I just watched this TED talk by a man who makes up words to describe obscure emotional feelings such as the hunger for disaster, or the fear of achieving your goals... He describes words at one point as 'keys into people's minds.' That's very apt. Language in essence is a form of mind control. I …
How to set the tone
Look at that tree. It's a pretty normal tree, right? I tried to pick a very neutral picture of a tree--one that could be anywhere, with anything going on around it outside the frame. Anything could be happening to the person observing it. How would you choose to describe this tree? That choice should …
Create without conditions
Imagine a cellist playing one of Bach's solo suites. Does he consider his audience? (Did Bach, for that matter?) Does he play the suite differently to audiences of different incomes and educations and social backgrounds? No, the work selects its audience. -- Verlyn Klinkenborg One could argue the above quote by noting that pop bands …
Losing optimism
Oryx and Crake is slowly revealing information as to how the end of the world happened. Now we have learned that health corporations were creating diseases in order to sell the cure. And I tried, but I couldn't come up with one reason why real healthcare corporations wouldn't do this at some point in real …
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
I found myself inspired by the end of this book. The final sentence really wraps it up, and I liked the color it gave to all the preceding (and proceeding?) stories. It's not really a spoiler, but it goes something like this: "Your efforts will be nothing but a drop in the ocean!" "What is …
Jonas David 