Category: Random Musings

Speaker for the Dead

Speaker for the Dead
Speaker for the Dead (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

…to understand who a person really was, what his or her life really meant, the speaker for the dead would have to explain their self-story – what they meant to do, what they actually did, what they regretted, what they rejoiced in. That’s the story that we never know, the story that we never can know – and yet, at the time of death, it’s the only story truly worth telling…

Orson Scott Card

When I first read the introduction, I realised that there was a tonne of meaning in it. An eulogy is meant to celebrate a person’s life, and that means more than just delivering positive platitudes about the departed’s character. It would be great to know the actual person, warts and all. They shouldn’t mind much since they are already dead.

Powerful stuff.

XKCD: Traffic Lights

I know that I sometimes feel like this:

Green Pus

Looks tasty – green pus in my finger. I had a pretty annoying finger infection that is currently receding. I’m waiting for the puss to boil up so that I can squeeze it out. Yum!

Expressing Anger

I don’t really know how it happened but I’ve toned down on my blog postings ever since coming back to Malaysia. I can assure you that I do not feel any less anger at things that make me angry, but for some reason, I’ve cut down on the vitriol.

Maybe it’s a sign of age. Men mellow with age – it is known. So, maybe I have just mellowed down a bit. However, I highly suspect that’s not the case but that I’ve merely had other channels to direct my anger towards. There are so many other stupid people to scream and shout at.

I have been blogging actively for about 6 years now. Granted, I have a little less time to do it these days due to career demands, but I still try to write as often as I can. So, maybe this has also contributed to less angry writing.

Also, maybe it’s because I’m now back in Malaysia and drowning in all the political drama until I’ve lost my breath to speak. There seems to be a lot of anger everywhere and in that case, I try to be the voice calling for calm instead.

But all in all, I’m still angry.

I can still feel this rage burning in me. There are just so many things that need to be done to fix things and not nearly enough time to do it all.

But the question is, who am I angry at?

Honestly, myself.

Taking Sides

Why would a supplier of services, like me, ever want to take sides in a business fight?

It’s in my best interest to continue supplying my services to all sides of the fight – as long as I remain neutral and do not take preference on any side. I sell to all at the same price with the same quality.

It’s their problem if their end-product ends up being priced markedly differently.

I shall continue to sell my services at the same price and quality to all parties involved. If they think that they can find someone better than me to do the job, it’s a free market.

Laissez-faire and all that.

PM Elections

I just had this random thought this morning – about how Malaysia might want to have direct PM elections.

In our current system, the PM is appointed by the YDPA based on his discretion on who commands the majority in parliament. My argument is that this is based on the notion that by commanding the majority support in parliament, the PM also enjoys the majority support of the people.

Unfortunately, with gerrymandering and malapportionment, it is possible for a Malaysian PM to command a majority in parliament with under 20% of the popular support. So, this premise no longer holds true. A better measure that the YDPA might use to appoint the PM is a person who can command the majority of popular support.

What better way to get this feedback than through direct PM elections?

I will try to develop this idea further in my law blog, taking into account the necessary Constitutional Law aspects.

Visions of Armageddon

No, it’s not Armageddon. I was just musing to myself, how is the world and the human race, likely to end.

Post-WW2, many have envisioned that a thermo-nuclear war between nations would wipe us out. That’s merely a product of the nationalised thinking of the time and we’ve come to regard that as less and less of a possibility today.

Some have also imagined that humans would end up creating a race of robots who would rise up against us, enslave us and ultimately wipe us out. That’s behind such blockbusters as The Matrix, Terminator, I-Robot, etc.

More recently, some have imagined that we would end up creating a mutagen or super virus in our labs, that when let lose, would eventually wipe out the human race. Whatever’s left behind would not have enough viable genetic material to continue on. Lots of disaster films here too.

However, I thought to myself today, that neither of these possibilities are going to be likely in the future. I think that our end would be ensured when we have war, not fought by humans but by our creations. As a result of this war, we humans would be collateral damage and would get wiped out.

Why do I think so?

No specific reason except that I think that the human race, as a whole, is dumb. We are not smart enough to actively engineer activity that will bring about Armageddon. Armageddon is likely to be an unintended by-product of our inaction.

So, that leaves someone or something else as the catalyst for Armageddon. Why not our creations?