So, I’m still thinking about the past and the future. There’s a few things I’ve been thinking about. I did a little research, to see what other people thought about the topic, turns out people are at least thinking about the topic.

When talking about the past, I can look at it two ways. First, the past must exist because it has an effect on the present. If someone pissed me off today, I might still be mad about right now, so it must exist still. Alternately, it is really truly only my memory that causes the past to “exist,” in which case, it doesn’t really exist at all, since a memory is not a physical thing TO exist.

This made me think about a man called Ronald Mallett, a physicist that wants to build a time machine. I learned about his research in a physics class a couple years ago. He is currently a professor at the University of Connecticut, but he’s pretty famous beyond the university. In a documentary on his work, I think it was “The World’s First Time Machine” (BBC/Discovery Channel documentary), he talked about his theories that if he were to build a time machine, he would only be able to cause particles to travel back to the time that the machine was turned on, essentially, otherwise, there would be nowhere to send the particles back to.

He also theorizes that if he were to turn the machine on, he could potentially begin to receive particles immediately, as he may be sending himself some from the future back to the point in time when he turned it on. Philosophically speaking, if there is no past and no future, then a time machine would indeed be completely worthless, it would really just be a machine that causes you to continue doing whatever you’re doing, it would essentially also not exist. This makes me think that Ronald Mallett should speak at my fake symposium.

When thinking about the future, Roger Ruddle wrote an essay that talked about God, of course. He was talking about how if God can exist everywhere, then God could exist in different places simultaneously and thusly could exist in different times simultaneously. This is a contradiction, of course, because nothing can exist in two different times at the same time (the phrase itself being the contradiction). Not sure how useful this information will be in my research, but it was still interesting to read at least.

I’m also tempted to look further into the Theory of Relativity, but I feel like this might be meddling a little bit too far into the realm of time alone, rather than existence within time, so I’m still a little undecided on that.

Well, at least I consider this bit of research a success in that I have solidified at least one guest speaker for the conference.

Well, quite literally thinking about the future, not mine, not yours, just the future in general. I mean, what is it? Does it really exist? Is it entirely theory? “Future” is certainly a noun, right? A direct object even. But not really, in my opinion. I think the future which extends beyond the length of your life doesn’t exist. I suppose this is speaking relatively, but I think it could make for a good argument.

First, a little background. The reason this comes up is because we’re starting a project in Design 2 that requires us to invent a symposium (if you will) that is called “The future is not what it used to be.” Here’s the exact project:

“You are hereby provided with a title for a symposium. Basically speaking, you are given the very beginning and a framework - based on your own interests you will furnish content/theme. THE FUTURE IS NOT WHAT IT USED TO BE is a hypothetical symposium - you can make this conference about art, film, fashion, culture, ecology - to name a few possibilities - which are endless.

In relation to this symposium you will design:
01/Visual identity for symposium
02/Poster - to function in flat form and also as a self mailer
03/DVD + CD packaging [these can be two separate items or combined as one package]
04/A short teaser booklet

In implementing and accomplishing the above you need establish a place + time - furnish a paragraph describing intent of symposium and provide names + titles and lecture information etc. Remember you are the designer, the author, the planner and the editor in this project.”

So that’s the whole idea of the project, if that makes any sense. The other part of it is that he wants us to take into consideration the idea of self and time into our process of considering the future. Which lead to me thinking about the future, which is where we started here, see my drift?

So in thinking about the future, I was thinking about it in terms of a philosophical argument sort of symposium. The two sides would be considering the idea of the future as it exists immediately (to you that is, since everyone has a different future for 10 seconds from now), the idea of a future that happens after your life, and the idea that the future doesn’t exist beyond the span of your individual life, since for you, technically, it doesn’t.

To the idea of a future beyond what your lifespan is, I would say, “If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, did it make a sound?” And to the idea of a lack of future due to your lack of existence I would say, “Was there no past prior to your birth?” I think there could be steady argument either way on the matter, I mean, of course the tree makes a sound, right? And what if everyone has lied to you about the “past?” I mean, of course it’s entirely a philosophical discussion, but I think if I were going to hold my own symposium I would want to hear some strong, relevant, valid arguments from either side and I would have a lot of fun listening to some philosophers battle it out in lecture form rather than book/article form. Who wouldn’t? This will, of course, make the project that much more difficult for me, but you know, I think the harder it is, the more I will learn from it.

I mean really, why am I paying to be here?

So today was a good day. I didn’t do anything at all, I really just sat around in front of a computer and looked pretty. And speaking of sitting around and looking pretty, that’s what I’m going to get paid to do. I’m talking about figure modeling of course. All you have to do is take off all your clothes and sit and be drawn and get paid $15/hour. It’s a great deal if you ask me. My mom seems to think otherwise, but hey, whatever. It’s not her that has to do it anyways.

As far as classes have been going, they’re all pointless. Today, I spent 6 hours in a single room in front of a single computer and did approximately 10 seconds worth of actual work. My professors are making it a point to not do anything useful, they actually don’t even always show up on time, or at all as it were. So you see, college is a bit like real life, except you have far more free time and far less clothing on (and the food comes in endless, free supply, but of poor quality).

So today I got to thinking that maybe I should start a blog. It would give me somewhere to talk my thoughts through (in a manner of speaking) and then I could maybe expand on them better. I mean, don’t get me wrong, staring at a wall has it’s value, but I feel like putting things into words might work better. And don’t get me wrong, because I mean, I have a journal, and I write in it fairly regularly, but it’s just that not everything is journal worthy (in the same way that not everything should be posted on the internet) so I figure this could be a quick way to either send out updates to anyone who cares or just generally talk about life and what I think of it. I don’t expect anyone will read this, but I think it could be worthwhile just for me to have as an avenue whether I decide to use it regularly or not.

My worry, of course, is a. I will put something in here that is too personal and I didn’t mean to, or b. I will think of it like I think of my digital camera, nice to have, but I hate actually bringing it anywhere (so I never use it, do you see where I’m going with this?) In any case, I will try to make it a point to do neither of those things for two reasons, a. because you don’t want to hear the personal things anyways, because either you don’t know me or you don’t care, and either way, and b. because unlike my digital camera, I feel like this could have a purpose for me. So there you have it. If you dare, enjoy.