Edward Piercy

Brain Dead, Almost

Friday, 25. September 2009, 00:16:12

I was reading a post by Dirk earlier today
in which the
question was raised as to what we would do if we could do
something and be guaranteed that we wouldn't fail.
My thought on the matter there was that I normally don't
think about failure -- I just do it. Which sounds very much
like an old Nike commercial but I guess that's the way I think.

Well that mode of thought has led me recently to go
back and do a review of General Chemistry. The thought
behind that mad plan is that I'd like to go back and do the
3rd quarter of GenChem that I didn't do a decade ago. The
fact of the matter is that I miss chemistry, have missed
it ever since I last took it. I miss its purity and its beauty, the
way it makes me look at the world in an ever fresh way.

So I have gotten my old textbook out and have started in
on it. Chapter One mainly deals with units, significant
digits -- mostly math stuff. Today I covered a section
in the chapter dealing with the factor lable method. I went
through the sample problems and felt positively brain dead.
Math is one thing that is NOT like riding a bicycle. If you don't
use it, you lose it. And I found that my main problem was
my ignorance dealing with exponents. I kept working at it
and kept getting the wrong answers. Finally, after 2 hours
with it, I finally got a problem right. At that point I decided
to quit while I was ahead.

Quit for today, at least. I'm sure there are a lot more dragons
lying in wait for me tomorrow. In any case I made dinner and
ate. And tonight I will watch a little television and try to
rest what is left of my brain after all these years.

DinnerWorldwide Day of Play

Comments

L2D2 # 25. September 2009, 00:55

I loved chemistry is high school. I loved all my science classes, but the chemical equations were always a bugaboo and I had to struggle with them. I took chemistry my senior year in high school when I was 17. And I was madly in love with my chemistry teacher, who was 24. Too bad he was married.

edwardpiercy # 25. September 2009, 01:00

A little teacher/student thing goin on, huh? At least in your mind.

L2D2 # 25. September 2009, 01:32

Well, I was too shy, but was so ga ga he probably had no problem looking at me and realizing I was head over heels

edwardpiercy # 25. September 2009, 02:28

I had a music teacher who was very hot. When she would walk through the cafeteria in her minidress and her 4" platform heels guys would run into each other with their trays. Even teachers.

PainterWoman # 25. September 2009, 03:53

Never took chemistry or math in high school. I took typing and shorthand the first three years and worked part time my senior year.

gdare # 25. September 2009, 04:35

Brain is acting like a muscles sometimes. Figuratively speaking, of course. But it needs exercise. The more, the better. And another connection to muscles: brain is relaxed the most after physical training or any kind of manual work. Very strange organ....

edwardpiercy # 25. September 2009, 05:14

@ Pam

My typing teacher in h.s. was a dork. Fortunately I only had him one summer.

@ Darko

I don't think any of my muscles are being exercised much any more. As for the brain muscles, I think I mainly have more gluts and pecs.

gdare # 25. September 2009, 05:32

Stardancer # 25. September 2009, 06:54

I took more science classes in high school and college than any other single discipline. I love figuring out how things work. Guess that contributed to leading me into manufacturing and process control/improvement, and even construction.

Of course, it probably didn't hurt that I was obnoxiously curious, too--always asking my dad so many questions about stuff that he'd finally just tell me to shut up for five minutes.

edwardpiercy # 25. September 2009, 07:14

I've always been a curious cat myself. And you know what they say about that.

Well you can come here Star any time you want and write for 5x5 minutes. Or 50x. :_@:

(What the hell was that last bit? Damn Blackberry! Damn thumbs!

)

Stardancer # 25. September 2009, 07:58

Yeah, I know: "Curiousity killed the cat."

My mom said that to me once, and I said, "At least she died having known the thrill of discovery."

Right before she smacked me right across the mouth.

(True story.)

gdare # 25. September 2009, 08:27

dantesoft # 25. September 2009, 11:50

I don't know how it works in your mobile browser (OM5?) but WA is a nice site for mathy stuff: http://www.wolframalpha.com/examples/Chemistry.html

Aqualion # 25. September 2009, 16:16

Stumbled upon one of my old graduation papers from secondary school the other day - on religous symbolism, primarily as seen in the works of James, Jung and Fromm. Got an A for it, which is why I kept it. It messed me up. Of course I did understand and also remember some of it, but even so... What struck me the most is, that I actually consider my self as a man who knows stuff, but this coincidence has made me wonder whether I really know anything after all. I do realize that I might have forgotten more than I thought.

edwardpiercy # 25. September 2009, 17:22

@ Star

Well that doesn't sound too good.

@ Dan

Cool. I was just trying to figure out whether I could use it to cheat on tests.

@ Martin

Socrates was a great man, but I think his scepticism applies better to the ethical sphere than to knowlege in general. I certainly cannot see nuch value in going around saying that I know that I don't know or that I don't know what there might be to be known.

Since the Enlightenment we generally seek and define lnowledge by certain basic principles -- empiricism. And while that paradigm may not be perfect I think it gives us the best way to procede, and also posits that knowledge is possible. My personal view is that without that we put ourselves into a world of smoke and mirrors. Which is not a world I want to live in.

And there are plenty of people who would want us to live in that smoke and mirror world, they've been there throughout history and you can see them every day on CNN, fostering ignorance, rejecting truth as we have come to know it, and trying to reduce us to servitude. I reject that.

Aqualion # 25. September 2009, 20:01

Hear ! Hear !

I am often confused and puzzled by how people (like the ones on CNN) define 'truth'. To me truth is something different and profounder than 'reality'. In my book, if somebody tells a lie, he is not responsible for being untruthfull. He is just plain lying, as in saying things arent as they really are. Hes lie is un-real, not necessarily un-truthfull. The truth is something else, something deeper.

I'm not saying I know exactly what this truth is, and I am not sure anybody knows, but most of us have somehow or somewhat a pretty good idea about reality and what is going on in this place.

After all, we all live here.

edwardpiercy # 25. September 2009, 20:19

Yeah, would mostly have to agree Martin. More and more the past months I've been thinking of the universe not as a dualistic entity but as made all of the same fabric. In that sense even such things as ethics and the existence or nature of the divine would be in the same category as (for example) the chemical makeup of methane. If it is all of the Creator, then it seems to me that it all must be unified.

It's just a hypothesis.

As for CNN, most of them seem to claim these days that there isn't really any truth -- it's just all opinion or spin.

Welcome to the 21st century.

And that's B.C.

Thanks for your comments Martin.

Aqualion # 25. September 2009, 20:56

Not at all.

The new truth seems to be Darwin's all over again. It's all in the genes. It's all biological. It is as if the majority of what we in Denmark call 'opinion-creators' - the guys from CNN fx - has decided to just throw the towel into the ring and call it a day. We are just spiralling chords of some renegate DNA, and nothing else. Art, religion, ideology, culture, ethics, philosophy is just rubbish, white noise in the circuits of our minds or repressed sexuality, anger, fear or sorrow.

Androids? Aren't we all?

edwardpiercy # 25. September 2009, 21:04

Nature vs. Nurture. The trend right now seems to be with the former.

In a more monistic view of things they would both be part of the same process.

Aqualion # 25. September 2009, 21:12

I guess the mad scientist has made it easier for him self by teaching his robots to take care of them selves and forget about all those stupid thoughts and dreams and get back to work and not to drink fluid acid (on a daily basis), only use organic axel grease and remember to always wear energy efficient lightbulbs.

As a consequence of this I have decided not to quit smoking.

edwardpiercy # 25. September 2009, 21:19

Energy efficient lightbulbs? I wear LEDs myself.

Aqualion # 25. September 2009, 21:29

Speaking of which: How is it going with that magic lamp of yours?

edwardpiercy # 25. September 2009, 21:32

No success getting it to work.

Yet.

Aqualion # 25. September 2009, 21:45

I have finally given up on that trip to The Land of The Tree fairies I was planning. Since they have started this nuclear development programme and expelled all foreign journalists, I see no chance of going there in the near future. I guess I'm stuck here with all the rest of mankind, which is not that bad, really.

edwardpiercy # 25. September 2009, 22:31

I hear they now have certain centers where they are manufacturing high-grade fairy dust.

I guess we'll just have to make do as best we can.

Stardancer # 26. September 2009, 00:24

Hey, can either of you tell me how to turn this danged crystal ball on? Had it for years, and can't get the blasted thang to work.

edwardpiercy # 26. September 2009, 00:38

Have you tried plugging it in?

Stardancer # 26. September 2009, 02:43

There's no cord. And no place to put one.

: pouts:

edwardpiercy # 26. September 2009, 03:33

L2D2 # 26. September 2009, 07:16

Solar power, Honey. Put it out in the sun.

L2D2 # 26. September 2009, 07:17

It's a "Green" crystal ball, e know.

Stardancer # 26. September 2009, 07:39

All that does is burn the grass.

edwardpiercy # 26. September 2009, 17:32

Maybe it's more of a reception problem. Like satellite TV.

You could try it on top of a mountain?

Aqualion # 26. September 2009, 17:56

I've fondled balls before. Hey, I still fondel balls on ocassions. It doesn't always lead to anything. I rub, I squeeze, I sometimes even ask other people to fondel my balls, and ocassionally something happens, but not always. Never tried fondling green balls, though. In fact I'd get pretty upset if my balls went green.

edwardpiercy # 26. September 2009, 18:02

I really can't think of any response to that one. I really can't.

L2D2 # 26. September 2009, 18:40

I really do not wish to think of a response to that.

edwardpiercy # 26. September 2009, 18:46

There's that scene in that movie with Rodney Dangerfield where he is coaching a girl's soccer team, and he opens up the back of this mini-van and there are all these soccer balls in the back and he says "All I can say is that it takes a lot of balls to play soccer!"

LMAO.