From Plato and Platypus Walk into a Bar...

Here’s another example of a philogag, this one a riff on the Argument from Analogy, which says that if two outcomes are similar, they must have a similar cause: A ninety-year-old man went to the doctor and said, “Doctor, my eighteen-year-old wife is expecting a baby.” The doctor said, “Let me tell you a story. A man went hunting, but instead of a gun, he picked up an umbrella by mistake. When a bear suddenly charged at the man, he picked up the umbrella, shot the bear, and killed it.” The man said, “Impossible. Someone else must have shot that bear.” The doctor said, “My point exactly!"

You couldn’t ask for a better illustration of the Argument from Analogy, a philosophical ploy currently (and erroneously) being used in the argument for Intelligent Design (i.e., if there ’s an eyeball, there must be an Eyeball-Designer-in-the-Sky.)

A Dream Within a Dream

Once upon a time, I dreamt I was a butterfly...Suddenly I awoke...Now, I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly dreaming that I am a man. - Chuang-Tzu

Image Source: Moodflow

Generally, I sleep like a log, and I don't experience many dreams (at least, I don't remember them).  The few I get, don't make a lasting impression.  Though I get them in 3D with 1080p resolution, they are easily forgettable and are mere meaningless dreams - that's all.

But a few months ago, as I mentioned to my buddy Raama, I had an amazingly vivid dream that knocked my socks off.  The content was (apparently) bland, but the imagery was surreal.  It is impossible for me to describe this experience in words, but here is my feeble attempt (in italics).  The setting was our home in Vizag.  

My siesta was disturbed by a snoring sound.  While still lying in bed, I turned slowly to my left, and to my amazement, it was my dad (who passed on earlier this year)! I just couldn't believe my eyes.  I knew that it couldn't be real. But it was! I noticed his chest moving up and down as he was breating.  He was alive! I shook his shoulder gently and woke him up.  I was looking into his eyes and he was looking into mine.  I could clearly see his eye glasses, hairs on his chest sticking out of his banian, texture of his skin, ...all minute details.  Out of utter disbelief, I pinched myself hard on my forearm, to make sure that I wasn't dreaming; I immediately felt the twinge.  So, it had to be real.  In excitement, I held his hand, and walked him into our living room, where my mom and siblings were sitting and chatting with each other.  My mom was shocked to see him.  But my siblings were indifferent, as if it wasn't a surprise to them.  At that point, my dad looked at all of us with a sad expression on his face, and slowly walked into the bedroom (which faces south).

At that point, I woke up with a jolt.  The phantasmagoria was so real that I still remember every detail - the colors, the smells, the emotions,....

I am not jumping to conclusions on supernatural phenomena based on this XP.  It probably was just nostalia.  However, it made me add Freud's work to my "to read" list.  I wonder if dreams are analogous to disk defragmentation!  Perhaps when we are in hibernate mode, our brains archive all important image, smell, emotion, and sound files!  And may be our brain sees some of these files in a random fashion, analogous to our watching of time-warped scenes while fast forwarding DVDs!  

From the movie, The Matrix

[Neo sees a black cat walk by them, and then a similar black cat walk by them just like the first one] 
Neo: Whoa. Déjà vu. 
[Everyone freezes right in their tracks] 
Trinity: What did you just say? 
Neo: Nothing. Just had a little déjà vu. 
Trinity: What did you see? 
Cypher: What happened? 
Neo: A black cat went past us, and then another that looked just like it. 
Trinity: How much like it? Was it the same cat? 
Neo: It might have been. I'm not sure. 
Morpheus: Switch! Apoc! 
Neo: What is it? 
Trinity: A déjà vu is usually a glitch in the Matrix. It happens when they change something.

Clint EastWood's Take Life

Caricature Source: Interesting.....at least to us

From Reader's Digest, October 2008. 

Great stories teach you something. That's one reason I haven't slipped into some sort of retirement: I always feel like I'm learning something new.

There was a time in my life when I was doing westerns, on the plains of Spain. I could have stayed there and probably knocked out a dozen more. But the time came when I said, That's enough of that. As fun as they were to do, it was time to move on. If a story doesn't have anything that's fresh in it, at least for me, I move away from it.

Take your profession seriously; don't take yourself seriously. You really only matter to a certain degree in the whole circus out there. If you take yourself seriously, you're not going to be able to move forward. You're going to be hampered by always wanting to look in the mirror and see if you have enough tuna oil on your hair or something like that.

The Beauty in Sadness

One of my childhood buddies from St. Anthony's High School is faced with an "apparently" unpleasant situation over which he has absolutely no control. While praying for his comfort, I say "apparently", as nothing would turn out to be as bad (or as good) as we project it to be, at the time of trial (or triumph). I realize that words are mere words, and only we know how it feels when things don't look as bright as we want them to be, and no one can really share the magnitude. While I was talking to my buddy, I was reminded of the following content from the thought-proving tome The Book of Understanding: Creating Your Own Path to Freedom.

Can't you see any beauty in sadness? Meditate over it. Next time, when you are sad don't fight with it. Don't waste time in fighting - accept it, welcome it, let it be a welcome guest. Look deep into it with love, care .... be a real host! And you will be surprised - you will be surprised beyond your comprehension - sadness has a few beauties that happiness can never have. Sadness has depth, and happiness is shallow. Sadness has tears, and tears go deeper than any laughter can ever go. Sadness has a silence of its own, a melody, which happiness can never have. Happiness will have its own song but more noisy, not so silent.

I am not saying to choose sadness. I am just saying, enjoy it too. When you are happy, enjoy happiness. Swim on the surface, and sometimes dive deep into the river. It is the same river! One the surface is the play of ripples and waves, and the sun rays and the wind - it has its own beauty. Diving deep into the water has its own quality, its own adventure, its own dangers.

And don't become attached to anything. There are people who have become attached to sadness, too-...

సర్వేజనా సుఖినో భవంతు

Happiness

Simplicity is not grinding poverty: It is not the polar opposite of wealth. To live simply is to pursue a quiet path of moderation. In a life of balance between opposite extremes lies inner happiness.

People everywhere, in their quest for happiness outside themselves, discover in the end that they’ve been seeking it in an empty cornucopia, and sucking feverishly at the rim of a crystal glass into which was never poured the wine of joy.