h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

hello Jerms!



do you like my random title? i couldnt think of anyhting else. i have an interesting pad of paper beside me with little things written on each paper.i was going to use one of those but none of them seemed to be very fitting....... "You are my little angel. Friendship like a bright lamp lights up my soul" no, you see? no good at all. and all of them seemed more or less like that....

i've allways liked the hokey pokey. possibly the only dance that i can do with out really screwing up badly. except for maybe ring around the rosie, the chicken dance, and the macaraina...... if thats actually how you spell it.......

anyways, i'm getting really off topic! somehow you have that effect on me....

i'm actually here to introduce someone to you

*brings X out of the shadows*
Jerms, this is X.
X, this is Jerms.

there we go
now i've introduced you, and my jobs done.

!

So.......um........Hi. How's it goin'? No, okay. That's a really bad way to try and start a subject....

Hmm.....Well it worked before.....Hmm........I hope you don't mind Met, I'm going to ask him the same questions I asked you.......

So first off, what's your opinion on death? What I mean is, you know, what do you believe happens to people when they die and stuff? I'd ask what your religion is, but I find that people's opinion on it don't always conform to their religion's, so I'm going to ask more directly. Actually, what /is/ your religion for that matter? Just out of curiosity.

I'm an Athiest. So no God. But, of course, that doesn't necessarily preclude anything else. At the moment I haven't really got an opinion, beyond that the Heaven and Hell concept has never made even the slightest sense to me. If anything, I'm thinking Reincarnation, maybe. But I don't really think that's right either. I think we probably just die, and it's not something the human mind was designed to accept, so it's not something most people do accept.

But anyway....That gives you an idea of me I guess. Met says you'll be on Sunday night, so I'll be here hoping to get a chance to talk to you, as I've been wanting to meet you.

*nearly dies of shock*

wow... what a question!
i would have settled for something like 'whats your favorite color?' but then thats me, not you.

and no, i dont mind.



oh! jerms..... just so you know.... i dont know if i'll be on tonight. i have to go out for dinner, and we're leaving at quarter to 5, and i dont know when i'll be home. but i'll try and be here later tonight....

Hello!
And Hello!

So, X, one thing you should know about me; when I'm on hootoo I tend to reply to stuff as is comes up (dunno why, just one of those things) so before I leap into answering your question, I just have to say... Arisztid, you mean the hokey /kokie/, right? I dunno about the spelling, but I know that hokey pokey is a type of food. It's yummy. You should try it. And then dance the hokey kokie about how good it tastes.

Why the heck do I know the lyrics for the macarena? ...Macaraina? Whatever. They're in spanish! And I don't like the song!!! Gah!

Okay, so how about that death then. Well to be honest I don't really care much for what happens after death, because since my reality will completely shift gears at that point anyway it would be kindof tricky to describe the experience with any point of reference back to what we currently know. So whatever happens, it will almost certainly be undescribable to anyone who hasn't died yet.
And I don't believe in heaven, and I don't believe in hell; because the christians created them to be another variation on the theme of 'karma', and I know too many good people who died slowly and painfully for me to be able to believe that karma exists.

What I /do/ believe is something which mainstream religions haven't come up with a name for yet, so I just put the word 'agnostic' on the census forms when they come around, because it's easier than explaining every time. Except for last time, because a friend was trying to get 'jedi' recognised as a formal religion.

My personal theosophy is related to recursive chaotisism, and also involves a little evolutionism. This does not mean that I am against creationism; on the contrary, I believe that evolutionism and creationism are not mutually exclusive. I wish people would stop pretending that they are.

I could probably go on, but I have a lecture in a few minutes, so I won't. I'll be back again in about four hours I guess. Hopefully I'll see you and Arisztid here then?

Nice to meet you!

jerms! you're on!

4 hours? rats. i'll be gone by then. but i'll come back on after i get back from the dinner.

and no, i do mean the hokey pokey. at least thats how we sing it here. perhaps its because we dont have the hokey pokey food what is it? i've never even heard of it before.....

~*~And no, I do mean the Hokey Pokey. At least that's how we sing it here. Perhaps it's because we don't have the Hokey Pokey food, what is it? I've never even heard of it before.....~*~

We sing it "Hokey Pokey" too, so I'm just as confused as you are. *Waits for Jerms to explain.*

~*~when I'm on hootoo I tend to reply to stuff as is comes up (dunno why, just one of those things)~*~

That's cool. I copy it and then paste it to respond to the pieces one at a time, as you can see.

~*~Well to be honest I don't really care much for what happens after death, because since my reality will completely shift gears at that point anyway it would be kind of tricky to describe the experience with any point of reference back to what we currently know.~*~

That's a very good point, and I completely agree with it.

~*~Because the Christians created them to be another variation on the theme of 'karma', and I know too many good people who died slowly and painfully for me to be able to believe that karma exists.~*~

Hmm........*Freely admits that he doesn't actually know what karma is, wonders if Jerms might explain it to him, so he'd understand what he means.*

~*~What I /do/ believe is something which mainstream religions haven't come up with a name for yet, so I just put the word 'agnostic' on the census forms when they come around, because it's easier than explaining every time.~*~

Fair enough. But you wouldn't mind explaining to me what it is anyway, would you? Simply because I'm interested in knowing.

~*~I believe that evolutionism and creationism are not mutually exclusive.~*~

Well they aren't exclusive, frankly. They /could/ fit together if anybody bothered to let them. It's probably just that Creationism was around for centuries before Evolutionism. In order for them to fit you'd have to ignore some of the stuff that the Mainstream religions were saying at that point, which most people couldn't do, because they had been raised from birth to "know" it's true without question. (Which is behavior I've never agreed with.) And then, of course, most of the religious leaders saw it either as a threat to their power, or as obviously wrong, and denounced it, which certainly didn't help.

~*~Hopefully I'll see you and Arisztid here then?~*~

You'll see me. Met might be a little late, but she'll be here.

~*~Nice to meet you!~*~

Nice to meet you too!

*Leaves to watch Star Trek.*

Sorry I'm late; I was updating my PS.



It's the Hokey Kokie here. Or however it's spelt. I was trying to find a picture of a hokey-pokey chocolate bar or something, but the website is poos and doesn't have any pictures. There'll be something somewhere, if you can be bothered googling for it.

Oh sorry, karma, yeah. It's the buddhist belief that good things happen to good people, and bad people will have bad things happen to them. Or maybe it's a Taoist belief. I'm not certain of anything at this time of year.

The word 'Nos' comes from the same root word as to know. And 'Ag' is a negation lexeme like 'un' or 'non' (A lexeme is a word-part).
So an Agnostic is someone who is 'un-knowing' what their religion is.

I'm sleepy, I'll leave you to do the talking for now.

~*~Sorry I'm late; I was updating my PS.~*~

Oh! Neat! I'll look at that once I'm done here.

~*~There'll be something somewhere, if you can be bothered googling for it.~*~

Hmm.....I can't really. And I have too much homework to do anyway.

~*~karma, yeah. It's the buddhist belief that good things happen to good people, and bad people will have bad things happen to them.~*~

Oh. I see. I'll have to agree with you, I think that's wrong.

~*~So an Agnostic is someone who is 'un-knowing' what their religion is.~*~

....I knew that already.....You seem to misunderstand what my question was.........You implied that you weren't "Agnostic" as such, but that your own beliefs simply didn't have a name. I want to know what those beliefs entailed, if you don't mind my asking.

~*~I'm sleepy, I'll leave you to do the talking for now.~*~

You will?

I was looking forward to talking to you....

"You seem to misunderstand what my question was.........You implied that you weren't "Agnostic" as such, but that your own beliefs simply didn't have a name. I want to know what those beliefs entailed, if you don't mind my asking." Oh I'm sorry I misunderstood.

Um. It's kindof tricky to explain, and I don't really have time right now, but I'll try to summarise instead, so that you don't explode with curiosity before I get the chance to explain properly.
Ok. Things happen in cycles. No, wait... Things happen in waves. That's better. Think of a biorhythms graph, like a sine curve drawn on a piece of paper, and then another sine curve drawn on it out of sync, and then another curve of the two added together, so that at some places they cancel out, and in some places they combine. Well most things are like that. No, wrong again. /ALL/ things are like that. Absolutely everything is a wave, or moves in a wave motion. Now hold that thought, I'll come back to it.

There's a guy who did his university thesis, I think it was at Massacheusetts Institute of Technology, who was working on creating a robot which could replicate itself. Part of the robot was a 3D laser metal-cutter or something. Anyway, this works in well with my degree, which is in Artificial Intelligence.
I could, in theory, take that robot, and program it so that it could not only replicate itself, but also to learn from its environment and /make improvements on its own design/ before reproducing.
With several thousand generations (okay probably more like millions) these robots could ... wait I've just realised I've already written this before. Damn. Wait up a second.



Okay just read this, dude. It'll save me a whole lot of typing. A2841158

I gotta run anyway dammit, I have to be home to catch a visitor soon, so I'll try to see you both tomorrow?

I'll finish off the story then; sorry to have to rush.

Sorry I missed you Arisztid.

~*~Okay just read this, dude. It'll save me a whole lot of typing. A2841158 ~*~

I did. I've heard of that idea before, and you explained it very well!

~*~In fact, this hypothesis can be shown to prove absolutely everything about our reality, as far as I can figure, except for only one thing.~*~

What's the "one thing"?

~*~so I'll try to see you both tomorrow?~*~

Yep. I'm on every day, usually.

"/ALL/ things are like that. Absolutely everything is a wave, or moves in a wave motion. "
ooooooh......... i'm a wave.......
i move like a wave......... wait.... really? *gets up and walks around*....... i dont think i move like a wave.......

oooh! a degree in Artificial Intelligence! you're soooooooo smart! i know, i allready knew thats what you were doing. however it allways sounds so impressive........

i'm sorry i missed you too
tomorrow? you'll be on tomorrow? has you're schedule changed from the way it was before? i didnt expect to see you till day after tomorrow....
ok. well, i'll try to be here.... but it depends on if my brother is using the computer.........


talk to you later

oh, and just so you know........ i went to google, and did an images search.
i typed in 'hokey pokey+chocoate bar' and it said no results, so i put in 'hokey pokey' and all i got was pictures of the dance..... maybe i'll try 'hokey kokey' later.....

hugs!

ok. so i did that.
and it comes up with the spelling correction of hokey Cokey, but whatever. the interesting thing is that it also comes up with pictures of the dance......
so now we know, we're all right

s!

Yay! s!

"What's the "one thing"?" - Read the heading.

"I move like a wave......... wait.... really? *gets up and walks around*....... i dont think i move like a wave......." That's because you're moving in a wave pattern relative to something else which is moving in a wave pattern in almost exactly the same way. Look at the tops of people's heads as they walk; it's a wave pattern. Your heart rate and blood pressure change according to a chaotic wave pattern. The planet rotates according to a chaotic-cyclic wave pattern. And you're walking relative to the planet.

I tried searching for a pic of a hokey-pokey bar, but all I can find so far is part of one: http://www.cadbury.co.uk/EN/CTB2003/about_chocolate/brand_stories/ice_cream.htm
The banner picture thingee near the top of the page here has a selection of chocolates - the bar with the golden middle on the right hand side is called a crunchie bar, which is honeycombed hokey-pokey covered in chocolate. So there blah.

I'm still trying to make it back to the ship...
Must... Clear... Backlog... !

"Read the heading."
~*~A sense of humour is not a survival trait. So why did we evolve it then?~*~

Oh! I have an idea! It prevents chronic depression. Thus far reducing the suicide ratings, and greatly increasing likelyhood that a species will survive. When you're actually capable of contemplating the vastness of the universe and seeing just how pitifully unimportant and trivial and hard life really is, it makes sense that you'd need some way to keep a cheerful attitude, lest you determine that there's no reason to let yourself suffer so.

*Clicks on the link.*

Hmm.....That's hard to see very clearly.....*shrug*

~*~Must... Clear... Backlog... !~*~

Given how long /you've/ been gone, that's going to take a very llllllloooooooonnnnnnnnnggggggggg time. Good luck with it.

dont you know what a crunchie bar is X?
or shall i send one to you with my letter?

"Must... Clear... Backlog"
yay! that means replies!

and look! i'm on at the same time as you jerms!

~*~Don't you know what a crunchie bar is X?~*~

I don't think so....I'm sure I've never eaten one in any case....

~*~Or shall I send one to you with my letter?~*~

Would you? That would be nice.

of course i will silly!

id do anything for you

maybe i'll even send you two. is there anything else you want?

Mmmmmmm.........Junk food.....Thanks lots!

No, I can't think of anything else just now. You're already sending more than I deserve......!