Profile for Synergy
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Displayed name | Synergy |
| Member number | 6292 |
| Title | Shaper |
| Postcount | 2009 |
| Homepage | |
| Registered | Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
Recent posts
Pages
| Author | Recent posts |
|---|---|
| The War on Christmas in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Thursday, December 13 2007 19:59
Profile
Even über-Christian Ned Flanders greets people with "Heidely-ho-dely, neighborino." -S- Gah, can't type rite today. [ Thursday, December 13, 2007 20:00: Message edited by: Synergy ] -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • N:R Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items • A5 Map Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Omaha Mall Shooting in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Thursday, December 13 2007 19:35
Profile
I've noticed something. These discussions where Stillness (or anyone) represents pretty much one entire side of an argument, and everyone else represents divergent points of view, makes for highly unsatisfying discourse. There is no satisfactory dialog with anyone who bases their belief about the nature and quality of all things on the Bible or a religious text. The answers are already perceived to have been given and set in stone. There is about a zero percent likelihood of alternate possibilities or even just interpretations being entertained. To do so is to destroy one's whole foundation of belief, being, and perception of safety in their world. So, what did you expect? If the laws of some ancient Semites claimed God said homosexuality is an abomination, and someone 4000 years later sees that relic as God's pronouncement for all humankind and all time, well, how are you going to argue with that kind of devotion to the enlightened and non-discriminatory beliefs of ancient people who spent a lot of time killing or being killed by their Caananite neighbors? Why not be a categorical discriminator if you follow the Bible lock and stock? You have God as your model, the greatest Discriminator of all: He apparently only spoke his truth and offered his graces for millennia to some wayward, bloody tribes in Mesopotamia, and ignored the rest of humankind. God is the Great Discriminator of ancient Palestine. Why should the modern day devotees of this ancient "enlightened" religion be anything other? -S- [ Thursday, December 13, 2007 19:46: Message edited by: Synergy ] -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • N:R Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items • A5 Map Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Omaha Mall Shooting in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Wednesday, December 12 2007 15:19
Profile
The list of statistics on advantages to "marriage" aren't really describing the benefits of marriage, per se. They are describing the advantages of children who grow up with some measure of love, affection, consistency, structure, and boundaries, which they are more likely to get when people love each other enough to create a partnership that persists. "Marriage" is again, an arbitrary construct and term we keep using, but really has no absolute meaning apart from social ceremonies, marriage licenses, and government benefits. Practically speaking, as far as children are concerned, it doesn't matter one bit if the stable people staying together, loving and nurturing the children are "married," male-female, or anything in particular. Love does what it does wherever it does it. It is no respecter or disrespecter of "marriage." It succeeds within it or without it. Again, I'd ask, why does love require a contract? That only makes it look like we are afraid love itself cannot be sufficient to last without external ordinance, social declaration and expectation, benefits, or coercion. Children grow up "better" where they are loved and see love modeled by their caretakers. That is all that has been demonstrated. Studies have a very hard time teasing out the actual variables they are often measuring, especially when there is a bias toward demonstrating something. The list demonstrates what I am stating about loving partnership at least as much as it supports what "marriage" does. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • N:R Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items • A5 Map Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Omaha Mall Shooting in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Monday, December 10 2007 14:33
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quote:This is plainly the case. What is marriage supposed to be anyway? What is it other than a moral construct based on ancient religious views and property laws? In this modern world, what business or even use does government have in being involved in the arbitrary construct we still call marriage. Why should the government care one bit or affix legalities to reliational contracts? I say the government should get out of marriage entirely. I'd say the same to a lot of people too. If you need to have laws or contracts to have a meaningful and ongoing relationship and partnership with another person, then it is based on fear (of loss), rather than on love, which gives absolute freedom and does not require someone to love them till death do they part. How can you make demands of the heart of another over the course of an entire lifetime? If you can create such a thing in your life, fantastic. It's the ideal of many. But it's religion that assigns value, rules, restrictions, and moralities to how people partner and couple. We have governments in the world that evolved out of the belief systems of ancient peoples and this has always been based on religion. Government is and always has been a reflection of the religious beliefs of the world. Any implication of any morality around people partnering in any way that does not infringe on others is religious only. Why are our governments still marrying religion to themselves by being involved in marriage? That's the only question I see in this whole issue. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • N:R Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items • A5 Map Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Omaha Mall Shooting in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Saturday, December 8 2007 15:46
Profile
I see someone finally came up with something to draw Stillness out of the shadows again. ;) Stillness said something that I'd like to comment upon; "race is based on arbitrary manmade distinction. Gender is not." Gender is a word that gets used in the place of sex, and it blurs the distinction. Your sex is not arbitrary. "Gender" is a construct we invent around what your role is as your sex. Gender is the sex that a person identifies with, regardless of the body they are in. Gender is a socially created and enforced role we play. Books like "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus" get written based on gender roles, not on biology. We're making all this up. Our ideas about gender, marriage, relationships. One man one woman marriage (with all its concomitant rules and requirements/vows/promises) is The Great Sacred Institution of Christianity. It largely crafted it, as we now know it in the west. Religion continues to seek to control it, define it, protect it. But it, too, is an arbitrary construct. I only ask one question, setting all other assumption/belief aside: How is that working for us? Where divorce is possible, we see more than half of marriges ending in divorce. Of those who stay together, often for religious reasons or children, I'll argue that a large percentage again are in unhappy marriages. How's it working for us? One definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. The old, religious institution of marriage as we have inflicted it upon the world, is ripe for serious re-vision. We need a new vision of relationship. We could start with a different concept: relationships are about opportunity, not obligation. True love gives the beloved absolute freedom, and does not even require vows of devotion and servitude. It does not require the soul to be or do that which is not in the heart to do. True love lets go or permits evolution in relationship. Marriage as it exists is about patriarchy, possession, and property. It's broken. We have a lot of Christian heritage mixed into our current legal consideration of marriage. Any people who love one another and wish to devote themselves to one another could be permitted to do so on equal terms. Personally, I don't think anyone deserves special monetary consideration whether single or "married." This is a big part of the problem to begin with. This continues to imply people as property/commodity, that somehow they are tax-related possessions along with anything else you "own." -S- [ Saturday, December 08, 2007 15:53: Message edited by: Synergy ] -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • N:R Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items • A5 Map Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Mental training in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Monday, December 3 2007 14:14
Profile
Interesting and provocative intention you have proposed here, Alex. Why use hypnosis to achieve your ends? There is a way to access the beliefs of your subconscious mind, and essentially erase/reprogram them very simply with a therapy technique called Psych-K. I trained in it recently. It also requires permission from the superconscious that what you are seeking to program into your subconscious is safe and appropriate for you. Some would call the superconscious "God." It is that higher part of knowing within, which is typically beyond our conscious awareness, but has an agenda for us. The subconsious doesn't have an agenda, per se. It just executes its programming, much of which is acquired. Psych-K tests established beliefs in the subconscious using kinesthetic measures, as the subconscious conrols motor function/muscle integrity. It is a very cool, streamlined, and methodical technique that can bypass years of therapy trying to get at and change deep-seated belief patterns. It doesn't require any weirdness or altered state of being. It doesn't matter if you understand it or even believe in it. What it does take is training in proper utilization. Or you can seek out a practitioner, if there is one in your area. I can hear Alec's wholly predictable response to this already. As a preemptive comment, I have no interest in Alec's opinion on the possibility or veracity of this modality or whether there is a superconscious, or whatever will get his knickers in a twist. This technique is quite cool, simple, and powerful—more direct and powerful than hypnosis, and I think it would streamline what you might be attempting to achieve, unless you are just tinkering with yourself for fun, rather than for more specific intention. One can learn to self-test, and self-program with Psych-K. Subconscious beliefs typically derail conscious intent and statements of intent on one's behalf. This is why power of positive belief techniques often don't work for people consistently, if at all. We are fighting against inner processing which is a million times more powerful than our conscious processing. We start acquiring all the crap that hampers us from the subconscious level, from the messages our parents, society, and institutions deliver to us from day one. For instance, one usually starts with examining and changing one's beliefs about whether change for the self is safe and desirable. If you don't address your belief about change, you might not get far with trying to change other beliefs with Psych-K. The subconscious is like a tape-recorder. It processes around 4 billion bits of information per second. Our conscious mind only processes around 2 thousand bits per second. Guess which one wins out when it comes to conflicting beliefs? It doesn't have an opinion or judgement. It just has instructions that have been recorded, as if on a tape. If we don't like the instructions we wind up with, we can record over them with new instructions...as long as the superconscious permits. You can find out anything you believe at a deep level through muscle testing. Check it out, if this sort of thing is what you are seeking to accomplish. There are 42 trainers worldwide. -S- [ Monday, December 03, 2007 14:15: Message edited by: Synergy ] -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • N:R Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items • A5 Map Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Meadows of Heaven in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Sunday, December 2 2007 20:58
Profile
Music. Ah, what a vast iceberg we have landed upon here. For all the music you may have heard or known in your life, there is myriad more that has never crossed your ears or even, perhaps your imagination. The very concept of what denotes "music" is a curious contrivance with surprisingly diverse range. Not only can I never come close to knowing a drop in the bucket of all the bands in existence, there are numerous entire genres of music I'll never know. One could spend lifetimes exploring... Some recent, random listening: Tangerine Dream, Kraftwerk, KMFDM, 16 Volt, Chemlab, Rob Zombie, Celldweller, Criss Angel, Korn, Garbage, Plastikman, Squaremeter, and a bunch of obscure experimental ambient/noise/surrealism/soundscape stuff from the UK and Europe like Monos, Alio Die, Asmus Tietchins, Thomas Köner, Lustmord, and Nurse With Wound. I own all this music. I have a, shall we say, rather large, collection. My number one hobby for many years was going to lengths to amass music I love. I also have a great fondness for most of the music of the Beatles. Early favorites forever ago: Larry Norman, Oingo Boingo, and also, yes: Tom Lehrer, thanks to Dr. Demento. How delightful to see Mr. Poisoning Pigeons mentioned not once, but twice, already. Favorite recent lyricists include Edward Ka-Spel of The Legendary Pink Dots, Jim Thirlwell (Clint Ruin) of Foetus: anyone who can belt out slightly twisted and clever lyrics like, "This isn't the melody that lingers on — it's the malady that malingers on," earns my most skewed admiration. I was hit by a brick when I first heard (and saw the video for) Skinny Puppy's "Dig It" in 1986. This set me spiralling on an industrial music obsession that continued for many years. Skinny Puppy was the first real concert I ever attended (not including Petra, a Christian rock band in the early 80's...really, that doesn't count, does it?) If I were a part of a SW band, I would contribute unspecificable noise and electronics, spoken/muttered/hissed/whispered lyrics of wry whimsy involving irony and wordplay. Music is a magical trip I really get off on. I don't need drugs. I get high with a little help from my (musical) friends. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • N:R Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items • A5 Map Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Wow!! in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Wednesday, November 21 2007 21:47
Profile
Ultima IV on my //c. What did it take...44,000 moves to complete? First computer game ever was Adventure, which became Zork, on some clunky DOS machine my dad's friend put together. That was when I first started staying up too late at night. Worst time waster ever? The Civilization series. Worse than crack. Welcome. :) -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| The Continuing Story of Spiderweb Software in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Wednesday, November 21 2007 21:41
Profile
1. Alorael - because I have no freaking idea at all who or what he/she/it actually is. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Stuffing into Small Places? in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Monday, November 19 2007 23:18
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This just might be the oddest thread ever. I'm rather enjoying it. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Stuffing into Small Places? in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Sunday, November 18 2007 23:08
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And to think that school bullies usually consider this punishment. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Stuffing into Small Places? in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Sunday, November 18 2007 22:20
Profile
I've found it's now impossible for me to be put in a box. I like the scene in Ocean's Eleven when the tiny Asian acrobat slips back first down into the inside of a lockbox on wheels being taken into the casino vault. He folds up neatly in two, and slides down neatly inside completely out of sight. I guess you'd have to not be claustrophobic to be in the heist business. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt • A5 Items Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Photo Thread (with an abominable twist) in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Wednesday, November 14 2007 22:44
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Oh, now I get it. It's Riibu, because you can't see her at all. Very clever. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt • [URL=http://www.ironycentral.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=23;t=000020] A5 Items Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Synergy? in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Wednesday, November 14 2007 17:03
Profile
Good news, everyone. The doctors are pretty sure they will be able to save both of my legs. :P -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Fantastical Thoughts On RPG Game Mechanics in Avernum 4 | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Tuesday, November 6 2007 11:20
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Interesting interpretation. Actually, not. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Original names in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Monday, November 5 2007 21:26
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I thought Iffy was about 12. It is hard to see outside a present lens. I'm rather marveling at the perspective and trying to remember what I imagined of myself in late life when I was around this age. I know I realized I was going to grow up, be an adult, and do adult things. In fact, I remember being terrified that when I hit about 20, I was going to become boring and do those boring adult things. Well, it hasn't happened yet, and I'm quite a ways past 20. The happy news is that there is no absolute about what "growing up" actually is, and it doesn't have to be anything you don't want it to be. But I think we may often be surprised, in restrospect, at what we find ourselves being, becoming, and doing through the course of our lives. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Original names in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Monday, November 5 2007 18:15
Profile
Do you really imagine you are going to remotely the same person at 102 as you are right now, and that computer games will be an important thing to you? I'm not saying it couldn't happen, but... -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Original names in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Monday, November 5 2007 17:28
Profile
quote:You show remarkable audacity to make such a declaration, especially if you really imagine you mean it. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Left or Right? in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Sunday, November 4 2007 21:36
Profile
quote:I am thinking it likely that I am about to make my posts twice as infinitely more readable by reducing them to zero times as many words. I escaped the temptation to become a lawyer shortly after graduating high school, but I was tempted. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
| Which way does the water swirl? in General | |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Sunday, November 4 2007 21:30
Profile
Sometimes it seems like it, yes? In this case I wasn't, but I was feeling reflective and rather euphoric. I know the results can be sickening, not unlike reading someone else's love poetry. -S- -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |