So, I’m bored, and it seems to be the fashion to do this ‘Year in review’ shit. If I do it, I’m going to do it my way. I’m not one to break a trend now, am I?

• January: I quit going on nights out and discovered Chuck Palahniuk. Romeros begins.
• February: It snowed, cancelled lectures, and I trenched to town to buy my speakers – on a whim, of course.
• March: An Asian maid came onto me. Hazel got drunk and flipped out. Within the week, we hooked up.
• April: Flo-Rida! Orlando Magic! Dwighty! Nuff said.
• May: I moved out of Avon, leaving the place where I had the best year of my life.
• June: I saw Hazel a few times. Met lots of people I didn’t know who knew me at a party. I got the Alienware. Very little happened past that.
• July: I played Dynasty Warriors a lot.
• August: I played Warriors Orochi a lot.
• September: Moved into Swindon Street. My Alienware breaks. Prose begins again, and I attend the only two PY214 lectures I would get up for.
• October: Playstation 3! The new era of gaming begins. Took Hazel home to see the new St David’s centre. It was average.
• November: I got a new car. Sweet condition Mazda 3 for £1200. Possibly the best deal of the decade.
• December: Finished semester one, and everything around me breaks.

As side notes, I may have stopped playing Pro Evo around March, but that team will forever remain in my heart. BRADLEY!!
At the party in June, I had far too much attention from people I didn’t know and the whole country seemed to introduce themselves to Hazel. This was the last time I saw Kiz in person. Uni will do that to you.

To wrap it all up, my prose had the revelation I came to uni to find, the money I saved on boycotting nights out got me some flashy hot tech, I saw an NBA game, the Nuggets made the conference finals, I actually got a girlfriend, and video games reclaimed their place in my day-to-day life.
So, really, nothing happened at all.

These days I shower so hot it stings a little.

I'm realising it really is one of the only ways to wake me up in the morning.

I always knew it would be a risky move.
Oh god. I found a piece of mine from two years ago. I thought I was good then. An honest friend told me it was shit.
I pretended he was joking. Now I know he wasn’t.
I’ve improved since then. This course has made me feel comfortable in my craft. I found my voice where I never would have on my own.
I think I’m good now. The honest friends, they just tell me it’s not ‘their thing.’
I think I’m good now. Really, I know I’m not.
What can I gain from this other than self-satisfaction?
I’ve always wanted to be a writer. I never believed I could until this course.
Self-satisfaction is cheap. I’d sell it for a HDTV any day.

When I talked about the Nuggets royal bitchslap of a schedule, what I didn't mention was that their next game was against the L.A. Lakers. Defending champions, and the team that knocked the Nugs out of the conference finals last year.

But it as our homecoming after that ridiculous schedule, and we wanted revenge on the team the deepest playoff run the Nugs have had in 24 years.

What was that Kobe? Only 19 points? Scoreless in the second half?
What was that Lakers? 29-8 in the third quarter?
What was that D.J. Mbenga? Little rookie Ty Lawson dunked all over you?
And, once again, what was that scoreline? Oh yeah. 105-79.

Bye Bye Kobe! Thanks for the visit!

In other news, Saturday night was entertaining when the neighbours had a HUUUGE argument. I mean, shrill top-of-your-lungs screaming with lots of swearing. I even heard "DONT FUCKING HIT ME!!" and "HE FUCKING HIT ME!!!"

This happens a lot, but this was easily the worst I've heard.

They also appear to have given up on doors, and have instead opted for the 'try to walk and punch through my wall' approach. Yeah, that was fun to try and get to sleep in.

Ha! And Hazel thinks we fight.

Is how many games the Nuggets have won so far this season.

This is very pleasing, 66% win rate, even though they finished 65.9% last year.

Here's why. Of their first 9 games, they won their first 5. J.R. Smith was absent for the first seven. Kenyon Martin missed number 7. Seven of those 9 games were away, including a six-games-in-nine-days road trip to the east to play teams they went 1-5 against when they were away last season, many of which have improved over last seasons counterparts.

In short, times have been a bitch for the Nuggets so far, and they've come out of it with a 66% win rate.
Very impressive.

There's still a major gap at the shooting guard spot. J.R. seems set to come off the bench as the sixth man to give some scoring energy when the starters tire out. So we've got...Arron Afflalo? Starting?

Says it all really, doesn't it?

If a trade could be made to get a decent two-guard, someone who not only can defend but put up 10-15 points on the board per game, the Nugs would have a rock solid squad.
With this and the added composure of a year with Chauncey and a year of deep playoff experience, I think they have the resume to go the full distance this year.

Of course, no one believed in them this year either. Most analysts had them around mid-level, even after a conference finals appearance. But this year I believe in them.

They can go the distance. The question is, will they?

Because it won't be easy.

Found this online today:

"So what is a narcissist? Someone who preens in front of the mirror all day in admiration? NOT! Ask yourself this: is your partner intensely angered by anything that seems to suggest that he or she might have a flaw? Narcissists will do anything, including brutalizing their own family, to maintain their own feeling that others see them as without any flaws. And, narcissists have extreme and illogical sensitivities, sometimes connecting the most minute observations with their intense fears of being seen as flawed. Narcissists will strain every muscle to meet their own "flawless" image, and demean or destroy anyone or anything who casts any doubt on this image. If you see this dynamic in your partner, family member, coworker, or friend, you are very probably dealing with a narcissist."

Seems pretty accurate.

Call me arrogant, but I think I’m safe in saying I’m not repulsive or inherently unlikeable.
I also think I’m safe in saying that I wont be gracing the cover of any magazines or be hailed as the highlight of a party anytime soon.
Sure, I have spurts of intelligence and retain lots of useless information but I’m surprisingly ignorant about most things both trivial and important.
I don’t exactly do much with myself. I keep to myself, take care of myself and rarely involve another self. I haven’t done anything new in months. People don’t hate me because I stay out of their way but I don’t hold conversations well. I’m incoherent and boring and get interrupted a lot. The few things I claim to be good at I’m not when you compare me to those with real talent. I have a huge ego but don’t really brag anymore. I’m mostly just competitive and spiteful and self-absorbed.
I’m the slightly big fish in the small pond that no-one pays attention to because he sleeps all day. I’m selfish, I’m unsociable, I’m uptight and I’m spineless.
All in all, I’m fairly below average.
Few consider me a friend. My right hand can count those who’ve wanted something more.
Yet, she claims to love me.
She doesn’t even know why, so she’ll never tell me why.
Sometimes I find it hard to believe her.

DaveJonesBSNews has closed his YouTube acount.

We started out at the same time. Helped eachother out.
I checked a month or so ago. He hadn't made a video in months.

Him and Veritas. I measured myself by their success.
I don't really make videos anymore, either.

He was one of my first friends on YouTube. We haven't spoken in fourteen months.

A lot has changed in two years.

This is my problem with Dawkins.
He is a publicist. A 'consciousness raiser.' As such his points sometimes (almost always) give up their validity in exchange for controversy.
He did it again here.
This is perhaps one of Dawkins' most legitimate points. Labelling a child with a certain religion or raising them up to believe in a particular one certainly has detrimental affects on a child's mental/intellectual freedom.
How many people believe in their religion because that's the one they were raised into? Sure, you can justify your faith but the raised Christians usually end up justifying Christianity and the raised Muslims usually end up justifying Islam.
Anyone who doesn't know the power of labelling and upbringing really needs to take a psychology 101.
Raising and labelling a child into a religion is not totalitarian nineteen-eighty-four mind control but it is a mental shackle many lack the strength or the will to break free from.
I believe it is a restriction on intellectual freedom. I believe it is a problem and I believe it needs addressing.
And, for the record, it would be equally as bad to bring the child up telling them all religions are lies. Bring the child up neutral. Educate them in all positions. Let them decide for themselves.
No, you wont eliminate all influence. You never can. The parents beliefs will always hold an allure. But you can at least give the kid the freedom to choose it.

Where Dawkins goes wrong is the word 'abuse.'
It's powerful. Controversial. But, precisely because of that it's easily misunderstood. Those who disagree will take his position to the extreme and when Dawkins retracts that to the more reserved, reasonable position, it is easy to make his important and totally valid argument seem absurd. The point is missed. He is deemed an intolerant asshole.

If you're going to use an argument about labelling and semantics, make sure you word it right yourself.

Well, yesterday was fun.

My original plan: Go to English language lecture. Come home, play Fifa and lounge around.

What really happened: Hazel arrives. Convince her not to go to lecture. Bedroom fun times. Get up 2/3 hours later than planned. Go into town. Spend £50 on Red Cliff, Blu-ray, and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. Hazel buys me Metal Gear Solid 4 as a 'gifty.' Come home. Play MGS4 until 1/2am. Watch Fight Club. Bedroom fun times. Sleep.

Now THAT is a Thursday to remember!

In true me fashion, though, today's been a non-eventer. I got up at 4, ate some food, lounged around as Sam and Steve played Pro Evo. I put a t-shirt on at half 6.

There's a house party I'll be leaving for in a minute. House parties are not fun events for me. I get bored far too quickly, and I don't like being thrown in a party where everyone I know is talking to 10 people I don't. Hazel goes back to Corsham around 10, so I'll make my leave then. Until that point I get the feeling we'll be locked in her room being antisocial.

Because that's how we roll.

Experience kills your confidence.

It's something that was raised in your ignorance and dies in perspective.

Or maybe I'm just useless.

Shiiiiiiiit!

I haven't posted anything on here for almost a month. Well, you can blame Sky for that. We were planning on getting the internet within about a week or two of our moving in.
Turns out our phone line is a business line. Sky apparently don't do business lines. You'd think we had cancer or something.
BT had no idea our phone line ever existed. The woman on the phone seemed like a broken tape recorder on loop.
"Thees iz nout a BT laine."
Turns out our phone line was deactivated when the girls who lived here before us moved out. To activate it would cost £25. Then we would contact Sky and they would set us up with broadband in 3 weeks.
So we went to Virgin for fibre optic. Two weeks in we finally get the internet.

But that isn't all that held me back. Ohhhh no.

Two days before I moved, around the time I made my last post, my Brand New Alienware decides it likes driver errors and crashes the entire computer.
Blue screen! Blue screen! Fucking blue screen!
Yeah, so I couldn't use my Alienware properly until I respawned it a few days ago to all the factory settings.
I'm not getting comfortable with it though. On my lovely little drive up to my new old house the pretty but flimsy AW exterior cracked on me.
Not a massive crack, but significant enough for me to need to send this bastard away to get fixed at some point.

I'm going to have to suffer the HP once again.
This is not a second coming I am going to enjoy.
Jesus' would be more welcome. And that goes hand in hand with, well, you know. The Apocalypse.

The world did not want me posting on LiveJournal.
That and I couldn't be bothered.

( 3rd Generation Gaming comes to my bedroom! )

Mike said our prose lectures are like a movie. This is Prose 2. I think it's more like a TV series. So here I go, into Season 2!

I'm satisfied now I have some ideas for stories. Mike is already sorted, and now for Tyler I've had some flashes of brilliance.
My choices are:
1 - A couple had a son and the father discovers he is sexually attracted to the baby. His wife finds out. Shit kicks off.
2 - A new queen is crowned, a 13 year old girl. Her power is slowly usurped by parliament. At 16, the Queen of England becomes a prostitute.

Which deliciously twisted storyline will provide the most entertainment to write? Ohh decisions, decisions!

I had unlocked everyone in the Wei forces except him.
He was one of the main reasons I bought the game.
I organised my story modes in order of who I thought would be able to unlock him.
Then I was left with only Shu.
I knew it was one battle during this campaign.
Then I saw it.

"Shu army & Zhang Liao army"

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSS!!!!

I actually screamed and punched the air.
Literally.

I don't think I've been this excited about anything in a game for a long, long time.

Then when I was finally shown this:


I squealed again.

To give you perspective on how much I love this guy, he has been my favourite character of my favourite game series since I first played as him. I love Jiang Wei, but I LOVE Zhang Liao.
It surprised me that I didn't cum a little.

Now I'm off to get Celestial Wyvern. He is the one character who I actually feel physical pain having to watch him suffer with anything other than his 3rd or 4th weapons. The man deserves the best.

And to get that, the duo I have waited so so long to see side by side finally unite!



Oh.Yes.

( Timeout! )

I'm almost finished with Hero in the Shadows. I have to admit, while the whole "I'm going to spell out to you everything that's happening" prose style that's typical of third-person, especially fantasy, is far from my thing Gemmell writes a good book. They could make an amazing RPG video-game out of this if they just tweaked it a bit to make it more game-friendly. You know, less sitting and talking, more action.
Of course, it would have to be an action RPG to get me to play it, but there's no denying it would be kick-ass.

On a more freakishly twisted note, remember Dynasty Warriors? The original? When it was Tekken and not 1 vs 1000? Well check this out.



They need to do more shit like that in today's games!

Once again I have been reminded that banks are useless.

I'm surprised no one saw the recession coming when you walk into your local branch and no one there knows how to supply you with a chequebook.
This means I'll be stealing my parents cheques to pay the rent this year.
That's a bad slope to be on.

I was also once again reminded that Barry town is full of chavs, tracksuit bottoms and old widows.
Cheltenham is far from the epitome of cool, but how can anyone wonder why I left Barry?
Or why I hate coming back?

There was one joy though. The one decent store in the whole street is the GameStation, which has one massive trade-in section for all us poories.
They mislabelled a Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence with the trade-in price of the standard MGS3.

To put this into perspective, Subsistence is used & new on Amazon for £50. This is the absolute cheapest I have found.
Sometimes, prices can exceed £100. Amazon has another for £300.
This is all used. The standard price for a brand-new second gen game is £30

Hazel found one in store for £15.

Oh, the people at the counter were pissed. Of course, they still sold it to me at the advertised price, but they were bitching about who price-tagged it. Ohh, they were bitching. They were not happy with 'Chris', if that is his real name.
It's an easy enough mistake to make, but they have just lost a fair bit of cash thanks to his fuck-up.

Thanks, Chris! And thanks, Hazel!

I'm taking a steer away from all the philosophy now.
It's just something I do when I'm stressed.

Stressful week has gone! Now we can get back to what this blog was made for! Weird shit.

Has anyone every wondered how Stretch Armstrong stretches in the mornings? I mean, its got to be one weird circumstance. Does he stretch out across the whole room? Does he keep extending and never actually get the stretch satisfaction?
Something tells me he isn't a morning person.

I haven't posted a fun time pic in a while. So in anticipation of the upcoming new NBA season, does anyone remember the time Ira Newbie went Street Fighter on Mike Dunleavy?

When people find out about my steadily declining interest in theism and philosophy there are a variety of responses people give. Some say they told me so. Others wish me good riddance. A few lament.

Very rarely am I asked why.

The reason is not because of the subject itself, although now I know my way around a bit the subject has lost some of its allure. The main reason is the people themselves that engage in these topics.

There aren’t many better examples of this than my latest video, ‘My Falsehoods.’

 

I think my days on YouTube are coming to an end.

 

What saddens and annoys me about ‘My Falsehoods’ is that it was supposed to be a documentation of all the things that I have been irrational about, in the hope of reminding myself that I might be, in fact, probably am irrational now.

What it became was an encyclopaedia of examples of the irrationalities of everyone else.

 

When I say ‘irrational’, I do not mean ‘incorrect.’ Rationality is not conclusion based. What I mean is that my reasons for believing such position were not justifiable, and therefore irrational.

What I gave in the video was a vague, vague outline of what I believed and why, and stated the basic principles of what I believe now.

It was not meant to be a set of convincing arguments for my new positions.

I stated this in the video. Numerous times.

Why do you all think I linked and annotated links to so many videos of me actually outlining cases for these new positions?

And yet, people are all too eager to jump on the bandwagon.

People claiming that the video was poorly reasoned, that I hadn’t presented any arguments, that their opinion of me has declined. People who had clearly not watched the relevant videos where I actually explain things.

 

Irrationality 1: We often block out information that does not fit our worldview.

Irrationality 1.2: We are less likely to go out of our way to find information disagreeing with us than we are to seek information that agrees with us.

 

Irrationality 2: We often simplify the positions of those who we disagree with to make them easier to refute.

 

As predicted, among all the arguments, very few of them presented anything new. I got a feeling similar to having a theist quote the Bible at me. Robotic. Repetitive. Unresponsive.

 These people make arguments that seem ignorant to the objections people have to them.

(And there are legitimate objections. There are to every position in philosophy. And this is philosophy. Even discussing whether god is science is philosophy. It’s epistemology. If you don’t believe there are legitimate objections to your position you are not looking hard enough.)

Many of the arguments were not arguments at all, but blunt statements that they are right or this is the case. They are secure in this though, because it is such a commonly stated idea.

In the next sentence they say all theists are deluded and would be locked up in mental asylums if it were not for the numbers lending their view credence.

 

Irrationality 1: We often block out information that does not fit our worldview.

 

Irrationality 3: We are less likely to question information that agrees with us than we are information that disagrees with us.

 

Irrationality 4: It is easier to make generic statements than correct ones.

 

Irrationality 5: It is easier to attack the person than their argument.

 

A strawman, for example, is when you take a bastardised view of someone’s argument, one that clearly is absurd, and refute that rather than the argument your opponent is actually advocating.

A strawman is not when you repeat your understanding of the person’s argument and ask them to clarify if this is, in fact, what they meant before proceeding to make an argument against it.

That is called a misunderstanding.

 

Irrationality 6: We throw around ‘irrational’ and ‘logical fallacy’ so readily that we in fact use them irrationally and fallaciously.

 

These irrationalities help us deal with cognitive dissonance. Yes, that psychological process of irrationally dealing with information that disagrees with us. Yes, that one you like to throw at those you disagree with so much. You can feel it too.

 

Irrationality 1: We often block out information that does not fit our worldview.

Irrationality 7: It is much easier to recognise that others are wrong than it is to admit that we are wrong.

It’s for this reason that I made ‘My Falsehoods.’ It’s for this reason that I am making this irrationality series. To help recognise your own irrationalities, not the person you disagree with.

This video has made me seriously doubt if any of you are ready for it. But it has also convinced me that information like this is needed more than I ever thought.

Footnote: Of those that did, in fact, inquire as to my reasons for things I said in the video, heard me out and dealt with what was said, there were some interesting things mentioned. As a result I have yet again adjusted my views regarding some of the things said in the video. Thank you for that!

5 a.m. insomniac philosophy.

I really do hate aesthetic objectivists. I really do think they're arrogant and/or closed minded.
This isn't because of an irrationality though. I know enough about irrationality and cognitive dissonance that aesthetic objectivism is so common that if I wanted to rid myself of cognitive dissonance I need simply take the issue up with those that agree with me and alleviate myself.
No, the reason I hate them is because I'm yet to see any argument for it other than "I'm right. You're wrong."
They claim objectivism but use the arguments of a subjectivist.

This isn't just the case with beauty. The same is true of things like, say, music preferences. When I say 'aesthetics' I don't just mean beautiful. I mean all these commonly held subjective opinions that objectivists can scoff at. They don't seem to understand that when I say Run-DMC is better than Avenged Sevenfold I have a damn good reason for thinking so. I could probably even make a rational case for it.
But it's still a subjective opinion. It's just a reasoned one.
Aesthetic objectivists have no problem stating their reasons for their preferences, but do nothing to show why this perspective is objectively true.
They just state that it is, as if their reasons are enough to make it true for everyone. The basic equivalent of "I think this, so it must be true."
Subjective arguments.

The reason aesthetic objectivism doesn't make sense isn't because their opinions are unjustifiable.That would be an objectivist argument. It makes no sense because when it boils down to it we are dealing with concepts such as 'beautiful' and 'better'. All aesthetic opinion is based on concepts like these. Concepts with fluid meaning. Concepts where the meaning is contingent upon a condition and is meaningless without it. Concepts where the condition is personal opinion. Nothing more.
Subjectivism.

An attempt to objectify aesthetics may try to base the concept of, say, 'better' on something like pragmatism. They could say this is quicker or healthier or more productive. But is quicker, healthier or more productive necessarily 'better'? What if I want to go slow and savour the moment, die early on the joys of fatty foods or reduce productivity slightly to maximise enjoyment? You see, defining 'better' as pragmatic does nothing to show why pragmatic is 'better'.
This problem is unavoidable, because it will always fall on the last system we use to justify our epistemology. A self justification is needed somewhere, and these self justifications rest all their weight on personal opinion.

Ultimately it is all a set of assumptions. You prefer health. I prefer tasty food at convenient times. You appreciate the dexterity and musical skill it takes to play a guitar. I appreciate the complexities and delicacies of well written lyrics.

These assumptions are not right or wrong. They are not concerned with validity. They just are.

But objectivism can be appealing. It holds the esoteric narcissism that the majority of the world who are aesthetic subjectivists are wrong, ignorant sheep. Additionally, everyone who doesn't believe in their brand of beauty is just as ignorant. They, however, are intelligent and have exclusive access to the truth.
Objectivism is simple, powerful and can make you feel very superior. Unfortunately, it's wrong.

At its core aesthetic objectivism is a refusal or inability to accept differentiating assumptions from their own.
That is why I say it is arrogant. That is why I say it is closed minded.

That is an objective argument for subjectivism.

Everyone seems to be talking about babies recently. I don’t know what’s up. Perhaps it’s mating season and I can’t smell the scent because I’m anosmic.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Me with a kid is bad news. I would not wish to torture another human being with either my genes or an upbringing I’m responsible for.
I’d use the kid for social experiments. When naming the kid, everyone always says what a lovely name it is, regardless of what name you give the baby. I’d call it Sparta so I could stand in public and say “THIS IS SPARTAAAA!!!”
Just for the reaction I’d get.
Adolf Sparta. That’s it.
Hazel on the other hand would have a kid for the psychological experiments. I wouldn’t put it past her to have the kid wake up to hear “Hello Sparta. I want to play a game.”

I really wouldn't.

Is this how you would treat your child?

It has been an odd few days.

I've been trying out new things and exploring new areas. Since Hazel left I've gone back to my daily bum routine, but everything has a twist. MSN is different. The PS2 games are fresh. My video editing is format conversion and I've argued topics on YouTube that I've never argued before.

In an attempt to spend a minimal amount while maximising video gaming pleasure Dynasty Warriors has made a dramatic comeback. DW 3 and 5 for £10 should last me some time. Hopefully I can stave off the PS3 for a while now.

I spent Hazel's time here making a vlog on the parents' HD camera. A social and technological experiment.
Result 1: I learned it's too much effort to record your life. I prefer living it.
Result 2: Hazel really doesn't like cameras.
Result 3: Format conversion is a bitch.
Hazel will be happy to know if I ever post that video it will be a long time coming. Right now I've given up.

I've spent the past week arguing aesthetics. I don't know why. I don't care about aesthetics.

The ways in which people deal with cognitive dissonance never ceases to amaze me. More and more frequently I'm seeing it take two forms. Objectifying your view as absolute ("Nope, you are definitely 100% wrong. There is no room for context or personal opinion here.") and personal attacks, usually as an ad hominem or attack on motivation ("He is deluded. He just says that because...")
As soon as these two enter the arena, all substance takes a quick and simple bow to the rhetoric of sophistry.

Oh, and I remember why I hate aesthetic objectivists. They're either arrogant or closed minded. I lack the wisdom to judge which.