Logic; Not Really That Important

Logic: Wikipedia cites its earliest definition as around 900 years old by Averroes and to simply be, "the tool for distinguishing between the true and the false".

Other definitions include "the formal systematic study of the principles of valid inference and correct reasoning" (Penguin Encyclopaedia); "the science that investigates the principles governing correct or reliable inference." (dictionary.com); and "the science of the laws of discursive thought (James McCosh)"

My favourite has to be Richard Whatley's as it consciously addresses the fact that knowledge is not only the regimented science of truth, but also the beautiful art of explaining it; "the Science, as well as the Art, of reasoning."

Most definitions, though, will agree that logical conclusions are pretty important in our understanding of the world and are a coherent system to analyse our surroundings.

Unfortunately, it seems that some people don't think this to be a good enough system for them, and that their assumptions should be viewed with equal time and respect as the researched views of organisations and experts.

I had, what turned into, a shouting match with a girl who claimed to have heard and seen ghosts in her house – I will admit my usual impartiality and cool-headedness took lunch break without informing me that day.

https://www.facebook.com/ExtraordinaryGhostHunters

The girl said at one point "well if you're going to say that, you might as well discount The Bible then". Not the greatest argumentative tactic to employ against an atheist, but I'll give her that one and move on.

What I can't so easily forgive is her approach to logical thinking. Remembering that almost a millennium ago logic was defined as a tool to distinguish between the true and the false, try to grasp the reasoning behind the following sentence;

"There are some things in the world that can't be explained with logic."

When I heard this, I knew it was a lost battle. There is no way you can have any kind of sensible conversation – let along screamed argument – when the other person disregards logic in their understanding of the world.

Unfortunately, I don't think this is an isolated incident. There are these people everywhere, blindly accepting what they like to think of as true and somehow feeling a sense of righteousness in their ignorance.

The education system is clearly failing if people are leaving school at 16 without any kind of reasoned, unbiased approach to what they read in The Daily Mail, watch on Great British Ghosts or hear in the pub from Tony the local mentalist.

On the topic of Great British Ghosts; what the hell is Michaela Strachan doing presenting this show? She used to do The Really Wild Show – a factual, educational show – and now she's ponsing about with a load of ghost hunters pretending that there's something 'spooky' in an old castle.

On Great British Ghosts website there is a page called Top 10 Ghostly Facts. Well straight away I'm smelling a rat. And the first 'fact' doesn't do much to alleviate this...

"A half-naked, half-frozen chicken haunts the area of Pond Square in London's Highgate!" 

First off, no it doesn't. And secondly, their justification for this is "many have claimed to hear the screeching of a chicken". Well it must be true if the so-called 'many' have claimed it.

They even have to put an exclamation mark to show us how unlikely it is, but assert that it still is definitely a fact.

Also, on a completely separate tangent – a recent work placement boss I had called an exclamation mark an explanation mark. I'd love that if everything that was being explained was rounded off with a '!'. It would just make everything more exciting.

School text books would be incredible, they'd sound like they were those collections of odd facts you sometimes get emailed:

"Your intestine is 20ft long!"
"Adult lungs have a surface area of around 70 square metres!"
"Junior Sumo wrestlers have to wipe the arses of senior Sumo wrestlers!"
"William Shakespeare was died in 1616! He is thought of as one of the greatest British writers!"
"Igneous rocks are formed are formed through the cooling of lava!"
"If a train is travelling at a constant speed of 60 mph, it will take it 7 minutes to travel a distance of 7 miles!"

The Tenacity of Life

After spending a weekend in an Oxford field, not washing, then a week in a plush Edinburgh flat, washing, I'd got used to the highs and lows of festival life. Then, at 1430 of a Friday, I boarded a train from Edinburgh to London Euston, set for Bournemouth later that day. Arriving at 2330 meant that that day provided me with an awful lot of practise at sitting.

I sat all the way from Edinburgh, through Carlilse, Preston, waiting at Wolverhampton for about half an hour, down through Birmingham and Coventry before finally emerging, bleary eyed and with a numb arse, at London Euston. Once, I moved seats, from aisle to window. This excitement happened just south of Preston, and I remember it well as a momentous part of the fairly grey and drizzly journey.

I also shared the journey with a large blob of a man for quite a while. Pleased to have taken the window seat at this point, so his girth could fall into the aisle, instead of being wedged between me and the window, forcing his unnecessary width to steal away inches of my already small seat.

After I finally reached Bournemouth (my London-Bournemouth train was equally boring, so I'll not bother describing its narrative) I returned home to find my peace lily looking rather worse for wear. It was to be expected, as it hadn't been watered in about 5 weeks.

Worried, I quickly plunged it into water and hoped it would recover.

Miraculously, by the morning it was already looking better. It had sucked up more water than I thought possible so I doused it again and went out.

I returned again to find it looking perfectly healthy after 24 hours since the grievous neglect had ended.

My mother sure can breed a hardy plant. Years of neglect and occasional watering in our frigid house has forced these plants to adapt or die.

This fairly small act got me thinking of life itself and how brilliantly tenacious it is. The mere fact that it is so strong is a testament to Darwin's incredible realisation that unsettled the foundations of people's viewpoint of the world.

I've had the following messy piece written on my desktop for months, I've been wanting to do something with it but have had no context to shoe horn it into. I'm leaving it mostly unedited as I just wrote it all in one splurge and I like it that way.

What is life?

A collection of cells, clinging together in each other's best interest.

Religion gives us a sense of importance, the idea of a soul attaches importance and a definite segregation from the world around us.

We aren't devoid of the world, we are inexplicably from and part of the universe. We are, as Neil DeGrasse Tyson says, children of the stars. We are constructed of heavy elements manufactured within the guts of stars which exploded and scattered the life-permitting elements across space and time.

We aren't separate from the universe and looking at it. We ARE the universe, and we mooch about doing universe stuff.

We often see life as a magical thing, some innate force that drive us onward. But this is just a result of Darwinian evolution. Our cells drive us on, in search of food and a mate. That's all we need. Our cells don't know what they're doing. We barely know what we're doing. We just give in to desire and follow a meandering path, flitting from place to place. Be it the desire to glut on banoffee pie or be it the desire to suppress other people in search of some higher sense of worth and success, these desires push us.

God, so claims Genesis, breathed life into man. A life giving wind, a breath that cannot be defined or described scientifically.

No he didn't

What I find most incredible is that this magical breath doesn't exist. Well not that it doesn't exist. That's not amazing, that's just truth. I find life itself utterly beautiful. We are alive, simply because it's convenient to be. It means ours cells will sustain, split, reproduce, feed and die. And yet as the cells within our bodies wither and pass back into the ecology of the land, we continue. The building blocks of us change and are replaced like an infinitely filled, youthful bench in an uncompromisingly complex game of water polo. New players sent on every second; ailing players – having fulfilled their role – dumped and replaced.

We are not so special, what we are is a convenient way for cells to go about this process of production and replacement. Their coexistence is mutually beneficial; the cells that make up the heart pump blood around the body, blood comprised of different cells and organisms, aiding respiration of other cells, ones that couldn't exist without the heart and blood cells. Those cells giving the heart and blood cells an advantage by the symbiotic relationship they sustain.

The digestive system is constructed of cells that need blood, oxygen and energy, so it is useful for them to be contained within a cosmopolitan ape. So they are. The bacteria within our guts are not using us a vessel to get from A to B, they are an integral cog in our bodies. They aid digestion and help us live, just as we let them live their natural lives by proving a warm, moist cavern with a continual conveyor belt of nutrients.

As soon as food passes our lips it becomes simply one more group of cells in an ocean of others. We glide pompously around as if we are special, but we are slaves to our cells, to their needs. Whatever it is that makes us special, intelligent and pompous is not external. It is the lives of these cells, the processes that happen without us knowing.

Life is something so inexplicably linked to prehistoric coalitions of single celled organisms that we forget about it. We unconsciously fulfil urges of our bodies, consuming nutrients that are needed, ignoring unwanted morsels.

It is this mutual relationship of cells that allowed my peace lily to survive. The cells shutting down certain areas of the plant to maintain central processes vital to prolonging life. Almost hibernating, waiting for me to come back and finally give it some attention.

A Little Understanding Of Neuroscience Is All I Ask

My more regular readers – and by that I of course mean 'my father', as I personally signed you up to my email alerts, so I can only guarantee your visitation – will know that I all too often have arguments with people regarding spirituality, religion, the existence of souls, ghosts, and other kinds of made up mental stuff.

Many people believe that we as humans are embodied by something 'other', something not physical that makes us us. Some people believe it's not just humans that have this mystical inner being, and that animals also have this blessing. Although its uncanny how the animals they think are without-soul aren't personified in Disney films, while the cute, furry, fluffy ones that are do, of course, have souls.

As I wrote previously, scientologists attempt to define this with logic, asserting that if you have your appendix removed, you don't become any less you. They claim your body is merely a tool that you use for survival, equally your mind is a tool used to decipher the world.

The hilariously named 'Thetan' – pronounced like Mike Tyson would say 'Satan' – is the equivalent of a soul, but is somehow different from a soul, but the only differing attributes between the two seem to be the arbitrary label attached...

Anyway, this soul's existence is justified by our consciousness and morals, something supposedly lacking in other animals. Aside from this simply not being true, as many animals exhibit morals and clearly conscious thought (see below), the fantasy of a soul has concrete science against it. And yet the myth perpetuates...

Unfortunately, this evidence is no new discovery. The brain cells that are thought to give us consciousness were first noticed under the microscope of  a little-known Bulgarian neuroscientist in the 1920s.

When Constantin von Economo first saw them, he thought they were signs of disease, but over the past century our understanding of them as improved and it is now thought that these cells – as they are present in similarly intelligent animals (dolphins, elephants, chimps, etc) – are a sign of our heightened intelligence, social bonds and moral consciousness.

Various things have been used to differentiate us from 'the animals' and – as with most incorrect theories – they are all slowly falling down, with one of the few claims remaining to be the 'soul'. Surely a decent understanding of the masterpiece of evolution that is the human brain would open people's eyes to rational thought, but I find myself despairing at the continued ignorance of simple neuroscience.

Please stop being mental and start using the brain that you is so incredibly intricate that we're barely starting to understand it.

That's true

Debating Education Reforms

With the news that Michael Gove plans to scrap the current GCSE system and return to a two-tier O level-esque form for examination, I feel that work does need to be done on our education, but not necessarily in these kinds of traditional forms.

About a week ago my attention as drawn back to an encounter I had with a number of well spoken, intelligent young men on the topic of sunburn. The whole palaver definitely taught me a lot about myself and my own debating skills, and showed that they were clearly superior to me.

Something I'm constantly coming in contact with is poor debating and argumentative skills, and this is something grossly skimmed over in our education system.

And this isn't me just being flippant again, I actually think debating is the best way to learn. It's changed a number of my viewpoints and by developing ideas as a group, everyone benefits. I see no reason why it should be so ignored in modern day schools.

Of course, debating improves as the number of debaters increases. Creating large groups of debaters can lead to great pools of knowledge that benefit all involved. These mass debates would allow people to discover new ways of thinking for themselves.

Most importantly, to kick start this kind of movement, a name is needed. As these debates would be doing so on a massive scale, the only sensible label to be attributed to them would be 'mass debates'. Of course, meaning the the participants would be 'mass debaters'.

Now, who would oppose my suggestion that schools would be improved by this breed of mass debaters, keen on interacting with one another and leading each other forward in their own self-discovery? You'd be a fool to do so.

Anyway, the reason for this post is shoe-horning in the following conversation, so take a few minutes to read it. It's genuinely hilarious.

I suppose I should blur out names... Nah, I have neither the time nor patience to do that

Transit of Venus

As our unfairly labelled 'evil twin' passed between Earth and the Sun last night I slept in and clouds blanketed the south east.

I was keen to see the celestial event, but my confidence in BBC weather reports held me back from setting alarms and I'm pleased I did.

Something that this morning's photos of the event have really driven home for me is the three dimensions of our sky. It can become all too easy to see a dome moving around above us, each spot of light a relatively small point of interest.

But, of course, we are lost in an ocean of stars, planets and miscellaneous lumps of rock and ice hurtling through space.

It's easy to forget that the small dot that traversed the disc of the sun this last night and this morning is of comparable size to the Earth and is a world swathed in a thick atmosphere, concealing hoards of volcanoes an uninhabitable heat and pressures.

To my great displeasure I saw that Jonathan Cainer had been chiming in in the Mail's coverage of this story. Telling readers that this visible movement of Venus is benign (thank Christ, because I was expecting it to mean that new love was on the horizon, or new opportunities would present themselves to me and the rest of the world in unison), in a way that almost presented his astrological nonsense alongside the centuries-old science that has studied this phenomenon and used it for logical, scientific, useful progress.

Here are some of the best photos that I've found online...

The dismissible size of this speck reminds me of a favourite quote of mine from Carl Sagan, eloquent and awe inspiring as ever...

We are forgettable and insignificant in the universe. What a privilege it is, therefore, to exist.

Make the most of it, but don't ever think you have some divine right over all that exists, you are mere star dust that was drawn together by gravity. An infinitely humbling fact that never fails to excite me.

The Undeniable Miscommunication of Beauty

A few weeks ago I began an art installation. But not any old art installation. This installation - as I insist it be referred to as an installation - lives.

The Undeniable Miscommunication of Beauty lives, breathes, and it ruins my mother's lettuces.

Today I found another addition so I thought it about time to let you, internet, know all about it.

Here are a few photos of the installations and the meanings behind them...

As this creature shrewdly observes the soil before it, it teaches us that our own actions need not be conscious. We must move and think freely to truly honour ourselves. From whence comes vanity, comes evil.

This stark image clearly tells us about the dangers of high life. As we strive for constant improvement, we find ourselves out of our depth; lost in the clouds and devoid of our roots. Here I placed a flower at the base of the picture to signify the beauty of the past, and the longing for nostalgia.

This angle of the installation was one that caused the most controversy. Some loved the disorientating way that the mollusk loomed over them, but others questioned my motives. I must use this outlet to describe my true intentions: I was desperate to discuss poverty in these pieces, here I spent many weeks honing the construction to address this difficult issue. The looming figure was designed to reflect the insecurities of third world countries in the recent light of first world issues, the backlighting especially - I felt - drove home these points and really helped me to deal with them in my own mind.

A similar angle to a previous piece, but this one significantly different in many ways. Grasp of my subject here was a more optimistic one; by elevating the optimism and opening the left hand backdrop - clearly pointing to left wing liberalism - I hoped to create a hope and desire within visitors.

One of my favourites here; The Lost Limbs of Beauty Once Held really manages to communicate the nostalgia for the present that each of us holds. In our processed and sullied lives, we oft forget the beauty of a day's work and ignore the pleasures of the soul. I set this piece directly into the ground to communicate its grounding with reality and every day life.

Another piece using a mollusc subject here. I felt a true affinity with their ability to act on instinct, I longed to move as purely as them, but I cannot. I spent many weeks reeling in their glory, attempting to escape my complicated mind and into the thoughts of such a beautiful creature. Alas, a bag of bones I remain...

This photo was a time in which the installation properly came to life for me. Within moments of seeing this, I was throw back to childhood; told off for playing on the sofa with my shoes on. The bold movements of my subject spoke directly to my soul and left my speechless. It actually took a few days to recover from this image. I have emerged a stronger man, though.

 

This close up is a snippet of a larger piece I entitled What Is Beauty Within Utiliarianism?, similar to Lost Limbs in many ways, but drastically different in meaning and impact. I really felt that here the strongest areas of impact were colour and texture; by casting away my inhibitions I was able to mould this wonderfully original, and unquestionably moving, product from what was mere dust.

Here we have the conclusion of the installation. Not only in a different time, but in a different space. My work cannot be confined to spaces or timezones. Here one notices a plethora of different images swirling around the central point of another mollusc. Hanging onto a line.

A lifeline. A nylon line. The two become synonymous. Our relationship with materialism has gone too far, we rely on trinkets and objects that hold no worth. We strain along our lines, trying to find new ground to discover, new things to buy and new people to dispose of. We grow distant and forget the true meaning of life; we leave friends behind and search for that new car, a bigger house. Let go of the line, fall into the abyss. The darkness will save you from yourself.

Racist, ill-informed and pointless

Europeans talking in stilted, affected English paired with uncomfortable political motives and racist allegiances. No, this isn't the G8 summit, it's the Eurovision Song Contest. Hooray! I bet everyone's pleased to see it back on our screens.

The appeal of this show has always eluded me, especially British obsession with it. We make some of the best music in the world; producing The Beatles, David Bowie, Led Zeppelin, Queen, The Smiths, Radiohead, The Libertines, Blur, Oasis, The Ashdowns, Arctic Monkeys, Legion of the Damned, Andy Abraham and Paul Potts, to name a few.

So why to settle for, and attempt to compete with, such awful aural bilge?

The fact that most of Europe doesn't help our cause for winning, but I'm not sure we should be all that bothered. Perhaps that's what's going on and I've just not realised. We purposefully send the worst 'musicians' out to obscure ex-soviet states simply so that our real musicians can stay in the studio creating music possible of exciting endorphins amongst the musically educated.

And in this instance, I think it had to be a ploy to remove a rampant paedophile from our streets for a few hours.

Of course, I'm joking. I'm sure Daz's sexual preference is perfectly above board and usually remains within the confines of a farmyard. Please allow me to take this opportunity to add that Daz Sampson is not a paedophile, nor is he an animal molester. I accused him of said crimes simply for hilarious comedy effect which, I'm sure, you'll agree worked faultlessly. Again, the only raping Daz Sampson has done is of the British music industry. Well at least to my knowledge. He might have done some. Saying he's not is just as libellous as saying he has. Basically, I've not looking into Daz's criminal record or counted the notches on his bedpost. I doubt there are many, but I reckon they're all above board.

Another wonderful entry cast adrift from our shores was by a band named Scooch. Apparently we can only have contestants with ridiculous names.

Which leads me nicely into this years' entrant. A man with possibly the worst name imaginable. Englebert Humperdink. His parents mush have been mentally disturbed whilst being simultaneously high, having an unfortunate cocktail of seizures, strokes and epileptic fits, being chewed by bears, crushed by grand pianos made of concrete and choking on popcorn kernal skins when they named him.

His school years must have been wonderful.

Anyway. The Eurovision Song Contest fails to hold any merit in my eyes, and I wish we either canned it in or actually sent some talent out to whichever crumbling European state has the privilege to host.

Daz Sampson is an innocent man.

As is Bill Posters.

Cats on the Internet

The internet is a smorgasbord of pictures, videos and GIFs of cats. As a dog lover, I'm not as enthralled by them all as some might be, but I can certainly enjoy looking at a cat doing stupid things and falling over.

It is strange that one species of animal has so successfully wallpapered the internet with its image, but today I found the sole greatest example of this tomfoolery and why is it the felines that reign supreme over all others. Whilst achieving this incredible feat it also demonstrated why cats, in real life, are a ridiculous example of life.

I hope you agree.

Late addition:

I found this other GIF that is equally brilliant...

Papa's Memoirs

For a recent university assignment I decided to write the most subversive, postmodern, politically challenging, issue-addressing, groundmoving peice of satire the world has ever seen.

It would be an ungodly tragedy to only allow Dr Hywel Dix the pleasure of reading it, so I am here to share it with the world.

Strap in.

Papa's Memoirs

T'was Tuesday last and I reclined in my favourite chair in the study. The soft furnishings supporting my slender figure and the rich, maroon book ends adorned my walls. I had just finished a rather smashing little bottle of brandy and I was feeling drowsy in the flickering light of the dimming fire when a knock came to my door.

Across my threshold, before I had even the chance to respond, stepped a shining young man, his clothes glistening in the candlelight and a slight rustle with every movement he made. This chap surely intrigued me, my irritation at his premature entry was soon forgotten as my eyes danced over his bright clothing with delight. Never before had a Swanson met such a creature, for I would have no doubt been fascinated to read of one in papa's memoirs.

Yet, this alien being stood with mild displeasure and slight discomfort upon his countenance. I greeted him and sat him down with a glass of a disappointing red, for it was to my overwhelming disgust that Miss Whippet had failed to keep the cellar stocked with brandy and my evening's escapades had sucked the cellar dry, leaving only the small supply of Gran Reserva from my weekend in Seville. Bloody swill those Spaniards make, they're good for nothing but sleeping and throwing donkeys around. Jolly good food, though, never fails to make me feel like a peasant, such a rustic and simple people they are.

But alas, we had none other to offer, and certainly none of their unique food, and so my new friend sipped away indifferently, whilst I summoned Master Liveridge to stoke the fire into something more fitting to hosting a guest.

My guest's words came out rather clipped – not clipped like a stern mistress, but clipped from either end as if few consonants were available to his lips. I pondered his origins, possibly from The North, I had heard that they found speech difficult – a result of their hours of solitude whilst mining. But surely this shining, crinkling apparition could have never seen a mine, his vibrancy of colour must have been of the highest quality. Parisian? Thai? Persian? I had never seen such garments before.

He established his name as 'Tony'. This man must have been of the highest status, as after I waited a significant time to hear the family name, he remained mute. In my embarrassment I had to pretend to have known of him, but I fear he saw through my devilishly hidden ploy as he remained apathetic throughout my tales of school days with his father and one summer we spent together, dabbling in homosexuality and hiding from our parents.

For as much as this tale was a true fiction, I became rather attached and somewhat wished my misspent youth had featured Tony's father, Jeremy. Such a subtle and gentle man he was, he called me 'Precious' and it never left me. A true gentleman he had been to me in our short time together. I will never forget him.

Tony, who had seemed uncertain this whole time, begun to try to tell me something. His words were, despite his questionable oral affliction, wholly trustworthy as I know that Jeremy would never fail to raise a honest boy, and the glint in Tony's eye was as strong as Jeremy's was that night under the stars. We snuggled under a tartan blanket as the stars reflected from Jeremy's eyes, and yet the natural sparkle gleamed through the thousands of shafts of starlight that caressed our bodies.

Whilst Tony could see me casting my mind back to this simpler time, he set down his Gran Reserva and lent forward in such a way that told me to listen up. I snapped out of remembering my youthful vigour and fixed my gaze upon him.

Tony produced a leaflet from his jacket. Instantly my expectations of this man grew tenfold. Not only was he dressed in the finest linens man can buy, but it functioned as a subsidiary filing cabinet. My mind boggled at the intricacies of the design, what other secrets did this man hold? I was surely mystified by his continuing complexities.

I inspected the simple concertina publication; pictured upon the front was a far more lowly man, upon his feet were mere sandals and a crude robe adorned his torso and legs. My only thoughts were that this were a charity, to clothe and house the unfortunate, and construct a new legion of fine men – as Jeremy had so successfully done with fine Tony, here.

As I accepted this kind gift Tony begun talking, asking if I know his Holy father. I had never imaged Jeremy to be Holy before, but it explained much of his magical qualities. So, of course, I explained to Tony the long summer that his 'Holy father' and I spent together. After a brief period, Tony begun again and explained that the man upon the paper was his father's son. My heart broke at this point, how could Jeremy have allowed such a hideous mistreatment of one son, whilst the other flourished in utterly beauty within my study's walls.

To cut a long story unforgivingly short, Tony explained to me the tale of the man whom he calls 'God' who is omnipotently and inexplicably both his father, my father and the father of at least three other families which I could name at the time. As much as my mind had been challenged by the previous revelations of the day, I was not prepared for this. I had understood that my father was a lawyer named Anthony, and yet such concrete facts of my life were being cast unceremoniously aside for the new knowledge young Tony delivered to me.

Tony told me of all this things his father had done. He seemed like a far more complex man that I had first assumed. He had not only created Tony, myself, William Johnson, James Lipton from two towns over as well as Oliver Lincoln, but he has crafted the world itself. The stars that shone from Jeremy's sweet eye had been placed there by this fellow. How he managed it, I know not, but I surely knew it to be the truth.

I had such a plethora of questions to bestow upon this man, and yet he seemed keen to leave, and as quickly as this man had entered into my life, he was gone. Left only with the memory of his spectacular clothing and a small leaflet depicting Tony's unfortunate, desert rat brother.

 

Rationale

Papa's Memoirs discusses numerous issues relevant to modern day society; from suppressed sexuality and  religion to racism and class ignorance, it bravely wades into the heart of the issues with no bias based on sociological norms – providing a necessary, unbiased comment, unrivalled by its contemporaries.

Its placement in Fringe Magazine would strongly correlate with the magazine's manifesto to "publish styles and genres that other journals eschew and [...] voices that are not often included in the canon"(Fringe Magazine 2012) as the satirical style and farce-like approach is not as well-used in other magazines.

Fringe's mantra is a modern one – aspirations to change the face of literature after it has become "too realist, monolithic, corporate, print-bound and locked in its own bubble" (Fringe Magazine 2012) underpin a lot of  the writing, this fits well with the approach used in Papa's Memoirs. The postmodern feel that is established through the main character's delusion and diversions is widely aided by non-linear time and a blurring between fact and fiction – something that is strongly influenced by modernist writers like Woolf – and even approaches stream-of-consciousness narrative with the repeating digressions.

The blurring of fact and fiction goes one step further and creates a difficult meaning to grasp behind the main character's mental stability. Freudian work has clearly influenced this piece as neurological issues and sexual overtones drive action – despite the action being merely within the confines of the imagination.

This idea of realism and imagination allows a comment on neuroscience and the interpretation of individuals' understanding of the world around them. Is an imagining – providing it is truly believed – just as real as the world around the imaginer? By providing such thought-provoking questions, Papa's Memoirs would appeal to Fringe's readers and manifesto by experimenting with formal traditions and highly contentious modern thinking.

Class, as an issue, is represented strongly here, but by subverting the assumed norms of society it provides a fresh look at the topic. The main character's affinity for material gain and pleasures of the body are overrepresented whilst Tony's spiritual superiority is largely played down, something all too often done in modern life. By presenting these things in such a way, Tony's superiority is largely overlooked by the protagonist, and the obsession with materialism blinds him to the possibility to find eternal peace with the message Tony brings.

Tony's position of power and generosity is one often played down in the media, working class people are often misrepresented and demonised whilst the rich aristocracy have long been revered. This story reflects the new uprising of displeasure towards this long-established system and strives to present a more relevant society, clearly something Fringe is a keep advocate of.

The aims of Fringe are largely about truth and progress and not merely commercial gain as "nobody is trying to make Money out of it." By having no affiliation to any money-making company, it is able to be revolutionary, frank, arrogant, impertinent and "directed against Rigidity and Dogma". It is "a Magazine whose final Policy is to do as it Pleases and Conciliate Nobody, not even its Readers" (Fringe Magazine 2012), such forthright intentions provide a wholly stable grounding for work to be subversive and radical, much like Papa's Memoirs successfully is.

Bibliography

Fringe Magazine, 2012. Manifesto. Available from: http://www.fringemagazine.org/manifesto/ [Accessed 10 May 2012].

 Wow.

The Bitterroot Footage

A couple of weeks ago Stumbleupon – the bittersweet harpy it is – directed me towards a supposed discovery of old photos and video footage by a New Yorker called Chad – as if his ethnicity was in any question with a name like Chad.

A the story was intriguing and begged for a little more information. Fortunetly, Chad had supplied two dates in the near future when he would 'release' the visual treats onto the internet. I made note of them with the intention of returning to the page on the 5th and 12th to see some more.

My suspicions had already been raised as to the credibility of this story, as setting release dates for images that Chad already had access to wouldn't really help get his story out there. It kept my attention, though, and my thoughts of a corporate, bottom-up advert simmered.

I also found it pretty strange that Chad had bothered getting a domain for his relatively small discovery. He would have had to pay for www.thebitterrootfootage.com and the presence of Facebook and other social media networks allows us to make fan pages and get things out there with no need for payment.

I stuck with it though and, true to his word, Chad uploaded some photos on the 5th. To my great pleasure, a staid cliché was emerging. A hooded figure with a dark face seemed to be our main protagonist.

Still, I stayed with it, the footage has to be something a bit better, I assumed.

The 12th rolled along and, again, true to his word, Chad uploaded the video. For everything I can say against this jock – for I assume he is a jock, no man named Chad could be anything but American and a sports fan – he was reliable. No dates have been set for the future, but I'd be very surprised to see him being late for any upcoming after dinner speeches, mall openings or NASCAR rallies.

We are told 'More info soon', though. I wait with baited breath.

The video itself screams "I'm scary! Be scared of me! I have little material plot or background but, by gum, I'm a little bit spooky! Pleeeeeeeease tell all your friends how weird and spooky I am."

So I did.

What I find funniest, though, is the rather definite lack of attention its getting. Chad's Youtube video has had a little over 50,000 views. A number that would have once impressed me, but in the days where this talentless weirdo gets over 3 million views - 50,000 is nothing.

My own internet video success even dwarves Chad.

This stunning HD footage of a sheep sneezing got over 200,000 on Myspace and Youtube combined. The Bitterroot Footage hasn't got shit on a sheep from Homewood school that's probably dead now.

Oooooh. Spooky. Dead sneezing sheep.

Anyway, I just thought I'd share the failure of this advertising campaign, whatever it's for. Unless it was meant to flop and draw out low quality, cynical blog posts like this one.

That'd be clever. I'm sneaking a look behind the magician's curtain. Although I doubt any media executive would give it the go ahead.

Although someone did OK this advert.

Mental...

Facebook: A Necessary Evil

As the news that Facebook's IPO  (whatever that may be) is already oversubscribed (whatever that might mean) pops onto my Reuters newsfeed, I feel a second Facebook post coming into life. But one rather different from the last, complimentary one, heralding the social network as brilliant and having the potential to communicate far beyond what we usually use it for. Today sees a return to cynicism, I'm sure you're be pleased to hear.

I've been very lucky. My course has given up on exams now, and we're left with the odd assignment paired with an unhealthy amount of down time. I see my friends ploughing through a thick sludge of revision, exams and continuing assignments as this academic year draws to damp close. I certainly cannot envy their position, but I find myself imagining the impossible task it would be for me to now have such a pile of work on.

My left hand now needs no neural signals to type F-A-C-E, whilst my right press the down arrow and enter within a split second. I often find myself with several homepages of the same dull website which now has the sweet delight of numerous updates as I am too quick to thwart a stockpiling by my automatic addiction to regular visits.

In genuinely wish I could sever this tie, relinquish its chokehold on me but – as many friends who have tried – I know that it has become such a necessary evil in our lives. Nothing can be planned without it. Even phones, what I considered to be more reliable than Facebook , have started failing me as responses will only come accompanied by the sweet bloop I have begun hearing even when away from my laptop.

My internet homepage has various feeds, delivering to me the latest news, science stories, TED speeches, weather, the odd interesting photo, amongst others. And yet before I check all of these things I have preselected to be the first thing I see when logging onto the internet, my fingers quickly type out the Facebook URL and once again another day has been wasted.

University is almost two thirds over now, and I really hope I can reclaim my time and spend it a little more productively over my final year. I sincerely doubt that, though...

The problem is that we're all on it. Even my mum pops up every now and again. Even she uses it to remember birthdays. Mums are supposed to have some kind of inbuilt system to deal with that kind of nonsense. Why is Facebook getting involved?

That's the problem, though. It's becoming such a necessary evil in our lives, somehow it's gone one step further than Bebo (who incidently implemented timelines just before they sunk out of favour) and Myspace ever managed, and we all now depend on it for getting by.

There's also the fear of losing everything. Delete Facebook and delete all your photos, old conversations and memory prompters. Facebook would lose so many users if it allowed us to download our accounts. It won't stop me wishing they'll do it at some point, though...

I suppose this post is more about the wasted opportunity of the internet. Not only does Facebook have the potential to communicate for us so well, but the internet – once you drag yourself away from that website that ashamedly sits at the top of your most visited list – has so much more interesting stuff.

Here are a few of my favourites. Enlightened yourself.

 

 

 

 Also look at this brilliant picture I did

I can tell that you're jealous.

Charity? More like Immorality.

I've recently had a bout of writer's block, which I'm sure you're all mortified to hear, although this return to my blog does end your unprecedented period of cold turkey, so well done for surviving this far. It must have been tough for you.

During these past long and arduous 24 days without inane complaints about the flawed world around me (well at least not recorded in the medium at least), I've attempted to find things to write about and time and time again I'd have to turn my back in order to preserve the unrivalled professionalism upheld on this hallowed example of a web page.

Even the recent dilapidation of my body at the hands of flu failed to coax anything interesting out of me. As I hallucinated night after night in cold sweats and spend days barely able to leave my bed, you'd have thought I'd come up with something a little trippy and interesting. But no. Here we are. Stuck. Still stuck in bloody writer's block.

So what you're about to read is obviously going to be incredibly exciting and worthwhile. I'll thank you for reading in advance, just in case you don't bother making it to the end.

Today I was having a lazy day watching TV – because I'm ill, you know – and whilst the current affairs and latest scientific breakthroughs discussed by Jeremy Kyle and his onslaught of big thinkers were utterly enthralling me, I noticed an envelope on the table beside me.

Hidden within said envelope was a free pen. My lucky day, thought I. Conscious of my writer's block, could it be an omen? Something to spur me back into productivity? I took out the pen and sneaked a look, 'British Red Cross'. Why thank you for your kind gift, British Red Cross. That's awfully kind of you, what with all the aid work you also do, you've taken time out of your busy day to send me of all people a pen. Completely free. Gratis. Bloody good of you.

In my bewilderment to British Red Cross's unrivalled generosity, I made the terrible error of opening the jaws of this Trojan gift horse and peered inside.

For what I am able to show you, be warned. Your trust in charities could falter if you read this, so if you wish to remain ignorant of their misdeeds – and by all means do – leave now. For all of our sakes.

An overview of the fetid beast that sits upon my desk now

An uncencored close up of the demonic apparition

Not one drop of ink shall fall from this creature's tip. A foul trick for the so-called British Red Cross – more like the British Red Herring – to play.

This struck me with such horror that I tremble as I write this even now. The cold heartedness of these – and I'm sorry to have to say this – these bastards is unacceptable. To deceive a young, innocent, frail boy (who is recovering from a monstrous bout of flu) is unforgivable. I just hope that no-one of a weaker heart was so thoughtlessly built up before being brutally cast back down to Earth from their small pedestal of joy at human generosity.

I would not go so far as to say you ought to boycott and slander these cruel 'do-gooders' but I think you all know what is the right thing to do. Their actions have left us no other options.

I hate to have to leave you on such a downtrodden note, but my heart tells me that you need no more instructions. Each of you already knows which actions to take, so my work has been done.

Thank you for reading. Stay strong, mighty warriors.

Why copyright infringement and piracy is a good thing

The internet has seen millions of people flexing their creative muscles making mash ups, compilations and remakes of copyrighted work. This new art form can cause days to be lost sifting through terrible fan vid after god-awful obsession-fuelled twilight mentalness. Obviously, I'm not saying these videos are good things.

I'm not a twat.

The recent bill passed by those darn Americans has seen this image go up on one famous hub of damned useful piracy.

I'm sure I'm not the only one to have seen this page recently, but it seems incredibly reminiscent of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty Four, Charlie Brooker's recent Black Mirror series.

Now, as I'm fairly conservative and sceptical of most conspiracy theories and suspicions grown around world events, I find it hard to imagine anything on that kind of scale taking over the internet. But this seems to take a step too far...

As previously stated, there are a lot of uninteresting compilations and poor quality oestrogen-motivated  teenage masturbations to Twilight and other sparkly vampire stories, but there are also some properly brilliant things out there.

I'm not talking about actual good quality videos that are well thought-out and genuinely funny.

I'm talking about the wonders of Video Brinquedo – a hilariously ballsy company that continue to rip of Disney, Pixar and Dreamworks despite reviews such as "the laziest/cheapest movie studio of all time".

There are numerous other videos in the suggested videos tab, so I won't link you to any more videos, but they are properly brilliant.

Video Brinquedo, I salute you.

Jono: The Musical

You shan't be hearing any more from me about Jono: The Sodding Musical, but here is one final update in conjunction with the DVD release.

George and I answer a few questions from our avid fans, with an erratically changing clock behind us. 

I'd just like to thank everyone who's been involved and has lent us favours, time and effort. It's all really appreciated and we're very pleased with the DVD, so bloody buy one.

Also, for our hoadrs of mental fans, here are a few of the error messages we had to contend with whilst simply trying to get the show onto a DVD.

But we are all finished now. Wonderful news. Here are another few pictures of the box itself.

Behold their beauty and splendour!

Visit our facebook page for more information on how you can get your very own, unique copy of Jono: The Musical.

https://www.facebook.com/events/326697477367196/