Insomnia

I’m currently suffering from putting my insomnia to good use (so far I’ve installed Tracks), so I’ll take the time to post some random thoughts:

• I was bitten by April Fools twice today. The second time because I was too exhausted to remember that it was April Fools.
• A life without hope is not wasted or a pity any more than a life without religion is.
• A good friend of mine once told me that if you listen to what people say carefully, they will give themselves away at some point. Like most wisdom phrased in an open-ended way, I’ve seen lots of confirmation of this and little contradiction.
• I think a fair number of people like to dominate others with their words. Being on the receiving end of that kind of thing is really exhausting. I think it’s fairly obviously just people playing out their psychodramas in an environment where you can’t just club and be clubbed.
• State-granted monopolies on culture, art, and media in general stifle creativity, limit freedom, and exist to protect one power against another. In this society it’s almost always used to protect the established power against the new one. Standard Lessig, now apply it to those organizations we may otherwise support. That pinched-face discomfort you are feeling is cognitive dissonance between your stated preferences and your desire to defend your principles.