The humanities

[robinson]

Many years ago, my dear friend, long departed now, utters to me, in his delightful semi serious way, one of those deep truths he often threw out as if they were confetti, but in reality were as solid grenades'

... primed to go off many years later. Pillory is probably the only one who will understand

As I watch the bright stars shining, I think a thought of the clef of the universes, and of the future.

[robinson]

What he said was roughly this, "Nobody is interested in the humanities when they are young, but when you get old, it's all you are interested in"

[robinson]

For all I know he stole that from somebody. He was a genius in that he stole from everyone, and mixed it up, presented it with some awesome music, and at some point instilled awe, and even tears

[robinson]

Now I know, as do you, if you are who I think you are, that some complete asshole here is going to take a dump in the thread

[robinson]

The purpose of the many posts is simple

[robinson]

It makes their virtual defecation of what exists inside them, appear much later in the thread

[robinson]

With any luck, on the second page

[robinson]

A vast similitude interlocks all,
All spheres, grown, ungrown, small, large, suns, moons, planets
All distances of place however wide,
All distances of time, all inanimate forms,
All souls, all living bodies, though they be ever so different, or in different worlds,
All gaseous, watery, vegetable, mineral processes, the fishes, the brutes,
All nations, colors, barbarisms, civilizations, languages,
All identities that have existed or may exist on this globe, or any globe,
All lives and deaths, all of the past, present, future,
This vast similitude spans them, and always has spann’d,
And shall forever span them and compactly hold and enclose them

[robinson]

Mistah Kurtz -- he dead.
(A penny for the Old Guy)


We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us -- if at all -- not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.



Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death's dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind's singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.

Let me be no nearer
In death's dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer --

Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom

[robinson]

This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man's hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.

Is it like this
In death's other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.

[robinson]

The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river

Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.

[robinson]

Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o'clock in the morning.

Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom

Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow

[robinson]

Life is very long

Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow

[robinson]

For Thine is the Kingdom


For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

[robinson]

The Hollow Men by T. S. Eliot

[robinson]

On the beach at night alone,
As the old mother sways her to and fro, singing her husky song,


As I watch the bright stars shining, I think a thought of the clef of the universes, and of the future.

A vast similitude interlocks all,
All spheres, grown, ungrown, small, large, suns, moons, planets
All distances of place however wide,
All distances of time, all inanimate forms,
All souls, all living bodies, though they be ever so different, or in different worlds,
All gaseous, watery, vegetable, mineral processes, the fishes, the brutes,
All nations, colors, barbarisms, civilizations, languages,
All identities that have existed or may exist on this globe, or any globe,
All lives and deaths, all of the past, present, future,
This vast similitude spans them, and always has spann’d,
And shall forever span them and compactly hold and enclose them


On the Beach at Night Alone
Walt Whitman - 1819-1892

[robinson]

Of course Pillory might not read English well enough, but he can fucking look up the translation, can't he?




























Still won't be the same

[robinson]

Only three more to go

[robinson]

Thank fucking Christ

[robinson]

There is a certain joy in knowing, if it is really true, that sparks, that crusty old bastard, won't ever read any of it











































I understand now why poets hide the meaning

[robinson]

So my old friend was right, at least about me

Of course I have to include science as a humanity

[robinson]

Which is so odd








If anyone had told me I would be greatly interested in science at my great age

I would have laughed and hit them with my electric guitar

[robinson]

Oh fuck yeah


Full Townsend on their big fat lying head

[robinson]

Fuck me

[robinson]

How many posts means a second page is quite variable

[robinson]

Doesn’t matter


I got Elliot in with no asshole post interrupting

[robinson]

Probably should have put this in the Skeptics Ink forum


Nobody reads that one

[robinson]

https://twitter.com/ppathole/status/149 ... 66882?s=21

[robinson]

For the nerds and geeks
Who read the topic
Only you know who you are



A little gift
hidden deep in time
Perhaps with out a rhyme

In Basic code
The most basic one
That existed at the time

The asterisk
Is used to mean
“Whatever you want it to be”

In ASCII code
(Because this is true)

The numeric code
For the *
Is the number 42

[robinson]

If you got that

You are fucking awesome

[robinson]

You know how you can tell crypto isn’t the same thing as money?


Nobody makes ads to try and get you to buy money

[robinson]

OK that was off topic


I apologize

[robinson]

Is it like this
In death's other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.

[robinson]

I blame the school for instilling hatred and disgust of the poets

[robinson]

Also certain poets

[robinson]

For pillary

[robinson]

Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori

[robinson]

Horace

[robinson]

Dulce et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.

[robinson]

Wilfred Owen

(1893-1918)