andrewducker (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
andrewducker) wrote2003-10-22 08:10 am
andrewducker) wrote2003-10-22 08:10 am
(no subject)
I'm really not that interesting.
No, really.
I'm quite introverted, spend most of my time either reading, watching TV or attached to the computer, don't drink more than very occasionally, don't enjoy large gatherings of people (unless they're people I feel comfortable around, which doesn't happen that often).
I do enjoy going walking (providing that the destination of the walk is considered less important than the walk itself), engaging in discussion (providing people aren't going to get too emotional about it), playing computer games (which I haven't had nearly enough time for recently and seem to have largely lost the inclination towards), writing (mostly LJ, fiction doesn't seem to be grabbing me at the moment), playing board games (when I can get the people together to do so) and various similar geeky activities.
I can be fairly amusing in conversation, although I have a regrettable lack of ability to know when to be serious. I can discuss fairly deep things in a fairly logical fashion, but mostly prefer to do so online, where I can see my thoughts laid out in front of me.
But generally speaking, when you get right down to it, I'm just some guy. Smarter than average, certainly, but nothing particularly earthmoving (well, unless we're talking about me in my computing capacity, in which case I'm a god on earth and you should all be bowing down at my feet).
I always feel like people have higher expectations than that. That because I throw out the occasional interesting nugget on LJ or a witticism or two in a conversation that I have to be both a muse and amusing all the time. In some ways I feel past this - somewhat jaded with it all and thus lacking in enthusiasm for many of the ideas that float about, both mine and others. When people raise the fact that money is 'fake' or are excited by the ideas presented in The Matrix or libertarianism or communism (or pretty much any other -ism) I just feel like pulling the covers over my head.
I've had the conversations so many times that I just can't raise any enthusiasm for them. I've questioned the very basis of reality, knowledge and belief…and then I got on with my life. I find myself much more interested in investigations into the complexity of sociology or economics, and how they can be used to change the world. I no longer want to tear down the world and recreate it according to some ideal - I want to take what we've got and see how it can be leveraged for the greater happiness of actual people.
Quentin Tarantino was rabbiting on about his 'big dick' theory of filmmaking, which says that ability is related to sex drive - when you've got that fire in your belly then you do your best work. At some age the drive goes and the directors think "Now I'm not distracted all the time I can really get some good stuff done." And then they make what he called "limp dick" movies.
While I don't want to agree with his general tone or choice of language, there definitely seems to be a transition as people go through life fiery rebellion and idealism to a more complex, compromised view of life. This can then cause youths to view adults as 'boring' or 'dull' because they refuse to take simple, uncompromising stands on what they see as complex issues. I feel like I stepped over at some point in the last few years and now find myself unwilling to take a stand on the vast majority of arguments - after all, if the answer was that simple and obvious, there wouldn't be the vast disagreement. About the only point I'm willing to make a stand on is that existence is vastly complex and there are no simple answers to any of the simple-sounding questions.
Obviously, this isn't a fun or exciting place to be - you won't see James Bond, Luke Skywalker or Neo standing up for doubt and uncertainty. So I find myself feeling slightly sidelined - when everyone else wants to charge out and change the world through demonstration and fighting the bad guys, I want to find out why these people act the way they do and see things from their point of view to see if we can change that instead. It's just not the kind of thing that people write interesting songs about. That's a shame.
No, really.
I'm quite introverted, spend most of my time either reading, watching TV or attached to the computer, don't drink more than very occasionally, don't enjoy large gatherings of people (unless they're people I feel comfortable around, which doesn't happen that often).
I do enjoy going walking (providing that the destination of the walk is considered less important than the walk itself), engaging in discussion (providing people aren't going to get too emotional about it), playing computer games (which I haven't had nearly enough time for recently and seem to have largely lost the inclination towards), writing (mostly LJ, fiction doesn't seem to be grabbing me at the moment), playing board games (when I can get the people together to do so) and various similar geeky activities.
I can be fairly amusing in conversation, although I have a regrettable lack of ability to know when to be serious. I can discuss fairly deep things in a fairly logical fashion, but mostly prefer to do so online, where I can see my thoughts laid out in front of me.
But generally speaking, when you get right down to it, I'm just some guy. Smarter than average, certainly, but nothing particularly earthmoving (well, unless we're talking about me in my computing capacity, in which case I'm a god on earth and you should all be bowing down at my feet).
I always feel like people have higher expectations than that. That because I throw out the occasional interesting nugget on LJ or a witticism or two in a conversation that I have to be both a muse and amusing all the time. In some ways I feel past this - somewhat jaded with it all and thus lacking in enthusiasm for many of the ideas that float about, both mine and others. When people raise the fact that money is 'fake' or are excited by the ideas presented in The Matrix or libertarianism or communism (or pretty much any other -ism) I just feel like pulling the covers over my head.
I've had the conversations so many times that I just can't raise any enthusiasm for them. I've questioned the very basis of reality, knowledge and belief…and then I got on with my life. I find myself much more interested in investigations into the complexity of sociology or economics, and how they can be used to change the world. I no longer want to tear down the world and recreate it according to some ideal - I want to take what we've got and see how it can be leveraged for the greater happiness of actual people.
Quentin Tarantino was rabbiting on about his 'big dick' theory of filmmaking, which says that ability is related to sex drive - when you've got that fire in your belly then you do your best work. At some age the drive goes and the directors think "Now I'm not distracted all the time I can really get some good stuff done." And then they make what he called "limp dick" movies.
While I don't want to agree with his general tone or choice of language, there definitely seems to be a transition as people go through life fiery rebellion and idealism to a more complex, compromised view of life. This can then cause youths to view adults as 'boring' or 'dull' because they refuse to take simple, uncompromising stands on what they see as complex issues. I feel like I stepped over at some point in the last few years and now find myself unwilling to take a stand on the vast majority of arguments - after all, if the answer was that simple and obvious, there wouldn't be the vast disagreement. About the only point I'm willing to make a stand on is that existence is vastly complex and there are no simple answers to any of the simple-sounding questions.
Obviously, this isn't a fun or exciting place to be - you won't see James Bond, Luke Skywalker or Neo standing up for doubt and uncertainty. So I find myself feeling slightly sidelined - when everyone else wants to charge out and change the world through demonstration and fighting the bad guys, I want to find out why these people act the way they do and see things from their point of view to see if we can change that instead. It's just not the kind of thing that people write interesting songs about. That's a shame.
no subject
When far to many people become older (40s or 50s+) they cease to be interested in innovation. I doubt that this is anything more than habit, and I think that this is a trend that needs to be fought.
no subject
I'm neutral, sounds vaguely plausible, but there could be any number of other reasons, even if they are correlated with a particular hormone profile (more test. makes you more confident for one thing)
I suppose somebody somewhere must have studied women, but I don't recall seeing anything on that.
I know where you are, but I can still find things to argue about :-) On the plus side, I have less fear. Maybe less certainty makes for less fear.
Hey! old guy! can you hear this?!
"Andrew Ducker - not as funny as he used to be"
Relax - we don't have that high expectations of you.
Anyway , the LJ demographic is younger than you, of course they're discovering things for themselves for the first time.
(actually, you sound a bit like Bill.....)
Re: Hey! old guy! can you hear this?!
Right, that's it, you're out of my will.
Re: Hey! old guy! can you hear this?!
There goes my only chance of getting digital Tv.
Re: Hey! old guy! can you hear this?!
lengthy response, prepare to duck
that aside, some of your post...
recently i read an introduction to Jung. for all his flaws, he had an extremely positive view of the possibilities of being older, and talked of 'individuation'. I understand that to be something like: having gained a sense of yourself during adolescence, you spend the rest of your life extending and refining that selfimage and moving deeper and deeper into 'what it is to be yourself'.
I realise that waftiness alarm bells may be ringing. (shrugs).
Don't know about you, but I find that prospect quite exciting; I've thought, acted and felt in many directions so far, and I liked lots of them and look for ways of integrating different drives such that I get as much of the things I like as possible. 'The things I like' should not be reduced for the sake of easy argument to 'oh you hedonist' or similar; as far as I am concerned I can like taking a long view and am prepared to have conflicting desires; maybe today's desire is to enjoy the experience of having deeply conflicting desires, or at least to appreciate and accept it.
I'm very interested in Ken Wilber and related theories of development, trying to understand a life in terms of the (always loosely) definable 'stages' passed through by living, and more than that, trying to understand how a life can go wrong (in the sense that the person does not feel any happiness living it (or similar definition of problems)).
I'll try to keep simple and to the point, not easy.
If all of your libido, the fire in your belly, is dissipated amongst the many possible ideas and unresolved conflicts to which you give attention, at some point it will no longer function to drive you forwards, and will be completely used up merely in keeping you where you are. ceteris paribus, there you will stay.
Instead, you might turn your attention to resolving those things which bug you, strongly held principles, things about which you passionately feel 'i am not x', vague feelings of discomfort, familiar but unpleasant patterns of behaviour, that sort of thing.
As you develop, you experience conflicts, overcome them, transcend them, find conflicts of different qualities about different things, do it all again. Different things fuel the fire every time. I don't think that the fire ever goes completely out; otherwise how could there be such passionate old men and women as there clearly are?
also: fuck the mainstream. many want to go out and demonstrate; I've been on a couple of marches, i supported one but not unconditionally, and others i attended or saw made me think about how limited a view you must have to have to think that the march would make a difference... but it still has a point.. but the relationship between them isn't simple...
I just mean that as you develop further, fun and excitement genuinely take on different meanings and it becomes harder to find other people who share similar meanings for them and so it can seem sidelining to get older. But, if you think positively of lengthening life expectancies and developments in culture, you might find that there is a growing mainstream where a different, richer and more complicated set of ideas hold sway, amongst more and more people as time goes on.
Just because such arguments are complex, doesn't mean that the drive and passion that underlies them and gives them force and direction need weaken. yes it's harder to find them and have them, but surely they're richer more worth having now that you've had the matrix conversation a hundred times and could again if you wanted but life's too short?
Transcend and include. move beyond what you were into new kinds of learning but incorporate the previous stuff and make it all your own.
I'm sorry if that came out wrong, weird, etc, or in any way made you cringe. Clearly it's not an easy discussion to have at all, let alone by text and with an almost-total stranger :)
I hope you liked it. Let me know.
no subject
i may have the whole young "let's make the world a good place!" thing going on and occasionall rant about it, but what do i do? nowt.
maybe that's why you';re interesting.. because you can see sides to arguments, whereas a lot of people just won't even bother.