless countries - were living seemingly normal, civilised lives and the next? Hell. This story constantly made a point of the old normality having disappeared so swiftly and easily into the new horror and that notion legitimately scares me. All in all, a compelling if quietly terrifying read that I do recommend.

Now reading; 

I have not yet gotten too far into the book, but I am already happily ensconced in the ubiquitous Eugenides style that I love.

Still to come (just to name a few from the pile):

Yep, shamefully, have still not read these since the last entry, however it has occurred to me that this last day of the Easter break might be a fabulous opportunity. 

And eventually:

Eventually...

On the notion of Belief: Do Science and Religion really have to be incompatible?

'Science and religion are based on different aspects of human experience. In science, explanations must be based on evidence drawn from examining the natural world. Scientifically based observations or experiments that conflict with an explanation eventually must lead to modification or even abandonment of that explanation. Religious faith, in contrast, does not depend only on empirical evidence, is not necessarily modified in the face of conflicting evidence, and typically involves supernatural forces or entities. Because they are not a part of nature, supernatural entities cannot be investigated by science. In this sense, science and religion are separate and address aspects of human understanding in different ways. Attempts to pit science and religion against each other create controversy where none needs to exist.'

The National Academy of Sciences on the compatibility between science and religion

I do encourage everyone to read the rest of that page linked above.

Earlier today, the I Fucking Love Science (IFLS) FB page posted a link about what happens to you if you happened to give up sugar for Lent. I'm always somewhat wary of seeing links like this on IFLS, not because I'm not religious, quite the opposite, but because I've become accustomed to the hostility and mindless bashing that comes with even remotely daring to have the notions of both science and religion in the same vicinity. I have seen it before when IFLS linked to an article talking about the potential discovery of the birthplace of Jesus. Now I understand that IFLS and any similar sites are not The History Channel or otherwise historically informative, but when I see comments like, 'Why are you reporting on a myth', I am filled with a very quiet but very real fury (look up the history for two seconds, honestly). On today's post about sugar addiction that dared to mention Lent, some choice comments included, 'If you practise Lent, there's already something wrong with your head' and 'do people who fucking love science observe Lent?'.

Clearly that first comment is far more incendiary than the second which, outside of my own bias and doubt, could have been genuinely meant. In that case, I will answer it with a resounding yes. Some people who fucking love science actually observe Lent because they are both scientists and Catholics or Christians. In fact, growing up, the majority of priests I knew were scholars in science, most notably physics. Even now, some of my friends who are scientists and engineers are also very devout Catholics who have no problem pursuing science and practising their faith at the same time. Bearing further mention are the countless Christian or Catholic scientists who have contributed so significantly to our modern understanding of the world. How many people know who Georges Lemaitre, Angelo Secchi or Roger Bacon are? Look them up.

[On a personal note, I am a happily practising Catholic with a Bachelor of Science in Psychology (although one who admittedly chose not to pursue it as a career but professionally assists others who have) who agrees wholeheartedly with the use of the scientific method to learn more about the world around us. Any qualms I may have with scientific pursuit usually fall under the umbrella of scientific ethics (an area into which I undertook postgraduate study), often in the area of bioethics (eg. cloning), but such areas are generally contentious and without medical or scientific consensus so I'm far from alone on that count, religious or not.]

Essentially, what is upsetting and angering about comments that immediately jump on the science and religion can't coexist is that these days, some such declarations (not all, I'm sure, but many) are made without having actually attempted to read or research the idea and appear to have become Pop Fact, much like the notion that religion has caused the most wars (again, fury) despite the fact that according to recorded history, only 123 out of 1763 wars and less than 2% of all people killed in warfare have been classified as religiously based, according to the Encyclopedia of Wars by Phillips and Axelrod. Yet, people seem more than willing to blindly accept that religion is a bigger source of evil than outright human greed and territorial conquest and the need for power and control.

Also, from experience, a lot of people who seem to 'love' science, have no damn clue what it actually is. As a Psych student, I was often told by people I knew in the hard sciences that 'Psych is not a science' despite the fact that the method by which I spent a degree being taught to study observable human behaviour was most definitely the scientific method and the statistical analysis that followed (which I have gladly left behind) was engaged to ensure we were obtaining results as statistically significant as possible. We didn't do that shit for fun, we were trying to see if the variables we had manipulated in order to test our hypotheses were actually making a real difference - just like people do in labs. Pardon us for trying to scientifically research something that is intangible and therefore more difficult to assess. To this day, I say those studying cognitive psychology are some of the most creative people I've ever encountered. Being able to construct experiments to test and observe memory? Insanely imaginative and clever.

But I digress. As the statement made above by the Academy of Sciences points out, scientific reason and faith and belief look at things from completely different angles and ultimately, that's how you want to view the world - from as many angles as possible. Considering we live in an age obsessed with pluralistic thought and perspective, it's odd that people are then only willing to engage in understanding the world via one very often flawed means. When journalists investigate a story, attacking it from just the one side or the one perspective, it begs questions of bias, an agenda and a lack of objectivity. Why is it suddenly completely objective to stand by science and nothing else?

I think what people get confused is scientific fact versus scientific discovery and possibility. More likely than not, what many people take on board as scientific 'fact' is nothing more than the replicated results of studies that provide evidence for particular conclusions to be drawn. These are not facts, they are findings that potentially support hypotheses and once disproven or falsified, will be altered. As an undergrad science student, I was trained to write, '... there is evidence to suggest...' ad nauseum. Even in areas of more solid and tangible results, for example, biological or medical discoveries and treatments, there are only so many treatments, medications and therapies that work 100% of the time. As a sufferer of a number of chronic medical conditions, I can at least personally attest to the fact that many treatments that have worked on many past patients have not been able to work on me and I am not alone in that at all. When it comes to science, we do what we can with the knowledge that we have and still test what works and what doesn't. The rest, we take on almost as a form of faith, eg. I have never seen these medical results in others for myself, but I have taken it on faith that the medical community backing these assertions aren't simply lying to me. In that same spirit, I have never been to space, seen the moon's surface for myself or seen the Red Spot on Jupiter with my own eyes, but I have faith and trust in those astrophysicists who have done the research for me.

Now, if someone has no belief or has chosen not to believe in the supernatural (I don't, however, tend to adhere to the notion that anyone chooses what they believe. While specific beliefs can be altered, belief in itself is simply that. You believe something or you don't), then fine, if you have no room for any form of spirituality in your life or are happy in the notion that biological or neurological processes or quantum mechanics are enough explanation for the more intangible aspects of life, then by all means, that is absolutely your call. This does not, however, give you the authority to declare as fact beyond a shadow of a doubt, that those who do believe in a supernatural aspect of the world are either dead wrong and intellectually pitiable because in some cases, the likelihood will be that those people have put a lot more thought into it because that which is intangible bears far more need for thought by nature of its invisibility.

I do understand that there are people out there who have thoughtlessly decided to follow one belief system or another, among them Catholics and Christians, however, this type of believer is not strictly bound within the arena of religious faith. There are blind adherents to scientists, philosophers, hell, nowadays, even celebrities (I'm looking at you, Jenny McCarthy, incidental anti-vax champion. More fury).

Rather than demonise, however, as I've always stood by the notion that everyone believes what they do for a reason, whatever reasons they may be, at the end of the day, by all means, disagree, mock, even, if you really must, but maybe once in a while, instead of burrowing comfortably in your warren of disbelief/belief, ask someone you just do not understand - why?