Alternative Transportation
It's true. You can have too many vehicles for exploring the universe. It's kind of like a classic car collection.
posted by jm at 10:07 PM
Friday, October 09, 2015
It's true. You can have too many vehicles for exploring the universe. It's kind of like a classic car collection.
About Me
- Name: jm
I am a brilliant creation of the universe formed from the cosmic protoplasm sailing into eternity. I have two hands, two feet, a couple of great ears, and I'm clipping through life at a moderate pace; minding my p*s and q*s, crossing my t*s, dotting every i.
Previous Posts
- Anyone's Guess
- Galactic Voyages
- Beleaf
- A Frightful Night in the Suburbs
- Good god, Jm. You're getting old.
- 1000 light years from here briefly I am
- Begone-ia
- The Seat of Confidence
- The Vastness of Empty Space
18 Comments:
Looks nice! And I hope that model has a juice bar! I rode in one of those once. Vehicle, not juice bar. Just hitchhiking, not as a permanent passenger.
Most industrialized people do not actually hold onto a vehicle — after all, they need maintenance and will age — but will nevertheless have ridden many more than one vehicle until they've lost count. Personally, I feel that as long as it gets the job done reasonably well, it doesn't matter so much which vehicle unless you have a special application or terrain. I have heard of some who would like to go without a vehicle altogether, though perhaps having exchanges of goods and services with others who travel further in whatever fashion.
I suppose one could consider the vehicle as a technological extension of legs. Perhaps the ability to imagine, too, has a forbear in the experience of mobility, physical or otherwise. Imagination, then, is the ultimate shape-shifting all-terrain vehicle, often extending itself unpredictably into material territory.
" it doesn't matter so much which vehicle unless you have a special application or terrain."
Unless you're a car lover like I am. My 1986 Honda Prelude whines, rattles, and knocks, and I adore the little thing. The leaks are being stopped with Gorilla Tape. Opening the hood requires special treatment, and the speedometer makes a terrible racket at times. But it has a lot of get up and go, and it zips through traffic beautifully. The only real problem is its tiny size. Sometimes people don't see me, like the hapless lady who smashed into my left rear. I'm not practiced in using my horn, but I'm working on it. I'm a huge fan of the automobile. And driving soothes me.
I guess the wheel started all of this and that goes a long way back. Rolling onward. What a sensation.
"perhaps the ability to imagine, too, has a forbear in the experience of mobility"
I think the ability to imagine comes built in, but mobility probably gives it flight and the belief that humans can reach their imagined destinations, even though the frontiers keep moving outward.
Ah, but that's me personally, of course. I have always preferred the air craft or water craft, and the feel of the breeze. On paved lands, I like the bicycle best — probably I feel more connected to the earth and to the forces of nature. And amazingly, your car actually still works and isn't too dangerous.
My brother-in-law very recently said that he will have to retire his car and purchase a new one. That's because he needs a new car to drive to work, drive kids around, etc. and, I don't know the details but the old one cannot be repaired without costing more of his budget and cash flow than a new car would. It was time, he decided, to cut his losses.
He is the hardware lover in the family. My sister has always dated men who have strong relationships with their vehicles, whether motorcycles or cars. She herself absolutely loves to drive except in the heavy traffic that seems to be the unending plague of her commute to work from her verdant suburban neighborhood.
"I guess the wheel started all of this and that goes a long way back. Rolling onward. What a sensation."
And the wheel started with some other thing. All action being part of larger action. The self as action, too. It is quite the explosion of color and form from some perspectives.
"I think the ability to imagine comes built in, but mobility probably gives it flight and the belief that humans can reach their imagined destinations, even though the frontiers keep moving outward."
Indeed. I think everything comes "built-in", or latent as some may say. It may be that it will be found that all of the senses are probably really extensions of one sense, and exists in some fashion in the smallest organelle or, as I sometimes imagine, the subatomic particle.
It truly is amazing that my car still works safely.
It was my mother's and the fact that it survived her is a testament to its endurance.
My mother took nine driving tests before they finally gave her a license. She didn't have any major accidents but she had many minor incidents. Her little orange Mustang had a different color door put on when that came off. She was constantly bumping into this and that, but she got safely out of this life, leaving her vehicle remarkably intact.
The little Prelude looks pretty good for its age and wear and tear. And the Gorilla Tape matches. You can barely see it. Even the foam insulation I used to fill a big hole beneath the gas cap has blended in, covered nicely with Rustoleum.
As long as the sub compact beauty wants to go, I'll drive.
Gorilla tape and foam are wonderful things.
I have heard people claim that the functional level of their beloved so-called mechanisms and other external objects — machines, houses, roads — are directly and deeply entangled with the perspective of the people using them. In that, it is not unlike the health of human bodies.
Magical effects aside, I do find that the combination of focus and patience — of fine attention — is often determinative to the quality of results. And that, too, has to do with attunement to the object or situation at hand.
I could bemoan the loss of hands-on crafts to modern peoples, but perhaps something comparable will take its place.
Absolutely!! Another one of my favorite topics.
"I have heard people claim that the functional level of their beloved so-called mechanisms and other external objects — machines, houses, roads — are directly and deeply entangled with the perspective of the people using them. In that, it is not unlike the health of human bodies."
It's exactly like health. And you are so right about the attunement to the object and situation. Objects are alive in my opinion.
"I could bemoan the loss of hands-on crafts to modern peoples, but perhaps something comparable will take its place."
I find that to be a tough decision. Whether to bemoan or not, that is.
Here's a partial list of one writer's car/body connection.
ENGINE PROBLEMS: difficulty motivating oneself, feeling loss of personal power
FUEL LINE PROBLEMS: feeling undernourished, too weak to continue
COOLING SYSTEM PROBLEMS: running too hot, too much emotion held inside
TRANSMISSION PROBLEMS: difficulty moving forward(aggression) or backward(flexibility)
ELECTRICAL SYSTEM PROBLEMS: loss of power, energy - inertia, fear
LIGHT PROBLEMS: awareness dimmed
WINDSHIELD PROBLEMS: lens we look through is distorted (I would add protection against on coming elements)
PAINT PROBLEMS: self image, analogous to skin system
Speaking of bemoaning....I find it interesting that I constantly bemoan the presence of annoying sounds, and yet my car could well be implicated. I must endure, just like the vehicle. It's teaching me.
Of course, another interesting subject is houses and plumbing problems.
As the body shop guy said, "Gorilla Tape is awesome!"
What an interesting list. I wonder what a flat tire represents! Is it perhaps like "getting off on the wrong foot" or more like the equestrian's half-halt to rebalance the horse?
It seems to me that every piece of Gorilla tape in the world has a story to tell, of events that happened and events that never did.
We automatically construct and sense alternate realities. Our ability to imagine alternate trajectories and outcomes enhances our appreciation of narrative twists and turns. It gives perspective and depth, and makes the real realer. What would it mean to be an individual if there were no diversity of possibility?
"Of course, another interesting subject is houses and plumbing problems."
One time, a college classmate asked me what were some things I most appreciated in my everyday life. He laughed when I promptly declared without a trace of hesitation, "Hot and cold running water!"
Widespread modern plumbing and sanitation are among the best advances, which came about once humanity understood the connection between dirt and disease. Not so long ago in the history of the world, they uplifted burgeoning humanity, with its horses, dogs and cats. Such utilitarian developments paved the way for our brighter, airier, and far more aesthetic environments and lives.
I have heard it suggested that, in future centuries, people will look back at our era and be aghast at our profligate use of water and natural wood. Though I hope that there will still be something like recycling showers, whatever other technological advances there may be. I would not mind recycling steam showers, with built-in entertainment and communication systems; people could perform office work while getting hydrotherapy, assuming that work as we know it will still be a thing.
I often marvel at the magic of hot water coming out of faucets.
Hydrotherapy has preserved my sanity.
Concerning work....I presume work will continue since it's a law of physics. All machines seem to be designed to do something, including the human one.
And no doubt there shall always be hot water ready to hand, for as long as humans love it so.
Ha, there's work and there's work, which is why I qualified with an "as we know it". There's working hard and there's hardly working, as the old joke tells. And some people are retired, while others are still looking. Machines, too, are subject to entropy, and break down.
I am mindful to step lightly in speaking around physicists, though, because they know better than we that the laws of physics indicate that the ability to do useful work is ever decreasing in the universe as potential is used up. If potential is entirely unused, then time does not progress.
The mind of our physicists are unusual things, often venturing where angels fear to tread, into spaces smaller than pinheads and wider than galaxies, and sideways through time and every which way through space. You know Ben Franklin's proverb about watched pots never boiling? It seems that they took it more literally than Poor Richard intended. Their latest feat of wizardry is to stop the passage of time for radioactive atoms -- preventing radioactive decay -- by staring unblinkingly at them, and next they will try putting a single unbroken lifeform -- a tiny bacterium -- in "two different locations" at the same time because "it's cool".
There is apparently no concern over blurring the bacterium's sense of identity. Let's hope they never try that on a human being, for humans are confused enough as it is. Although there would be some advantages to it; I have joked that were there two of me, we'd either get twice as much work done or twice as little, or both.
Perhaps future wizards will spark a new universe from the ashes of the current one when it has run its course, or they will use something like your airborne water craft to cross the cosmic gulf to younger universes.
Yes, yes, and yes. Potential energy is what I had in mind.
So retirement is not what it's cracked up to be. The human machine is still poised for motion and people continue to work at something. Even a poor hearing impaired oldster watching a blasting television is work of some sort. The eyes dart. The mind works, sort of. The hands stay busy, and the mouth often does too.
~ the laws of physics indicate that the ability to do useful work is ever decreasing in the universe as potential is used up. If potential is entirely unused, then time does not progress.~
What a thought. The world coming to a standstill. Perhaps a blast of new potential is in the wings. Alternate dimension anyone? Or does potential recreate itself? Where is its source? What is it exactly?
So staring stops time? I might try that.
~There is apparently no concern over blurring the bacterium's sense of identity.~
The pursuit of knowledge is all consuming. All are food for the laboratory genius.
I certainly love the idea of younger universes. Younger anything at this point.
Maybe if I stare at the fruitfly flying around my computer I can get it to stop. Or it might be my misfortune to have it instantly reproduce itself in another spot.
And humankind progresses. They've moved from trapping beavers to trapping atoms.
"Perhaps a blast of new potential is in the wings. Alternate dimension anyone? Or does potential recreate itself? Where is its source? What is it exactly?"
It probably both expends and renews itself through transformation.
You could construe time as the unfolding of potential.
A substance at uniform temperature cannot be used to drive a heat engine such as used in your beloved car. Like in the taiji symbol, contrast begets dynamism, altered balance precipitates motion.
So, it is possible that our universe is one among a vast infinitude and, like the heat transfers that mobilize your car engine, energy transferring between universes is continually transforming, re-emerging as fresh energy and new potential.
The realm of dreams can be regarded as a child of our physical universe, but one that reinvigorates the physical universe. A curious thing is that dreams can be both private and public, both divergent and convergent; people have sometimes reported shared dreams.
Some mystics go so far as to claim that our consensus reality too is not as simple as we think, that we are ever diverging and converging like overlapping universes, a kind of cosmic Venn diagram, perhaps accounting for at least some proportion of conflicting accounts of the past.
"So staring stops time? I might try that."
I actually tried slowing time, not stop it, as a child through fine attention. It is rather difficult. Our sensory apparatus is naturally geared to perceive change; its normal operation is to leapfrog, so to speak, over units of time. Human energy normally is too broad to perceive the fine motion of an individual atom. So now scientists use machines which can slice time more finely, and a ray of light that targets the atom.
Motion implies that most of the infinitesimal slices of time in Zeno's paradoxes somehow escape notice, else that space-time is granular rather than smoothly continuous. If space-time has a granular structure — like how small dots comprise printed newspaper reproductions of photographs or the images on your computer screen — then there is a minimum length below which smaller lengths cannot exist, and a smallest slice of time that cannot be divided further. Then you have atoms of space-time, just as you have atoms of matter and quanta of energy.
Psychologically, extremely heightened attention causes events of mortal peril to appear to pass slower. The official explanation is that there are more perceptual details to cognitively process in the same amount of time, and so it seems that time has slowed.
But if that is not merely a perceptual-cognitive illusion, then hypothetically you could mentally dive into a single moment of time so that it expands into a vast array of possibilities rather than flying past the focal point of the present moment. People who act relatively "blindly" overlook the openings to alternate futures. They do not captain their souls nor see beyond the horizon and, unlike your post's charming illustration, their watercraft easily take in water and never defy gravity.
"Maybe if I stare at the fruitfly flying around my computer I can get it to stop. Or it might be my misfortune to have it instantly reproduce itself in another spot."
Ha, it is very difficult to scale up quantum effects to the level of multicellular living organisms. Too many atoms. It is like wanting all voters to vote for the same candidate. You might do better trying to influence the fly's brain with scent. Some people bait fruit flies with funnels inserted into bottles containing apple cider vinegar and overripe fruit.
I once heard a woman recount her verbal negotiations with various insect species. In one of her stories, there was a huge swarm of mosquitos right where she and her much younger beau needed to cross a small bridge. Her beau had wanted to retreat but she, being a taoist mystic not prone to conventional thinking, told him that she had A Different Idea. (They nearly parted ways right then and there, she later joked.) "One mosquito", she told the mosquitos as her beau stared incredulously. "Only one bite." She received only one bite, and she let the mosquito drink as long as it wanted from her upraised bare arm. She claimed that she had been so accepting that there was no reactive swelling of her skin at all. She and her beau crossed the bridge without further incident.
I have several such insect stories, too, but in them I do not negotiate. One summer evening, when I and my brother, River, were young, there was a firefly on the living room ceiling. I went and got a step ladder and a glass container. Standing on the ladder, when I moved the container toward the firefly, it fluttered a yard or so further out of my reach. River laughed. I snorted with exasperation, glaring at him and at the firefly.
Of course, I, disfavoring unnecessary concessions, dramatically gathered myself, pointed the jar at the firefly, and commanded it in a thunderous, authoritative voice of absolute conviction. At that, the firefly promptly zipped in a abnormally straight line directly into the mouth of the jar.
River, surprised, guffawed louder than ever. I calmly clapped my free hand over the mouth of the jar and, with all dignity, stepped down the ladder and nodded at River to open the porch door for me so that I could release the firefly outside.
Now, you may reasonably suppose that my shout had frightened the firefly into instinctively seeking the nearest hiding place, albeit it flew toward me who was the source of the sound. And that may be so. Perhaps the actual mechanism is not as important; the thing is to be spontaneous, creative, and intuitively trace the paths of possibility that fan out from the present moment.
"And humankind progresses. They've moved from trapping beavers to trapping atoms."
Indeed. ;-) Beavers trap water, humans trap atoms, and atoms trap electrons. And so it all goes, merrily and gently down the stream.
"contrast begets dynamism"
An important dictum.
Sometimes I intentionally create contrast to liven things up. The problematic experiences serve a good purpose this way.
The perceived speed of time depends on many factors, I think. Often I travel the identical distance and each experience differs vastly. I'm surprised how short it can be at times.
It would be an interesting way to save gas money!
"Sometimes I intentionally create contrast to liven things up. The problematic experiences serve a good purpose this way."
Yes, generally, contrasting experiences instill deeper appreciation.
Time can be rubbery, both subjectively and objectively. Subjective time seems to pass eight times faster at ages 40-80 than it does at ages 5-10. Overwhelming the brain with fresh information (e.g., learning a new skill), absorption in complex tasks or perceiving details (e.g., art, meditation), and putting your brain to work on something difficult or seemingly impossible are excellent ways to keep the neural circuits young, limber and strong — wakeful to the richness of life. When the brain follows predictable routines and habits that bypass fresh perception, that is when attentional capacity diminishes and time seems most fleeting.
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