The Random Collection

[12graphics]

Janelle Monaé Ties a Windsor Knot While Impersonating a Puppy

[scientificphilosopher]

Merry Christmas! Happy New Year! Death is inexorable!

[thelovejournals]

Love is a fire. It burns everyone. It disfigures everyone. It is the world’s excuse for being ugly.

Leonard Cohen, “Love Is A Fire” (via thelovejournals)

[alittlelights]

[scientificphilosopher]

Existentialist philosophers teach us that we alone are responsible for creating a meaningful life in an absurd and unfair world.

To say that we have absolute freedom to pursue our life’s meaning presumes that there is nothing getting in our way. But this isn’t always the case.

In The Ethics of Ambiguity, existentialist author and philosopher Simone de Beauvoir notes that as children we shoulder no responsibility; we live in a ready-made world with ready-made values. As we mature and become acquainted with our freedom we can begin to take matters into our own hands. However, many of us revert back to our childhood ways, trading freedom for security. Why?

Some of us are cut off from our goals; many of us are manipulated into pursuing desires that are not ours. We can be willed towards fruitless endeavours and therefore excluded from creating a meaningful future for ourselves.

The problem is that the oppressed often don’t know they are oppressed; they view the world as one that cannot change, as “a natural situation”. The only escape, according to de Beauvoir, is revolt. “The oppressed can fulfill his freedom as a man only in revolt.”

As de Beauvoir famously stated: “Life is occupied in both perpetuating itself and surpassing itself; if all it does is maintain itself, then living is only not dying.” For de Beauvoir, life is one of continuous change, an unstable system in which balance is continually lost and recovered. For her, inertia is synonymous with death. [full article]

[daria-kin]

Moscow, Russia.

Photo by Dani Kioko

[rejectionofmediocrity]

The best way to keep a prisoner from escaping is to make sure he never knows he’s in prison.

Fyodor Dostoevsky (via rejectionofmediocrity)

[faradays-cage]

a little sketch I did a while ago

[faradays-cage]

Karmin Inspired Sentence Starters { Part One }

“Don't think twice, rock your body, lose your mind.”

“I wanna make your heart beat, I love when it beats for me.”

“I wanna raise pulses”

“I'm coming for your rhythm, I'm here to wake you up.”

“What's that now, you forget how to breathe?”

“You control the beating in your chest.”

“You and me are through though.”

“Once upon a time, I met the perfect guy.”

“Mama always said, ‘Nice guys finish last’.”

“Daddy always said, ‘Money can't buy class’.”

“I want you to prove that I'm right about you.”

“I want it all.”

“All I need is one more night with you.”

“My world is divided without you.”

“Call all your homies up, tell 'em to bring a cup.”

“Nobody's keeping track how many drinks you had.”

“We been waiting for a night like this.”

“Stars always seem to shine the brightest right before they fall.”

“I never noticed how hot it is under these lights.”

“We speak all day and never talk.”

“Can we brave the tidal wave?”

“Girl you can't deny it, the sparks are flying.”

“Now let's get together and light up the dark.”

“You bring the match, I'll bring the gasoline.”

“We can heat it up.”

“Don't leave me out here in the cold.”

“Nobody's watching, so no more talking.”

“I just wanna get you near me.”

“I can lift you off of your feet.”

“Don't you get the feeling that you're tangled up.”

“I wanna break free but I can't get out.”

“I'm just a prisoner of your love.”

“If I escaped you I would be lost.”

“I’ll be just fine.”

“Sometimes I just hate to love you.”

“You can let your guard down 'til the end.”

“Forever doesn’t happen overnight.”

“Don't think we're together.”

“I change like the weather.”

“You got me feelin' something kind of vicious, delicious.”

“I won't do your dishes.”

“I be coming at you like a raging bull.”

“I don't wanna hear you say a thing at all.”

“We can do it like you want.”

Don't you keep me waiting

“You better be careful baby.”

“If you get too carried on, you could fall in love.”

“Use me like a cash register.”

“What's in it for me?”

“No gracias, mi amigo.”

“You fool me once fool me twice, but the ends don't meet.”

“How can I trust you, all you want is more.”

[likeafieldmouse-deactivated2015]

[psyducked]

playtime’s over

[nino-rota]

Lola, Jacques Demy, 1961

[scientificphilosopher]

ScientificPhilosopher’s Book Giveaway #4!

Howdy, friends, followers, and fellow nerds! To celebrate reaching 40,000 followers (what?!) I will be holding another book giveaway! 

This has been a particularly rough year for many of us, so the books I will be sending out will focus on perspective and empowerment. Books are capable of picking us up when we’re down, lighting the way in darkness, and granting us longer and richer lives. I want to do what little I can to offer that to more people.

So, on that note, in one month (on Feb. 1) I will choose FIVE folks to receive a book from my personal library. The giveaway is open worldwide. All you have to do is be one of my followers and to reblog this post. I will then:

contact you (please have your ask box open AND be okay with disclosing your shipping info. Also, the winners will have 48 hours to respond before new winners are chosen.)

send you an eye-opening, perspective-giving book, which will be delivered right to your doorstep! (in past giveaways I’ve sent out books from authors such as Carl Sagan, Oliver Sacks, Ann Druyan, Cordelia Fine, Dan Dennett, Toni Morrison, and Brian Greene.) I promise the book will be in good condition. If you happen to already own it, then pay it forward and give it to one of your bookworm friends!

I’m doing this simply to say THANK YOU. I have been totally overwhelmed with how kind and supportive so many of you have been. As I’ve said before (but it’s always worth saying again), I am so grateful for the fan mail and interesting questions I get (feel free to ask me anything!)—I just really feel the love on this website. It’s so wonderful to see others who are passionate about science and philosophy and social justice and reading and critical thinking and life and all it has to offer. 

I look forward to announcing the winners of the giveaway. Until then, keep your mind sharp and keep thinking!

[popsonnet]

[shmoo06]

BAD GIRLS

[nemoanimus]

Notre personnalité sociale est une création de la pensée des autres.

Marcel Proust (via nemoanimus)

[ohmycheese]

#me

[thechanelmuse]

Are we a lost generation of our people? Add us to equations but they’ll never make us equal. She who writes the movie owns the script and the sequel. So why ain’t the stealing of my rights made illegal? They keep us underground working hard for the greedy, But when it’s time to pay they turn around and call us needy. My crown too heavy like the Queen Nefertiti Gimme back my pyramid, I’m trying to free Kansas City. Mixing masterminds like your name Bernie Grundman. Well I’m gonna keep leading like a young Harriet Tubman You can take my wings but I’m still goin’ fly And even when you edit me the booty don’t lie Yeah, keep singing and I'mma keep writing songs I’m tired of Marvin asking me, “What’s Going On? March to the streets ‘cuz I’m willing and I’m able Categorize me, I defy every label And while you’re selling dope, we’re gonna keep selling hope We rising up now, you gotta deal you gotta cope Will you be electric sheep? Electric ladies, will you sleep? Or will you preach?

Janelle Monáe, “Q.U.E.E.N.” (via thechanelmuse)