Discomforting

A very discomforting image of the Moon.  Some adjectives come to mind, all of them reminiscent of my personal fears, such as -- stuck, wedged, forced, imprisoned, suffocating, tight, locked-in, wrong side down...

Related posts:  Truly Hellish

                         More Musings On Hell

                         Custom-Made Hells

Miracles vs "Miracles"

I was re-reading Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar... by Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein, two philosophically-inclined gentlemen who use humor to explain concepts and issues in philosophy.  And in the chapter on epistemology (the study of the nature of knowledge and how it's acquired) I came across something I missed on my first read of the book.  In it, it is stated that according to David Hume, the 18th century British philosopher with an empirical bent, the only reasonable grounds for believing something is a miracle is that trying to explain it any other way results in ever wilder explanations.

A "floating" leaf!  A small miracle?

O.K., Hume is one of the many revered names I encountered in the Philosophy 101 class I once took, but I must not have found much that I found fascinating in the great man's theories because I don't remember anything about him but his name;  but then, this time around something about that explanation of miracles struck me:  if all possible alternative explanations for a miracle are even more improbable that the miracle itself, wouldn't that make those alternative explanations miracles themselves?  Are there degrees of "miraculousness" -- much like  the *Degrees of Infinity in math -- and so, using **Occam's Razor, one must choose the simplest miraculous explanation?  Granted, I realize the above definition of a miracle paraphrased from the book is a gross simplification of what must have been an awesomely complex thesis, but it just seems to me that if a miracle is defined as something that breaks the familiar laws of nature, then by necessity any hypothesis that is more improbable than that miracle is simply something that breaks more laws of nature, and so, as long as we're allowed to break the laws of nature here, why not go whole hog and break as many as we can think of, and just call it "more miraculous miracles".

I actually wanted to pose this question to the authors through their website platoandaplatypus.com, but for some reason I kept getting the "403 error. forbidden" screen, so that was that.

A too, too prosaic explanation -- a spider's web, in this case

*Georg Cantor, the 19th century mathematician, came up with the then-shocking idea that infinity is not a single, vague idea;  that there is actually an infinite set of infinities (known as "transfinite" numbers), each being infinite but greater than the prior infinite set.  The "smallest" infinity is the set of natural numbers (the basic "counting" numbers, as in 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.., to infinity, at least in principle).  The transfinite series is itself infinite;  there is no "largest" infinity, as no matter how high you go in the series of infinitely large sets, it's always possible to create a still larger set by consolidating all the prior, smaller sets as members.

**The "rule" that when there are multiple possible explanations for a phenomenon, the simplest one that will do the job is usually the best one, named after William of Ockham -- and yes, he was a philosopher.

Peek

Full Moon

From several nights ago.

Or was it the Sun?

I don't remember.

Antes Y Después II

Maybe it's the current controversy over the casting choices for the new Odyssey movie slated for release in July, but anyway when I saw these (whatever they be) in the asphalt on my walk I was instantly reminded of the story of Polyphemos the Cyclops from the Odyssey.

Polyphemos before Odysseus and crew:

Polyphemos after Odysseus and crew:

Related post:  Uncanny Resemblance

Real Dog And Fake Dogs

One of them is a pretty good fake, though.

Ominous Cloud

We were supposed to get light rain today, so I took my umbrella (actually one of my eight umbrellas;  why do I have so many?  Because over the past several years, I've been caught unprepared in a sudden downpour a number of times, and each time I needed to duck into the nearest convenience store to purchase an umbrella) as I set out on my photo-walk.  It didn't rain while I was out, but the sky was full of dark clouds and at one point I noted this distinct, rather striking cloud formation, and closing in and heightening contrast brought out some interesting details within.  Looks almost like a solid object, doesn't it, like... dare I say... another "cloud creature"?

Select related posts:  Fish Crossings

                                   Blooming Darkness

                                   Amusing Yet Eerie Cloud Creature

                                   An Amusing And Touching Dream

                                   2 Creatures

                                   Cloud Creature At Dusk

Ungraceful Pigeon

Caught at just the right (wrong?) moment in its takeoff -- looks both awkward and strange, as if it were not rising so much as just floating.

Spooky Moon

Yes, definitely a little spooky... but still also kind of cute^  Makes me think of a cat or puppy play-nipping, or maybe your six-year old brother or nephew jumping out and going "Boo!"

Yes, Indeedy

Someone once asked me why I keep the nails on my ring and pinky fingers long on both hands.  I told them it isn't just for show;  there are very real practical reasons for them, such as:

#1. Digging lint out of my navel and toenails

#2. Scraping out ear wax

#3. Picking my nose

#4. Picking my teeth

Not necessarily in that order.

Thank you, thank you, I'll be performing here 'til Sunday.

A Cloud Stretching

When I first sighted it, it was like a down feather from an angel's wing (I know, schmaltzy), but it grew from down to plume to flight feather and eventually to pheasant tail over some ten minutes.  There is a bit of a jump between the second and third images because as I followed the movement of the cloud, at one point I had to wait at a street crossing for the notoriously long Korean traffic signals to change and there was a tree blocking the view while I waited.  And after the last photo it became too attenuated to be of further interest.

Mystical Break

Two days ago I went to check out Ilsan Lake Park, just north of here, after a longish hiatus since my last visit.  Actually, I had made a half-hearted plan to attend the International Flower Festival there, which took place just a couple of weeks before, but, well, laziness and intertia intervened.  But (here cometh the rationalization) in a way that was a good thing, because now I was able to enjoy the park without the big crowds that would have thronged there for the event.  Anyway, by the time I got to the park it was already mid-, going on late-, afternoon, and the light was beginning to take on a warm golden tinge.  I took full advantage of it and took a bunch of shots, and when I checked them out later, I was struck by how much they reminded me of the animation style of Japan's Studio Ghibli.  The warm and rich, yet soft, pastell-like colors reminded me most particularly of the overall look of Spirited Away (Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi), which is one of my favorite movies of all time, animated or live. 

Related posts:  Magic Tree

                         Untitled, But Sort Of Fairytale-ish

Off-Kilter

Just ambling along, looking right and left, down at the ground and up at the sky, as usual looking anywhere but where I'm going, when I noticed this:

An elevator shaft that looked to be maybe 3 degrees or so out of whack with the rest of the building.  Why?  Surely it cannot have been deliberately designed to be that way?  It really isn't a good candidate for a "witty design" factor, as it's just too small a breach to stand out;  on the contrary, most people probably wouldn't even notice it on the roof of the building as they passed it by, all preoccupied with their own individual pressing businesses.  As it stands now, all it does is just bothering the heck out of my OCD-addled brain, which demands that corners and edges align cleanly.  On the other hand though, I can't imagine how such a small but obvious misalignment can have passed muster before breaking ground.  Did something go wrong during the construction, maybe?  Some minor but unfixable flaw only noticed when the project was already past the point of no return?  It's just so odd-looking.

Another "Just Odd"

 

Related post:  Peek

Watch Out, Little Man

 

Errant Bobby Pin

Just walking along, looking at everything but where I'm going, and spotted this.  Got my obsessive-compulsive disorder and/or the suspected high-functioning autism to "thank" for this discovery.

Moon Flight

"𝑆𝑒𝑒𝑚𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑖𝑚𝑝𝑜𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑏𝑖𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑒𝑠 𝑐𝑎𝑛 ℎ𝑎𝑝𝑝𝑒𝑛, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑜𝑛𝑙𝑦 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑒𝑠"

Another card from the mysterious unknown deck

(Is it pretentious that I got it translated to Latin?^)

Comet On The Sidewalk

Saw this on the ground while out walking

 

and got the idea for this

That Time Of The (Lunar) Month

Time to screw with the Moon again.

13,591 Steps In Seoul

Some random shots taken while perambulating around GwangHwaMun Square this afternoon and evening, plus one on the way home.