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[23 Nov 2009|11:18pm] |
Tentative Schedule for next semester:
Modern Algebra II
Advanced Laboratory II (W)
Dance Technique:Contact Improv
Theory of Computation
Japanese Film and Animation
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[22 Nov 2009|10:26pm] |
Posting pretty rarely these days. Too much life to throw into a journal, and for a while, I was putting my life story into an attempt at literature instead.
Anyway, I used to write a whole lot about "the wrong universe." I wrote several stories under this nebulous title. It is a feeling that everything I do is playing some game that lies false to my desires. It is the notion that just nextdoor is a society that is more relaxed and meaningful than this one. The notion that the world should be more romantic, less of a nuisance, beautiful in ways usually found only in moments or dreams. The notion that I was born into the wrong universe.
This weekend, I think I found something closer to this dreamworld which I seek.
Now I'm back here, but it bothers me less. I'm going to try to focus now and work harder. There is something to work for.
I don't hate science anymore again. I'm not obsessed with it either. I will do RQFT - as much as is reasonable in the next 2.5 weeks.
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| Current State of Something |
[01 Nov 2009|05:55pm] |
If science were really easy, I'd take it just for the heck of it. This is partially the case in 1st semester postgrad bioinformatics, at least so far. I'm doing not-horribly and haven't actually done any readings or outside-of-class work. Therefore, I enjoy it.
This is not the case with relativistic quantum field theory. This class takes a disproportionate amount of time for me to make half-assed progress on the problem sets. I wish I had not signed up to take the exam for this. Similarly, I have a large and difficult programming project in lattice QCD. Since I don't want to work in academia or research, this kind of study is unimportant and not rewarding to me. When it starts to eat up huge amounts of time that could be dedicated to more relevant tasks, I start to really hate studying. This applies both to physics and computer programming.
I currently oscillate between being okay with taking a little more science and absolutely wanting to leave it for good.
Fundamentally, there's nothing I hate about science - I just hate the fact that it takes an awful lot of effort for something that will never grant me what I desire.
This changes under the circumstances that:
1) I find away that I can attain my desires through science.
2) Science becomes worthwhile for other reasons (such as being satisfying on its own).
3) Science becomes easy enough to do as a sidequest.
I am currently focused on #1. My hope is that with Bayesian inference, a good problem-solving mentality, strong mental discipline, and great patience for complexity, I can learn social skills faster than normal. Social skills aren't necessarily an end in themselves, but I find myself wishing almost constantly that I had more.
For this reason, I am going to try not to hate science. Because I already have it, and it's a sunk cost, so any benefit I can squeeze out of it now is better than nothing. I'm writing a LiveJournal post to remind myself of this. Plus, who knows, maybe in a year I'll discover a new way in which computers can solve all my problems.
It is also worth noting that I hate science out of fear that I will be straightjacketed in a scientific or engineering career. I must take additional steps to resist this, but having a science background shouldn't force me into using it, at least not in the US.
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[22 Oct 2009|01:21am] |
My God, it is such a mess. I don't know how much of my aversion to doing "too much science" comes from childhood fears related to people taking/self-attributing my talents. The repulsion I feel for corporate America may have to do with the sensation of having my hard-earned abilities ripped from me. And so I instinctively seek not to earn what I can't defend.
I'm going to take a more active role in driving many things. Pursuing aggressively, rather than reacting. More frequent "relavance?" queries to myself.
No. Maybe that's not it. Maybe it's just a question of removing that block. Why is it there?
I will find out!
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[21 Oct 2009|07:02pm] |
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A couple days ago, I had the idea of using GPU-acceleration (combined with some other things) to deliver cheap, real-time cloud computing for mass consumption.
Tonight I read that nVidia has already started doing it.
Guess I'm back to doing this again. Good idea, several months too late.
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[20 Oct 2009|04:58pm] |
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music |
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A Sunny Day in Glasgow - 5 15 Train |
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I almost regret the 30 points of physics I chose to take this semester, given that they take up well more than 70% of my academic time and don't have any forseeable relevance in life. But it least they sound cool. I suppose that's more than most things are worth these days.
I suppose I must remind myself not to discount the various signs of progress in these past months. Nervous responses finally calming, next steps becoming apparent.
Otherwise, I really don't like sitting here, not knowing if I'll ever catch up in RQFT but quite sure I won't be on a date in the near future. I don't care for being chained to my academic desk, but at least it's better than corporate.
I've done well. I've learned how to not care. How to meditate on the connectedness of all things and the next hour eat something I paid to have murdered by overworked immigrants. How to understand that the world ends every hundred years and accept that millions more will die before this decade is up. How to sit here and post on LiveJournal when I know that there are a million more efficient uses of the time.
For the first time I feel like I think I should have as a teenager. Rebellion appears more logical with each new day. With twenty one years drawn behind me, I sometimes question whether it was all wrong, whether I would do better to invert everything I have ever known about living. Smaller apocalypses than such have generally been good for me, but without targeting, I doubt there is anything to learn.
I am painfully aware of how I would enjoy being a sadist. It fights with so many of my current dreams and visions of what is good. Maybe this is part of my problem.
I have a purpose in life, and that purpose is to survive the end of college and bridge the chasm to a better place. I don't know why. If you ask, I'll give some roundabout answer that involves immortality and world domination.
I no longer fear routine damage on my body or soul. I suppose that when form divorces function, I am one step closer to that void.
This is a dumb way to be, but from here there are many ways to go. I suppose I should therefore enjoy my time here.
In other news, I discovered that by feeling the temperature and microcurrents in the air, I can close my eyes and sense walls moments before touching them. I wonder what else I can feel below the surface.
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[19 Oct 2009|04:21pm] |
Life goes on at U. of Edinburgh. Surviving bioinformatics for the time being. Hoping for the same with RQFT and everything else (though RQFT is the one that currently most worries me).
I've rejoined some kind of fencing. I'm going to try not to go crazy with it the way I did junior year and let any tournaments ruin a perfectly good weekend - I may simply not go to tournaments. Besides, priorities are different today.
The project is coming along very well. Maybe it's production level. Maybe it's not. I'm currently looking for alpha testers for a new kind of high-resolution real-time autocorrelator, as used in dynamic light scattering and fluorescence correlation spectroscopy. Or anyone who knows what that is and might be interested in chatting about it.
Kinda bored right now, as usual. Kinda worried at the same time, which is always the case. I get still these nightmarish scenarios playing out in my head, like I mentioned in the summer, but I think I know what they are now. As I heard years ago, my nervous system is somewhat over-reactive, making small screwups into fiascos and turning miniscule probabilities into unavoidable accidents. Ironically, I also crave stimulus of magnitude that low-stress lifestyles never seem to provide. I am also a single male in my 20s, which does not make this problem any less apparent.
Shit, I'm in my 20s. Is this supposed to be my prime or something? God I hope not.
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| emag a yalp ew llahs |
[17 Oct 2009|01:53am] |
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Let's try an experiment:
If you could change something about me, what would it be?
(no comment screening)
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[15 Oct 2009|01:09am] |
So I've got the most insane schedule ever, with 3 graduate-level classes and half-a-schedule of physics for which I lack all prereqs. Not to mention the massage classes I suck at, and the desire to do fencing and capoeira and some reasonably practical martial art all at the same time. Plus improv comedy and creative writing. And then I still have my project to work on and am going to want a business plan for it soon.
But you know what? I'm not gonna let it phase me this time. I started relaxing this weekend and I'm going to keep doing that. Because I'm growing into an entrepreneur, and working in 3 different subjects each 2 levels above me is just ordinary. Boring. Yesterday's news.
I also might have missed an opportunity with some insanely hot girl. Who knows. Can't let that get to me either. Might've missed 2 since I got here. Or might not.
Just gonna meditate, get some sleep. I'll need it. And think back to the summer I turned 16 years old and didn't think I could pass linear algebra at Brooklyn Poly... and the day I found out I'd scored an A, better than half the college juniors who'd flunked it the first time
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[08 Oct 2009|01:16am] |
Once again I feel continually bothered by my social anxiety and related lack of progress.
But if this is all there is, if life is no longer stepping in to push me down and hold me there, then I can deal with this. It's just a matter of plan and action.
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[07 Oct 2009|10:09pm] |
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The Buggles - Video Killed the Radio Star |
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Sometimes I remember what things used to feel like, how they were different. Specifically, I think of a night in which two of my friends and I stayed out partying far too late in Williamsburg. We walked back on the Williamsburg bridge, shirtless in the summer air, and ate at a NYC diner around 4AM. There was nothing especially great about that night - in most ways it was a useless exercise in hipsterism. It didn't feel that way, though. There was a certain feeling to the night, promise in the air. It darkened my senses and brightened my thoughts.
Then was college sophomore year, the glory days or what passes for them now. I'd just been cruelly eliminated from a relationship that wasn't supposed to have gone anywhere in the first place, leaving me to walk out of depression with a newfound freedom and hope. I proceeded to find defeat where I needed, and victory where I'd most hoped. It was a year spent with more happiness than usual, though I could already feel that something needed to break.
Junior year broke everything. But no, I suppose my GPA held up, even as I stopped caring about it. And I fixed things by the end, somewhat. Still does the shock of it fall upon me.
I finished the relativistic quantum field theory problem set tonight. What does that mean? Well, it means I don't have to worry about field theory for the time being. And maybe that junior year really did teach me to solve physics problems in a tenth the time I could before it.
And that's significant, because it leaves me with time tonight. Time to think about whether the feelings of old were just a delusion, or if there might be a new way to make them true.
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[28 Sep 2009|11:33pm] |
Hmmm... so the first thing I do when I get to Edinburgh is find a way to overload myself... this is a strange pattern of mine. Next week ought to be easier, though.
I'll probably drop product management. Today's lesson was how to create databases in Microsoft Access. Yes, this is the same course that promises to be geared toward entrepreneurs in its now outdated course description. Instead I attained the joys of data entry. It's also a 9AM, 40min from where I live. So today I awoke too early and am now very tired.
Apparently I damaged my rotator cuff? Probably leading sloppy swingouts for most of the summer. That would explain the shoulder pain. Anyway, I need some excuse to drop an activity. Maybe I'll let Lindy fall for a month or two while my shoulder heals.
I'm doing another play. It wasn't supposed to be good - no auditions, all n00bs, 1 week to improvise and rehearse. But oddly, it's quite awesome. All 9 of them (there were 9 groups).
These times remind me how much thinking I've left to do. I still want to be an entrepreneur, and probably the non-coding side of the company. But I also still have a sense of science being cool, and of business people being full of shit. I still feel something accomplished at the thought of a publication. Yet I loathe the notion that I would be spending the next 10 years of my life between various labs, waiting for someone in charge to promote me, from BA to PhD, then out of postdoc, then through the various levels of assistantships and professorships...
Maybe I don't hate science at all. Maybe I love science. Maybe what I hate is the thought that I would be working for and at the mercy of an authority.
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[26 Sep 2009|01:49am] |
Tentative Course List:
> Computational Physics Honors Project (GPU-based Lattice methods for the QCD Dirac equation)
> Relativistic Quantum Field Theory (I don't have the prereqs for this, so it's really hard)
> Informatics for Entrepreneurship
> Product Management (engineering)
> Computer Design
> Bioinformatics
In other news, there are breakdance and blues dance here. Awesome. There are also capoeira and fencing, in case I want to keep up with those. And a series of classes in massage. Then there's actual, practical self-defence, taught by a mixed martial arts teacher.
ATI is quite... crappy. Their Brook+ compiler actually brought down my Linux box (yes, the compiler, not the program that it was compiling). This is a major setback for this weekend.
Other than friends, I think the thing I miss most about Swarthmore right now is... Sharples!
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[24 Sep 2009|03:48pm] |
I'm now at a major crux of college life: do I take what is cool, or what applies to my desired career?
On the cool side, I have a computational physics project to program a GPU-based solver for the Lattice QCD Dirac equation. This would have me working with a professor who is currently designing the frontloader for the Blue Gene Q, and probably communing with three other cool guys. As a co-requisite, I would have to take a course in relativistic quantum field theory. There is also bioinformatics.
On the relevant side, organization studies, product management, project management. All 3 courses about how to run a business and deal with people. All three things that I desperately need a better understanding of.
There is 1 course, informatics entrepreneurship, which is both awesome and relevant.
There is 1 course, computer design, which is boring and not useful but required for a CS minor.
Please comment.
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[20 Sep 2009|11:12pm] |
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Sufjan Stevens - Chicago (MPD version) |
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I had a weird night last night. I got progressively drunker and at some point decided that I could nuke my own mind/bad memories with alcohol. It was then that I recognized I'd been dreaming for months of "obliteration," and that my dreams were not of destroying some external hardship but to free myself from my own bondage. I had similarly believed that with the junior year of hell I would purge all inefficiency and baggage from my personality but never made the connection until last night.
This ended with my drinking plenty but not all that much in the grand scheme of things. My memory didn't get fucked, and half of the mental confusion was from the strobelights. I made the simultaneous realization that I'd been trying to do the opposite as well - to re-affirm myself and thereby escape the baggage of doubt.
It has been abundantly clear to me in these past days that I suffer from paranoia and social anxiety.
I suppose my ultimate desire is transcendence. Of nation. Of thought. Of suffering. Of death. I should meditate again.
In other news, Gnu Make is much like a shell in itself. Complicated, powerful and very necessary.
PS. After countless hours, the makefile is very close to compiling the Brook+ component. Hopefully, adding OpenCL will be much easier.
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[20 Sep 2009|01:00pm] |
Edinburgh has been great so far. Now to actually start classes...
I have to figure out whether I want to take a business course or attempt a foreign language for 1 semester. Both seem like they would be massively useful at the moment.
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| Edinburgh Observations |
[14 Sep 2009|11:56pm] |
I suffer currently from a terrible and depressing loneliness. I do not know if this is completely normal for one who has gone to another country and been cut off from one's friends/family, whether it is missing the typical return to Swarthmore and all that I have come to know there, or whether it is a misplaced fear of future leavings. Maybe I put too much pressure on myself to make friends instantly? Does anyone have experience with this kind of thing or know what it is?
In other news, U. Edinburgh charges $ for club membership. YUCK! But the food is cheap, the U. is cheap, the room is good (and not horribly expensive), and everything else will help me avoid overspending.
It just hit me a moment ago that I can do what I always do - try to build again from scratch. It's usually silly but never depressing to feel that one has an open slate. Of course I am wiser now. I know that the slate is not all open. But on the other hand, I left behind a lot of problems when I came here. For one thing, I'm not so self-conscious or nervous as a I remember. I don't know why. Do I feel that I've nothing to lose? Are four months the perfect amount of time that nothing really matters enough to be afraid of?
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[14 Sep 2009|02:20pm] |
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Iron and Wine - Serpent Charmer |
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Finally moved in. The room is not too bad, and there's a reasonable kitchen very nearby. The flatmates also seem cool, though I've hardly met 2 of them. There are 3 internationals in this flat and one Scottish fresher.
Ceilidh last night was excellent. I'm glad to hear that these are relatively common in Edinburgh. Now to do more things.
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[12 Sep 2009|10:48pm] |
Strong is the enemy of comfortable.
Right now, you couldn't imagine how much a part of my wishes that I were back in Swarthmore, chilling with old friends in David Kemp or Willets. I remind myself that this time last year I wished the same thing - just as everything I thought familiar and good evaporated from my life. Consistency was no protection from the shattering of comfort zones then. This does little to change my feelings now. I just moved into this dorm an hour and a half ago. It's cold and basementy, but the room is massive and the location optimal. Feeling tired and lonely as ever.
I think partially I fear to leave Swarthmore behind. But it was logical for me to have come here. I will stay strong.
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[11 Sep 2009|11:41am] |
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music |
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OCDJ - Smoke My Cheese |
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Last night, I had my first incident with the French police (though still not sure if they were actually police, or just transit employees). A group of light green uniformed people standing in the tunnel connecting the yellow line to the dark green line. One lady asks me for a ticket. I don't know why, so I pull out a used ticket from my back pocket. She says something to the tone of "no good," so I pull out a new one with similar results. At this point, I believe that they are from a different rail company and there is some mix-up about which train I'm trying to get on. I cannot explain this to them, speaking almost no French. The lady continues to tell me that it is "no good," and I continue to try to ask what I'm supposed to do about that and explain that I'm just connecting in the subway. She then starts talking about cash and credit cards, and pulls out a list of prices. This looks suspicious. She has my passport at this point. Another green uniform, a large black man, is also spewing tons of stuff in French. At some point she asks me about the station (I'm not sure what), and I reply "Trocadero," because that's where I got on. She then says "one ticket, one ride" (in English). At this point it's starting to become clear that I'm being accused of a crime. I try to ask what I'm supposed to do, and she just keeps saying, "no good." She then pulls out a pad and says something that I picked up as "if you don't pay the fine, we will cite/arrest/do something bad to you." I pull out my credit card, and she takes that instead. In the last instant, I realize what is happening and pull out all the used tickets from my pocket. The black guy runs them all through a machine and eventually finds one that is "good." She then returns my passport, credit card and "good" used ticket.
So I think I was about to be arrested for turnstile jumping (which would have probably prevented my going back the UK for the whole semester abroad deal), but it's still a little ambiguous. I'm not completely sure whether they were trying to get me in more trouble or if there was a cultural/linguistic miscommunication to their end as well. Either way, it would have helped to have known about this before almost getting arrested.
This is probably about the 10th incident of major assholery I have so far encountered in France. I've only been here 9 days. I remember my mom having warned me of the French being unhelpful/rude to strangers, kind of like New Yorkers. I have to say that's a poor comparison. Compared to Paris, New York is a shining city of peace, love and friendliness. I don't know if people don't like me because I'm America, or because my French is poor and butchers their language. Either way, this is quite the unfriendly place for tourists.
In other news, I leave tomorrow. for more permanent (4 months) residence in Edinburgh. Yay. Keeping the fingers crossed, because I know there are at least 20 things that could go wrong in the first days and that at least 5 of them will.
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