Thursday, June 30, 2011

The Comeback

Psyche, I never left.

Just recovering from eating my own words with that rant a while back on Green Lantern. But honestly, it wasn’t that bad. Honestly.

More to come if you’re interested. It’s going to be a long summer if I’m gonna stay the same unmotivated, aimless and distracted self. One day it’ll all funnel into something worthwhile, and you can be the first to witness it.

I’ll pay you. In Internet money. I’m serious.

I’m just getting started.

 

Honestly.

Monday, June 13, 2011

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Food for Thought.

Big question, bigger answer.

This is why I’m taking philosophy electives.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
An Atheist Professor of Philosophy was speaking to his Class on the problem Science has with God. He asked one of his new Christian students to stand.

Professor: You are a Christian, aren’t you, son?

Student: Yes, sir.

Professor: So, you believe in God?

Student: Absolutely, sir.

Professor: Is God good?

Student: Sure.

Professor: My brother died of cancer, even though he prayed to God to heal him. Most of us would attempt to help others who are ill. But God didn’t. How is God good, then? Hmm?

(Student was silent)

Professor: You can’t answer, can you? Let’s start again, young fella. Is God good?

Student: Yes.

Professor: Is Satan good?

Student: No.

Professor: Where does Satan come from?

Student: From.. God.

Professor: That’s right. Tell me son, is there evil in this world?

Student: Yes.

Professor: Evil is everywhere, isn’t it? And God did make everything. Correct?

Student: Yes.

Professor: So who created evil?

(Student didn’t answer)

Professor: Is there sickness? Immortality? Hatred? Ugliness? All these terrible things exist in the world, don’t they?

Student: Yes, sir.

Professor: So, who created them?

(Student had no answer)

Professor: Science says you have 5 senses you use to identify and observe the world around you. Tell me, son.. have you ever seen God?

Student: No, sir.

Professor: Tell us if you have ever heard your God.

Student: No, sir.

Professor: Have you ever felt your God, tasted your God, smelt your God? Have you ever had any sensory perception of God, for that matter?

Student: No, sir. I’m afraid I haven’t.

Professor: Yet you still believe in Him?

Student: Yes.

Professor: According to empirical, testable, demonstrable protocol, Science says your God doesn’t exist. What do you say to that, son?

Student: Nothing. I only have my Faith.

Professor: Yes, Faith. And that is the problem Science has.

Student: Professor, is there such a thing as Heat?

Professor: Yes.

Student: And is there such a thing as Cold?

Professor: Yes.

Student: No, sir, there isn’t.

(The Lecture Theatre became very quiet with this turn of events)

Student: Sir, you can have lots of heat, even more heat, superheat, mega heat, white heat, a little heat or no heat. But we don’t have anything called cold. We can hit 458 Degrees below Zero which is no heat, but we can’t go any further after that. There is no such thing as cold. Cold is only a word we use to describe the absence of Heat. We cannot measure cold. Heat is energy. Cold is not the opposite of heat, sir, just the absence of it.

(There was a pon-drop silence in the Lecture Theatre)

Student: What about darkness, Professor? Is there such a thing as darkness?

Professor: Yes. What is night if there isn’t darkness?

Student: You’re wrong again, sir. Darkness is the absence of something. You can have Low Light, Normal Light, Bright Light, Flashing Light… But if you have No Light constantly, you have nothing and it’s called Darkness, isn’t it? In reality, darkness isn’t. If it is, You would be able to make darkness darker, wouldn’t you?

Professor: So what is the point you are making, young man?

Student: Sir, my point is, your Philosophical Premise is flawed.

Professor: Flawed? Can you explain how?

Student: Sir, you are working on the Premise of Duality. You argue there is Life and then there is Death, a good God and a bad God. You are viewing the concept of God as something finite, something we can measure. Sir, Science can’t even explain a thought. It uses electricity and magnetism, but has never seen, much less fully understood either one. To view death as the opposite of life is to be ignorant of the fact that death cannot exist as a substantive thing. Death is not the opposite of life, just the absence of it. Now tell me, Professor, do you teach your students that they evolved from a monkey?

Professor: If you are referring to the Natural Evolutionary Process, yes of course, I do.

Student: Have you ever observed Evolution with your own eyes, sir?

(The professor shook his head with a smile, beginning to realize where the argument was going)

Student: Since no one has ever observed the Process of Evolution at work and cannot even prove that this process is an on-going endeavour, are you not teaching your opinion, sir? Are you not a Scientist but a Preacher?

(The class was in uproar)

Student: Is there anyone in the class who has ever seen the Professor’s brain?

(The class broke out into laughter)

Student: Is there anyone here who has ever heard the Professor’s brain, felt it, touched or smelt it? .. No one appears to have done so. So, according to the established Rules of Empirical, Stable and Demonstrable Protocol, Science says that you have no brain, sir. With all due respect, sir, how do we then trust your lectures?

(The room was silent. The Professor stared at the student, his face unfathomable)

Professor: I guess you’ll have to take them on Faith, son.

Student: That is it, sir.. exactly! The link between man and God is Faith. That is all that keeps things alive and moving!

----------------------------------------------------
That student was Albert Einstein.
Brilliant.

[reblog: fashionchief on tumblr (times like this I wonder if I should convert)]

Monday, June 6, 2011

NEAT.

I’m peering into Stephen Fry’s life, I feel dirty. I never knew any of this about him though. Wanna know why Britain is awesome? This guy, with all of his problems, apparently. He’s still epic. LISTEN.

Parts 2 and 3 are on the related links.

[via awesomepeoplehangingouttogether]

Friday, June 3, 2011

Not tl;dr for once.

Just watched How To Train Your Dragon again. So now I’m gonna give you a list, because I know how much reading you have to do with this blog. I apologize.

My favourite animated movies—Western and Eastern animation—are as of right now:

  1. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time
  2. How To Train Your Dragon
  3. Up
  4. Toy Story 3
  5. Tangled
  6. 5 Centimeters Per Second
  7. Toy Story
  8. Grave of the Fireflies
  9. Monsters Inc.
  10. iunno, The Land Before Time, maybe?

This is not an accurate representation of my favourite animated films, come to think of it. Just the first ones that came into my head. Pixar is always the best, but Dreamworks makes some gems once in a while. And Disney’s newest princess is rightfully deserving of a Top 10 place in anyone’s lists, I think.

Fuck yeah, animated movies. Real life can eat it.

Aurally Audacious Endeavours – The Reign of Kindo

I should be asleep, but I gotta tell you about this band that someone recommended to me, first. Because the more I listen to them and watch them the more I start figuring just how fucking ridiculously talented this band is. I’m not even bullshitting you, this is pretty unreal stuff when you watch or hear them play. Really, it’s not surprising, they’re signed to the indie label Candyrat Records. Other guys on it? Andy McKee, Antoine Dufour—not a bad rep.

If you play an instrument, and know about playing music, this will probably be an even better song.

The basics: that’s what Wikipedia is for. But they’re from Buffalo, they used to be called This Day & Age, but they got a new member and changed their name to this peculiar one. They’ve decided to call themselves a jazz influenced progressive pop-rock band. I call it Jazz Rock, cause it’s simpler. And Jazz is the slickest, coolest, smoothest genre in music.

And that’s what this band is. Sonically, they’re tight as hell. Because what they play is so damn complex all the time, you don’t really notice it, but slowly you pick up on the individual sounds and rhythms these instruments are playing, and it blows your mind—it blew mine at least. The piano and the drums specifically, are reason enough to listen to this band. The drummer is insane. And the piano melodies are the main jazz element in this outfit. Who doesn’t love jazz piano?

The vocalist is the other big point. Off their new album, This Is What Happens, there’s 15 tracks worth of vocals to take in. The sound of this guy’s voice is damn grappling—it seems to form with the sound of the band around him, like a cup. It just fills it all in. Probably has to do with the mixing of the album—in that case, that is some sick mixing (you should hear the snares on this thing), but the timbre and the projection of his voice is just so perfect—technically, and stylistically for these songs.

It’s a versatile vocalist for a versatile band too, they switch up time signatures for multiple tracks, their chords and rhythms are very diverse, and the overall sound is a clean, polished, and cohesive. Everything’s neat and tidy, but its still full and lush

Is it rock? Is it jazz? Is it pop (stylistically, anyway)? Don’t know. Don’t care. It’s awesome, is what it is.

They have 3 releases, 1 EP and 2 albums, their latest is mentioned above.

Check ‘em, folks.

[shouts to Preet for showing me! Thanks, bro!]

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

EPIC Follow-Up of a Fanmade Game Trailer of the Week

Big news buzzing around the computer gaming community on the Internet right now is related to Half-Life, one of the most well-known and critically acclaimed computer (or video) games ever made.

When this video went up, it sparked buzz immediately across game websites, blogs, and gaming news outlets across the web. Why? Well, it’s not because the graphics are outstanding by today’s standards. Half-Life was as game created in 1998. What this independent animator did, was take everything in the game, and polish it up.

Original gameplay clip. Notice any changes between this one and the one above?

As the animator, James Benson, describes in his video, he took 99% of what the game gave him in terms of materials and graphic assets, and he worked with it to create a really damn epic movie-like trailer for a game that just about anyone who plays computer games will know about.

As you’d think. It went big quickly. And when I went to his channel, I realized that this guy had done something else pretty spectacular.

This post from a while back introduced you to my favourite game in the style of a dance-off with a bunch of crazy lookin’ characters. Same guy. Makes sense really. But all those dancing dudes? They all came together.

The common consensus is that James Benson should be hired by Valve Software already (the game developer who created both the Half-Life series and Team Fortress 2). If anybody’s interested, he animates using the program 3DS Max, and yes, it is a program for the pros. I jelly.

Half-Life 3, get this guy on board. 2022!