Got an e-mail yesterday saying newtype, animage and animedia were on there way. This seems far too soon to me - I'm sure they're not normally published until the 10th, but if I get them before the weekend then that will be quite useful as I could potentially get them scanned.
Dunno - it's seeming likely to be quite a bity weekend at the moment, with quite a few things I either need to (mostly cleaning and shopping related) or could do. Here's a sample:
The portable hard-drive I use for storing the fansubs I download is rapidly filling up. There's quite a few shows that I've either kyboshed or have come to a natural end, so there's plenty I can burn to DVD.
It's a bit of a tedious job at times, though, is burning DVDs. But it needs to be done.
Then there's e-baying: I've got a stacker-box full of stuff now that could do with e-baying. Some of it's a little unlikely to sell as it's not from popular anime or manga series, so I've not a huge hope of making a lot money, but even a small cash injection wouldn't hurt now.
e-baying is tedious to get started. There's all the farting about with taking, then cropping and resizing the photos. Plus there's weighing them and working out the postage costs (Royal Mail seems to increase the price of something every couple of months :/). And then there's writing the actual auction notes - I've a template, but it's still rather tedious.
I should also do a batch of ironing. It's not desperately necessary, because recently I've bought a few new shirts and I've plenty to spare, but the recent heat wave caused me to use up all my short-sleeve shirts. I've now got them back from the laundrettes, so I'd like to get them ironed in case we get another hot spell.
Then there's scanning of course - megami is here and the other mags are a possibility, but I've also got a couple of artbooks I should scan.
And mentioning the scans, I need to archive the scans I took in recent months. That always takes ages as I have to work out what series stuff is from.
There's the German Grand Prix this weekend too. I shall watch that, obviously, but there's also the US motoGP that was on last week. I've not had a chance to watch that - being in the states, it was naturally on quite late here in the UK.
Then of course there's my original plan - updating the website stuffs. Part of me feels I should hold back on the websites until my walling picks up a bit more, but I dunno it's been a long time without any updates.
I'd also thought about giving the car a quick clean as well - this summer weather really brings out the bugs, which seem to be magnetically attracted to my bumper. But the forecast isn't so good this weekend, so it may not be possible.
My, what an exciting life I lead!
Friday, 10 July 2009
Thursday, 9 July 2009
there is no god
Extract from "Why I Am Not A Christian" by Bertrand Russell:
This is a remarkably succinct summation of my own views on the matter and it was some 82 years ago this point was made, making it around two and a half times older than me.
All religion is based on fear.
The fear of the unknown and the fear of death. In some ways religion is therefore in a similar vein to one of Bertrand's own areas of expertise - Philosophy. In the same way that Rene Descartes stripped things back to "Cognito, ergo sum" (I think, therefore I am), religion attempts the same thing.
I think therefore I am works like this. Do I exist? Well, if I did not exist I wouldn't be able to wonder if I exist or not. Therefore, I must exist.
It's possible to pick this statement apart to some degree, but let's take it as read for now. What religion does is use a very similar line of thinking - and this applies to all religions, but the monotheistic are the easiest to work through as an example, and also probably the most prevalent fantasies at this time.
It says that this book (the bible, Qur'an, Torah, whatever) exists. It says that this book contains the word of God, as transcribed by a profit (or a mystic or a witness to the events - the exact person varies). Therefore God must exist.
Without God, these words could not have been transcribed or these events could not have happened, therefore God must exist.
When you come down to it, this is the basic argument for the existence of God, as defined by monotheistic religions.
The problem is that this argument does not hold water for one simple reason: we all know that people are perfectly capable of making stuff up.
In fact, there are multi-billion pound industries based solely on the fact that people are extremely good at making stuff up. Indeed, the level of imagination shown in most religious texts almost proves the very point.
We also know that people are entirely capable of making stuff up and, crucially, actually believing that it really happened. We also know that drugs can induce hallucinations and altered states of perception. We also know that some people hunger after power and influence.
You would think that, given even low intelligence, these clear flaws in the process would have put religion to rest some time ago.
The problem is explained by what Russell talked about:
1) People are taught to believe in God from childhood.
It is difficult to break this ingrained learning. Take the simple case of abused children - they sometimes grow up and abuse their own children in a horrifying vicious circle.
In addition, and somewhat ironically, religion is able to pervert the very liberalism that tolerates its existence. Society (schools and teachers) do not want to cause offence. We are all told that religious freedom is our choice.
This means any attempt to break the cycle of illogic results in cries of oppression from the religious. The irony comes in that all of these monotheistic religions preach conversion - it is the job of believers to force/compel/persuade others to convert to their religion: for them, religious intolerance is part of the very religion itself.
This prevents critical examination of the facts. It even seems to have gotten to the stage that science is being taught in an "optional" way, as if it is just one possible explanation of events and religions represent another. This is such a preposterous notion it beggars belief.
2) God as Big Brother
Religion acts on fear.
Fear is a very powerful emotion - possibly the most powerful.
Everyone is afraid of death. It seems cruel and arbitrary that, at some point in the future, I will die. It seems cruel and arbitrary that the people I love will also die.
Is it not, therefore, a comforting thought that I have an everlasting soul? And that my soul will live on in some form? Possibly it will even get to go to a super-nice heaven.
This is why it's very difficult to argue against God and religion and heaven.
Whatever arguments you make against Religion & God - how illogical it is, how ridiculous, how contradictory, how flawed, how dangerous and damaging - this is what it comes back to: people are afraid of death.
They don't want to die and they don't want their friends & family to die. But they know they will, so they take comfort in something that makes them the promise that, if they believe, if they have faith, then death won't really be the end that it seems.
It's a difficult thing to argue against that and therefore to successfully convince people when this fear is the core problem. In a sense, what have they to gain but uncertainty if they act rationally and logically and stop believing?
"Of course I know that the sort of intellectual arguments that I have been talking to you about are not what really moves people. What really moves people to believe in God is not any intellectual argument at all. Most people believe in God because they have been taught from early infancy to do it, and that is the main reason.
"Then I think that the next most powerful reason is the wish for safety, a sort of feeling that there is a big brother who will look after you. That plays a very profound part in influencing people's desire for a belief in God."
This is a remarkably succinct summation of my own views on the matter and it was some 82 years ago this point was made, making it around two and a half times older than me.
All religion is based on fear.
The fear of the unknown and the fear of death. In some ways religion is therefore in a similar vein to one of Bertrand's own areas of expertise - Philosophy. In the same way that Rene Descartes stripped things back to "Cognito, ergo sum" (I think, therefore I am), religion attempts the same thing.
I think therefore I am works like this. Do I exist? Well, if I did not exist I wouldn't be able to wonder if I exist or not. Therefore, I must exist.
It's possible to pick this statement apart to some degree, but let's take it as read for now. What religion does is use a very similar line of thinking - and this applies to all religions, but the monotheistic are the easiest to work through as an example, and also probably the most prevalent fantasies at this time.
It says that this book (the bible, Qur'an, Torah, whatever) exists. It says that this book contains the word of God, as transcribed by a profit (or a mystic or a witness to the events - the exact person varies). Therefore God must exist.
Without God, these words could not have been transcribed or these events could not have happened, therefore God must exist.
When you come down to it, this is the basic argument for the existence of God, as defined by monotheistic religions.
The problem is that this argument does not hold water for one simple reason: we all know that people are perfectly capable of making stuff up.
In fact, there are multi-billion pound industries based solely on the fact that people are extremely good at making stuff up. Indeed, the level of imagination shown in most religious texts almost proves the very point.
We also know that people are entirely capable of making stuff up and, crucially, actually believing that it really happened. We also know that drugs can induce hallucinations and altered states of perception. We also know that some people hunger after power and influence.
You would think that, given even low intelligence, these clear flaws in the process would have put religion to rest some time ago.
The problem is explained by what Russell talked about:
1) People are taught to believe in God from childhood.
It is difficult to break this ingrained learning. Take the simple case of abused children - they sometimes grow up and abuse their own children in a horrifying vicious circle.
In addition, and somewhat ironically, religion is able to pervert the very liberalism that tolerates its existence. Society (schools and teachers) do not want to cause offence. We are all told that religious freedom is our choice.
This means any attempt to break the cycle of illogic results in cries of oppression from the religious. The irony comes in that all of these monotheistic religions preach conversion - it is the job of believers to force/compel/persuade others to convert to their religion: for them, religious intolerance is part of the very religion itself.
This prevents critical examination of the facts. It even seems to have gotten to the stage that science is being taught in an "optional" way, as if it is just one possible explanation of events and religions represent another. This is such a preposterous notion it beggars belief.
2) God as Big Brother
Religion acts on fear.
Fear is a very powerful emotion - possibly the most powerful.
Everyone is afraid of death. It seems cruel and arbitrary that, at some point in the future, I will die. It seems cruel and arbitrary that the people I love will also die.
Is it not, therefore, a comforting thought that I have an everlasting soul? And that my soul will live on in some form? Possibly it will even get to go to a super-nice heaven.
This is why it's very difficult to argue against God and religion and heaven.
Whatever arguments you make against Religion & God - how illogical it is, how ridiculous, how contradictory, how flawed, how dangerous and damaging - this is what it comes back to: people are afraid of death.
They don't want to die and they don't want their friends & family to die. But they know they will, so they take comfort in something that makes them the promise that, if they believe, if they have faith, then death won't really be the end that it seems.
It's a difficult thing to argue against that and therefore to successfully convince people when this fear is the core problem. In a sense, what have they to gain but uncertainty if they act rationally and logically and stop believing?
Wednesday, 8 July 2009
non reviewage
Now normally I would do a mini-review of the weekend's rental title today.
However, there was no rental title this weekend. The way my rental account is set up I actually only get 3 DVDs a month and by this weekend I'd watched them all.
Usually, I would take the opportunity to watch something else - perhaps one of my bought DVDs - but as is probably obvious from the gushing posts I've been making about it just recently, the only thing I really watched this weekend was BSG. Indeed, it was a close call for me actually even managing to watch my usual chunk of recorded telly so heavily into BSG was I.
You'll be glad to know that I've started on season 3, but I don't really propose to talk about it again. Trouble is, I'm not really in the frame of mind to post one of my more 'discussion' or 'issue' based posts, so I'm afraid it's going to be more life drivel.
It's been raining quite a bit the last few days. It's also noticeably cooler. I know that not all of the country experienced a heatwave last week, but I for one am glad of the change. It's been so much more pleasant.
Last night I got home to discover my landlord had returned.
This was somewhat earlier than expected. I mentioned the early return to him and he said it was a day earlier than planned, due to the rain nearly washing them out. However, I'm positive that the note he left me said they were going to be away for much, much longer - several more weeks.
But he then indicated they would be going away again very soon. I'm guessing they were either originally planning to roll both breaks into one, or he simply got confused and put the wrong date.
It puts a kibosh on a couple of things I had planned, but nothing spectacular.
The latest megami turned up on Monday.
I could have had it last Friday, but for some reason they left one of those "missed you while you were out" notes. I dunno why they bothered doing that - it fits perfectly easily through the letterbox and doesn't require a signature.
However, one of the good things about TNT, the courier, is you can go online with the note and specifically tell them to leave it on the doorstep (or wherever). I did this on Friday and was hoping they'd deliver it on Saturday (I spent all morning glancing out if the window in the hopes of seeing them) but it was Monday they re-attempted delivery.
I'll hopefully get it scanned this weekend along with some other bits and pieces I need to scan, but the priority is still on getting my website rolling again.
However, there was no rental title this weekend. The way my rental account is set up I actually only get 3 DVDs a month and by this weekend I'd watched them all.
Usually, I would take the opportunity to watch something else - perhaps one of my bought DVDs - but as is probably obvious from the gushing posts I've been making about it just recently, the only thing I really watched this weekend was BSG. Indeed, it was a close call for me actually even managing to watch my usual chunk of recorded telly so heavily into BSG was I.
You'll be glad to know that I've started on season 3, but I don't really propose to talk about it again. Trouble is, I'm not really in the frame of mind to post one of my more 'discussion' or 'issue' based posts, so I'm afraid it's going to be more life drivel.
It's been raining quite a bit the last few days. It's also noticeably cooler. I know that not all of the country experienced a heatwave last week, but I for one am glad of the change. It's been so much more pleasant.
Last night I got home to discover my landlord had returned.
This was somewhat earlier than expected. I mentioned the early return to him and he said it was a day earlier than planned, due to the rain nearly washing them out. However, I'm positive that the note he left me said they were going to be away for much, much longer - several more weeks.
But he then indicated they would be going away again very soon. I'm guessing they were either originally planning to roll both breaks into one, or he simply got confused and put the wrong date.
It puts a kibosh on a couple of things I had planned, but nothing spectacular.
The latest megami turned up on Monday.
I could have had it last Friday, but for some reason they left one of those "missed you while you were out" notes. I dunno why they bothered doing that - it fits perfectly easily through the letterbox and doesn't require a signature.
However, one of the good things about TNT, the courier, is you can go online with the note and specifically tell them to leave it on the doorstep (or wherever). I did this on Friday and was hoping they'd deliver it on Saturday (I spent all morning glancing out if the window in the hopes of seeing them) but it was Monday they re-attempted delivery.
I'll hopefully get it scanned this weekend along with some other bits and pieces I need to scan, but the priority is still on getting my website rolling again.
Tuesday, 7 July 2009
manga scans
I finished season 2 of BSG.
Well, that's not quite true - I've still the extras to go through, so while I've the show I've not 'finished' the DVD set yet.
I think one of the things that's impressed me the most is that the show isn't afraid to take a few risks. One of the things a lot of episodic television relies on is the return to the norm or the preservation of the status quo. In other words, our heroes don't die and our baddies never win.
But with BSG it's more complicated. I mean, just as a simple example that isn't really spoilering too much, the baddies do kinda win and they do so at the very start of the show. I mean, the first ep has the baddies wiping out 99.9% of humanity - that's not at all far off a big tick in the win column.
And there's plenty of that as the show goes along too - at the end of series 2 the status quo gets knocked so far off axis that it's a genuine shock.
Another example is that what you would classically see as being a dramatic series end type episode occurs a third of the way through season 2 and what it actually does end on is much more of a punch in the gut affair.
It's really brave is what I'm saying, and it's better for it.
Anyway, despite my growing BSG obsession, the weekend wasn't entirely a bust in terms of getting stuff done.
I managed to tick off most of the stuff on my to do list, one of the most important being that I scanned a whole load of manga covers.
I'd normally talk about the anime I watched while I scanned at this point, but scanning manga covers is always too complicated an activity to allow me to watch any anime. But what it does mean is I can finally finish off a whole load of reviews I've written for my website.
Making all the pictures for my reviews is a horribly tedious affair. I mean, scanning them is a pain to start with, but then there's the long process of resizing them and cropping them for the reviews. It's all stuff that sounds simple, but in practice ends up being both mind-numbing and very long winded.
But hopefully what I'll do is have a long session of it this next weekend and then start updating the site again.
There's unfortunately been no movement from me on making any walls, or even vectoring some scans, so I doubt I'll be having updates for anything except the reviews for a good while.
I'm not sure if this represents an effective end to my walling 'career' or not. I'm certainly very de-motivated when it comes to the whole walling thing.
But then, truth be told I've been quite de-motivated to do anything. I mean, I've hardly written anything (creatively, I mean) I've not exactly been keeping on top of updating my websites and I've been struggling to keep up with the scanning.
I can't understand where all the time goes :/.
Well, that's not quite true - I've still the extras to go through, so while I've the show I've not 'finished' the DVD set yet.
I think one of the things that's impressed me the most is that the show isn't afraid to take a few risks. One of the things a lot of episodic television relies on is the return to the norm or the preservation of the status quo. In other words, our heroes don't die and our baddies never win.
But with BSG it's more complicated. I mean, just as a simple example that isn't really spoilering too much, the baddies do kinda win and they do so at the very start of the show. I mean, the first ep has the baddies wiping out 99.9% of humanity - that's not at all far off a big tick in the win column.
And there's plenty of that as the show goes along too - at the end of series 2 the status quo gets knocked so far off axis that it's a genuine shock.
Another example is that what you would classically see as being a dramatic series end type episode occurs a third of the way through season 2 and what it actually does end on is much more of a punch in the gut affair.
It's really brave is what I'm saying, and it's better for it.
Anyway, despite my growing BSG obsession, the weekend wasn't entirely a bust in terms of getting stuff done.
I managed to tick off most of the stuff on my to do list, one of the most important being that I scanned a whole load of manga covers.
I'd normally talk about the anime I watched while I scanned at this point, but scanning manga covers is always too complicated an activity to allow me to watch any anime. But what it does mean is I can finally finish off a whole load of reviews I've written for my website.
Making all the pictures for my reviews is a horribly tedious affair. I mean, scanning them is a pain to start with, but then there's the long process of resizing them and cropping them for the reviews. It's all stuff that sounds simple, but in practice ends up being both mind-numbing and very long winded.
But hopefully what I'll do is have a long session of it this next weekend and then start updating the site again.
There's unfortunately been no movement from me on making any walls, or even vectoring some scans, so I doubt I'll be having updates for anything except the reviews for a good while.
I'm not sure if this represents an effective end to my walling 'career' or not. I'm certainly very de-motivated when it comes to the whole walling thing.
But then, truth be told I've been quite de-motivated to do anything. I mean, I've hardly written anything (creatively, I mean) I've not exactly been keeping on top of updating my websites and I've been struggling to keep up with the scanning.
I can't understand where all the time goes :/.
Monday, 6 July 2009
bsg
I think I may have been getting a little obsessed with Battlestar Galactica.
This is BSG the remake/re-imagining, btw, not the original series. I have vague memories of the original BSG, mainly centring around the dogfights in space and also people holding blasters and shooting the Cylons.
At the time I wasn't aware of it, but looking back it's easy to see how it was a bandwagon-jumping exercise for Star Wars. Indeed, looking back at it they seem to have gotten awful close to copyright infringements on more than a few occasions.
I mean the Cylon centurions look like Storm troopers who have been painted silver and the viper fighters that the good guys use look a lot like miniature X-wing fighters. But still, even then it had something - it wasn't a complete dearth of interesting ideas.
As I say, I don't remember it too well, but I do remember enjoying the episodes I watched.
I was therefore a little sceptical about the remake. I, like many I'm sure, am generally sceptical about remakes anyway, but I'd heard very good things, so I bought the DVDs. It also helped that I heard the show would end with a definite end - I like series that have a definite end, rather than the whole rubbish American system of trigger-happy cancellations.
Anyway, as I think I mentioned last week, it's a real belter of a show. Indeed, in some ways I think now that I'm almost through season 2 I'd say this second season was the best of the lot. That's quite rare that a show gets better with each season.
The only thing I can't really get my head around is the episode count. The miniseries as I noted was shown as a single thing on he DVD, and then the 1st series was a fairly standard 13 episodes. But then it all goes a bit weird.
Season 2 is 20 episodes long. Season 3 is also 20 episodes long. Then Season 4 goes very odd - halfway through there's a sort of separate 'film' like entity called Razor, but then it got walloped by the writer's strike so it stops. There's then what they're calling Season 5 in the UK, but is really the rest of Season 3.
It's all a bit odd - I'm more used to 22, 24 or 26 as the longer series lengths for American shows.
It doesn't affect the quality, though - indeed, I think you could argue that less episodes would lend itself to better quality. I do confess I was actually afraid it would end up looking a little Mickey Mouse and it would be a case of praising the story over the visual side of things.
I couldn't have been more wrong - as well as excellent writing, the show really looks great as well. Especially the CG - the CG is verging on movie-level goodness, witch is remarkable for a TV series.
This is BSG the remake/re-imagining, btw, not the original series. I have vague memories of the original BSG, mainly centring around the dogfights in space and also people holding blasters and shooting the Cylons.
At the time I wasn't aware of it, but looking back it's easy to see how it was a bandwagon-jumping exercise for Star Wars. Indeed, looking back at it they seem to have gotten awful close to copyright infringements on more than a few occasions.
I mean the Cylon centurions look like Storm troopers who have been painted silver and the viper fighters that the good guys use look a lot like miniature X-wing fighters. But still, even then it had something - it wasn't a complete dearth of interesting ideas.
As I say, I don't remember it too well, but I do remember enjoying the episodes I watched.
I was therefore a little sceptical about the remake. I, like many I'm sure, am generally sceptical about remakes anyway, but I'd heard very good things, so I bought the DVDs. It also helped that I heard the show would end with a definite end - I like series that have a definite end, rather than the whole rubbish American system of trigger-happy cancellations.
Anyway, as I think I mentioned last week, it's a real belter of a show. Indeed, in some ways I think now that I'm almost through season 2 I'd say this second season was the best of the lot. That's quite rare that a show gets better with each season.
The only thing I can't really get my head around is the episode count. The miniseries as I noted was shown as a single thing on he DVD, and then the 1st series was a fairly standard 13 episodes. But then it all goes a bit weird.
Season 2 is 20 episodes long. Season 3 is also 20 episodes long. Then Season 4 goes very odd - halfway through there's a sort of separate 'film' like entity called Razor, but then it got walloped by the writer's strike so it stops. There's then what they're calling Season 5 in the UK, but is really the rest of Season 3.
It's all a bit odd - I'm more used to 22, 24 or 26 as the longer series lengths for American shows.
It doesn't affect the quality, though - indeed, I think you could argue that less episodes would lend itself to better quality. I do confess I was actually afraid it would end up looking a little Mickey Mouse and it would be a case of praising the story over the visual side of things.
I couldn't have been more wrong - as well as excellent writing, the show really looks great as well. Especially the CG - the CG is verging on movie-level goodness, witch is remarkable for a TV series.
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