From: Phillip Gawlowski <cmdjackryan@...>
Date: 2008-04-18T14:43:57+09:00
Subject: Re: Ada vs Ruby

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Tom Cloyd wrote:

| Well, yes. And it's also classical Zen Buddhism - we kill the Buddha we
| meet on the road to avoid being distracted from the road. All
| idealizations and representations fail, and we must endeavor not to be
| taken in. When formalisms are complete enough not to fail, they become
| clones - copies, not representations. Psychologically, this is why
| thinking too much betrays the thinker. The dialectic between
| representation (formalism) and reality is ongoing and unavoidable, if
| one wishes to minimize crashes of all sorts.

Or, on a wider scale, the difference and conflict between perception,
perception of self, and reality (which can be objective, or not), in all
its forms.

After all, every thing we create reflects our self, on one level or
another, be these things physical or not.

I think Plato's Allegory of the Cave applies, too.

"The things which we perceive as real are actually just shadows on a
wall. Just as the escaped prisoner ascends into the light of the sun, we
amass knowledge and ascend into the light of true reality: where ideas
in our minds can help us understand the form of 'The Good'." [0]

| What utterly fascinates me is that this clearly seems to be true in
| cockpits AND people's love lives. That makes it a very good truth
| indeed. My earlier expressed appreciation derives precisely from  my
| delight at seeing the same truth I know well in my home environment
| emerging here in a very different (for me) environment. "Delight" is the
| precisely correct description of my reaction to seeing this, although it
| does not well represent the reality of that reaction. (!)

Well, it is not all that surprising, considering that humans are
involved in all of this. ;)

I share the delight, in a way, from my philosophical background, myself.


[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory_of_the_cave

P.S.: My random quote add on for Thunderbird worries me in its
randomness, producing quotes that somehow relate to the email I'm going
to write..

- --
Phillip Gawlowski
Twitter: twitter.com/cynicalryan

Zen: the sound of the ax chopping. Chopping logic.
~ -- Edward Abbey
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.8 (MingW32)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iEYEARECAAYFAkgINRgACgkQbtAgaoJTgL8xUACeJYr3ZBTf2EPZVfnuvxq8j90O
i8YAn1d+h0yion6otHUmM9Ku2kKEMxox
=D1oT
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----