Yesterday: walked the dog, ran some errands, did some grading, went over to Casa de Coach B with Monkey. Several things occured to me over the course of the day.
*How can the wind be blowing in one's face while walking west, then seem to be blowing in one's face while walking south, then seem to be blowing in one's face while walking east, and then (you guessed it) blowing in one's face while walking north. One might become disoriented. Perhaps one was walking in a straight line the entire time and only thought he or she was making turns.
*Speaking of turns, I am terrible at rolling virtual marbles on virtual tile surfaces. It's a life skill I simply don't seem to possess, yet I have managed to live a relatively full life despite this handicap. However, it brought to mind this hypothetical quandary: suppose my parents had the medical and monetary wherewithal in 1968 to do genetic screening of yours truly, in utero, and this anomaly (my predisposition to be a poor virtual marble roller) were discovered. Now, suppose one of my parents could not bear to bring a child into this world with such a handicap, fearing that somehow the child's inability to perform such a simple-seeming virtual skill would open him or her up to ridicule and impenetrable barriers over the course of life. For the sake of decorum, and my parents' constiutution, let's say they decide simply to splice a gene here and there and somehow manage to create an uberroller, a child with a preternatural ability to roll virtual marbles over virtual tile. How would that have altered my life? What experiences would I have missed? What character-building life moments (that ultimately made me the man I am today) would I have been denied? These ethical questions previous generations have been mercifully spared; however, generations of the near future will be faced with them. Should we not grapple with them ourselves, and spare our children (or rather our brother's children) the divisive debate?
*I always thought Superman used his powers for good, but, as revealed in the film, Superman Returns, the Man of Steel also uses his power to spy on old girlfriends and sneak into the bedroom of his estranged child. Super spooky is what that is.
1 comment:
That hypothetical quandary makes me tired! Oh yeah, I'm already tired because I'm sick. Can I request one of those genetic splice improvement packages (the one that includes the time machine) that would boost my immune system. Not only make me less vulnerable to wetness evil but also unaffected by poison ivy and the like? Tha would be spiffy. I know it would prevent suffering I've experienced that has led to my faceted and resolute character, but I think that would be OK.
How weird. I totally had that all-the-time wind in the face experience on Saturday too! It was like 70 degrees here, so it was a nice nonstop all-directional wind. Maybe since the icecaps are disappearing there will be no more true north and thus no direction and then the wind will go all over the place.
Anon AMVB
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