Meta and Meta

Genius

To be a genius is to be the last one standing.

(As for me, I sat down a long time ago.)

Pity

"Stop feeling sorry for yourself."

To the extent that that's good advice, doesn't it follow that you should stop feeling sorry for others?

Striving for Obscurity

Whitman famously celebrated that he contained multitudes. Me? I hate crowds.

What the "Ought" Problem Really Is

You can't derive  an "ought" from an Id.

Watch Your Grammar

"Things can be different."
"Things could have been different."

Thus a change in tense transforms hope into regret.

Blink

Crossing the moraine,
Forcing cold from my path:
Every saccade gives rise to a new I (a new eye)
And annihilates an old one.

Fatalistic Optimism

Spurgeon said that by perseverance the snail reached the ark.

On the other hand, by sluggish pace most snails get squashed underfoot.

Still, what else is a snail to do?

Getting Stronger's Gonna Kill Me

In the interval between ideal and fate, I struggle against nature to eke out that next marginal victory. So far, so good.

Eventually, though, she's gonna waste me. The best I can do till then is get in a couple of good licks.

Optimistic Nihilism

Nothing matters. So the fact that nothing matters doesn't matter.

Might as well seize the day, then.

Dummy Check

When the contents of minds are at odds, the contents of the world should be consulted.