Aahgg!
 

I'm sick of you Windoze! With your poorly constructed UI and you stupidly programed...er, programs! Someway, somehow, I'm going to convince the professor I work for of the superiority of Macs, and I will gleefully throw you and your gray Dell casing off the top of the JFSB!

...Okay, I feel a bit better. I don't usually hate Windows with this much furry and passion, but it's just driving me buggery today! How I long to be able to use AppleScript on this thing! Then all these repetitive tasks would do themselves! I just need to get my act together here, I suppose, I've almost figured out how to do this job on my Mac...

Anyway, just a little aggravated at my new job, thought I'd share.

perhaps you should bring your Mac to work and show the guy first hand how much easier things could be!..

I have done a number of such demo's at various jobs... and they have always taken my advice and bought Macs!.. and never looked back

I'm hoping for that, but the Prof is out until the 19th of August...

Perhaps you could help me out though. We're trying to OCR a bunch of old documents. For the most part it just can't be done, but on the ones that can... I just wonder if there are any specific advantages to using a Mac or this?

I already plan on showing him how I'm streamlining the workflow with AppleScript, which may talk him into a lot. Plus, spotlight will really help with his project. So I have a couple things going for me...

Any other suggestions from anyone who has dealt with a similar situation?

optical character recognition is a bear, regardless of what system you use. what are you trying to scan? I've think I've seen some mac software for this, but it's expensive...

however, tell your professor that another professor says "macs rule." might not be totally convincing as is, but I have empirical evidence... ;)

I feel the pain on the Windows hate. I'm using a hacked together Pee-cee running Windoze XP until I can get a replacement MacBook.

Hey Zalister, what's the new job then? Tell us about it mate.
G.

Another windoze hiccup that I'm getting REALLY mad at.

I own a Motorola RAZR V3m, and it worked flawlessly under Mac OS X. I could bluetooth to it and add ringtones, images, whatever. Windows, however, no such luck. I have to use the cable and Motorola's phone tools.

Moto's phone tools frequently fails to see the phone because EVERY TIME I unplug THE PHONE, WINDOZE washes it's hands of it and it never existed. So I have to reinstall the drivers. every. time. I. unplug. my. phone.

Ughhhh.

I feel better now after getting that out of my system.

I got a job as a research assistant at the University I attend. Nothing to special, just scanning in documents for a future online resource (we hope). It will look good on my resume when I try and apply to grad school (I hope to teach history at a University some day.) I just wish the topic and the work were more exciting...hopefully this will open up an oppurtunity to work with an Asian Studies professor, but we'll see...

:D
Thanks tw, I will. We have plenty of examples in our own department, but it's always nice to have someone from another school giving an opinion, eh? If you don't mind my asking, where do you teach and what do you teach?

I'm assuming that the perceived advantages for your professor supporting PCs are; familiarity, cost and software availability. It is often difficult to quantify these but I'll try.

Apple is widely regarded as a driving force behind the entire PC industry in hardware design and it is well known that the Windows GUI is largely based on the Mac OS. These in themselves are no reason to switch to or continue with a particular platform, however they do point to an underlying product quality and attention to detail which Mac users are well known for defending - often amazed that the other side doesn't get it. The bottom line with Macs is that since Apple have a fundamental role in production of both the hardware and the operating system software, they have a lot to lose if product quality is seen to be bad or flawed. They spend a lot of time designing both the insides and outside of everything they make. This results in an overall better experience using these machines. That there is no possibility of a driver error (or in most cases a driver even being required) when Apple ensure compatibility while designing the system. Conversely, who makes PC hardware and peripherals is largely out of the control of Microsoft - resulting in very cheap parts, but dubious compatibility. It is seen by many PC people the Mac way is limiting. In practice, it is entirely possible to expand and enhance, upgrade and expand every Mac, the problems associated with windows dlls and drivers and registry problems and etc. etc. etc. simply are not there with the Mac.

Similarly, the plethora of Windows viruses and vulnerabilities simply do not exist on the Mac platform. There have been Mac OS X security updates since the introduction of OS X about 6 years ago. These have in fact been security issues with FreeBSD Unix, on which OS X is built. FreeBSD is regarded as one of the most secure Unixes to begin with. A combination therefore of Apple's choice of Unix and their preemptive patching of FreeBSD security issues make for a very secure environment (as FreeBSD is open source, these security updates and vulnerabilities are fed back to the FreeBSD community as well). When it comes to trust of the vendor of your hardware and software, I would be VERY much more likely to trust Apple than Microsoft. Microsoft operating systems are continually being crippled by viruses and vulnerabilities unless a tremendous amount of time, energy and money is spent on tech staff keeping on top of it all. In my view, tech staff would be better deployed helping with training or productive support (developing systems or databases etc.) than keeping patches up to date on many machines. I know that much of this can be automated, however, it then becomes a more and more costly exercise.

On to cost. It is true that, a few years back, many Macs were more expensive than similarly equipped PCs although I would argue that that is no longer the case. This comes down to the fact that there are many more PC manufacturers covering a vast range of prices and quality than the one Mac manufacturer. It is similar to saying that there are less expensive cars than BMW or Mercedes (Apple incidentally have a bigger market share than either BMW or Mercedes do of the car market). If you compare like for like between Apple and Dell/HPCompaq/Sony, bang for your buck you get a better deal with Apple with performance - build quality and total cost of ownership. The total cost of ownership is quantifiably lower on the Mac (a report was done by Gartner group confirming that Macs are 36% cheaper to own and run than PCs). Additionally, Apple have better overall customer support and higher customer satisfaction.

As for software availability, All major software manufacturers produce equivalent Mac versions of their software. As Mac OS X is Unix based, there are an endless number of Unix applications and high end databases etc which can be used.

Costas

I'm a political scientist, though as a rule I don't like to give out a lot of personal info on the web (frankly, there are two kinds of political scientists in the world: jaded Machiavelian realists and dedicated idealists with varying degrees of paranoia - guess which one I am... :D). History is a tough route, though; you sure you want to go that way? it's intellectually satisfying, but really tough to sell. If you want to go that path, I'd suggest that you try to build a connection into one of the social science disciplines (which have much better job offerings), or else aim for critical theory. you can't do straight history anymore, anyway; the post-modernists gutted the empirical foundations of it.

If you can't convince the prof. because of money (Macs are more expensive than PCs), you could perhaps suggest Linux. You could bring in a Live CD and shove it into one of the PCs, see if he likes it, and, if you're lucky, he'll let you click 'Install'.

My first question is, what kind of tie-in do you mean? At the moment I'm doing cultural history with a dash of Foucaultian anti-history and a good number of reforms planned for pedagogy. Specifically I study Japanese religions (Buddhist and Shinto mostly). I'm also learning a lot of "general Asia" things because all of my professors say it will make me far more hire-able :).

I also kind of wonder what you mean by straight history. If you mean political history (aka the roll of dead presidents), well, that's not really my thing. I know about it, but I'd rather discuss the influence localized shamanism had on festivals than any ruler. Mainly I'm doing this because I want to study why religion effects our day to day lives, and how. Eventually I want to put religions into a far better perspective than what we currently have. Religion tends to be viewed as either a vice or a virtue these days, it's neither really. It's black and white thinking like that I hope to overcome.

But, I'm still an undergrad, so I have a lot of time to think about it, right? If you have any further advice, I'm more than willing to listen to it.

first question:

You are talking about OCR software that can scan a paper document as a text file, instead of an image so you can edit it in a text editor correct? I do not know of any software for OS X for this, but there is a plethora of apps on windows side. OCR bridge is one of them, and then HP has their software blah blah blah. You may not have many choices running a mac for what you want to do. However, I could be totally wrong.

2nd question:

I am curious about what straight history is too, I have never heard the term, is it a buzz word? I am immediately thinking of Columbus and how his-story is completely wrong on the account of his actions. We patronize this man who did not discover the Americas first, thought they were actually the west indies, totally destroyed a whole nation of peaceful indigenous islanders (complete genocide) and sized up other tribals as slaves and started a slave trade. Yet we have a holiday to celebrate his greatness in the USA, wtf? That stuff kind of makes me mad how in school when you are a kid you are taught one thing, then you get older and learn what really happens.

I agree with you, and have had many round to round bouts with religious people on how there is nothing new under the sun and how all religions are based off the same old myths and how it limits us as human beings and causes us to be biased and form opinions on others with out even knowing them first. I mean look how jesus christ and Osiris are pretty much paralleled characters in religion. It is like they are pretty much the same person but you know like 3000 years apart. I don't want to start any flame discussions on religion because lots of people take it to hear too much. Good luck going down your path because a lot of people won't want to listen to you, they are already brain washed.

In retrospect religion can offer great things and I don't dis anyone who practices any religion and i firmly believe they have the right to believe in whatever they want, and at the same time I believe they should also have the same respect. So just to cover myself, no offense to anyone.

My post ended up being so long I made some headings...

Religion

Ha ha, no offense taken. Though, I will be upfront, your view sounds like on of the didactic views I hope to change :D. Not so much that you should become religious, but I hope we can come out of this Catholic (read: Church is state) aftermath that makes it so no one trusts religions at all.

Personally, I hope people practice what makes them happy, and I insist people do not practice things that could harm others. But I only mention that to clarify my position on religious belief, not as a sermon. In essence, I have a great deal of respect for most religions, and I truly wish others would open their minds to the truths that can be learned. I don't personally believe you have to throw in completely with a religion to learn from it...I just wish more people were of the same opinion.

Columbus

A quick comment on Columbus... If your curious about why Columbus has become a hero, then you need to read a couple books on "Nationalism", specifically on creation of the nation-state They'll have a few at the local library. But to summarize, when monarchies started to take over Europe in the late 1700's they realize they could not induce the faith that a theocracy could, and thus could not gain the kind of sacrifice from their citizens that a religion could. Hence, the Crusades were a Catholic thing, and belonged to no one country.

So, most monarches started to create (sub-conciously) something called the "nation-state" the idea was to join people together through a common history and sense of purpose. Think Aryan Nation in Germany, or "The Red Army" in the USSR. These common histories (with their common heroes and virtues) created a deep sense of national pride among the citizens of said nation, causing patriotism, something people of continualy proved they are willing to die for.

Nationalism is both a good thing and a bad thing. On the one hand, having a collective identity allows us to do things that we otherwise could not. It makes for bigger markets, more shared ideas and a sense of belonging that most people crave. Sadly, this same feeling can be manipulated for evil as well. And evil people have no problems with lying to create nationalism, just so they can more effectively control their populace.

It's not a conspiracy theory really, it's just that at one point someone decided that lying about Columbus would serve a better purpose in the end, so they lied about it. To them it was, undoubtedly, a small thing. But look at the effects it's had... In the end, Nationalism can go for either good or bad. But it is a strong force, one that was intended to replace religious fervor even, so it has to be used wisely, or not at all.

Yeah, that's nationalism in a nut shell. Really a very simple overview, you should go find a good book on it. If you remind me later, I have a few lying around and I can tell you the titles. I just don't remember them off hand. TW, being a PoliSci Professor, probably has some better suggestions than I do, so you might ask him.

Optical Character Recognition

And on OCR. Where trying to scan some old documents so that they are searchable PDF's. Quite honestly, I don't think the technology is complete there yet, so it will probably just require a lot of transcription efforts. Oh well, it's what you get working with old documents. If only my college had the money to develop software for this...


Sorry for the long post folks, some things can't be answered quickly...

One of the truly astonishing things about computer nerds (admit it -- most of us here qualify for that sobriquet) is that besides intelligence, they don't share much else in background. Aside from PolySci and History in this thread, I keep in touch with a number of Mac geeks and know something about their backgrounds. Without names they are a professor of music, a percussionist, a song-writer/performer, a concert master/arranger, two Engineers, a Veterinarian, a Surgeon, a degree in Christian Studies, a lawyer, a biochemist, and a few CompSci types. Does a fascination with computers transcend other interests?

Well the only common ground I have seen is that almost all "computer people" likes science fiction. Otherwise no common grounds at all.

True, I guess -- I do.

I think so. In my time at college I have been a Psych Major, English Major, Advertising Major, wannabe Music Major, Computer Science Major and finally a History Major (some of those were for very very brief periods of time). But computers have stuck with me through all of them. I think it's just because computers can be used in so many situations. I don't know if I would use "transcends" so much as "encompasses", but I agree with you.

A better way to put it would have been "have utility in all interests". Most of us are not Donald Knuth -- we don't invent and polish algorithms -- but we use them to their fullest.

Yeah if you met me in public you would have no idea what I do for a living or that I am even into geeky technology. Here are some reasons why.

1) I hate star trek - its lame

2) I like to drink beer and whiskey, see live music, chase women, and be out of control a lot of times

3) I do play video games but hate LAN parties and the like, and every other type of party that lacks liquor and women

4) Don't play D&D and any other type of role playing game, though I do find some of the D&D jokes online to be funny. In fact I may even use the D&D jokes from time to time. I do kind of like the role playing video games that I have played over the years...so well not sure how I stand on that one

5) I don't have nor do I watch cable TV

6) I don't drink mountain dew

7) I hate all MMORPG video games, they are all lame


I think of myself of one of those people who you can't immediately try to fit into any one stereotype at all because I am in to just about everything and like to get into everything.

Also, there are tons of reasons I can be labeled as a "computer geek" I mean for one I have over 5,000 posts on this forum.:rolleyes:

that'll work. Foucault is edging you into critical theory (though to my mind he's a bit of a drama queen - lol), and the Asian focus works well. you might want to branch out from Japanese buddhism a bit - its take on buddhist philosophy is... interesting... but only one voice among many in the buddhist realm (there's actually a fascinating paper to be written about the impact of buddhist thought on cultures and cultures on Buddhist thought as it spread east from India...)

sorry, not jargon or specialized terminology; just my own laziness with speech. by 'straight history' I just mean conventional, empirical history - a kind of archeology applied to historical objects and events. straight historians are people who seek out the letters, diaries, official records, and other written material of people directly (or tangentially) related to significant events to try to build a more accurate picture of those events. for example, people who study the various revisions Jefferson made of the Declaration of Independence are straight historians, as are the people who study the extra-marital affairs Jefferson had with his slaves. the only problem with straight history, really, is that straight historians are implicitly engaged in an act of story-telling which they don't like to admit to. they prefer to think of their work as scientific and objective.

c'est la vie... :)

don't they still flog you for that in Kansas City??? :)

really, you ask me, what computer geeks have in common is that they love to solve problems, but don't like to waste time. computers give all of the joys of conquest of your average crossword or Sudoku puzzle, in a form that actually has some functional purpose. makes my ticker tick...

by the way, does Hegel's Phenomenology count as Science Fiction?
(bad, obscure philosopher joke, there, sorry. ;))

Or at least not waste time more then once. I can spend hours on scripting something that would have taken 30 minutes to do by hand the first time.


Completely agree.

hehe nope in Kansas city they encourage it, there is not much else to do!

Seeking God is a lot like following current events. If you rely on only a single source, you get a distorted view of things. For the greatest understanding, one must examine as many sources as possible. "Truth is like a great mirror, shattered by time into a hundred thousand pieces, allowing all who possess a small fragment to claim, 'my religion is the true one.'"

Or, put another way, God is like the summit of a mountain. The summit cares not which path the climber takes to reach it. If a climber is ascending a path up the mountain, he has no opportunity to convince others who have chosen a different path that his path is better without leaving his own path.

There exists a Sufi proverb, "Love the water more and the pitcher less."

I think too many people get WAYYY too caught up in religious metaphors instead of the religious message. All of the greatest teachers have offered the same message, they have just each used different metaphors that they felt their audience could most easily relate to. I think when people believe their (established) religion is substantially different from someone else's, they lack understanding of either their own, the other person's, or both.

Finding spiritual enlightenment is not a competition. Religions are not teams. I find it rather frustrating that so many people view them as such.

I couldn't agree more J Christopher, well spoken!

Just for a good example, I can turn your own mountain analogy on it's ear :). In ancient Daoism it was believed that one should not be proud like a mountain but humble like a lake (even in referring to "God"). The reason? If one is a teacher, and one's students are like water (molding to their instructors teachings), then it is apparent! Water cannot, on it's own, attain the highest peak. Rather, water flows down into the valley, forming into a lake.

Thus, in this analogy, one needs to be humble like the valley to attain God (or peace in Daoism, as God in the western sense was not really present), not proud like the mountain.

Yet, it is still the same exact idea as your mountain analogy. Both describe ways to get to God. The subtle difference, I conject, is in the separate religions understanding of the individual's purpose and how they come to their understanding of an individuals role towards God. At that time in China, it was believed that truth and happiness are easily attained, and that complexities were merely a result of society. Of course at the time society was just forming, and people were afraid of it. It only makes sense in context. So the idea of wandering down a hill towards happiness sounds wonderful compared to the confusing, violent mess that was Chinese society around 600 BC.

Your analogy comes for a Judea/Christian western background that is heavily influenced by the industrial revolution, one that believes hard work, and to a small extend materialism, are good things. Thus working hard to make societies larger is a virtuous goal, and struggle up a mountain seems like a better analogy for truth than wandering down a hill. But why the difference? In our day society brings us medicine, protection and cable TV. As much as some of us disdain society, we would be lost without it (unless you actually do know how to subsistence farm). As a population we are addicted to society, not that I'm complaining mind you, I like my Mac :).

Point being, the different analogies work in their respective spheres because they take different times, place and understandings into account. Just a little extra evidence for your argument, honestly. Maybe something to chew on as well.

Being an Atheist because of strong religious judgement in my area (The last point J makes in this post), I have to say I agree with your viewpoint on religion. I chose to go Athiest because it seems that if you go one religion around here, two more look down upon you. It's as if they play teams.

On the subject, though, we have lots of people around my area who believe it is their divine duty to annoy the non-believers until they submit to their will. Sure, I'm blowing it a bit out of proportion, but with one of my girlfriends, who expressed slight interest in their religion, they attacked her like a pit bull–once they had her they wouldn't let go, even though she wanted out of it.

Does not the seed of yin lie within yang, and vice versa? To paraphrase Buddha, within everything exists its opposite. :)

The closest English word I've found for this concept is enantiodromia.

God is the summit, and the mountain, and the climber. it's only the narrowness of our own vision that convinces us it has to be one (and hence not the others...). One person climbs to the top and looks down over all the earth, another sits at the bottom and looks up at the stars, a third walks away to build a barn and till the fields, and the only sadness in all that is that each thinks the others are fools.

or so it seems to me. ;)

That's Buddhist if ever there was a buddhist thought. I like it :).

As for J Christopher, yeah, that's all true as well, though the Zen-ness of your comments is infuriating in an enlightening sort of way.

As a point of clarity, the early Yin and Yang model actual did not have one inside of the other, they were merely seperate elements that constituted the beginnings of the Universe when the great Dao split into it's lighter and heavier elements.

But I think you people are too smart for me, I'm slowly becoming content to just listen. Maybe I'll learn something for once...

Out of curiosity, what is it you do for a living J Christopher?

I do like buddhism and some aspects of it as well very much. I do like the idea that everything you see and interpret is an illusion.

.
"I should be content to look at a mountain
for what it is and not as a comment on my life."

-- David Ignatow

Very Universalist of you. Or Buddhist. Or (very early) Christian. Or-- well, you get the idea.

Interesting. I was not aware of that. I think Taoism and Gematria (a subset of Kabbalah) are very similar in their explanations of the "beginning." I've also read Jewish interpretations of Genesis that are very consistent with that explanation of the universe's beginnings.

I'm a student.

Ah yes, the concept of non-being, or the emptyness of being, depending on what sect you are looking at. Actually, the idea that everything is a complete illusion is a relatively new concept. Initially the concept was that all physical objects are devoid of permanent existence (impermanence). Thus, the Mac you are looking at now will not be the same Mac you are looking at in a year. It will have subtly (or perhaps greatly!) changed between now and then. All physical objects are like this.

The greater idea behind this goes back to the four noble truths, or their understanding at least. In essence, life is suffering, and one of the many reasons for that is humans innate ability to become attached to the mundane (physical world). Since we attach our emotions to things that will eventually fade away because of their impermanence, it is inevitable that we will feel sorrow. Such is life :).

What is trippy to me is realizing how impermanence effects our day to day lives. Going back to the Mac in front of you, for example, it contains the essence of prior objects that were themselves impermanent. So all of our computers contain wood from a tree and metal from a mountain. But from whence did those objects come? They are also objects imbued with the essence of prior objects that were impermanent. Honestly though, take a look around you and try to imagine the exact history of all the pieces of every object around you. It's mind blowing.

And yes, I do study Buddhism quite a bit :). The only religions I feel I lack knowledge in right now are Islam and Zoroastrianism. I have a passing familiarity with every other major religion, but know precious little of those two.

Science tells us this, also. What we perceive as solid matter is really empty space in which a lot of energy is concentrated. What we perceive as light/color is just energy escaping that empty space.

Our perceptions are not reality. Our perceptions are how our imaginations interpret reality.

That is why I like it, and that is why I relate to buddhism, it is a religion that seems to actually try to keep itself up to date and not be so dogmatic. Then again every religion has its dogmatic followers, but at least I think (or at least how I understand buddhism) that being that way is kind of going against what it is all about.

lol... which do you want it to be? :D

how about let it be one with everything?:rolleyes:

Maya is commonly translated as "illusion". I think this is incorrect; a more functionally accurate equivalent is Perception.

Certain practices (meditation, prayer, advanced martial arts, breathing), or certain spontaneous experiences (sublime music, great sex, magnificent landscapes), :cool: may weaken our inner filtering/structuring mechanism that upholds the Consensus Reality into which all of us, by consequence of our upbringing, have been initiated. That may bring is closer to the fundamental Reality, for the world is not as we perceive (Maya).

Well, those are my thoughts...

It doesn't matter; they're all the same, just looked at from different perspectives. :)

ah, the hotdog joke... :p

it's funny - I'm not really religious, but I hate to tell that to people, because then they think I'm an athiest, or an agnostic, or something like that. nothing could be farther from the truth.

butwaddayagonnado...

Same goes for me. I like to study religions and mythology a lot. I think that the Norse and Greek gods were way cooler than any modern day god, but hey that is a bit beside the point. A friend of mine turned me on to a term which I just recently learned as ignostic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignostic

Interesting term.

Don't forget entheogens. :)

OT observation
 

Without intending to denigrate any of the posters in this thread by saying so, I've come to the conclusion reading the whole thread over that most of you must be between 17 and 30. I say that from the perspective of a retiree who just turned 70 with 3 adult "kids" in their 40s and 7 grandchildren ranging from 4 to 10. The age range I quoted is when you wonder about such things and explore your thoughts and feelings about them through the filters installed, as ArticStones put it, by consequence of your upbringing. Wondering, perhaps, if the grass is greener in another pasture.

Having done that myself then, particularly as two of my best high school friends were Jewish and Roman Catholic counterfoils to my Protestantism, and a bit later, in University, a Hindu (from Madras) and a Zoroastrian (from Bombay via Trinidad). In my first job as a university professor, my first office mate was Chinese, my second was a Hindu (with whom I jointly owned a sailboat and who was married to a Hasidic Jew with a PhD in Musicology who decrypted ancient musical notations), and my third was a Muslim Egyptian. Later, I went to Thailand for a spell, accompanied by a Turk and an Egyptian Copt (whose first name was Stalin), and, of course, worked with two Buddhists (at Suranaree U in KoRat where the dorm room I was in had a copy in English of Buddha's teachings).

In spite of these exposures and uncountable discussions over a beer at a barbecue or in an Airplane, I've been fascinated, but in the end (at about 40) reverted to my "Consensus Reality into which all of us, by consequence of our upbringing, have been initiated". Full circle. There are no right answers, so you end up sticking with what you know in your bones, inculcated by your parents, for the most part.

OT congratulations
 

Hey Nova, missed your birthday. Hope it was a good one. Happy Birthday :)

now see this is the problem: why worry about terms? why this need to slap some keyword on ourselves, as though we were searching for our souls on google? I'll tell you, I have a pet theory that the main reason we put names on our religions is so that we can easily and conveniently distinguish good people from bad people ('good people' we can threaten with divine punishment, and they take it seriously; 'bad people' don't, and need to be converted, avoided, or killed). when you come to understand that everyone is good, then the whole idea of calling yourself a 'this' or a 'that' seems faintly ludicrous.

just think of me as a gnosy bastard, and leave it at that... ;)

so (if I may paraphrase): 'the truth is that there are no truths, so eventually (when we grow up) we see that all we know is what we've already (always) known.'

hmm...

people experiment, yes, mostly because we are attracted to novelty. and when the novelty wears thin and we get tired of experimenting, we find ourselves left with an unruly jumble of accumulated thoughts and experiences. some people (as you did) box them all away and return to their original beliefs, richer for the experience. some people take that jumble and organize it into something new and heartfelt, their old beliefs inevitably thrown into the mix in some way. and some few (more than you think, really) find the thread that runs through the whole mess, and then the jumble - old beliefs and new alike - falls away and leaves them free.

discussions like this are often Rorchachs; your own experience projected on the world as an inviolate truth. and that's perfect, so long as you understand it for what it is. :o

That reminds of some graffiti I once saw in a public restroom:

"Reality is for those who can’t handle drugs." ;)

At 70 one adapts the point of view that any birthday is better than the alternative! :D. My grandmother, long ago now, used to say "I'll enjoy life for as long as I'm looking down at the grass". Thanks for the good wishes, although I can't imagine how you knew when my birthday was.

"...take two 'shrooms and call me in the morning." ;)

As for mind blowing, let's hear it for threads that go from Macs to Religion to Drugs... Which reminds me that I need to go grab my glowing shrooms background of the web somewhere, I've been missing that one...

Well, according to some pundits Macs are a religion.
Others, however, insist that it’s merely a drug. ;)

What we may agree on, however, is that Windows is a depressant.
And that Vista, in certain cases, may be classified as virtually a catatonic agent. In some particularly susceptible persons, however, it’s been known to induce violent, anti-technological rages.

Steve Ballmer is reported to have been playing with a Beta version of Vista shortly before his famous song-and-dance. You know: the one that required hospital treatment for ripped vocal chords...