Long, long, long ago, when the music was the sun.

[Socks]

Hello Boyah, my dear friend. There are some things on my mind and in my soul which I will share with you all.

Yesterday in sociology--dead horse, I know--there was actually a discussion of family and work and law, more dead horses, I know that too. In this discussion, I heard fascinating things, which should says nothing of the function, simply of the feature. The most startling of these involved the so called failure of education. Hmm... yes, 'failure of education'. What was to be done? According to some, more regulation and elimination of summer fun is necessary to achieve parity with the world and produce quality professionals. Hmm... I thought, really? How can that be? How can education fail the individual? It is quite obvious that is quite impossible. Priorities, however, ah, these, yes these, will absolutely affect potential. You see, with the wrong philosophy no manner of arrangement and measure of re-arrangement of the physical will ever make sense of and make sense with, the nature of life. But the nature of life was not up for discussion, no, only the failure of education.This is too clear to see and too honest to admit, lest we embarrass everyone. Hmm... I thought, so what really needs to be done?...

And that I will chew later on. Now, I must work, and have no fun.

[Nyerp]

i toke up in class

[Socks]

I'll relate an anecdotal case before I go to bed. The teacher calls me aside to profess his thrill and amazement of the paper I wrote for his class. This was very embarrassing to me, and I would have taken a lower grade than go through this. More still he says he could not write like that. I was red and sorry for him and just said thanks. The worst part is what came next, when he asked what schools I had attended in the past. The point of this I could not see, but the gist could feel, and it was rather an offense. I should have been asked about my life first. All the merit belongs to me, school is an extension of myself, I fail or I pass. I told the truth and mentioned that, one's ability to perceive and then express is not formed inside of class. He said he was complimenting me, and I said I don't compliments very well. So more things were thrown out there, but I left them alone because of the endemic smell. Don't get me wrong that teacher is a very decent guy, I will not deny him that, but he asks how instead of why, and I will not omit that.

[Socks]

The night into morning, and hope remains a vision.

I look outside the window and toward my history, there is much depravity there, brother slaying brother, of some pointless progress. And I think, I feel it is always a mistake to mistreat and be inhumane, because you become in-human, and have lost what you should have found; to bury a genuine spirit and raise a dubious ghost.

You don't give meaning to your life by slapping down a ruler stick to measure others, you measure yourself first and carry that standard with you as your own. I take exception with the way some people define their world, by what they are not, as opposed to what they are. It always takes more effort to build something than to tear it down, and to posses your own house and live in it and love it, than to borrow another home and squat in it and hate it. I told the class some days ago, 'remember ladies and gentlemen, inside out first, not the other way around'.

People don't understand that it is easy and folly to commit to some things completely and neglect other things totally, it is much much more difficult and noble to commit to all things equally and realize in anguish and glory that you will never reach 100 percent in all of them them, but you will never allow 0 percent in any of them. People never appreciate this fact, and expect me to respect them because they managed to accomplish something at the expense of something else. The The technician is a master of one trade, a tool for one task, and therefore will always be a seasonal operator, a specialist of limited demand. His scarcity denotes his little value, it does not indicate his rarity. His ranks are thin precisely because his necessity is slight.  He is uncommon because he is uncommon and for good cause and not good cause. He is an oddity, he is not a miracle. Common things are abundant because they are essential and therefore universal. These things are of greater value, of greater merit and of greater use. Only a fool would sell his foundation to buy a roof. Only a salesman can sell his pick up trick as uniquely skill with a straight face. The inmates run the asylum. Together with the advertiser they have woo and awed you into a dizzying and perpetual sleep. We've sold the eternal housewife, the general handyman and our inherent ability to do what any man can do, because ordinarily these factors and functions tend to master nothing and ordinarily only perform everything. True, a just life and good family and decent manners and honest labor and a meaningful existence too, tend to all get in the way over one stock and trade.

Our character takes precedence over our capital. Our thirst is to survive, their hunger is to gorge. But take solace in the fact that for every choice there is a sacrifice. My priorities are organic, not artificial. Our worth as a human being is not measured through action, it is defined through intent. Images are so very two dimensional and flat and flimsy and static, but they may be glossy and large and colorful and cut. But an ethical mind is beautiful and a caring heart is priceless. Together they mould of you a soul and illustrate your life. Wisdom is not taught, but learned, and yet look at which approach society takes. As if knowledge can be produced, ha, knowledge is only conceived!

These thoughts are incomplete in form here but these sentiments are absolute in form elsewhere. And if it seems somewhat a dream, yes, the truth does seem surreal when your life is a fallacy.

[snoorkel]

'education' has a terrifying tendency toward specialization when individuals with our enlightened modern mind should be seeking multi-disciplinary unity in all truths -- the correct lens to view the world through is not provided by science (to make example of a particular group, often noted atheists, that usually feels they are concerned with absolutes of provable 'right' and 'wrong'), nor religion or any other 'all-in-one' philosophy.

the most obvious flaw in Western thinking, which is the basis of education, is to regard the definition of constituent parts as a process to view a whole, when in fact the total behavior of the whole is always quite unpredicted by the actions of its parts individually; holistic observation (observing the complexities of interactions between parts, not the finite values of parts individually) is necessary to discern the real relationships between elements...

this principle of understanding applies to far more than science and induction, it is the reason why you can know all of the rules of grammar yet fail to produce a piece of text that's aesthetically satisfying, and the reason why breakthroughs and moments of 'divine inspiration' always confer an ability to realize previously unseen interrelationships despite already knowing the specific qualities of the related parts.

I think ideally a student can choose his own unique path of study according to his own character (as you said), and have numerous options available to fulfill it. clearly our university system does not provide this. our education system and esteemed 'academia' are hardly less developed than a century ago despite our ability as a society to support something much greater.

[Selkie]

I agree