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jasonlblair.
1. Upon meeting someone for the first time, what do you look for in order to have a positive impression of them? Negative?
Initial positives are someone who makes eye contact and is able to focus their attention on our conversation. Really strong positives are when someone actively moves to make the people they are with more comfortable, such as noticing someone else's emotional state, positioning themselves so they can hear you better in a crowded room, and otherwise being generally willing to spend time on someone else.
Negatives? Seeming oblivious to context, being aggressive in dealings with others, bad or non-existant grooming, and just about any "ism" you care to name. Hatred and ignorance are ugly, ugly things.
2. Pick a famous literary icon that everyone gushes over and tell me why that person is a hack.
Hmmm. Robert Jordan? Nah, too easy. :) In modern fiction, I'd have to say Anne Rice. She can be a decent storyteller, but her writing is so florid you could practically stick it in a vase and have done. She has little to no sense of pacing or action, and her dialogue... ugh. Her books need a plot and a keeper, for as it is they ramble hither and yon like an Edwardian heroine out for her daily constitutional.
For Literature, I'd have to say James Joyce. I know many people are fond of Joyce, but I am not one of them. He could tell a good story now and then, but it was a rare and wonderous thing when he found his way out of the labryinth of his own writings to do so. What I have read of his work left me utterly cold, and made the class a complete chore to me. What others see as being artistic and breaking out of stale literary conventions of the time, I see as being needlessly obtuse and pointless. No Joyce for me, thanks.
3. You are the lead character in a film. Write the scene that introduces you to the audience.
A great sword fight rages between outrageously dressed characters, against the backdrop of a ruined castle wall. The action is furious, back and forth, and then a woman's voice rings out across the scene, "Gerald raced toward Stephen, their blood mingling as they thrust at one another passionately? What the hell is this shit?"
The actors look confused and stop fighting, with the two principal male figures eyeing one other provocatively. The scene cuts to a woman with wild hair sitting at a computer, cursing under her breath and mumbling "thrust at one another with their swords, the blades ringing in the heat of battle" as she taps the keys on the keyboard. She then pushes her bangs out of her face, shaking her head. she picks up her empty water bottle and heads off to refill it.
4. Do you believe in intelligent life on other planets? Why or why not?
I believe there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in Horatio's philosophy (or mine, really), so I wouldn't be surprised at all. Heck, I had SETI installed on my computer for a while, about three moves back. I don't expect we'll find it in my lifetime, though. Interplanetary travel on any meaningful scale is quite a ways off, and interstellar travel is little more than a pipe dream. Until we have those, I don't think we'll be finding anything, because the odds that it'll find us instead are even more miniscule.
As to why, it's because the odds are simply too good for that we aren't an anomoly. We know what conditions best suit life as we recognize it, and we have a number of possibilities for replicating those conditions (albeit they're all too far away to actually check out). That doesn't even count the idea that life exists in forms we don't understand and can't account for (say, under conditions that aren't optimum for us).
5. When you picture an illegal activity, what usually comes to mind?
Theft. Typically from stores or homes rather than muggings.
jasonlblair.1. Upon meeting someone for the first time, what do you look for in order to have a positive impression of them? Negative?
Initial positives are someone who makes eye contact and is able to focus their attention on our conversation. Really strong positives are when someone actively moves to make the people they are with more comfortable, such as noticing someone else's emotional state, positioning themselves so they can hear you better in a crowded room, and otherwise being generally willing to spend time on someone else.
Negatives? Seeming oblivious to context, being aggressive in dealings with others, bad or non-existant grooming, and just about any "ism" you care to name. Hatred and ignorance are ugly, ugly things.
2. Pick a famous literary icon that everyone gushes over and tell me why that person is a hack.
Hmmm. Robert Jordan? Nah, too easy. :) In modern fiction, I'd have to say Anne Rice. She can be a decent storyteller, but her writing is so florid you could practically stick it in a vase and have done. She has little to no sense of pacing or action, and her dialogue... ugh. Her books need a plot and a keeper, for as it is they ramble hither and yon like an Edwardian heroine out for her daily constitutional.
For Literature, I'd have to say James Joyce. I know many people are fond of Joyce, but I am not one of them. He could tell a good story now and then, but it was a rare and wonderous thing when he found his way out of the labryinth of his own writings to do so. What I have read of his work left me utterly cold, and made the class a complete chore to me. What others see as being artistic and breaking out of stale literary conventions of the time, I see as being needlessly obtuse and pointless. No Joyce for me, thanks.
3. You are the lead character in a film. Write the scene that introduces you to the audience.
A great sword fight rages between outrageously dressed characters, against the backdrop of a ruined castle wall. The action is furious, back and forth, and then a woman's voice rings out across the scene, "Gerald raced toward Stephen, their blood mingling as they thrust at one another passionately? What the hell is this shit?"
The actors look confused and stop fighting, with the two principal male figures eyeing one other provocatively. The scene cuts to a woman with wild hair sitting at a computer, cursing under her breath and mumbling "thrust at one another with their swords, the blades ringing in the heat of battle" as she taps the keys on the keyboard. She then pushes her bangs out of her face, shaking her head. she picks up her empty water bottle and heads off to refill it.
4. Do you believe in intelligent life on other planets? Why or why not?
I believe there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in Horatio's philosophy (or mine, really), so I wouldn't be surprised at all. Heck, I had SETI installed on my computer for a while, about three moves back. I don't expect we'll find it in my lifetime, though. Interplanetary travel on any meaningful scale is quite a ways off, and interstellar travel is little more than a pipe dream. Until we have those, I don't think we'll be finding anything, because the odds that it'll find us instead are even more miniscule.
As to why, it's because the odds are simply too good for that we aren't an anomoly. We know what conditions best suit life as we recognize it, and we have a number of possibilities for replicating those conditions (albeit they're all too far away to actually check out). That doesn't even count the idea that life exists in forms we don't understand and can't account for (say, under conditions that aren't optimum for us).
5. When you picture an illegal activity, what usually comes to mind?
Theft. Typically from stores or homes rather than muggings.
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Re:
Date: 2004-02-06 10:52 am (UTC)From:"If there's a god out there, why doesn't he make his presence known by speaking through a burning bush or a booming voice from the sky?" (asked after they have received the radio signal from space)
"I'd say we got the booming voice from the Heavens."
(*again, loose quote*)
I am not a religious person, in any way, but that dialogue, more than anything else I've encountered, made me questions my views of science and/vs religion.
Re:
Date: 2004-02-06 11:53 am (UTC)From:A man lived in an area where flood waters were rising. According to all reports, the rain was only going to continue, and all the authorities recommended evacuation. When some friends of his drove by in a van to get him and some of his things, however, he said, "No need. God will save me." He waved good-bye to his friends and went back inside.
The flood waters continued to rise, and the roads were soon washed away. Soon they were up to the door, and inside the house. To escape them, he climbed up on the roof. An hour or so later, people drive by in a boat. "Come down!" they said. "We'll take you to safety!"
"No," the man said. "Thanks, but God will save me!" The people tried to convince him, but he refused to be moved. They eventually moved on to rescue someone else.
The floodwaters were still rising, though, and were eventually above the roof's edge -- and still rising. He had been on the roof for hours, praying all the while. Like a miracle, a rescue helicopter appeared, lowering a rope and harness to him. The man refused, however. "No! God will save me!" He refused to get into the harness. The rescue team could not force the man to go, and so moved on.
As night approached, the water continued rising, and the man slipped off the wet roof and was swept away, drowning. When he got to heaven, he was deeply confused and distraught.
"God," he said, "you taught us that all we needed was to have faith in you and that anything can be done. When I called to you, why did you not save me?"
God looked at the man, exasperated. "I sent a van, a boat, and a helicopter! What more did you want?"
[i]Moral: Do not mistake form for function, especially where religion and science/technology are concerned. Just because we can understand something does not render it any less miraculous, or any less divine. [/i]