Non-practice

I recently played enough StarCraft and good-old chess to try and make a comparison between the two.

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I recently read on a web site about a person’s who’s friends were having tattoos, while that person didn’t.

And that person said that he had a bit more creativity, a white canvas (the skin), which left some room to creativity.

And I wondered – why do people have tattoos? One reason would be for aesthetics, but yet another one could be courage.

It might look like a person proves courage by having a tattoo.

But what if there is also courage in not having a tattoo? What if the courage was soft, calm, and relaxing, rather than all-powerful?

What if courage meant you do the right thing, you choose a path to you that gives you flexibility for the future (what will you do with your skin when you’re 10 years older?).

Sure, having a tattoo proves you have courage. But, to me, not having one proves this even more.

Also, there’s this: “Confidence is Silent. Insecurities are Loud!“ “Încrederea în sine e tăcută. Nesiguranța de sine e vocală!” – Blog de Olivian Breda.

“Răul poate să-l facă oricine, cât de nevolnic ar fi. Binele însă e numai pentru sufletele tari şi firile călite. Răul: lapte pentru copii; binele: carne pentru adulţi.” (Nicolae Steinhardt »)

There was once a conversation on TV between Andrei Pleșu and Andrei Gheorghe, and Andrei Pleșu said he doesn’t generally swear because he prefers the liberty of swearing from time to time, but not once every two sentences.

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There’s this quote:

“For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?

(Matthew 16:25-26, NIV; Source »)”

This means that every person on this planet has a soul that values more than the whole world. Do you think you’re better than X? That may be, but that person has enormous inner value. Just by existing.

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Dacă știți despre “Efectul fluture”/“Butterfly effect”, e greu să nu vedeți legătura între COVID-19 și posibilul efect fluture.

Ca justificare, dacă o persoană X are sau nu COVID și infectează sau nu o altă persoană poate avea un impact major asupra vieților multor oameni.

E un efect de domino masiv, în care un gest simplu de protecție (mască, săpun, izolare) poate preveni o reacție în lanț.

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I follow Seth Godin.

From time to time, he writes about an extraordinary book, something which impressed him, a special project.

But rarely, if ever, does he mention average books, not-so-great-projects, and so on.

And I think there are two or three reasons for which I, unlike him, should write about less-than-great things:

• It trains the muscle. You learn how to write better about books in general if you review lots of them. If you write a lot about movies, you learn how to write about movies. I wrote one of my first reviews on any movie about “Le Notti di Cabiria” (1957). It wasn’t that good. For some other books, when I didn’t write lots of reviews, I wrote poorly. Sure, if all you write is one or two paragraphs about a movie/book, it doesn’t matter all that much what you say. But even then the constant exercise should help you write better.
• You learn how to read a book/watch a movie better. If you write about how the actors played their roles, next time you see a movie, you will focus more on that aspect. If you constantly write about the ideas/emotions you got while watching a movie, you will pay more attention to this. And this is good.
• “The gold is in the dark. And one does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light but by making the darkness conscious.” ~ Carl Jung. There are some movies (and books) which are not-so-great, but, still, you might get one idea or two. On an overall scale, it’s more likely that a top book (by critics or sales) gives you more ideas than a poor book, but that’s not always the case.

All these are specific to things that can’t be offended if I write poorly about them. I will generally refrain to write something negative about a real-life, can-be-offended, person.

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When you play most computer games, you need to beat the computer 100%. If you play a strategy game, you must destroy all the buildings/units your opponent has. If you play chess, it’s a checkmate or a draw. In a fighting game, you need to go to 0%.

The thing is, it’s unlikely for a computer to still beat you, when he’s at 3%, and you’re at 100%. But he never gives up. And I wish it would. There’s a huge probability you’ll win. But in order to do so, you need to do some boring stuff, which makes you feel in power “Oh, how good I am, with this much advantage I can win. Oh, I’m so good, look at me!”. In order for you not to lose this feeling of power, I think, game creators don’t create an algorithm for abandoning games by the computer. “Let him enjoy his winnings!”.

I just think it brings no real value, other than the pleasure of winning when you pretty much can’t lose anymore.

The AI from StarCraft I doesn’t abandon games, but in StarCraft II it does. :)

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There was a debate recently on how do games influence learning and development. My thoughts, below.

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