The Art of Voyeurism

I stare at you, dear reader, through my binoculars, as you are reading these words. You glance over your right shoulder, wondering how this can be. But sure enough, you see me looking straight at you. My eyes meet yours, though yours are denied the luxury of this rendezvous by the obstacle that is my binoculars. You see two white diamonds gleaming back at you – a trick of the midday sun.

I just watched as you reread that last paragraph, looking to see if you had misread parts, or if there might be some typographical error in the text. And now I can see the look of perplexion that dominates your face as the truth of the situation dawns on you. Now you are faced with a choice: you can continue reading as normal, to see how this plays out; you can put the book down and never open it again, in the hopes that I might vanish with the words; or you can skip forward, skim reading parts of the book that are meant for later. This last option seems the best – if the book is about your immediate present, then you assume the rest of the pages must be blank. But what if you flick to page one hundred and seven and the narrative continues right from where you left off? Perhaps it might be wiser to pick option two and stop reading right now… or now… or even now. But you know that I will still be watching you, just as I must have been before in order to have written the words on the page in front of you. You consider the possibility that I can time-travel, but immediately dismiss that concept and berate yourself for being so absurd. I can see the anger in your eyes and the curl in the corner of your mouth as you curse yourself. At any rate, you are still reading, so you must have chosen the first option. Since you’re here to stay, at least for now, perhaps we ought to get to know each other…

Why a Unicorn living in North Korea is More Plausible than it Sounds

As human beings, we seem to have a predilection to be spoon fed everything that we know. We scour the internet for weird and wonderful facts, and we take them as just that: facts which exist in the realms of the context in which they are delivered. But really, a lot of what we read should be appreciated from a safer distance. It is probable that all of my fans, followers, friends and first time readers will readily berate North Korea as the most farcical, ridiculous, absurd (those words all mean the same thing) country on this planet. But is it really?

Let’s look at a few of the ‘facts’ that coagulate to make North Korea the most laughable nation there is…

In 2012, reports surfaced that a unicorn lair had been discovered just outside the North Korean capital of Pyongyang. Claimants reckon that the unicorn residing within the lair is one of the many ridden by the ancient King Tongmyong, who founded a dynasty that stretched from the 3^rd century AD to the 7^th century BC. In other words, the unicorn is at least 2700 years old. As preposterous as we assume this claim is, consider that parts of the western world believe in, or have believed in, even more ludicrous claims. For example, there are plenty of people living all across the western hemisphere who readily assert that in 1947 a UFO crash-landed on Earth, and now Roswell harbours at least one dead alien. We immediately disregard the unicorn of North Korea as fabrication, but we are more reluctant to dispute the Roswell incident. This is probably because we are bombarded with anti-North Korea propaganda, and a part of us would rather believe in aliens than unicorns.

How about this for nonsense: in 1994 Kim Jong Il (then North Korean leader) picked up a golf club for the first time and hit a 38 under par round, including 11 hole-in-ones. Again, we scoff and dismiss the claim as horse manure. But we live in a world where millions of people will not question the authenticity of a claim that a man they opt to follow both walked on water and turned it into wine. The idea that a man, who has never played golf in his life, could hit 11 hole-in-ones is pretty outrageous, but nonetheless possible. It is conceivable that, by some obscene natural gift, or fortuitous fluke, that feat is entirely achievable. I personally once hit a hole-in-one. I possess no talent for golf whatsoever, but by sheer blind luck, at the age of about 9 or so, my father took me to play golf and I shot a ball from tee to hole. Luck is a very real phenomenon, but the ability to walk on water cannot be achieved through luck or natural talent (Dynamo is a fraud!).

Here’s another one: Kim Jong Il reportedly stated that he could change the weather depending on his mood. Well that’s pretty dumb as well (except in Hollywood movies, where it rains every time a couple have a disagreement and one of them gets sad), but it’s not the first time people have been forced to accept that weather is not always a naturally occurring concept. Let’s take a journey back to Ancient Greece, where we can rub shoulders with such scientific geniuses such as Aristole and Plato, and writers like Socrates. They were definitely founding figures of some of the ideas that modern science, linguistics, mathematics and philosophy still cling to. But they believed in a big guy with a beard who was raised by a goat, could throw lightning bolts wherever he pleased, and generally ruled the sky, which in turn was supported by another big guy. Believing that Zeus controlled the weather is as silly as believing that it rained when Kim Jong Il cried, but people are far faster to dismiss the latter notion than the former.

Whatever nonsense spews from North Korea, just remember that the western world has probably believed in theories that far outweigh the stupidity of any theory to come from North Korea. Also remember that North Korea has a better view of the stars than us, because they don’t use many lights at night. And we all love stars.

Time-Traveling celebrities: Explained with Science.

We’ve all seen those viral posts about celebrities who definitely came from the past, or went back there to pose as somebody we now recognise from our history textbooks. And we usually scoff at these absurd claims, and declare ‘It’s Photoshop!’ Or something like that. Sometimes we blame the Illuminati. Sometimes we blame aliens. Whatever the cause and effect, we definitely have time-traveling celebrities walking among us.

No, wait, we don’t. I guess the human brain is trained to witness a seemingly impossible, or magical phenomenon and become enraptured. That is the premise of illusionists, after all. We see something incredible, and we want to believe that it is not a trick of the light, sleight of hand or founded in misdirection. We know there is a logical solution to the problem in front of us, and we pretend to search for it, but really we don’t want to arrive at it. As soon as we know the inner workings of anything that amazes us, we are no longer amazed. And we all love being amazed, right? The paper bag trick, for example, whereby a magician throws a goddam invisible coin in the air, which zooms round the room, before catching it in a paper bag and, lo and behold, it is visible again. We hear it land in the bag. How is that done? Here’s a video of Eric Morecombe doing it.

If I click my fingers, the bizarre becomes banal. If you don’t want to know my theory on how celebrities can time-travel, well… spoiler alert. I’m hoping you, dear reader, have seen (or read, the book is better) The Prestige. If not, to summarise, Christian Bale plays two characters who perform a transportation trick (that is, where a person disappears, before reappearing elsewhere) by the sheer fact that they look the same. They are twins. Now I am not suggesting that we all have a twin somewhere in the past, because that would make us some multiple of hundreds of years old. But some of us kind of do.

Time for science! We know that there are finite combinations of DNA. It is a very, very, big, ginormous, colossal number, but it is finite nonetheless. So theoretically it is possible for another human being to look the exact same as you do. Granted, it would be a very rare occurrence; I am pretty sure there are more possible combinations of DNA than the total number of human beings to ever have walked on this planet. But even so, the chance exists that once upon a time a person with your exact features and physique was cured by Jesus himself. This article right here explains all the scientific and mathematical parts of my theory if you wish to better understand what I am driving at.

So, here is a set of images of time-traveling celebrities. I put it to you that this is codswallop; these are just genetic illusions. That said, I’m not sure why that Sphinx looks like MJ; more on that one next time.

Click.

Why i think Adelina Sotnikova deserves the Olympic Gold (feminists, beware: contains smut)

I do not claim to know the first thing about figure skating. As far as I am concerned, an axel is a badly spelled car component and a Salchow is a pretty rancid activity in which one passes gas from their fart portal to the mouth of their partner before inhaling their own air bagel by kissing said partner. You’re welcome.

One thing I definitely am an expert on, however, is Black Swan. I am a fan of Natalie Portman. She is perfect. But Mila Kunis steals her crown in that film. Sure, Natalie Portman is sexy, and dances well with very little clothing on. But Mila Kunis has the real sex appeal. It’s all in the face. She’s devious, flirtatious, and a bit of a bad egg. She’s the one we lust after, Portman is the one we’d marry. I guess that’s the point; Portman is the white swan, Kunis is the black swan. The wife and the mistress.

Back to figure skating. There is this raging debate about Yuna Kim being robbed of the gold medal at Sochi at the hands of erratic, biased judging, which led to Adelina Sotnikova taking gold for Russia. But you know what? The judges made the money shot. Sotnikova was sexy, cheeky and a bit risqué. Kim was precise, graceful and dull. Sure, she was technically unflawed (I assume – part of a car and a fart…) but she just was not interesting to watch, from an impartial, uneducated view. Sotnikova drained the blood from my brain. She was Kunis, Kim was Portman. I’d have them both, but I’d pick the Russian first.

Jokes and smut aside, my point really is that this is a subjective sport. With factors such as the attractiveness of the dancers, the music they pick and colour of their outfit surely coming into play, the final scores surely cannot, by the very nature of human fabric, be solely based on whether or not they messed up their double toe-loops? Sotnikova’s music was jaunty, catchy and fun. Her dress was fiery, glowing, and a bit inappropriate. Her face was seductive, mysterious and the epitome of enjoyment. Kim was professional, cold, distant and monotone. I find it hard to believe that these factors do not influence the judging. That’s like saying one book is better than the other because the grammar is more accurate. The human brain doesn’t work like that. As novels go, I’d rather read Sotnikova’s, even if Kim writes better.

Basically, I think Sotnikova was better because I fancied her more. And really, isn’t that what matters? I daresay a vast proportion of the viewing public didn’t have the first clue what a Lutz is, and I doubt they cared. They just wanted Adelina Sotnikova and her dress to become momentarily disconnected. And I’m sure their trousers twitched when she won the gold.

Feminists, please form an orderly queue.

Could Humans Soon Be The Second Most Intelligent Race On The Planet?

Fellow humans, it has come to my attention that we may be on the brink of relegation to the rank of second most intelligent race on the planet. Ray Kurzweil is, according to this article, a fairly tech savvy guy and he reckons that, through his collaborations with Google, in less than two decades our intelligence levels will have been usurped by computers. If what he is prophesising is incredible foresight, and not the conjectures of Mystic Mike or whoever currently writes the daily tabloid horoscopes, then we can look forward to an era when nothing that we do online can even be conveyed as private.

Mr Kurzweil reckons that Google will be able to scan everything we write, from blog posts, to emails, in order to build an electronic map of our inner workings. Those drunken statuses that make no sense to anyone who stumbles across your timeline will be analysed and digitally broken down to enable Google to better understand you. Everything you type in the little white box of any search engine will be stored in your personal online biography. In short, Kurzweil asserts that Google will be able to predict the questions you are about to ask, before you have even begun you have even considered them.

This all sounds very clever, and possibly the basis for a movie called The Social Network 2 or something like that. But surely it is breaking down our very fabric; dehumanizing us and rendering us unable, or unwilling to think for ourselves? If it becomes possible to just stare at Google’s homepage and suddenly be transported to whichever website you wanted to go to, without you even having to lift a finger, then cognitive thought processes must be rendered obsolete?

Humans are unique on this planet as the only organisms in possession of intellect. We are intelligent, quizzical and ponderous. We strive for knowledge, and a better understanding of the world around us, and beyond. We are a species of spontaneity, and that is one of our more attractive qualities. Our lust for scientific understanding has already led to our imaginations being limited in one direction. By that I mean, no longer are natural phenomena considered the work of the gods; a rainbow is just a spectrum caused when the sun’s light is refracted and distorted by water droplets. There was a time when magic was real, when myth and fact were indistinguishable as they fought each other in an ethereal tango, where reason and rhyme were equals. But now logic is already beginning to grind imagination into the dusty roads of paths once trodden, and surely we need to prevent our intelligence from swallowing the same pill?

If what you really desire is a lazy way to learn, then look no further, dear reader, for we have already created such wonderful tools as www.stumbleupon.com and www.pinterest.com. Here you can refine your search parameters and with a mere single click of your left mouse button, be transported to the incredible world of whatever subject takes your fancy. These websites are by no means perfect; they sporadically spew forth pages with subject matters which may be only loosely related to that which you wish to peruse. Nonetheless, that fact alone ensures that our spontaneity is mirrored by our inventions.

Here’s another problem I envisage for a world with no freedom of thought, nor action: what if we change our habits? Let’s say Google knows me, and assumes that, since it is 10am on a Tuesday, I am intending to write a poem. Perhaps it will suggest that I check out websites like www.rhymezone.com and www.synonym.com and www.poetry.com. Not a bad shout, Google, you know me well. But what if I happen to decide that on this particular Tuesday, even though it is 10am and that is poetry time, I would actually quite like to learn how to knit a pair of socks. Am I doomed to never feel the excitement of territories new and magical? Can I not become that which I am thus far not? What if you aren’t happy with the direction of your life? All these questions seem to indicate that we should not, at any point, ever try to fully understand ourselves, or ever try to create a machine capable of doing just that. Human beings have the capacity to be spontaneous, to adapt, to learn, to be fickle, to be creative, to be influenced and to be influential. This must never be taken away from us, and Google must stop being a voyeur.

Field of Seas (Flood Poems:1)

The sky has fallen to the ground:
the mud once dry, now hidden, drowned
beneath a sea of brown,
and green,
and grey,
so now reflections stay,
where, once, dark shadows lay.

The day stares down at its own image,
unseen before, except in streams,
that now are bursting at the seams.
Its face is sullen, dismal,
staring at the debris, though with a twinkle in its eye,
like a far off moon, smiling. Sly
Old Blue Eyes cried a tear
that made the fields disappear.
It made the treetops shake with fear,
for they were all that now stood clear.
It birthed an island, where none had prior been
and turned the tractor to a submarine.

Should we erase the words of Shelley when Emin is free to speak?

If you live anywhere in urbanised Britain, you are more than likely to have stumbled upon one or two obscenities crudely sprayed on the sides of buildings. Sometimes you might get a bit luckier and actually come across a highly artistic mural or something at least somewhat aesthetically pleasing. But no matter how beautiful the artwork, it will always reside well beneath the stigmatic blanket of graffiti.

I come to you, however, to challenge that view. To change the way we, as society, brand our creative peers. Sure, spray-painting swear words along the barriers of a public thoroughfare is pretty pathetic. And I do not condone such mindless vandalism. But there is definitely a point when graffiti transcends into the world of art.

Summertown, in Oxfordshire, has recently been vandalised. Somebody has taken it upon themselves to spray some lines from the poem Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley on the boards that surround a housing development. They have duly been painted over, and other words have appeared. The spray, it seems, is mightier than the brush. But I ask, should these words really be painted over time after time? Is that not just a waste of taxpayers’ money and human resources? In a world where text speak is becoming the mother tongue and the real literary giants, the forefathers of Stephanie Meyer, are fast dying in the embers of a forgotten literary past, should we not be embracing this attempt at spreading the delight of poetry?

Living in Margate, I seem to recall not so long ago that we (the town, I mean) paid some multiple of thousands of pounds to artist Tracy Emin for a permanent installation to accompany our new gallery. What we got was a bright pink neon sign, apparently in Emin’s own handwriting, which read ‘I’ll never stop loving you’. Forgive me for being old fashioned, but I do not regard that attempt at poignancy with as much reverence as the words of Shelley. Now Summertown are getting the words of Shelly permanently etched onto their sidewalks, for free. I repeat, for free.

If we are painting over Shelley, then let’s tear down Emin too. I’m just saying.

What if the universe is neither finite nor infinite?

I don’t pretend to know very much about science and how stuff works. But I was watching a documentary about infinity and the question was raised about the nature of our universe: is it finite or infinite? The two proposed solutions to this problem are both equally incomprehensible. Let’s assume that the correct answer is that it is infinite. That means we have no chance of ever reaching the boundaries of the universe, because they simply do not exist. And that is a difficult concept to grasp. The balloon analogy is often used as a visual representation of the infinitely expanding universe: imagine that the balloon itself is the entire universe, and as you blow it up it becomes larger in all directions. Some say that that is what the universe is doing too. But even that analogy does not adequately represent the theory that the universe is infinitely expanding since, eventually, a balloon can no longer become bigger and it will burst.

The second theory is that the universe is in fact finite, and its diameter is a measurable constant, theoretically. But that is equally difficult to comprehend: if the universe has boundaries, what is beyond them? We assume that we cannot escape the confines of the universe, and that is true of both theories. But if we could, what would be there waiting for us? Rational cognition does not allow us to be able to imagine an environment where literally nothing exists.

This got me thinking, maybe there is another possibility. What if the universe is expanding, but is not increasing in size? By that I mean, what if the density is changing? Imagine a black hole for example: they constantly increase in mass, but the size of them appears not to grow at the same rate as the size of the matter that constitutes their make-up. Hypothetically, if the Sun was to become a black hole (which is impossible due to its relatively small mass) it would only have a diameter of 3km, but its mass would still be the exact same as it is now. That means that all the material that forms the Sun’s 1.4 million km diameter, would be compressed to a 400,000^th of its current size, roughly.

So, if we know for an absolute certainty that matter can remain the exact same size in terms of mass, but occupy a much smaller portion of the universe, could that be what is happening to the universe as an entire entity? Let’s hypothesise that we are becoming denser: although you would assume perhaps that we would notice as that would imply that we are becoming smaller, and that we can measure size as it is quantitative, maybe that isn’t quite so true. What if our rulers are also getting littler? We are only able to measure distances relative to their surroundings. So if EVERYTHING is condensing, it follows that the proportion of everything in relation to everything else observable is still constant.

What I’m trying to say, perhaps without much coherence, is that the universe could be expanding, whilst also staying the same size. If everything condenses to make room for new things, then the balloon can be indefinitely blown up. The problem I have in coming to terms with this theory, or indeed the two preeminent theories, is thus: from my understanding of the laws of physics, you cannot create energy/matter/etc, everything is recycled, so if new celestial objects are being created, from whence did the matter and energy required come? Dark matter? Dark energy? We know very little about these two phenomena, so what if I hypothesise that they can disappear entirely. Not be recycled, and not transfer their energy elsewhere, just vamoose. We assume that dark matter constitutes roughly 80% of the mass of the universe, even though we cannot see it. Well what if it can completely vanish from the universe altogether? Then the universe could remain the same shape and size, but decrease in density. In other words, the stuff in the blackness we call space could expand outwards, without the universe becoming larger. Isn’t that like a black hole? What if all the black holes in the universe suck in matter and then they evaporate, which we know to be true? Then would there not be space for other stuff to occupy?

I have just confused myself. Over and out.

How to Play Scrabble in Space (Idea for my new novel)

One of the more popular rooms on the ships was the games room. Here passengers could challenge each other at Scrabble, Chess, Dominoes, Battleships, and any other popular game imaginable. The games were all stored in labelled slots in the walls of the room, and the passengers had to press a button to release the game of their choice. They then had to carry the game to the designated table. Each table was specifically designed for whichever game was to be played on it. The Scrabble table was particularly inventive. Players would slide the whole box into a special compartment built into the edge of the table. The box was then pulled into the table, in much the same way as a DVD is sucked into the slot of a DVD player on Earth. Once inside, the top and bottom of the box would become fixed to two magnets housed inside a large, white cuboid container on one side of the table. The lid would be attached to a thin sheet, which rose to the top of the container, allowing the lettered tiles to escape from the box and float within the confines of the cuboid. On each side of the container was a small, round hole, big enough to fit a hand through, and sealed with a rubber cover, which would part to allow access then close again to keep the tiles inside. A player could place their hand through the hole to collect their tiles from their arbitrary suspension inside the container. Towards the end of the game there was always a game of cat-and-mouse as a player would chase the last rogue tiles around the inside of the cuboid, before finally catching hold of them. Once a player had selected their seven starting letters, they placed them onto a specially designed rack, which was shaped like a traditional Scrabble rack with the addition of a folding top section that clasped the tiles into place. The board itself was set half a centimetre down into the surface of the table and covered with a Perspex sheet. In the sheet were removable squares which covered all two hundred and twenty-five of the spaces on the board. In order to place a tile on the board, the player had to lift the little Perspex square, insert their tile beneath it, then replace the Perspex square to keep the tile in place. It was not uncommon for a game of Scrabble to take half a day when played like this.

Who The *@%! Are Arctic Monkeys?

The BRIT Awards seem to have instigated a tidal wave of chastisement aimed in the general direction of British Indie-Rock progenitors, Arctic Monkeys. Fronted by Alex Turner, at whom much of the hostilities were aimed, Arctic Monkeys crash-landed at the pinnacle of British rock music in the mid ‘noughties’, tearing up radio waves and nightclubs with gritty anthems such as ‘I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor’ and ‘Dancing Shoes.’ Their lyrics, penned by Turner himself, told stories that every post-pubescent boy with a floppy haircut could relate to, or at least dream of experiencing himself. With seemingly anecdotal stories of growing up in an over-sexualised, boozed-up Britain full of cultural differences and violence based on stereotypical dress senses, these songs were rooted in the fundamental day-to-day lives of Turner’s intended audience.

Arctic Monkeys blossomed from the seeds of their predecessors, most notably The Strokes and The Libertines, who both had gone on hiatus in the last two years. Their catchy guitar riffs and lyrics that told stories spawned on the chaotic night streets of urbanised Britain, instantly found footing with music lovers looking for a replacement for those aforementioned bands. ‘When the Sun Goes Down’ had become the new ‘Don’t Look Back into the Sun’ and ‘Mardy Bum’s’ scummy man was the new anti-hero on the indie-rock scene, taking over from the protagonist of doomed youth who starred in ‘What a Waster.’

There were numerous other contenders for the title of indie-rock heavyweight champion of Britian, particularly the likes of Franz Ferdinand and Razorlight (fronted by Johnny Borrell, who was a founding member of what would become The Libertines) but after the acclaimed success of their first albums, these bands failed to deliver with their second offerings. Other hopefuls tried to create a transcendental sound with their music, doffing their top-hats in the direction of pop music. Forerunners in this category include the riotous Kaiser Chiefs and the danceable, melodious creations of The Killers, and their ostentatious frontman Brendon Flowers. But these bands also failed to hammer home the victory blow with their second albums. It was this fact alone that, in this writer’s humble opinion, set the very good apart from the good. Arctic Monkey’s lived up to the hype when they released their second record, Favourite Worst Nightmare.

Favourite Worst Nightmare took a slightly more mature approach to the subject matter of its older sibling, whilst remaining firmly cemented in youth culture. Songs about sexual encounters gone awry, like ‘Fluorescent Adolescent’, kept the established sentiment of Arctic Monkeys pointed in the same direction it always had been. Then there were other themes, such as in ‘Teddy Picker,’ which basically pointed out that anybody could become famous if they could string a good song together. A truth universally acknowledged, perhaps, but also an idea that went a long way to credit Arctic Monkeys, who had not only become famous by creating that one huge dance floor anthem, but had delivered half a dozen more in its wake and built themselves a pedestal that soared above the mere plinths their contemporaries were precariously perched on.

This brings me to the current discussions frequenting online forums and social networking sites. Comments like ‘Arctic Monkeys are the best we have to offer in terms of British music? What a load of bollocks,’ are the mainstay on most news feeds today. I made that quote up, but the content remains the same wherever you look. And you know what? For all the praise I can aim in the general direction of Alex Turner and company, these comments are bang on. Arctic Monkeys are nearly a decade old, and their songs are worn out. Their breakthrough anthems still remain just as good as they ever were, if a little more nostalgic rather than poignant these days, but their new offerings are dismal displays from a band with a big ego who are clutching at the frayed end of a rope they once were at the sharp end of.  The real disappointing fact about that, though, is that there really is nobody better. Since Arctic Monkeys took the scene and called it their own, there have been an abundance of incredible bands who have shot to stardom overnight, just like they did. The Enemy, Kasabian, The Fratellis, The View, are just a few examples of the sheer brilliance that British Indie-Rock has generated over the last decade. But where are they all now?

Though it pains me to feel the need to make this assertion, I have a strong suspicion that in a world where technology is advancing on an exponential level, I feel we are rapidly becoming overrun with dance music produced on arrays of electronic equipment so intricate that they would cause 1960s Doctor Who fans to wet themselves. With the advent of tools such as auto-tune, and the sheer fact that a guitar riff can be composed and recorded in mere minutes on a computer, it is of little wonder that One Direction and Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber are being allowed to define the next generation of music. But the fact still remains that Arctic Monkeys trumped Simon Cowell’s breast-fed line-up of mini-me’s to take home the award for best album. Perhaps proper music still lives on a tiny star, just visible on an otherwise dark and gloomy horizon.