Toadfish Monastery

1. Do you have any magazine subscriptions?
Not at the mo, but at various times I've had subscriptions to National Geographic, OMNI, Wired, Gourmet, Smithsonian, Discover, How, and Creation [art! not religion]. There are a few magazines that I rotate picking up issues from at the newstand.


2. African or European swallow?
This not being a topic of serious study back at uni (nor the premise for any of the above-mentioned periodicals), I consulted the interwebs for an expert's opinion. Ahhh, most enlightening.


3. Who is your favorite piratical figure of all time?
Cap'n pieces o'nine, at thee helm ov Thee Madde Moggies Revenge,  ov coarse! Wot kynde ov kweschunhs arrrgh these, ennyweighs!


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1  Another swell ov Antichristophobia is being trumped up by radical factions here in the YooEssA. Regardless of country, does your local press continue to flog this fear as well?


2. Religious inclinations aside, is there a living person who strikes you as a plausible contender for such a rôle? (can be a politician, entertainer, athlete, religious leader, neighbor...)


3. On the flip side, is there a living person who strikes you as an anti-antichrist? Someone you truly admire and would consider a good role model for the masses?

1  Another swell ov Antichristophobia is being trumped up by radical factions here in the YooEssA. Regardless of country, does your local press continue to flog this fear as well?
No. Even the evangelical periodicals usually limit themselves to warnings about satanical temptation in the here and now.

2. Religious inclinations aside, is there a living person who strikes you as a plausible contender for such a rôle? (can be a politician, entertainer, athlete, religious leader, neighbor...)
Kiko Argüello
Tadeusz Rydzyk
Josemaría Escrivá (while still alive)
Don't trust the wikipedia entries. They are patrolled by their cultists who will remove any negative info quickly.
Other evil persons I could name lack the mass appeal, charisma and persuasiveness for the job

3. On the flip side, is there a living person who strikes you as an anti-antichrist? Someone you truly admire and would consider a good role model for the masses?
It has become a bit of a cliche: the current Dalai Lama. Humble with a sense of humor, not hostile towards science...

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1. Any food allergies?
2. What has been the longest journey (time, distance) you ever undertook?
3. At what height above sea level do you reside?

1. Any food allergies?

If I drink orange juice made from concentrate, I get little welts on my hands.

2. What has been the longest journey (time, distance) you ever undertook?

The journey to figure out where I stand in the universe. (Still on it.)

3. At what height above sea level do you reside?

We're at 875.79 feet above sea level, apparently the same as Tianjin, China. Thank you for making me look that up. It was interesting!





1) Do you think that people in general have become more aggressive in the past year or so?

2) How could you be a better person?

3) Could someone else forgive you for something you have done wrong, or would you have to forgive yourself?

1) Do you think that people in general have become more aggressive in the past year or so?
I do not see any significant changes for better or worse, at least where I am.
Where I see more aggressiveness, I can't say whether the change is only in the attention it gathers or whether there is actually an uptick.

2) How could you be a better person?
Not being me, of course
There are many ways of improvement but the difficulty is to actually take one or more of those.
A cure for real and metaphorical laziness would be necessary, I fear.

3) Could someone else forgive you for something you have done wrong, or would you have to forgive yourself?
It's difficult to forgive one for sins noone knows about (esp. those that are 'mere' thoughts).
And since those are sins, there is low incentive to talk about them.
Forgiving oneself is too often the easy way of the hypocrite (which does not say that I am not a hypocrite).

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1. How would you define marriage (personally and legally)?
2. Does gardening have any appeal for you?
3. What do you think about profitting* from damage done to others without you having anything to do with that damage**?

*not necessarily monetarily
**(including indirectly by being a potential beneficient)

1. How would you define marriage (personally and legally)?
Marriage is a legacy behavior from agrarian societies where life expectancy was rarely above 20 years. It was a tool for subsistence farming in the lower classes and wealth retention in the higher ones, and only until the 20th century was related with sexual attraction between both parties*. As for it's legality, the whole point of the contract was to retain land or wealth, therefore the current push from the "between a man and a woman" crowd is completely anachronistic.

*In the past a man may have been attracted to his potential wife if he had a say in the process.

2. Does gardening have any appeal for you?
Conceptually? Sure, why not. Practically? Not really, it implies an important amount of time for care that is employed in other things right now. If one day I manage to get a pension (and that is a veeeery big If) and have space and enough time to burn I would definitively consider it.

3. What do you think about profitting from damage done to others without you having anything to do with that damage?
I guess that question would go well with trauma physicians getting paid for their services in a war zone. 

Morally it seems relatively easy to spot (as a reprehensible practice like buying stolen goods at bargain prices) but in reality it's harder to determine: ie, is an engineer paid to work on a reconstruction project in -say- Irak doing something morally reprehensible? In other cases an enabling behavior like selling weapons is frequently justified by the makers as the classic "but I didn't shoot those guns!" and plausible deniability becomes the norm. The [in]morality of such cases shouldn't be in doubt regardless of how common such practice is.

1. Assuming that the links between how prone to fear is an individual and his political leanings, would it be OK to make available and give anti-paranoid drugs to large parts of the population? 

2. If that doesn't work would you agree to send them to another planet/moon?

3. Should we start colonizing the moon, Mars and beyond if that doesn't work?

1. Assuming that the links between how prone to fear is an individual and his political leanings, would it be OK to make available and give anti-paranoid drugs to large parts of the population? Mr Green

If it truly is clinically-proven, mentally-unhealthy paranoia and there is a safe drug and those needing it may take it of their own free will, then I suppose it's not so bad. the question is: Would the truly paranoid take such an offer? 

2. If that doesn't work would you agree to send them to another planet/moon?

If they were willing to be sent there of their own free will, but again, being paranoid- would they go? Perhaps if they were convinced they could start a new colony of far-righteous paranoids they may be tempted. 


3. Should we start colonizing the moon, Mars and beyond if that doesn't work?

Maybe that's the ultimate plan, thus the interest in water on the moon.


                           

1) It is the end of the first decade of the 21st century. How do you think it has gone?

2) What do you think you might do with the new year?

3) What do you hope to accomplish by the end of the next decade?

1) It is the end of the first decade of the 21st century. How do you think it has gone?

technically it isn't the end of the first decade. that is next year. there is no year 0 in the gregorian calendar... blah blah... bore bore....etc

personally? not great but I am looking forward to the next one.
generally.... as well as can be expected. Probably not what you would expect to hear from me but we left the last century in such a mess that the face we are all still here is a bit of a miracle!


2) What do you think you might do with the new year?

try to persuade a girl to fall hopelessly in love me :-) try to be happier. genarally aim for smaller, more personal victories instead of trying to change the world single handed.


3) What do you hope to accomplish by the end of the next decade?

well it would be nice to be in charge of everything by then 


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1) what was your best christmas present?

2) Who is your favorite superhero?

3) why?

1) what was your best christmas present?

Half the cost of a rough-haired collie puppy (twenty years ago).

This year, some D&G jeans from someone hopelessly deluded about the possibilities of making me remotely fashionable.


2) Who is your favorite superhero?

Sherlock Holmes.



3) why?

It might be the costume, but more likely the triumph of rational humanism.

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1 When was the last time you hit someone?

2 Do you regret it?

3 Did you win?

1 When was the last time you hit someone?

Not technically hit, but when in hospital on a locked ward (I thought at the time due to madness, but I later saw the sign outside which said it was medical and I now think it was partly due to suspected infection), I tried to escape; in fact, I did escape, dodging through the locked door as someone came in, and made it to the lifts; as in all good films, the lift took so long to arrive (I could see no stairs), that a nurse managed to catch me. The main reason I had escaped was to get to the phone and phone book in the main entrance of the hospital in order to ring someone to tell them I was locked up (I did not know their number and the ward sister would not let me have a phone book). The nurse was not strong enough to man-handle me back into the ward, but we did a deal that he would give me a biro if I went back to bed. (the biro was the first part of a newly formed plan to repeat the escape and was required to copy out the number I needed from the phone book in the lobby downstairs as I realised I would not remember a number). On arrival at my bed, I asked for the biro. The nurse laughed in my face and reneged on the deal. I was so furious, especially at him laughing at me, that I grabbed a glass of water which had about one mouthful of water left in it, and threw the water in his face.

2 Do you regret it?

I do not regret it. The nurses should have told me why I was locked up and they should have seen that I had the wherewithal to phone someone. Even prisoners get the chance for one phonecall. All my human rights were being abused. The nurses in question should be prosecuted under the Geneva convention. I am glad I had the spirit to defend myself.

3 Did you win?

No. I remained locked up until a psychiatrist came and interviewed me and said I could be released. I never got to phone the person I wanted to phone who would have helped me. I did however get to phone the only person who's phone number I could remember - my sister - which was useless as I knew it would be. No one came to rescue me. I was sent home in a taxi with anti-biotics. At no time did anyone explain why I was locked up.

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1. Who would you want to make your one phone call to if locked up in a hospital medical ward?

2. What is the likeliest reason for you to be locked up?

3. Why do you think hospitals have become prisons?

Bumped. Come on Someone !

1. Who would you want to make your one phone call to if locked up in a hospital medical ward?
Locked with just one phone call? Sounds like the kind of situation in which the call is utterly useless, if somebody cares (s)he should be visiting frequently, if not it doesn't matter who you call, you are already alone.

2. What is the likeliest reason for you to be locked up?
The same reasons anybody would be locked, mental issues. Note that there is a difference between been interned and locked, being the latter used for those who are declared mentally incapable to take decisions related to their own health.

3. Why do you think hospitals have become prisons?
I don't see hospitals as prisons other than in the metaphoric sense of the word. For the sick it perfectly may feel like a prison but one preferable to the alternative.

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1. You have the opportunity to fix any personal flaws you have. What personal flaw would you keep?

2. Why?

3. In your opinion, would those who know you understand your decision?

1. You have the opportunity to fix any personal flaws you have. What personal flaw would you keep?

A: Whoa, difficult. I have so many. Maybe I'd keep my nerdiness.

2. Why?

A: It keeps me from thinking I'm too cool.

3. In your opinion, would those who know you understand your decision?

A: Yes, I think they would. My friends tend to be on the nerdy side, as well.



1) Do you have any beliefs you think are worth dying for? If so, what are they?

2) Do you have any beliefs you think are worth killing for? If so, what are they?

3) Do you have any beliefs you think are thoroughly worthless? If so, what are they?

1) Do you have any beliefs you think are worth dying for? If so, what are they?
I've often thought hard about this one. No I don't have any beliefs, but I do have a fact, which is belief connected but in my case is not to do with my beliefs. I believe if I was faced with death for being Jewish I would not deny I was Jewish. Obvious where this comes from, but also quite daft really. Suppose it is connected to race. I think of the chain going back into history (except some ancestors certainly "married out").

2) Do you have any beliefs you think are worth killing for? If so, what are they?  No.

3) Do you have any beliefs you think are thoroughly worthless? If so, what are they?

Everyone must tell the truth at all times. {impossible, nothing is truly truth}

Falling in love with someone available would make my life work for me {impossible, I'd still have ME/CFS}

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1. You are being tossed about in the rapids and have one minute to live before going under and drowning. What would you think about for that one minute?

2. You are facing execution unless you agree to be shot out of a cannon with no safety net. Which would you choose and why?

3. You could live in any country in the world (assume jobs, family, friends all there too). Which country would you choose and why?

1. You are being tossed about in the rapids and have one minute to live before going under and drowning. What would you think about for that one minute?
Any surface, rock or root to hold on? Watch intently. Keep your air. Measure your energy. What's coming ahead?
Essentially I would be fighting for my life on that minute.

2. You are facing execution unless you agree to be shot out of a cannon with no safety net. Which would you choose and why?
Mmm, depends, If I land without safety and they are going to let me die right there from my injuries I may choose to be executed.

3. You could live in any country in the world (assume jobs, family, friends all there too). Which country would you choose and why?
I have some ideas, philosophically I'm under the crazy impression that Sweden is a truly civilized country and I would like to see first hand how that works out. I fell in love with Paris when I was there, it seemed like a reasonably civilized place with plenty of cultural options, plus, it isn't as cold as Sweden . Then again I am Hispanic and perhaps I would like to be back with my crazy brethren, although perhaps not in Bogota, but may be a small town called Villa De Leyva, or if not in Colombia may be Costa Rica, which seems to be a little less crazy (and insecure) than Colombia. 

1. What do you like to cook to show off?

2. If price were of no consideration, what beverage would you drink more often?

3. What worldly pleasure you can't live without?

1. What do you like to cook to show off?
It used to be fettucine alfredo, now I take pride in my (equally evil) baclava.

2. If price were of no consideration, what beverage would you drink more often?
Did you have to ask?     Remy, of course!

3. What worldly pleasure you can't live without?
I am really rather fond of the internets and movies on dvd.
Less tech-intensive, my books .
I *could* live without my beautiful textiles, but why!   


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Are you an "I wouldn't change a thing!" or "I would change things!" type, when looking back on your life?

^ Why?

Would you rather write an autobiography or be the subject of a biography?