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Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Blog Post of the Week #1: The Incident

By:
Dillon Wheeler


***Note*** After multiple attempts at fixing the odd spacing and font sizes later on in this post. I have, effectively. Given up.

Okay well, I had planned for a Monday blog update, but, well you know good ol’ procrastinator me, and look at the bright side, TWOSday is twice as good! I didn’t get around to it Monday, Sorry but, I do have a good one for you today though! Awesome! Even comes with an original picture of my hero I took today! How about that!


Tuesday, November 30, 2010 4:17 PM GMT -0800
It begins.
You may ask what begins exactly. I get it, perfectly logical question, so I will tell you. First though, let me fill you in on a bit of the backstory.
I had just finished my last lab for my Earth and Atmospheric Sciences course, hurray! I know, great right? So completed it was, this by the way was around about 4:00 PM. So I finished up, said some goodbyes, thanked the teachers, and left. I made my way towards the subway system, like usual, you know? I got on the train, it was full so I was forced to stand up, no big deal. 
So here I am, standing up, moving along underground. I do the logical thing, put my headphones on and start listening to music, you know, it’s a long ride, over twenty minutes with sweaty people.
And so it begins.
4:17 and all is fine. Songs are playing, emotions are at a high, excitement even higher, stress low.
Then, a familiar song plays. 
“Times Like These” by the Foo Fighters. 
I hadn’t heard the song in a very long time, so okay, I go along with it, I like the instrumental intro.
Then it happens, now to preserve what happened and display the truth, I will repeat what I had wrote during the events. Word for word consecutively, no edits. 
#1
“Either I have been drugged, or something is not right with reality, this is definitely not normal, wow.”
I wait it out a bit, not too sure of what is happening.
#2
“I can’t be sure if what I was hearing was real, but how could it not be?
Still confused myself, I let it continue.
#3
“The music is repeating itself and playing backwards, with heavy static and stuff, I can’t explain it and I can’t be sure of anything, I do not know what the (expletive) is happening, but I do not it can not be something to do with my iPhone.
Now, In reality, It could have definitely been my iPhone, which is less than two months old and such an incident has never occurred prior.
I begin to reason at this point.
#4
And before I blame it solely on myself, maybe some paranormal interference (expletive) stuff up, like influenced the sound waves.
What I mean, is an external force. Unseen.
#5
I’ve replayed the song over and over and it is seemingly random occurrences, I can not make a conclusion to anything other than that I am being (expletive) with.
Then, After the ordeal, I recap the entire incident, in an attempt to make more sense to myself and others.
#6
So to recap - playing in reverse, heavy static, repeating one part perfectly, high pitched ringing noise, distorted voice/instruments.
All of which seemingly occurred at random, sometimes together, sometimes singular
Upon numerous replays, it has now ceased completely, with the exception of the occasional ringing,
My theory - I have no (expletive) idea what just happened, visual input remain changed throughout, it was only the auditory senses “misinterpreting?” what was happening.
So there you go, unedited (except for curse words of course), raw information, I myself, documented during and after the incident.
Still confused? Well, I was on the train, listening to music, when all of a sudden, it would repeat itself. 
Yes, the song would repeat a part I had just heard. 
What did I do? The logical thing, I took my iPhone out, inspected it, played with the headphones, then restarted the song. 
All was good.
Then boom, the good ol’ chap Dave Grohl, lead singer of the Foo Fighters would you know, deepen his voice, to oh let’s say, to Demon levels? Yeah thats right, It sounded like Lucifer himself was telling me that “It’s times like these where we learn to live again”. I KNOW, FREAKY!
Quickly, I unsheathed my iPhone from the constraints of my pocket, and checked it once again, nothing out of the ordinary, so I did the natural thing to do, restarted it once again!
This time, however unreal it may sound, I got to the point where Dave Grohl says his first word, I believe it is “I”, and completes the sentence. At which point, the lines started to play backwards. Now I can write backwards, idk, I guess, fluently? Not sure if that is the correct term, but I can do it. So, during my courses of writing backwards, I am able to recognize words being played backwards.
Okay, thats complete bogus, everyone can recognize a song being played backwards, just thought it sounded better throwing that in lol.
So it plays backwards, but that is not all, there is heavy, heavy, and I repeat! Heavy! Static in the background, I quickly checked the headphones once again, nothing. I wiggled the chord, no homo, and it did not change whatsoever, still extremely static-y.
At this point, I began writing the notes you read earlier.
I repeated the song multiple times over. Again producing variations between the distortions. Then at once, it stopped. Completely. Shoe-Bam Done. Yes, I create my own sayings. 
So, now we get to the good stuff. The juicy part. I have a few theories as to why this has happened. Let me start off with oh I don’t know, the most basic of them.

1. My iPhone
Now, everyone knows how Apple is, their products are designed, displayed and portrayed (rhyme please) to be flawless, perfect, redundant, beautiful pieces of technology. If they weren’t made of special alloys and glass you would probably eat them, or at least, you know, take a little nibble. I mean, how could you not? They are beautiful! 
As beautiful as one device can be. Those devices can fail. Perhaps it was a glitch in the system. A re-occurring bug, destroying my music experience. I don’t know. Seems the most logical.


2. Me, Myself, and I
Not the terrible song by some pop musician, I really mean myself on this one. I will admit, it is possible I was “hearing” things, and trying to interpret things as I would like have to believed them as being, but really were not. The Human Mind is a complex being. Not even itself can understand well, itself. 
Moving on.


3. The train and/or being underground
Getting slightly less logical here, but there is a chance of this. Perhaps, while being underground, there were some sort of signals being sent around, that interfered with my iPhone? It being solid concrete and all the signals would bounce easily enough and the train could have acted as a sort of receiver. Or, maybe it was the train itself emitting these signals?


4. Aliens
Yay! Aliens! Logical, no. Fun to talk about and ponder, yes! Maybe Aliens, have some sort, well okay, for sure they do. Maybe Aliens had decided that they did not want me listening to music, or thought they would send a message and began toying with me. Okay, please don’t stop reading. It was just a joke!!!


5. Brain Signals
Never count out the brain baby. That beast is capable of anything. You know there are toys out now that use brain signals to operate a fan and move a ball up in the air? The more strong-minded you are, the higher the ball! So, perhaps in all my subconscious glory, I had unknowingly messed with the signals. Distorting the information. Curious thoughts George.


6. Drugs
Though I had not taken any, or consumed anything, without my knowledge of course. Maybe I was somehow injected, or breathed in a psychoactive drug?


7. Reality itself
Maybe, just maybe reality is all subjective. Maybe the music I was hearing, was not music but the product of my mind? Perhaps, we are all being controlled, a la The Matrix and there was an error made, distorting the musical goodness I was receiving. Idk. What I do know though, is that if a very large African American confronts me, and tells me to take a pill from one of his hands, I am running as far away as fast as I can, thats how real nightmares begin, well, doesn’t have to be an African American, could be just plain African. No, I am just kidding. Some people from all races are a little deranged, there we go, diversity!
Okay, so in conclusion, maybe I don’t know what it was, I threw those possibilities out there. No doubt it could have been something else that I did not mention. If you have any ideas or have experienced the same thing, please, don’t hesitate to let me know. Until then I think I’ll go with the Alien theory, That way I can have some fun as I get to wear a tinfoil hat and sit in front of a television watching static! Oh joy...
Thanks,
Dillon Wheeler

Friday, November 26, 2010

Song of the Week #1: Gust Of... by The Album Leaf



By:
Matt Gallagher

Music plays a major role in my life. It accentuates feelings and builds emotions. It alters moods and provides the soundtrack to the soul.


Music is a pivotal part of my life, to say the least. So my goal is going to be to post, weekly, a track that has moved or affected me in some way. I'd like to stick to tracks that evoke feelings of setting and atmosphere, not just something I heard and really dug. Thats not what this is.

Like I said my goal is a song a week, at least. I may end up posting multiples, but I'll try for at least one.

Entry I: Gust Of... by The Album Leaf


What interests me most about this track is the constant high pitched drone that never lays up. Its reminiscent of "room noise": the ambient sound a room houses when no other sounds are present. It also reminds me of the tonal highs of circuitry. The sound made when passing current through a resistor. The sound is haunting and unsettling yet it is clashed with a beautiful guitar medley. I'm never quite sure what to make of it, yet it leaves deep emotions that resonate the more the track is played.


Thank you for listening,
Matt

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

The First Ten

I know I said I would post something monday or tuesday, but I have decided to just post articles on Fridays. Weekly.

The reason I am making this post today though, is that we have broken through the first ten!

The first ten countries.

Getting close to two months now, and there has been at least five people from ten countries reading the blog, I found that to be just awesome!

To think, the articles posted here have been viewed all over the world, from Canada to the United States to Russia to China to Australia and so on is amazing.

I would just like to thank everyone who has viewed the blog, and (hopefully) enjoyed my writing.

Thank you, you readers provide the inspiration for my writing.

- Dillon Wheeler

Monday, November 22, 2010

The Blog

As we are ever changing, I have made a sort of big decision.


Instead of just posting everything as soon as I write it, which, more often than not, is in a cluster of three or so posts. So, I have decided that the blog will be updated weekly, unless I have multiple posts/responses in which I just can not wait to post and need to get them up earlier.


Weekly updates will be useful because I can and will provide a constant flow of goods, instead of the usual three or four posts in a very short period, and then a long period before the next couple of posts. (Like now)


So I guess the next post will either be up today, or by tomorrow and then new posts will appear either every monday, wednesday or every friday, not exactly sure yet.


Keep on reading!

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Response to: Shaping Our Identity

By:
Matt Gallagher
The idea of a unified identity is very intriguing. I would actually liken it to the way the mind processes ideas and concepts. Lets take a cup for example. It is safe to assume almost anyone knows what a cup is; its properties. The cup holds items, holds liquids, is used for consuming. Everyone with the "idea" of the cup would define it as such but one's mental picture of it would be quite different from that of another's. When i say cup to you, you may picture a glass entity, elongated in shape, yet simplistic,whereas my "idea" of the cup may be round, stout, and ceramic. Although very different, both ideas of the cup are correct because the properties remain constant.

This general concept can be applied to the human identity. In Dillon's post, he brings up the notion that identity may be a constant or an imprint. Id like too introduce the possibility that what changes our identities is our idea of them; our subconscious projections of our identities. And it is not our identities that change with influence but our projections. With this concept one can then suggest the results of removing an identity. If for instance a man lost his memories or simply his identity, he could, in effect, resort back to the "definition" of identity; the general identity applied at birth or written into our "code".
I’m interested in getting others opinions on this. Post some comments.
thanks for listening,
Matt

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

A Goal Of Mine

I will be doing my best to update the blog as much as possible, the goal I have in mind is for an update every one to three days, this will be on a wide range of topics as they have always been, (although most fall under the scientific philosophy tab) and so if you have any requests for discussions or would like to see me produce more of a certain topic, leave a comment or two. Thanks


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Shaping Our Identity

By:

Dillon Wheeler


In this post, I mention identity a lot, and I just wanted to say, by identity I mean our conscious, way we act, think, our intelligence, memory, every brain process that is unique to each Human Being after a certain point. With that said, lets begin, shall we?


This is how we are physically identified,

but how do we identify our minds?


Over the past week, I have begun to wonder something. Something about reality. Something about Us. I began to wonder if we all start off exactly the same, and our identities are shaped by internal and external environments.


I mean, as soon as we are conceived, are we all equal? Equal in the sense that we have no identity? Again, I don't mean like eight months in the womb, I mean as soon as we are conceived, at the very moment when life has begun.


This is conception.


And if we are all the same, do we exist individually or are we everyone and everyone is us? Like a singular collective mind?


A collection of videos, like the higher collective

mind, if all humans were one.


But the question is, how would we know? If everyone was identical, what would we be?


As I sat on the daily train ride home, I looked to the man sitting across from me. I watched him for a brief time (I'm not a creeper…. I think) and I imagined myself being that man, and in truth, it was not that hard to imagine. There exist the distinct possibility that I could have been him and he could have been me, us being each other, "mentally" of course, and under the right circumstances.


Circumstances.


Let me give you an example, say twins are born at the exact same moment. By some occurrence, their parents gave them up for adoption, so both children are given up for adoption at the exact same time, and are both adopted by different people.


So here we are, with two infant human beings. Could we say that these babies have identities? Maybe, but most likely the answer would be No (refer to what I mean by identity at the top). So now lets believe these babies have grown up, one became a good man and the other an evil man. What is there that leads us to believe that these men were destined to become good and evil?


The Fictional Good Man - His parent treated him with care, gave him attention, encouraged and loved him.


The Fictional Evil Man - His parent mistreated him, gave him no attention, showed no love towards him.

There is a fine line between

good and evil.


So the environment that these twins grew up in, influenced their identity, it shaped them to become what they are now. So then we reverse their environments, the good twin is placed in the abusive home, and the evil twin is placed in the loving home. When they grew up, would the good twin still become the good twin, and the evil twin become evil? Or would their roles be reversed? It is likely that their roles would indeed become reversed, and so we could say that the two twins started off with "blank slates".


So if everyone starts off with blank slates, does that mean we can choose our identity? Does that mean that I chose who I am?


What if there is a singular identity and that everyone is a representation of that single identity? Would that identity be God's identity? Or does that mean something else, like the existence of reality all together?


Contemplate this, perhaps we were all created by God's vision (Im not very religious by the way) and subtle variations in the "formula" for identity made us all what we are now. Subtle variations meaning the environment I illustrated in the example above.


God's vision.


If this "formula" made us all what we are now, can we say that therefore we are all God himself? To make it clear, what I mean is that perhaps we all started off as God had intended (A vision of himself, or Adam if you will) but then, along the way, we morphed and mutated into what and who we are through the internal and external environments.


I am not a firm believer in God, though I do believe in a higher power, although not what you would think (maybe i will get into it in a future blog post?) and to conclude, sorry, but I do not know the answer to the questions I posed.


Oh, and if you like the blog and enjoy reading my writing, follow the blog, or drop a few comments telling me what you think, the feedback, good or bad would be much appreciated,


Thank You,

Dillon Wheeler

Monday, November 8, 2010

The Advancement of Mankind

By:

Dillon Wheeler

Do you think there was ever an advanced civilization of humans before us? Or perhaps an alternate reality in which we are much more advanced than we presently are? It is definitely something to ponder.


(Thinking: It's good for you!)


It has been said (and by logic this holds truth) that we only know a small fraction of our past history. Now think about it. All of what we know is because there has been things left behind. Artifacts, fossils, buried cities, rock carvings, all of these things is what has shaped our image of history. Past civilizations represented by clay pottery. Primitive stone axes representing

agriculture. It's all their, and we like to think (like to think as in we have CLAIMED) that everything we know is true. Now my question is, what if that is not true? What if what we truly know is much more than anthropologists, geologists, and whatever other ologists, tell the media? Write in the history books? What if there was that fabled atlantis?


(This is our history as we are told)


One day I was sitting in my seventh grade science class, It was an average day, nothing out of the ordinary, but I can't be sure about that, I wasn't paying much attention to my teacher. That is, until he told our class something that would be more important that anything else in my life. He once told me a story about an island, during the Greek or Roman era's, that was extremely advanced for it's time. He claimed they had running water, hot tubs, imagine that, hot tubs! flushing toilets, and many other pleasantries you and I take for granted in our advanced day and age. He told me the name of them, which I can not recall now. The point is, here we are, many centuries ago, and there is this island with all this advanced technology, how did they get it? Where did it come from? Were these people that brilliant and innovative or did someone help them? I don't know the answers to these questions. Nevertheless, catastrophe struck this island, wiping out everyone on it. What hit them? I am not sure, I don't think anthropologists are either. I think I was told that they believed it was a hurricane, or some other natural disaster, but truthfully, it could have been anything.


(Could this island have been Atlantis?)


My point of that story was, all we know of that advanced civilization, was that in our eyes they were far ahead of there time in the water and piping department, because, of what we have recovered. We have absolutely no idea how advanced this civilization could have been, running water today, electricity, combustible engines tomorrow?


How far advanced would this civilization have been, if it were not wiped off the face of the Earth? Would we be where we are now? That was technology that was not replicated for centuries! imagine the technology there could and would have been today.


It would be above our wildest imaginations, beyond anything we could ever envisioned. I know this because if these people were able to create that kind of technological advances, they must have had help from another possibly alien race. And we know, for an alien race to reach us, they need to be far ahead of where we even are now.


Another little thing I want to add, albeit a bit goofy, maybe they had the technology all along, (like somewhere down the line they advanced as we did now, but isolated) and these people were so advanced that they had discovered time-travel. With their ability to travel through time, perhaps they had gone back in time, and taught them how to create the technology that would lead to their advancements, and then an undetected natural disaster struck, wiping out these people, and therefore there future selves. Hahaha.


Thanks,

Dillon Wheeler

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Check Alien under the places tab!

Friday, November 5, 2010

Something New

Okay, I know I will not be able to finish one soon, and so probably not today, therefore I will just upload the document I've wanted to upload for a while, but it is a very long read, so I will upload it into its own page on the sidebar.

Thanks,
Dillon Wheeler

It's been a while.

Sorry for the delay in posts, I understand that has been over a week (approaching two weeks) since my last post. I've been very busy in the past weeks with school work (midterms and paper's due).The worst of it is over, but I still have some work ahead of me. I haven't forgotten about this blog though and I have wrote up some outlines for future blog posts. I have about seven posts I would like to upload, although they are not written in their, entirety. I am going to try my best to get one of them done today, and upload it, but if I am unable to finish it soon, then I will upload an interesting document I found on a forum. Mine or not, I am determined to keep new content flowing so updates will be coming very shortly!

[ A hint, maybe? :) ]

Keep your heads up and eyes open!

Thanks,
Dillon Wheeler