Mental Masturbation

 

Sex - between friends, and good tips SEX BETWEEN FRIENDS MANIFESTO for good friends who trust each other, are horny, and want to help each other out. Sex between friends should be like a back massage: freely offered, freely accepted doing it once is not a comittment to exclusivity - you won't feel bad if they get/give a back massage from someone else, and vice-versa. no expectations for the future - maybe you will share more back massages in the future, maybe not. if either friend is in a comitted relationship - don't even think about it. Cheating is still cheating, despite the SBFM, and you don't want to do it or help your friend do it. and of course, follow Benji's Good Sex Tips: The key to every good relationship is communication - keep the talk going - what's good, what could be better, what downright hurts, what you want, what they want - ask for advice - people usually know what they like. Make sure it feels good for everyone. Don't judge - everyone has weird fetishes - if you're not into something, just say so. Respect your partner - listen to them, if they're not into something, don't force it on them. Be adventurous - be willing to take risks and try new things. HAVE FUN! If you can't laugh if somebody farts during sex, you're taking it too seriously (unless you're rimming them). Make love with/to the entire body - sex is not just about genitals. Discover your partner's other errogenous zones. Be clean - wash yourself beforehand; it's just polite. Be healthy - I shouldn't even have to put this one here, but if you have any contagious diseases (STD or otherwise) *for god's sake* let your partner know before you start anything! Masturbation is great! -- both as a stress-reliever, and also so that you have a chance to explore you own body. You should know what feels good to you, so that you can tell your partner what you like.

 

Perspective - more! more! more! This ties in to the priviledge thing at the bottom - but I firmly believe in perspective. Keep an open mind and always think about things from as many possible viewpoints as possible. You may not change your mind, but at least you will have considered others' opinions. Learn a different language. The Sapir-Whorf hyphothesis states that people's thought is formed/restricted by the language(s) which they speak. Read about other cultures. Not everyone does things the same way. Just because you've always done it doesn't mean your way is better. Talk to other people. Find out what they think. Consider their background and upbringing. People are different. Expand your mind. Never stop learning. Don't ever think that you know it all. Always look around you and observe every minute detail. The fish is the last one to know it's in the water.

 

Beliefs - none   I believe in nothing, or rather, I strive to believe in nothing. By this, I mean that I am working to free myself from organized superstitious beliefs like religion, karma, signs (omens), etc. To me, these things are all ways of hiding from oneself the truth of reality. By removing these defense mechanisms from my life, I will be able to experience reality as it truly is, and I will further concentrate my focus on the present moment and its direct effects in my life. I believe in my senses. Drugs and mental illness have shown us just how fragile our sensory connections to the real world actually are. People see, hear, smell, and feel things that aren't really there. Despite this fact, doubting one's senses will simply drive one bonkers. I also believe that the universal principle that makes everything work is flow. I learned this in some part from Leroy White, a great musician and spiritual teacher. When you have a problem, the key to solving it is not to get stuck in it. You have to move through the event and flow with it. Similarly, and economist will tell you that "to make money, you have to spend money." I also believe in the power of the mind to create its own reality. The phrase "thoughts held in mind produce after their kind" illustrates this principle. Whatever one thinks about most, be it good or bad thoughts, that's what one will devote one's energies to, consciously or subconsciously. We can easily see evidence of this in the way that stress manifests itself.

 

Morality - none I realized one day while sitting in Bruce Hall's cafeteria (at UNT) that conventional morality (indeed everything we perceive as "moral") is taught by social indoctrination, social construction. Our morals are socially constructed. That is, we believe things are "good" or "bad" because we are taught that they are. There is no absolute morality. There is no absolute, objective "good" or "bad." I realized that by simply rejecting these indoctrinated values, I could free myself of the burden of social conscience. So now I have no (well, very little) conscience. Now, that's not to say that I don't have morals, because certainly I do. I don't go running around killing, raping and stealing because 1) it's just plain rude and 2) I'd probably get thrown in jail. This brings me to my current moral state. In psychology, we learned about the three developmental states of morality which a human (normally) goes through: preconventional, conventional, and postconventional. Preconventional is a punishment-based motivation. "I will not steal a cookie because I will get spanked if I do." Conventional is a rule-based motivation. "I will not drink (alchohol) becuase the law says that no one under 21 should consume alchohol." Postconventional is an ideal-based motivation. "I will not kill my neighbor's pets because it is bad." My new loss of conscience having nullified my postconventional morality, and my personal life philosophy (hedonism) making the second unimportant when combined with my common sense and inteligence, I am thusly reduced to a state of preconventional morality in which I act for my own benefit. Well, wouldn't it be nice if it were that simple? Really, my morals are a bit more complicated than that because in any action I take, I do consider the repercussions. Killing my neighbor's pets would be mean and cruel, because I can empathize with said neighbor, and know that I would grieve greatly if such an act were committed against me and mine. Likewise, I do not steal from people or kill unnecessarily (ie I am an omnivore, and I kill bugs).

 

Political theory - absolute divine manipulation / neo-monarchism
granted:	1) that people, humans, are machine-like (predictable) in their behavior and 2) that the macroscopic correlations we draw between cause and effect of our own behavior are actually just macroscopic effects of microscopic reactions and 3) that humans will behave in a manner they consider "good," regardless of any objective moral code that may exist definitions: good - either a) morally good, virtuous or b) furthering their own desires and pleasure objective - non-relative
therefore:	it is the goal of the ruling body to create and maintain a pervasive moral code which will 1) support the unity and placation of the ruled masses and 2) provide them with the highest "good."
results:	1) single, knowledgable ruler; works through invisible means and knowledge of the inter- and intra-actions between and within the individuals of the ruled masses 2) ignorant masses, hold whatever beliefs they do, pursue their ideals of "good" and continue to function mechanically.
effect:	the resulting society is run by a phenomenon similar to Big Brother in 1984, except that people have no knowledge of the existence of Big Brother. Oh, and life doesn't suck so much. The people need have no faith because their wills are manipulated to achieve the goal.

  

 

Relativity ® Privilege One of my favorite concepts as of late has been relativity, specifically, as it relates to privilege. I realize that I am a very privileged individual. I have never been without food for very long; I have never been abused; I have, for most of my life, been able to surround myself with people who love and care for me. One's values are directly dependent on one's current situation in life. This is why rich people are generally conservative and don't give a fuck about poor people. And equally why poor folks want to live in a welfare state. (Of course I'm making grand generalizations, but it's to make a point.) Because I have lived such a privileged life, I can afford to not really give a fuck about a bunch of starving kids in Africa*. Now, since I have no morals, I will not tell you that this is either good or bad. The point of the observation is to urge everyone to be thankful for everything you have, because chances are that somewhere, someone (or a lot of someones, or a whole country full of someones) don't have it as good as you do. *The fact is that one person can't solve world hunger by working on it part-time. I don't have the time or the resources to dedicate myself to this, or any of a number of smaller problems.

 

Artificial Intelligence Semiotics is the study of symbols and their meanings, and the process of how those symbols acquire their meanings. As a result of studying semiotics and linguistic deconstruction, one realizes that words, by themselves, have no meaning at all. They are simply letters (symbols) or sounds strung together in some repeated pattern. It is only by our giving them meaning, that words convey any thoughts. For any word that one knows, one has a stored collection of facts about that word: what is refers to, how to properly use it, and it's relationships to other words. I think that because our words have no inherent meaning, there is no reason whatsoever why any computer, with sufficient sensory devices, could not become human-like in communication.

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