EVER WONDER...ABOUT THE MENTAL POWER IT TAKES TO CHOOSE A CEREAL

I'm currently reading a book by this great author (Jonah Lehrer) called Proust was a Neuroscientist. It's about how artists discovered principles of the brain far before science- giving examples of chefs, writers (Proust, of course), and artists. It's so interesting that I'm annotating it for fun- don't look so surprised; for one, no one can see you when you stare at your computer, and it says I'm a nerd in my personal blurb on the left, you should have seen this coming.
I figured that Jonah was a cool dude- no surprise their...he's into neuroscience so we're automatically best buds. He also wears sweaters and those clear, smart person glasses that make geeky boys look like philosophers. You can watch all of this in a you-tube video- big surprise right? That last post was super long, so this one is going to be super easy on me- video. There. Done.

Don't you just want to hugs him!!!

EVER WONDER...THE DIFFERENE BETWEEN CONSTRUCTION AND CREATION

A city starts as nothing but land, just a flat surface that stretches onward. Then buildings are built and they are small at first, but gradually turn into massive complexes and skyscrapers; yet, this isn’t what truly makes up a city. New York isn’t just a bunch of buildings, but a gathering of people and personalities; it is a network of relationships interwoven between buildings. The city may have been constructed from blueprints and steel beams, but the people create the city and give it life.

To create and to construct are both processes of building, but one fulfills an organized need and the other fulfills an innate desire for expression. We construct to fill a specific purpose, such as a lack of housing or bumpy roads. It’s to fix something that is broken or to make something that is needed; a bridge is constructed so that it is easier to go from point A to point B, and road signs are constructed to create order.

Creating, dissimilar to construction, does not have a concrete purpose. Instead, it is a form of communication and expression; an architect, for example, may have an idea to build a housing complex, but not just any housing complex. The architect is an artist, and therefore would use his or her creativity to not only make the building functional but also visually stunning. The need for the building to be beautiful comes from the architect’s desire for expression and the ability to influence the culture of the community. Unlike the rationale of construction, things aren’t created only to be useful; creation happens to make connections between people, things, and ideas.

The architects blue print, and its connection to society and culture, helps to define the line between creation and construction. While the buildings preliminary form is created out of the mind of the architect, the actual building is constructed, and this is because construction is a process of assembly. The building is put together piece-by-piece using the diagrams and measurements given. There is one way to complete the tasks set forth and that is the way it’s written in the manual. This is the downfall of construction, that it is confined to the original design.

Creativity, on the other hand, flourishes with improvisation and development. The nuances of buildings come from flashes of creative genius that dare to go beyond the bounds of normal structures. When the designer decides that a building will have a unique attribute, he or she is subjecting it to creativity. Often, creative genius is an experiment and may not work out the way that the designer had planned, so he or she would have to remove it from the concept.

While a mistake in creativity is a learning process, construction is more concrete and a mistake could be devastating; a screw out of place could ruin the whole structure. This stress around construction makes the end result doubly satisfactory. Few people are enamored by the process of a building being erected, and the cranes that sprout up over the skyline aren’t aesthetically pleasing. It’s hard to appreciate the rough steel beams, but the final glistening building is truly a sight to behold. We have rituals for the completion of construction projects like the ribbon cutting ceremony. Once everything is completed and the construction is done, the ribbon is cut, and the world moves on.

These buildings that are constructed to form the backbone of a city give room for the creation of neighborhoods and communities. These neighborhoods develop on there own, and gain recognition for having flower shops, galleries, or particularly good pastries. These specialties grow from the citizen’s freedom of expression; they create a neighborhood atmosphere by deciding to share their passions. Chelsea, the gallery center of Manhattan, didn’t become famous over night. As rent skyrocketed in Greenwich Village, the poor artists and gallery owners moved lower on the island. Now Chelsea is almost completely galleries and art installations, which reflects the people that moved into the area so many years before. This is the benefit of creation; there is hardly an ugly moment in the process, and some would argue that it never truly ends. As long as the creation is still conveying the original message, its story continues.

Charles Dickens once wrote that “The whole difference between construction and creation is this: that a thing constructed can only be loved after it is constructed; but a thing created is loved before it exists.” In a concrete world, construction is supreme. It follows patterns and guidelines, which make it predictable and unimaginative. Creativity happens because the world is not concrete, but fluid. We have emotions and fickle whims that cannot be met by order and structure. Instead, we change, our lives change, and our cities change with us.

EVER WONDER...WHY A CRAPPY CAT DRAWING IS IN THE OBSERVER

The Charlotte Observer has this kids holiday card contest where children submit entries and have them featured in the paper. I submitted a picture of my cat Beau Rose and it won the pre-teen category. Go thirteen year old me!

In today's paper it was featured...again. I'm not proud of this. In fact, I'm a little ashamed. Don't judge thirteen year old me- here's The Charlotte Observer page today. If anyone is interested in entering...

Oh! and happy Thanksgiving y'all! (I'm extra southern this time of year)

EVER WONDER...HOW TO TAKE OVER A DIGITAL WORLD

Yes, I have realised that I post far to many videos...this is the effect of the holiday season- having no time to write and all the time to look for expensive gifts to ask 'Santa' for. What's at the top of the list? Well, I'm glad I asked myself. Civilization 4 was one of the greatest gifts I ever received; it was one of those that when opened, I immediately download it onto my computer. The best part was that my parents couldn't really complain, it's a history and strategy game after all.
It had three great things going for it: the graphics were one of the best parts because they were so life like for '05. It was a beautiful game and one of the best parts of playing it was building the world wonders and going into the funky mirage and watch it be built in like- ten seconds. A ten second pyramid. Another was the fighting, which was just to much fun. You'd build your little warriors and archers and cavalry and if you made it into the twenty-first century you'd get these super cool tanks. I'd stack twenty Calvary on top of one another and a war elephant for good measure before going on to siege the great cities of Boston or Cairo. I'm proud to say that I totally destroyed both Genghis Khan and George Washington. Take that world leaders! I beat your digital dust! Third, but probably my favorite- after you discovered a new technology, Lenard Nimoy would read a famous quote and then there'd be a ding noise. It was so cool- like he was in the room giving me Vulcan logic.
Yep...good times. Now that I'm no longer ten years old I'm ready for the big leagues. Civ5 was just released and I'm too excited not to watch countless hours of YouTube coverage of sloppy recordings of nerds first Civ5 games on their Mac books. Did that make sense? I don't know.
Here's on of the better reviews- kinda long, and if you don't want to watch then skip to the very end to see the incredible graphics. In '05 someone could have mistaken that for a fraking photo.

Video Games Civilization V Review HD

XBox 360 Playstation 3 Nintendo Wii

EVER WONDER...ABOUT THAT HEEEEEEE MAN

Best movie of the...ever? The Fifth Element; it stares the ever so gorgeous Bruis Willis and the ever so lovely Milla Jovovich. They are a lovely pair of ex army officer and supreme being (with a multipass of course)
The plot is basically to stop the world from dying due to evil space aliens, but all that aside it's a very funny and well made romantic sci/fi action drama. I will no doubt post more about this in the future, but for now- how about some Ruby Rhod?

EVER WONDER...ABOUT THE APPEAL OF CRUDE HUMOR

I like humor- I'm sure that's not a surprise. The surprise is that I like the crude stuff that most people cringe at- surprised now? This is a post on crude humor...uh, bitch. My first specimen is Blake Wright. He's an artist with a dirty soul...I like his clever- I thought of this and you didn't, loser- stuff, which is funny because, like the d + g hybrid, it's usually terrible ideas. As much as I love consolidation, letters are difficult to morph with lasting results as shown by this nifty diagram. He also draws shoes and writes thing under them like, five shoes from Payless that are in my budget and in my nightmares. Also, a Halloween post wear a girl is dressed as butter and saying- I'm a stick of butter, but slutty. You get it? Because girls always dress like slutty things on Halloween, most of which are childhood TV characters and blue collar workers...Really, someone should tell them that they look like desperate hookers, and not the classy ones for ceo's and senators.

EVER WONDER...ABOUT THE TEN PRINCIPLES OF DESIGN

It seems so obvious to me now, but I'd never realized how much design and ergonomics goes into everyday things; just walking down an aisle in Home Depo everything passed by an industrial designers hands. A movie called Objectified focused on the design of everyday objects- I was blown away by not only the subject, but the quality of the movie itself. It's so wonderful to see something done well! In any normal circumstance I find documentaries dull and unwatchable, but this one draws you in and makes you desperate for more when it's over.
This is one of my favorite parts from the movie for two reasons. 1) It focuses on simplicity 2)This mans voice is spectacular. I want a German/Swedish/Norwegian man with a lovely rough voice such as this...

EVER WONDER...ABOUT THE POWER OF POSITIVE THINKING

This is from the Moth Grandslam...true stories told live without notes. I've been sort of fascinated with teenage/ high school stories lately. It's so cliché, but there is such a wide array of conflict in our teenage years that its the perfect age for a good story. Here's another about finding love in odd places...and you've never heard this one before.

EVER WONDER...IF TODAYS TECHNOLOGY IS YESTERDAY'S SCIENCE FICTION

With the rapid on slot of new technology it often seems to come out of no where- cell phones and the Internet as just some brain magic that an engineer cranked out in his spare time. This is wrong on many levels- the first being that things don't develop that quickly, and in fact the Internet was a brain baby in someones mind many years before it became reality. Second- technology evolves from these embryonic brain babies into week prototypes, and it takes quite a while for it to mature into a standard adult technological interface.
Sometimes these embryonic brain babies don't come out of the minds of scientists and engineers, but instead the creative brains of science fiction writers.
Neal Stephenson in his book Diamond Age (a novel based around an electronic book) influenced the creation of the Amazons Kindle e-book. He also wrote another book called Snowcrash, which inspired the 3D online worlds like WoW and Secondlife.
A film called Metropolis made in 1927, which is about a deadly machine monster, pre-dates the first Artificial Intelligence Center by thirty-nine years.
Invisibility has been a topic of discussion for a very long time, even going back as far as Greek mythology and Plato's The Republic. Being one of Science- Fictions favorite non- existing inventions it has also been used in an array of popular books and series like Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings,The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and Artemis Fowl. Stealth technology began to develop in the 1930's for ships, planes, and missiles. More recently in 2006, a team in Britain developed the first stages of an invisibility cloak.
Last but not least (actually, we'll call them the best :D) are all of the inventions predicted by Star Trek. The first being flip phones, which were inspired by Starfleet communicators. Next the interactive computer, the one that you can talk to and it will answer back. Last being the iPhone, which I would relate to the tricorder devise; I feel like it could do just about anything; now, we don't need our phones to do everything, but if it doesn't do it- than there is probably an app for it!

Of course, Science-Fiction doesn't try and predict the future, but with all of the crazy ideas floating around in the fiction-verse, some of them have to make it in the tech world. And thank goodness too- I would be so lost without my GPS App!

EVER WONDER...IF YOUR ON ACID

David Ellis is a North Carolina native, who grew up with a love of hip-hop from listening to the hippest New York "beats". Yeah...he's one of those music/art/film people who combine everything and make super amazing stuff like kinetic installations, which is just a fun way of saying performance visual art...he makes his art while people watch- that's what I'm trying to say.
Yeah, so here's a video of one of those kinetic installations! :D